Daily American telegraph. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1851-1852, 1852-02-03
Reported for the Daily American Telegraph
Americas Mission, the ChristianizatiO1
OF the World.

Of the World.
Rev. A. Given Carothers, young gentleman
recently licensed as minister of the gospel by
the Presbytery of the District of Columbia, on
Sunday evening last appeared before the congre-
CATION of the Fourth Presbyterian Church, 9th
street. (Rev J. c. Smiths, to lecture upon the
important subject here indicated-America's mis-
sion, the Contamination Of the acorld. He took
for his text the second and third verses Of the
fourth chapter Of Daniel, as follows:
thought 1t good to show the signs and wonders that
the high God hath wrought toward How great his
spnsl and how mighty are wonders his kingdom is
everlasting Kingdom and his dominion is from generation
| to generation"
| Nebuchadnezzar, (the speaker remarked,) in
his rage and fury, commanded the most mighty
men in his army to bind Shadraoh, Meshach, and
| Abedneeo and to cast them into the burning
fiery furnace, because they would not serve his
| gods, nor worship the golden image that he had
set up. The order was executed, but God de-
liyered those whom the wicked king had endeav-
ored to destroy
| This naughty monarch was thus made to con-
fess that God ruleth in the kingdoms of men, and
giveth them to whomsoever he will. He did more
than make this confession. He published de-
cree unto all people, nations, and languages that
dwelt in the earth, acknowledging the sovereignty
of Daniels God and the text is q part Of the
salutation contained in that decree.
1t is not the intention of the preacher to dwell
upon the history connected with Nebuchadnezzar
nor to enforce any practical truth intended by
| the mere circumstances and facts accompanying
| the narratives but he has thought it good to
show the signs and wonders which the high God
hath wrought toward our happy country, and
also the great, grand and glorious mission of
| America which these signs and wonders portend
God prcsides over the destnies of nations. In
| our folly we forget this great elementary truth,
and by forgetfulness rush blindly into the absurd
tiles of unsanctifed reason. Embarked as we
are on the river of destiny, we are content, for
the most part, with taking simply the course and
rapidity of the cddies on which 6oat our ind-
vidual interests, or at most those of party or
section, while few mark the progress or direction
of the mighty food on which We are borne"
The world aud oil that it contains are theatres
upon which, and by which, arc exhibited the
glorics and benevoence of that God who so loved
the world as to redeem it from the destruction Of
sin through our Lord Jesus Christ And the
preacher expressed sublime truth who said
that this great globe we inhabit, spinning noise
lessly OH its axis, as it keeps its way annual
round the sun, a part of the great clockwork of
the solar system, is leagued physically with the
throne of God, the holy architect Of all--what
we call the attraction of grayitation invisiby
controlling it according to the related ha"monies
of the planetary and sidereal universe. Awful is
its order and increasing its motion, progressive
and rotary, grand and glorious, and exact the
perfection of its periods. And has it no submer
league with the throne of God? The sin on its
surface would induce us to suspect the contrary;
that the curse of abandonment is to snite it with
the tangent described alone of the force centrifu-
gal, flying like thought away from its proper and
peaceful centre, till regions of nterminable night
and eternal winter-the backness Of darkness
forevershould ALLEVIATE it from the holy universe,
and sepulchre its being in the living death of
horror and despair. But the plan of our God is
gracious and everlasting. This very globe of
ours is to be increasingly the selected theatre of
his own clustering wonders and prodgies of phi
lanthropy."
History is but the accomplishment, or rather
the manifestation, of Gods purposes respecting
the salvation of man, and the ultimate and uni
versal triumph Of the Redeemer's kingdom. For