The Camden weekly journal. [volume] (Camden, South-Carolina) 1853-1861, 1855-07-03
MisrRllanRntls..
Profanity and Drunkenness.

Extract from sermon preached before the
Legislature of South Carolina, in the Hal! of
the House of Representatives, by J. II. Thorn
well, D. D., December 9, 1854.
= But next to this inquiry int our own State,
the judgments of God should direct our atten-
ton to those forms of iniquity which most ex'
tensively prevail in the land. And, although,
we cannot say with absolute confidence that
these are the specific offences for which the
sword has been drawn from tie scabbard, it is
enough to know that they are sins, and sins
which will inevitably be punished, unless a
timely repentance intervene. When Gods
judgments are abroad in the land, they put us
upon general inquiry. They proclaim the
fact of sin, and that sin we are to search out
and expel wherever we find it, whether in our
own hearts, or in the customs and usases Of
the people.
We should ask, then, to-day, whether there
are any sins that pre-eminently attach to the
people Of our State; or if not peculiar to US,
which have widespread and controlling indu-
ence.
That there are any which are peculiar to US,
/ am not prepared to say; but the people Of
this Confederacy are certainly distinguished, to
an extent unknown in other countries, except,
perhaps, Great Britain, by profaneness and
fn.emperance. These deserve to be called ma
tional sins. A stranger might infer from the
tone of popular conversation; from the ex.
clanations Of excited individuals; from the
clamors of anger and passion, that We &C.
knowledge the Almighty for no otherpurpose
than that we might have name to swear by,
or a convenient exHetive to fill up the chastns
of discourse. Profaneness that may repeat
what / have elsewhere said, is sin, the enormi.
ty Of which the imagination cannot conceive;
because no thought can compass the infinite
excellencies of Him, whose prerogative it is to
be, who sits upon the circle Of the earth, and
the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers,
who stretcheth out the heavens as curtain,
and spreadeth them out as tent to dwell in.
Thata puny creature Of the dust, born to-day
and gone tomorrow, should have the audacity
to pour contempt upon that glorious name which
Seraphs adore with rapture, is enough to as.
tonisE the heavens and conMlse the earth.-
Yea, still more astonishing is that miracle Of
patience which endures the monsters, when one
word would arm all nature against them
make the ground treacherous beneath them
heaven terrible above them; and hell ready
to meet them at their coming. The magni-
tuds of the sin cannot be, exaggerated. 1t is
enough to make the blood curdle to think of
the name of God banded about as the bauble
and plaything of fools, to point jest, to sea-
son obscsnity, and to garnish tale.
This offence cannot 60 unpunished. If there
be God, He must vindicate His own majesty
and glory. There NUT be period when all
shall tremble before Him, when every knee
shall bow and every heart shall do reverence.
The sword of justice cannot always be sheath,
ed, nor the arm of vengeance slumber, and
who shall say that the pestience which has
been walking amongst us, and Staying its thou.
sands upon the right hand and the left, has not
received its commission on account OF the
sbounding profaneness of the land Who
shalt deny that The deep has been evoked in
storm and deluge to proclaim the name Of the
LorHss terrible and gloriouss' In the sight of
angels there can be no greater sin than that of
p,ofaneness. They know something of what
God il They fear that dreadful name, and
their imaeinstions, lofty and expanded as :hey
are. cannot measure the height and depth Of
that iuiquity which can make light Of SO tre.
mendous . being. 1t is the very spirit and
core of al cvil-the quintessence OF ungodli.
ness. a,
In It's influence upon society, hardly less dis-
.,trous are the ravages ofintemperance; and
vhst makes the case so alarming, the moral
sensibilities of the people are hardly alive to
che sesf character Of drunkenness a. at once .