Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1863-04-08
National Fast Day-The Presidents
Proclamation.
By the President Of the United States IF
\ PROCLAMATION.

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PROCLAMATION.
WHEREAS, The Senate Of the United
States, devoutly recognizing the Supreme
Authority and just Government of AL
mighty God, in all the affairs of men and
of nations, has, by a resolution, requested
the President to designate inc set apart
a day for National prayer and humilia-
ton:
And whereas it is the duty of nations,
as well as of men, to own their depend
ence upon the o%verruling power of God,
To confess their sins and transgressiOns. in
humble sorrow, yet with assured hope
that genuine repentance will lead to mer-
Cy and pardon, and to recognize the sub
lime truth announced in the Holy Scrip
lures and proven by all history, that those
nations only are blessed whose God is the
Lord:
And, insomuch as we know that, by
His divine law. nations, like individuals,
are subjected to punishments n chas-
Elements in this world, may we not justly
fear that the awful calamity of civil war,
which now desolates the land, may be
but a punishment inflicted upon US for
our presumptuous sins. to the needful end
of our national reformation as a whole
People? We have been the recipients of
the choicest bounties of Heaven. We
have been preserved, these many years,
in peace and prosperity. We have grown
in numbers, wealth and power as no other
nation has ever grown. But we have for
gotten God. We have forgotten the gra-
cious hand which preserved us in peace,
and multiplied and enrichedand strength
ened us; and We have vainly imagined,
in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all
these blessings were produced by some
superior wisdom and virtue of our own.
Intoxicated with unbroken success, we
have become too selfsufficient to feel the
necessity of redeeming and preserving
grace, too proud to pray to the God that
made us
1t behooves us, then, to humble our
selves before the offended Power, to- con-
fess our national sins, and to pray for
clemency and forgiveness.
Now, therefore, in compliance with the
request, and fully concurring in the views
of the Senate, / do. by this my proclama-
ton, designate and set apart Thursday,
the 30th day of April, 1868, as a day OF
national humiliation, fasting and prayer.
And | do hereby request all the people to
abstain on that day from their ordinary
secular pursuits. and to unite, at their
several places of public worship and their
respective homes, in keeping the day holy
to the Lord, and devoted to the humble
discharge of the religious duties proper
TO that solemn occasion.
All this being done, in sincerity and
truth. let us her rest humbly in the
hope. authorized by the Divine teachings,
that the united cry of the nation will be
heard on high, and answered with bless,
ings, no less than the pardon of u now
divided and suffering country to its form
er happy condition of unity and peace.
In Witness whereof, / have hereuntC
set my hand, and caused the seal of the
United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington on
this thirteenth day of March, in
the year of our Lord one thousand
L. 5 eight hundred and s~ixty-three, and
of the independence of the United
States the eighty-seventh.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
By the President:
WV. II. SEWARD, Secretary of State.