The Indianapolis journal., 1884-01-11
COL. JOHN 1. NEVIN.
The Garfield Prayer Written by Lately De-
ceased Pittsburg Editor:
Pittsburg Leader:

Pittsburg Leader:
Perhaps nothing more applicable to his [Col
Nevins case could have been written during his
season of sickness than his prayer for Garfield
which he wrote and published the 9th Of Sep
tember, 1881, the day set apart on which the
people of these United States were to pray for
the dying President. That editorial was as fol
lows:
go Thou Infinite Power behind the veil of
things, on Whom by various names call all ma
tions of men when sorrow and distress make
them feel the need of help from above and be-
yond them, it may be a superstition that impels
the people of this great country to expect that
the appeal that they unitedly send up this day
will move Thee one hairs breadth from the
immutable order of Thy. will. expressed
in what we call the Laws of Nature.
Yet surely it is a noble superstition, eevating
every heart that shares it, and attuning every
mind to receive whatever it may seem best to
Thee to bestow. whether Of good or evil. And
when this appeal goes up for the nations chief
ruler, stricken down so causelessly and cruelty
that the whole world has turned to wonder and
to grieve, there is none so hard of heart and cold
of belief not at least to wish to feel the feel
ings that stir in the bosoms of millions of his
countrymen this day, and to swell with one
more voice the volume of the great petition.
Therefore, we pray-not only those of us who
have the faith that removes mountains, but
those also whose doubling belief is as the voice
of a child crying in the night-those
of us who know not whether the
''amen" that strs in their bosoms is an
instinct inherited of religious ancestors or a
personal ineradicable emotion that mocks the
labored efforts of reason: all pray, both we
of the North and we of the South--we of the
busy marts and we of the rural fields-we who
go formally to the church to-day and we who
stay at our business-we all pray that President
Garfield may not die 0. guard him on that
journey which he is taking write these
lines. Grant that it may do him the good that
he expects, and that his physicians try to hope,
MAY the breezes Of the great sea drive away the
baleful odors of the river marshes far from him,
and fan his fevered cheeks till his poor swollen
face shall regain the look of health May the
league long rollers laundering on the Atlantic
beach soothe his ear and comfort his sad soul.
May Long Branch prove indeed stopping place
on the road to his home at Mentor, and not to
that longer home, the grave. o, we besecch that
he may not die but live.
And yet Thy will be done as we know, amid
all our prayers and with all our faith, that it
must be- If Thy natural laws decree that James
A. Garfield is to die, aid us atleast to see that he
shall not have died in vain. If il was necessary
that one man should even die to cement the
broken bonds of the union of this people, we will
try to say it was well. From the blood of Gar
field, causelessly shed by madman or liend, we
can even now see, has sprung up a sympathy,
born of common sorrow, between North and
South that has healed the wounds of the war as
they would not otherwise have healed fora gen
Grafton If it is neelful, in order that this sor-