these themes. Often has he reminded the people that Jehovah is a covenant-keeping God, that he "keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him, to a thousand generations;" that the temporal as well as the spiritual wants of his people are the objects of his care. And as he scattered the manna over the face of the wilderness before his ancient church, so now he is mindful of his covenant. He giveth bread to the hungry, and the redeemed of the Lord have abundant reason to say that his mercy endureth forever.

There are persons now living in Illinois, in Missouri, in Iowa, and in Wisconsin, who arrived there before there was a quail in all that country. But soon after the Anglo-Americans had pitched their tents in the land, the quails came around them by thousands and by tens of thousands. Why is this? From whence do they originate? It is the hand of God. I will mention one great purpose that is answered by the quail. It strikes dumb the lips of pride. He who wishes not to see the hand of God, will say the bees that go before the wave of American population proceed from domesticated bees among the settlers, although the vastness of their multitude, and notable facts like that at Nashville, utterly refute the theory. But where the sceptic can find even the shadow of an argument against the hand of God, he will, like Pharaoh of old, harden his heart. But ask him, "From whence come the quails? From domesticated quails? He is dumb. The fact is, you cannot tame a quail. At least, I have known some very thorough experiments, which resulted in total failure, and believe that the quail is generally regarded as incapable of domestication. Should any one say the quails feed on the farmer's grain, — his corn and his

wheat, and therefore they follow the American emigrants, I answer, that this does not touch the mystery; because the prairie hen, or American grouse, the wild goose, and the crane, are just as fond of corn as the quails perhaps more so. But these birds are all over the face of the wilderness, and live independent of the cultivated fields of the white man. Yet when the farmer comes near their wild abode, and ploughs up the earth, and produces his crop of corn, you will see the prairie hen, the wild goose, the crane, clustering around the corn stacks, and manifesting far more greediness for grain than you ever see exhibited by the quail. The mystery is not touched. Whence comes the quail?

Ascertain from whence the hornets came, that went before the standard of Israel; ascertain from whence the quails came, that fell around their camp; and then you will have no difficulty in understanding the phenomena that now precede and accompany the standard of Zion, as she lengthens her cords and enlarges her boundaries. God's church is in that moving multitude which is pressing westward. The ark of his covenant is there. And now, as in ancient times, his church is "engraven on the palms of his hands." You can account for the above-mentioned facts, just as you account for the sea giving up its dead at the sound of the last trumpet. It is the hand of God.

THE GREAT WESTERN REVIVAL

OF 1800.

WHOEVER has carefully examined the history of Israel, as detailed in the sacred oracles, may have remarked, that very often the prophets endeavored to recall to the minds of that people the period and the scenes of their first espousal to God. Indeed, there is no narrative more calculated to wake up in our own heart the living emotions of religion, than the story of our first saving acquaintance with Christ. It is profitable to the individual, to the family, and to the church at large, that these manifestations of God's power and mercy should be told to children, and to children's children.

In relation to this matter, I have often thought that the church of God in the west has reason to adopt the language of the Psalmist, "Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul." "He brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it and fear, and shall trust in the Lord."

It is now my purpose to sketch some of the scenes in the early history of the church of God in the west. Before the close of the revolutionary war, large bodies of emigrants had settled in Tennessee and in Kentucky.

Many of them were from Virginia, many were from Pennsylvania, and many also were from North and South Carolina. Quite a large number of these were religious men. Extensive and powerful revivals of religion had been granted to the American churches, while we were yet colonies of Great Britain. In New England, Edwards, Bellamy, and their fellows, were the favored. instruments. In New Jersey, Gilbert and William Tennant, and their contemporaries, were greatly blessed. In Virginia, Samuel Davies, whose sermons have since been so widely circulated, and James Waddell, labored with immense success. Among my earliest recollections are the glowing descriptions which old persons, then living in my father's neighborhood, would give of the preaching of this James Waddell. There was a kindling animation in the aged countenance, and their eyes would fill with tears, at the mention of his name. He is the Blind Preacher so eloquently described by Hon. William Wirt in his "British Spy." When Wirt saw him, he was old, and frail, and blind; yet evidently the wreck of a superior man. Long before this period, he had been a messenger of mercy to multitudes of the perishing; and the gospel, through his instrumentality, had been to many glad tidings of great joy. It should be mentioned further, that in the Carolinas also, and in Georgia, the gospel, at this time, had made great progress. Georgia was one of the first points in America where George Whitefield preached; and from thence to the most northern colony he found the fields white to the harvest. Indeed, there were such religious prospects in our country before the revolution, that Jonathan Edwards entertained and published the opinion that the millennium, or latter

day glory, would first shed its light on the souls of men in America.

Now, such was the condition of the American church, when that wave of population, which had risen on the sea-shore, and rolled abroad over the Atlantic regions, began to ripple over the comb of the Alleghany, and rush down and spread itself over the fertile plains of the west. Many of the first emigrants from Pennsylvania, Virginia, and the Carolinas, carried their religion with them. And it seems that, at that early period, religion could better "bear transportation," than at a later day.

War has almost invariably a demoralizing tendency; and the war of our revolution, however necessary and important in its connection, was not exempt from this unhappy concomitant. But, perhaps, in no other part of our country were the sad results of war realized, at that time, to the same extent as in the new settlements of the west. There the supply of Bibles and Religious privileges were few.

pastors was limited.

And many of the population were as sheep having no shepherd. There was less, therefore, to counteract the evils incident to war than in other sections of our land.

Above all this, it must be observed, that when peace was concluded with Great Britain in the year 1783, and other citizens could return to the pursuits of peaceful life, and the enjoyment of gospel ordinances, the frontier population of the west were embroiled with hostile Indians for the space of half a generation. During this period of fierce conflict between the white and the red man, those Indian tribes that hung around our western border produced not a few "men of

renown."