This declaration of independence preceded the one made by Congress in 1776 more than a year, and is a noble monument of the patriotism and piety of the people of North Carolina.

The colony of North Carolina is particularly distinguished for the large number of able and patriotic ministers who were diligent laborers in the fields of intellectual and Christian culture and in sowing broadcast the seeds of liberty and of future independence. The annals of Biblical learning and of freedom are adorned with the names of Campbell, Hall, Hunter, McAden, Craighead, Alexander, McWhorter, McCane, Petillo, and others, who were master-workmen in their department of Christian labor, and ardent and fearless patriots. These men were the pioneers of freedom and independence, and in all the measures preparatory to the coming revolution they were the foremost leaders.

THE COLONY OF GEORGIA

Has a suggestive Christian history. James Oglethorpe, a member of the British Parliament, imbued with the philanthropic spirit of the gospel, obtained in 1732 a charter from George II. to establish a colony in North America. He had in former years devoted himself to the benevolent work of relieving multitudes in England who were imprisoned for debt and suffering in loathsome jails. Actuated by Christian motives, he desired to see these poor sufferers placed in an independent condition, and projected a colony in America for that purpose. "For them, and for persecuted Protestants," says Bancroft, “he planned an asylum and a destiny in America, where former poverty would be no reproach, and where the simplicity of piety could indulge the spirit of devotion without fear of persecution from men who hated the rebuke of its example." This Christian enterprise enlisted "the benevolence of England; the charities of an opulent and enlightened nation were to be concentrated on the new plantation; the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts sought to promote its interests; and Parliament showed its good will by contributing ten thousand pounds."

In January, 1732, Oglethorpe, with one hundred and twenty emigrants, landed in America, and on the basis of the Christian religion laid the future commonwealth of Georgia. The Christian liberality and philanthropy of the founder of the colony

spread its fame far and wide; for it was announced that the rights of citizenship and all the immunities of the colony "would be extended to all Protestant emigrants from any nation of Europe, desirous of refuge from persecution, or willing to undertake the religious instruction of the Indians." The Moravians, or United Brethren,-a denomination of Christians founded by Count Zinzendorf, a German nobleman of the fifteenth century, -were invited to emigrate to the colony of Georgia. They accepted the invitation, and arrived in the winter of 1736. Their object was to Christianize and convert the Indians, and to aid in planting the institutions of the New World on the basis of Christianity. The journal of John Wesley during the voyage exhibits the godly manner of the emigrants. "Our common way," says he, "of living was this. From four of the morning till five, each of us used private prayer. From five to seven we read the Bible together, carefully comparing it (that we might not lean to our own understanding) with the writings of the earliest ages. At eight were public prayers. At four were the evening prayers,-when either the second lesson was explained, or the children were catechized and instructed before the congregation. From five to six we again used private prayer. At seven I joined with the Germans in their public service. At eight we met again, to exhort and instruct one another. Between nine and ten we went to bed, where neither the roaring of the sea nor the motion of the ship could take away the refreshing sleep which God gave us." What a Christian way of spending the time, for emigrants sailing over the mighty deep to aid in founding a Christian empire on the shores of a new world!

When these Christian emigrants touched the shore, their first act was "to kneel and return thanks to God for their having safely arrived in Georgia." "Our end in leaving our native country," said they, "is not to gain riches and honor, but singly this, to live wholly to the glory of God." Their object was "to make Georgia a religious colony, having no theory but devotion, no ambition but to quicken the sentiment of piety."

The Christian founder of the commonwealth of Georgia carried his Christian principles into all the official transactions of the colony. The survey and division of the lots in the city of Savannah were conducted under the sanctions of religion. On the 7th of July, 1733, the emigrants met in a body upon the

bluff of the river, before Oglethorpe's tent, and, having returned thanks to Almighty God and joined in prayer for his blessing to rest upon the colony and city they were about to found, they proceeded to lay out the lots and divide them in a Christian manner. They felt and said, "Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain."

Under the administration of Oglethorpe, the colony greatly prospered and increased in numbers. "His undertaking will succeed," said Johnson, Governor of South Carolina; "for he nobly devotes all his powers to serve the poor and rescue them from wretchedness." "He bears a great love to the servants and children of God," said the pastor of a Moravian church. "He has taken care of us to the utmost of his ability. God has so blessed us with his presence and his regulations in the land, that others would not in many years have accomplished what he has brought about in one."

In 1734, after a residence of fifteen months in Georgia, Oglethorpe returned to England. He succeeded in obtaining additional patronage for the colony, and in October, 1735, set sail with three hundred emigrants, and after a long and stormy voyage they reached the colony of Georgia in February, 1736, where they were joined a few days after by a band of Christian emigrants from the highlands of Scotland.

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These colonists were accompanied by John and Charles Wesley, the founders of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Their purpose was to aid Oglethorpe in his philanthropic labors and to convert the Indians to Christianity. Charles Wesley held the office of Secretary for Indian Affairs, and also that of a chaplain to Governor Oglethorpe.

Rev. Mr. Stevens, a historian of Georgia, says that "John Wesley established a school of thirty or forty children, and hired a teacher, in which he designed to blend religious instruction with worldly wisdom; and on Sunday afternoon Mr. Wesley met them in the church before evening service, and heard the children recite their catechism, questioned them as to what they had learned in the Bible, instructed them still further in 3 the Bible, endeavoring to fix the truth in their understandings as well as in their memories. This was a regular part of their Sunday duties; and it shows that John Wesley, in the parish of Christ's Church, in Savannah, had established a Sunday-school nearly fifty years before Robert Raikes originated his noble

scheme of Sunday-instruction in Gloucester, England, and eighty years before the first school in America on Mr. Raikes's plan was established in New York."

George Whitefield visited Georgia, and preached with wonderful eloquence and zeal, and labored with apostolic faith and perseverance in founding an Orphan Asylum, a "Bethesda," a "House of Mercy," for orphan children. His fame and influence soon spread over the colonies, and wherever he went tens of thousands of people hung with breathless interest on his preaching. He made a number of voyages to England and back to America, and died in Newburyport, Massachusetts, in 1770. In consequence of his Christian services. to Georgia, and especially his efforts for the orphans, the legislature of the colony proposed to remove his remains to Savannah and to bury them at public cost. Dr. Franklin wrote to Dr. Jones, of Georgia, on the subject as follows: -"I cannot forbear expressing the pleasure it gives me to see an account of the respect paid to Whitefield's memory, by your Assembly. I knew him intimately upwards of thirty years his integrity, disinterestedness, and indefatigable zeal in prosecuting every good work I have never seen equalled, I shall never see excelled." And such was the effect of Whitefield's preaching in Philadelphia that Franklin said, "It was wonderful to see the change soon made in the manner of our inhabitants. From being thoughtless or indifferent about religion, it seemed as if all the world were growing religious, so that one could not walk through the town in an evening without hearing psalms sung in different families in every street."

"It is a matter of great interest," says the historian of Georgia, "that religion was planted with the first settlers, and that the English, the Salzburgers, the Moravians, the Methodists, the Presbyterians, and the Israelites severally brought with them the ministers or the worship of their respective creeds. The Christian element of colonization-that without which the others are powerless to give true and lasting elevation-entered largely into the colonization of Georgia, and did much for her prosperity and glory. No colony can point to a leader or founder in whose character meet more eminent qualities or more enduring worth than in that of James Oglethorpe, the father of Georgia."

These Christian facts in the colonial history of our country suggest the following lessons:

1. The faith of the Puritans, and of the founders of the various colonies, in the divine origin and authority of civil government.

They held firmly to the declarations of the Bible, that "there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God." And the doctrine of the divine origin of civil government led these Christian men to regard the civil ruler as the "minister of God to the people for good; and that he that ruleth should rule in the fear of God." This true and noble faith in reference to civil government and the character of the men who administered it placed the entire administration of government under the direction of God and in harmony with his will. The results of this faith and practice will always be in perfect harmony with the just ends of government and with the highest political and moral propriety of a nation. This grand idea was one that was always supreme in the minds and purposes of the Puritan and other colonial legislators in respect to civil government. They ever regarded government as from God; and this view invested it with all the dignity and authority of a divine institution.

"The first settlers," says Lord Brougham, "of all the colonies, were men of irreproachable character. Many of them fled from persecution; others on account of honorable poverty; and all of them with their expectations limited to the prospect of a bare subsistence in freedom and peace. All idea of wealth or pleasure was out of the question. The greater part of them viewed their emigration as a taking up the cross, and bounded their hopes of riches to the gifts of the Spirit, and their ambition to the desire of a kingdom beyond the grave. A set of men more conscientious in their doings, or simpler in their manners, never founded an empire. It is indeed the peculiar glory of North America that, with very few exceptions, its empire was founded in charity and peace."

2. The subordination of civil government to the power of the Christian religion.

"They looked upon their commonwealths as institutions for the preservation of the Churches, and the civil rulers as both members and fathers of them." Hence it was a favorite doctrine