AN

ADDRESS,

DELIVERED TO THE GRADUATES

OF RHODE ISLAND COLLEGE,

AT THE ANNIVERSARY COMMENCEMENT,

IN THE BAPTIST MEETING-HOUSE

IN PROVIDENCE,

SEPTEMBER 5, 1798.

39

AN ADDRESS.

You, gentlemen, have the singular fortune to complete the course of your collegiate education at a period the most alarming and interesting that the world ever saw. Principles and conduct prevail, which threaten destruction to those institutions of religion and government, to which mankind are indebted for all the blessings of civilized life. In that part of Europe where the altar has been profaned, where the bands of society have been burst asunder, where the most endearing connexions have been exchanged for purposes of worse than brutal associationthe passions have been wrought up to such a paroxysm of rage, that they have set at defiance the sacred obligations of religion and justice; have proclaimed open war against the Almighty, and covered the earth with blood and murder. There you behold tigers and wolves, in human form, sparing neither age nor sex. To them a Supreme Being is a chimera; immortality, is unconscious sleep; and future responsibility, the frightful offspring of superstition. There the hydra of despotism, riding on her iron car, gnashes her bloody jaws, and growls destruction to the world. From this horrid spectacle, turn off your eyes to your native country, where laws are regarded, where government is equally administered, where the constituted authorities are respected, where the God of heaven is worshipped; and let your full souls rise with an indignant determination to resist at