-hundred millions of dollars. Not less than a million of persons were engaged in it, in both the French and Russian armies. At the lowest estimate, it would take two · hundred dollars a year, on an average to support each individual, considering that a large proportion of them were officers, whose salaries must have been hundreds, and some of them thousands of dollars a year, and that many of them were cavalry whose expenses must have been much greater than those of infantry, and also that immense expense must have been incurred for equipment of the army in ordinance and other things.*-Such is the expense of war, of peril and battle, of victory and defeat. And in this it should be recollected, that the waste of property by conflagration, pillage, and other ways of destruction, is not included; neither is reference had to ancient days in recounting the millions of their armies and the treasure requisite for their equipment and support.

.

Another of the evils of war is the bloodshed and slaughter it occasions. "No one," said Cresus to Cyrus," can be so infatuated as not to prefer peace to war. In peace children inter their parents. War violates the order of nature, and causes parents to inter their children." soldier," said Dean Swift," is a being hired to kill in cold blood, as many of his own species who have never offended him, as he possible can." How true the expression,

"A

They that take the sword shall perish by the sword." It is supposed, that not less than fourteen thousand millions of human beings have fallen the victims of war,a number eighteen times greater than the population of the whole globe at the present time. In the Revolutionary war of this country, England, it is said, lost two hundred thousand lives.

*See Labaume's Narrative of the Campaign in Russia, and Segur's History of Bonaparte's Expedition to Russia.

Cæsar, in the fifty battles fought by him, slew, according to the statements of Dr. Prideaux, one million one hundred and ninety-two thousand of his opposers. O, what battle fields have been drenched in blood by the armies of Alexander, Cæsar and Napoleon! If a Persian King, a heathen, on reviewing his army was affected to tears, at the consideration, that in one hundred years from that time, every human being he then saw would be numbered with the dead; what should be the emotions of every Christian, when reflecting on the thousands of millions, that have been brought to an untimely end by sanguinary contests?

War has a pernicious effect on the morals and happiness of man. Nothing can be more promotive of vice and immorality. "War makes thieves," says Machiaval," and peace brings them to the gallows." The habits of soldiers, who have been for any considerable time quartered or encamped, become dissolute. The miseries of war are great,

"Man's inhumanity to man

Makes countless thousands mourn.'

Lamentation and wo are inscribed in, letters of blood on

every, warlike scene. Awful is the catastrophe of a martial contest. Man, horse, can lie in undistinguished ruin. In some, life is extinct. In others, blood is gushing from dissevered arteries. Shrieks of expiring nature arise Then are heard the

from every quarter.

"Lingering groan, the faintly uttered prayer,
The louder curses of despairing death."

What heart-rending anguish has this evil produced in the quiet domestic circle? The dearest ties it has severed forever. Families happy in the enjoyment of each other's society, are called to part with a tender father, or be

loved brother, who leave their peaceful home, perhaps never to return. What hours of painful anxiety are endured by those who remain behind! How many desolate many.desolate widows, and helpless orphans has this scourge of man produced! O,. could we realize in its full extent the magnitude of suffering it has occasioned, we should indeed deprecate it, as one of the most fearful judgments of heaven! When a treaty of peace at the close of the Revolutionary war had been signed at Paris, Dr. Franklin wrote a letter to Josiah Quincy of Braintree, in which he says, " May we never see another war; for in my opinion there never was a good war or a bad peace."

66

II. How shall wars be abolished, and peace be pro

moted.

To accomplish this object, every lawful and practicable method should be adopted.

1. The ministers of the gospel should advocate this cause by precept and example.

Every ambassador of the "Prince of peace," is by his office a peace-maker. He is a disciple and minister of him who came from heaven to propose peace and reconciliation to a revolted world. He should, therefore, advocate pacific principles and measures. He is obligated to do it in the social circle, from the pulpit, and on every occasion, when opportunity is afforded. Once it was deemed lawful and expedient for ministers to supplicate a blessing on the warror's arms, and to return thanks for success in battle. But in the nineteenth century, ministers have learned to pray, that the Lord would turn the counsels of the wicked into foolishness, and dispose contending nations to peace; that he would "break the bow and cut the spear in sunder; burn the chariot in the fire, and make wars to cease unto the end of the earth."

2. Parents, and those who have the charge of youth

should impress on their minds an abhorrence of war.. Children generally, are delighted with the dress, music, and parade of military occasions, and very early discover a proneness to imitate the soldier. This propensity should be repressed. Children should be taught the design of martial exercises. The causes, the sinfulness,.and the misery of war should be explained to them, and they should be trained up with the love of man and the love of peace, ruling in their hearts. This duty devolves upon Parents, Guardians, and Instructers.

3. Publications denouncing war and advocating peace, should be printed and widely disseminated.

Information on this subject must precede correction of sentiment and feeling in relation to it. This must be diffused through the community by that powerful engine, the press. To some extent, this has been done. Several periodicals in England have advocated, with much decision, this noble cause; such as the "Philanthropist," the "Eclectic Review," the "Evangelical Magazine," the "Edinburgh Review," the "Christian Observer," and the "English Baptist Magazine." -Most of the religious and some of the political periodicals in the United States, have espoused this cause, if not with the zeal desirable, yet with commenable interest. The opinions of the wise and good, of the statesmen and the philanthropist, on this subject, should be proclaimed as with trumpet-tongue. These will have a happy effect. How must the sentiments of Washington, the father of his country, impress every true patriot and Christian! Said he, in a letter to a friend, "For the sake of humanity it is devoutly to be wished, that the manly employment of agriculture, and the humanizing benefits of commerce should suspend the wastes of war, and the rage of conquest, and that the sword may be turned into the ploughshare." Mr. Jeffer

son thus writes: "Will nations never devise any other national umpire of difference than force? Are there no means of coercing injustice, more gratifying to our nature, than a waste of the blood of thousands? Wonderful has been the progress of human improvement in other lines. Let us hope, then, that we shall at length be sensible that war is an instrument entirely inefficient to the redress of wrongs."

4. Societies, having for their object the abolition of* war, and the promotion of peace, should be established in this and other lands.

It will be found necessary to adopt such a course in this, as well as in other benevolent enterprises. Every Christian should consider himself a member of a Peace Society. He is by his profession an advocate for peace, and he should give his name to some. society, that he may bear open testimony on behalf of the goodness and importance of the cause. Every philanthropist,-friend to his country and the world, should become a herald of peace, and array himself on the side of Him, "who maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; who breaketh the bow and cutteth the spear in sunder.". Let none deem this enterprize Quixotic, or destined to fail. Every benevolent institution of the present day, undertaken and carried on in faith, prayer, and persevering effort, will succeed. The martial spirit will wane. The time will come when the "ultima ratio regum"-war, will not be resorted to for the settlement of national disputes. A revolution on this subject has begun, and revolutions, be it remembered, seldom go backward. "Time was when feats of arms, crusades, and the high array of chivalry, and the pride of royal banners, waving for victory, engrossed all minds. Murder and rapine, burning cities and desolating plains-if so be they were at the bidding of royal or