But, my Lords, it is not only in the house of prayer that we offer to the First Cause the acceptable homage of our rational nature,—­my Lords, in this House, at this bar, in this place, in every place where His commands are obeyed, His worship is performed.  And, my Lords, I must boldly say, (and I think I shall hardly be contradicted by your Lordships, or by any persons versed in the law which guides us all,) that the highest act of religion, and the highest homage which we can and ought to pay, is an imitation of the Divine perfections, as far as such a nature can imitate such perfections, and that by this means alone we can make our homage acceptable to Him.

My Lords, in His temple we shall not forget that His most distinguished attribute is justice, and that the first link in the chain by which we are held to the Supreme Judge of All is justice; and that it is in this solemn temple of representative justice we may best give Him praise, because we can here best imitate His divine attributes.  If ever there was a cause in which justice and mercy are not only combined and reconciled, but incorporated, it is in this cause of suffering nations, which we now bring before your Lordships this second session of Parliament, unwearied and unfatigued in our persevering pursuit; and we feel it to be a necessary preliminary, a necessary fact, a necessary attendant and concomitant of every public thanksgiving, that we should express our gratitude by our virtues, and not merely with our mouths, and that, when we are giving thanks for acts of mercy, we should render ourselves worthy of them by doing acts of mercy ourselves.  My Lords, these considerations, independent of those which were our first movers in this business, strongly urge us at present to pursue with all zeal and perseverance the great cause we have now in hand.  And we feel this to be the more necessary, because we cannot but be sensible that light, unstable, variable, capricious, inconstant, fastidious minds soon tire in any pursuit that requires strength, steadiness, and perseverance.  Such persons, who we trust are but few, and who certainly do not resemble your Lordships nor us, begin already to say, How long is this business to continue?  Our answer is, It is to continue till its ends are obtained.

We know, that, by a mysterious dispensation of Providence, injury is quick and rapid, and justice slow; and we may say that those who have not patience and vigor of mind to attend the tardy pace of justice counteract the order of Providence, and are resolved not to be just at all.  We, therefore, instead of bending the order of Nature to the laxity of our characters and tempers, must rather confirm ourselves by a manly fortitude and virtuous perseverance to continue within those forms, and to wrestle with injustice, until we have shown that those virtues which sometimes wickedness debauches into its cause, such as vigor, energy, activity, fortitude of spirit, are called back and brought to