[Independent Chronicle, March 6, 1794 , No. 3764 of the Leffingwell sale appears to have been a manuscript of this text.]

Commonwealth of Massachusetts [Seal]

By his honor Samuel Adams, ESQ , lieutenant-governor and commander in
chief of the commonwealth of Massachusetts

A proclamation for A day of public fasting, humiliation, and prayer.

It having been the invariable practice from time to time when our pious and renowned ancestors took possession of this land, at the approaching season of the year, to set apart a day publickly to acknowledge an entire dependence on the Father of all Mercies for every needful blessing, and to express sorrow and repenntace for the manifold transgressions of His Holy Laws:  And the Practice being highly becoming all people, especially those who profess the Christian Religion: 

I have thought fit, by, and with the advice of the Council to appoint Thursday, the Seventeenth day of April next, to be observed throughout this Commonwealth, as a day of public fasting, humiliation and prayer; earnestly exhorting the Ministers of Religion to assemble with their respective Congregations on the same day—­that deeply lamenting our ingratitude to our Heavenly Father, to whom we are under all possible obligations, and our many deviations from those right and safe Paths, into which, as our Supreme Governor, he hath plainly directed us, we may with one heart and voice humbly implore His gracious and free pardon, thro’ Jesus Christ, supplicating His Divine aid that we may become a reformed and happy people.  At the same time humbly beseeching him, mercifully to regard our lives and health, so that no infectious and mortal distemper may prevail amongst us:  To favour our land with the alternate benefits of rain and warmth of the Sun; and that our hopes of a plentiful harvest may not be disappointed by devouring insects, or any other calamity:—­To prosper our trade and fishery, and the labor of our hands:—­To protect our navigation from the rapacious hands of invaders and robbers on the seas, and graciously to open a door of deliverance to our fellow-citizens in cruel captivity in a land of Barbarians:—­To continue and confirm our civil and religious liberties; and for that great purpose to bless and direct our great University, and all Seminaries and Schools of education:—­ To guide and succeed the Councils of our Federal Government, as well as those of the several States in the Union, that under their respective Constitutions they may be led to such decisions as will establish the liberty, peace, safety, and honor of our country:—­ To inspire our friends and allies, the Republic of France, with a spirit of wisdom and true religion, that relying on the strength of his Almighty Arm, they may still go on prosperously till their arduous conflict for a government of their own, founded on the just and equal rights of men, shall be finally crowned with success:—­And above all, to cause the Religion of Jesus Christ, in its true spirit, to spread far and wide, till the whole earth shall be filled with his glory.