Who but he opens the eyes of the blind, and unstops the ears of the deaf, and sets the lame on his feet, and strengthens together the drooping heart and the feeble knees,—by setting before the one the radiant frame of society in all its fitness, and waking up for another the voices of human companionship, and compacting the powers of the weak with those of the strong, and cheering all by warding off injury from without, and making restraint easy where perchance it may gall any of those who are within? Sacred is the power of the ruler as a trust; but if it be used as a property, where is its sanctity? If the steward puts out the eyes that follow him too closely, and ties the tongue that importunes, and breaks the limbs of the strong man in sport, so as to leave him an impotent beggar in the porch of the mansion,—do we not know from the Scripture what shall be the fate of that steward? As it is with a single ruler, so shall it be with a company of rulers,—with a government which regards the people only as the something on which itself must stand, which takes bread from the children to give it to dogs; which sells God’s gifts to them that are without, at the risk of such utter blindness that they shall weary themselves to find the door out of their perplexities and terrors. What governments there be that commit the double sin of lording it over consciences, (which are God’s heritage,) and of ruling for their own low pleasures instead of the right living and moving of the people, judge ye. If there be any which mismanage its defence, and deny or pervert justice, and refuse public works, and make the church a scandal, and the court a spectacle for angels to weep over and devils to resort to, and, instead of speeding the people’s freedom with the wings of knowledge, shut them into the little cells of ancient men’s wits, it is time that such should know why God hath made them stewards, and should be alarmed for the coming of their Master. It is not for the men and maid-servants to wrest his staff from his hands, or to refuse his reasonable bidding, or to forsake, the one his plough, and the other his mill, and the maidens to spread the table: but it is for any one to give loud warning that the Master of the house will surely demand an account of the welfare of his servants. Such a warning do I give; and such is the warning spoken by the many mourners of this day, who, because they honour the kingly office as the holiest place of the fair temple of society, and kingly agents as the appointed priesthood, can the less bear to see the nation outraged as if there were no avenging angel of Jehovah flying abroad; and comfortless in their miseries, as if Jehovah himself were not in the midst of them." It was well that Dr. Reede felt that he could bear the pillory. He was pilloried. --------------------- THIRD AGE.