The iniquities of a nation constitute a burden that impede it--1. _In its pursuit of material prosperity._ With what desperate intensity this English nation toils! and for what end? Chiefly that it may accumulate wealth. How greatly it is impeded in this pursuit by its costly government! But how much more by its costly vices! On strong drink alone this nation expends a larger sum than the whole amount both of imperial and local taxation--more than one hundred millions annually! Other vices that are nameless, how much they cost, and what a hindrance they are to the nation in its pursuit of wealth! 2. _In its pursuit of social happiness._ What a crushing burden of sorrow the nation's iniquities impose upon it! 3. _In its pursuit of moral and intellectual improvement._ According to a monkish legend, the church of St. Brannock's, in Braunton, Devon, could not be erected on its original site, because as fast as the builders reared up the walls by day, by night the stones were carried away by invisible hands. A like contest goes on in our own land. The nation's virtues are toiling to elevate the national character morally and intellectually, using as their instruments the school, the church, the press; but as fast as the virtues build, the vices pull down. In all these respects the nation's iniquities constitute its heaviest burden. _Consequently,_ 1. To give a legal sanction to vices, or to connive at what promotes them, for the sake of certain additions to the national revenues, is suicidal folly of the grossest kind. 2. Those are the truest national benefactors who do most to abate the national iniquities. The palm for truest patriotism must be awarded, not to "active politicians," but to faithful preachers, Sunday-school teachers, temperance reformers, &c. 3. Vices of all kinds should be branded, not only as sins against God, but as treasons against society; and all good men should, in self-defence, as well as in a spirit of enlightened patriotism, band themselves together for their overthrow. That is a mistaken spirituality which leads some good men to leave imperial and local affairs in the hands of the worldly and the vicious. We are bound to labour as well as to pray that God's will may be done "on earth as it is in heaven," and that "His kingdom" may come in our own land.[2] That which is true of nations is true also of individuals; the heaviest burdens which men can take upon themselves are vices. Vices lay upon men a burden--1. _Of expense._ Even so-called "indulgences" are costly; many professing Christians spend more annually on tobacco than they give to the cause of missions. Vices keep millions poor all their lives.[3] 2. _Of discredit._ 3. _Of sorrow,_ clouding all the present. 4. _Of fear,_ darkening all the future.