Benjamnin F. Butler, Butler's Book: Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences of Major-General Benjamin Butler

[971] and commandments, I have thought fit to appoint, and by and with the advice and consent of the Council, I do appoint Thursday, the 5th day of April next, as a day of public humiliation, fasting, and prayer in this Commonwealth. And I request the ministers and people of every religious denomination throughout the same to assemble on that day in their several places of worship that we may unitedly humble ourselves in the presence of Almighty God, and acknowledge, with deep contrition, our manifold sins and transgressions; that we may devotedly deprecate His judgments and implore His merciful forgiveness through the merits of our blessed Lord and Redeemer.

While we thus bow in humble adoration before the Most High, let us render Him our unfeigned thanks for the numerous instances of His continual bounty toward us and our fathers, whom He planted in this fruitful soil, and, in an especial manner, that He endowed them with wisdom to render this a land of piety, freedom, and order. And, inasmuch as we have disregarded their example and neglected those principles by which they obtained and transmitted to us the inestimable blessings of the Christian religion, of law and of liberty, let us earnestly beseech Him to heal our backslidings and restore us to that temper and conduct by which alone we can hope to be happy in this world and in that which is to come.

At the same time that we look with all humility to His grace for the remission of our sins, let us, with one mind and one voice, supplicate His blessings for us and our beloved country, that He would alike preserve us from the pestilence that walketh in darkness and the destruction that wasteth noonday; that he would graciously smile on the labors of the husbandmen, and cause the earth to bring forth her increase in due season; that He would relieve our commerce from the embarrassments with which it is burdened, and grant that prosperity may again distinguish our navigation and fisheries, so that they who “go down to the sea in ships” and do business in great waters, may have abundant reason to praise His holy name.

That He would afford success to our manufactures and prosper all the works of our hands.

That He would graciously condescend to direct the Government of the United States, and give them wisdom to discern and firmness to pursue the true interests of the country; that He would preserve us from war and from all connections that lead to dishonor and adversity; that He would dispel the clouds that encompass us about, and continue to us the enjoyments of peace, liberty, and religion; that He would influence the governors of the several States to do everything within their respective spheres to