BY HIS EXCELLENCY,
ICHABOD GOODWIN,
Governor of the State of New-Hampshire.

A PROCLAMATION
For a Day of Public Fasting and Prayer.

In accordance with usage, and with advice of the Executive Council, I do hereby appoint Thursday, the eleventh day of April next, as a day of Public Fasting and Prayer throughout this State, and ask the people to assemble on that day, in their respective places of public worship, for the purpose of offering to Almighty God their humble supplicaitons — imploring a continuance of his mercy to us, both as individuals and as a nation.

Never in our national history has there been greater occasion for humility, penitence and prayer; never was our political horizon so darkened by the clouds of discord and rebellion; never were our dearest social and national interests in such imminent peril. It becomes us, therefore, to look through and beyond all human agencies, and to acknowledge the sovereign providence of God. He hath smitten, and he alone can bind up our wounds.

Let us humbly consider our ways, confessing our sins; and may we not be unmindful that even while enduring the keenest injuries from the hands of men, we but suffer a just punishment from the hands of God. Let us ask to receive a spirit of conciliation, justice and patriotic devotion for ourselves; a spirit of candor and consideration — a returning sense of justice and duty — for our erring brethren.

May wisdom, moderation and forbearance, combined with a deep sense of high responsiblity, animate the hearts and minds of those who, in this perilous season, are called upon to uphold the Constitution and adminster the Laws of the land. Let us earnestly pray that lasting good may be evolved from the present evil; that our once glorious Union may be reestablished and preserved; that our Judges may be restored as the first, and our Counsellors as at the beginning; and that we may be mercifully saved from the bitter horrors of civil war, or the fearful woes of anarchy.

Given at the Council Chamber, this twenty-eighth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-fifth.

Ichabod Goodwin. —

By his Excellency, the Governor,
Thomas L. Tullock,
Secretary of State.