Westminster sermons : sermons on special occasions preached in Westminster Abbey

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WESTMINSTER SERMONS

WESTMINSTER SERMONS

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PREACHED IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY
BY

ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, D.D.

LATE LEAK OF WESTMINSTER

NEW YORK

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

1882

FRANKLIN PRESS:
»AND, AVBRY, AND COMPANY,

XI7 FRANKLIN STRBET,
BOSTON.

Publishers' Note.

These Sermons have been collected and are now
published in accordance with the wish of Dean Stanley.
They are given as delivered, with the correction of
obvious errors. Some of them have been already
printed in periodicals and separately.

Easteb, 1882.

OOINTENTS.

ON THE ABBEY.

PAGE

A Reasonable, Holy, and Living Sacrifice. (On the

Dean's Installation) ..... 1

Dedication of Westminster Abbey. (The 800th Anni-
versary) . . . . . . 18

The Coronation of William the Conqueror, and its

Consequences . . . . • .39

The Altar of Westminster Abbey ... 50

The -Religious Aspect of Sculpture • . .66

ON ROYAL AND NATIONAL EVENTS,

A Threefold Call . . . . #

The National Thanksgiving: —

I. death and life ....

II. the trumpet of patmos •

III. the day of THANKSGIVma

England and India . . • • •

The Return of the Traveller . •

76

83

92

102

114
128

vU

vill CONTENTS.

FUNERAL SERMONS.

FAGB

Lord Palmerston ...... 138

Charles Dickens ..... 149

Science and Religion. (Sir John Herschel) . . 162

The Religious Aspect of History. (Mr. Grote) . 179

Frederick Denison Maurice .... 191

The Mission of the Traveller. (Dr. Livingstone) 197

Charles Kingsley ...... 214

The Religious Aspect of Geology. (Sir Charles Lyell) 230

The Religious Use of Wisdom. (Bishop Thirhvall) 246

The Religious Aspect of Gothic Architecture. (Sir

Gilbert Scott) . . . . . .260

The Late Princess Alice .... 273

An Indian Statesman. (Lord Lawrence) . , . 280

Thomas Carlyle ...... 296

The Days of Old. (Rev. Lord John Thynne) . . 307

The Earl of Beaconsfield . . . . 319

MISCELLANEOUS SUBJECTS.

Christian Fraternity ..... 330

Diversity in Unity ..... 340

The Close of the Mission Services on St. Andrew's

Day, 1879 . . . . . . .356

The Distress of Paris ..... 863

CONTENTS. IX

PAOB

The Christian Rule of Speech. (American Independ-
ence) . . . . . . .374

The Crusade of Charity .... 384

The Greek Massacre . • • . . 899

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING
SACRIFICE.

January 10, 1864, the day following the Dean's Installation.!

/ beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye pre-
sent your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is
your reasonable service. — Romans xii. 1.

. When Christianity dethroned the previous religions of
the world, it immediately did that which proved its sov-
ereign right to the position which it claimed. It took
the names, the institutions, the ideas which it found,
and gave them a new and better meaning; or even if it
destroyed them, it immediately planted a correspond-
ing idea or institution in their place. It " took away "
that which was old and ready to vanish, in order that
it might "establish" that which will endure for ever
and ever.

Of a thousand instances which might be given of this
upward, soaring tendency, this transfiguration of earthly
things by a new and heavenly light, none is more re-
markable than its treatment of Sacrifice. Sacrifice, so
universal in the old religions, both Jewish and Pagan,
has in its ancient sense been rejected by Christianity
altogether. There is now no Christian sect or church
where God is worshipped by the slaughter of dumb

1 This sermon has been published by the author as a first step towards
the fulfilment of the prayer offered up in the Abbey on the day of his
installation, " tliat those things which he hath promised, and which
his duty requires, he may faithfully perform, to the praise and glory of
the name of God, and the enlargement of His Church."

1

2 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

animals or of human victims. But in a higher sense
Christianity is, above all other religions ever known, a
Religion of Sacrifice. It is a Religion founded on the
greatest of all sacrifices, the Sacrifice of the Incarna-
tion,^ culminating in the Sacrifice on Calvary .2 It is a
reli^rion of which the whole continuance in the world
depends on continual sacrifice — the sacrifice (such is
the new meaning which the New Testament has poured
into the old word) of the heart and mind in grateful
praise and thanksgiving,^ the sacrifice of good deeds,*
and broken hearts and contrite spirits,^ the sacrifice of
the whole man in the dedication of himself to God.^

The very word as we use it in common parlance has
risen into this higher and nobler signification ; the
earthly, Levitical, outward element has melted away.
The Prophetical, spiritual element, so strange and new
in the 50th and 51st Psalms, when David contrasted the
flesh of bulls and the blood of goats with the offering
of a right conversation and the sacrifice of a troubled
spirit," became fixed by the Apostle St. Paul in the
permanent forms of Christian worship, in the ordinary
language of Christendom.

" I beseech you," — so he speaks to us in the Epistle of
this morning, — " by the mercies of God, that ye present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God,
which is your reasonable service." That is to say, " I
beseech you, by all that God has done for you in crea-
tion and in redemption, in nature and in grace, that
ye offer to Him your own bodies^ not the bodies of any
other victims or offerings, but your own, your own
beings, your own human forms ; a living sacrifice — not

1 John xvii. 19 ; Eph. v. 2 ; Heb. x. 7, 8, 10 ; Rom. viii. 32 ; 2 Cor. v. 21.

2 Heb. ix. 28, xiii. 12. 3 Heb. xiii. 15 ; Rom. xv. 16.
< Heb. xiii. 16 ; Ps. \. 23. 5 Ps. n. 17.

« Ps. 1. 23 ; 1 Pet. ii. 6 ; Rom. xii. 1 ; Phil. ii. 17. 7 Ps. 1, 13, u. le, 17.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACBIFICE. 3

dead victims, falling lifeless on the ground under the
sacrificer's flashing knife, but instinct with life and
energy; lioly and acceptable unto God — not less holy
and acceptable because it is a moral and spiritual, and
not a ceremonial holiness ; your reasonable service — a
worship, a service, not of irrational creatures, of bulls
and goats, of flowers and fruits, but of reasonable
human beings, worthy of the God who planted reason
and conscience within us.

This is the true Christian sacrifice which should per-
vade all our worship and all our life, the breathing
incense of all our prayers, all our actions. It is no
metaphor, no figure of speech. It is the substance, the
reality, which has taken the place of those older sacri-
fices which were but types and shadows of the true
Sacrifice, as in the case of our Divine Redeemer, so, in
a lower sense, in the case of His servants.

Let us trace the full meaning of these words.

There have been moments in the life of many a
Christian man when this sacrificial act must have been
true to the very letter. In the early ages of persecu-
tion, when Christians gave up their bodies to the sword,
the stake, the cross, the wild beasts, for the sake of
Christ, they must have felt that they were indeed pre-
senting themselves to be " holy, reasonable, and living "
victims in the cause of God and of truth. Soldiers, too,
on the eve of some great battle, must, if they reasoned
at all, have felt that they were sacrificing themselves
in the literal sense of the Apostle's words. On the day
when our armies landed on the shores of the Crimea,
this very chapter was read to one of the advancing
troops by one of the officers in command ; and we and
they may have truly felt how that was indeed a living
sacrifice, a sacrifice of body, life, and limb, of the best
blood of England's sons ; holy^ because it was made at

4 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

the call of duty; reasonable^ because it was not the
devotion of brute courage or wild superstition, but of
calm, loyal, reasoning obedience.

But not only in these greater occasions, but in the
less exciting though still eventful days of our ordinary
lives, we can enter into every word of the Apostle's
appeal. We many of us feel its whole meaning, when
in the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, in that remark-
able self-dedication which once formed the very central
portion of the consecration prayer,^ and which still
forms the culminating point of the whole service, we
use these very words, and ^^ present to God ourselves^ our
souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and lively sac-
rifice to Him'' We feel it with an especial force in the
beginning of the new year, when new hopes and new
resolutions rise within us, and when we determine, it
may be with- many an effort and many a pang, to enter
on a new course of life, and, like the early Christians,
bind ourselves as by a sacramental oath or pledge to
the renewed service of our Heavenly Master. We feel
it still more, if there be any amongst us who are enter-
ing not only on a new year, but on a new crisis, a new
career, a new position, which to be worthily fulfilled
requires, in the most literal sense, the sacrifice of all
our energies to this one purpose. And if, as in the case
of him who now addresses you, this entrance on his
new career, this admission to his new office is expressed
in solemn words, handed down from former times, and
solemnly spoken within these sacred walls, how natu-
rally does the text of this day convey the feelings with
which he would now appear for the first time before
this congregation to devote himself to the work to
which he has been called ! Antique and peculiar as
those words may be, fresh from the fiery struggles of

1 First Liturgy of King Edward VI.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 6

the age of our Royal Foundress, yet they rise by the
force and elevation of their expressions so far beyond
the occasion which gave them birth, and so singularly
adapt themselves to the sacrificial and sacramental
pledge in which all Christians are invited by the Apos-
tle and by our own Church to join, that I may well
unite both forms together, and combine for your in-
struction and my own the universal truth and the par-
ticular case, the Apostolic injunction and the Royal
oath, by which you as Christian people, I as a Christian
teacher, present ourselves on this day as a reasonable,
holy, and living sacrifice to our All-wise and All-mer-
ciful Father — you, on the new year, which lies before
you filled with its unknown trials, pleasures, and duties;
I, on the new office which, in the sight of God, demands
the same sacrifice and requires the same encourage-
ment that belongs to every office and ministry in the
Christian Church everywhere.

Let us, then, take the • characteristics of this sacrifice
as they are expressed by the Apostle, as they are put
forth by the Church of England in its most solemn
Service, as they fall in with the peculiar claims of this
great Collegiate Church.

Reasonable — holy — living.

I. First, "A reasonable sacrificed That is to say, a
sacrifice, a dedication, not of mere impulse, fancy, affec-
tion, but of our reason, our understanding, our intellect ;
a sacrifice in which our reason takes full part, in which
our understandings go along with our spirits, in which
our minds go along with our hearts. How is this to be
done? The sacrifice of our reason^ the reasonable ser-
vice, which the God of reason and of truth requires
from us is, first and foremost, the sacrifice to Truth.
Not to authority, not to freedom, not to popularity, not
to fear, but to Truth.

6 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

It is, no doubt, a hard sacrifice which is thus required.
Long inveterate custom, cherished phrases bound up
with some of our best affections, the indolent respect of
persons or acquiescence in common usage, these are
what Truth again and agjain compels us to surrender.
But this is precisely the sacrifice which God demands
from us at His altar, this is precisely the sacrifice which
in our solemn act of self-dedication we declare that we
are ready to offer. Vera consuetis semi^er antehabiturum
— that " we will always prefer Truth to Custom," that
we will give to Truth not the second or the third, but
the first place ; that antiquit}', novelty, prejudice, fash-
ion, must give way before the claims of Truth wherever
it be found. Dear, no doubt, is tradition ; dear is the
long familiar recollection ; dear and most sacred in its
own place and measure is venerable antiquity on the
one hand or bold originality on the other ; but dearer
than any of these things, dearer and higher in human
things, dearer and higher 3'et in things divine, is Truth,
the duty of seeking and speaking the Truth in love, in
the unshaken faith that Truth is great and will in the
end prevail. And may He, whose name is Truth, be
with our humblest efforts to teach the truth, and honor
the truth, here and everywhere !

And close upon this pledge, in Christian teaching,
there follows another like unto it. We declare that
" we will always prefer the written to the unwritten,"
scripta non scriptis ; that "the Word of God," as it ap-
pears in the Bible, is above all human opinions what-
soever. This, too, is a sacrifice often hard to make. To
search the Scriptures thoroughly, to resign ourselves
to their real original meaning, to make out the true
sense of Prophet, Psalmist, and Apostle, and not force
our opinions upon them, this is a task which may in- ,
volve many a struggle hard to flesh and blood, many a

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 7

sacrifice of time and thought, and ease, unknown to
those who tread in the smoother walks of literature, or
science, or practical life. But it is a sacrifice to which
some at least in every generation are called ; and the
object is one which is worth the sacrifice to every Chris-
tian man, to every Christian teacher, who cares for the
progress of the human race, who cares for the welfare
of Christendom.

The Bible. Doubtless it contains many "things hard
to be understood," many things " which the unlearned
and unstable may wrest to their own destruction." But
take it with all its difficulties — take it with all the im-
perfections of the human agencies by which it has come
down to us, and it is still true that at least in the
great field of Theology no more reasonable service can
be offered up by man to God in this generation than
the study of the Scriptures. " Thy word is tried to the
uttermost," tried by the honest investigations of science,
tried by the undue claims made upon it, tried by the
misunderstanding of its enemies, tried by the misunder-
standing and exaggeration of its friends ; and yet, in
spite of all, " Thy servant loveth it," ^ because he knows
that there is nothing else like it in the world, nothing
else which will so well repay all the trouble, anxiety,
and misapprehension which its study involves. Its
value has increased, not diminished, with the lapse of
ages. It is even more important than in former times
to be able to go back from modern controversies to the
fountain of our faith, pure and undefiled, in the hills
from which it springs. It is still the Book of books,
not to one nation only but to all mankind. It is still
the guide both of the learned and of the ignorant.
Through its vast variety of style and character, light
and shade, parable and history, song and prose, sorrow-

1 Ps. cxix. 140.

8 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

ful and joyful, profound and simple, it is more than
ever the best means of bringing together the educated,
the half-educated, the uneducated ; the inquirer, the
waverer, the believer, the misbeliever ; if not in one
communion of discipline and worship, at least in one
communion of thought and feeling. It is still "the
witness in all ages of the higher things in the heart of
man, the inspired source of truth, the way to the better
life." It contains treasures of wisdom, of justice, of
tenderness, of toleration, of freedom, which have never
yet been exhausted. It stands on a height above all
the human speculations wdiich have gathered round it.
Ancient Creeds, modern Confessions of Theology, have
their own place and value, but in form, in substance, in
spirit, they are immeasurably below the Bible ; they are
not to be named for a moment in comparison of the liv-
ing voice of God, as it speaks to us through the living
acts and utterances of patriarch and king, lawgiver and
judge, priest and soldier, psalmist and prophet, through
all the manifold " sundry times," through all the infi-
nitely " divers manners " in which He inspired the
teachers of His chosen people, until "in these last
d^js He has spoken to us " once for all " in " the Per-
son of Jesus Christ " His Son." To bring out the true
meaning of each part of the Sacred Scriptures in its
due proportions ; to interpret the Bible, not by our own
fancies concerning it, but by what it says of itself;
" rightly to divide the word of truth " by distinguishing
between the essential and the unessential, between the
eternal and the temporal, between the letter and the
spirit ; to strive to put an end (if I may use the words
of one of my most distinguished predecessors) to " the
unnatural war between faith and reason, between hu-
man science and Divine ; " ^ to confute the manifold

1 Horsley's Sermons, vol. iii. p. 175.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 9

and opposite errors which arise contrary to the plain,
simple, Divine wisdom of the Bible ; to confute them
by every means in our power, but above all by the
surest of all means, by candor, by moderation, by
patient and comprehensive study, always making the
best and not the worst of those who oppose us, con-
stantly seeing truth even in the midst of error, making
the best refutation of error, not by attacking what is
false, but by fully stating what is true — this is the
noble sacrifice, this is the reasonable service which the
Christian teacher in the Church of England, and in this
great Abbey, is pledged to offer to Him who seeks for
His true worshippers those who worship Him in spirit
and in truth.

n. Secondly, the sacrifice must be holy. Ah ! to
what a world beyond ourselves does this word carry us !
how near to the Great White Throne ! how far away
from ourselves, and this miserable,- selfish, sinful world I
How easy to feel its meaning, how difficult to explain
it ! how far more difficult to apply it ! A life, a worship,
separate, consecrated from the low, envious, uncharita-
ble, narrow, impure influences which dry up our better
thoughts ; a life set on higher aims, a life which has
within it something at least which recalls the world to
the sense of the saintly, the heroic, the heavenly, the di-
vine ! Where shall this holiness be sought ? How shall
we figure it to ourselves? There are many answers
which might be given. But I fall back on two which
are furnished in our own solemn pledge, that we " will
draw our rule of life from the Word of God," and. that
'' we will embrace with our whole souls the true religion
of Christ." Weigh well the force of both these expres-
sions. They are the same in meaning as those in which
the whole aim of religious teaching has been well summed
up — " To live in the spirit of the Bible, and to love the
Lord Jesus Christ."

10 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

" The rule of life to be drawn from the Scriptures."
I have spoken of the Bible as the fountain and the
bulwark of Truth. Let me now speak of it as the foun-
tain and the bulwark of Holiness. There is indeed a
holiness in the Bible which speaks for itself. The spirit
which breathes through it is indeed the spirit of the
saints, the spirit of heroes, because it is the spirit of all
holiness and of all goodness. To live in the spirit of the
Bible, to live in that exalted atmosphere which nursed
the faith of Abraham, and the unselfishness of Moses,
and the courage of Joshua, and the devotion of David,
and the hope of Isaiah, and the energy of Paul, and the
love of John — this is better than any rule however
careful, than any form however exact, which scholastic
ingenuity or ascetic piety has ever devised.

Take even a single Psalm. Read over in your house-
hold the 15th or the 101st Psalm ; read over to yourselves
the 51st, which was sung in this morning's service. Or
take even a single text — a single verse from the 13th
chapter of the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, or from the
Sermon on the Mount ; act upon it throughout a single
week, make it the rule of a single family ; what a holy
sacrifice, salted with the salt of God's special grace,
would then be offered up ! What a difference would it
make in the happiness, the usefulness, the dignity, the
greatness of the whole neighborhood, of the whole insti-
tution, of which we form a part !

And yet further, if we ascend from the Bible to Him
of whom the Bible speaks, what a lifting up of our
hearts above the toil, and dust, and turmoil, and con-
troversies, and doubts of the world, if we could with a
full sense, or any thing like a full sense of the meaning
of those majestic words, declare ''that we embraced with
our whole souls the true religion of Christ!'' Of Christ,
and of no one else ; the religion, not even of His best-

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 11

beloved servants, or of His greatest and wisest and old-
est Churches, but of Himself; the religion of Christ, as
He Himself has taught it to us, and showed it to us, in
the Four Gospels — in His words, in His works, in His
mind, in His Spirit, in Himself. Do not disparage the
teaching of the Apostles : it is full of instruction for all
future times. Do not disparage the teaching of any of
the Churches which they founded : each Church in each
age has rendered its own peculiar service to the cause
of goodness. But even the collective wisdom of all
the Churches has not in religious matters reached up
to the wisdom of the Apostles, who lived in the presence
and in the spirit of Christ ; and even the Apostles point
not to themselves, but to Him, as the Founder of their
faith, as the Source of their spiritual life. Ask spiritual
counsel, O my brethren, from all these quarters, but ask
it especially from Him who, if our belief concerning
Him be true in any degree, must be above every other
religious teacher that has ever appeared on the earth.
Ask, in every perplexity, in every dispute that crosses
our religious life, ask what He would have said, what
He would have done. Ask not of Him questions of
times or seasons, or questions of this world's knowledge
and power, which he refuses to answer ; but ask of Him
the questions how we are to please God, how we are to
serve our brethren, how we are to deal with sin, how we
are to deal with error, how we are to deal with our
opponents, how we are to deal with our own follies, and
passions, and sins ; and assuredly we shall receive an
answer, not of this world, nor of this age, nor of the will
of man, nor of days long past, nor of any sect or party
or church, but the answer of the Eternal Mind of God
Himself, the answer of the Ancient of Days, the same
yesterday, to-day, and forever.

In the true, original, catholic, evangelical Religion of

12 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

Jesus Christ, and in this alone, all the divided religions
of Christendom find their union, their repose, their
support. Find out what He was and what He is —
what He is and what. He is not. Find out His mind,
His character, His will ; and in His greatness we shall
rise above our littlenesses, in His strength we shall lose
our weakness, in >His peace we shall forget our dis-
cords.

O that we might be strengthened, every one of us,
to make this holiest of all sacrifices to the holiest and
greatest of all causes ! O that Christendom might be
drawn more and more, year by year, to its true Lord
and Master ! O that we might rise, ever so faintly, into
that loftiest of all the aspirations of the sweetest psalmist
of England and the English Church : —

Weary of all this wordy strife,
These notions, forms, and modes and names,

To Thee, the Way, the Truth, the Life,
Whose love my simple heart inflames —

Divinely taught, at last I fly

With Thee and Thine to live and die l**

III. " To live or die I " This brings me to the last
characteristic of the Christian sacrifice — not only " rea-
sonable," and " holy," but " living." There have been
those who have offered to God a reasonable and a holy
sacrifice, but a dead sacrifice — a sacrifice cold, hard,
philosophic, reasonable, without warmth, without sym-
pathy, without action ; a sacrifice holy, devoted, but
shut up within books, shut up within walls, the dry
bones of religion without its animating spirit, the imi-
tation of Christ in thought and feeling, not in life and
action. Such sacrifices may be in their measure accept-
able to Him who knows our manifold weaknesses. But

1 Charles "Wesley, Hymn on Catholic Love.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 13

they are not the highest and best sacrifices, they are
not those in which He most delights. No, our sacrifices
must not be like the dead carcases of the ancient vic-
tims, thrown away to perish or to be burned ; they
must be living, moving, walking, speaking, acting in
the face of day ; living, vigorous, active bodies, living,
cheerful, energetic souls. We know what we mean by
saying that a child or a man is " full of life." That is
(as long as God grants us health, and strength, and
spirits) what our sacrifice of ourselves should be —
'■'■ full of life." Not desponding, sickly, pining, morbid,
morose ; not gloomy, chilling, cold, forbidding ; not
languid, lazy, indolent, inactive ; but full of life, and
warmth, and energy ; cheerful and making others cheer-
ful, gay and making others gay, happy and making
others happy, contented and making others contented,
at ease and putting others at ease, active and making
others active, doing good and making others do good,
by our living, lively, lifelike, vivid vitality — filling
every corner of our own souls and bodies, filling every
corner of the circle and the institution in which we
move, with the fresh life-blood of a warm, genial,
kindly. Christian heart. Doubtless this, too, requires
a sacrifice ; it requires us to give up our own comfort,
our own ease, our own firesides, our own dear solitude,
our own favorite absorbing pursuits, our shyness, our
reserve, our pride, our selfishness. But for this, too,
there is a cause, there is a reward. That solemn pledge
of duty which calls us to our reasonable and to our holi/
sacrifice, calls us also to the living active service of our
neighbors, of our Church, of our country, to the living
faithful service of the great institution of which so
many of us in this place are members. To protect its
interests, to guard its privileges, to extend its useful-
ness, is the vow which needs, or ought to need, no out-

14 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

ward words to express it in any who is summoned to
fill an}^ place, from the humblest to the highest, in this
sacred building. To breathe a soul even into these
dead stones, to draw out the marvellous tale which lies
imprisoned within each wall, and tower, and arch, and
relic of this most august of English sanctuaries; to
make each sepulchre give up again to life its illustrious
dead for the glory of God and for the instruction of us
who tread these famous floors ; to feel within ourselves
a new life inspLfed by the grandeur, the beauty, the
hoary crown and the length of days, beneath which our
lot is cast; to throw new life and meaning into the
words of our Services, into the truths of our Creeds,
into the very sounds of our hymns and anthems — this
indeed would be to become " living stones,^ a spiritual
house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ."

And not only from the dead outward structure, or
from the outward sounds and words, but from the liv-
ing souls and spirits who live and move among and
around these ancient sepulchres and mighty walls shall
our living sacrifice be found.

What a fresh stream of youthful interest for so many
generations has been poured through our aged cloisters
and our venerable precincts by the illustrious School,
which unites us in them to the two greatest Colleges
of our two great seats of learning ! What a refuge for
calm learning, for eager search after truth, for advance
of the landmarks of knowledge, is still supplied by this
sacred spot, — as in earlier ages rescued from amidst
the waste of waters and the tangled thickets of the
wilderness, so now rescued from the ever-advancing
roar of this vast city, from the thorny paths of passion
and faction ; a temple where serener thoughts may be

1 1 Pet. ii. 5.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 15

breathed and higher interests served, above the waves
and storms of this troublesome and shifting world !

What a flood of spiritual life should stream from this
the very heart of England's heart, to enlighten, purify,
animate, the ignorant, the suffering, the young, the
helpless, the oppressed, the desolate ! What a return-
ing stream of life should flow back from them to awaken
our silence, to stir up our seclusion, to respond to our
services, to profit by our instructions !

And as we look forward to the future, can we forbear
with grateful hearts to reflect what an encouragement,
what a stimulus to all who come after, has been already
furnished by the changes effected through the activity
and the self-denial of those who have gone before ! How
widely of later years have our doors been opened by
the just confidence which has removed the barrier that
shut out the sight of our historic walls from those who
would most benefit by the sight of them ! What a new
glory has been thrown around even this glorious church,
by the rule of the wise and good and gentle Head now
to be withdrawn from us ; under whose auspices the
silence of our majestic nave has, after a slumber of
three hundred years, been again broken by the tramp-
ling feet of vast congregations, by the welcome sounds
of prayer and praise, by the eloquent voices of the
goodly company of preachers ! What a renewed energy
of all good works, what an inroad of the living word of
God into the dense circles of vice and ignorance which
surround our precincts, by the zeal and munificence of
those who have cared for the wants of our vast parishes ;
where within thirty years churches have been trebled
and quadrupled, clergy raised from six to twenty-eight,
school-children from three hundred to three thousand !
What living sacrifices may have been already, and may
yet still be, snatched out of the dead masses that en-

16 A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE.

close us right and left, by that adventurous movement
for the spiritual aid of Westminster,^ which was first
begun by one of our own number, who threw himself
with all the fervor and generosity of his nature into
the work of rousing the neighborhood to a sense of the
need ! What a revolution, directly or indirectly, was
effected by that single effort; a blessing not only to
them that received and to those that are passed away,
but to him that gave and to those that will come after ;
what a new crown of honor to the great Abbey, which
for nineteen years he has thus faithfully served !

0 may we all be roused by these and like mercies to
renewed efforts for the future ! O may we all unite in
the living work, of whatever kind it be, to which by our
own special gifts we may be called ! Too vast, too va-
rious to be discharged by. any single hand or any single
mind, it belongs to all alike, for each to take that part
which he can best perform. "Whatsoever — whatso-
ever it be that thy hand, thine own hand, findeth to do,
do it with all thy might." Each has his own peculiar
call. " We are," as the Apostle says, in the words fol-
lowing on my text, " many members in one body, but
all members have not the same office." Let each make
use of the other's gifts, to supply that which lacketh in
himself, let each supply with all his force that which
he alone can give ; so shall our sacrifice be indeed the
sacrifice of one living united whole, the more united,
the more living, because made up of divers and oppo-
site parts. And above all, let the one Divine gift be
there which is to every Christian sacrifice what the fire
from Heaven was to the sacrifices of old, the one living
fire which gives warmth and light to every part — the

1 The VT'estminster Spiritual Aid Fund, started in 1846 by the exer-
tions of the Rev. Christopher Wordsworth, D.D., then Canon of West-
minster, now Bishop of Lincoln.

A REASONABLE, HOLY, AND LIVING SACRIFICE. 17

fire, the life, of all Christian graces ; that supreme grace
of Charity which "bears all things, hopes all things,
believes all things, endures all things," "without which
whosoever liveth is counted dead in the sight of God,"
with which whosoever has even the very humblest
measure of faith and hope, may have the blessed assur-
ance that he has passed from death to life, if only he
love the brethren.

In and through that Divine Charity, that Divine Life
and Death of Charity, of which all earthly charity is the
faint and humble likeness, we therefore now present
unto Thee O Lord, ourselves, body, soul, and spirit, to
be unto Thee, "a reasonable, hol}^, and living sacrifice ; "
and although through our manifold sins and weaknesses
we are unworthy to offe unto Thee any sacrifice, yet
we beseech Thee to accept this our bounden duty and
service ; not weighing our merits, but pardoning our
offences ; through Jesus Christ our Lord, by whom and
with whom, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, all honor
and glory be unto Thee, O Father Almighty, world
without end.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

December 28, 18G5 (the Feast of the Holy Innocents), being the eight
hundredth anniversary of the foundation of the Abbey by King Edward
the Confessor.

It was . . . the Feast of the Dedication, and it was winter. And
Jesus walked in the Temple in Solomon's porch. — John x. 22, 23.

Every word in this text seems to breathe a peculiar
savor. It exemplifies a trait in our Lord's life, not com-
mon, not belonging to the essence of His Divine mission,
not bearing on the general edification of Christendom,
but still deeply connected with some of the best feel-
ings of the human, heart, and a help to the upward
course even of the saints of God. It is the sense of a
great historic past ; an attachment to local memories ;
the recollection of famous anniversaries ; the delight in
the names of the mighty dead.

" It was the Feast of the Dedication." It was the
festival, not of the first foundation and consecration of
the Temple, but of that reconsecration of it by Judas
Maccabseus, when he and all the host "saw the sanc-
tuary desolate, and the altar profaned, and the gates
burned up, and shrubs growing in the court as in a
forest, or in one of the mountains," and amidst the
sound of " trumpet and songs, and citherns, and harps
and cymbals," ^ the new altar was dedicated. " It was
winter ; " the words recall the very time of the year
when this joyful celebration took place, on the five-and-

1 1 Maccab. iv. 38, 40, 52, 5i, 55, 58.
18

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 19

twentieth clay of the ninth month, — that is, of our
month of December, — on the same clay on which,
three years before, the heathen had profaned it ; in
the same inclement season, of which we read in the
book of Ezra,^ how the wintry sleet so depressed the
people, that they sat trembling and cowering "for
the great rain " and cold ; yet still, in spite of it, " there
was very great gladness among the people," " worship-
ping and praising God, who had given them good suc-
cess, and put away the reproach of the heathen."

On such an anniversary as this — not one of the
greatest in their history, not sanctioned by the Law or
the Prophets, full only of that strong religious and
national feeling which belongs to the memory of every
such event in every history — " Jesus," we are told,
" was in Jerusalem, and walked in the Temple in Solo-
mon's porch." He blessed it by His presence. The
joy which broke through the gloom of that wintry sea-
son He condescended to make His joy. He walked to
and fro in the courts and cloisters of the Temple hal-
lowed by those ancient recollections of patriotism and
devotion. He lingered in that splendid portico which
closed the eastern side of the Temple courts, and which
was called after the great king who, long before the
dedication of Judas Maccabseus, had consecrated the
whole place, and whose glory awakened a thrill of emo-
tion, if we may so say, perceptible in the words of the
Redeemer, whenever He named the name of Solomon.

On such an anniversary as this, we, too, are gathered
together in a building, if less famous, and in some
respects less sacred, yet of far grander dimensions,
numbering far longer years, and bound up with events
hardly less stirring than that in which " Jesus walked ; "
underneath a porch, and roof, and walls, which, in part,

1 Ezra, X. 9-13.

20 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

even in name,^ still more in the regal magnificence
which it has witnessed from age to age, recalls, by a not
unworthy association, the art, and the power, and the
glory of the kings of Judah.

Eight hundred years have passed since on this day
was completed the dedication of the Abbey, which, like
that Jewish Temple, Avas purified, and adorned, and
consecrated in the place of the ruin and desolation
which had well-nigh swept away the vestiges of older
times.

"We know not what may have existed before in the
days of Oifa or Edgar, or the doubtful Sebert, or the
still more doubtful Lucius, amidst the bristling thickets
and the stagnant channels* of the Isle of Thorns,^ beside
the swollen current of the dark and stormy river, in
the savage solitudes, parted by many a rushing stream,
and many a broad green field, from the Roman or Brit-
ish fortress on the adjacent hills of London. On that
earlier antiquity we need not dwell. We need on this
day only go back in thought to that Innocents' Day,
eight centuries ago, when the act was completed which
fixed the destiny of this building and of this spot for
all future time.

Tliere is something in the simple words of the Saxon
Chronicle describing this event which almost seems
like a faint echo of the words of the text. " At Mid-
w^inter King Edward came to Westminster, and had the
Minster there consecrated which he had himself built
to the honor of God, and S. Peter, and all God's
saints." It was at Christmas time, — when, as usual in
that age, the Court assembled in the adjoining Palace
of Westminster, — that the long-desired dedication was

1 The Northern Porch, the great entrance to the Abbey, is known by
the name of Solomon's Porch.

2 Thorn-Ey.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 21

to be accomplished. The King had been for years pos-
sessed with the thought. Like David in the Psahn of
this morning's service, he " could not suffer his eyes to
sleep nor the temples of his head to take any rest, until
he had found out a place " ^ for the great sanctuary
which was henceforth to be the centre of his kingdom.
On Christmas Day, according to custom, he appeared
in state wearing his royal crown ; but on Christmas
night his strength, prematurely exhausted, gave way.
The mortal illness, long expected, set in. He struggled
through the three next days, and, though when the
Festival of the Holy Innocents arrived he was already
too weak to take any active part in the ceremony, yet
he aroused himself on that day, to sign the Charter of
the Foundation ; and at his orders, the Queen, with all
the magnates of the kingdom, gathered within the
walls, now venerable from age, then fresh from the
workmen's tools, to give to them the first consecration,
the first which, according to the belief of that time, the
spot had ever received from mortal hands. By that
effort, the enfeebled frame and overstrained spirit of
the King was w*orn out. On the evening of Innocents'
Day, he sank into a deadly stupor. One sudden and
startling rally took place on the eighth day of his ill-
ness, on the fifth of January. The recollections of the
teachers of his youth, the dim forebodings of approach-
ing disaster and change, found vent in a few strange,
hardly coherent, sentences that burst from his lips.
Then followed a calm, during which, with words, very
variously reported, respecting the Queen, the succes-
sion, and the hope that he was passing " from a land
of death to a land of life," in the chamber which long
afterwards bore his name in the Palace of Westminster,
he breathed his last.

1 Ps. cxxxii. 3.

22 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

A horror, it is described, as of great darkness, filled
the whole island ; with him it seemed as if the happi-
ness, the liberty, the strength of the English people had
vanished away.^ So dark were the forebodings, so
urgent the dangers which appeared to press, that on
the very next day, while Duke Harold was crowned in
the old cathedral of St. Paul's, the dead King was
buried within the newly-finished Abbey, — the first of
the hundreds who have been since laid there round his
own honored grave.

My brethren, this is not the time or place to enlarge
on the liistorical or antiquarian interest of this remark-
able event ; to describe how far the present fabric cor-
responds with that erected by Edward ; ^ to show where
we can still lay our hands on stones which witnessed
that scene; what changes it has since undergone, what
has been done, and what still needs to be done, to
complete and carry on the work on this day dedicated
forever to God. But there are reflections which it
suggests, such as can be offered nowhere else so fitly
as on this occasion, and from this place.

1 Life of the Confessor by Ailred of Rievaulx.

2 For the Abbey, as built by the Confessor, see the representation in
the Bayeux Tapestry, and the Latin description in the time of Henry I.,
and the French poem in the time of Henry III,, published in Mr.
Luard's Collection (pp. 90, 244, 417), with Mr. Scott's comments, in the
Gleaninfjs of Westminster Abbey, p. 3, 4. The Abbey, as we now see it,
was for the most part rebuilt by King Henry III. (1220 to 1269) out of
regard to the memory of the Confessor, and continued by subsequent
sovereigns down to the reign of George II. But, though re-constructed
on a more magnificent scale than the Church of King Edward, it covers,
as is believed, the same ground; and there are still vestiges of the ori-
ginal building to be seen in the Pyx Chapel, in the passage leading from
the Great to the Little Cloisters, and perhaps in some portions of the
walls of the ancient Dormitory and Refectory, and of the Crypt under
the Chapter-house. The Founder was originally buried before the High
Altar, but his remains were ultimately removed to the present Shrine
in 1269 by King Henry III. The original Church of Sebert or of Edgar
stood at the western end of the present Abbey.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 23

I. First, then, the celebration of this anniversary,
connected as it is with the whole growth of the Abbey
and all its glories, out of the act and deed, out of the
life and death and grave of such an one as was our
Founder, is a tribute to the undying power of that
simple cliildlike goodness which this Festival of the
Innocents of itself commemorates, and which is the
one permanent and distinguishing feature of the tradi-
tional character of Edward the Confessor.

Let us see exactly what that character was. On the
one hand, if we look at the details of his history, it is
hardly possible to imagine a figure more unlike, more
incongruous to our own time than was the quaint, irres-
olute, guileless King, who alone of all the canonized
English saints rests undisturbed in his ancient shrine.
We know him well, as he is described to us by his con-
temporaries. We see that grave, gentle figure, old even
as a child, moving slowly along with downcast eyes.
We recognize him at a distance by the singular appear-
ance of his full, flushed, rose-red face, contrasted with
the milky whiteness of his waving hair and beard. As
we draw nearer, we hear those startling peals of strange
unearthly laughter,^ which broke through his usual
silence ; we see those thin pale hands, those long trans-
parent fingers, with which, as it was believed at the
time, and for many generations afterwards, he had the
power of stroking away the diseases of his subjects.
We are astonished, as we look into his outer manner of
life, at finding a prince whose time is equally divided
between devotional exercises and the passionate pursuit
of hunting ; when not in church, spending day after
day with his hawks, or cheering on his hounds. We
find, as we penetrate into his inner life, a childishness of

1 As in the stories of his visions of the Danish king and of the Seven
Sleepers.

24 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

thought and action, which at times turned into harsh
disregard of those to whom he was most nearly bound,
and at times into the most fanciful extravagances. We
discover, if we examine into the actual grounds of his
titles of Confessor and Saint, that they belong to the
fierce struggles between Saxon and Dane, to the worldly
policy of Norman rulers, to the lingering regrets of
Saxon subjects — most interesting and touching to the
English historian, but to the general heart and mind of
Christendom of slight moment and of small account.
In these respects the gulf of eight centuries between
us and him is indeed impassable. His opinions, his
practices, his prevailing motives, even in the act of this
foundation, are such as in our own times, not only not
in England, but in no part of Christian Europe, would
be shared by any educated teacher or any educated
ruler.

I dwell on these differences, because they serve to
bring out more clearly the true lesson which is taught
by his life and death ; namely, that through, and across,
and in spite of those immeasurable divergences, we yet
can recognize an innocent childlike faith, which was
the secret cause of the charm exercised by him over his
countrymen then, which may flourish still in our altered
age, and has always an appointed place in the economy
of God's ever-moving world.

This Church — so we hear it said sometimes with a
cynical sneer, sometimes with a timorous scruple — has
admitted within its walls many who have been great
without being good ; wise, without being simple ; noble,
with a nobleness not heavenly or saintly, but of the
earth earthy, of the w^orld worldly, of the wisdom of
the children of this world. Meanly and lightly do they
conceive of the greatness and goodness of God who
would complain of this wide recognition of all His gifts

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTEH ABBEY. 25

to man. Yet still it is a counterbalanciDg reflection,
full of weighty truth, that the central tomb, round
which all these warriors and poets and statesmen repose,
contains the ashes of one who, weak and erring in many
respects, as they were, rests his claims to interment
here, not on any act or deed which could rank him
amongst the great ones of the earth, but on the artless
piety, the guileless faith of those early days. He
towards whose dust was attracted the fierce Norman,^
and the proud Plantagenet, .and the grasping Tudor,
and the fickle Stuart — the stern Edwards, the frivo-
lous Richard, the conquering Henry, the worldly-wise
Elizabeth, with her unfortunate sister, and still more
unfortunate rival, the pedant James with his ill-starred
descendants, and, even from remoter circles, the Inde-
pendent Oliver, the Dutch William, and the Hanoverian
George — was one whose humble graces were within the
reach of every man, woman, and child, in every time, if
we rightly separate the perishable form from the im-
mortal substance. His goodness and piety were accord-
ing to the light and means of his age. We, if we would
follow in his footsteps, must be good and pious accord-
ing to the light and means, not of his age, but of ours,
not of the eleventh century, but of the nineteenth.
The self devotion, the charity of those ancient times
need not, must not, shall not die. In order to live, and
flourish, and abound, it must take the forms, and use
the means, and value the light of those eight hundred
years, which God's mercy has added to the world's
experience since the Confessor passed away. Still it
is his goodness which is here enshrined — whatever
shade or whatever light rest upon it — and which we,
under forms however altered, must continue and in-

1 The Norman kings were not buried, but were the first to be
crowned, in the Abbey.

26 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

crease. It is to his faith in the unseen world, amidst
whatever ignorance and darkness, that we owe this
complex structure. He spoke the word, and it was
transformed into stone ; and even in some of its most
peculiar features, the institution still perpetuates the
thought of its first Founder. "Through faith," we
may well say, ''he has stopped the mouth of Time,
quenched the violence cf enemies, escaped the edge of
the sword, out of weakness been made strong." ^

II. And this brings me to the second point, of which
the day invites us to think. Not only, as I have just
said, have eight centuries rolled by, each bringing its
accumulated stores of thought, and wealth, and experi-
ence to our country, but the very event of which we are
now celebrating the anniversary, was itself the begin-
ning of a new order of things which has continued ever
since.

The year in which the Abbey was dedicated, was not
only the last year of King Edward the Confessor, but
it was the eve of the Conquest, the year preceding the
greatest change which, with one exception, this Church
and nation have witnessed since the days when this spot
was first reclaimed from its thorny thickets, in the dim
and distant age of our earliest conversion to the Chris-
tian Faith. Christmas Day, 1065, was the last which
ever saw an Anglo-Saxon king bearing the English
Crown. The first coronation which these halls wit-
nessed was that by which, on Christmas Day, 1066, the
Norman Conqueror effected his storm}^ seizure of the
throne and realm of England. And of this vast change,
the simple-hearted Founder of the Abbey was, con-
sciously or unconsciously, himself the chief inaugurator.
Saxon as he was by birth, yet by education he was a
Norman. Almost at the moment of his death he wa-

1 Heb. xi. 33, 34.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 27

vered between a Saxon or a Norman successor. He had
imbibed the first elements of that Norman, Southern,
French, Italian civilization, which was to quicken the
dull and stagnant blood of our Anglo-Saxon ances-
tors.

This Abbey, the great work of his life, the last relic
which the royal house of Cedric bequeathed to England,
was itself the shadow cast before of the coming event, a
portent of the mighty future. Few changes have ever
been so sudden and so significant as that by which, in
the place of the humble wooden or wattled churches of
the Anglo-Saxon period, arose the massive buildings
of the Norman style. The solid pillars, the rounded
arches, the lofty roof, the cruciform shape, — all these
were new and strange to a degree which we can now
hardly conceive ; and of this new style and shape and
dimensions, the Abbey of the Confessor was the first
signal example. When Harold stood by the side of his
brother Gurth and his sister Edith, on the day of the
dedication, and signed his name with theirs as witness
to the charter of the Abbey, he might have seen that he
was signing' his own doom, and preparing for his own
destruction. The ponderous arches in yonder cloisters,
under which the Saxon nobles passed with awe-struck
wonder, to the huge edifice that, with its triple towers
and sculptured stones and storied windows, overtopped
all the homely tenements far and near, might have told
them that the days of their power were numbered, and
that the avenging, the civilizing, the stimulating hand
of another and a mightier race had been there at
work, which would change the whole face of their lan-
guage, their manners, their church, and their common-
wealth.

And yet more, the. Abbey itself was, as it were, a new
centre for a new political and religious world. The

28 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

" Old Minster," ^ as the Cathedral of Winchester was
called, in which the Saxon kings had for centuries been
crowned and buried, was now to be exchanged for this
" New Minster," depending for its fame on the future
generations which were to be gathered within it. It
was, we may say, founded not only in faith, but in hope
— in the hope that England had yet a glorious career to
run ; that the line of her sovereigns would not be dried
up even when the race of Alfred had ceased to reign ;
that the troubles which the King, as it was believed,
saw in prophetic visions darkening the whole horizon of
Europe, would pass away, and that a brighter day was
yet in store, than he or any living man in the gloom of
that disastrous winter, in the rudeness of that boister-
ous age, could venture to anticipate. We have seen
how that hope has been more than fulfilled ; how the
Abbey has been renovated, enlarged, glorified, by dy-
nasty after dynasty ; how, even if at times disfigured
and neglected, it has kept its hold, with a tenacity un-
equalled by any other building, on the reverence of the
whole English people ; how its precincts have witnessed
not only the solemn inauguration of each successive
stage of the English monarchy, but the parallel rise and
growth of English constitutional liberty ; how it has
been the refuge, both in life and death, of princes who
had no other place to lay their heads. We see how, in
the change of the Reformation, greater, as I have said,
even than the Norman Conquest, it still survived the
shock ; how it has since enrolled amongst its ministers
many " wise and eloquent in their instructions, honored
in their generation," and lent its shelter to the famous
School, which has bound the memor}^ of so many illus-
trious names by the links of earliest affection to these

1 Possibly, however, as distinguished from the " New Monastery,'*
built by Alfred at Winchester.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 29

venerable courts : how underneath its shade have been
h'Cld assemblies not only to discuss some of the most
momentous questions interesting the Church of Eng-
land,^ but also to compile and send forth the only Con-
fession of Faith which was ever sanctioned by law for
the whole island,^ and which, though bearing the name
of " Westminster," is still the established formulary of
the Presbyterian Church of Scotland. We know how
its pavement or its walls embrace memorials from every
rank and profession and opinion ; trophies of chivalry,
ancient and modern; of poetic invention, sublime or
tender, grave or gay ; of science in its loftiest specula-
tions or its homeliest applications ; of those who have
wrought immortal deeds, and those who have recorded
them in immortal words; of those Avho have relieved
the sufferings, or upheld the hopes, or purified the stains
of our common humanity. We know how in " this tem-
ple of silence and reconciliation " are found in a strange
but instructive union many renowned in their own day,
and forgotten in ours, wdth others once neglected, but
by a late justice receiving their meed of honor ; sover-
eigns and statesmen, divided in all but in death and in
hope of a common resurrection ; the ornaments of other
communions, Roman, Puritan, Nonconformist, beside
the uncompromising prelates of our own ; the doubting
sceptic hard by the enthusiastic believer ; the smoking
flax beside the blazing lamp, the bruised reed beside the
sturdy tree.

Such has been the growth and the development of the

1 Within the Abbey the important though disastrous acts of the Con-
vocation of 1G40 ; in the Jerusalem Chamber, the approval of the Litur-
gical changes of 1UG2, by Convocation, and the discussion of the further
changes of 1G89 by the Royal Commission.

2 The doctrinal vVrticles of the Westminster Confession of Faith were
sanctioned by the English Parliament in 1647, and the whole Confession
by the Scottish Parliament in 1618.

30 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

seed planted here by our Founder. We do well to
think of it. The Abbey, so considered, is a standing
monument and witness of the peculiar formation of our
English institutions, of our own duty towards them
both as Englishmen and as Christians. The Norman
Church erected by the Saxon King ; the new future
springing out of the dying past ; the expansion of the
first idea of an institution founded for a special and
merely temporary object into uses co-extensive with
the interests of the whole commonwealth through all
its stages — how striking an example is this of the
blessed continuity by which in England the new has
been ever intertwined with the old ; liberty thriven
side by side with precedent; Church and State been
inextricably interwoven one with the other ; opposing
parties both in Church and State co-existing, neutral-
izing, counteracting, completing each other, neither by
the other entirely subdued, each by the other endured,
if not honored !

Oh what an exhortation to hopefulness, to forbear-
ance, to comprehensive charity ! Fear not, though
troubles brood thick around us ; they cannot be darker
than those which clouded the prospects of our country,
when the last hope of England seemed to be buried in
the grave of her last hereditary Saxon king. Fear not,
though old things seem ever passing away, and all things
seem to become new. The change cannot be vaster
than when this new edifice sprang up on the ruins of
the old, and the rustic solidity of the Saxon gave way
before the fiery energy and fresh life of the adventurers
from beyond the sea. Fear not to build up the waste
places, and put a new sense and a new force into old
words and old institutions ; or to employ the resources
of the present to carry out the duties and the principles
of the past. There cannot be any difference more wide,

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 31

any incongruity more irreconcilable than there was
between the humble hovels that stood here amidst the
island thickets, and the new building that was to rise
in its place and gather within its walls the greatness of
a new empire. The vicissitudes and ramifications of
the architecture, the worship, the uses of this building,
are likenesses of that true " enlargement " of the Church
of God and of the Church of England, which is a chief
duty of every one who takes office in this place, so as
to embrace within its sympathy (I use the words cf a
living 1 statesman), "every true instinct and need of
man, regardful of the just titles of every faculty of his
nature, apt to associate with and make its own all,
under whatever name, which goes to enrich and enlarge
the patrimony of the race." Here, at least, all English-
men may forget their differences, and feel for the mo-
ment as one family gathered round the same Christmas
hearth. Underneath this roof, each one, of wdiatever
church, or sect, or party, will find the echoes of some
memories dear to himself alone, — some which are dear
to all alike — all of them blending, more or less, with
that manifold yet harmonious " voice from heaven "
which is as " the voice of many waters " of the distant
sea of ages past, or as " the voice of a great thunder "
pealing through the convulsions which have shaken
nations and churches, or as " the voice of harpers harp-
ing on their harps a new," a nobler " song " of Truth
and Love, " before the Throne," and '' before the Elders"
of ancient days, and '' before the Four Living Creatures"
of God's boundless universe.^

IIL From this thought we pass at once to the direct
object of the foundation of this august edifice. I speak
not of those curious legends, and dreams, and visions,

1 Address of Mr. Gladstone to tlie University of Edinburgh.

2 Eev. iv. 2. The Epis:le of the Day.

32 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

and vows, whicli wroiiG^ht the Confessor's mind to the
act of dedicating this Church, v/hich now only concern
us, as showing in how perishable, yet for the time how
solid a vesture great ideas have ck)thed themselves.
They shall perish, but these shall endure. For, under-
neath all these imaginations, there was the fixed inten-
tion, which has never died out of these walls amidst
their many changes, that this magnificent pile was to
be the house where Christian souls might meet to hold
converse with their l^vlaker. Whatever it has since
become — of ro3"al, or heroic, cr historic, or artistic —
it would liave ceased to be, if it had not been, over and
above these and much more than these, a place dedi-
cated forever to the worship of Almighty God.

This, it is true, is the purpose which it shares in
common with the humblest church or chapel in the
kinc^dom. But, at least, to us who here carrv on that
worship, the dignity, the perpetuity, of our office is
brought home with double force by the reflection that
on -it, as on a thin, at times almost invisible thread,
has hung every other interest which from generation
to generation has accumulated round us. Break that
thread, and the whole building becomes an unmeaning
labyrinth. Extinguish that sacred fire, and the arched
vaults and soaring pillars would assume the sickly hue
of a cold artificial Valhalla, and "the- rows of warriors
and the walks of kings " would be transformed into the
conventional galleries of a lifeless museum.

You who have worshipped here v/eek by week, year
by year ; to whom these stones speak not of any secular
or ecclesiastical grandeur, but of the silent nurture of
ycur individual souls, of rest to the weary and heavy-
laden in its holy cervices, of dear recollections of de-
parted friends, sons, brothers, parents, partners in life's
struggle, that with you have here learned to know and

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 33

value the secrets of heaven and the blessmgs of earth:
— They who in former times, few and scanty it may be,
or in mucli ignorance, sought God beside mediaeval
shrine or relic ; or, in after daj^s, caught here the im-
passioned words of Baxter and Owen ; ' or through
succeeding generations have drunk in the calm and
strengthening prayers of our own Liturgy, in the ever-
recurring cycle of the Christian year : — By these, and
such as these, one may almost say, through all the
changes of language and government, this giant fabric
has been sustained, when worldly ecclesiastics or grasp-
ing statesmen would have let it pass away.

From many a " secret " nook, unthought of there,

Eises for that proud " Church " their " still " prevailing prayer ;

and its Founder's intention has been carried on by many
a one who never thought of him, as he could never have
dreamed of them.

And you, young and old, who take part in our ser-
vices day by day — you, too, who love to lend your
voices to add to them new grace and force — join hand
in hand, and heart to heart, with those who in times
gone by, within these walls, "found out those musical
tunes " which we to-day sing over their graves, to make
the worship worthy of the place, as the place is worthy
of the worship.

It was the hope of the Founder, it was the belief of
his age, that on this spot was literally planted a ladder
on which angels might be seen ascending and descend-
ing from the courts of heaven. Fond dream ! we say ;
yet surely not altogether fond if we can accept and fulfil
the brief words in which the most majestic of English
divines has described the nature of Christian worship.
" What," he says, " is the assembling of the Church to
learn but the receiving of angels descended from above?

84 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

what to pray, but the sending of angels upward? His
heavenly inspirations and our holy desires are as so
many angels of intercourse and commerce between God
and us. As teaching bringeth us to know that God is
our Supreme Truth, so prayer testifieth that we acknowl-
edge Him Our Sovereign Good." ^

And is this, too, a fond dream ? — a hope too lofty to
be realized in our later days ? Not, O my brethren —
not if we could receive it in all its fulness and all its
simplicity. Not surely in vain did the architects of suc-
cessive ages raise this glorious edifice as we now behold
it, in its vast and delicate proportions, in this our day
more keenly appreciated than in any other since it was
first built ; designed, if ever were any forms on earth,
to lift the soul heavenward to things unseen. Not
surely in vain has our English language grown to meet
the highest ends of devotion with a force which the rude
native dialect or barbaric Latin of the Confessor's age
could never attain. Not surely in vain has a whole
world of sacred music been created, which no ear of
Norman or Plantagenet ever heard, no soul of Saxon
harper or Celtic minstrel ever conceived. Not surely
in vain has the knowledge of God's word and work, in
the Bible, in history, and in nature, always steadily
increased, century by centurj^ to unfold to us the mind
and the operations of Him with whom we have to do.
Not in vain, surely, has the human heart, by God's grace,
kept its freshness whilst the world has been waxing old,
or the most restless and inquiring of human intellects
been led by deep experience to know that the Everlast-
ing arms are still beneath us, and the Eternal God is
our refuge, or that " prayer is the potent inner supple-
ment of noble outward life."

So surely, even now, may this Abbey be a witness to

1 Hooker, Eccl. Pol. v. 23.

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. . 35

that one Sovereign Good, of that One Supreme Truth;
a shadow of a great rock in a weary hind, a haven of
rest for human hearts and souls in this tumultuous
world, a breakwater against the waves upon waves
which beat unceasingly against its island shores.

IV. This leads us to one concluding thought. For
those human hearts and souls outside, that perhaps
never are brought Avithin these walls at all — for them
also this day and its consequences have a true signifi-
cance. Around the church and the grave of the Con-
fessor has sprung up, by a natural effect, the stir of life
and activity which now encircles it. If he was the
founder of the Abbey, he was hardly less the founder
of the City, of Westminster. And assuredly those souls
of the poor, the friendless, the sick,^ the suffering, are
precisely those for whom the good King most cared,
and who cherished the deepest and longest affection for
him. If S. Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, was the
saint before whom the Confessor trembled with a dark,
mysterious awe, S. John,^ the Apostle of Love, was the
saint whom he venerated with a child-like, familiar ten-
derness. By that loving spirit he was endeared to the
Saxon race, as the pattern of a better age. Through
this, the sense of an oppressive or unjust tax was to him
like a cruel wound. Through this, the name of Edward
was multiplied far and wide over English families, as
the pledge of kindly, honorable. Christian regard to the
wants and the rights of others.

Much, thank God, has been done in former days, by
those who have served the Abbey of Westminster, for
the multitudes collected round it. Many a labyrinth of

1 The alms collected on this occasion were devoted to the "Westmin-
ster Hospital, which stands on the site of the Confessor's Sanctuary,
within the ori;?inal precincts of the Abbey.

2 See the comparison of the Confessor's devotion to S. Peter and S.
John in Ailred of Rievaulx.

36 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

poverty and infamy, as intricate and as formidable as
those tancrled thickets which Scbert or Edward cleared
away, has been levelled by the active beneficence of
modern times; many a hand has been stretched out to
offer spiritual aid to those most in need. But the need
still continues, still grows, out of the necessities engen-
dered by the ancient selection of this spot as the centre
of the English Empire.

And from this centre of the English Empire when-
ever the need arises, we may surely appeal to the heart
of the English people, as now, in the name of this great
Dedication, at this midwinter of our year, in the name
of all the recollections which have made us what we
are, in the name of the eight long centuries of God's
continued goodness to us, that whatsoever each one
finds to do, he will do it with all his might, to cause,
as best he can, and in all manifold senses, this place,
and all around it, to be indeed the House of God and
the Gate of Heaven.

And now, for these our mercies, and for these our
needs, let us join our thanksgivings and our prayers to
Thee, the Giver of all good, and the Source of all
strength.

O Almighty God, who hast knit together Thine
elect in one communion and fellowship, and built
Thy Church on the foundation of the Apostles and
Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner-
stone, who out of the mouths of babes and sucklings
hast ordained strength ; we thank Thee for the work of
our Royal Founder, who out of weakness was made
strong to dedicate this Church to Thy honor ; and we
pray Thee that there may never be wanting a succes-
sion of Thy faithful servants to carr}' on what he began.

O Almighty Father, of whom all the families in earth
are named, and who makest men to be of one mind in

DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 37

a house, we thank Thee that Thou hast caused this
sanctuary to be the home of the English people, and
the seat of the Imperial throne ; and hast in it ever
turned the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the
hearts of the children to their fathers. Grant that " the
free and princely spirit of wisdom and of government,
of knowledge and of true godliness, of counsel and of
strength," here invoked on the crowned head of our
Sovereign Lady the Queen, may evermore descend on
her and her children's children, " to lead this people in
the way wherein they should go," ^ and from us " we
beseech Thee to take away all hatred and prejudice and
whatsoever else may hinder us from godly union and
concord : that as there is but one Body and one Spirit,
and one Hope of our calling, one Lord, one Faith, one
Baptism, one God and Father of us all, so we may
now and henceforth be all of one heart and one soul,
united in one holy bond of Truth and Peace, of Faith
and Charity." ^

O Almighty Lord, whose never-failing Providence
ordereth all' things both in heaven and earth, we thank
Thee that, through the changes and chances of eight
hundred years. Thou hast so guided this nation that in
its passage through things temporal it has not lost the
things eternal ; we thank Thee that in this sacred edi-
fice, preserved by Thy goodness from fire and flood,
from lightning and tempest, from war and tumult,
Thou hast permitted us from generation to generation
to offer to Thee the sacrifice of prayer, and to gather
together the dust and the memorials of those whom
Thou hast raised up with special gifts to adorn this
Church and Commonwealth to Thy glory and the wel-
fare of mankind. May this great people serve Thee

1 Prayer from the Coronation Service.

2 Prayer from the Service for the Accession.

38 DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

more and more with a wise and understanding heart, in
righteousness and true holiness ! May this ancient sanc-
tuary ever be devoted to the offering of Thy true and
spiritual worship, to the manifesting of Thy blessed
presence, and to the communicating of Thy heavenly
grace ! Let Thine ear ever be attentive to the prayers
of Thy people, which within these walls they shall make
to Thee. Let Thy peace visit the trpubled spirit and
heal the wounded conscience of him that cometh hither
in penitence and faith. Let Thy consolations wait upon
the afflicted and the mourner. Let Thy Spirit of Truth
be here with those who teach, and with those who learn,
to guide them into all truth. And we beseech Thee
that we who serve in this holy place may "have the
fulness of Thy grace, that those things which our
duty requires ^ we may faithfully perform to the praise
and glory of Thy name, and the enlargement of Thy
Church," and that we may all with thankful hearts
show forth Thy strength to this generation, and Thy
power to all those that are yet for to come, through
Him who is the same yesterday, to-day, and forever.
Praise ye the Lord ! Hallelujah ! Amen.

1 Prayer at the Installation of the Deans and Canons of Westminster.

THE CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CON-
QUEROR, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.

Christmas Day, 1866.

Every battle of the warrior is with confused noise, and garments
rolled in blood; but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire. For
unto us a Child is born, unto us a So7i is given. — Isaiah ix. 5, 6.

The Prophet in these words goes back to the famous
events of his country's history, to the day of Midian,^
when Gideon routed the mighty host, amidst the terrors
of a midnight panic, and amidst the carnage of the
Raven's Rock and the Wolf's Winepress. It was in-
deed " a battle of the warrior with confused noise, and
with garments rolled in blood." But he then foretells
a time when out of these wars and tumults there should
come a period of deep peace, when these warlike imple-
ments should be burnt to ashes, according to the prac-
tice of ancient times which heaped sword and spear and
armor as on a huge funeral pile, when the victory was
won, to proclaim that the strife was over, that the chari-
ots were burnt with fire, and the spears broken asunder .^
And he saw that this peace would come, because within
his own time or hereafter — he knew not clearly which
— a Son, a King, should be born, who would be the
Prince of Peace, the founder of a new and eternal king-
dom, clothed with a majesty which should put to silence
the contentions of men, and with a power which should

1 Isa. ix. 4; Judg. vii. 22-26. « Comp. Ps. xlvi. 9.

40 THE CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR,

compress and unite the most divergent elements. May
I on this Christmas Day take up the Prophet's thought,
first recalling to you an event from our own history,
of which this day is the anniversary, this house of God
the scene, and then drawing from it lessons congenial
to the Prophet's teaching and to the glad tidings of this
season ?

You may remember that last year we celebrated on
the Feast of Innocents' Day the eight hundredth anni-
versary of the foundation of this Abbey by the last he-
reditary Saxon king. We have now advanced another
year, and this day on which I now address you is the
eight hundredth anniversary of the first authentic coro-
nation celebrated in this place, the coronation of William
the Conqueror. That coronation is remarkable, not only
as being the first in the long series which has since been
one of the chief glories of the Abbey, but from its own
intrinsic interest, and from the marvellous lessons which
it conveys to us. I shall not scruple to describe it to
you at length. The great battle wiiich had decided the
fate of England had been fought in October. William
entered London as a stranger and a conqueror. But he
was determined to mount the throne according to all
the forms which ancient usage had prescribed. Here,
therefore, by the grave of the last Saxon king, whose
heir he claimed to be, on this Christmas Day, the usual
coronation day of the Anglo-Saxon sovereigns, in the
heart of what was to be henceforth, as never before,
the capital of England, he appeared with his courtiers
and his army. Here, in the newly finished Abbey, he
took his stand before the altar, beside King Edward's
tomb, the huge, unwieldy, indomitable conqueror,
strange contrast to the feeble, gentle, fantastic prince
of whom we spoke last year. Outside the church, to
guard him frOm the attacks of his new subjects, were sta-

AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 41

tioned troops of Norman cavalry ; inside were crowded
together Norman nobles and Saxon people. The two
nations, distinct from each other as Frenchmen and
Englishmen, took an equal interest in the event of that
day. To each the question was addressed, to the
Normans in French, by a French prelate, the Bishop
of Coutance, to the English in English, by an English
prelate, the Archbishop of York, whether they would
have this king to reign over them. Each returned a
shout of welcome. But the shout was so loud and fierce,
the discord of the two rival Uxno^uag^es and nations so
harsh, that the Norman soldiers without, hearing but
not luiderstanding the uproar, burst in upon the church.
A wild panic, a confused flight, and a bloody massacre
followed. The Abbey was left almost empty. The
King, with the assistant clergy, stood alone by the altar.
He, for the first time in his life, was so terrified by the
scene, that he remained trembling from head to foot in
the extremity of fear. They, hurrying as best they could
through the sacred forms, poured the oil over his face
and planted the crown on his head ; and thus was inau-
gurated the English Monarchy, thus was begun the
series of those august ceremonials which have since
never ceased to be celebrated within these walls.

It was indeed " a battle of the warrior with confused
noise, and with garments rolled in blood." Who could
have thought on that day that those discordant nations
could have ever been knit together; that those lan-
guages, so unintelligible each to each, should have ever
been blended into one ; that the dynasty, so darkly
enthroned on that seat of blood, could have ever been
firmly fixed in the affections of the people ? Yet so it
has been, and it is for thi^ reason that it is no unwor-
thy subject of contemplation even on this sacred day.
Those ajicient implements of warfare liave indeed been

42 THE CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR,

"burned with fuel of fire ;" their ashes are scattered to
the winds. The proud Norman and the humble Saxon
are united indissolubly in one nation, the great English
people ; the French tongue and the English tongue are
welded together into one speech, the great English lan-
guage ; a Sovereign, the descendant at once of William
the Conqueror, and of his rival Edgar Atheling, has
been seated on the throne of Edward the Confessor,
the centre of the English Constitution, the head of the
British Empire.

This of itself is an example, always encouraging, of the
way in which good springs out of evil, and troubles sub-
side, and peace returns, when its return would have
been thought impossible. But in this case there is
something yet more consoling. That peace, that glory,
that good, which grew out of this Norman coronation,
is the natural result of the original discordance. '' Two
nations," we have seen, were in the womb of the Abbey,
in the womb of the Church and State of En<Tland on
that day; but out of those two nations came the gifts
which each most wanted to make up a perfect whole.
Without the Norman conqueror we should have had no
progress — without the Saxon subject we should have
had no solidity. Both qualities have marked our history
ever since. We have been a two-sided, doubly-gifted
nation ; antiquity and novelty, liberty and authority,
aristocracy and democracy, have been interwoven with
our Constitution and with our character, as you will
find them nowhere else interwoven in any part of Eu-
rope. By this means the internal harmony of our kmgly
Commonwealth has been preserved, by this means peace
and good-will have been maintained amongst us on occa-
sions when they have perished everj'where else. Christ-
mas Day to us is not as on that first Christmas Day in
the Abbey, a stormy signal for bloodshed, massacre, and

AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 43

misunderstanding ; but it comes home to every part of
the nation equally, as binding man to man, and both to
God, equally with the bonds of Christian and of Eng-
lish S3'mpathy. " Unto us," even in this lower sense,
"a Child is born, and He shall be called the Prince
of Peace."

I might apply this even to private quarrels. I might
say to two neighbors who are at variance, to two friends
who have quarrelled, and who think that they can never
be reconciled. Do not despair; you are not more at
enmity than were the Normans and Saxons on the
Christmas Day of 1066. Whatever may be the differ-
ences which divide you each from each, they may in
like manner change and fade away. The old pagan
philosopher used to say, " Look upon your friends with
the thought that they may one day prove your enemies."
The Christian philosopher says (and it h certainly one
lesson from the Norman Conquest), " Look upon your
enemies with the thought that they may one day prove
your friends." Look upon them with the experience
which this day furnishes. Think that the Norman may
be one day blended with the Saxon. Think that the
Saxon will one day bless the Norman.

But may I go a step farther, and point out how this
double element, which has pervaded, without destroy-
ing, the English Nation, has also pervaded, without
destroying, the English Church? Two nations, two
parties, two tendencies, have from the first been in her
womb also. They have been in the Church of Eng-
land, for the very reason that it is the Church " of Eng-
land." The Church of England is a mixed and double
Church, because England is a mixed and double nation.
If it were not so, it would not be the national Church.
At this moment of conflict between two great sections
in the Church, it is but the same which has been again

44 THE CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR,

and again in the State, in the language, in the Consti-
tution of our country. Look at the words of the first
Exhortation in the Liturgy. It is half Norman, half
English. It is composed of the same two elements of
speech that resounded in such fearful discord through
the Abbey on the day of the first coronation : " acknowl-
edge," is Saxon; "confess," is French; "meet to-
gether," is Saxon ; " assemble," is French ; " humble,"
is French; "lowly," is Saxon; "goodness," is Saxon;
" mercy," is French. Even by these trivial signs let us
be reminded that the battle of the warrior and the gar-
ments rolled in blood have been forever burnt with
fire, and melted down into one harmonious language.

But no less, as we go through the Prayer-book, and
find expressions which sometimes suit one frame of feel-
ing, and sometimes another, let us not be offended by
them ; let us not distort them ; let us acknowledge that
each gives our opponents (if so we choose to call them)
an advantage ; but let us see in them also a blessed
continuation of the same unity which has elsewhere
with us overcome the difference of race and language.

Some of us may lament that one set of expressions
should have been left, which savors of the old super-
stitions of the Church before the Reformation. Others
may lament that expressions have been admitted quite
contrary to these, breathing only the rational or the
spiritual atmosphere of modern times. But neverthe-
less these expressions have existed together, and the
two parties may exist together ; and the only real
breach of Christian faith and Christian charity is when
each insists on having the Church and nation to itself,
when each endeavors to cast out the other.

Take even that question which has so much agitated
many minds at this lime — the divergence of opinion
respecting the blessed Communion of the Lord's Supper,

AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 45

in wliicli we are this day to partake. Ever since the
Reformation, there have been two opposite tendencies,
two opposite frames of thought on the subject. Some,
with the Church of Rome and the German Reformer,
Luther, have found pleasure in figuring to themselves
" a real presence," a special nearness to Christ in the
outward tokens of bread and wine, even identifying
these tokens with Himself, even feeling as though they
handled Him witli their hands, and saw Him with their
eyes. On the other side, there have been those who,
with the Swiss Reformer Zuinglius and the great mass
of the Reformed Churches, have found pleasure rather
in believing that their Saviour's Presence was in the
heart and in the spirit, within and not without, spiritual
like Himself, brought near to us by remembrance, by
love, by reason, by faith, not by the mere outward act,
or the mere outward ceremony. These two tendencies
have prevailed in this or that mind, according to the
natural turn which disposition or circumstance has
given ; and have prevailed, with all the innumerable
shades of intervening opinion and feeling, from the very
outset of the Reformation down to the present day.
They have left the traces of their conflict in the very
words with which the sacred elements are administered.
At the first beginning of the English Liturgy, just
emerging from the old Church and its peculiar forms,
the words were with us, as in the Churches of Rome
and of Luther, " The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ
preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life." ^
When the Reformation had advanced farther, and the
Church of England had become entirely a Reformed
Church, these words were omitted, and in their place
were substituted, " Take and eat this in remembrance
that Christ died for thee, and feed on LLim in thy heart

1 Br the First Prayer-book of Edward VI., 1549.

46 THE CORONATION OF WILLIAM THE CONQUEROF,

by faith, with thanksgiving." ^ When, after the acces-
sion of Elizabeth, it was desired by her and her wise
counsellors to make the Church as comprehensive and
as national as possible, the two forms were united to-
gether.2 And so they have continued till our own day,
a pledge and token to us, that the true policy of the
Church of England, may we not say of the Church of
Christ, is not to exclude entirely either of these feelings,
but to blend them together, and in that most solemn
act of Christian fellowship to feel ourselves not two,
but one people. Many a time, on this and on a thou-
sand other questions, has each party striven to drive the
other out. Each for the moment has partially suc-
ceeded ; each has succeeded to its own great loss ; each
has done that which would have been done, had the
Normans at the first coronation succeeded in stamping
out the Saxons forever, or the Saxons forever repelled
all contact with the growth and progress of the Nor-
mans. But the spirit of the English nation, the spirit
of the English Church — may we humbly saj^ the Spirit
of Christ our Lord in the better spirits of both Church
and nation? was too strong for the violence of any
single party. Oh may it be so still ! May we still, both
as a nation and a Church, deserve the glorious reproach
of keeping together those who elsewhere have been
divided asunder ! May we cherish the blessed privilege
of holding social intercourse, maintaining Christian
communion, between those who in other days, per-
haps even in our own, would deny and excommunicate
each other ! Prove and show as much as we will, and
as much as we can, the folly, the exaggeration, the dis-
proportion, the futility of the views which we think
wrong. But still remember that there is a worse evil

1 In the Second Prayer-book of Edward VI., 1552.

2 In the Prayer-book of Elizabeth, 1559.

AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 47

than error, and that is, injustice towards those in whom
the error exists. Remember that, if our adversaries
have labored with untiring zeal to drive us out, the
true Christian retaliation is for us to labor with untir-
ing forbearance to keep them in. The true weapons by
which to put down error are argument, reason, knowl-
edge ; the true armor by which error can best be
repelled is love of truth, candor, charity.

To other times and to other countries belong " the
battle of the warrior, with confused noise, and garments
rolled in blood," the sword and stake, the rage for ver-
bal distinctions, the ceaseless desire to find causes of
division, partiality, and strife. To ours belongs, or
ought to belong, the ceaseless desire to burn up these
causes with fuel of heavenly fire. To us belongs, or
ought to belong, the determination to " have the faith
of our Lord Jesus Christ without respect of persons,"
to bear with the practices in which we cannot partici-
pate, even whilst most strongly condemning them ; pro-
viding only that they are not forced on those who wish
not for them, that they have liberty of conscience for
themselves, not dominion over the faith of others. To
us belongs the heaven-born trust, that with the fire of
zeal about the greater matters of the law, justice, mercy,
and truth, those lesser things of hay, straw, stubble,
will be burnt up and destroyed. To us belongs the
hope of a true Christian peace, founded not on artificial
fusions of outward form, or ill-assorted unions of eccle-
siastical organization, but on the greatness of God's
love, and on the greatness of man's duty. " For unto
us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given," who will
unite us together, if we cleave to Him with heart and
soul, for this very reason, that He is greater than any
of the sects or Churches which call themselves by His
name. '' He came " — I quote words, far better than

48 THE CORONATION OF WTLLTA3I THE CONQUEROR,

my own, of an English historian educated in this place
— " He came, bringing with Him the knowledge that
God is a Being of infinite goodness ; that the service
required of mankind is not a service of form or cere-
mony, but a service of obedience and love, obedience
to the laws of morality, and love and charity towards
man. The God made known in Christ demanded of
His children no other sacrifice than the sacrifice of
their own wills, and for each act of love and self-for-
getfulness bestowed on them the peace of mind which
passed understanding.

" Such a Gospel, had it remained as it came from its
Founder," — nay, if even now we can return to it, —
" would have changed," may yet change " the aspect of
the earth. It would have knit together," it may yet
knit together " in one common purpose, all the good,
all the generous, all the noble-minded, whose precepts,
whose example would serve as a guide to their weaker
brethren. It would not have quarrelled over words
and forms. It would have accepted the righteous act,
whether the doer of it preferred Paul or Cephas. In
that religion, if ever it is fully believed, hatred would
have no place, for love, which is hate's opposite, is its
principle. The essence of it is something which is held
alike by Catholic and by Protestant, by Lutheran and
Calvinist." i

It is for this reason that Christmas with its high
glory to God is also the time of peace and good-will to
earth. The greatness of God is the true rebuke to the
littleness of men. The greatness of Christ is the true
rebuke to the littleness of Christians. The war of
words and names and forms sinks into nothing in
His presence, because in Him there is neither Jew
nor Greek, Norman nor Saxon, circumcision nor un-

1 Froude's History of England, vol. ix. p. 300.

AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 49

circumcision, ritualism nor anti-ritualism, rationalism
nor anti-rationalism ; because He is not Paul, nor
Apollos, nor Cephas, but infinite Grace, and Purity,
and Truth ; because He is, above and through all these
things, "the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the
Prince of Peace."

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.*

Easter Day, 1867 and 1873.

On the first day of the iceeJc, very early in the morning^ they came
unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they liad prepared ; and
they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. — Luke xxiv. 1, 2.

On this Easter Day, when we once more open to view
the accustomed place of our Holy Communion, on which
so much care and labor have been spent, these words
seem not unsuited to express our thoughts. They came,
that faithful band, to pay their tribute of affection and
respect to the place where the Lord was laid ; they came,
as one of their number had come before, with an alabas-

1 The Communion Table or Altar of "Westminster Abbey has had a
long and varied history. In the first Abbey, as built by Edward the
Confessor, it stood at the eastern extremity of the church. In the
Abbey, as rebuilt by Henry III,, it stood where it has remained ever
since, in front of the Confessor's shrine. Of this Altar the only remnant
now existing is the richly-painted frontal, discovered by accident some
years ago, and now in the south aisle of the church. In the fifteenth
century the screen was erected behind the Altar, shutting off the shrine
of Edward the Confessor from it, as was common at that epoch. Of this
screen or reredos the eastward or hinder face still remains, with the
legendary life of the Confessor carved on its frieze. The westward
front has long ago perished, and has been since replaced, first, by the
marble altarpiece of the time of Queen Anne ; next, when this was re-
moved in 1824, by a plaster screen, intended in some degree to imitate
the ancient forms; and this was finally replaced within the last ten
years by the present reredos, which was erected under the direction of
Sir Gilbert Scott. The Communion Table, which now stands in the
position which it has occupied since the Restoration, is of cedar wood,
carved by Messrs. Farmer and Brindley. The frieze of the reredos cc>n-
sists of sculptures of the history of our Lord, corresponding to that of
the life of Edward the Confessor on the other side. The space beneath
50

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 51

ter box of ointment of spikenard very precious, as she
beforehand to anoint His body for the tomb, so they
to anoint and guard it afterwards. They knew well
the sacred spot ; they knew the little garden, outside
the city walls ; they knew the rocky hill, out of whose
ancient face was hewn the sepulchre wherein never man
before was laid ; they knew its deep recesses ; they had
seen the clean linen cloth infolding the frame, and the
napkin wrapped about the head ; they had watched the
huge stone door drawn across the mouth of the cavern ;
and now, as the first light of the sun broke over the
dark summit of the Mount of Olives, they approached
the tomb once more with their charge of aromatic stores,
to honor the memory of Him whom they had lost.

It was the natural reverence of the human heart for
great recollections and sacred places, it was the natural
reverence of the Christian heart for all that belongs even
to the outward service of our Divine Redeemer. This
reverence is not itself religion ; far from it. Even the

is filled by a large mosaic, from a design of Messrs. Clayton and Bell,
representing the Last Supper. On each side of this are four statues
— which, as well as the frieze, were executed by Mr. Armstead. In the
centre are St. Peter and St. Paul, the two Apostles to whom the Abbey
is dedicated, representing the two divergent tendencies of Christianity;
on the north is Moses, as the Lawgiver, looking towards the north tran-
sept, which contains the tombs of the statesmen; and, on the south,
David, as the Royal Psalmist, looking towards the south transept, as
containing the tombs of the iioets. Of these statues and their meaning
an account is given in the sermon on " The Religious Aspects of Sculp-
ture." The porphyry which furnished the three circular slabs in front
of the Altar was brought from the East by Lord Elgin at the same time
as the Elgin marbles, and was presented to the Abbey by his grandson
in 1870. The last additions were the gilded canopies above the mosaic
picture, and underneath it heads of the holy women of Scripture —
Ruth, Anna, Elisabeth, the Virgin Mary, Mary Magdalene, Martha,
and Dorcas. The whole work was completed on Easter Day, 1873; its
earlier portion had been completed on Easter Day, 1867, and the sub-
stance of the present sermon was preached on both those occasions, in
the presence of those who had been concerned in the sculpture, carving,
and arrangement of the whole.

62 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

Holy Sepulchre, which they thus came to adorn, has
been the cause of some of the most cruel wars, and the
scene of some of the most senseless discords, that have
ever disgraced the Christian name. When the Angelic
voice invited the women on the morning of Easter Day
" to come and see the place where the Lord lay," their
thoughts were immediately directed upwards. " He is
not here ; He is risen." Still, with this reservation the
feeling is permitted — it is the common instinct of man-
kind, it is part of the natural gospel (so to speak) of
Him who took our nature upon Him.

I propose therefore to set forth some of the reasons
which give a special significance to the glorification or
our Altar.

It has been sometimes said that the history of the
sacrament of the Eucharist might be made a history of
the Christian Church. So it might be almost said that
the history of the Holy Table in this Abbey might be
made a history of the English Church. The original
form and position of the Table of the early Christians
had long passed away before the erection of our first
altar. It stood at the extreme east end of the build-
ing, thus representing the period when the primitive
idea of the early church had been effaced, but before
the more complex doctrine and structure of the Middle
Ages had arisen. Then came the period from the
Plantagenets to the time of the House of Lancaster,
during which it was brought to the almost central
position that it now occupies, recalling something of the
original arrangement of the Basilica; but entangled
with the various forms of strange devotion with which
those ages abounded. Then, as these fantastic forms
multiplied, there sprang up the screen, which parted
it from the Eastern chapels, and divided asunder the
building, as with a wall of partition, unknown to ear-

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 53

lier times, forming, after the manner of that perplexed
age, church within church, division within division, in
ever narrower circles. Then descended the tempest
of the Reformation, scattering riglit and left the an-
cient figures that stood around, and planting in the
place of the old altar the plain wooden movable table,
in imitation of the original primitive usage, sometimes
standing where it now stands, sometimes in the midst
of the church. Next, in the reign of Anne, when the
arts took a new turn, when the classical dome of St.
Paul's Cathedral was rising from its ruins, and our own
Western Towers were added by the hand of the great
architect of that period, were raised the sculpture and
painting — highly esteemed in that age, and lasting
down to times within our own memory in the begin-
ning of this century, when they too vanished before
the first faint revival of mediseval antiquarianism.
Each of these changes coincided with the development
of fresh thoughts and fresh feelings in the Christian
Church, each containing much that each succeeding age
lamented, whilst receiving the footprint of new ideas
through the changing periods of the history of our
Church and nation. Each, were this the time to en-
large upon it, has some peculiar lesson of its own. But
there is this lesson belonging to them all. — We some-
times think that it is the Transitory alone which
changes, the Eternal which stands still. Rather it is
the reverse. The Transitory stands still, decays, falls
to pieces. The Eternal, though changing its outward
form again and again, endures. It is therefore, as we
might have expected, that whilst the subordinate parts
of the church have remained comparatively unchanged,
or changed only by the mouldering lapse of time, this,
the most sacred part, has continually kept pace with
the altered feeling of each succeeding period. Those

54 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

memorials of mortal men, as the Apostle freely spoke
of the patriarch David, are dead and buried; after
they had served their own generation they fell asleep,
and were laid with their fathers, and saw corruption
and decay. But He whom God raised again saw no
corruption. The memorial of His life and death has
been changed it may be according to the poor con-
trivances of men, but remains still alive, and kept alive
by its inherent vitality.

The everlasting mountains are everlasting, not be-
cause they are unchanged, but because they go on
changing their form, their substance, with the wear and
tear of ages. " The iJverlasting Gospel " is everlast-
ing, not because it remains stationary, but because,
being the same, it can adapt itself to the constant
changes of society, of civilization, of humanity itself.
Such a new step we have now again made, in accord-
ance with the feelings of our own generation ; and we
would take occasion of it to ask, "What are the rea-
sons why, according to the principles of our Church,
and according to the natural instincts of Christendom,
this Holy Table should be the chief point of attraction
and interest in this our ancient and splendid sanctuary ?

I. It is the Lord's Table.

Whatever else is the purpose of that sacrament which
we here celebrate, its main object is to bring before us
Christ our Saviour. Other consecrated spots there may
have been in this church, other objects of reverence,
which, from time to time, have attracted deeper atten-
tion. There have been times when the main interest
of the congregation was centred on the tomb or shrine,
now of this king, now of that — now of this illustrious
hero, now of that; or, again, when the preacher was
more regarded than any other part of the service, and
every eye and ear hung on the pulpit ; or, again, when

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 55

the throne of our sovereigns has been the centre of all
the thoughts and feelings of the vast assemblage gath-
ered in these walls. But in our ordinary worship this
is not so ; the Holy Table must always be the chief
object of our interest, for this simple reason, that it
brings before us Christ the Lord, and no one else.

Take away the belief in Christ, and all meaning van-
ishes from this spot ; take away this sacred table, and
there will remain no other outward object in the church
which specially reminds us of Christ — the Lord in the
fulness of His Spirit — the Lord, not in any one aspect
of His appearance, but in the whole of it. To grasp
the entire spiritual truth of Christ's manifestation, to
make it the food of our souls, and the strength of our
minds, is the justification of this sacred ordinance, is
the glorification of this sacred place. This is the true
secret of the mysterious power of the ordinance of the
Lord's Supper, that more than prayer, more than medi-
tation, more than emy other single holy act or word, it
brings us into close communion with the Divine Person,
whom truly to know is life eternal.

It is He who invites us to come. No Man, no Priest,
no Church, steps between us and Him. It is the Lord's
Table, not the table of any particular school or minister;
each communicant draws near on his own responsibility,
for his own good, on the dictates of his own conscience.
Our Table is not fenced by any artificial discipline.
It is not guarded by any fantastic scruples. Whosoever
Cometh to it, and to Him whose Table it is, " earnestly
repenting of his sins, in love and charity with his neigh-
bors, and intending to lead a new life" — shall in no
wise be cast out by the wise and merciful Saviour whose
strength he seeks to gain. And this remembrance of
the pre-eminent greatness of Christ our Saviour, dear to
Christians everywhere, ought to be specially precious

56 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

to Christians and to Englishmen in this church. Here,
where we not only live, but worship in the midst of so
many recollections of a stirring past, so many thoughts
of a stirring present, it is doubly needful to have con-
stantly kept before us that there is One Name, which is
above every name. One Master in whose presence no
one else is master, One whose faith we hold without re-
spect of persons, One whose Spirit, rightly understood,
is the source of all the strength, and freedom, and light,
which makes our country great and glorious, One whose
Cross is a rebuke to all our selfishness, and ignorance,
and narrowness. Look at these marbles and colors;
and when, as after the Passage of the Jordan, your
children shall ask their fathers, now or in time to come,
" what mean those stones " of porphyry and alabaster,
those golden canopies, those glittering mosaics, then
shall you let your children know that they tell us of
the glor}^ of Christ our Lord, that is, of the glory of
Justice and Truth, Purity and Love ; the glorj' of the
love of God to man, the glory of the love of man to
God. It reminds us that the kingdoms of the earth
which have their throne and seat in this place are be-
come the kingdoms of the Lord and of His Christ. It
reminds us that communion with Him and following in
His footsteps is the highest blessing that can be sought
for any worshipper under this roof, from the Queen to
the peasant.

11. It is the Lord's Table. That word recalls to our
minds at once what is the special act of His life which
it commemorates. It is His farewell to His disciples —
it is the fact that in that last farewell. He blessed to
their use, and sanctified by His blessing, common bread
and common wine, our ordinary fare. It is the constant
memorial that Relig^ion and Common Life are mixed
together, one and indivisible ; that our common joys

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 57

and sorrows, the joys of social intercourse, the sorrows
of parting and bereavement, are all sanctified by our
Christian hopes and fears.

The Table ; its very name and shape and material
remind us of that simple repast in the upper chamber
at Jerusalem. So it was always called in the early ages,
so it is still called in the Eastern Churches, so it is
always called in our own Prayer-book. In itself we
need care little of what it is made — wood or stone, or
gold or brass ; yet assuredly, if for a moment one may
dwell on such a mere outward detail, it is interesting to
remember that wood, the usual material of our ordinary
tables, was the material from the earliest times, in East
and West, of our holy Tables also ; that such, too, after
a long interval, it again became at the Reformation ;
and that such in the midst of all these brilliant sur-
roundings it is still in this place. Our richly-adorned
Table is the successor of the plain board which served
for the Last Supper at Jerusalem, of the rough planks
which still at Rome represent what is believed to be the
holiest and most venerable Altar in the City of St.
Peter, of the simple oaken table which, from the
Reformation almost down to the present century, stood
in this place. Despise not the name, or the thing, or
the form ; the more we remember how homely it was in
its origin, how primitive in its outward shape and fash-
ion, the more does it deserve to be honored as the monu-
ment of the most sacred and pathetic parts of the
Christian story. It is the fittest memorial of Him,
whose home was the home of the humble workman, the
carpenter Joseph, of Him who was Himself a carpenter,
laboring with the toil of an Eastern workman, under
the hot sun of the East, till the day's work was over,
of Him who adorned by the first miracle that He
wrought the festive gathering at Cana, who declared

58 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

His acts of mercy chiefly by His feeding the hungry
multitudes, who was known to His disciples chiefly by
the breaking of bread, by the sacred meal in which
He parted from them, by the sacred meal in which He
met them again in the joy of His Resurrection. They
who kneel before it, who receive from it the strength
which its sacred ordinance gives, will remember that its
holy and elevating power depends on its homely signifi-
cance — the Table of all our common tables, as the Bible
is the Book of books.

III. Another name by which we call the Lord's Table
in common speech is the Communion Table. This
name, though not expressly sanctioned by the law of
the Church, indicates a peculiar truth of which we
sometimes lose sight. '' The bread which we break,"
says the Apostle, "is it not a communion" — that is, a
joint partaking — "of the body of Christ? The cup
of blessing which we drink, is it not a communion"
— a joint ijartaking — " of the blood of Christ ? " The
whole force of the word and of the Apostle's argument,
is that it is a communion with each other, through our
joint, common, mutual partaking of the same bread and
the same cup. Round that Table, we become one with
each other, because we become one in Christ. And
here, again, the original position of the Table in all the
older churches of Christendom was a testimony to this
solemn truth. Tn all the churches, where the ancient
arrangements have been preserved, the Table stands not
at the Eastern extremity of the church, but in the cen-
tre ; the clergy on one side, and the congregation on
the other ; literally in the midst of the whole congrega-
tion. So also it was placed in all common English
churches for the first century after the Reformation.
So also during some portions at least of that period it
was in this Abbey. But even before that time, in fact,

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 59

since the thirteenth century, it has, owing to the pecu-
liar conformation of the building, been far more nearly
in the midst of the church, than in most cathedrals;
and, though this arose from other causes, yet when we
look at it in its present position, with the long vista
extending behind it eastward, and before it westward,
we may remark that this central situation represents to
u.'> the original idea of the primitive Eucharist, the cen-
tre of the whole Christian worship;. the meeting-point,
a.) of old, between the clergy and the laity, so here,
between the past and the present, between the dead and
the living ; the dark shades which lie in solitary chapels
and mouldering tombs, behind it ; — the living stir of
human souls, spreading to the right and left, before it.
In this sense may the blessed Sacrament, which is here
administered, be forever a bond of union between all
the different classes of our countrymen — between the
thoughts Avhicli belong to ages past and gone, and the
thoughts which belong to ages present and to come !
It is the pledge and sign of the duty of carrying on, as
best we can, this great Christian Society which we have
inherited; every grade of social life, every mode of
thought, every temper and disposition continuing to
help forward every other in the cause of good.

IV. We are thus brought to one other word which
we apply in common language to the Holy Table — the
Altar. This is a title which, unlike the others of
which I have been speaking, has no direct warrant from
Scripture, from the primitive Church, or from the
Prayer-book. The name " Altar " is not applied to the
Holy Table in any part of the New Testament, or in
any author of the first three centuries (with perhaps
two doubtful exceptions), or in any part of the Prayer-
book. But it is so commonly employed, that we may
well ask whether there is not a sense in which it may,

60 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

after all, be lawfully used. If the name may be any-
where lawfully used, it is here. In the Coronation
Service which has the authority of the Privy Council
of the Sovereign, and which is used within these walls
and nowhere else, our Table is called "an Altar." This
one exception, therefore, will justify us in considering
in what sense the word " Altar," according to common
usage, may be employed for our Sacred Table, what
additional reason is hereby given for its embellishment
and glorification.

" An Altar " means a place where Sacrifice is offered.
Is there any sense in which the Bible and the Prayer-
book acknowledge the offering of Sacrifice at our Holy
Table? There is one passage, most impressive and
most important in our Communion Service, and one
alone, in which the word " Sacrifice " is so used. It is
that prayer in which, after the Communion, we offer to
God " the reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice of our-
selves, our souls and bodies," to be accepted, notwith-
standing our manifold unworthiness, " as our bounden
duty and service."

This is the true Christian Sacrifice, which may well
entitle any place where we offer it to be called an Altar.
This Sacrifice, not made by the Priest or IMinister, but
by the People, this offering not of dead or dumb mate-
rials, but of living, spiritual beings, this pledging of
ourselves to our Master's service, is that which specially
belongs to the Holy Sacrament of the Lord's Supper,
and which may make the spot at which we offer it to
be, in an especial sense, the true Altar of the Chris-
tian's worship.

And well may it thus be called in the one service of
our Church, where, as I have said, it is so called — in
that great solemnity in which the Sovereign is pledged
to maintain the welfare of the people and the faith of

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 61

Christ in this sacred ordinance. That is indeed the
Sacrifice of the prayers and praises of a whole nation,
the Sacrifice of the highest life in this Church and realm
to the good of man and to the glory of God.

And how much is the solemnity of this Sacrifice of
ourselves enhanced, when we make it on the same spot
and in the same ordinance, as brings before us the great
Sacrifice of Christ our Saviour ! That Sacrifice is fin-
ished ; it is full, perfect, and sufficient in itself ; it be-
longs to the past ; it lives only in our grateful memory,
or in its lasting consequences. But, in the sense in
which I have been speaking, it can, and ought, in its
measure, to be repeated, by ourselves, that is, by the
Christian congregation, every time that we approach
the Sacred Table. The Holy Sacrament is the holy
" oath " or pledge of Christian soldiers to their heavenly
Captain. Each one as he kneels there, with all the
past mercies of God full in his remembrance, and all his
present and future duties full in view, declares himself
ready to follow in the steps of the great Self-sacrificer.
" Each 1 one, when he hears the words. This is My body
which is given for you, do this in remembrance of me,
declares himself as answering. Yea, Lord, I am ready
in remembrance of Thee to give also mj^self for the
advance of Thy kingdom. Each one as he hears the
words. This is My blood which is shed for you and for
many for the remission of sins, ought to make the an-
swer in his heart. Yea, Lord, I am ready to shed my
blood also, if thereby the sins of many may be blotted
out."

So viewed, the Holy Table does indeed become an
Altar in the grandest and highest sense, for it combines
within itself the memory of the historical Sacrifice of

1 These words arc taken from a highly instructive passage in Wil-
son's Hampton Lectures on the Communion of Saints.

62 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

Christ long ago, and the perpetuation of the moral and
spiritual Sacrifice of Christians now. "Hereby per-
ceive we the love of God because He laid down His
life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the
brethren."

And there is yet one other Sacrifice, mentioned in
the same prayer in the Communion Service, which 1
reserve for the last, because with this I will conclude —
our Sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. This is the
true Eucharistic Sacrifice. "Eucharist" is thanksgiv-
ing. " It is meet and right, and our bounden duty, to
give thanks to God at all times and in all places, but
chiefly " in this sacred ordinance, when we commemo-
rate the innumerable benefits of Christ's death and pas-
sion ; chiefly on this day, when we have brought to its
desired completion the work which has been wrought
out with such loving care by those who planned and by
those who executed it. They who, month by month,
and week by week, have watched its rise, and raised it
like a tender plant, whose hands have made and fash-
ioned its delicate work and traced its gracious forms,
they who in their different stations, and with their dif-
erent crafts, have labored with exceeding toil to bring
it to its final completion — they may well offer to God
their grateful thanks for having been permitted to bring
to a successful issue the work which they may well call
their own. In it their name and fame, their labor and
their skill are enshrined as a gift to God. " We, God's
humble servants, entirely desire His fatherly goodness
to accept these " as our oblation, our Easter offering.
"The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof;"
every thing that there is of beauty in sculpture, poetry,
painting, or architecture, every thing that there is of
skill in mechanical contrivance, has its religious side,
has the link, if it can be found, which binds it round

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 63

the throne of God and the gates of heaven. The ala-
baster from our Midland quarries, the marble from our
Cornish rocks, the mosaic colors from the isles of Ven-
ice, the porphyry from the shores of the Nile or of the
Bosphorus, the jewels from the far-off coasts of Asia
and America, combine as truly now in the service of
Him, who has " given us the heathen for our possession,
the uttermost parts of the earth for our inheritance,"
as did the gold of Ophir and the sandalwood of India
for the temple of Solomon. It has been our endeavor
not to destroy the old, but to retain from every age
that which can ^ill be used for good, and to add only
that which was required by our increased insight into
Divine Truth, our increased growth of human knowl-
edge. Our forefathers did what they could in former
times, according to their light ; we have done what we
could in our day according to our light. It is the
privilege of our time that we can admire the shell,
without believing it to be the kernel ; and that we can,
whilst we cherish the form, retain the spirit. The
truest worshipper is he who, whilst he does not despise
the accompaniments of earthly beauty, remembers that
appreciation of the past may be combined with hope
for the future ; that art may be made to minister, not
only to the lower objects of religious reverence, but to
the worship of the One Supreme Good and the One
Supreme Truth; that the spiritual and inward is a
thousand times more precious than the material and
the outward, and that the simplicity and sincerity of
our service is a thousand times more beautiful than any
decoration however gorgeous, or any form however
graceful.

It is the last change which this our sanctuary has
witnessed, the last probably that this generation will
witness. Let us hope that every sacrament celebrated

64 THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

under its newly-raised tabernacle may become more
and more what every spiritual communion, and every
spiritual sacrifice, ought to be — a sacrament, or ordi-
nance, in which the outer form is less and less thought
of, and the inner spirit more and more. Let us hope
and pray that the centre of this Abbey, thus adorned
and thus beautified, thus bringing before us in all its
grace and simplicity that which is the centre of all
Christian doctrine — the life and death of Christ —
may become the focus and spring of Christian light
and life to the ever-multiplying population around us.
Let us hope and pray that every marriage of which
that Altar witnesses the celebration, may grow more
and more into the fulness of an English and a Chris-
tian home. Let us hope and pray that when in far
distant years, in each succeeding reign, the Crown of
England is taken from that Table to be placed on the
Sovereign's head, every time that the throne is placed
before it to receive the new occupant, every time that
the blessing of Christ in His holy ordinance is thus in-
voked on this our kingly Commonwealth — let us hope
that the happiness and peace of our Church and king-
dom may spread wider and deeper, as from a more glo-
rious centre, as from a purer spring, as from a higher
source. " Lift up your heads, O ye gates of future
times, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors of the
greatness of England, of the opportunities of Christen-
dom, and the King of Glory shall come in." Who is
the King of Glory ? It is the Lord strong and mighty,
the Lord mighty in battles, the Lord who has been vic-
torious in a thousand battles over sin and evil in all
their forms ; who in the great battle-fields of the world
has put down our ancient foes of slavery and supersti-
tion, and cruel tortures, and oppressive tyranny, and
who will put down no less our present and future foes

THE ALTAR OF WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 65

— indifference, intolerance, drunkenness, anarchy, re-
spect of persons, party spirit, and luxurious selfishness.
It is the Lord of hosts, the Lord of all the armies and
all the soldiers who ever have fought, and ever will fight
for the cause of God ; the Lord of the beneficent ruler
and of the enlightened statesman, of the heaven-inspired
poet and of the skilful artist ; the Lord no less of the
humble and faithful servant, of the artisan honest in his
calling, of the father, husband, son, and brother, strug-
gling each in his own vocation, to build up a pure and
happy home — the Lord of those Warriors and Priests
of the ancient faith, who served the old Altar which has
passed away, no less than of those Pastors and Teachers
who shall have ministered at the new Table which has
risen in its place. The Lord of hosts, He is the King
of Glory, of a glory which belongs to every deed and
thought of secret goodness, to every humble striving
after truth — the glory which we, whether " beholding "
or reflecting "as in a glass, are changed to the same
image from glory into glory by the Spirit of the Lord."

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE.

Easter Day, 1871, on the occasion of the erection of four statues in
the reredos of Westminster Abbey.

In the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four
" living creatures" . . . and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy,
holy, holy. Lord God Almighty, which teas, and v>, and is to come ; and
they give glory and honor and thanks to Him that sitteih on the throne,
who Uvethfor ever and ever. — Rev. iv. 6-8.

This is part of the vision of the Apocalypse, which is
intended to express, in imagery taken from the outer
and lower world, the worship which all creation offers
up to its heavenly Lord. The four figures which thus
appear around the throne are described as having the
strength of the ox, the majesty of the lion, the swiftness
of the eagle, and the intelligence of the man. The
word which is translated "beast" in the Authorized
Version is properly rendered " living creature," as the
corresponding Hebrew word is in the Prophet Ezekiel
(reserving the word "beast" for a totally different
phrase which occurs in the later chapters to designate
the monsters of the deep). The expression "living
creatures " is well chosen to indicate that all created
life is intended to be included in the act of adoration.
The vividness of these words well suits the expression
of thankfulness for God's mercies which the festival of
Easter calls forth. May I be allowed also to take them
as bearing on the illustration of this same truth, by
the erection of the Four Statues which have just been
placed in the vacant niches of this sanctuary ?

66

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE. 67

I. In the first place, this vision of the Apocalypse is
a sanction of the faculty which we call, from this power
of creating images, by the name of " imagination."

(1.) These figures described in the Apocalypse have
(as we know well) no actual existence in the courts of
heaven. But they none the less bear witness to the
truth that such forms are warranted under the Gospel.
The letter of the second commandment, prohibiting the
making of any graven image, had already been aban-
doned, when in Solomon's temple the art of the sculptor
had graven the figures which adorned its cedar walls
and supported its brazen laver.^ But the abundant use
of like images, both in the older prophets and in the
Apocalypse, not indeed by the hand of the inspired
artist, but by the words of the inspired poet, has car-
ried on the principle into detail. The stern simplicity
of the old. Mosaic law belongs to the time when '' the
hardness of the heart " of the ancient people could not
in any other way be kept from idolatry. But this stern
necessity gave way, as in other matters, so in this, be-
fore what St. Paul calls " the riches," the wealth, the
abundance of new thoughts and new resources in the
human mind opened by Christianity. From this time
poetry, painting, music, and sculpture have poured in a
flood of sacred imagery on the world. Sometimes, no
doubt, this has been abused ; sometimes it has been per-
verted to false science, false taste, and false religion.
But in proportion to its perfection it has ministered to
the beauty and sublimity of Christian sentiment ; and
a wise man has well remarked that it is not the perfec-
tion, but the rudeness of the art which leads to super-
stition.2 The veneration of outward objects is often

1 Josephus, Ant., viii. 7, § 5. See Lectures on the Jewish Church, voL
ii. pp. 220, 222.

2 See Milman'3 History of Latin Christianity, ii. 152, 153.

68 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE.

more debasing in the East, where all sculpture is for-
bidden, than in the West, where it has been encouraged.
There is often a superstition quite as gross in iconoclasm
as there is in idolatry ; and it is by an intelligent, Prot-
estant, Christian use of all the arts, whether of the musi
cian, the painter, or the sculptor, that this abuse is best
prevented. Therefore it is that, whilst there is hardly
a corner in this Abbey where the ancient Israelite or
the modern Mussulman would not be shocked at the
representation of living creatures, as if in violation of
the commandment that forbade the erection of graven
images, it is also true that every one of those countless
statues, whether of statesman or poet, whether of alle-
gorical figure or actual human being, is a witness to the
true liberty of the Gospel which has broken loose from
the bondage of the law, and uses freely every faculty
wherewith God has endowed the human soul ; and every
such figure that lives again beneath the sculptor's hand
joins, as it were, in the never-ending, never-ceasing cry
of all creation — " Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty,
that is, and was, and is to come." They proclaim, or
ought to proclaim, the nobleness and the purity of " the
human face divine," which bears on its front the image
and superscription of the Almighty, the marvellous
workmanship of that human frame whioh is "fearfully
and wonderfully made ; " they record for after ages the
head that planned, and the eye that saw, and the hand
that wrote, and the mouth that spake, all those burning
words and melting thoughts by which this State and
Church have been kept revolving round the Eternal
throne.

(2.) May we not also say that this same glorious art
is an illustration, almost an example, of that great truth
of Life and Immortality which the festival of Easter
commemorates? Those who have seen the workshop

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE. 69

of a statuary will enter into the famous saying of one
of the greatest of -modern sculptors (Canova), that " a
statue is born when it is produced in cla}^ that it dies
when it is reproduced in plaster, that it rises again
when it is finally reproduced in marble." That is
exactly what ought to make every such labor of the
sculptor, both to him who works and to him who sees
it, a type and likeness of the transforming changes
wrought in our outward frame and inward character by
the Great Artificer whose workmanship we are.

There is the clay, the soft ductile clay, as in the
hands of the potter, as in the time when " day by day
our members were fashioned when as yet there were
none of them," when our characters were not yet
formed, but were being moulded by the force of circum-
stance or companionship, or human genius, or divine
grace, just as the clay of the statue by the finger of the
artist — here an addition, there a subtraction — is re-
newed daily, we might almost say born again, under the
pressure of his watchful care.

There too is the cold dull outline, when life has van-
ished, when the shroud is around us, when there remains
nothing but the fragile, featureless form, as in the dead
lifeless plaster.

And, lastly, there is the Resurrection. Out of the
block of marble, as if they had been buried within it,
come forth at the successive strokes of the chisel, the
bright, ideal face, and outstretched hand, and firm foot,
by efforts which are indeed likenesses of that trans-
formation described to us by St. Paul, when he tells us
how the " corruptible shall put on incorruption, and the
mortal shall put on immortality." And the marble fig-
ure which so emerges is a pledge — faint and remote, per-
haps, yet still not to be despised — of the undying force
of the human spirit, which thus outlasts the violence of

70 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE.

revolutions and the slow decay of time. If we look on
the face of one whom we ourselves have known thus
" immortalized," as we say, by the sculptor's art, if yet
further we see the face of one that we have never seen
at all, brought near to us, looking oat of the years that
are past and gone, if we see this, not only in the case
of those who have lived within our own time and
country, but in ages long buried, and in countries far
removed ; if we see the Caesars on their pedestals at
Rome, or the yet more distant Pharaohs in the sands of
Egypt, not hundreds but thousands of years ago ; yet
more, if we see those of whose form and figure we
know nothing, but for whose disembodied spirits the
skill and genius of later times have furnished forth an
outward frame to enshrine the ideal of what we think
they must have been — then indeed we feel that there
is something in the human mind triumphant over mat-
ter, that there is even on earth a victory stolen from the
grave, and a sting from death ; we feel that after the
natural earthly body has perished there may well be a
spiritual ideal body for each human soul, " one glory
for one, and another for another " — that God, out of
His infinite treasure-house, may well give to each a new
form and existence, " as it shall please Him."

(3.) We learn thus to appreciate the bright future,
the lofty ideal of human nature and of human destiny.
It is of little matter to us whence we have descended,
out of what materials our first ancestors were created,
even though it be, as the Bible tells us, from '' the very
dust of the ground." But it is of infinite moment to
us to feel, to know what we actually are, what the high
capacities we possess, what the great responsibilities
which rest upon us, what the eternal destiny which may
be in store for us. It is for this that every noble exer-
cise of the faculties which God has given us, every con-

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE. 71

scientious work, in which we labor to produce some-
thing which shall outlast ourselves or our generation,
is a gift as from immortal spirits to an Immortal Spirit.
" God is not a God of the dead, but of the living."
Those bright ideas, those finer qualities of the human
soul which art labors to perpetuate, and which science
delights to explore, are the pledges that God will not
despise the works of His hands, that we shall live on,
in spite of death and time.

II. Such is the general lesson of the contemplation
of the creation of man, and of the efforts of Christian
art to perpetuate its glories.

And now let us briefly describe the special ideas in-
tended to be conveyed by the Four Living Creatures —
the four gifted human beings — whose images have just
been erected around the Holy Table.

They represent four characteristics of the human
race in its highest perfection, which seemed the fittest
homage to be paid in this place to our Creator and
Hedeemer.^

The two figures which stand in the centre are the
two chief Apostles, always united in primitive art, as
they are in the Bible itself.

The one on the right of the Table is St. Peter, to
whom, from the special predilection of our Founder,
this Church was dedicated. He represents the solid
rock, the outward framework, on which and in which
the Church was built — its ancient, universal, catholic
aspect. He stands erect like a pillar of the fabric ;
the keys of government are in his hands, and on his
book are written those words of universal comprehen-

1 The new statues here described, the work of Mr. Armstead, are
placed in the vacant niches above the Communion Table, on each side
of the mosaic picture of the Last Supper, and underneath the frieze
representing the events of the Gospel history.

72 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE.

sion by which he opened, as with a golden key, the
kingdom of heaven to the whole rac6 of man, — " God
is no respecter of persons.''''

By his side is St. Paul, who, on the other hand, rep-
resents the fervor, the life, the freedom of the Church,
to which St. Peter gave the outward framework. He
stands with outstretched hand, as on Mars' Hill at
Athens, as on the Temple stairs at Jerusalem, or before
Agrippa at Caesarea — the great teacher, the fiery
preacher ; and he grasps the sword by which he suffered
martyrdom, but which is also the emblem of the word
that he preached, "quick, and powerful, and sharper
than any two-edgfed sword, piercing even to the divid-
ing asunder of soul and spirit," "rightly dividing the
word of truth," in those weighty epistles on which is
inscribed the corresponding name of " the sword of the
Spirit.''''

These are the two great human forces of our religion
— which, in their widest form, are called Christendom
and Christianity — the vast outward framework and
the moving inward spirit. All that constitutes the
true strength of the ancient Catholic Church in Peter,
all that constitutes the true strength of the Reformed
Churches in Paul, is represented in them. Lovely and
pleasant were the two Apostles in their lives, and in
their deaths they were not divided. Truly do they
here bring before us the union of the old and the new,
the depth and the breadth, which is the glory of all
Christian worship and of all Christian faith.

And now let us turn to the farther right and to the
farther left. On the right of Peter is the great law-
giver of the old dispensation, who by the early Christians
was regarded as his forerunner — Moses, the founder
of the Jewish Commonwealth, as Peter of the Christian

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE. 73

Church. There he stands, as he came down from Mount
Sinai, bearing in his hands the tables on which are
written the first words of the Ten Commandments ;
and in him we see the representative of the general idea
of statesmanship and law. He gathers up in his person
the memories of our own famous statesmen, buried in
the North aisle of the Church, towards which he looks
— lawgivers, rulers of the people, pillars of the State,
who are in the world at large what Peter and Peter's
true spiritual successors have been in the Church.

On the other side, corresponding to St. Paul, is the
greatest teacher of the Jewish Church — David, the
royal poet and prophet, who, by the lofty spirit, the eter-
nal truths, of his Psalter has sanctified, for every age,
the philosophy, the learning, the poetry of all mankind.
As Moses looks towards our buried statesmen, so David
stands beside our buried poets. As Moses combines
with Peter to represent the solid forces which bind
together the commonwealths and churches of the earth,
so David combines with Paul to represent the ethereal
grace, the prophetic zeal, the poetic fire, which still,
through a thousand voices, breathe the ancient " RaU
lelujah'' first adequately expressed by the strains of his
harp, on which it is inscribed.

These are the Four Living Creatures which have
been thought worthy to stand round the central figure
of our departing Master, the four elements of life,
which are the fitting emblems of the purposes of this
sacred building — the all-embracing order, the all-awak-
ening energy, which give life to the Church, the sus-
taining force of heaven-sent law, the informing force of
inspired genius, which give life to the world. We can-
not spare any of them from our earthly existence. Let
us remember them in our spiritual worship. Let us, as

74 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF SCULPTURE.

we see them thus exalted, remember that they all, and

we with them, have the same divine function of giving

» glory and honor and thanks to Him that sits on the '.

throne, who liveth for ever and ever " — to Him " who ^ ,

was dead and is alive for evermore." j

A THREEFOLD CALL.

Jane 28, 1868, the anniversary of the Queen's coronation, on the occa-
sion of the public thanksgiving for the escape of H.R.H. the Duke
of Edinburgh and for the success of the Abyssinian War.

Speak, Lord ; for Thy servant heareth. — 1 Sam. iii. 9.^

So spoke the youthful Prophet and ruler after he had
thrice heard the Divine call. It was in the darkness
of the early morning.; the seven-hranched candlestick
alone lighted up the curtains of the Tabernacle. There
knelt the innocent child, as we see him pictured by the
greatest of English painters ; his little hands clasped in
praj^er; his bright eyes looking upwards towards a
light which none but he could see, towards a voice
which none but he could hear — the likeness of that
touching sight which every parent knows who sees his
little ones first beginning to falter their infant prayers,
and murmur their infant hymns.

But the same truth which is taught us by the sight of
our children at their prayers — all attention, all recep-
tion— by the story of the 3^oung Hebrew Prophet thus
receiving deep into his soul the first of that long succes-
sion of prophetic revelations, is forced upon us by the
more impressive events of the lives, whether of nations
or of individuals. Again and again a call is made to us,
as distinct, if we would but listen to it, as that which
came to Samuel. A call to duty, a call to thankfulness,
a call to better and serious thoughts ; and what is

1 First Lesson of the Evening Service.

76

76 A THREEFOLD CALL.

needed is that we should be able to say, " Speak, Lord ;
for Thy servant heareth." That is the difficulty.
The whirl of business, the succession of enjoyments, the
clatter of voices around us, the strife of parties, the
drowsiness of indolence, the blindness of passion, the
deafness of prejudice — all these distract our attention,
shut our eyes, close our ears. It is this need of a pause,
of a lull, which makes it good for us to have our
thoughts arrested and diverted by any marked anniver-
sarj^, by an}' solemn remembrance of public events, by
any stirring incident in our own experience. A silence
then falls around us ; a still small voice can then make
itself audible. The Lord speaks ; and for the moment
our ears are open to hear His call.

Such a call, in more ways than one, this day brings
to us.

I. It is now just thirty years since this Abbey was
the scene of the most splendid and moving spectacle
that our generation has witnessed. It was on the 28th
of June, 1838, that the nobles, commons, and clergy of
England were gathered within these walls to welcome
to the throne a Sovereign, whose youthful promise and
queenly grace awakened again a flame of loyal devotion,
a spring of serious hope, such as was thought to have
well-nigh died out from amongst us. To her, on that
bright summer day, came the awful, yet inspiring sum-
mons to preside wisely and justly over the great people
here represented around her. And to the nation at
large, not only in this Abbey, or in this metropolis, but
in many a rustic church, and in many a retired village,
throughout the Empire, was brought home the feeling
that we were one people and one family, with one heart
and one soul, bound together to promote each other's
welfare, and to lift our thoughts upwards to whatsoever
tilings were true and honest, just and pure, lovely and

A THREEFOLD CALL. 77

of good report. It was this common feeling of national
unity and national duty — this electric sentiment with
which the whole air was charged, that gave a deeper
meaning to every word of that solemn ceremony, a fresh
significance to every splendor of that grand pageant.
The Queen was in the midst of her people ; each on that
day was given to each ; a new era seemed to open for
each ; an era of new happiness and usefulness for the
one, of new glory and greatness for the other — of Chris-
tian progress towards perfection for both.

Thirty years have passed away, thirty years of how
much loss and of how much gain to all of us ! How
many have been snatched away from the home, or
Church, or State, or Throne of which ftiey were the
stay and support. How many have been the noble
opportunities passed by, how many the good deeds not
attempted until it was, or seemed to be, too late I And
yet how much also has been added to us ; how happily
round that royal seat have risen up the children, and
the children's children of the future dynasty ; how much
of pure renown has been added to the English name in
peace and war ; how many a noble Christian deed has
lighted up far and wide the dark corners of our land !
In the mere thought of these vicissitudes — in the grate-
ful remembrance of what has been done for us, of evils
extinguished which, we trust, shall never reappear, of
good accomplished which, we trust, shall never be re-
versed — in the bitter grief for good which might have
been done and has been left undone — in the enkind-
ling hope of all the splendid and useful and holy works
that still remain to be done — in all these thoughts the
call is repeated this day ; and may each of us, from the
highest to the lowest, renew that covenant which then
was made, and say, "Speak, Lord; for Thy servant
heareth." The nation has advanced fast and far on its

78 A THREEFOLD CALL.

way ; the nineteenth century itself is moving towards
its close. It is for each one of us to keep pace with it,
to feel that on each and all of us depends the right
direction of that onward journey. " Speak, Lord ; " let
us hear and understand Thy will ; we are indeed all
ears to hear, and all eyes to see, if Thou wilt but guide
us rightly.

II. And now there come to us two special calls again,
from most different quarters, awakening most different
feelings, yet still pointing to the same end ; calls from
the uttermost extremities of the earth, which reached
our shores within the same twenty-four hours, and which
by this very coincidence made us feel the vastness and
variety of the* sphere, the loftiness and breadth of the
task, which Englishmen have before them.

Let us ask what is the call conveyed to us in each of
the two events, for which we are invited to express our
thankfulness to Almighty God, and which are thus hap-
pily combined on this auspicious day. In each there is
a lesson beyond the event itself. Let us open our ears
to hear it.

Look first at the victory with which our arms have
been crowned in Abyssinia. Rarely indeed in the
annals of warfare, has a great purpose been carried out
so exactly within the limits of time and space, foreseen
and prescribed, as that which the endurance of our
soldiers and the skill of their chiefs have accomplished
in that distant land. For this blessed close of deep
anxiety, for these marvellous gifts of God's Spirit to
our race and country, we offer our unfeigned thanks.
But even more than these is the mercy vouchsafed to us
of the power of showing in the light of these achieve-
ments, the bright example of a war unstained by the
slightest tinge of ambition, by the slightest taint of
gain — a war, reluctantly undertaken, laboriously car-

A THREEFOLD CALL. 79

ried out, magnificently successful, not for the sake of
territory or wealth, but for the sake of redeeming from
captivity a handful of Englishmen, with their wives
and children. The European world looked at our
armament with wonder ; they treated with incredulous
scorn our protestations that so vast an enterprise was
undertaken for so small an object ; they could not think
it possible that a great nation would enter on so great a
war for so simple and so barren a purpose. Thank
God, we have shown that it was possible ; and therefore
when we read of that long march for many a weary
league, over Alpine heights, and under burning suns,
of that fierce fight on Good Friday morning, of the
entrance into that mountain fastness on Easter Mon-
day, it is not so much over the fall of Magdala, or the
death of its chief, that we triumph gloriously, as over
the false and wicked doctrine that nations can only
fight for unworthy objects, and soldiers be courageous
only when their recompense is plunder. It is not so
much for the valor of the enterprise or the splendor of
the achievement that we thank Almighty God, as be-
cause He has, by that valor and that splendor, enabled
us to set " on a hill which cannot be hid " the great
Christian principle of uniting might with right, power
with forbearance. " Better is he that ruleth his own
spirit than he that taketh a city." As a just cause
is a sufficient ground for a mighty war, so also a just
cause is its own sufficient and exceeding great reward.
" Speak, Lord," to England and to Europe — " speak.
Lord," and let Thy servants hear. Let us hear in those
trumpet-calls of Abyssinian victory, the call to justice
and mercy, wherever God shall lead us. Let us, as our
hearts throb in receiving back our soldiers from that
strange mysterious country, welcome in them the true
successors and sons of the knights of old, who fought

80 A THREEFOLD CALL.

for truth and right, not for gold or land ; let ns feel
that in their deeds humanity itself has made a step
onwards, and that the kingdom of God which is not of
this world has acquired a new possession in the heart
and mind of Christendom. Let us be taught to value
the Divine gifts of courage and skill ; but let us be
taught to value still more deeply the Divine duties of
justice, generosity, and self-control.

III. There is another call of God from a yet more
distant shore, which comes still nearer home. It is that
which reaches all our hearts through the merciful
Providence which has sheltered from death a Prince of
our Royal House. ^

The horror of a reckless crime, the thankfulness for a
life full of youthful hope rescued from, an untimely end,
the sympathy with those who have thus regained, as on
this day, a son, a brother, from the grave — these are
the natural Christian feelings which rise unbidden to
every heart, and which are but weakened by the reflec-
tions of preacher or teacher. As in the most pathetic
of all the Gospel miracles, the great Healer of sorrows
has raised from the bier " the son of his mother."
" Young man, I say unto thee, arise. And He deliv-
ered him to his mother ; and she was a widow." In
the words also of the most pathetic of all the Gospel
parables, " It is meet that we should make merry and
be glad ; for this thy brother was dead and is alive
again, was lost and is found."

" It is indeed very meet, right, and our bounden duty,
that we should at all times and in all places give thanks
to Thee, O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty Everlasting
God," whenever the springs of pure domestic love are
stirred within us, whenever a sudden shock awakens us

1 Referring to the attempt to assassinate the Duke of Edinburgh at
Sydney, March 12, 18G8.

A THREEFOLD CALL. 81

to the sense of the nearness and clearness of family ties,
and home-affections. Never may we cease to feel the
force of that sacred passion. Never may we cease to
rise above ourselves into the fellow-feeling of delight
with which the brother welcomes home the brother, and
the mother the son. " Speak, Lord," on this, and like
occasions, to all our hearts. We are silent ; our com-
mon, vulgar, baser, selfish murmurings and babblings
are hushed. Speak to us, for Thy servants hear ; speak
to us of tender kindly emotions ; speak to us of the
blessedness of peacemakers ; speak to us of the purity
and loveliness of domestic affections ; speak to us of
the infinite preciousness of a life, of a living soul, res-
cued from sudden destruction, preserved for all those
noble and beneficent purposes which God places before
each human spirit, specially before those whom He has
set in the high places of the earth, and endowed with
the capacities of greatness.

And here again, as in that other call of which I spoke,
there comes a voice of yet deeper import, a strain of a
yet higher mood, than at first catches our ears. That
life which has been rescued is not a mere private life.
It is one of a house which belongs not only to the na-
tion but to the Empire. In those far-off regions where
it occurred, the bright side of this dark event has been,
that it has awakened a sentiment of loyal, generous,
unselfish, enthusiastic affection for the country and for
the throne of England, such as even here we rarely see,
such as there we hardly knew to exist. Old men, they
say, wept for grief to think that such an inhospitable
deed should have darkened their shores ; the whole com-
munity went beyond and beside themselves in tokens
of sympathy with the youthful sufferer, of thankfulness
for his deliverance. By that one act the whole vast
continent of Australia — the whole range of English
settlements along the coasts of all the Australasian

82 A THREEFOLD CALL.

Islands was moved in oneness of heart and soul with
this their mother-country. They and we have been
alike made to feel that we were members of one race
and family, children of the same sacred hearth, subjects
and fellow-citizens of the same royal commonwealth,
heirs of the same great name, of the same exalted
duties. To awaken such a feeling as this is the true
mission of an English Prince. To furnish this link
between the old world and the new, between England
as she is and has been, and England's sons wherever
they wander over the wide world's surface, is indeed
the very task to which the children of our regal house
are called, and which their royal parents fondly dreamed
for them. To have become the centre of such a sympa-
thy is indeed worth living for, is indeed a recompense
for hairbreadth escapes, for suffering days and nights,
the true reward of all kingly and princely labors,
" good measure, pressed down, and running over, given
into their bosom."

"Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth." JSTot for
ourselves do we act, but for others ; not for our own
circle only, but for the great country which is our in-
heritance ; not for England only, but for all those mul-
titudes of men and nations, that bear the English name
and speak the English tongue, do our actions, some
more, some less, extend their influence for good or for
evil. In the silence of that vast expectant multitude,
in the presence of those thousands and tens of thou-
sands, seen or unseen by us, we have to perform our
parts in this our generation. Speak, Lord ; our souls
are hushed to hear what Thou hast to say to us. Great
is the stake, overwhelming may be the risks — most
glorious are the opportunities. Speak, Lord, and show
us what our duty is — how high, how difficult, yet how
happy, how blessed — show us what our duty is, and,
0 great God and Father, give us strength to dp it I

THE NATIONAL THANKSGIVING,

I. —DEATH AND LIFE.

December 10, 1871, during the illness of the Prince of Wales.
To live is Christ, and to die is gain. — Phil. i. 21.

On a day like this, when there is one topic in every
household, one question on ever}^ lip, it is impossible
to stand in this place and not endeavor to give some
expression to that of which every heart is full. By a
natural Christian instinct, the whole nation is gathered
into one focus. We all press, as it were, round one
darkened chamber, we all feel that with the mourniag
family, mother, wife, brothers, sisters, who are there
assembled, we are indeed one. The thrill of their fears
or hopes passes through and through the differences
of rank and station ; we feel that, whilst they represent
the whole people, they also represent and are that
which each family, and each member of each family,
is separately. In the fierce battle between Life and
Death, for the issues of which we are all looking with
such eager expectation, we see the likeness of what will
befall every individual soul amongst us ; and the reflec-
tion which this struggle, with all its manifold uncertain-
ties, suggests, concerns us all alike.

I have thought, therefore, that it is best to fix our

83

81 DEATH AND LIFE.

minds for a few moments on what that struggle in-
volves — to ask what are the true lessons of Life and
of Death ; to ask why it is that, whether as men, or
citizens, or Christians, we desire with such prolonged
earnestness that Life, and not Death, may be the issue
of this mortal agony.

In doing so, let us be guided by the words of St.
Paul. He is writing to his best-beloved converts. He
opens his heart more fully to them than to any others.
He admits them, as though they were his own brothers
and friends, to his innermost chamber. He discloses to
them his doubts, his anxieties, his weaknesses. He
describes to them the danger in which he is — danger,
we know not whether of natural sickness or of a violent
end. He looks on Death and he looks on Life, and he
knows not which to choose ; he sees the good of each.
At last he decides that what might have seemed the best
for him is not really the best : that what might have
seemed the worst for him is not really the worst. He
tells us, in short, what are the reasons for desiring
Death ; but he tells us still more strongly what are the
reasons for desiring Life.

It may seem almost cold thus to balance and weigh
the searchings of the heart at such moments. Yet
it was not coldness in the Apostle ; it was the depth
of tenderness. It is not coldness in us ; it is the only
channel into which we can profitably turn our thoughts
on such an occasion, and make it yield its proper lesson.

I have, before this, in quite another connection,
used these words of the Apostle. I know not how
to do better than to use them again to-day, sharpened
and pointed as they are by the feelings of the moment,
even to " the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and
discerning the thoughts and intents " of our innermost
hearts.

DEATH AND LIFE. 85

To die is gain. Who is there that has not from time
to time felt this, as he looks at the sufferings of this
mortal life ; as he thinks of the wearing nights and
days of sickness, of the restlessness, the sinking, the
pain, the despair, the distress of the watchers, the pro-
longed agony of the bystanders ; as he looks at the
miseries of this sinful world — the disappointments of
brilliant hopes, the sore temptations to evil, the mul-
tiplied chances of failure? Who, as he thus thinks
of himself or of others, has not been moved to say, from
time to time, " Oh that I had the wings of a dove, that
I might flee far away and be at rest ! " It is the feel-
ing beautifully expressed by the greatest of our poets,
when he says : —

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry, —

As, to behold desert, a beggar born,
And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity,

And purest faith unhappily forsworn,
And gilded honor shamefully misplaced,
And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,

And art made tongue-tied by authority,
And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill,

And simple truth, miscall'd simplicity,
And captive Good attending Captain 111 ;
Tired with all these, from these would I be gone.

So wrote Shakespeare in his famous sonnet, and so
felt even the great Apostle when, amidst the desertion
of friends, and the hard struggle of truth against false-
hood and good against evil, he desired to be at rest and
be with his Master beyond the grave, which, he says,
" would be far better."

So, too, we for ourselves, and for those that we love,
and for those whose lives are fraught with so many
chances of fatal shipwreck, may well long for that day
when we and they shall have shuffled off this mortal

86 DEATH AND LIFE.

coil ; when we shall have done with the anxious trials,
the paltr}^ quarrels, the baffled hopes, the grinding toil
of the great Babylon of this harassing world ; when we
shall have escaped from the burden and heat of the day,
from the roar and tumult of the swollen torrent of life,
to be with those beloved departed.

Who in the mountain grots of Eden lie,
And hear the fourfold river as it murmurs by.

In this sense death is, and must be, a gain to all.
And it is by reflecting on this clear gain that the mind
bows itself to the Supreme Will, and the heart nerves
itself to the terrible thought of the last dread summons
from all that we see and love in this earthly scene. It
is for this that, in the language of our Visitation Ser-
vice, we commit the soul with such assured confidence
into the hands of its faithful Creator and most merci-
ful Saviour.

But the Apostle tells us that, after all, there is some-
thing yet greater than the gain and rest of Death, and
that is the struggle and victory of Life. Death was
gain to him, but Life was something more. " To live
is Christ." Death in one sense is the gate of Life
eternal ; but Life — this mortal life — is the only true
gate of a happy and peaceful death. It is in Life — in
the wear and tear of Life — that those graces must be
wrought and fashioned which perfect the soul, immortal
over Death. " Reckon yourselves," says the Apostle,
" to be dead to sin.'' But there is something much
more than this, " Reckon yourselves to he alive to God
through Christ." He preaches with all his heart and
soul, not the worthlessness, but the infinite preciousness
of Life.

Those lines from our great poet, which I quoted
just now, describing his weariness of the world, close

DEATH AND LIFE. 87

with the one thought which reconciled him to remain-
ing: —

Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,
Save that, to die, I leave my love alone.

That, doubtless, is one chief thought that makes
earthly life dear to us — the thought that it contains
those whom our departure would leave desolate and
alone. But in fact this sense of human love is a like-
ness, like all pure earthly affections, of a feeling far
higher. When the heathen, when the unbeliever have
often sought escape from the troubles of life by self-
destruction, they have done so to escape from that
which to them had no sacred value. But the Christian,
the believer in God and in Christ, has, or ought to
have, the abiding consciousness that in Life there are
not only (it may be) the dearest objects of his earthly
affection, but that there is the very work, the very pres-
ence of Christ. It is one of the points of coincidence
between true Christianity and true civilization. As
mankind advances in civilization, human life becomes
more sacred, more precious ; as mankind advances in
Christianity, the human soul, which is but another word
for human life, becomes more precious, more sacred
also. By leaving our work here before the time, we
should leave His work undone. By turning our backs
in self-will or impatience on this mortal scene, we should
be turning our backs on Him who is in those very suf-
ferings and struggles most surely to be found.

Every kindness done to others in our daily walk,
every attempt to make others happy, every prejudice
overcome, every truth more clearly perceived, every
difficulty subdued, every sin left behind, every tempta-
tion trampled under foot, every step forward in the
cause of good, is a step nearer to the life of Christ,

88 DEATH AND LIFE.

through which only death can be really a gain to us.
Death may be great, but Life is greater still. Death
may be a state to be desired for ourselves, rejoiced in
for others, but Life is the state in which Christ makes
Himself known to us, and through which we must make
ourselves known to Him. He sanctified and glorified
every stage of it. He was a little child, and showed us
how good it was to be obedient to our parents, how dear
to a mother a child could be ; how He never forgot her,
but even on the cross thought of what would soothe and
comfort her. He grew up to boyhood, he showed us
how to learn, both by hearing and asking questions;
how early He could be busied in doing His Father's
work. He showed us in full manhood how, in the midst
of the world, and of constant pressing duties, many com-
ing and going, in feasting and in company, no less than
in serious moments. He was still the same Divine Mas-
ter and Friend. He showed us in the desolation and
solitude of Gethsemane and Calvary, when He seemed
to be left, unsupported, to Himself, that He was yet not
alone, because the Father was with Him. This is the
way in which this poor human life may become a Di-
vine life, may become a life of Christ.

Therefore, when we apply these words and thoughts
to ourselves, what is it but to dwell not on the misuse,
but on the use of our existence ? Think how much yet
remains to be done in the thirty, twenty — yes, even in
the ten years, or perhaps in the one year, perhaps even
in the one day, that yet may remain to us. Despise it
not, neglect it not ; cherish, enlarge, improve this vast,
this inestimable gift, whilst it is granted to us with its
endless opportunities, with its boundless capacities, with
its glorious hopes, with its indispensable calls, with its
immense results, with its rare chances of repentance,
of improvement, even for the humblest and weakest

DEATH AND LIFE. 89

To rise above ourselves, to lose ourselves in the
thought of the work, great or small, that God has
placed before us — to live in that life which is indeed
eternal, because it belongs both to this world and the
next — for the sake of doing this the Apostle could
consent to live, could prefer life with all its sorrows to
death with all its gain. " God is not a God of the dead,
but of the living." Christ is not a dead Christ, but a
living Christ. " The living, the living, he shall praise
Thee, he shall serve Thee." The varied duties of com-
mon life — the trivial round, the common task — are
the means b}^ which we carry on the true Apostolical
succession of Christ's first servants. " There may be
everywhere" — I quote the words of a devoted Chris-
tian of another country — "there may be everywhere
a silent apostleship, a persuasive and incessant sermon
— namely, the natural brightness of a profound and
true content. Never can the immortal hopes to which
our devotion renders its sacrifice be so well proclaimed
by our words, as by the radiant tranquillity of that
inward repose which comes up from the heart to the
countenance." " I find " — so said this same saint-like
person — "I find Death perfectly desirable, but I find
Life perfectly beautiful."

And what is true of the life of individuals is true also
of the life of great communities. There is, indeed, both
of individuals and of nations, a life which is not a life,
empty, dead, barren, a mere existence, vanity of vanities.
But the collective life of thousands of English Christian
souls — the life of the heart of a great people — life, not
stagnation, life, not idleness, — is the very element, the
living element in which the spirit of man lives and
makes others live, of whicli the Spirit of Christ, which
is Christ Himself, is the life and the light. This is what
is meant by saying that the Church — that is the Chris-

90 DEATH AND LIFE.

tian society, the living company of all good men, the
souls and hearts of Christian men and women — forms
" the Body " of Christ. We, whether singly or collect-
ively, are His representatives ; we are (so the Bible
repeatedly tells us) His very self. In all that is best
and purest in us, in our duties, in our hopes. He lives.
Because He lives we live. Because we live He lives.
It is sometimes asked — it was asked the other day by
an eloquent preacher in the great neighboring Cathedral

— whether the Christ, the Historical Person who lived
eighteen hundred years ago, is still alive amongst us.
It is also sometimes asked, in many forms, and with
many forms of reply, how and where Christ's presence
is to be found and felt. But the best answer to all
these questions is the answer of the Apostle, " To live
is Christ." It is so, as I have said, on the smallest scale
in our individual existence. It is so on the largest scale.
" The Life of Christendom is the Life of Christ." That
is the proof, the evidence, the direct continuation of the
Life of Christ. It is through the multitudinous mass of
living human hearts, of human acts and words of love
and truth, that the Christ of the first century becomes
the Christ of the nineteenth. Each successive age,
each separate nation, does His work on a larger and
still larger scale. The arts, the literature, the sciences,
the charities, the liberties, the laws, the worship of the
commonwealths of Christian Europe are all parts of the
living body of Christ. Their influence on us is part
of His influence. Their benefits to us are part of " the
innumerable benefits of His Cross and Passion." To
live under the best influences of Christendom, to live
under the best influences of Christian England, this for
us, and this onl}^ is — the Apostle allows us to say so

— is Christ Himself.

And now, O my brethren, if there be an individual

DEATH AND LIFE. 91

life to which much that I have already said be appli-
cable ; a life dear to hundreds of loving friends, and to
a most loving family ; a life which in their service and
affection finds its best inspirations and its best vital-
ity ; a life which had till now (humanly speaking) long
years of usefulness and happiness before it — then for
the preservation of that life, for the sake of him who
now lies on the dark confines of hope and fear, and for
the sake of those most near and dear to him, we may,
and must earnestly pray, and trust that it may by God's
blessing be preserved. And when we add the further
thought that this is a life which may, if so be, influence
to an untold degree the .national existence of which I
just now spoke — a life which, if duly appreciated and
fitly used, contains within it special opportunities of
good such as no other existence in this great commun-
ity possesses ; a life which may, if worthily employed,
stimulate all that is noble and beneficent, and discour-
age all that is low and base and frivolous ; which, from
its exceptional position, will have the power of moder-
ating the extremes of party zeal, and of pursuing the
common weal of all with an energy not weakened or
divided by local or partial claims; a life which, if
spared, may be the instrument for making us more and
more to be of one mind and heart in all that is just and
good, even as at this moment the fear of losing it has
brought us all together with one heart and one soul —
such a life is worth living, is worth praying for. And
for such a life, for such a Royal life — which is so dear
now to those who watch its fluctuations from hour to
hour beside and around the bed of sickness, which may,
with God's blessing, be so precious for our cliildren and
our children's children — we pray that it may yet be
prolonged for the good of men and the glory of God,
through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who is ''the Kesur-

92 THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

rection and the Life, in whom whosoever believeth,
though he were dead yet shall he live."

n.— THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

December 17, 1871.

/ was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great
voicey as of a trumpet. — Rev. i. 10.

The new Calendar of Lessons, which has been fol-
lowed for some months in this church, introduces for the
first time in the Services of this Sunday portions from
the Book of the Revelation of St. John. The history
of the reception of that book in the Church is curious
and instructive. For the first three centuries it was
not regularly received amongst the Canonical Books of
Scripture, and even after it was received, even at the
time of the Reformation, very few lessons were selected
from it to be read in public. The reasons for this are
obvious. The book is in fact exceedngly obscure —
and it has been made even more obscure by the fancies
of interpreters. It was also in ancient times looked
upon askance, because it was the favorite text-book of
those who were then thought heretics, and in modern
times because it has been the favorite text-book of
angry polemics and fanciful diviners of the future —
the source whence have been drawn weapons of offence
against theological adversaries, or imaginary pictures of
the history of modern Europe. But in spite of these
objections, it has, by the force of its sublime poetic
form and its high moral tone, held its ground ; and the
true instinct of Christendom has been shown in the

THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS. 93

fact, that without the sanction of Councils and against
the opinion of great prehxtes, this mysterious book has
gradually forced its way into the Canon of Scripture,
and now at last, after having been almost excluded from
the public service of the English Church, it has been
appointed to be read during the last month in the year,
when its lessons naturally fall in with the season of
Advent. Some chapters are still omitted, as fit rather
for the solitary student than for tlie mixed congrega-
tion. But there is enough given to ex^^ress the general
tenor of the book, and it is of this general tenor that I
propose to speak, and of this with its special applica-
tion to ourselves.

The Prophet (for as such we must regard the author
of this sacred book) was on the solitary island of Patmos,
withdrawn from earthly things, like Moses on Sinai, or
Elijah on Carmel. Round about him was the bright
^gean Sea, with its hundred isles and the neighboring
mountains of Asia Minor, within whose circle lay the
familiar Seven Churches to which his epistles and ad-
dresses were sent.^ And it was on the Lord's Day.
He was wrapt in the stillness and devotion of the day,
already even in that early time set apart for the con-
templation of heavenly things. Such was the external
framework of the prophecy. It was in this solitude, in
this solemn scene, from this lonely peak of speculation,
that there was unrolled before the eye of his spirit that
vision of the future which is called the " Apocalypse,"
that is the ''Revelation," the ''Unveiling" of the will
and purpose of Providence.

Amidst all that is obscure and difficidt, there are two
main features of this Revelation which may be easily
described and easily understood. The first is that, as
in all the prophetic visions of the Bible, the outward

1 See Appendix to Sermons in the East, pp. 225-31.

94 THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

\

imagery is taken from the objects and circumstances
immediately at hand and around. Not only do the
bright sky, the wide sea, the lofty mountains, the gro-
tesque rocks, the sandy beach, of Patmos and the adja-
cent islands enter into the picture, but the whole tissue
of the visions themselves is drawn from the events with
which the atmosphere of that portentous time was
charged. It was the period which witnessed the fulfil-
ment of those signs* in earth and heaven which are set
forth in the Gospel records brought before us at this
season. The long peace which had prevailed through-
out the world down to the death of the Emperor Nero
had just been broken up. It was the epoch which the
Roman historian describes as " teeming with disasters,
terrible in war, rent with faction, savage even in peace."
From the Northern Ocean to the ^gean coasts, all was
in confusion and alarm ; wars and rumors of wars, earth-
quakes, volcanoes, armies marching and countermarch-
ing, the fall of Jerasalem, the burning of Rome, the
overthrow of the cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii,
the barbarians hanging on the frontier, dynasty after
dynasty succeeding each other on the imperial throne,
"the powers of heaven shaken, men's hearts failing
them for fear of those things that were coming on the
earth." This was the horizon on which the Prophet
looked out, and it was the thought of these calamities
which presented to him the imagery of those prophecies
which have themselves continued the like imagery for
all such convulsions in every age. The " thunderings
and lightnings and earthquakes," " the trumpets of
war " and " the vials of wrath," the overthrow of the
Imperial city on her seven hills, the bottomless pit, and
Death on his pale horse, all these are the signs which
he read in the lowering heavens and the distracted earth
of his own times. And on the other hand, the martyrs

THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS. 95

under the throne, the white-robed army of saints, the
new Jerusalem coming down as a bride adorned for her
husband, were suggested by the thought of the little
band of Christians already spreading through the Em-
pire, already becoming the centres of light and life and
truth amidst a corrupt, decaying, and dissolving world ;
struggling against their fanatical persecutors in the Jew-
ish Church, and their heathen persecutors in the Roman
Empire, yet still holding their own, and containing
within themselves the pledge of the future of civiliza-
tion and of Christianity. It is needless, it is futile to
seek in these chapters for the detailed history of our
own recent times. They have no relation to modern
events ; they belong, as far as their letter is concerned,
to the States and the Churches which formed the hori-
zon, far or near, of the Seer on the rock of Patmos, in
the first century of the Christian era — not to the States
and Churches of Italy, France, Germany, or England,
in the sixteenth, or eighteenth, or nineteenth, or twen-
tieth centuries, as some in all succeeding generations
have vainly tried to find them.

There is much in them that we shall never understand
— they are riddles of which the key is lost ; " the times
and the seasons that the Father has put in His own
power," and " which are not known to the Angels of
God, nor even to the Son of Man," are not likely to be
discovered by any process of interpretation, however
ingenious, from this sacred book, which, as regards these
outward things, was addressed to the generation not of
some future age, but of that Avhich its author was spe-
cially sent to waken and to warn.

But, secondly, there is an eternal truth wrapt up in
these sublime visions — in their spirit, and not in their
letter ; in their general principles, not in their details.
On that great Lord's day St. John was not in the flesh.

96 THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

not in the time or space of any particular scene or spot
on earth, but "in the Spirit." And "in the Spirit,"
under these outward forms, he described how through
struggles, through miseries and confusions of every kind,
the cause of goodness and truth, the spiritual man (so
to speak) of the whole human race advances towards
perfection. From that solitary rock he saw the shaking
of empires, the ruin of nations, the persecution of the
saints, the blood of the martyrs ; yet he felt persuaded,
and in his bright and beaming words of hope and tri-
umph, he has stamped on the mind of Christendom his
persuasion, that ^^urity and truth would come" out victo-
rious at last. It is at times a hard doctrine to receive.
It seems at times as if the advance of civilization, of
religion, of goodness were so irregular that we almost
despair of the ultimate purposes of Providence, of the
final perfection of humanity. Yet the Seer of Patmos
did not despair, nor was troubled beyond measure ; and
so, neither should our hearts fail.

In the voice of the trumpet that spoke behind him,
however varied its tones, he recognized, and we should
recognize, the voice of God. Even when, as then, the
progress of humanity seemed to be thrown back, and
ancient superstitions seemed to be regaining their hold,
he clung, and we may still cling, to the hope that good
will be wrought out of evil ; even when we look on the
grievous crimes and follies which have brought about
the fall of nations, we may speak of them, as even in
that hour of judgment St. John himself spoke of them,
with a feeling of human sympathy for the wreck of
Imperial greatness and world-wide splendor.

These, then, are the two main features of the Apoca-
lypse. First, the interest, which the public events of
our own time are intended to awaken in the hearts of
Christians. Secondly, the moral and spiritual effect
which such an interest is intended to produce.

THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS. 97

Other signs, other striking events, have occurred in
the earlier part of this year, on which I have before
dwelt,^ as like to those greater convulsions of which the
Revelation speaks. But it seems to me that we shall
be also following out the spirit of this sacred book, if we
fix our attention on the one public event, close at hand,
which has recently filled our minds ; if we concentrate
our thoughts on that one single trumpet-call, and ask
what permanent good we may learn from it.

We were all of us engaged in our several pursuits ;
most of us as much withdrawn from any of the concerns
which were going on outside of our own immediate
circles as St. John w^as removed from all thoughts of
the great Roman Empire in his seclusion in the isle of
Patmos. Suddenly, like him, we every one of us were
roused from these separate individual cares — every
one, however high or however humble, in the midst of
our several distractions and occupations, as though we
heard "the voice of a trumpet talking with us." It
came not from falling thrones, or blood-stained battle-
fields, or burning cities, but from a single sick chamber
in a secluded English county. At each successive re-
verberation of that thrilling voice, as it was repeated
from city to city in countless messages, it hushed the
strife of angry disputants, it silenced the eager gather-
ing, it broke up the festive banquet, it rang on from
shore to shore through the vast range of the whole
empire ; the whole nation of Englishmen became on a
sudden possessed with one thought and one desire.
Even the remote subjects of our dominion, of other
races and other creeds, joined in one united prayer for
one single youthful life, that it might be sustained in
its fierce struggle with death. And now that the tones

1 lu sermons prea,ched in the earlier part of 1871, during the troubles
of Fiance and the conflagration of Paris.

98 THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

of that trumpet are changed from mourning into joy,
from despair into hope, not the less are its vibrations
felt in every household and in every heart.

My brethren, there is not yet such absolute confi-
dence as that we can indulge in assured thanksgiving
for the answer to our hopes ; and it is not till that day
arrives that we can look forward, as we then ought to
look forward, with solemn and serious thoughts to the
fresh duties which the gracious mercy of God will then,
if so be, impose both on him who is spared, and on us
who have so earnestly trusted that he might be spared.

But we may, even now, before the recollection of our
strain of eager expectation and anxiety has faded away,
ask ourselves what this voice was intended to teach us ;
we may seek to give the reasons to ourselves and to
other nations why our hearts have thus burned within
us, why, by the mortal struggle of a single existence,
our souls were so deeply stirred.

There were many feelings which this unexpected
trumpet-call awakened in us, that made it like a voice
from a better world.

Let me speak of a few of these. I confine myself to
those which apply to all of us alike.

The first lesson of such a summons is that it called
us out of ourselves. Nothing is so narrowing, contract-
ing, hardening, as always to be moving in the same
groove, with no thought beyond what we immediately
see and hear close around us. Any shock which breaks
this even course, any thing which makes us think of
other joys and sorrows besides our own, is of itself
chastening, sanctifying, edifying. We are, or ought to
be, the better for having had our souls filled with the
thought of others, whom many of us never saw, with
hopes and fears which went far beyond the small span
of our own lives into the distant future.

THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS. 99

Secondly, it touched a chord which vibrates even in
the least responsive hearts. It appealed to our sense
of the sanctity, the preciousness of family ties ; it drew
us round one family hearth. In every condition of life
a natural instinct prompted an instantaneous sympa-
thy with and for the sufferer and those who were watch-
ing around him, because in every household the same
scene might at any moment be enacted. It made us
feel, according to the trite saying, that royal persons
are of the same flesh and blood with us; but it also
made us feel — which is no less important — that we
are of the same flesh and blood with them. That strain
of suspense, that sorrow, that joy which we all of us
have felt, was a testimony to the true nobleness and
greatness of home affections. Let us, as we think over
this week, thank God that He has planted these in-
stincts within us. Let no one be ashamed to own, let
every one be eager to cherish, these pure and sacred
feelings, which a whole nation has been proud to ex-
hibit, and which are in fact the foundation of all true
national and all true Christian life.

Thirdly, it has brought before us how, amidst all our
dissensions and party strifes, we are still Englishmen —
Englishmen, first and foremost, whatever we may be
besides. This is not the first time that the like pene-
trating sympathy with a single member of the royal
house has knit together the hearts of all. So it was, as
our fathers have told us, when the Princess Charlotte
was snatched away in a moment of time with her in-
fant child. So it was on that sad day which, on its tenth
anniversary in this past week, filled every mind with
dark forebodings, when the illustrious Prince, whose
loss is still felt throughout the Empire, was called away
in the midst of his beneficent career. So it has been
in that alternation of grief and hope which has wavered

100 THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS.

round the sick bed of the Heir of the remote future.
This it is which gives to the Family that represents the
whole people so rare, so singular an interest. It brings
before us in a living, present shape the fact that above
and beyond all sects and parties there is such a thing as
an inextinguishable feeling towards our common coun-
tr}^, a sacred bond in the thought that one familiar name
calls up all our patriotic emotions, a charm which gilds
the wear and tear of politics with a personal devotion,
such as no mere abstraction could enkindle. I have
often before and elsewhere dwelt on the sacredness of a
Christian State, on the paramount supremacy of the
English Crown and the English Law. It is impossible
to imagine a more striking tribute than that which has
been just rendered to this sometimes forgotten and dis-
paraged truth, by the spontaneous outburst of every
class and of every party. There are nations, and there
have been times, in which the devotion to the reigning
family has been a thing separate and apart from the
love of country. There have been times and places,
where the love of country has existed with no loyal
feeling to the reigning family. Let us thank God that
in England it is not so. Loyalty with us is the personal,
romantic side of Patriotism. Patriotism with us is the
Christian, philosophic side of Loyalty. Long may the
two flourish together, each supporting and sustaining
the other ! .

And, finally, this universal movement has shown —
what in the last resort Englishmen have always shown
— that we are (I say it not in any spirit of boastful-
ness or ostentation) a Godfearing and religious people.
What was the natural expression of our hopes and fears,
our sympathy and our anxious expectation ? It was the
united sacred language of prayer to the Supreme Ruler
and Father of the Universe. Not only in the churches

THE TRUMPET OF PATMOS. 101

in which, as here, day after day, the names of the Sov-
ereign and her children are habitually mentioned, and
where, in silent meditation, each of those names has
through the whole of this long suspense been com-
mended to God, not only in the solemn prayer which
on last Sunday was offered up with one consent in
every proud cathedral and humble village church which
owns the Queen's authority, but in every church and
chapel of every sect, however far removed from our
mode of worship or doctrine ; in temples of other faiths
in regions far away ; in journals at home, however cyni-
cal and worldly ; in assemblies however secular, the
same awful Name was invoked, the same devout wish
was expressed, the same sacred petition breathed, differ-
ing in words, but in substance the same. This is indeed
a true Christian communion ; this is to keep the unity
of the Spirit in the bond of Peace. We need not pen-
etrate into the inscrutable secrets of Providence, we
need not perplex ourselves with precise questions on
the mode in w^hich Prayer is answered. It is enough
for us to know and feel that it is the most natural,
the most powerful, the most elevated expression of our
thoughts and wishes in all great emergencies. It is
enough to know that, in the most severe of all trials,
the most sustaining and comforting thought is the fixed
belief that we are in the hands of an All-Avise, All-
merciful Father. To Him we turned in anxious sus-
pense, to Him we turn again with grateful thanks. Into
His Hands we commended the spirit of the sufferer,
hovering between life and death, to be strengthened,
purified, and, if it might so be, restored to us. Into
those same Hands of infinite compassion we commend
once more that same youthful spirit, returning, as we
trust, from the gates of the grave to a higher, better,
grander life than ever before.

102 THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

May we be strengthened by the voice of the heavenly
Trumpet to fulfil more faithfully, more loyally, more
courageously our duty towards him ; may he be strength-
ened by that same voice, as from another world, to fulfil
more actively, more steadfastly, more zealously his duty
towards us ! " Unto God's gracious mercy and protec-
tion we commit him. The Lord bless him and keep
him ! The Lord make His face to shine upon him, and
be gracious unto him ! "

ni.— THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

March 3, 1872.

/ was glad when they said unto me, We will go into the house of the
Lord. — Psalm cxxii. 1 (Prayer-book version).

These words, taken from the Psalms of the 27th
day of the month, which I have caused to be again
repeated here to-day, met the eyes of thousands in the
course of the past week, inscribed over the western
portico of St. Paul's Cathedral. They fitly expressed
the feeling which swayed the heart of the whole me-
tropolis. We were glad, we rejoiced, becauae our Sov-
ereign and her people had said, *' We will go into the
house of the Lord." It was a gladness which made
itself felt even to the distant extremities of our mighty
Empire. It was a gladness for the gracious gift, as if
sent direct from heaven, of a precious life which we
had earnestly sought. It was the gladness of behold-
ing the Sovereign whom we loved once more trusting
herself amongst us, and receiving with radiant smiles,
with unshaken courage, the tokens of her people's

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. 103

loyalty. It was the thankful gladness, we may say, for
the Thanksgiving itself, the grateful relief, that a day
so long expected with such eagerness — we had well-
nigh said with such awe — as its morning dawned with
its mighty burden of innumerable human souls, had
come and gone amidst such almost unclouded bright-
ness, such almost unbroken order and pure unstained
enjoyment.

But it was not mere gladness, not mere thanksgiving.
When we felt that the centre of all those myriad move-
ments was not the seat of commerce, or legislation, or
pleasure, but the consecrated house of the Lord ; when
we looked down on the multitudes covering that vast
area, or upwards to the multitudes suspended in that
soaring cupola ; when after the long hours of waiting,
there fell over all those dense masses a stillness, as of
an unseen Presence ; when, as the voice of praise and
prayer went up from thousands of lips and thousands
of hearts, the whole atmosphere became, as it were,
charged with worship — we felt assured that the ages
of faith are not yet run out ; that Religion, in its widest
and deepest sense, still holds its sway over the hearts of
Englishmen, that it shall be, as far as human foresight
can reach, the crown and consummation, and best
expression of our noblest and purest feelings. And
when further we remarked, how, under that spacious
dome were gathered (with the single exception of one
exclusive bod}^) the representatives of every Christian,
nay, of every religious community in England, how all
of these felt that, agreeing here or disagreeing there,
they yet on the whole could join in the utterances of
religious faith and hope as embodied in the venerable
forms of the National Church — it was a living proof
that such united worship within one common national
sanctuary is not an idle dream ; it was a sign that a

104 THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

National Church, so bound up, heart and soul, life and
limb, with the Nation and the State, could alone fur-
nish such a common meeting-point of religion and
patriotism — it was a pledge that as long as the memory
of that day remains, England will not willingly consent
to make over her noblest historical and sacred edifices,
her purest and highest aspirations after God, to the
keeping of any single sect, or to the mere rivalry and
contention of private interests.

When further we thought how he who was the
central object of that vast gathering, was there not
merely as an ordinary worshipper, but as one who had,
by a marvellous recovery returned from the very valley
of the shadow of death, and that, by a singular coin-
cidence, the Primate's words of sober and simple coun-
sel were uttered by one who had himself been recalled
by a recovery not less wonderful to health and activity
amongst us — a dying man, speaking as to a d}' ing man
of the duties of the living to which both had been
alike brought back ; when we remembered how around
that youthful form life and death had battled, for long
days and nights, like mortal combatants, in a strife of
which the whole English race were the awestruck spec-
tators ; when we glanced at the mother, wife, brothers,
sisters, and little children, in whose anguish, and anx-
ious expectation, and returning happiness all the nation
found the impersonation of their own peculiar joys and
sorrows — then, again, we felt that it was not merely
a solemn service, a sacred act of adoration, but a ser-
vice, a worship, of the most living reality, because it
rose from and gathered round a living human being,
with passions, hopes, fears, duties, such as each one
of us knows in himself, needing the same strength from
above, struggling with the same terrible temptations,
wrought in the same English m-ould, inheritor of the

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. 105

same individual destiny for weal or woe, according to
the deeds done in the body, whether they be good or
whether they be evil. Other services might be more
ornate, more dramatic ; other appeals to the feelings
more exciting ; other forms of devotion more eager to
pry into the secrets of the eternal world, or explain the
unrevealed mysteries of Providence. We were content
with the simple expression of heartfelt gratitude, as of
sons to a Father, for a mercy received ; and if that nat-
ural expression rose to gigantic proportions, it was only
because the whole nation was resolved to bear its part
therein.

But yet more ; not only was this a solemn religious
festival, not only did it concern the welfare of a human
soul, which, whether of Prince or peasant, is equally
precious in the sight of the Eternal God — but it was
the response in every English heart to the sense of the
union, too subtle for analysis, yet true and simple as
the primitive instincts of our race, which binds the
people of England to their monarchy, and the mon-
archy to the people. It is the feeling of which the
Psalms are so noble a rendering, and which make them
so fit an exponent of our national hopes and fears. —
*' There is the seat of judgment. There are the thrones
of the house of David. For my brethren and compan-
ions' sake, I will wish thee prosperity ; yea, because of
the House of the Lord our God, I will seek to do thee
good." So spoke the Psalmist in the inspired thanks-
giving, from which the text is taken. And so in a yet
more exalted strain, another Psalmist drew a picture
of what such a monarchy should be — " Give thy judg-
ments, O God, to the king, and thy righteousness to
the king's son. He shall judge thy people with right-
eousness, and thy poor with judgment. He shall deliver
the needy when he crieth, and the poor also, and him

106 THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

that hath no helper. In his days shall the righteous
flourish, and abundance of peace, so long as the moon
endureth."

Such was the ideal of a just and beneficent Mon-
archy more than two thousand years ago. Such, to
all who can feel or think, it still is, amidst whatever
mixture of personal and national infirmity, amidst
whatever changes have been wrought by differences
of time and race and country, in our modern exist-
ence.

Look for a moment at the serious, philosophic, Chris-
tian aspect of such a monarchy, at that which alone
rendered possible the feelings of the week that is past.
It is the one name and place amongst us which unites
in almost unbroken succession the whole range of our
island story, which is the common property of the
whole British people, we might almost say of the whole
Anglo-Saxon race. No other existing throne in Europe
reaches back to the same antiquity, none other com-
bines with such an undivided charm the associations
of the past, the interests of the present. It is the one
name and place which, being raised high above all
party struggles, all local jealousies, over all causes and
over all cases, ecclesiastical as well as civil, is the
supreme controlling spring which binds together, in
their widest sense, all the forces of the State and all
the forces of the Church. It is the one name and place
which, being beyond the reach of personal ambition,
beyond the need of private gain, has the inestimable
chance of guiding, moulding, elevating, the tastes, the
customs, the morals of the whole community. It is
the one institution, which, by the very nature of its
existence, unites the abstract idea of country and of
duty with the personal endearments of family life, of
domestic love, of individual character. This is the

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. 107

bright side of that ancient and august possession, which
has steadied the course of our onward progress, and
given us peace in the midst of tumults, and freedom
in the midst of disorder. It is because of the greatness
of this possession, that we so fervently pray and hope
that he who is its destined heir shall be worthy of his
noble inheritance. He knows, and we know, that on
him henceforth, as by a new consecration and confirma-
tion, devolves the glorious task of devoting to his
country's service that life which is in a special sense
no longer his but ours, for which his country's prayers,
his country's thanksgivings have been so earnestly
offered. He knows, as few in like positions have
known, the mighty power for good which has, within
our own memory, been exercised in that lofty sphere
by one who, from early manhood to his sudden and un-
timely end, wore " the white flower of a blameless life,"
unscathed and unspotted even in that " fierce light which
beats upon a throne." He has learned by the experi-
ence of these eventful weeks, he has had borne in upon
him by thousands and tens of thousands of voices, that
"of him to whom much has been given, of him shall
much be required." Hardly ever, in the long course
of our history, has so heart-stirring a prospect been
opened, of beginning life afresh, of taking the lead in
all that is true and holy, just and good, of finding in
the hundred calls of duty a hundred openings for the
best and purest enjoyment, of strengthening the relaxed
fibre, if so be, of English morals, of raising and purify-
ing the homes of the poor and the tone of every grade
of English society, of becoming by the sheer force of a
stainless and guileless life a terror, not to good works,
but to the evil.

Over the tomb of a famous Prince, who lies buried
in this Abbey, and whose first entrance on a new career

108 THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

of goodness and usefulness began from the moment
when he stood by his father's deathbed within these
precincts, there is carved the flaming beacon or cresset
light, which, says the ancient chronicler, '"• he took for
his badge, showing thereby that as his virtues and good
parts had been formerly obscured, and lay as a dead
coal waiting light to kindle it, . . . notwithstanding
he being now come to his perfecter years and riper
understanding, . . . his virtues should now shine forth
as the light of a cresset, which is no ordinary light."
Such a kindling of such a beacon light, which shall
reach as far as the fame of this Thanksgiving has pene-
trated — - such may God grant to him whom the nation
hopes by its prayers to have won back to itself forever.
"Give, Oh give thy servant wisdom and knowledge,
that he may go out and come in before this people . . .
that is so great." " The Lord preserve his going out
and his coming in, from this time forth for evermore."

But if this be what we expect from the Throne, let
us ask ourselves what the Monarchy, what the Empire,
what the world expects from us. It is the glory of
England that if the welfare of the Prince is the welfare
of the people, not less is the well-being of the people
the only safeguard of the well-being of the Prince. It
is not with us, as in some Eastern or despotic States,
where the Royal House dwells apart, withdrawn from
all the surrounding influences of the country or the age
in which their lot is cast. The breath of public opin-
ion, of good or evil example, in our mixed and varied
society, rises upwards as much as it descends down-
wards.

It is in our power, in the power of the people of Eng-
land, to drag down the Throne, even in spite of itself,
to the level, if so be, of our own meanness, triviality,
or self-indulgence, as it is, thank God, also in our power,

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. 109

by the purity of our homes, by the sincerity and the
loftiness of our purposes, to create the atmosphere in
which the Throne must become pure and lofty, because
it cannot help receiving the influences which ascend to
it from below and from around. We, by raising up a
constant succession of just, upright, loyal, single-minded
citizens, of enlightened and energetic teachers, of far-
seeing and unselfish statesmen, form a body-guard
around the Royal House of England, even as the
statues and monuments of famous Englishmen in this
Abbey stand like a guard of honor round the shrines
which contain the dust of our Princes and our Kings.
Any breach in that sacred line of honest English hearts,
any failure of duty, of vigilance, or of faithfulness on
our part lays open the way for the destroyer to come
in and lay waste the innermost sanctuary of the State
itself. Our prayers, our thanksgivings, if they are to
last beyond the passing moment, must take the shape,
not of idle flattery or fond endearments, but of stern
requirements of duty both from others and from our-
selves.

We look down with mingled indignation and con-
tempt on the miserable outrages attempted in former
years against the Gracious Majesty of these realms.
We are accustomed to regard with scorn the handful
of misguided men, who seek to win popular favor by
appeals to the prejudices, the passions, and the igno-
rance of the people. But let us remember that these
are not the only or the chief dangers against which the
Nation is bound to protect the Throne. If there be,
as there have been in other times and in other coun-
tries, those who, hovering round the footsteps of the
great, either for their own selfish ends, or from mere
weakness and complaisance, or from mere vanity of
vanities, strive to serve them by smoothing the path to

110 THE BAY OF THANKSGIVING.

sin, by maldng a mock at goodness, by hiding the un-
welcome truth, or repeating the welcome falsehood;
if there be any who, under the guise of friends, play
the part of tempter and evil counsellor, who lie in wait
for every occasion to flatter, to indulge, and to corrupt
— if there be any such anywhere, these, far more than
wild fanatics or the feeble parasites of the multitude,
these are the real traitors, the real enemies of Sover-
eign, Prince, and people all alike.

It is for the growth of such as these that we, the
nation of England, are, in great measure, responsible
before God and man. They are bone of our bone and
flesh of our flesh. It is by our levity, if so be, that char-
acters such as these are encouraged in their wretched
folly, as it is by our firmness that they are discouraged
and cowed. They come cut when the moral atmosphere
has been made dark around them, "wherein all the
beasts of the forest creep forth for their prey." But
" when the sun ariseth," when the bright burning light
of a sound public opinion is brought to bear upon them,
" they get themselves together and lay them down again
in their dens."

On these then, and such as these, whosoever they be,
men or women, high or low, the Day of Thanksgiving
is or ought to be a Day of Doom. Against these, and
such as these, the nation is called upon to echo the
voice of most just judgment that goes up from every
honest heart. On these, if on any human being what-
ever. Christian society, English society, ought to place
its deliberate ban, its unmistakable mark of righteous
indignation. Whatever may have been before, yet now,
if after the experience of these never-to-be-forgotten
weeks and days — if, after this solemn recognition of
the value of our great institutions, of the incalculable
importance of the character of our rulers — if, after

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. Ill

this, the nation relaxes its hold on the high vocation,
which has thus been marked out, our last state shall
indeed be worse than our first. If, after this, any such
as I have described, shall be found, betraying, mislead-
ing, ensnaring those whom by every call, human and
divine, they are bound to lead into all good and keep
from all evil, such, if there be any such, deserve the
contempt of man and the vengeance of God, as amongst
the meanest, or the weakest, or the most detestable of
mankind.

There is yet one more topic on which I would dwell.
In those ancient days of the Jewish monarchy and Jew-
ish people to which the text belongs, it was customary,
on solemn occasions when, as we read, " the King and
the people made a covenant with each other and with
God," to erect some monument, some towering pillar,
some massive altar, as a permanent witness to them-
selves and to the world, in order that they and all
might forever be reminded of what they had pledged
themselves to do. It was a just and natural safeguard.
Human emotions are so transitory that they need some
such external monument or form in which they may
be consolidated and fixed. Such a monument we are
asked now to erect — most suitable to the occasion,
most lasting in duration, most significant to the eye
and the mind of England for all future time.

It is the restoration, the completion of the great met-
ropolitan Cathedral of St. Paul, that witnessed the sol-
emn service which we here this day, in the sister Abbey
of St. Peter, have also met, in our humbler measure, to
commemorate. It is in accordance with the varying
characteristics of these two venerable and majestic
Churches, that, whilst the Abbey of Westminster is
interwoven by a gradual, silent, continuous chain, as
by the links of " natural piety," with the even tenor,

112 THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING.

the stately pageants, the silent departures of our coun-
try's rulers and heroes, St. Paul's Cathedral derives its
historical interest from single stirring incidents, from
the sudden and terrible vicissitudes of its own rise and
fall, from the thunders of the Reformation at its pulpit
cross. It has received the burst of national exultation
at the destruction of the Armada, the victories of Blen-
heim and of Trafalgar. It has mourned with a mourn-
ing people over the graves of Nelson and Wellington —

Who is he that cometh, like an honor'd guest,
With a nation weeping, and breaking on my rest?
Mighty seaman, this is he
Was great by land as thou by sea.

It has rejoiced with the universal rejoicing at the unex-
pected recovery of an aged Sovereign at the close of
the century that is past. It has now rejoiced, yet again,
with the still wider joy, over the yet more wonderful
restoration of the youthful Prince. In the circles of that
same dome, round those same wide-embracing walls, that
witnessed the covenant, as it may well be called, be-
tween the Heir of the Throne and his future people,
shall now be carried on that glorious work which the
mighty architect of the Cathedral was compelled to
leave unfinished, which its most venerable historian
and illustrious divine labored in vain to accomplish, but
which, when completed, shall make the great Protes-
tant Cathedral of England worthy to look in the face
the great Roman Basilica, of which it is even now a
noble rival, — worthy also of the magnificent future
which more and more seems opening before it, as the
centre of instruction and edification to the thousands
of worshippers, week by week, assembled within its
almost illimitable space.

For such a completion as this the greatness of the

THE DAY OF THANKSGIVING. 113

Imperial Thanksgiving demands the united help of
the British Empire. For such a completion as this, let
every Englishman give, far and near, according to his
means. Let none think they can give too much, let
none think their contributions too insignificant, to com-
memorate a day in which they have all taken part —
towards a great work, a world-renowned edifice, which
ought to have been finished long ago, which, so long
as a National Church exists amongst us, every English-
man may call his own, from the Queen in her palace
down to the humblest peasant or the most remote Non-
conformist, throughout the length and breadth of the
land.

And when, in after days. Prince and people alike
shall gaze with admiration on its vast interior, bright
with all the splendors which art and wealth can bestow,
as even now they look from far on those sublime pro-
portions which rise above all the smoke and stir of this
bewildering multitudinous city — may he and we be
ever reminded of the solemn thoughts which have now
filled our hearts, may he and we be always able to look
back upon this week with thankfulness and not with
shame, may he and we then behold in that august edi-
fice a standing memorial of good resolutions, not broken
but accomplished ; of noble hopes, not disappointed but
fulfilled; of splendid opportunities, not lost but cher-
ished to the utmost ; of generous devotion, on our part,
to our Queen and country, not wasted in party strife
but spent in the common good ; of love for God's holy
Name, not shown in futile and fierce disputes about
trifles but in the great causes of justice, charity, and
truth! May we all be able to say ten, twenty years
hence, with as much sincerity as now, " I was glad
when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of
the Lord ! "

ENGLAND AND INDIA.

October 11, 1875, being the day preceding the departure of H.R.H. the

Prince of Wales for India.

Now it came to pass in the days of Ahasuerus, (this is Ahasuerus
which reigned, from India even unto Ethiopia, over an hundred and
seven and ticenty provinces).

There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the
people in all the provinces of thy kingdom.

How can I endure to see the evil that shall come unto my people ? or
how can I endure to see the destruction of my kindred^ — Esther i. 1 ;
ill. 8; yiii. 6.

We have reached that point in the Lessons in our
Church Services where the history of the people of
Israel blends with the history of the other nations of
the earth — Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. I pro-
pose to take, as the subject of my sermon, a book which
is more exclusively devoted to this outside world than
any other book in the Bible, and which, perhaps on this
account, is never read in our Sunday services. It is the
Book of Esther.

The scene of the Book of Esther is not Palestine,
but Persia ; not Jerusalem, but Shushan or Susa. The
king Ahasuerus is that famous prince whom we know
in Grecian story under the name of Xerxes. The
events took place in the palace of Susa, in the great
hall of which we know the exact form and figure from
that of which the ruins still remain at Persepolis — the
most magnificent hall, it is believed, that ever was raised
for regal splendor. There sate " the great king," as he

lU

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 115

was called, surrounded by the seven princes of the
realm. Round his throne we trace the peculiar customs
of the Persian Court, which, with but little change,
have continued down to the present day.

What is it which, with all these foreign associations,
gives to such a book its place in the records of the
chosen people ? It is because it is the description of
the most signal deliverance of the vast body of Jews,
who were settled throughout the different countries
comprised in the vast territory of the Persian Empire.
" There is a certain people scattered abroad and dis-
persed among all the people in all the provinces of thy
kingdom, and their laws are diverse from all people."
Such was the account given of them to Ahasuerus, and
we know from other sources how true it was. Along
the banks of the river Euphrates numbers had remained,
with schools and universities and sacred places ; so that
it was a proverb, " Whoever dwells in Babylon is as
though he dwelt in the land of Israel." High up in the
mountains of Kurdistan the descendants of those who
were transplanted thither are said to be found even to
the present time. In the green fields of Egypt there
was a powerful colony established, which afterwards
formed the materials of the great Jewish community in
Alexandria.

These settlements were suddenly doomed to destruc-
tion by one of those violent acts which characterize the
policy of Eastern sovereigns. The anger of Haman,
the king's chief minister, was roused against one of this
body because he refused to do reverence before a mortal
man j and in his anger he included the whole race.
Posts, after the manner of the Persian Empire, were
sent into all the provinces " to destroy, to kill, and to
cause to perish, all Jews, both young and old, little
children and women, in one day, even upon the thir-

116 ENGLAND AND FNDIA.

teenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month
Adar."

This is the subject of the book, and its main interest
hinges on the mode of the deliverance. They were
delivered by what we might call three remarkable coin-
cidences, any one of which would have failed of itself,
but all together combined to produce the result as
surely as if the Divine Presence had been manifested
in flames of fire, or with twelve legions of angels.
There was the singular chance, as we should say, that,
owing to a quarrel in the Court of Susa, a Jewish
captive was at that critical period the favorite queen
of the Persian king, and that she had the spirit and
courage, at the risk of her own life, to reveal her origin,
and to plead for the lives of her countrymen. There
was next the accident, that the king, on a sleepless
night, was suddenl}'- reminded of a service that years
before he had received from the hands of Mordecai.
There was, lastly, the good fortune that when Haman
cast the lot at the beginning of the year, to find an
auspicious moment for the execution of his designs, it
•postponed the time from day to day, and from month to
month, till it was deferred to the thirteenth day of the
very last month of the year. According to the custom
of the Medes and Persians, which forbade any royal
decree to be altered, it was impossible for the king,
even on the entreaty of Esther and Mordecai, to with-
draw his rash and cruel order ; yet, owing to this long
interval, there was still time left to issue a counter
decree, permitting the Jews in every city to gather to-
gether and defend themselves to the death. It was still
early in the year — still the third month — when this
second decree was issued; and in the interval which
thus elapsed, before the dreaded thirteenth day of the
twelfth month arrived, they had time fully to organize

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 117

their defence ; and when at last the attack was made,
the spirit of their enemies was broken down, " the fear
of them fell on all people ; " the rulers of the provinces
helped them ; they stood at bay against the hunters of
their lives, " and no man could withstand them."

I. Such briefly are the main points of the story of
Esther. Let us now ask what lessons are taught by it.

(1.) First, then, let us turn to the structure of the
story itself. In one respect the Book of Esther stands
absolutely alone amongst all the books both of the Old
and the New Testament. From one end of it to the
other the name of God, so common everywhere else, is
entirely absent. So startling has this peculiarity seemed
that in the early times of the Christian Church there
were those who wished to exclude the book from the
Scriptures altogether, while others, as we may see from
the additions which we find in the Apocrypha, endeav-
ored to introduce and invent the religious phrases which
the original narrative did not contain.

But it is this very peculiarity of the Book of Esther
which is so instructive. It is necessary for us that in
the rest of the sacred volume the name of God should
constantly be brought before us, to show that He is all
in all to us and to the world. But it is expedient for
us no less that there should be one book which omits it
altogether, to prevent us from attaching to the mere
name a reverence which belongs only to the reality.
We cannot doubt that Esther and Mordecai were really
animated by the faith and love of God. We cannot
doubt that the quarrel of Ahasuerus, the sleepless night,
the delay of the lot, although all these occurrences were
what we should call accidents, yet worked out the will
of God as completely as the parting of the Red Sea or
the thunders of Sinai. Let the Book of Esther be a
token to us that in the daily events, the unforeseen

118 ENGLAND AND INDIA.

chances, of life, God is surely present ; that in little
unremembered acts, in the fall of a sparrow, in the earth
bringing forth fruit of herself, springing and growing
up into a bountiful harvest, we know not how. His will
is accomplished as truly as by fire and earthquake. The
name of God is not there, but the work of God is.

Let us learn from the admission of such a book into
the Bible not to make a man an offender for a word or
for the omission of a word. There may be many who,
without any outward confession of faith, are as faithful
servants of God as those who are full of religious expres-
sions ; many who, from reverence or reserve, or want of
fluent discourse, abstain altogether in public from using
the names of God and of Christ, and yet are true ser-
vants of God, true missionaries of Christ, by deed or
look, though not by word. " There is neither speech
nor language, but their voices are heard among them.
Their sound is gone out into all lands, and their words
unto the ends of the world."

By acts of silent goodness, by a humble faith, that
does not express itself in speech, the presence of God is
often as surely indicated as in the actual calling on His
name in prayer and praise, in teaching and preaching.

When Esther nerved herself to enter, at the risk of
her life, the presence of Ahasuerus — " I will go in unto
the king, and if I perish, I perish " — when her patriotic
feeling vented itself in that noble cry, " How can I en-
dure to see the evil that shall come unto my people?
or how can I endure to see the destruction of my kin-
dred ? " — she expressed, although she never named the
name of God, a religious devotion as acceptable to Him
as that of Moses and David, who no less sincerely had
the sacred name always on their lips.

It is the same truth as is conveyed by our great
dramatist, when he describes how, amongst the three

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 119

daughters of the British king, the true affection was to
be found, not in the two that made the loudest profes-
sions, but in the one who, from fear of overstepping in
the least degree the bounds of truth, answered nothing,
and kept all the proof of her love for the tender care
which she showed when all others turned against him : —

Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least ;
Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound
Reverbs no hollowness.

(2.) Secondly, our attention is called to the great
significance, not merely of the Jewish community which
was fixed in the Holy Land and in the Holy City, but
of that vast body of Jews scattered over the world, and
known by the name of the Dispersion. What, we may
ask, was the importance of their preservation? We
have only to look at the Acts of the Apostles to see,
far more surely than Esther or Mordecai saw, the infinite
consequences of their exertions, of God's intervention
at that moment. It was those very congregations of
dispersed Israelites that furnished the link between
Jews and Gentiles through which the Gospel spread
from one to the other. What the Jews in Palestine
and Jerusalem were for the first foundation of Chris-
tianity, that the Jews in Babylonia, in Egypt, in Asia
Minor, in Greece, in Italy, were for its subsequent prop-
agation. From their ranks came Stephen and Apollos,
Barnabas and Paul ; out of them were formed in every
instance the nucleus, the basis, round which the Gentile
Churches gathered. From the earnest prayer of Esther
to Ahasuerus, from the various chances which aided that
prayer, was drawn, by a long succession of consequences,
the golden chain which has brought the isles of the
Gentiles into the Church of God.

These are the chief religious lessons of the Book of

120 ENGLAND AND INDIA.

Esther. The details of the Imperial splendor and the
strange intrigues of the Court of Xerxes, however in-
teresting in an historical point of view, have no special
edification for us. The bitterness of Esther against
Hainan's innocent family belongs to the hardness of
that old dispensation which is condemned by Christ our
Lord, and which the Jewish race themselves, at least in
this country, have long since laid aside. The fierce
anathemas that once were uttered in their synagogues
whenever the feast of Purim was celebrated — stamping
with their feet and shaking their fists whenever the
name of Hainan was mentioned — have dropped out of
their worship, as the like expressions are gradually dis-
appearing from Christian worship also.

It was for these harsher and more worldly character-
istics of the Book of Esther that Luther hesitated to
receive it into the Bible. " It is too full," he said, " of
heathenish naughtiness, and it Judaizes too much." Yet,
amidst that " heathenish naughtiness " and that narrow
Judaic spirit, it carries with it lessons of enduring
value for all time. It is a book which, in spite of all
its defects, ranked amongst the Jews as the very most
precious portion of the whole Bible after the Law —
more precious than even the Prophets, or Psalms, or
Proverbs. We need not rank it so high as this. We
perhaps may regard it as the least important of all the
sacred books. But even this humblest part of the Bible
is not without its use if it can teach us those inestima-
ble lessons of silent courageous patriotism which are as
much needed in England as in Persia, and those duties
of energy and self-denial which are as essential for
Christians as for Jews.

11. Let us apply the story more especially to our-
selves.

Is there any race of men, now, as were then the dis-

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 121

persed Jews, with like high issues dependent on their
good or evil fortune ?

" There is," now, as there was then, " a people scat-
tered abroad and dispersed through all the provinces,'*
not of one kingdom only, but of an almost boundless
empire — raised up, and preserved, through a long suc-
cession of ages, by a protection not indeed miraculous,
but as truly providential as that by which the Jews
were saved in the time of Esther — a people the fear
of whom is on all the nations in a wider and better
sense than was that of the Jews on the heathens with
whom they dwelt — a nation with power and knowledge
such as make it in a still higher degree than those an-
cient Jewish colonies, " a light to lighten the Gentiles,
and to be the glory of God's people Israel."

We all know without another word what that nation
is. It is ourselves — we say it in no boastful spirit —
our own widely dispersed English, British, Anglo-Saxon
race.

And to speak only of one portion of that great dis-
persion of Englishmen, there is that vast Eastern Em-
pire of which the name is for the first time mentioned
in the Bible in the first words of the Book of Esther :
— " This is Ahasuerus, which reigned from India even
unto Ethiopia." In India, so marvellously acquired,
sometimes by force and fraud, sometimes by just and
beneficent rule ; in India, whose trophies fill many a
niche in this church ; in India, so mercifully saved to
us through dangers and escapes as remarkable as any
that are recorded by history ; in India, whose ancient
religion, philosophy, and language have in our genera-
tion been for the first time brought to light by the la-
bors of German and English schohirs; in India, glori-
fied with a dubious splendor by the names of Clive and
Hastings, and sanctified, with a purer and milder lustre,

122 ENGLAND AND INDIA.

by statesmen like Bentinck, soldiers like Havelock,
missionaries like Henry Martyn, pastors like Heber and
Cotton — in that vast province of the British Empire,
surely, if nowhere else, we as Englishmen have to ex-
press our thankfulness, as truly as ever did the Jews
of old, for our signal deliverances, for that eminent
greatness to which God has raised us in former times,
and from which in these latter days He has not allowed
us to be cast down.

And what are the corresponding duties ? Can it be
doubted that, as in those' ancient Jewish settlements of
the Dispersion, so, and much more, in all those various
portions of the world whither our commerce, and our
arms, and our enterprise, have carried us, but especially
in India, the sons and daughters of the English race
are the true missionaries for good or for evil to the rest
of mankind?

Is there any one in this congregation who has trav-
elled or has intended to travel, for pleasure or for busi-
ness, to those distant regions? Is there any one who
mourns for the dead received back from those danger-
ous climes only just in time to breathe at home their
parting breath, or who looks back on bright courses of
usefulness, prematurely closed, of the servants of their
country and their God, sleeping far away beneath the
shadow of the Himalayan heights, or in the bed of the
rolling Ganges, or by the surf-beaten shore of Madras ?
Is there any one who has friends, brothers, sons, in that
Eastern Empire occupying the positions almost of
kings, with an influence extending over vast popula-
tions such as will never again fall to their lot, such as
rarely falls to the lot of any human being? If there
be any such (and it is the peculiarity of every English
congregation that there may be such in every church
throughout the land), let them remember the heavy

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 123

responsibility, the glorious privilege, which rests upon
them and theirs.

The Book of Esther teaches us — what our own ex-
perience and common sense teach no less — that it is
by the lives as well as by the lips, by deeds as well
as by words, nay, by deed even more than by word, of
our countrymen in foreign parts, that the truth and
beauty of Christian life and Christian doctrine are to
be made known, if ever Christianity is to spread be-
yond its present limits. The name of God may per-
chance be withheld; but the presence of God may be
made as clear as light. According as an English trav-
eller, an English soldier or sailor, an English magis-
trate or merchant, an English governor, presents an
image of justice or injustice, of purity or impurity, of
reverence or of profaneness, of kindly appreciation or
of dull indifference, will be the likeness which the
Mahometan and the Hindoo will form in their own
minds, and retain perhaps to their dying day, of our
country and our religion. According as the life and
conduct of an Englishman, in camp or in field, in busi-
ness or in pleasure, attracts or repels, conciliates or
offends, elevates or corrupts, those with whom he
comes into contact, will be the rapid advance or the
indefinite delay of the kingdom of God in the sphere
in which he moves.

It is recorded that some Brahmins, conversing with
the Danish missionary Schwartz, replied to his argu-
ments in behalf of Christianity, '^ We do not see your
Christian people live according to that Holy Word.
They curse, they swear, they get drunk; they steal,
they cheat, they deal fraudulently with one another;
they blaspheme and rail upon matters of religion, or
often make a mock of those who profess to be reli-
gious ; they behave themselves as badly, if not worse,

124 ENGLAND AND INDIA.

than we heathen. Of what advantage is all your pro-
fession of Christ's religion, if it does not influence the
lives of your own countrymen? Should you not first
endeavor to convert your own countrymen before you
attempt to proselytize Pagans ? " But turning to him
they said, '' Of a truth you are a holy man, and if all
Christians thought and spoke and lived as you do, we
would without delay undergo the change and become
Christians also."

And if such is the duty of those who are thus called
to foreign parts, what is that of those who remain at
home ? We have heard it a thousand times. It is by
all the means in our power to build up and strengthen
all the elements of Christian life in our countrymen
who depart from us to fields so full of interest. It is
for us to make them feel the manifold instruction which
they may receive, as in a second education, by moving
amongst scenes and races so unlike to those with which
they have hitherto been familiar.

It is our duty to foster here, in the focus of English
civilization, the public opinion, the private influence,
which shall keep alive in our countrymen abroad the
conviction that of those " to whom much has been given
shall much be required." It is according as we treat
their conduct with levity or with seriousness, with in-
different apathy or with generous sympathy, that they
will go out to their callings there in a low or in a lofty
spirit. If they take in hand so great an enterprise
unadvisedly, lightly, and wantonly, it will be in large
measure because we have not done our best to raise
them to the consciousness of their high vocation. If
we insist on their entering upon it advisedly, rever-
ently, and in the fear of God, we shall have delivered
our own souls, and they, it may be, will rise to the level
to which we insist that the}^ shall reach. The ancient

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 125

founders, the ancient princes, of the Grecian colonies
took out with them to their distant settlements a spark
of the sacred fire wliicli was always kept burning on
the hearth of the parent country. It is for us to see
that the sacred fire on our hearth is always kept bright
and pure. If its ashes grow cold with us, the spark
which is taken from it will dwindle and sink far away.
If it blazes warmly here, its heat will be felt to the ex-
tremities of the Empire. And when we think how,
amongst those dispersed countrymen, our own friends
and brothers and children may hereafter, if not now, be
found ; when we think how honorable may be their
success, how miserable their failure, in proportion as
their opportunities are used wisely or foolishly, well or
ill — is it possible to help joining in the spirit of
Esther's petition, " How can I endure to see the evil
that shall come unto my people ; or how can I endure
to see the destruction of my kindred? "

We were roused to fury in the days of the Indian
Mutiny. We could not endure to see, we could not
endure to hear, of the evil that came to our people dur
ing that dark time.' We could not endure to see or to
hear of the destruction of our kindred by murder, or
pestilence, or famine. But surely any man who has
in him (I will not say the heart of a Christian, but) the
spirit of an Englishman, ought to feel no less keenly.
How can we endure to see the evil that will come to
our people far away by our careless living, by our folly
or recklessness, by our insolence or intemperance or
indolence ? How can we endure to see the moral de-
struction of our kindred, the imperilling of our Empire,
the discrediting of our name, our race, and our religion,
by the unworthiness of us who are its representatives
and its witnesses ?

For the blessings or the curses which accompany, for

126 ES'GLAXD AXD ESDIA.

the good or evil influences which inspire, those who go
forth to our vast dependencies, or who rule them, or
who dwell in them, we who form the public opinion of
England must be more or less responsible. It is the
necessary consequence of the principle, which is as true
in the State as in the Church, that, ••if one member
suffer, all the members suffer with it ; or if one member
be honored, all the members rejoice with it."

Many of you will have perceived why this subject
has been chosen for our thoughts at this time, when for
the next five months our attention will be specially
turned to India. To-morrow the first Heir of the Eng-
lish throne who has ever visited the Indian Empire
starts on his journey to those distant regions, which the
greatest of his ancestors, Alfred the Great, a thousand
years ago. longed to explore, and which now forms the
most splendid jewel iu the British crown.

On this eve of that departure, solemn to him and
solemn to us, we pray that the Eldest Son of our Royal
House, in whose sickness and recovery, four years since,
the whole nation took so deep an iuterest, shall now
once more be delivered from perils by land and perils
by sea, from " the terror by night and from the pesti-
lence that destroyeth in the noonday ; " we pray that
he may be restored safe and sound to the Mother, the
Wife, and the little children, who wait with anxious
expectation his happy and prosperous return.

But we X->ray, or we ought to pray, yet more earnestly,
that his journey may be blessed to himself, and to those
whom he visits, in all things high and holy, just and
pure, lovely and of good report. We pray that he and
they who attend him may feel how sacred a trust is
committed to them ; we pray that we who remain be-
hind may never ourselves forget, or suffer others to for-

ENGLAND AND INDIA. 127

get, how arduous and (if -so be) how noble a duty
they have undertaken. We pray that we, by our sym-
pathy in all that is good, by our detestation of all that
is base, may, like those of old time, hold up the sinking
arms and strengthen the wavering hands of those who
are charged with the responsibility of this mission of
good-will, of duty, and of hope. We pray that they
may be so filled with the spirit of power, of love, and of
a sound mind, with the spirit of justice and wisdom,
with the spirit of courtesy and purity, that, wheresoever
they go, the name of England and of English Christen-
dom shall be not dishonored, but honored; that the
fibre of Indian society, whether amongst our country-
men or amongst natives, shall not be relaxed, but
strengthened; that the standard of our national mo-
rality shall not be lowered, but raised ; that the bonds
of affection between the ruling and the subject races
shall be not loosened, but confirmed. We pray that
this visit, long desired and at last undertaken, to those
marvellous lands, may, by God's mercy, leave behind,
on the one side (if so be) the remembrance of graceful
acts, kind words, English nobleness. Christian principle,
— on the other side, awaken or renew, in all concerned,
the sense of graver duties, wider sympathies, loftier
purposes.

Thus, and thus only, shall that journey on which the
Church and nation now pronounce a parting benedic-
tion, be worthy of a Christian Empire and worthy of
an English Prince. For the buildhig up, in truth and
righteousness, of that Imperial inheritance, for the moral
and eternal welfare of his own immortal soul, may the
Lord preserve his going out and his coming in, from
this time forth for evermore 1

THE RETURN OF THE TRAVELLER.

May li, 1876, being the Sunday after the return of the Prince of "Wales
from India. Preached in the presence of iheir Royal Ilij^hnesses the
Prince of Wales, the Princess of Wales, the Duke of Edinburgh, and
the Duke of Connaught.

/ was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the
Lord. — Psalm cxxii. 1.

This Psalm is one of a series from the 120th to the
134th, which are culled in our version ""^ The Songs of
Degrees," but more properly " The Songs of the Re-
turn " — the songs in which the Israelites, after their
exile in Babylon, expressed their joy at finding them-
selves once more in sight or in prospect of home. The
Psalms and Prophecies of the time describe the delight
with which the travellers started on their westward jour-
ney ; hoAV they mounted ridge after ridge, and caught
the first view of their own ^ country ; how the beacon-
fires- Hashing from their native hills Avelcomed them
onwards ; how at last their feet ^ stood '' fast within thy
gates, O Jerusalem." This is one part of the feeling of
the Return of the Exiles, and it became the root of that
patriotic sentiment which flourished henceforth in the
Jewish nation with a vigor never known before.

There is another feelin^: in the backo^round which
gives additional force to this passionate homesickness
and patriotic fervor. They had not merely been absent
from home. They had been sojourning in a mighty

1 Ps. cxxi. 1, cxxvi. 1, Ixxxiv. 7. ^ jer. vi. 1. ^ Ps. cxxii. 2.

128

THE RETURN OF THE PULNCE OF WALES. 129

empire wholly unlike their own. They had seen the
splendors of Babylon; they had mixed with the princes
and potentates of Chaldea, Persia, and Media ; they had
drunk in all the influences of those far-off seats of Ori-
ental wisdom. Their ideas of religion, of history, and
of science liad become enlargxHl. If in some respects
they were a lesser nation than they were before the
Exile, in some res2:)ects they were much greater. For
they had received a new and serious impulse, which
ended in nothing less than tlie greatest event of the
world's history — the advent of Christianity.

These, then, are the two feelings of the human heart
which are consecrated by the Psalms and Prophets of
the Keturn — The value of Home ; the value of new
and wide experience.

(1.) There is not one single human being in this con-
gregation to whom this is not one of the nearest and
dearest thoughts. There is not one of us who does not
in some measure respond to the appeal in which the
poet asks, in words almost too familiar to be quoted :

Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to liimself hath said,

* This is my own, my native land I '
Whose heart liath ne'er within him burn'd,
As home his footsteps lie hath turn'd

From wandering on a foreign strand ?

There has not been a generation of men for the last
three thousand years, there will not be a generation of
men to the end of time, in which some will not read
with sympathy that story on which the greatest master
of ancient poetry has spent all his art — which tells of
the return of Ulysses after his long absence ; the wife
counting the weary days in the hills of Ithaca ; tho dog
leaping up in his master's face and dying of joy ; the
aged servants recognizing their long-lost chief as he

130 THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES.

treads once more his father's threshold. To any man
worthy of the name, the thoughts of mother, and wife,
and chikh'en, and brothers, and sisters, are amongst the
most inspiring, the most purifying, the most elevating
of all the motives which God has given us to steady our
steps, and guide our consciences, and nerve us for duty,
through all the changes and chances of this mortal life.
Happy, thrice happy, is he or she who keeps this sanc-
tuary pure .and undefiled. False to his country, and
false to the true interests and the holy progress of mor-
tals, is he or she who undermines or betrays it. Not
charity only, but all the virtues of which charity is the
bond, begin and end at Home.

(2.) And yet in this wide world Home is not, nor
can be, all. Even by the changing scenes of this life
we learn that " here we have no abiding city," but are
"strangers and pilgrims upon earth; " and that at times
it is good for us to be so. That famous story of the
return of the Grecian chief which I just now quoted
derives half its significance from the tale of the many
cities and many men that he had beheld ; of the perilous
adventures by land and sea that he had encountered ;
of the strange forms and faces that had passed before
him since he quitted the shores of his native island.
There are doubtless many to whom this knowledge is
denied, to whom the same circle of duties and of pleas-
ures suffices, and must suffice, from year to year. For
such " untravelled travellers " " the trivial round, the
common task," the world-exploring book, or the un-
fathomable depths of the solitary soul in joy or in sor-
row, may take the place of the largest survey or the
most extraordinary surprises of distant scenes. But
for those who have been allowed to wander and to
return, who have annexed to the realm of their own
hearts and minds the sights and sounds of all that is

THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 131

grecitest and strangest on earth — there is or ought to
be given a new sense of the greatness of God and of man,
a new lever whereby to move the sluggish world within
and around us, a new zest to the duties of our own spe-
cial sphere, a new glory to the destinies of our race.

My brethren, You will have perceived what has led
me to speak to you on this double subject. 'There has
been a return from distant wanderings, in which the
whole country has taken a heartfelt interest, an interest
which ought to make every one of us ask more seriously
what is the blessing of Home, and what is the blessing
of those larger experiences which lie without.

The blessing of Home. — Is there a mother, wife,
child, who cannot understand the joy which welcomes
back a dear son, a beloved husband, an affectionate
father? who does not feel the heart warmed at the
thought that the forebodings and pangs of the parting
seven months ago are now past and gone ; and that the
delight which almost all of us have known under like
circumstances is shared by the most familiar, because
the most exalted, household in the land ? Is there any
Englishman or any Englishwoman so dead to the great-
ness of our country, so dead to the instincts of human-
ity, as not earnestly to desire that the household thus
blessed by Providence in these outward deliverances
from sickness, and sorrow, and danger, shall be blessed
also in all those things which alone can make a home
truly happy and a family truly noble and truly royal ?
Can we any of us fail to recognize at such a moment
that a fresh responsibility is laid upon all those who,
whether near or far, have any concern in the interests
of the State or the grandeur of the Throne? Ought
we not all to feel impelled afresh to watch with double
vigilance over their welfare, to foster with every en-
couragement their efforts for good ? Can we any of us

132 THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES.

fail to be assured that a double measure of infamy and
shame will be the deserved judgment on those, if any
there be, who by word or by act, by speech or by
silence, make temptation more easy, or goodness more
difficult, or duty more irksome, or sin more pleasant, in
the way of those by whose virtue we are all raised,
in whose shortcomings we all suffer ? At this moment,
in the touch of nature which makes the whole country
kin, we are all one family. Oh, may God grant that to
every member of that great family of the English race
the grace may be given to seek not our own, but others'
good ; not the passing amusement or success which is
for the moment, but the eternal happiness which out-
lasts the grave, and defies the world, and is the bulwark
alike of households, and of States, and of Churches !

And let us also remember on this day wherein con-
sists that other blessing — the blessing of enlarged expe-
rience. Home itself becomes doubly dear after long
absence. Our power of serving our country is multi-
plied by the knowledge gained of every other country.
That was a fine saying of the old Cavalier : —

I could not love thee, dear, so much,
Lov'd I not honor more.

That is a true sentiment also which makes us feel that
we do not love our country less, but more, because we
have laid up in our minds the knowledge of other
lands, and other institutions, and other races, and have
had enkindled afresh within us the instinct of a com-
mon humanity, and of the universal beneficence of the
Creator.

And if this be so in regard to ordinary experience
of foreign parts, how much is the duty increased when
the foreign parts are our own dependencies, and when
the contrast exhibited is the greatest contrast which

THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 133

this earth affords — the contrast between East and
West, between Heathenism and Christianity, between
the civilization of the ancient world of bygone ages and
the civilization of modern Europe ! If, as we know
from the long growth of history, the English rule
includes not merely a Kingdom shut up between the
four seas, but an Empire on which the sun never sets
— if "the Imperial Parliament" rejoices in that time-
honored name Avhich it bears by virtue of its far-reach-
ing sway — if there be any truth in the saying of an
•illustrious foreign statesman, ''that the conquest and
government of India are the achievements which give
England its place in the opinion of the world" — then
any event which brings these distant regions before us
ought to remind us that the morality, the justice, the
humanity of our country affect the welfare, not only
of the inhabitants of these little islands, but of those
vast dominions Avhere active Parsee, and subtle Hin-
doo, and haughty Mussulman, as w^ell as the settlers
of the English race, or the savage on many a lonely
shore or immeasurable continent, look up to us for
guidance, direction, and example. Do not think that
this breadth of view and depth of experience diminish
for one instant the importance of our insular and
domestic sphere. In a famous discourse which was
intended to show how true religion is best carried out
in the business of common life, the preacher — himself
one of the greatest orators of our age — illustrated the
possibility of combining the grandest thoughts with
the homeliest duties from the fact of the latent but
powerful influence exercised over a public speaker by
the consciousness of the presence of his auditory. " No
exertion requires a greater concentration of thought or
attention than this of speech. And yet amidst the
subtle processes of intellect — -the selection and right

184 THE RETURN OF TPIE PRINCE OF WALES.

ordering and enunciation of words — there never quits
the speaker's mind for one moment the idea of the
presence of the listening throng. Like a secret atmos-
phere, it surrounds and bathes his spirit as he goes on
with the external work."

This illustration in that discourse was carried on to
the thought of '' the One Auditor, the Awful Listener,
ever present, ever watchful, as the discourse of life
proceeds." But what is there said of the effect of a
listening audience on one who speaks is still more true
of the effect of vast multitudes of distant spectator^
on one who acts. It is not for nothing that to many
of us there have been of late called up the visions of
the "numbers numberless" of the swarming popula-
tions of our Indian cities ; or that we have tracked in
presence or in thought the scenes of the splendid, if at
times harsh and violent, deeds by which India was
won, or of the heroic courage and endurance by which
in the time of the Mutiny it was preserved to us. It is
not for nothing that we have seen or heard of the mon-
strosities of idolatrous worship, or the debasement of
unchecked superstition ; or, on the other hand, of the
marvels of the sacred river, or the snow-clad tops
of the highest of earthly heights, or the luxuriance of
the loveliest of tropical forests, or the grandeur of mon-
uments which Christendom has never surpassed and
rarely equalled. All these things have been unrolled
before us for our own good and for the good of others.
Those countless multitudes, those fairy cities, all hence-
forth become the close spectators of our actions, the
near recipients of our beneficence. Every crying need
for spiritual help, every just complaint, every high
aspiration, from those distant shores ought henceforth
to find a more ready access to our hearts. Every act
of grace or courtesy which we have shown or can show

THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 135

towards those subject-races — every firmer grasp on the
eternal principles of justice and purity that we can
exhibit in our relations with them, will henceforth
strike with double force on those who have been drawn
towards us by the bonds of personal regard and per-
sonal knowledge. Every deed of good or ill that we
perform is henceforth enacted, not only in " the fierce
light that beats upon a throne," but in the presence
of the gazing eyes and listening ears of peoples, and
kindreds, and nations. "Wherefore, seeing we also
are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses,
let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth
so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race
that is set before us."

" I was glad when they said unto me. We will go
into the house of the Lord." Once before I have
preached within these walls on this text. It was when
the whole of this vast city and nation was stirred as
one man to go up to the great Metropolitan Cathedral
to return thanks for the recovery of their beloved
Prince from the terrible struggle of Hfe and death
which for weeks the people had followed with thrilling
eagerness and anxiety.

That was five years ago. In those five years much
has passed — opportunities, mercies, visitations.

And now has come another moment, less exciting,
less tragical, than that solemn festival. Yet it reminds
us of that other time. Here, also, is an escape from
perils, if unseen, yet hardly less imminent. Here, also,
there is a thanksgiving in which, from the Queen down-
wards, we all share. Here, again, we are assembled in
a venerable church, if less august than the great Cathe-
dral of St. Paul's, yet to many of us even more closely
endeared. On that occasion I asked you to commem-

136 THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES.

orate the general Thanksgiving by contributing to the
restoration of that metropolitan edifice. On this occa-
sion it happens that the time falls in with the contribu-
tions to the yet more constant and pressing need of
strengthening the hands of the chief pastor of this
metropolis in his efforts for the good of its poor and
neglected masses, and no thank-offering can be con-
ceived more fitting, as far as material aid and support
can express the inward feelings of the heart. But, on
a day like this, those inward feelings rise higher still
and reach yet deeper down. The gladness of home
regained, the vicissitudes of joy and sorrow that have
crossed the path of many in the interval since the
Royal traveller left our shores, the sense of the moral
debt which England owes to India, and which India
owes to England, the prospect of duties, and difficul-
ties, and anxieties, ever multiplying and ever needing
all the vigilance of man, and all the grace of God to
direct aright, the voices of the living and the voices of
the dead — all combine to make us feel that, for mer-
cies such as these, genuine thankfulness in a Christian
man or a Christian nation has but one adequate expres-
sion, and that is a desire for increase of goodness,
increase of wisdom, increase of firmness, increased con-
tempt of what is vile, and selfish, and base, increased
determination to fight manfully in the faith of Christ
crucified, and under His victorious banner, against sin,
the world, and the devil.

Let us join once more, and for the last time, in the
words of that Praj^er which for five long months was
offered every Sunday in this place — that the journey
of the Heir of these realms now, by the good Provi-
dence of God, safely accomplished, may tend to his own
best happiness and the happiness of those nearest and
dearest to him, to the welfare, physical, moral, and

THE RETURN OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. 137

spiritual, of the Indian Empire and of this our own
Eegal Commonwealth, to the glory of Almighty God,
the Holy, the Just, the Merciful, and the Pure.

May the Eternal, who has thus blessed his going out,
bless yet more abundantly his coming in, from this time
forth for evermore !

LORD PALMERSTON.

October 29, 1865, being the Sunday after Lord Palmerston's burial in the

Abbey.

See that ye walk circumspectly . . . redeeming the time . . . under-
standing what the will of the Lord is. — Epiiksians v. 15, 16, 17.

So spoke the Apostle in the epistle of this day. He
tells his readers to "walk circumspectly" — that is,
with a keen, critical observance of all they see ; to " re-
deem the time " — that is, to make the most of every
opportunity that is thrown in their way, not to let any
part of it escape them ; to make every effort of mind
and heart to '' understand what the will of the Lord is "
— that is, to understand what is the special intention of
God, wrapped up in the different dispensations of joy
and sorrow which come across them. It is this very
thing which we are called upon to do this day — to look
hard into the essential lessons of the great solemnity at
which, on Friday last, so many of us assisted ; to re-
deem, and make the most of, for our instruction, the
opportunity of serious thought, thus afforded to us ; to
understand, so far as we can, what is the will of the
Lord concerning us, in the national homage then paid
to the illustrious dead.

It is one of the most instructive parts of solemnities
of this kind, that each has its own peculiar lesson to
convey. Of all the great men who are laid within these
walls, every single one, probably, is laid there for a sepa-
rate and distinct reason, which could not apply to any

138

LORD PALMERSTON. 139

one else. That grand truth which was read in our ears
in the funeral lesson, from the apostolic epistle, has its
special force on every such occasion here — " There is
one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon,
and another glory of the stars ; for one star differeth
from another star in glory."

In the chambers of the dead, in the temple of fame,
no less than in the house of our heavenly Father, there
are indeed "many mansions," many stages, many de-
grees. Each human soul that is gifted above its fel-
lows, leaves, as it passes out of the world, a light of its
own, that no other soul, whether more or less greatly
gifted, could give equally. As each lofty peak in some
mountain country is illuminated with a different hue
of its own, by the setting sun, so, also, each of the
higher summits of human society is lit up by the sun-
set of life with a different color, derived, it may be,
from the materials of which it is composed, or from
the relative position which it occupies, but each, to
those who can discern it rightly, conveying a new and
separate lesson of truth, of duty, of wisdom, and of
hope.

What, then, are the special lessons which we may
learn from the character of the remarkable man who
has been taken away, and from the tribute paid to his
memory ? I leave altogether the questions of political
and religious parties, which have no place here, and
confine myself entirely to those direct, practical lessons
which may be applied to all, of whatever opinions,
equally. I leave, also, altogether, those questions of
the unseen world which are known to God only. I
leave them, as our Cliurch leaves them, to that holy
and merciful Saviour, whose mighty working is able
to subdue all things to Himself, who sees as man sees
not, but who, we cannot doubt, commends to our admi-

140 LORD PALMERSTON.

ration whatsoever there is good and true in every one
of His servants, that from each we may understand the
more fully what the will of the Lord is, what the whole
counsel of God is towards us.

First, then, there was this singular peculiarity, That
the gifts by which the eminence of the departed states-
man was achieved were such as are far more within
the reach of all of us than is usually the case with those
who occupy a position like his. It has been said of
Judas Maccabseus, that of all military chiefs, he was
the one who accomplished the greatest victories with
the smallest amount of external resources. It may be
said of our late chief, that of all political leaders, he
accomplished the greatest success by the most homely
and the most ordinary means. It is this which makes
his life, in many respects, an example and an encour-
agement to all. The persevering devotion of his days
and nights to the public service, the toil and endurance
of more than half a century in the various high stations
in which he was employed, — these are qualities which
might be imitated by every single person, from the
highest to the lowest amongst you. You, whoever you
may be, who are disposed, as so many young men are,
to give yourselves up to ease and self-indulgence, who
think every thing that costs you any trouble a reason
for putting work aside, remember that not by such
faint-hearted, idle carelessness can God or man be
served, or the end of any human soul be attained, in
this life or the next. You, whoever you be, who are
working on zealously, humbly, honestly, in your differ-
ent stations, work on the more zealously and the more
faithfully, from this day forward, with the feeling
that, in the honors paid to one who was, in these
respects, but a fellow-laborer with you, the nation, as
in the sight of God, has set its seal on the value of

LORD PALMERSTON. 141

work, on the nobleness of toil, on the grandeur of long,
laborious days, on the splendor of plodding, persever-
ing diligence.

Again, he won his way, as we have been told a hun-
dred times, not so much by eloquence, or genius, or
far-sighted wisdom, as by the lesser graces of cheerful-
ness, good humor, gayety and kindness of heart, tact,
and readiness — lesser graces, doubtless, graces of which
some of the highest characters have been almost desti-
tute, yet graces which are assuredly not less the gifts
of God — graces wliich, even in the House of God, we
do well to reverence and admire. Those who may
think it a matter of little moment to take offence at
the slightest affront ; those who by their presence throw
a dark chill over whatever society they take part in ;
those who make the lives of those around them mis-
erable, by recklessly trampling on their tenderest feel-
ings, and wounding them in their weakest points ; those
who poison discussion and embitter controversy by push-
ing particular views to their extremcst consequences,
by widening differences between man and man ; those
who think it a duty to make the worst of every one
from whom they dissent, and to maintain a never-
ending protest against those who have ever done them
a wrong, or from whom they have ever differed, — such
as these may have higher pretensions and, it may be,
higher claims on our respect ; yet if they would under-
stand what the will of the Lord is, a silent rebuke will
rise to them from yonder grave, such as God designs
for. their especial benefit. The statesman who had
always a soft word ready to turn away wrath ; who,
if at times he attacked or was attacked justly, yet
never bore lasting malice towards his enemies ; who
was able to see, even in those who opposed him, the
true worth and value of their essential characters, —

142 LORD PALMERSTON.

from him, and from the honor paid to him, many an
eager partisan, many a hard polemic, many an austere
moralist, may learn a lesson that nothing else could
teach them. How many, by praising him, have con-
demned themselves ! How many, by making much of
him, have made much of the very graces which, in all
other times and persons, they have been unwilling even
to acknowledge !

Yet again, the long life which has just closed was an
enduring witness to the greatness of that gift which
even heathens recognized, of hope, unfailing, elastic
hope. " Never despair ! " so the vicissitudes of the
octogenarian chief seemed to say to us. From a youth
of comparative obscurity, from a middle-age of constant
struggle with opposition, through a shifting career of
many changes and many falls, was attained at last that
serene and bright old age, that calm and honored death,
which, in its measure, is within the reach of all of us, if
God should so prolong our years, and if we should not
despair of ourselves. Never be dispirited ; never say,
" It is too late ; " never think that your day is past ;
never lose heart under opposition ; hold on to the end,
and you may at last be victorious and successful, even
as he was — it may be in still nobler causes, and with
still more lasting results. Nor let us shut out the en-
couragement which this is designed to give us, by say-
ing that it was, after all, only the natural result of a
buoyant and vigorous constitution. To a great degree,
no doubt, it was so ; yet it also rested in large measure
on the deeper ground of a quiet conviction that the fit-
ting course for a man was to do what is good for the
moment, without vainly forecasting the future — to do
the present duty, and to leave the results to God. " I
do not understand," so he once paid to one who knew
him well, — "I do not understand what is meant by

LORD PALMERSTON. 143

the anxiety of responsibility. I take every pains to do
what is for the best, and having done that, I am per-
fectly at ease, and leave the consequences altogether
alone." That strain, indeed, is of a higher mood: it
is the strain of the inspired wisdom of ancient days —
" Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with all thy
might." It is the strain, also, may we not say, of true
Christian humility and courage, which may well calm
many a care, and nourish many a hope, and strengthen
many a faith, beside, and beyond, and above the care,
and the hope, and the faith of a mere political career.

And this leads me to another and a wider view of
the subject, in which, nevertheless, all, even the hum-
blest of us, may take an interest. If any were asked
what was the thought or belief which, from first to last,
most distinctly guided his policy and sustained his
spirit, they would say his unfailing trust in, and con-
cern for, the greatness of England. He was an Eng-
lishman even to excess. It was England, rather thjin
any special party in England — it was the honor and
interests of England, rather than even the Constitution,
or the State, or the Church of England, that fired his
imagination, and stimulated his efforts, and secured
his fame. For this it was that his name was known
throughout the world, in the most secluded villages of
Calabria, on the wild shores of the Caspian, in the mon-
astic solitudes of Thibet. To England, and to no les-
ser interest, the vast length of that laborious life,
with whatsoever shortcomings, was in all simplicity and
faithfulness devoted. My brethren, I know well that
when I thus speak there are considerations far greater
than these by which the human soul must be stayed
in life and death, by which the world and Church are
guided on their appointed course ; but on this occasion
this is the thought which presses most ^forcibly upon

144 LORD PALMERSTON.

US ; this is tlie framework in which those higher consid-
erations present themselves ; this is the special oppor-
tunity which we are to redeem, and out of which the
will of the Lord will make itself clear. In this great
historic building, on the disappearance from amongst
us of one of our chief historic names in the sight of all
that was highest and noblest in our national life gath-
ered round that open vault, it is the very mission of the
preacher to ask you to reflect on what should be our
Christian duty towards that kingly commonwealth of
which we, no less than he, are members — of which we,
no less than he, are proud — for which we, no less than
he, are bound in the sight of God to lay down our lives
and to spend our latest breath.

England, we love thee better than we know 1

It was surel}^ an allowable feeling which caused one
whose voice has often been heard from this place thus
to describe the thrill of joy and exultation with which,
in a foreign land, he —

. . . heard again thy martial music blow,
And saw thy gallant children to and fro
Pace, keeping ward at one of those huge gates
Which, like twin giants, watch the Herculean straits.^

Some such feeling of pride as this it was which was
roused by the awe awakened in many a distant and
many a suffering nation at the sound of the powerful
name now to be inscribed within these walls.

But it is with loftier thoughts than pride or even
thankfulness that our spirits mount upwards when we
reflect on what is really involved in that idea which
so inspired the long career which has just closed —
England, and a citizen of England. Think of our
marvellous history, slowly evolved out of our marvel-

1 Gibraltar: sonnet, by R. C. Trench, Archbishop of Dublin.

LORD PALMERSTON. 145

lous situation. Think of that fusion of hostile races
and hostile institutions within the same narrow limits.
Think of the long, bright, continuous line of our litera-
ture such as is unknown in any other country. Think
of our refuge for freedom and for justice. Think of
our temperate monarchy and constitution, so fearfully
and wonderfully wrought out through the toil and con-
flict of so many centuries. Think of our pure domestic
homes. Think of the English Prayers and the English
Bible woven into our inmost and earliest recollections.
Think of the liberty of conscience and the liberty of
speech which give to conscience and to speech a double,
treble* weight and value. Think of the sober religious
faith which shows itself amongst us in so many diverse
forms, each supplying what the other wants. These
are some of the elements which go to make up the
whole idea that is conjured up by the sacred name of
England for which our statesman lived and died.

And then remember that what England is, or will
be, depends in great measure on her own individual
sons and daughters. Nations are the schools in which
individual souls are trained. The virtues and the sins
of a nation are the virtues and the sins of each one of
its citizens, on a larger scale and written in gigantic
letters. To be a citizen of England, according to our
lost chief, was the greatest boast, the greatest claim on
protection and influence, that a man could show in any
part of the world. To be a citizen of England in the
fullest sense, worthy of all that England has been and
might be, worthy of our noble birthright, worthy of our
boundless opportunities, this is, indeed, a thought which
should rouse every one of us, not in presumptuous con-
fidence, but in all Christian humility, to redeem the
time that is still before us, and to labor to understand
what the will of the Lord is for ourselves and for our

146 LORD PALMERSTON.

children. When, two days ago, we stood amidst the
deepening gloom round the grave of the aged states-
man, it was impossible not to feel that we were witness-
ing not only the flight of an individual spirit into the
unseen world, but the close of one generation, one stage
of our history, and the beginning of another. We had
climbed to the height of one of those ridges which part
the past from the future. We were on the water-shed
of the dividing streams. We saw the last thread of the
waters which belonged to the earlier epoch amongst the
remains of which the ashes of the dead were laid ; we
were on the turning-point whence, henceforward, the
springs of political and national life will flow in another
direction, taking their rise from another range, destined
to commingle with other seas, and to fertilize other
climes. Even the oldest of living statesmen, compared
with him who has gone, belongs to a newer age, and
has to face a newer world. On this eminence, so to
speak, we stand to-day. To this new start in our pil-
grimage we have each one of us to look forward. It is
not in England as in other countries, w^here the national
will is but little felt compared with the will of a single
ruler. Here, for good or for evil, the mind, the wishes,
the character of the people are almost every thing. That
public opinion, of which we hear so much, which was
believed to be the guiding star of the sagacious mind
which has just gone from us — that public opinion is
moulded by every one who has a will, or heart, or head,
or conscience of his own, throughout this vast empire.
On you, on me, on old and young, on rich and poor, it
more or less depends, whether that public opinion be
elevating or depressing, just or unjust, pure or impure.
Christian or un-Christian. If it be true, as some think,
that to follow and not to lead public opinion must
henceforth be the course of our statesmen, then our

LORD PALMERSTON. I47

responsibility and the responsibility of the nation is
deepened further still. The very creation of the cha !
acter of our public men must then devolve in a manner
upon those below them and around them. They may
inspire us but we must also inspire them. We mu^t
strive with all our strength to be that in our stations
which we would wish them to be in theirs. We mu"
act as those act in a beleaguered city, where every sen
tmel knows that on his single courage and fidelity may
depend he fate of all. A single resolute mind, IZl
th truth, and the truth only, has ere now brought thf
whole mmd of a nation round to himself. A sinde
pure spirit has, by its own pure and holy aspiration
b athed a new spirit into the corrupt mass of a whole

m behalf of honesty, and justice, and mercy, and free-
dom, has rendered forever impossible pract^ es whTch
were once universal.

'; Brethren," -so says the Apostle in the chapter
which you have just heard in this evening's service 1
Brethren forgetting those things which are behind
and reaching forth unto those things which are befo e
I press toward the mark, for the prize of the high cal t
lug of God in Christ Jesus." So let me call upon you
n the presence of that grave which has been lolIt2
closed; in the prospect of the changes and trials, what

midst of those mighty memories by which we are sur
rounded ; i„ the face of that might/future to wh h we

For. Un?"'"?' "'''' ''"" """^^ ^^'"'^'^ -« behind
i^orgct .11 him who is gone all that was of the earth and

lli/ TeYT"''^'^^^^'^"^^*^^*-"^^^^i-
mortal-the knidness, the perseverance, the freedom

from party spirit, the hope, the self-devotion, which can

never pass away, and which are still before each one

148 LORP PALMERSTON.

of US. Forget, too, in the past and the present genera-
tion all that is behind, all that is behind the best spirit
of our age, all that is behind the true spirit of the Gos-
pel, all that is behind the requirements of the most en-
lightened and the most Christian conscience ; and reach
forward, one and alj, towards those great things which
we may trust are still before us — the great problems
which our age, if any, may solve, the great tasks which
our nation alone can accomplish, the great doctrines of
our common faith, which we may have the opportunity
of grasping with a firmer hold than ever before, the great
reconciliation of things old with things new, of things
common with things sacred, of class with class, of man
with man, of nation with nation, of church with church,
of all with God. This is the high calling of England,
this is the high calling of an English statesman, this is
the high calling of every English citizen, this is the high
calling of the nineteenth century, this is the will of the
Lord concerning us ; this, and nothing less than this,
is " the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus
our Lord."

CHARLES DICKENS.

June 19, 1870.

He spake this Parable. . . .

There teas a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine
linen, and fared sumptuously every day : and there was a certain beggar
named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, and desiring
to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table: moreover
the dogs came and licked his sores. — St. Luke xv. 3 ; xvi. 19-21.

There are some passages of Scripture which, when
they are read in the services of the Sunday, almost de-
mand a special notice from their extraordinary force
and impressiveness. Such is the Parable of the Rich
Man and Lazarus, read as the Gospel of this day.
There are some incidents of human life which almost
demand a special notice from the depth and breadth
of the feelings which they awaken in the heart of the
congregation. Such was the ceremony which, on Tues-
day last, conveyed to his grave, within these walls, a
lamented and gifted being, who had for years delighted
and instructed the generation to which he belonged.
And if the Scripture of the day and the incident of the
week direct our minds to the same thoughts, and mutu-
ally illustrate each other, the attraction is irresistible,
and the moral which eacli supplies is doubly enforced.

Let me then draw out these lessons in what I now
propose to say.

1. I will speak first of the form of instruction which
we are called upon to notice in the Gospel of this Sun-

149

150 CHARLES DICKENS.

day. It is not only, like most of our Lord's instruc-
tions, a Parable, but it is, as it were, a Parable of the
Parables. It is the last of a group which occurs in the
15th and 16th chapters of St. Luke, where the story is
taken in each case, not as in the other Gospels, from
inanimate or irrational creatures, but from the doings
and characters of men. First comes the story of the
Good Shepherd, with all its depth of tenderness ; then
the story of the Indefatigable Searcher, with all its
depth of earnestness ; then the story of the Prodigal
Son, with all its depth of pathos ; then the story of the
Unjust Steward, with all its depth of satire ; and, last
of all, comes the story of the Rich Man and the Poor
Man, drawn not merely from the mountain side, or the
dark chamber, or the tranquil home, or the accountant's
closet, but from the varied stir of human enjoyment
and human suffering in the streets and alleys of Jeru-
salem. It is a tale of real life — so real that we can
hardly believe that it is not history. Yet it is, never-
theless, a tale of pure fiction from first to last. Dives
and Lazarus are as much imaginary beings as Hamlet
or as Shylock ; the scene of Abraham's bosom and of the
rich man in Hades is drawn not from any literal out-
ward truth, or ancient sacred record, but from the
popular Jewish conceptions current at the time. This
Parable is, in short, the most direct example which the
Bible contains of the use, of the value, of the sacred-
ness, of fictitious narrative. There are doubtless many
other instances in the Sacred Records. There is the
exquisite Parable of the Talking Trees in the Book
of Judges ; there is the sublime drama of the Patriarch
and his Friends in the Book of Job ; there is the touch-
ing and graceful picture of Jewish family life in the
Book of Tobit, from which our Church selects some of
its most striking precepts, and which, in its Homilies, is

CHARLES DICKENS. 151

treated as if inspired directly by the Holy Ghost. All
these are instances where moral lessons are conveyed by
the invention of characters which either never existed
at all, or, if they existed, are made to converse in forms
of speech entirely drawn from the inspired imagination
of the sacred writer. But the highest sanction to this
mode of instruction is that given us in this Parable by
our Lord Himself. This, we are told, was His ordinary
mode of teaching; He stamped it with His peculiar
mark. " Without a parable," ^ without a fable, without
an invented story of this kind. He rarely opened His
lips. He, the Example of examples, the Teacher of
teachers, "taught His disciples 2 many things by para-
bles." Through this parabolic form some of His gravest
instructions have received a double life. If we were to
ask for the most perfect exposition of the most perfect
truth respecting God and man, which the world contains,
it will be found not in a Discourse, or a Creed, or a
Hymn, or even a Prayer, but in a Parable, a story —
one of those which I have already cited — the Parable
of the Prodigal Son.

I have dwelt on this characteristic of the Gospel
teaching because it is well that we should see how the
Bible itself sanctions a mode of instruction which has
been, in a special sense, God's gift to our own age.
Doubtless His "grace is manifold," 3 — in the original
expression, many colored. In various ages it has as-
sumed various forms, the divine flame of poetry, the
far-reaching gaze of science, the searching analysis of
philosophy, the glorious page of history, the burning
eloquence of speaker or preacher, the grave address of
moralist or divine. These all we have had in ages past ;
their memorials are around us here. These all we
have in their measure, some more, some less, in the age

1 Matt. xiii. 34. 2 Mark iv. 2. « 1 Pet. iv. 10

152 CHARLES DICKENS.

in which we live. But it is perhaps not too much to
say, that in ]io age of the world, and in no country of
the world, has been developed on so large a scale, and
with such striking effects as in our own, the gift of
" spealdng in parables," the gift of addressing mankind
through romance and novel and tale and fable. First
and far above all others came that greatest of all the
masters of fiction, the glory of Scotland, whose romances
refreshed and exalted our childhood as they still re-
fresh and exalt our advancing years — as would to
God that they still might continue to refresh and exalt
the childhood and the manhood of the coming genera-
tion. He rests not here. He rests beside his native
Tweed. But long may his magic spell charm and pu-
rify the ages which yet shall be ! Long may yonder
monument of the Scottish Duke, whom he has immor-
talized in one of his noblest works, keep him in our
memory, as, one by one, the lesser and later lights
which have followed in that track where he led the way,
are gathered beneath its overshadowing marble ! It is
because one of those bright lights has now passed from
amongst us — one in whom this generation seemed to
see the most vivid exemplification of this heaven-sent
power of fiction, that I would thus speak of it, for a few
moments, in its most general aspect.

There was a truth — let us freely confess it — in the
old Puritan feeling against an exaggerated enjoyment
of romances, as tending to relax the fibre of the moral
character. That was a wholesome restraint which I
remember in my childhood, which kept us from revel-
ling in tales of fancy till the day's work was over, and
thus impressed upon us that the reading of pleasant
fictions was the holiday of life, and not its serious
business. It is this very thing which, as it constitutes
the danger of fictitious narratives, constitutes also their

CHARLES DICKENS. 153

power. They approach us at times when we are indis-
posed to attend to any thing else. They fill up those
odd moments of life which exercise, for good or evil,
so wide an effect over the whole tenor of our course.
Poetry may enkindle a loftier lire, the Drama may rivet
the attention more firmly, Science may open a wider
horizon. Philosophy may touch a deeper spring — but
ao works are so penetrating, so pervasive, none reach
so many homes, and attract so many readers, as the
romance of modern times. Those who read nothing
else read eagerly the exciting tale. Those whom ser-
mons never reach, whom history fails to arrest, are
reached and arrested by the fictitious characters, the
stirring plot, of the successful novelist. It is this which
makes a wicked novel more detestable than almost any
other form of wicked words or deeds. It is this which
gives even to a foolish or worthless novel a demoraliz-
ing force beyond its own contemptible demerits. It is
this which makes a good novel — pure in style, elevat-
ing in thought, true in sentiment — one of the best of
boons to the Christian home and to the Christian State.

Oh vast responsibility of those who wield this mighty
engine ; mighty it may be, and has been, for corruption,
for debasement, for defilement ; mighty also it may be,
mighty it certainly has been, in our English novels (to
the glory of our country be it spoken), mighty for edifica-
tion and for purification, for giving wholesome thoughts,
high aspirations, soul-stirring recollections ! Use these
wonderful works of genius as not abusing them ; enjoy
them as God's special gifts to us ; only remember that
the true Romance of Life is Life itself.

2. But this leads me to the further question of the
special form which this power assumed in him whose
loss the country now deplores with a grief so deep and
genuine as to be itself a matter for serious reflection.

154 CHARLES DICKENS.

What was there in him which called forth this wide-
spread sympathy? What is there in this sympathy,
and in that which created it, worthy of our religious
thoughts on this day?

I profess not here to sit in judgment on the whole
character and career of this gifted writer. That must
be left for posterity to fix in its proper niche amongst
the worthies of English literature.

Neither is this the place to speak at length of those
lighter and more genial qualities which made his death,
like that of one ^ who rests beside him, almost an '' eclipse
of the gayety of nations." Let others tell elsewhere of
the brilliant and delicate satire, the kindly wit, the keen
and ubiquitous sense of the ludicrous and grotesque.
*" There is a time to laugh, and there is a time to weep."
Laughter is itself a good, yet there are moments when
we care not to indulge in it. It may even seem here-
after, as it has seemed to some of our own age, that the
nerves of the rising generation were, for the time at
least, unduly relaxed by that inexhaustible outburst of
a humorous temper, of a never-slumbering observation,
in the long unceasing flood of drollery and merriment
which, it may be, brought out the comic and trivial side
of human life in too strono^ and startling? a relief.

But even thus, and even in this sacred place, it is
good to remember that, in the writings of him who
is gone, we have had the most convincing proof that it
is possible to have moved old and young to inextinguish-
able laughter without the use of a single expression
which could defile the purest, or shock the most sensi-
tive. Remember this, if there be any who think that
you cannot be witty without being wicked — who think
that in order to amuse the world and awaken the inter-
est of hearers or readers, you must descend to filthy

1 David Garrick.

CHARLES DICKENS. 155

jests, and unclean suggestions, and debasing scenes. So
may have thought some gifted novelists of former times ;
but so thought not, so wrote not (to speak only of the
departed) Walter Scott, or Jane Austen, or Elizabeth
Gaskell, or William Thackeray : so thought not, and so
wrote not, the genial and loving humorist whom we
now mourn. However deep into the dregs of society
his varied imagination led him in his writings to descend,
it still breathed an untainted atmosphere. He was able
to show us, by his own example, that even in dealing
with the darkest scenes and the most degraded charac-
ters, genius could be clean, and mirth could be innocent.

3. There is another point, yet more peculiar and
special, on which we may safely dwell, even in the very
house of God, even beside the freshly laid grave. In
that long series of stirri;ig tales, now forever closed,
there was a profoundly serious — nay, may we not say,
a profoundly Christian and Evangelical truth, of which
we all need to be reminded, and of which he was, in his
own way, the special teacher.

It is the very same lesson which is represented to us
in the Parable of this day. " There was a certain rich
man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and
fared sumptuously every day. And there was a certain
beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full
of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which
fell from the rich man's table. Moreover, the dogs
came and licked his sores." It is a picture whose every
image is expressive, and whose every image awakens
thoughts that live forever. It is true that an Oriental
atmosphere hangs around it — the Syrian purple, the
fine linen of Egypt, the open banqueting hall, the beg-
gar in the gateway, the dogs prowling about the city.
But the spirit of the Parable belongs to the West as
well as to the East. The contrast, the inequality of

156 CHARLES DICKENS.

deserts and circumstances, on which it insists, meets
"US in the streets of London, no less than in the streets
of Jerusalem ; and the moral which the Parable intends
that we should draw from that contrast is the very same
which in his own peculiar way is urged upon us, with
irresistible force, throughout the writings of our lost
preceptor. Close beside the magnificence, the opulence,
the luxury of this great metropolis, is that very neigh-
bor, those ver}^ neighbors, whom the Parable describes.
The Rich Man has no name in the Scripture ; but the
Poor Man has a name in the Book of God ; and he has
a name given him, he has many names given him, in the
tales in which the departed has described the homes and
manners of our poorer brethren. " Lazarus," the " help
of God" — the noble name which tells us that God
helps those who help themselves — is the very prototype
of those outcasts, of those forlorn, struggling, human
beings, whose characters are painted by him in such
vivid colors that we shrink from speaking of them here,
even as we should from speaking of persons yet alive —
whose names are such familiar household words that,
to mention them in a sacred place, seems almost like a
desecration. It is of this vast outlying mass of unseen
human suffering that we need constantly to be reminded.
It is this contrast between things as they are in the
sight of God, and things as they seem in the sight of
man, that so easily escapes us all in our busy civiliza-
tion. It is the difficulty of seeing this, of realizing this,
which made a Parable like that of the Rich Man and
Lazarus so vital a necessity for the world when it was
first spoken. But He who spake as never man spake
saw, with His far-seeing glance, into our complicated
age as well as into His own. What was needed then is
still more needed now ; and it is to meet this need that
our dull and sluggish hearts want all the assistance

CHARLES DICKENS. 157

which can be given by lively imagination, by keen sym-
pathy, by the dramatic power of making things which
are not seen be even as though they were seen. Such
were the gifts wielded with pre-eminent power by him
who has passed away.

It was the distinguishing glory of a famous Spanish
saint, that she was "the advocate of the absent." That
is precisely the advocacy of the Divine Parable in the
Gospels, the advocacy of these modern human Parables,
which in their humble measure represent its spirit —
the advocacy of the absent poor, of the neglected, of
the weaker side, whom not seeing we are tempted to
forget. It was a fine trait of a noble character of our
own times, that, though full of interests, intellectual,
domestic, social, the distress of the poor of England,
he used to say, ''pierced through his happiness, and
haunted him day and night." It is because this sus-
ceptibility is so rare, so difficult to attain, that we
ought doubly to value those who have the eye to see,
and the ear to hear, and the tongue to speak, and the
pen to describe, those who are not at hand to demand
their own rights, to set forth their own wrongs, to
portray their own sufferings. Such was he who lies
yonder. By him that veil was rent asunder which
parts the various classes of society. Through his gen-
ius the rich man, faring sumptuously every day, was
made to see and feel the presence of the Lazarus at
his gate. The unhappy inmates of the workhouse, the
neglected children in the dens and caves of our great
cities, the starved and ill-used boys in remote schools,
far from the observation of men, felt that a new ray
of sunshine was poured on their dark existence, a new
interest awakened in their forlorn and desolate lot.
It was because an unknown friend had pleaded their
cause with a voice which rang through the palaces

158 CHARLES DICKENS.

of the great, as well as through the cottages of the
poor. It was because, as by a magician's wand, those
gaunt figures and strange faces had been, it may be
sometimes, in exaggerated forms, made to stand and
speak before those who hardly dreamed of their ex-
istence.

Nor was it mere compassion that was thus evoked.
As the same Parable which delineates the miseries of
the outcast Lazarus tells us also how, under that exter-
nal degradation, was nursed a spirit fit for converse
with the noble-minded and the gentle-hearted in the
bosom of the Father of the Faithful, so the same master
hand which drew the sorrows of the English poor, drew
also the picture of the unselfish kindness, the coura-
geous patience, the tender thoughtfulness, that lie con-
cealed behind many a coarse exterior, in many a rough
heart, in many a degraded home. When the little
workhouse boy wins his way, pure and undefiled,
through the mass of wickedness in the midst of which
he passes — when the little orphan girl brings thoughts
of heaven into the hearts of all around her, and is as
the very gift of God to the old man whose desolate life
she cheers — when the little cripple not only blesses
his father's needy home, but softens the rude stranger's
hardened conscience — there is a lesson taught which
touches every heart, which no human being can feel
without being the better for it, which makes that grave
seem to those who crowd around it as though it were
the very grave of those little innocents whom he had
thus created for our companionship, for our instruction,
for our delight and solace. He labored to tell us
all, in new, very new, words, the old, old story, that
there is, even in the worst a capacity for goodness, a
soul worth redeeming, worth reclaiming, worth regen-
erating. He labored to tell the rich, the educated,

CHARLES DICKENS. 159

how this better side was to be found and respected even
in the most neglected Lazarus. He hibored to tell the
poor no less to respect this better part in themselves, to
remember that they also have a call to be good and
just, if they will but hear it. If by any such means
he has brought rich and poor together, and made Eng-
lishmen feel more nearly as one family, he will not
assuredly have lived in vain, nor will his bones in vain
have been laid in this home and hearth of the English
nation.

4. There is one more thought that this occasion sug-
gests. In the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus,
besides the pungent, pathetic lessons of social life
which it impresses upon us, is also conveyed, beyond
any other part of the Gospels, the awful solemnity
of the other world. " If they hear not Moses and the
prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one
rose from the dead." So also on this day there is
impressed upon us a solemnity, before which the most
lively sallies of wit, the most brilliant splendors of
genius wax faint and pale, namely, the solemnity of each
man's individual responsibility, in each man's life and
death. ^ When on Tuesday last we stood by that open
grave, in the still deep silence of the summer morning,
in the midst of the vast, solitary space, broken only
by that small band of fourteen mourners, it was impos-
sible not to feel that there was something more sacred,
more arresting than any earthly fane however bright,

or than any historic mausoleum however august and

that was the return of the individual human soul into
the hands of its Maker.

As I sit not here in judgment on the exact place to
be allotted in the roll of history to that departing glory,
neither do I sit in judgment on that departing spirit!
But there are some farewell thoughts which I would
fain express.

160 CHARLES DICKENS.

Many, many are the feet which have trodden and
will tread the consecrated ground around that narrow
grave ; many, many are the hearts which both in the
Old and in the New World are drawn towards it, as
towards the resting-place of a dear personal friend ;
many are the flowers that have been strewed, many the
tears shed, by the grateful affection of " the poor that
cried, and the fatherless, and those that had none to
help them." May I speak to these a few sacred words
which perhaps will come with a new meaning and a
deeper force because they come from the lips of a lost
friend, because they are the most solemn utterance
of lips now forever closed in the grave? They are
extracted from "the will of Charles Dickens, dated
May 12, 1869," and they will be heard by most here
present for the first time. After .the emphatic injunc-
tions respecting ''the inexpensive, unostentatious, and
strictly private manner " of his funeral, which were
carried out to the very letter, he thus continues : " I
direct that my name be inscribed in plain English
letters on my tomb. ... I conjure my friends on no
account to make me the subject of any monument,
memorial, or testimonial whatever. I rest my claims
to the remembrance of my country upon my published
works, and to the remembrance of my friends upon
their experience of me in addition thereto. I commit
my soul to the mercy of God through our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ ; and I exhort my dear children
humbly to try to guide themselves by the teaching of
the New Testament in its broad spirit, and to put no
faith in any man's narrow construction of its letter here
or there."

In that simple but sufficient faith he lived and died ;
in that faith he bids you live and die. If any of you
have learnt from his works the value, the eternal value

CHARLES DICKENS. 161

of generosity, purity, kindness, unselfishness, and have
learnt to show these in your own hearts and lives, these
are the best monuments, memorials, and testimonials of
the friend whom you loved, and who loved, with a rare
and touching love, his friends, liis country, and his
fellow-men : monuments which he would not refuse, and
which the humblest, the poorest, the youngest have it
in their power to raise to his memory.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

May 21, 1871, being the Sunday following the funeral of Sir John
Herschel.

A7id God said, Let there he lif/hts in the firmament of the heaven
to divide the day from the night ; and let them he for signs, and for
seasons, and for dags, and years : and let them he for lights in the firma-
ment of the heaven to give light upon the earth. — Gen. i. 14, 15.

So the sacred writer described, in the first early
dawn of Science, and in the first early dawn of Reve-
lation, the creation and the purpose of that vast celes-
tial mechanism which has exercised the minds of men
ever since. It is a striking instance of the mode in
which the Bible does and does not teach Science. Of
details it tells us nothing, or tells us only what belonged
to tlie rude, unformed conceptions of those ancient
times. Neither the gifted seer, whoever it was, that
wrote that first chapter of the Book of Genesis, nor he,
the royal Psalmist, who wrote that glorious hymn which
speaks of " the heavens declaring the glory of God,"
had any even the faintest insight into the wonders
which the telescope has disclosed to the eye and the
mind of the later generations of mankind. The " lights "
of which the sacred historians or prophets spoke were
to them (such is the meaning of the word) burning
"lamps" or " candles " suspended in the sky. The '' fir-
mament " of heaven was to them a solid blue surface,
spread like a canopy over the habitations of men. The
heavenly bodies were not to them enormous masses of

162

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 163

worlds, millions of miles away, millions of ages old, but
bright flashing fires, kindled for the first time to illu-
minate the darkness of the freshly created earth. '' He
made the stars also " is tlie one brief passing record
in which the author of Genesis sums up, in his account
of the fourth day of Creation, the birth of those mighty
systems, each almost a universe in itself.

That corner of infinite space in which men dwelt
still seemed the centre of the whole. None knew as
yet the vast "ordinances of heaven;"^ none knew
" the balancings of the clouds," " the wondrous works
of Him that is perfect in knowledge." It was not the
Divine will that the Chosen People should be prema-
ture astronomers or premature geologists. Other and
nobler truths than these were committed to the race of
Israel — not the wisdom concerning earth or sky, but
concerning man and God, not (as Baronius quaintly
but wisely says) "the revelation of how the heaven
goeth, but the revelation of how we must go to heaven."

But, although this gradual and imperfect growth of
knowledge is involved in the very structure of the
sacred books, although it is as unjust to the Bible as it
is vexatious to Science, to endeavor to reduce scientific
systems into conformity with the Biblical accounts, or
to require the Bible to give us scientific systems — this
does not prevent, nay, rather it assists the sacred
writers, in giving us the germs, the principles, the
framework, of that which has, in the slow march of
ages, been developed, we may almost say, into a new
revelation.

Most remarkably is this the case with respect to
astronomy. There are two characteristics of the Bibli-
cal accounts of the sun and moon and stars, that con-
tain the first stimulating thoughts of all the discoveries

1 Job xxxvii. 15, 16; xxxviii. 33.

164 SCIENCE AND RELIGION,

which have since been achieved. They belong to that
side of the Bible which it possesses, not so much from
its directly didactic character, but from that grandeur
and solemnity of view which is the inalienable treasure
of every book, of every mind, of every prospect of
man or nature, in proportion as it rises, whether by
grace or genius, above the commonplace level of ordi-
nary trivial things.

The first of these characteristics is the profound
sense which the Biblical writers display of the sublim-
ity and beauty of the divine order of heaven and earth.
They knew not, they could not know, what it meant in
all its parts. But it struck a poetic fire out of their
inmost souls, that reproduced itself in thoughts and
words, of which the childlike simplicity is only equalled
by their inborn and supreme nobility. Human lan-
guage has performed many marvellous feats since the
first chapter of Genesis was written ; but the saying of
the heathen Longinus sixteen hundred years ago is still
true — that nothing more sublime has ever been spoken
than -the words, "And God said, Let there be light,
and there was light." The hues of the rising and the
setting sun have been depicted by many a poet and
many a painter, have been analyzed by many a scien-
tific process, by many an optic tube, since the shep-
herd-king watched the rays of the early morning dart
over the level line of the hills of Moab ; yet no more
life-like description has ever been given in few words
than that of the sudden emergence of the sun's bright
face like that of a joyous bridegroom on his wedding-
day from the curtain of his secret chamber — of the
startling bound with which he leaps over the dark
ridge of the eastern mountains like a giant rejoicing to
run his course. The Grecian poets have sung of the
repose of immortals and the toils of mortals, have

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 165

handled with delicate touch the lights and shades of
sea and sky; but we might search in vain for any
expression of intense and abounding joyousness in the
beauty of creation for its own sake equal to that which
the Book of Job describes when it tells us, that at the
laying of the foundation-stone of the world, " the morn-
ing stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted
for joy." 1 The Mosaic cosmogonist, the Psalmist of
Bethlehem, the Idumean patriarch, could supply no
theory of the universe ; but they felt assured that in
those glorious orbs there was an indication of divine
power and wisdom beyond what they saw more closely
around them. They were prepared, and they prepared
others, to hear more; they put themselves and the
world into an admiring, reverential, listening attitude.

And this brings me to the second point which I
would name. They felt that there was something in
these wonders which man was intended to understand
and to read. At times they are overwhelmed by the
greatness of the mystery — they look up in dumb
astonishment: "When I consider Thy heavens, the
work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars which
Thou hast ordained, what is man, that Thou art mind-
ful of him ? " 2 u Qanst thou," it is said to Job, " canst
thou bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades, or loose
the bands of Orion ? Canst thou bring forth the con-
stellations 3 in their season, or guide Arcturus with his
sons?"* But these very phrases imply a search, a
yearning after the hidden truth, the very opposite of
dull indifference or superstitious fear. They mount at
times into the full expression of what a great French
scholar calls '' the grand curiosity " of a scientific and
inquiring age. " There is neither speech nor language "

1 Job xxxviii. 7. 2 Ps. vjii. 3.

8 Mazzaroth, probably the signs of the zodiac. * Job xxxviii. 31, 32.

166 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

(so David sings) in those distant stars ; " neither are
their voices heard." Yet, in spite of their silence,
" their sound " — a sound of their own — " is gone
forth through all lands, and their words unto the ends
of the earth. Day unto day uttereth speech, night
unto night revealeth knowledge." ^ Those lights which
were set in the firmament of heaven were already seen
to be not mere purposeless ornaments, not mere twin-
kling fireflies ; they were set there (so the primeval his-
torian tells us) " for signs and for seasons, and for days
and years." ^ They were there for man to interpret, to
explain ; to hear that silent sound ; to read those inar-
ticulate words ; to educe out of their mystic dances and
labyrinthine movements, order and law, the ideas of
time and of space, the witness which they bore to the
glory of the first creative Cause, the service which they
rendered to the use of the last created being.

That miserable antagonism which later ages have
imagined between Religion and Science, had no place
in those venerable oracles of God ; that unnatural civil
war which in modern times has been waged under the
opposing flags of Faith and Reason, would have awak-
ened not the slightest echo, because it would not have
had the slightest meaning, in the minds of those primi-
tive theologians, of those sacred philosophers.

If that question to Job has in our days been all but
answered ; if there have arisen those who have ana-
lyzed " the sweet influences of the Pleiades, and brought
forth the constellations in their seasons ; " if the simple
reckonings " of days and years and signs and seasons "
have grown up into the vast systems of astronomy and
chronology, of Kepler and of Newton ; if the silent
language of the stars has been read and expounded in
all lands from the Arctic Pole to the Antarctic Ocean

1 Ps. xix. 2-4. ^ Geu. i. 14.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 167

— it is because He who set those lights in the firma-
ment of the heavens willed that there should be cor-
responding lights in the human soul on earth; it is
because He planted an instinct in the spirit of man,
which, in the presence of these wonders of creation,
longed to see them face to face, eye to eye ; it is be-
cause in these early records of the Book of books there
was implied and expressed that craving for an inter-
preter, for a translator, for an explainer of those mys-
teries ; because, whilst clothing their bright ideas of
the universe in such shreds of knowledge as they could
put together, they were filled with a fearless desire for
light, an eager restless movement after truth, such as
best befits the truly religious mind, such as fills the
human soul with the only true reverence, because it is
the reverence of knowledge and not of ignorance.

This is the beginning of the world's astronomy.
This is the true relation of the Bible to Science. Not
a system true or false, but an opening and encourage-
ment for all systems ; not a fixed letter to control and
check, but a living spirit of freedom to encourage, and
stimulate, all inquiry.

I. Most instructive would be the task to trace the
gradual progress of that inquiry, the full completion
of that revelation. But on this day I would confine
myself to such thoughts as are more immediately sug-
gested by the passing away from us of one who was
amongst the foremost interpreters of nature in these
our latter days.

Such a light set in the firmament of earth to meet
the light in the firmament of heaven has been bestowed
on us in that gifted spirit, whose mortal remains were
on Friday last laid beside his yet mightier master,
amidst the mourning of all that England could show
of scientific genius and research.

168 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

Of him, if of any, it might be said that he lived
amongst those celestial luminaries. "Born under the
giant shadow of his illustrious father's telescope," in-
heriting from him his aspiring tastes, and his uncon-
querable genius, the stars from his earliest years were
his constant companions. "Light," he used to say,
" was his first love." For him was reserved that task
which the Book of Job describes as of superhuman
magnitude — the exploration for the first time of the
"wonders without number," not only in the familiar
regions of the north, but in "the secret chambers of
the south " ^ that Southern Hemisphere, whose marvels
he has himself so eloquently described, " where a new
heaven as well as a new earth is laid open to the gaze
of the astronomer, a celestial surface equal to a fourth
part of the heavens, the vivid beauty of the Southern
Cross sung by poets, and celebrated by the pen of the
most accomplished of civilized travellers" — the con-
stellations which neither Moses, nor David, nor Galileo,
nor Newton ever saw, but which shall look down on
the future destinies of the teeming nation^ of the
youngest born of the families of earth.

What the Psalmist regarded as the incommunicable
attribute of divinity, was almost if not altogether
achieved by those twelve years' unceasing labors and
unwearied calculations of a single man — " He telleth
the number of the stars, and calleth them all by their
names." 2 The glorious sun, whose daily rising was
in the eyes of the earlier Psalmist at once so beautiful
and so mysterious, became to this latest of astronomers
the absorbing subject at once of his ardent imaginings
and his profoundest speculations. "Where are thy

1 "Which maketh Arcturus, Orion, and Pleiades, and the cham-
bers " (Hebrew, " the secret chambers ") " of the south " (Job ix. 9).

2 Ps. cxlvii. 4.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 169

beams, O sun, and whence thine everlasting light?"
seemed to those who knew him best the motto engraved
as it were over his study door.

II. But this is not the place, nor is it for him who
now speaks, to dwell on results which those only who
fully understand them can worthily report. Here let
us for a few moments speak of the moral lessons to be
learnt from the conclusions which those labors suggest,
and from the spirit in which they were approached by
him who is gone.

It was his peculiar privilege to combine with those
more special studies such a width of view, and such a
power of expression, as to make him an interpreter, a
poet of science, even beyond his immediate sphere. It
is this which justifies and demands the development of
a somewhat larger range of instruction from his career
than it else would have allowed.

1. First, let us speak of that which at once appeals
to the ordinary life of all — the effects of Science on
our common interests. Filled as he was with a pas-
sionate love of abstract truth, yet from that very love
of those high subjects he longed to diffuse the knowl-
edge of them as far and as wide as he could find eyes
to see or ears to hear them. He was animated to a
fresh enthusiasm by the conviction which he labored
to impart to others, of the vast practical importance of
scientific knowledge, in " showing us " (if I may ven-
ture to use his own simple but most exhaustive lan-
guage) ''in showing us how to avoid impossibilities; in
securing us from important mistakes when attempting
what is in itself possible by means either inadequate
or actually opposed to the end in view ; in enabling us
to accomplish our ends in the easiest, shortest, most
economical and most effectual manner ; in inducing us
to attempt and enabling us to accomplish objects

170 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

wliicli but for such knowledge we should never have
thought of undertaking." ^ These are homely rules,
but they are rules which can be translated into the
highest experiments and enterprises alike of scientific
study, of statesmanlike policy, and of Christian benevo-
lence.

2. He felt, too, with a strength rendered doubly
strong by the profound interest which he took in the
more spiritual subjects of thought, the immense advan-
tage of Science to Theology and Philosophy, in teach-
ing the necessity of accurate definition, and of testing
theory by fact. He felt and he taught with all the
persuasiveness of example no less than precept, the
danger of meeting scientific questions with any other
than scientific weapons, " the danger of mistrusting
even for a moment the grand and only character of
Truth — its capability of coming unchanged out of
every possible form of fair discussion." " Ye shall
know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." ^
How many a cobweb of fine-spun folly, how many an
imaginary distinction of metaphysics, how many a
scholastic entanglement, how many a baneful supersti-
tion— has vanished away before the touch of this
Ithuriel's spear of scientific research I how firm a grasp
of reality, how strong and fresh a belief in the ^ possi-
bility of knowledge and certainty, how just a sense of
the difference between false, artificial authority and
true natural authority — can be given to the least scien-
tific of us by such an interpretation of science as that
which has in these latter days been afforded to us !
This is no subtraction from any theology which de-

1 Herschel's Discourse on Natural Philosophy, p. 94.

2 John viii. 32.

3 See the Duke of Argyll's Essay in Contemporai y Review, May»
1871, p. 157.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 171

serves the name. It is giving new meaning to its
words, new bounds to its domain, new life to its skele-
ton.

3. Again, he, if any of his generation, taught us with
unabated confidence the hope which Science teaches,
no less than Religion, but which, whether in Science
or Religion, the natural man so shrinks from receiving
— the endless prospect of improvement set before man-
kind in its onward progress. It is the scientific version
of the Apostolic text, '' Forgetting those things which
are behind, and reaching forth towards those things
which are before." ^ Great as is the duty of humility
to the student of Science and to the student of The-
ology, equally needed and often equally missed in both,
yet not less needed for both, is the duty of hope, of
boundless trust in the inexhaustible resources which
the Giver of all good things has stored up in man and
in nature. .'' The character of the true philosopher is to
hope all things not impossible, and to believe all things
not unreasonable." ^ We are often asked, with a mix-
ture of incredulity and despair, when any new inquiry
is set on foot, '' How far will this take us ? Where will
you stop?" The true answer is that which he gave
with the emphasis of calm persuasion, namely, that this
is the very glory of science — '^ When once embarked in
any physical research, it is impossible for any one to
predict where it will ultimately lead him." We often
hear it said — we often in our indolence think — that
all truth is old, and that, there is nothing new under
the sun. The true answer of Science is that which
again is at once the parallel and the illustration of the
language of the Apostle. " The mysteries of knowl-
edge, which in other ages were not made known unto
the sons of men, are now revealed, and will be still

1 Phil. iii. 13. 2 Discourse, p. 174.

172 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

more revealed, to those whom God has chosen." ^ All
these thousands of years the many uses of the sun and
moon 2 and stars ^'were hidden, which are now made
manifest" to all the world, even to those who least
understand whence their knowledge came, or what it
means. It was his proud, yet reverential boast, that
the students of Science were "as messengers from
heaven to earth to make such stupendous announce-
ments that they may claim to be listened to, when they
repeat in every variety of urgent instance, that these
are not the last announcements which they shall have
to communicate; that there are yet behind, to search
out and to declare, not only secrets of nature which
shall increase the wealth or power of men, but Truths
which shall ennoble the age and the country in which
they are divulged, and by dilating the intellect react
on the moral character of mankind." ^

4. We often hear, from timid or anxious lips, that
the tendencies of Science lead towards a materialistic
fatalism. It is at once a consolation and a rebuke to
be told by one who knew these tendencies well, that,
on the contrary, it is or ought to be the result of Science
that, " instead of being supinely and carelessly carried
down the stream of events, we now, by the great re-
sources put into our hands, find ourselves, as never
before, capable of buffetting with its waves, and per-
haps of riding triumphantly over them ; for why should
we despair that the Science which has enabled us to
subdue all nature to our purposes, should (if permitted
and assisted by the providence of God) achieve the far
more difficult conquest of enabling the collective wis-
dom of mankind to bear down the obstacles which
individual short-sightedness, selfishness, and passion
oppose to all improvements ? " *

1 Epli. iii. 5. Col. i. 26. 2 Discourse, p. 308.

8 Hersrhel's Essays, p. 550. * Discoia'se, p. 74.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 173

This is the scientific form, in which we read as in a
parable the counterpart, and therefore the support, of
that which Hegel truly called the most conspicuous
mark of the Divinity of the Son of Man — His freedom
from, His triumph over, the destiny of time and cir-
cumstance : " In the world ye shall have tribulation :
but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." '

5. Again, not with high- vaunting words, but with the
simplest and most serious assurance, he saw in the
Unity of Science the reflection, the inevitable reflection,
of the Unity of one Supreme Life and Will. We are
told that every theory and research of Science is con-
verging towards absolute simplification, towards re-
solving form after form, and species after species, into
some one common element, or some one common origin,
instead of the endless multiplicity of distinctions which
the more barbarous ages of the world assumed. There
may be much in this which is exaggerated, much which
we cannot understand, much which may startle, shock,
confound us. Yet there is a reassuring side of this
great argument. This truth of the unity of all things,
which he in common with others of his mighty fellow-
laborers has put before us, is but the statement by sci-
entific process and in scientific language of the same
doctrine which in one short, sublime sentence, was pro-
claimed from Mount Sinai, " The Lord thy God is one
Lord," or which stands at the opening of the firsts page
of the first sacred book, " In the beginning God created
the heaven and the earth." " Chaos," as our departed
teacher well put the case, " is the natural counterpart
of Polytheism ; " " Kosmos," ^ the adornment, the ideal
beauty, harmony, and grace, the unvarying law of the
universe, is the natural counterpart of the belief in the
one Supreme Mind of the one Creator and Lawgiver of

1 John xvi. 33. « Esscys, p. 28; Discourse, p. 266.

174 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

all. " It is in this conservation of order in the midst
of perplexity, in this ultimate compensation brought
about by the continual action of causes which appear
at first sight pregnant with subversion and decay —
that we trace the blaster wisdom with whom the dark-
ness is even as the light." ^ This is the Religion of
Nature ; but it is also only another formula for that
which, in the Religion of the Bible, is called the doc-
trine of Redemption and of Grace.

6. And yet once more, in that vast expansion of the
systems of the universe which Galileo first revealed to
us, which Newton explained, which the two Herscheld
classified and analyzed, if our first feeling be one of de-
pression and bewilderment, surely the final conclusion
of Science is also the final conclusion of the Apostle, in
the favorite text of Bacon, Oh the depth of the riches
both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! " ^ Jt is
the great doctrine, faintly, dimly, imperfectly believed
by our forefathers indicated, in passing, by one obscure
word in one of the least edifying of our Creeds, but by
these wonderful disclosures, confirmed, vivified, illus-
trated, reverberated from pole to pole, from system to
system — the doctrine of the Divine Infinitude, the
Divine Immensity. It is the intellectual, the scientific
side of the same attribute which in the moral nature of
God we call His all-embracing compassion. His bound-
less toleration. His all-penetrating justice. His inex-
haustible forbearance. '' There are bodies celestial and
bodies terrestrial — one star differing from another star
in glory." ^ This was the very image by which, even
with the imperfect knowledge of that age, the Apostle
represented the divine truth which his Master had pro-
claimed in the simpler form, so grand, so comprehen-
sive, yet so tender, " In my Father's house are many
mansions." *

1 E&says, pp. 257, 258. 2 Rom. xi. 33. « 1 Cor. xv. 40, 41. < John xiv. 2.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 175

Such are some of the relations of Science to Religion,
of the relations of the heavens that are without us, to
the yet greater heavens that are within us, which the
world and the Church may learn from all the true stu-
dents of nature, and in a special degree from him who
is laid amongst us here.

III. And now let us draw aside the curtain a little
further, and pass to the yet more practical lesson from
the spirit in which he labored. Surely it is profitable
to every one of us, to contemplate that long life wholly
given to those lofty, unselfish aims — working, as he
himself expressed, " like a working bee at home," work-
ing to the very end, reserving almost his only indigna-
tion for that spirit of idleness and luxury which spends
life without using it, wliich dissipates life without civil-
izing it. There is no child here present who may not
take heart from the thought that these memorable labors
took their rise in the filial pride and affection which
enkindled in him the noble ambition to complete what
his famous father had begun. There is no young man
here amongst my hearers who may not be stimulated in
a steadfast, onward course, when he is told of those
early college days, when the young Herschel with two
or three of his friends vowed (like a similar band almost
at the same time ^ in a great neighboring nation) that
" they would put their shoulders to the wheel, and leave
the world better than they found it." There is not a
student or a politician, there is not an artisan or an
artist, of whatever kind, who may not be moved by the
burning words in which the English philosopher six-
and-twenty years ago urged on his laggard countrymen
to follow the example, even then bright witli transcend-
ent brightness, of the science and industry of Germany;
when he implored them to bear in mind that amidst the

1 See Life of Baron Bunsen,

176 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

vast overwhelming accumulation of facts forced in upon
us from every quarter,^ "what we want is Thought,
steadily directed to single objects, with a determination
to eschew the besetting evil of our age, the temptation
to squander and dilute it on a thousand different lines
of inquiry. The philosopher must be wedded to his
subject if he would see the children and the children's
children of his intellect flourishing in honor around
him." There is not a soul engaged in the turmoils of
private or of public life, of science, or theology, or
statesmanship, who may not be raised beyond their
petty trivialities by thinking of that venerable sage
who lived through his long years above the stir of con-
troversies, which he shunned, not from indifference, but
from principle ; without the slightest spark of unworthy
rivalry either towards men or towards nations, fired
only by that noble glow which results from companion-
ship in honorable effort.^ '' True Science, like true
Religion, is wide-embracing in its aims and objects.
Let interests divide the worldly, and jealousies torment
the envious. The true votaries of science breathe, or
long to breathe, a purer air. The common pursuit of
truth;" whether sacred or scientific, '' is itself a brother-
hood." 3 There is no one, old or young, who may not
be soothed and elevated by the remembrance of the
calm, cheerful, simple, sanguine faith with which he
rose towards truth and light of whatever kind, like his
own favorite bird, ever soaring towards the dazzling,
sunbright sky — lark-like, '' true to the kindred points
of heaven and home." ^ '^ To spring even a little way
aloft, to carol for a while in bright and sunny regions,
— to open out around us, at all events, views commen-
surate with our extent of vision, — to rise to the level

1 Esmys, p. G51. See also p. 17. 2 jbia,, pp. 30, G34.

8 Ibid., p. 680. 4 Wordsworth.

SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 177

of our strength, and if we must sink again, to sink not
exhausted but exercised, not dulled in spirit but cheered
in heart — such may be the contented and happy lot of
him who can repose with equal confidence on the bosom
of earth, or rise above the mists of earth into the em-
pyrean day.'' ^ Such, assuredly, was his lot of whom
we speak — ''always eager to cast down 'the High
Places and Groves of Ignorance,' and to open the doors
of the human mind to let in light and knowledge ; yet,
always sure that right would come right at last, always
content to urge the right rather than fight the wrong."
One remark in conclusion, which I will preface by a
fine passage from one of his own popular addresses, in
which he urges on his hearers the inestimable advan-
tages of a taste for reading good authors. "Give a
man," he said, " this taste, and you place him in contact
with the best society in every period of history, with
the wisest, the wittiest, with the tenderest, the bravest,
and the purest of characters, who have adorned human-
ity ; you make him a denizen of all nations, a contem-
porary of all ages. The world has been created for
him. It is hardly possible but the character should
take a higher and better tone from the constant habit
of associating with thinkers above the average of
humanity. It is morally impossible but that the man-
ners should take a tinge of good breeding and civiliza-
tion, from having before one's eyes the way in which
the best bred and the best informed men have talked
and acted.'' 2 It was in a yet higher mood of the same
vein of thought that, many years ago, in the hearing of
one who well remembers it, there fell from his lips a
like saying, in a burst of fine moral enthusiasm: —
" Surely if the worst of men were transported to Para-
dise for only half an hour, amongst the company of the
great and good, he would come back conveiced."

1 Essays, pp. 259, 737. 2 Essays, p. 12.

178 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.

Such, in its measure, is the privilege which we have
had and may have in dwelling even for a short time on
the words and thoughts of a soul so pure and noble as
that which has gone from us. Such, still more, is the
privilege of those who were his companions and friends ;
who traced him from his blameless youth to his honored
grave ; who were drawn round him in his quiet and
simple home by the charm of his genius, by the yet
more inexpressible tenderness of his affections ; who
now gaze up into heaven after him — the outward
heaven, where his name is written in the stars, the
spiritual heaven, where his name is written in the Book
of Life.

For us, let us trust that he has '^ left the world better
than he found it." For himself, let us use those hum-
ble and holy words of his own —

Enough, if cleansed at last from earthly stain,

My homeward step be firm, and pure my evening sky.^

1 Essays, p. 741.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

June 25, 1871, being the Sunday after the funeral of George Grote the
Historian.

The '^just " shall be had in everlasting remembrance.
Psalm cxii. 6.

It is now more than six hundred years ago since one
of the earliest fathers of English history, an inmate of
the venerable Abbey of St. Alban's, which nurtured the
first school of English- historical learning, recounted, at
the commencement of his work, how he was vexed by
questions, some i)ut by envious detractors, some arising
from serious perplexity, whether the record of times
that were dead and gone was worthy of the labor and
study of Christian men. lie replied, with a lofty con-
sciousness of the greatness of his task, first by an appeal
to the highest instincts of man ; and then added, as a
further and complete sanction of those instincts, the
words of the Psalmist, "The just shall be had in ever-
lasting remembrance." *' In meworid cetemd erit Justus^

These are simple and familiar words ; but the Chron-
icler of St. Alban's was right in saying that they con-
tain the principle which vindicates and sanctifies all
historical research.

" If thou," he said to his yeaders, " if thou forgettest
and despisest the departed of past geinerations, who will
remember thee ? " '' It was to keep alive," so he added,
'^ the memory of the good, and teach us to abhor the
bad, that all the sacred historians have striven, from

m

180 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

Moses down to ' the cleep-souled ' ^ chroniclers of the
years in which we ourselves are living."

The religious sense of History which Matthew Paris
thus endeavored to convey has never since altogether
died out from amongst us, and it may be well to express
it once more on this occasion, when it has been brought
to our minds by the solemn ceremony Avhich yesterday
consigned to the grave the remains of a great scholar,
whose life was spent in historical study.

As on a like occasion not long ago I dwelt on the
religious aspect of Science, so now I propose to dwell
on the religious aspect of History. As then we were
invited to express our gratitude to the Giver of all good,
for the genius of one who ''told the number of the stars,
and called them all by their names," so now we are
invited to give thanks for the gift which God has be-
stowed on the Church and realm of England, in the
genius of one who could call up the spirits of the mighty
dead, and " seek out the secrets of grave sentences, and
try the good and the evil among men." ^

Let us take the words of the text as the groundwork
of our thoughts.

I. "Everlasting remembrance," "eternal memory"
— "a memorial that shall endure from generation to
generation." This is what History aims to accomplish
for the ages of the past.

As we are reminded both by Scripture and by expe-
rience of the noble, the inextinguishable desire im-
planted within us, to understand and to bring near to
us the wonders of the firmanent, so in like manner we
may be assured that there lies deep in the human heart
a desire not less noble, not less insatiable, to understand
and to bring near to us the wonders of the ages that are

1 " Pectoris Profundi," Matthew Paris, Hist. Major, pp. 1, 2.

2 Ecclus. xxxix. 3, 4.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY. 181

dead and buried. " I have considered the days of old,
and the years that are past ; I will remember the years
of the right hand of the most Highest ; I will call to
mind His wonders of old time ; " ^ "I will declare hard
sentences of old, which our fathers have told us, that
we should not hide them from the children of the gene-
rations to come." 2 It is this continuity of purpose, this
progression of ages, this connection of the deeds and
thoughts of those that are gone with the deeds and
thoughts of men now upon earth, that as truly disclose
the mind of God in the world of man, as the order, and
harmony, and progression of the celestial bodies disclose
it in the world of nature. The Astronomer is the histo-
rian of the heavens ; the Historian is the star-gazer into
the dark night of the past. As the philosophic dis-
coverer enables us to distinguish the several distances
of the fixed stars from each other, which to common
eyes are lost in the sense of their distance from us, so
the philosophic historian distinguishes, for those who
cannot see as far a-s he, the several distances of the stars
in the moral world, "one star differing from another
star in glory," according to their opportunities, their
age, their characters. As the telescope enables the man
of science to resolve the nebulous clusters of the milky
way into the distinct worlds of which each cluster is
composed, so the microscope of scholarship enables the
man of letters to resolve the nebulous mist of primeval
tradition into the distinct elements out of which it has
been gradually formed. As the celestial spheres are
mapped out by the natural student to guide the mariner,
and "for times, and for seasons, and for days, and for
years," so the spheres of earthly events are mapped out
by the historical student, and the monuments of glory
and the beacons of danger are set along the shores of

1 Ps. Ixxvii. 5, 10, 11. 2 Ps. ixxviii. 2-4.

182 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

the past, to direct us through the trackless ocean of the
future. Happy, thrice happy he who has the ears to
hear those voices of the dead which others cannot hear ;
who has the eyes to see those visions of the ancient
times which to others are dim and dark. History may
be fallible and uncertain, but it is our only guide to the
great things that God has wrought for the race of man
in former ages ; it is the only means through which " we
can hear, and " through which " our fathers can declare
to us the noble works which He has done in their days,
and in the old time before them."

II. And not only the religion of the natural man,
but the whole structure of the Bible is a testimony to
the sacredness and the value of historical learning.
Unlike all other sacred books, the sacred books both of
the Old and New Testament are, at least half in each,
not poetical, or dogmatical, but historical. Even the
poetic and dogmatic parts are for the most part mate-
rials for history. The Prophets of the Old Testament
are also historians. The visions of Daniel are, as has
been often observed, the first signal example of the
Philosophy of History. Nor is it merely in form, but
in spirit, that this truth is set forth before us in the
Bible. The Religion of Christendom has, besides its
other transcendent marks of superiority, this broad dis-
tinction from all other religions, that it is essentially
historical. Of the three great manifestations of God to
man, in nature, in conscience, in the course of human
events, — " God in History " will to a large part of
mankind be the most persuasive. On the great scale of
the world's movements we see impressed the " unceas-
ing purpose " of the Creator ; on the smaller scale of
the lives of heroes, saints, and sages, we see the highest
efforts of the Creature.

Doctrine, precept, warning, exhortation, all are in-

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY. 183

vested with double charms when clothed in the flesh
and blood of historical facts. If there has been an
" everlasting remembrance " of One supremely Just, in
whom the Divine Mind was made known to man in a
special and transcendent degree, it is because that Just
One, the Holy and the True, '' became flesh and dwelt
amongst us," and became (so let us speak with all rev-
erence and all truth) the subject of historical descrip-
tion, of historical research, of historical analysis, of
historical comparison. The sacred historians of the
Jewish Commonwealth, still more the simple, homely,
but profound historians of the New Testament whom
we call the Evangelists, are the most impressive of all
preachers. They are subject doubtless to the same
laws, to the same difficulties as other histories, and it
is from the illustration of other histories that they can
alone be fully understood and appreciated. But in
themselves they are the enduring witness in the Book
of books to the immortal power of history in the educa-
tion of mankind.

III. And this power is not confined to the history of
the Jewish people, or of the Christian Church. It ex-
tends to the history of " the nations " — of " the Gen-
tiles," as they are called in the Bible.

Those of us who were present at the splendid dis-
course ^ which on Sunday last thrilled the vast congre-
gation within these walls, and who heard the preacher's
indignant repudiation of the common mode of dividing
secular from sacred history, will not need to be per-
suaded of the great Catholic and Evangelical doctrine
that whatever was or is good and true in any race of
men, is equally precious in the sight of God; that
Greece and Rome as well as Judaea had their own dis-

1 Sermon preached by the Bishop of Peterborough in Westminster
Abbey on the evening of June 18, 1871.

184 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

tinct parts allotted to them in the guidance and prog-
ress of the world.

Over and over again is this truth expressed in the
Bible, " The just," without reserve, in whatever nation,
and of whatever creed, " is to be had in everlasting
remembrance." " Whatsoever things are true, whatso-
ever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, what-
soever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any
virtue, if there be any praise," ^ in whatsoever race, or
under whatsoever form, — these things are the legiti-
mate, the sacred, subjects which the Father of all good
gifts has charged the historians of the world to read
and to record wheresoever they can be discerned.

The Apostle St. Peter received the heathen soldier
of the Italian band with the undoubting assurance that
''in every nation he that feareth God and worketh
righteousness is accepted with Him."^ The Apostle
St. Paul, in contemplating the whole Gentile world,^
declared that ''not the hearers of the law are just
before God, but the doers of the law are justified ; for
when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by
nature the things contained in the law, these, having
not the law, are a law unto themselves." The Apostle
St. John declared that " he who doeth righteousness is
righteous."* And the Master and Lord of Peter, Paul,
and John, welcomed with His own special favor the
Roman centurion,^ whose faith exceeded all that He
had found in Israel; and hailed the coming of the
Greek inquirers^ who sought to see Him on the eve of
His departure ; and declared in language not to be mis-
taken, that when " all the nations " should be assembled
before the Son of man at the last day, His gracious

1 Phil. iv. 8. 2 Acts x. 35. 3 Rom. ii. 13, 14.

4 1 John iii. 7. « Matt. viii. 10, 11. « John xii. 20-26.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY. 185

benediction would be pronounced on all those that had
done good to their fellow-men, even though they had
never heard His voice, nor named His name ; ^ even
though they had never said Lord, Lord, yet, if they had
done His Father's will, if they had ministered to His
brethren on earth — this, and this alone, was sufficient
to win His supreme approval.

IV. And if we look yet closer into the story of that
marvellous Grecian race, which we are especially called
this day to consider, let us never forget that Christi-
anity itself, if from one point of view it is as a Hebrew
of the Hebrews, from another and not less important
view, it has become even as a Greek to the Greeks.
The language of its sacred books is not the tongue of
Sinai or Jerusalem, but of Athens and Alexandria.
Without Plato, without Aristotle, without Alexander,
the whole preparation for Christianity, the whole devel-
opment of Christianity, would have been wholly differ-
ent from that which, in the fulness of time and with
these riches of the Gentile world poured into it, it has
actually become. There is in its very conception, if
one may so say, a welcome, a stretching out of the
hands to the sons of Javan and to the coasts of Chit-
tim. There is interwoven with the very texture of the
New Testament a tenderness, a humanity, a univer-
sality, a search after truth, a variety, a freedom of de-
velopment, a popularity of constitution, that, humanly
speaking, are not Hebraic, but Hellenic ; they belong to
that side of the Divine Image which looks not towards
the mountains and deserts of the East, but towards the
isles of the Gentiles and the uttermost parts of the
western sea. Even in that Supreme Exemplar, in
whom there is in one sense neither Jew nor Greek, yet
in whom in another sense Greek and Jew each find

1 Matt. XXV. 31^0 : vii. 21.

186 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

their corresponding elements, there is an aspect to
which, amidst a thousand differences and at an incom-
mensurable interval, there has yet no closer parallel
been suggested in the history of mankind than the
highest climax of the development of Greece in the
immortal story of the consecrated life and solemn end
of the Athenian philosopher.

Yet perhaps it is even more from the contribution
of new elements of life to the spiritual growth of man,
that the Hellenic race claims "the everlasting remem-
brance " of those who value the inward Holy Spirit
of our Christian faith yet more deeply than they value
even the most sacred and imperishable of its outward
forms. "To have known the history of a people by
whom the first spark was set to the dormant intellec-
tual capacities of our^ nature" — to draw forth from
the various forms of fable or legend, of strange antique
observance and rare preternatural beauty, "cunningly
graven in gold or silver or stone by art and man's de-
vice," the devotion of that ancient people to their thou-
sand "unknown gods," which caused them to be consid-
ered by the Apostle as in all things "very^ religious"
beyond all their fellows-^ to delineate the growth of that
singular freedom of discussion, and singular fidelity to
law, which have since combined to make Christendom a
living reality, and Western Civilization a possibility —
to appreciate the various motives and forces, which,

Through many a dreary age,
Upbore whate'er of good and wise
Still lived in bard or sage,

and stimulated those lofty spirits who have moulded the

policy, the art, and the philosophy of all educated men

in after times — to thrill the spirit of generations yet to

1 Grote's Greece, vol. i., Preface, p. viii. '^ Acts xvii. 22, 23.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF PIISTORY. 187

come by recording once more in all their fulness those
heart-stirring victories of the few against the many,
of light against darkness, which will be tlie watchwords
of patriotism and of liberty as long as the fabric of the
civilized world endures — to inquire in what intricate
dej^ths of those early times " could wisdom be found," ^
and where was the primeval "place of understanding"

— to trace the rise of that heaven-sent genius which
was forever preaching on the oracle. Know thyself, as
the holiest of texts, which '^permanently enlarged the
horizon, improved the method, and multiplied^ho as-
cendant minds of the whole speculative world " forever

— to have painted the gloomy side of that luminous
history, and seen onr own sins anticipated or exagge-
rated in that highly wrought society, the sins of party
spirit and of popular superstition, the action and re-
action of democratic and despotic violence, the growth
of dark vices and of hideous crimes, even under the
surfiice of the most refined, civilization and by the side
of the loftiest aspirations — to have gathered together
that vast "cloud of witnesses," who, though they "re-
ceived not our promises, God having provided some
better things for us, that they without us sliould not be
made, perfect," 2 yet have their memories enshrined on
the heights of fame, as trophies which will not suffer us
to sleep in the race that is set before us in the onward
progress of humanity towards the City of the Living
God ; — To have learned or to have taught any of these
lessons from the annals of that dear immortal land,

Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breathes around —

this is to have done something towards the " everlast-
ing remembrance" of the Just, the Free, the Beautiful,

1 Job xxviii. 12. 2 Heb. xi. 39, 40; xii. 1, 22.

188 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

and the True — this is to have contributed something
towards the glorification of Him whose name is Justice,
and Loveliness, and Liberty, and Truth.

V. Such an effort, sustained through almost forty
years of unremitting toil, marked the course of the
aged scholar who now rests from his lifelong labors.
For this end, alike in early manhood and in maturer
years, he steadily forsook and set aside (so far as he
could) all worldly cares and honors. For this and for
the advancement of kindred pursuits, he, in a distracted
and luxurious age, lived the simple and single-minded
life of an ancient or academic sage.

And if, as has been the lot of other eminent histo-
rians, he was himself an example of that which he de-
scribed, and grew like to that which he admired, if we
feel as though we were reading of himself, when he
portrays the Athenian statesman,^ who " by his straight
and single-handed course, with no solicitude for party
ties, and with little care to conciliate friends or offend
enemies, and by manifesting through a long public life
an uprightness without flaw, had beyond all suspicion
earned for himself the lofty surname of the Just," or
that Spartan chief,^ who rose above his countrymen by
his " entire straightforwardness of dealing and his Pan-
hellenic patriotism, alike comprehensive, exalted, and
merciful ; " if we almost fancy that we see living again
in him the genius of historical impartiality, which once
seems to have been realized amongst men in the Grecian
Thucydides — then of him also, as of those whom he
delineated, may those sacred words be repeated : " The
just shall be had in everlasting remembrance."

To be just was the inspiring motive and the control-
ling check of his whole intellectual life. For the sake
of preserving the exact balance of truth, he resisted

1 Aristides (Grote's Greece, iv. 459). 2 Callicratidas (Ibid. viii. 219).

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY. 189

what, to minds like his, in an age like ours, is an in-
ducement stronger than love, or honor, or wealth ; he
restrained a fervid imagination, he sacrificed the graces
of st3'le, and the desire of effect ; he never gave way to
"the constantly recurring temptation to break loose
from the unseen spell by which a conscientious criticism
bound him down." ^

And this passion for justice, which was the soul of
liis work, was also the soul of his character.

They who knew him best will tell us that of all the
public men whom they had ever known he was the most
unswervingly just. Those who knew him not, may be
assured that whatever honor or respect he won, beyond
the region of his intellectual eminence, was the tribute
which mankind feel to be due to any manifestation of
that most Godlike and Christlike grace, the virtue of
justice. Let those whose hasty, dogmatic, exaggerated
statements fall from their lips in unceasing flow, with-
out thought for themselves, or care for others, remember
(if they ever heard it) the slow, deliberate enunciation
with which, even on seemingly trivial matters, he would
drop out, syllable by syllable, his exact, unimpassioned
judgments, as though he feared lest a single phrase
should escape him that was not absolutely true — as
though he had forever sounding in the innermost cham-
ber of his conscience the sacred maxim, " By thy words
thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be
condemned." Let those who think it consistent with
their station, or their rank, or their religion, to treat
with rudeness, or with scorn, those from whom they
differ, those to whom they are superior, those to whom
they are inferior, remember, if they ever saw it, the
gracious urbanity, the antique courtesy, the tender
consideration, with which he met the jarring circum-

1 Ibid. Preface, p. x.

190 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF HISTORY.

stances and characters of life, as though he had ever
before him the Divine ideal of Ilim who, in the quaint
but reverent language of an early English poet,^ has
been called —

The First True Gentleman that ever breathed.

Let those who think that enlarged philosophy, or
daring speculation, or eager research, carries with it, as
by a fatal necessity, a fierce and scoffing spirit, a for-
ward speech, an intolerant, insolent temper — let them
remember, if they ever witnessed it, the reverential
abstinence, the modest forbearance of that firm but
gentle nature which, alike in act and word, was the
living representation of the apostolic maxims — "In
honor preferring others ; condescending to men of low
estate ; " " rendering " with scrupulous exactness " to
all their due, custom to whom custom, honor to whom
honor." ^

Such an one, whether he be of us or not, shall surely
be honored amongst " the spirits of just men made per-
fect " hereafter. In parting with such an one, whether
we look backwards to the dark shadows of this mortal
life, or forwards to " the Light which no man can ap-
proach unto," we may repeat for him, and urge on
others, those sacred words of which the scope is limited
to no age or country, and of which the meaning is inex-
haustible : " The path of the just is as the shining light,
that shineth more and more unto the perfect day."^
"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after
righteousness, for they shall be filled." * "Jw memorid
ceternd erit Justus^ ^

1 Dekker. 2 Rom. xii. 10, 16; xiii. 7. s Prov. iv. 18.

* Matt. V. 6. fi Ps. cxi. 7 (cxii. 6).

FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE.

From a Sermon on Sunday Evening, April 7, 1872.
Peace he unto you. — Luke xxiv. 36.

There is a name which was given in the old Pagan
religion of ancient Rome to its chief ministers — the
name of Pontiff ; and from them the name has de-
scended to the chief ministers of the Christian religion
in modern Rome. The name, as it was first applied,
meant the maker of bridges. Why it was so used, in the
first instance, we now hardly know. They were, per-
haps, specially employed in constructing those mighty
instruments of earthly peace and civilization — the
great roads and bridges by which those old Romans
tamed and subdued the world. But in a moral and
spiritual sense we ought all to be makers of bridges
still — Pontiff or no Pontiff, minister or no minister,
every Christian who walks in his Master's steps, but
especially those who are Pontiffs, those who do hold a
high place in the Christian hierarchy, and most of all
those who by their noble spiritual gifts have the power
to reconcile and bring together their fellow-men.

Churches need not be united in order to be at peace.
Men need not be alike in order to be at peace. Not as
the world giveth, not as outward appearance giveth, is
the peace which Christ gives to us. It was the saying
of a great monarch of France, looking out on the neigh-
boring country of Spain, '' There are no more Pyrenees.'*

191

192 FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE.

The power of the human will, the vaulting ambition of
one man, was — so he thought — sufficient to remove
even this greatest of natural boundaries. But so, even
literally, it may be said that Faith and Charity have
power to remove mountains. Mountains of difficulty,
mountains of misunderstanding, may vanish before the
power of knowledge, before the depth of philosophical
analysis, before the courage which despises difficulties,
before the insight which sees into a heart of stone. In
those same Pyrenean mountains there is a huge cleft
called the Breach of Roland, because it was believed to
be hewn out by the magic sword of that renowned pala-
din on his passage to the field of Roncesvalles. Such a
Breach of Roland, such a cleft through the hardest
granite barriers that have ever parted the families of
mankind asunder, has been ere now cut through by the
magic sword of the paladins of true philosophy, of true
theology, of the true Christian discernment of the spirits
of men.

Such an example of the gift of peace in all its senses
has been shown forth in a revered and saintly teacher,
who on the early dawn of Easter Monday was removed
from this world of strife to the peace which shall never
be broken. Many in this church may have seen —
many others, high and low, may have heard of — the
lifelong labors in behalf of Christian truth and Chris-
tian love, which have endeared to thousands of his
countrymen the name of Frederick Maurice. In one
sense it was a life not of peace, but of constant warfare,
of war against all that was mean and base and false ;
whenever and wherever he saw, or thought he saw, any
one wronged or oppressed, always in the foremost
rank; the champion of the fallen cause, of the for-
gotten truth, of the things which being eternal are not
seen, because they are hid behind the things which

FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE. 193

being seen are temporal. It was a life, too, not of
peaceful ease, but of incessant, unwearied toil, a bush
ever burning; and, as it burned, consumed with its own
inextinguishable zeal for God's house and God's honor,
devouring as a burning flame the mind and the body
that enclosed it ; bearing every one's burden and reliev-
ing every one's grief; suffering with the sufferings of
the poor and afflicted ; struggling with the struggles
of the inquiring soul. Who was weak and he was not
weak ? Who was offended and he burned not ? It was
a life, too, not withdrawn from earthl}'' concerns, not
wrapt up in abstruse contemplation. He lived in the
very thick of the stirring influences of our time. He,
if any one, was an English citizen, even more than
he was an English Churchman. He, whilst clinging
passionately, devotedly, to the ages of the past, yet
was, if any one, full of all the thoughts and events of
our own momentous century. Not a wave of specula-
tion in Europe, not a public event of joy or sorrow in
England, but called forth a sympathetic or indignant
cry from that travailing soul. None of our time have
in this respect so visibly been as the ancient prophets,
reflecting all the movements of the age, yet themselves
not led captive by them.

For this was the contrast which makes his life so
deeply instructive. In the midst of all this, he was in
all those senses in which we have spoken of peace, the
most peaceful, the most pacific, the most peace-making
of men.

Peace in himself; for, amidst the strife of tongues
and the war of parties, he remained self-poised, inde-
pendent, in a world above this world, in a land that
was very far away, with utterances sometimes obscure,
sometimes flashing with lightning splendor, yet always
speaking from his own heart and conscience that which
there he had truly found.

194 FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE.

Peace for others ; for he was ever striving to make
himself heard and felt across the boundaries which part
us asunder; a fountain of lire which irradiated even
where it did not penetrate, a trumpet that awaked
even where it did not convince, a music that soothed
even where it was not understood. In any sacred
word, whether of the Bible or of the Church, in all
the great words of human speech, he labored, perhaps
too eagerly, to discern — not its commonplace, earthly,
party meaning, but its heavenly, ideal, catholic signifi-
cance. He has been, in the high sense in which I used
the word, a true Pontiff of the English Church, a true
paladin in the English State. He has built bridges
that will not easily be broken across the widest chasms
that separate class from class, and mind from mind.
He has, with a more piercing sword than Roland's
Durandel, made a breach in the mountain-wall of pre-
judice and ignorance that will never be entirely closed.

Peace in God. In that voice trembling with emo-
tion each time he said the Lord's Prayer or the Apos-
tles' Creed, as though he was reading them always for
the first time, as though they came to him fresh with
their original freshness, yet laden with all the meaning
of ages ; in those eyes bright with faith in the eternal
goodness and justice of God; in that mighty mouth,
fixed in defiance against all falsehood, in which the
heart seemed to speak, as with lips of its own, the very
message which he was sent into the world to deliver —
the veriest stranger could see the " Peace not as the
world giveth," but as He giveth who is the giver of all
that is good in every praj^er, in every creed, in every
truth, human or divine. By that prophetic counte-
nance, by that inspiring voice, by that ennobling pres-
ence, the youthful listener felt that a mind higher than
his own was feeling for him; the old man perceived

FKEDERICK DENISON MAURICE. 195

that from the generations that were to come there was
as much to be learnt as from the generations that were
passed and gone ; the student saw the unity of theology
and of philosophy, of time and of eternity; the poor
man felt that there was one who was filled even to
overflowing with the sense of the brotherhood, the
community of all men. The secret of all this (if we
may venture to divine) was that of a trust absolute,
unbroken, yet with a perfect understanding of what he
believed, in the greatness and goodness of God and of
God's dealings with the whole race of mankind. The
religions of the world were all to him manifestations,
more or less imperfect, of the religion of Jesus Christ.
The various developments of the Christian Church
were all to him various provinces of the Kingdom of
Christ. The threefold name of the Father, the Son,
and the Holy Ghost, was not to him a dark insoluble
mystery, but a glorious revelation of the depths of the
moral being of God. Believing in the truth of this
revelation as positively as the strictest Pharisee or
fanatic of any Jewish or Christian sect, he could afford
to be as reverent as he was free, as fearlessly bold as he
was perfectly humble ; he was not, he could not be,
afraid of any evil tidings, of any inquiry, of any
research, for his heart stood fast, and believed in the
eternal God.

Such was the vision of Peace which he presented to
the world whilst he lived ; and his reward even on
earth has been that when his end came, the strife that
had been provoked by the long warfare of life, the
earthly passions which had cast out his name whilst he
was amongst us, were hushed into respectful silence
when he was taken from us. And amongst those who
gathered round his grave, or who honored his memory,
were many who met but there, and who there met in

196 FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE.

the Peace of God. For he, in whom the ancient faith
in Jesus Christ and His Gospel could enkindle such a
bright and shining light, had given the best proof that
the truth of that Gospel can make us free, that where
the Spirit of Christ is, there is liberty.

And from himself there came in those last hours the
most touching, the most impressive, because the most
characteristic, of all the utterances that could have
fallen from his lips. On that early Easter morning,
when the end drew near, out of the extremity of bodily
weakness, out of the darkness of death, he gathered
himself up and pronounced calmly, distinctly, and with
the slight variation which was necessary to include
himself as well as others within its range, the solemn
benediction with which the Church of England at the
close of its most solemn service gives its Peace not as
the world giveth — the benediction which had been
endeared to him through the long years of his faithful
ministrations, every word of which was to him instinct
with a peculiar life of its own, a peculiar reflex of his
own profoundest feelings. With that benediction let
me venture to conclude, in the humble hope that some-
thing of his spirit may breathe upon us through this his
last legacy — his last message to English Christendom.
" The Peace of God, which passeth all understanding,
keep our hearts and minds in the knowledge and love
of God and of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord ; and the
blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Ghost, be amongst us and remain with us
always."

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

April 19, 1874, being the Sunday after Dr. Livingstone's burial.

Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold ; them also I must
bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and
one shepherd. — John x. 16.^ •

If a visitant from another planet were to look over
the surface of this earth ; nay, if we ourselves cast a
glance at the map of the globe, it might seem as if it
was a vast system of impassable barriers ; walls of par-
tition mountains high, reaching to the clouds; rivers
which have become the very type of the gulf of death
itself; oceans with their illimitable, "dissociable" ex-
panse of waters — all the varieties of climate, race,
customs, which make every change irksome, every step
in advance a peril. Add to this the deeply rooted
instinct of the human mind, which binds each man to
his family and his country, which attaches him to the
haunts of his childhood, to the tombs of his fathers,
to all the endearing associations and ennobling glories
that make '' home " one of the most sacred of human
words, and patriotism one of the most exalting of
human virtues.

Yet, as if to meet these natural difficulties, to enlarge

1 The Gospel of the day from which this text was taken was John
X. 7-16, and the Lessons, which fell in their regular course, were Num-
bers xxi., describing the wanderings of Israel in the Desert, and Ephe-
sians iii., describing the mission of St. Paul to the Gentile world. The
16th and 23rd Psalms were chosen especially for the occasion, as well as
the anthem from the 35th chapter of Isaiah.

197

198 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

these contracted feelings, there is a countervailing in-
stinct planted in the heart of man, which has proved
sufficient not only to surmount all obstacles, but, in
surmounting them, to give birth to new virtues ; to link
the human race together by bonds as much stronger
than the barriers which keep them asunder as spirit is
stronger than matter, as knowledge is stronger than
ignorance, as love is stronger than hatred. ''Behind
these mountains there are also people like ourselves,"
is the unconscious cry (as expressed in the German
proverb), even of the unreasoning savage. " Other
sheep I have, which are not of this fold," is the same
thought, expressed in the highest form of human and
divine compassion. That instinct, in its simplest ex-
pression, takes the form of the world-wide ambition of
the traveller ; in its loftiest development it is the world-
wide beneficence of the missionary and the philanthro-
pist. The result of this divinely implanted instinct in
the sphere of knowledge is written in the noble sciences
of Geography, of Comparative Philology, of Ethnology ;
in the spiritual sphere, it is the great philosophical and
Christian doctrine of the unity of mankind, of the Holy
Universal Church, of the gathering of "one flock ^
into one fold under one shepherd."

Let me in a few words trace through its various stages
this glorious mission of the Traveller.

I. First, we shall speak of the simple, natural desire
of exploring new regions, of visiting famous scenes, of
breathing a new atmosphere, of traversing new experi-
ences. Let no one think scorn of this noble passion.
Well said the wise man of old, " It is the glory of God
to conceal a thing, but the honor of kings is to search
out a matter." ^ It is the glory of God to stimulate

1 The word translated "fold" properly means "flock," in the last
clause of John x. 16. 2 Prov. xxv. 2.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 199

search after truth, and enkindle chivalrous enterprise
by "determining for the nations their appointed times
and the bounds of their habitation." i It is the glory
of kings, and kinglike men, to discover the secrets of
His Providence, the treasures of His grace, the infinite
variety of nature and of man. Who is there that has
not felt at times the glow of that sacred fire, the enthu-
siasm of that heaven-sent inspiration ? No doubt the
poet spoke truth when he sang —

Breathes there the man with soul so dead

Who never to himself hath said,

" This is my own, my native land? " —

Yes, but it must also be added, "Breathes there the
man with soul so dead " who has not felt a new life
within him, when he has for the first time left his native
village and seen the great cities of mankind ; when he
has for the first time crossed the silver streak of sea,
and landed on the continent of Europe ; when he has
for the first time mounted the barrier of the Alps, and
descended upon the sunny regions of the South ; when
he has for the first time passed into the silent pathways
of the frozen North, or the ancient splendors of the East,
or the teeming activity of the virgin West? Is it not
true (if we may so far enlarge the saying of the Emperor
Charles V.) that each one of us becomes a new man
not only with every new language he acquires, but also
with every new land he traverses? Who can ever for-
get, that has once felt it, the exhilarating sense of his
first glance at the eternal snows, or his experience of
the boundless liberty of the desert, or the sublime
solitude of the ocean?

And if this be so with ordinary travellers, how much
more in those nobler spirits in whom it has become a
high vocation to unveil the mysteries which none before

1 Acts xvii, 26.

200 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

have known ? What moment is there of more thrilling
interest in the earth's history than when Columbus saw
the lights of the New World, of which for years he had
dreamed ? What purer thirst for knowledge than that
which, on the lonely Cape of St. Vincent, or in the
exquisite chapel of Belem on the shores of the Tagus,
fired the Portuguese voyagers for their manifold discov-
eries? What more touching proof of devotion to the
cause of duty and science combined than the grave of
Franklin and his gallant companions in the icy sepul-
chre of the Polar seas?

Even in this, its simplest form, the glory of the trav-
eller is one of the glories of our race ; nay, we may
add, one of the glories of our religion. It has its sanc-
tion in our earliest sacred associations. Who was the
first of the long line of those adventurous spirits who
" gat them out of their country and their kindred and
their father's house, not knowing whither they went "?^
It was Abraham, the Father of the Faithful. What
was the education of the youth of the Chosen Peoj)le ?
It was a perpetual journey, marching and countermarch-
ing through a "great and terrible wilderness,", through
mountain passes, through deep ravines ; their leader d}^-
ing in sight of the good land which he was not to possess
— the parable to every subsequent age of the pilgrimage
of life, the wilderness of the world, the prelude to the
promised rest. Who was it that planned the first voy-
age of discovery which brought back the sandal-wood
of Malabar, the peacocks of Hindostan, the ivory tusks
and the apes of Africa, the gold of the unknown Ophir ?2
It was the wise king the son of David. Whose life is
it that, as a famous writer expresses it, is one vast itin-
erary ; as another calls it, the Christian Odyssey follow-
ing on the Christian Iliad ; hurrying from continent to

1 Gen. xii. 1; Heb. xi. 8. 21 Kings x. 22.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 201

continent, from island to island, " in shipwrecks often,
in journeyings often, in perils of rivers, in perils of rob-
bers, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in
perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea ; in weari-
ness and painfulness, in watchings and fastings, in hun-
ger and thirst, in cold and ^ nakedness " ? It is Paul
of Tarsus, the Apostle of the Gentiles. And what —
if we may, with reverence, ask — what was one of the
chief aspects of the Foremost Figure of all which our
Sacred Books present? It is not of a recluse hermit
fixed in the Jordan Valley, nor yet of a teacher station-
ary in the schools of Jerusalem, with no thought for
those beyond the limits of his native land. It is of One
whose eye was turned to " the many who should come
from the east and from the west, from the north and
from the south," ^ before whose glance had once been
unrolled, as in a map, "all the kingdoms of the world." ^
It is of One who, in His actual life on earth, was con-
stantly moving to and fro, often not having where to
lay His head ; a hungry and thirsty wayfarer who, from
Galilee to Samaria, from Samaria to Judea, on the hills
beyond the Jordan, and on the coasts of Tyre and Sidon,'
on the snow-clad heights of Hermon, '* went about doing
good." 4

Quserens me sedisti lassus ;

Tantus labor non sit cassus.

Thou in search of me didst sit,
Wearied with the noontide heat ;
Oh may all that toil and pain
Not be wholly spent in vain I

Such is the origin, such, at least in part, the ancestry
and likeness that we claim for the noble army of Trav-
ellers. And this leads me to speak of the place which

1 2 Cor. xi. 25-27. 2 Luke xiii. 29. « Matt. iv. 8. * Acts x. 38.

202 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

they fill, or may fill, in the divine economy of the
world. I have already glanced at the light which they
have thrown on the secrets of the Universe. No one
who feels how sacred a thing is this earth, as the handi-
work of the Creator, as the expression of His will, can
be indifferent to the holy privilege of those who assist
in unveiling any part of that handiwork, in revealing
any part of that will, to the eyes of men. The whole
of it, if we believe in its derivation from one Supreme
]\Iind, hangs together, and so long as any corner of its
recesses remains unlaiown, we have not done our utmost
to learn our Father's whole mind toward us. It was
the generous expression of a wish, hopeless perhaps to
any one individual, that was once uttered by an enthu-
siastic student of Geography — ^' I should be miserable,
if I thought that there was a single land that I should
never visit, or a single language that I should never
know." But what in the case of one man is impossible,
is possible for the whole race of men, through its more
energetic members. There is no land which ought to
remain unvisited, there is no language that ought to re-
main unlearned, if we really desire to follow the true
Vestiges of Creation, the true Footsteps of the Creator.
" If we take the wings of the morning and dwell in
the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall His
hand lead us, and His right hand shall uphold us." ^
But it is not only in the accumulation of knowledge
that the Traveller discharges a heavenly mission. It
is also in bringing together, and in drawing upwards
towards a common centre, " the children of God that
are scattered abroad " in every race and clime. The
instinct which inspires the adventurous explorer is, in
its root, the same as that which inspires the devoted
missionary. It is the feeling that Mankind is one ; it is

1 Ps. xjxxxix. 10.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 203

the sense of kindred even with the most alien, the most
perverse, the most degraded forms of humanity ; it is
the sense that in races most unlike to ourselves there
are capacities of improvement, of superiority, of excel-
lence, of which, till we had seen them, we were almost
unconscious. And as the Traveller by the nature
of the case is almost always the representative of a
more civilized nation, of a more refined religion than
those into whose haunts he wanders, he becomes almost
perforce a missionary — a missionary either for good
or for evil. A missionary it may be for evil. It is
unfortunately true that the liberty of a traveller has
sometimes been the mask of license, that the indiffer-
ence, the profaneness, the self-indulgence, of the Euro-
pean are the only characteristics of himself which he
by his example imparts. Of all the crimes against our
common humanity, few are deeper in guilt or more
widespreading in their consequences, than that of the
man who thus coming in the guise of an angel of light
transforms himself into an angel of darkness, who
takes to himself the vices of the savage and gives in
return the vices of civilization. But this is not the
true Traveller, this is not the genuine seeker after
truth, this is not the faithful messenger to " the other
sheep that are not of this fold." Far oftener, we would
fain believe, the Traveller rises to the height of his
lofty calling, and awakens to the new responsibility
which his new position lays upon him. The humblest
wayfarer in the far East or the farther South has it
in his power, by fairness, by kindness, by justice, to
leave behind him his stamp on those who in him, per-
haps for the first time and the last time, have the
chance of knowing what is meant by a European, by
an Englishman, a Christian. The Explorer, even in
the most purely scientific pursuits, becomes accessible

204 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

to the catholic tendencies of pure Religion, to the
reverent sense of a watchful Providence, such as men
in their ordinary lives can hardly experience. What
lessons of faith and wisdom are read to us by that
passage in the life of Mungo Park, when, naked and
alone in the desert, he was recalled to hope and per-
severance by his reflection on the care of God, as
displayed in the leaves of the little plant which he saw
before him not bigger than his finger's end ! And
when, to the effects of personal example and personal
experience, there is added the assurance that, through
every pathway that the Traveller opens, civilization,
commerce, and religion will follow, and that thus alone
the waste places of the earth can become redeemed and
cultivated, — then we see how, as if by an undesigned,
or shall we not rather say a designed, coincidence, the
special obstacles of lands all but inaccessible are met
by the rare faculties of special men. If we may ven-
ture to invert the ancient proverb, " God's extremity
is man's opportunity." At home, no doubt Charity
begins. "He who loveth not his brother whom he
hath seen," how can he love the distant savage whom
he hath not seen? But, nevertheless, it is the very
will and purpose of our Creator, and of our Redeemer,
that "His voice shall be heard" even by those most
remote from the fold of our own religion, from the fold
of our own civilization. It is the very burden of the
prophets of old that not only the near, but the far
distant, horizon, shall share in the promised regenera-
tion. " The kings of Tarshish and Arabia, Ethiopia
stretching out her hands unto God," ^ were not, in the
grand prophetic view of the world, out of mind, be-
cause out of sight. They occupied, we may say, the
constant background of the picture. It is in the far-

1 Ps. Ixviii. 31; Ixxii. 10.

TBra MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 205

thest and most unlikely regions that the most signal
triumphs of truth and goodness were expected to be
felt. Not the crowded city only — not the peaceful
hamlet only — but "the wilderness and the solitary
place " shall be glad for them : not the garden and the
vineyard only, but " the desert shall rejoice and blos-
som as a rose, and the parched ground shall become
a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water, and an
highway shall be there, and it shall be called the way
of holiness." ^

II. And now let us turn to the occasion which has
led to these thoughts.

I have spoken of the gracious allotment by which the
Ruler of the world has brought the inborn sentiment of
curiosity and benevolence in the more highly favored
parts of the earth to bear on the darkness and isolation
of the more remote and obscure. It would almost seem
a^ if, by a yet further distribution of the same merciful
Wisdom, particular tracts of the world had become the
vent, the sphere for the energy of particular nations,
which have acquired a kind of special parental interest
in these neglected lands, these Foundlings, as it were,
of the human family. Such has been the singular lot
of Africa. That vast, impenetrable continent has been,
for the last hundred years, the peculiar subject of the
inquiry and the philanthropy of England, as in early
ages it was to the civilized world of Greece and Rome.
The grand secret of geography — the course of that
mysterious and beneficent River which has for ages
veiled its head, and provoked the curiosity of mankind
from Herodotus downwards — has laid a special hold on
the imagination of this remote island, of which Hero-
dotus hardly dreamed. The forlorn condition of the
African races has awakened a sympathy in English

1 Isa. XXXV. 7, 8.

206 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

hearts which no Greek or Roman ever knew ; and this
Abbey teems with the memorials of those who have
labored in the cause of the negro and slave.

Such was the sphere to which, in its double aspect,
was devoted the life of him who has been adjudged by
competent authority the greatest African traveller of
all time.

In few men has been developed in a stronger, more
persistent form, that passion which we just now ana-
lyzed, for penetrating into the unknown regions of the
earth. His indomitable resolution has revealed to us,
for the first time, that vast waste of Central Africa
which, to the contemplation of the geogrj^pher, has lit-
erally been transformed from a howling wilderness into
" the glory of Lebanon." '^ The parched ground " has,
in his hands, "become a pool, and the thirsty land
springs of water." ^ The blank of " Unexplored Re-
gions " which, in every earlier map, occupied the heart
of Africa, is now disclosed to us, adorned with those
magnificent forests ; that chain of lakes, glittering (to
use the native expression) like " stars " in the desert ;
those falls, more splendid, we are told, even than Niag-
ara, which no eye of civilized man had before beheld —
where, above the far-resounding thunder of the cataract
and the flying comets of snow-white foam, and amidst
the steaming columns of the ever-ascending spray, on
the bright rainbows arching over the cloud, the simple
natives had for ages seen the glorious emblem of the
everlasting Deity — the Unchangeable seated enthroned
above the changeable. To his untiring exertions, con-
tinued down to the very last efforts of exhausted nature,
we owe the gradual limitation of the basin within which,
at last, must be found the hidden fountains that have
lured on traveller after traveller, and hitherto baffled

• 1 Isa. XXXV. 8.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 207

them all. We trust that those way-worn feet now rest
not unfitly on the dust of Rennell, the most illustrious
of the founders of African exploration. We cannot but
rejoice to think how the aged^ chief of geographical
science in our own day, if he could not welcome back
alive, would have welcomed back dead to this his last
repose the friend in whose existence his own seemed to
be bound up.

But there was yet another feeling — deeper than the
thirst for knowledge, however insatiable, or the love of
adventure, however indomitable — that drew him forth
to those distant wilds. There was implanted in him, as
there has been from time to time among the sons of men,
not merely the love of human kind at large, but the love
for that particular race of mankind, which by color, by
long oppression, by persistent resistance alike to the
inroads and the influence of civilization, has alternately
repelled and attracted the more privileged children of
Shem and Japheth. "My practice," he said, "has
always been to apply the remedy with all possible
earnestness, but never allow my own mind to dwell
on the dark shades of sin's characters.^ I have never
been able to draw pictures of guilt as if that could
awaken Christian sympathy. The evil is there. But
all around in this fair creation are traces of beauty, and
to turn from those to ponder on deeds of sin cannot
promote a healthy state." Most noble and wholesome
sentiment — noble and wholesome, not only in Africa
but in Europe — not only in heathendom but in Chris-
tendom ; in dealing both with Christians and with hea-
thens, how often neglected, and yet for any hopeful,
energetic action, how indispensable ! He loved Lo dwell
on their individual acts of kindness I ^ He reiterated

1 Sir Roderick I. Murchison. 2 Livingstone's Researches, i. 200.

8 Ibid. 1. 500.

208 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

his assurance that their moral perceptions of good and
evil are not essentially different from our own.^ And
out of this sense of his fellowship with them as children
of the same Heavenly Father and of the possibility of
embracing them within the fold of the same Heavenly
Shepherd, there rose, as he wandered on amongst them,
the passionate desire, ever mounting to a higher and
yet a higher pitch of burning indignation, of fierce
determination, to expose and by exposing to strike a
fatal blow at that monster evil, which by general testi-
mony is the one prevailing cause of African misery and
degradation — the European and Asiatic Slave-trade.
He grappled with it, as with the coils of a deadly ser-
pent, and it recognized in him in turn its most formida-
ble foe. Each strove to strangle each, and in and by
that struggle he perished ; too soon, alas ! for him to
know how nearly he had succeeded ; not, we trust, too
soon for us to secure that his success will be accom-
plished ; and that the work, which in its commencement
and its continued inspiration was the brightest side of
the name of Wilberforce, shall in its comjjletion shed
the chief glory on the name of Livingstone.

Such he was as an Explorer, such as a Philanthro-
pist ; what was he as a Missionary ? I have, in part,
already answered this question ; for all these callings
spring from the same root in human nature, from the
same inspiration of the Providence of God. But we
should miss one of the chief lessons of the Wanderer's
course, if we did not in a few words indicate his pecul-
iar place in the glorious company of those who have
devoted their lives to the spread of the Christian faith.
It was a peculiar place. He was a missionary, not only
as ordained for that work by the hands of a small group
of faithful ministers, some of whom yet live to see how

1 /&id. i. 158: ii. 277-301.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 209

he followed out the charge which they intrusted to him,
but as fashioned for the work by special gifts of the
Creator. Preacher he was not, teacher he was not ; his
was not the eloquence of tongue or pen. His calling
was different from this, and by that difference singu-
larly instructive. He brought with him to his task an
absolute conviction, not only, as I have said, of the
common elements of humanity shared alike by heathen
and Christian, but of the common elements of Chris-
tianity shared by all Christians. Himself born and
bred in one of the seceding communions of Scotland,
allied by the nearest domestic ties, and by his own mis-
sionary vocation, to one of the chief Nonconformist
Churches of England, he yet held himself free to join
heart and soul with all others. For the venerable
Established Church of his native land, for the ancient
Church and Liturgy of this country, with one of whose
bishops he labored, as with a brother, through good
report and evil ; even for the Roman Church of Portu-
gal, and the disciples of Loyola,^ from whom in theo-
logical sentiment he was the furthest removed, he had
bis good word of commendation. If he freely blamed,
he also as freely praised. He remained faithful to the
generous motto of the Society which sent him forth.
" I never," he said — strange and rare confession — "I
never as a missionary felt myself to be either Presby-
terian, Episcopalian, or Independent, or called upon in
any way to love one denomination less than another." ^
Followed to his grave by the leading Nonconformists of
England and the stanchest Presbyterians of Scotland,
yet we feel that all the Churches may claim him as their
own ; that all English-speaking races may regard him
as their son ; not only those who nurtured his childhood

1 Livingstone's Researches, i. 3, 393, 396, 453, 410, 611, 676.

2 Ibid. i. 6, 118.

210 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

and his youth, but those who beyond the Atlantic strove,
in his hater days, with characteristic energy and with
marvellous success, to search out the clew of his wan-
derings, and to bring back the latest assurance of his
lost existence.

Yet, further, he was penetrated, as years rolled on,
throuoch and throuQ^h and more and more with the sense
that the work of a missionary is confined to no order
or profession of men. As even from his early youth he
steadily refused to recognize tlie opposition between
religion and science,^ so in his later years he hailed the
evangelization effected by the trader, the traveller, and
the legislator, no less than that effected by the professed
evangelist. When, in one of his latest utterances, he
expressed w^ith enthusiastic gratitude his conviction
that " Statesmen are the best of missionaries," he taught
a truth which all Churches, and all societies, not least
in our day, may well ponder and plead. But the most
powerful missionary agency, as proclaimed both by his
teaching and his example, is that of individual charac-
ter. Most impressive in itself, and in its transparent
simplicity, is that testimony which he rendered years
ago. " No one ever gains much influence in Africa
without purity and uprightness. The acts of a stranger
are keenly scrutinized, b}^ both old and young. I have
heard women speaking in admiration of a white man
because he was pure, and never was guilty of secret
immorality. Had he been, they would have known it,
and, untutored heathen though they be, would have
despised him every where." ^

When he first came among them, he was reverenced

as a man born in the depths of the sea ; clothed with

a lion's mane, controlling the rains of heaven. But,

after he had long dwelt among them, he was reverenced

1 Livingstone's Besearches, I 4, 5. 2 jjjia, i, 513, 553j ii. 11)5.

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 211

on far higher grounds. They then learned to appreci-
ate the true above the false supernatural ; he was loved
and feared, not as a. magician or a spectre, but as a just
and kind benefactor, before whose strong will they
bowed, and by whose faithful affection they were sub-
dued. And when, in after times, the passing stranger
shall look on his grave in this church, and shall be told
that it contains the bones of a wayfaring man who per-
ished in the remote wilds of Africa, that grave itself
will be felt to be the most enduring monument of his
greatness, because the very fact of his burial here, in
the heart of- England, is, as it were, the footmark and
finger-print of the plighted faith and awe-struck venera-
tion which inspired the reverent care alike of heathen,
Mussulman, and Christian around the solitary death-
bed ; because it shows, by the most indisputable tokens,
the devotion which must have sustained that small band
of African youths in their arduous enterprise of carry-
ing, through six long months, in spite of all the obsta-
cles of cUmate, all the inborn prejudices of ancient
superstition, all the machinations of hostile tribes, the
last relics of their departed master.

III. And now one word in conclusion. Those Afri-
can boys have done their duty. What is ours? We
are told that the last words of the mighty traveller m
his lonely hut were, "I am going home." Home in
both senses — his spirit to the home of his Father which
is in Heaven, his mortal remains, they doubtless felt,
to the home of his fathers in the land of the distant
north. He is come home to us. Cosmopolitan, catho-
lic, almost African as he had become, yet let us not
forget that he was bone of our bone and flesh of our
flesh. He never forgot his Scottish birthplace, or his
English friends. As his predecessor, Mungo Park, be-
guiled the solitary night of travel by repeating the dear

212 THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

lays of the Border minstrelsy, so David Livingstone
delighted to see in the strange scenes of Central Africa
an enlarged likeness of the vale oi his native Clyde,
a reminiscence of the Campsie Hills, and of Arthur's
Seat. He was one of us ; he was, if there be amongst
my hearers artisans or craftsmen from the loom or the
factory, he was especially one of you. Like Tompion
and Graham, like Telford and Stephenson, by whose
side he now lies, he was the builder of his own fame
and of his own character. What he was and what he
became, that, by God's grace and your own stout hearts,
you may be and you may become. What boy is there
that may not be inspired by the example of that vigilant
industry by which in his youthful days, amidst the roar
of machinery, he picked up sentence after sentence from
the book which his spinning-jenny was made to sup-
port? What man is there that may not be at once
humbled and encouraged by the record of that patient,
almost painful perseverance, with which in declining
years, counting the obstacles of time and space for
nothing, he toiled, through ceaseless hardship, through
ever-multiplying infirmities of body and mind, with the
sickening sense of loneliness, desertion, and disappoint-
ment, towards the attainment of the work which he
had set himself to do, or die ? Who is there that may
not be nerved to the performance of duties, high or low,
by the sight of the life-long comment on that homely
maxim treasured up by him as the family legacy of his
rustic ancestor — "Be honest;" or those other words
addressed to him from the death-bed of a poor Scottish
peasant — '' Now, lad, make religion the every-day busi-
ness of your life, not a thing of fits and starts ; for if
you do not, temptation and other things will get the
better of you."

English lads of every degree, remember that such a

THE MISSION OF THE TRAVELLER. 213

one as yourselves has achieved this famous career —
has won this memorable name. " Strengthen the weak
hands ; confirm the feeble knees. Be strong ; fear not." ^
Such deeds as these are the Alpine summits and passes
of life ; these are the safety-valves even of our insular
eccentricities. And when we consider the ends for
which his life was given — the advancement of knowl-
edge to the uttermost parts of the earth, the redemption
of a whole continent and race of mankind from the
curse of barbarism and heathenism, and from the curse
of the wickedness of civilized men more hateful than
any savagery or idolatry, then from his grave there
arise not only to us as individuals, but to our whole
nation — I will even say to all the nations of the civil-
ized world — the last prophetic words which, in the
fulness of his vigor, he addressed to that English Uni-
versity which paid special honor to his labor: "I know
that in a few years I shall be cut off in that country
which is now open ; do not let it be shut again. I go
back to Africa to make an open path for commerce and
Christianity. Do you carry out the work that I have
begun. I leave it for you." He leaves it for you,
statesmen and merchants, explorers and missionaries,
to work out the wise fulfilment of these designs. He
leaves it to you, adventurous spirits of the rising gener-
ation, to spend your energies in enterprises as noble as
his ; not less noble because they were useful ; not less
chivalrous and courageous because they were under-
taken for the glory of God and the good of man.

1 Isa. xxxv. 3- 4.

CHARLES KINGSLEY.

January 31, 1875.

Watch ye; stand fast in the faith; quit you like men^ , , , be
strong. — 1 Corinthians xvi. 13.

It was once remarked to me by a venerable and
saintly person, the late Thomas Erskine, of Lmlathen,
that one of the most striking characteristics of the
Psalms was their free, unrestrained appreciation of
what we call nature, whether in the moral or the physi-
cal world ; that they begin with commending the hon-
est, upright man, '' the noblest work of God," and they
end by calling on every creature, animate or inanimate,
to praise the Eternal. This sympathy -^ith the natural
man and the natural creation is the more remarkable in
the Psalter, because, of all the sacred books of the Old
Testament, it is the one which is confessedly the most
spiritual, the most intimate in its communion with the
Divine. And we learn from this, as from many like
characteristics of the Bible, that the modern distinction
drawn, from the Middle Ages downward, between nature
and grace, between the secular and the spiritual, between
the Church and the world, however difficult it may be
altogether to avoid such phrases, is not an essential part
of the Christian religion, and in no way corresponds to
the opposition drawn in the Scriptures between the
flesh and the spirit, between the h.ly and the unholy —
is the product of an artificial condition, whether of

214

CHARLES KINGSLET. 215

barbarous or civilized society, which has stunted rather
than forwarded the upward growth of the spirit of man
towards its Divine original. To these artificial separa-
tions the mass of mankind readily accommodate them-
selves ; it is more easy for the worldly to be entirely
worldly, and for the religious to be exclusively religious,
each in the isolated mediocrity, whether we call it golden
or leaden, which tends to produce a false standard of
religion and a low estimate of the sphere in which our
duties are cast. But it is for this reason that we ought
to prize as among God's best gifts any characters, any
phenomena, that break through this commonplace level,
like mountain crags, and countersect and unite the
ordinary divisions of mankind, or, like volcanoes, burst
forth at times, and reveal to us something of the cen-
tral fires within and underneath the crust of custom,
fashion, and tradition. Such are those whom we some-
times see, who appear to cynical critics or to supersti-
tious formalists to have chosen a position in life appar-
ently alien to the bent of their inclinations or their
antecedents — a religious man, for example, becoming a
lawyer or a statesman ; a bold, gallant youth, born to
be a sailor or a soldier, and led by circumstances into
the career of a clergyman. Such, also, are those in
whom the inborn flame of genius illuminates, or, per-
haps, shatters the earthly vessel which contains it, and,
despite of all surrounding obstacles, claims affinity with
kindred sparks of light and warmth, wherever they
exist.

We all know what and who it is that suggests these
thoughts. In that multiplied shadow of sorrow and
death which has for the last few months and weeks
enlarged its borders beyond usual precedent throughout
the land, one brilliant light which shone in our dim
atmosphere has been suddenly extinguished: and we

216 CHARLES KTNGSLEY.

cannot allow it thus to pass away without asking our-
selves what we have gained by its brief presence
amongst us, what we have lost by its disappearance.
Others have spoken, and will long speak, on both sides
of the Atlantic, of the literary fame of the gifted poet
whose dust might well have been mingled with the dust
of his brother poets within these walls. Others will
speak, in nearer circles, of the close affection which
bound the pastor to his flock, and the friend to his
friends, and the father to the children, and the husband
to the wife, in that romantic home which is now forever
identified with his name, and beside which he rests,
beneath the yews which he planted with his own hands,
and the giant fir trees that fold their protecting arms
above. But that which alone is fitting to urge from
this place is the moral and religious significance of the
remarkable career which has left a spot void, as if where
a rare plant has grown, which no art can reproduce, but
of which the peculiar fragrance still lingers with those
who have ever come within its reach. To the vast con-
gregations which hung upon his lips in this church, to
the wide world which looked eagerly for the utterances
that no more will come from that burning spirit, to the
loving friends who mourn for the sudden extinction of
a heart of fire, for the sudden relaxation of the grasp
of a hand of iron — I would fain recall some of those
higher strains which, amidst manifold imperfections,
acknowledged by none more freely than by himself,
placed him unquestionably amongst the conspicuous
teachers of his age, and gave to his voice the power of
reaching souls to which other preachers and teachers
addressed themselves in vain.

It has seemed to me that there were three main
lessons of his character and career, which may be
summed up in the three parts of the Apostolic farewell,

CHARLES KINGSLEY. 217

which I have chosen for my text — " Watch ye ; quit
you like men, and be strong ; stand fast in the faith."

1. Watch — that is, "be awake, be wakeful ; " have
your eyes open, the eyes of your senses, the eyes of
your mind, the eyes of your conscience.

Such was the wakefulness, such the vigilance, such
the devouring curiosity of him whose life and conversa-
tion, as he walked amongst ordinary men, was often as
of a waker amongst drowsy sleepers, as a watchful sen-
•tinel in advance of a slumbering host. The diversity
of human character, the tragedies of human life, were
always as to him an ever opening, unfolding book.
But perhaps even more than to the glories and the won-
ders of man, he was — far beyond what falls to the lot
of most — alive and awake in every pore to the beauty,
the marvels of nature. That contrast in the old story
of " Eyes " and " No Eyes," was the contrast between
him and common men. That eagle eye seemed to dis-
cern every shade and form of animal and vegetable life.
That listening ear, like that of the hero in the fairy
tale, seemed almost to catch the growing of the grass
and the opening of the shell. Nature to him was a
companion, speaking with a thousand voices. And
nature was to him also the voice of God, the face of the
Eternal and Invisible, as it can only be to those who
study and love and know it. For his was no idle
dreamer's pleasure ; it was a wakefulness not only to
the force and beauty of the outward world, but to the
causes of its mysterious operations, to the explanations
given by its patient students and explorers. Rarely, if
ever, did he join in the headlong condemnation —
never in the cowardly fear — of science and scientific
men. They seemed to be fellow-workers, and he with
them. From this noble confidence in the results of
physical research take comfort, O ye of little faith;

218 CHARLES KINGSLEY.

open wide your eyes and ears to every breathing of
the Divine Spirit, to every accent of the Divine Truth.
To you. as to him, let every thing that hath breath
praise the Eternal God. Children gathering shells on
the sea-shore, fishermen by chalk streams, huntsmen on
the bright days of autumn and of winter, watchers
of the secret growth of plant and insect, and penetrat-
ing stream and shifting soil — fear not to learn and to
teach those lessons of holy and innocent enjoyment
which awakened in him the constant praise of the Eter-
nal Cause, '' for His name only is excellent, and His
power above heaven and earth."

When he spoke in his sermons of the " cedars of God,"
or, " of the lions roaring after their meat from God " —
when he spoke in liis romance of the tropical skies and
forests, Avhich " at last " he saw with the bodily eye,
long after he had described them with the imagination
of the poet — who does not feel that the contemplation
of those wonderful works of God became, as it were,
part of the framework and groundwork of his religion,
and may, in a measure, become part of ours also?

Who that has heard him speak of the Benedlcite^ the
Song of the Three Children, can hear it again without
feeling in it that sanctification of science which drew
from him such reiterated cries of admiration, regarding
it as he did, apocryphal though it be, as the very crown
and flower of the Old Testament — the invocation of
Nature to bear witness against the idolatry of nature ?
— " O ye works of th6 Lord, bless ye the Lord : praise
Him and magnify Him forever."

Who, again, can fail to derive a sense of grim conso-
lation — nay, more, of Christian philosophy — as he
encounters, even in the bitter, biting blast of our sharp
English winter, or yet sharper spring, that moral lesson,
that living sermon, breathed into it by those exulting

CHARLES KINGSLET. 219

lines which will hardly grow old as long as the east
wind blows and the English nation lasts? —

Welcome, black North-easter,

O'er the German foam —
O'er the Danish moorlands,

From thy frozen home !

Come, as came our fathers,

Heralded by thee.
Conquering, from the eastward,

Lords by land and sea ;
Come, and strong within us

Stir the Vikings' blood,
Bracing brain and sinew —

Blow, thou wind of God !

2. This leads me to the second part of the Apostolic
maxim — "Quit you like men, and be strong," 'Avdpi^egda
nal xparaiovgde. Surely, if there was any one of our time
with whom this precept was associated, even to exag-
geration, it was with him who is gone. That famous
phrase which he indeed repudiated for himself, but which
became inextricably attached to his name, was but the
Apostle's word in modern form. No doubt the Bible
overflows with sympathy for the sorrowful, the suffer-
ing, the feeble ; but it is also full of heart-stirring
commands " to play the man," " to be men in under-
standing," "to quit us like men," and "be strong and
very courageous." Christianity, if it is to hold its own
and be what it claims to be, must be not only gentle,
feminine, and sweet, but masculine, muscular, and
strong. But, in fact, the two sides thus represented
in the Bible, and certainly as exemplified in him, were
not inconsistent; rather in their best form they are
inseparable. No one was more chivalrously respectful
towards women, more tender to the weak and suffering.
Of all his songs, of all his utterances, that which will

220 CHARLES KINGSLEY.

live the longest in the mouths of men is that which is
full, not of the fierce spirit of the Sea-kings, but of the
wailing and weeping cry of simple human pathos —

O Mary; go and call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home.
Across the sands of Dee.

Even in his rude conflict with the superstitions of
mediaeval times half his force was derived from his
kindly appreciation of their nobler side. The " Saint's
Tragedy " would have been to him no tragedy had he
not fully recognized that Elizabeth of Thuringia was
indeed a true Christian saint. And this gave yet more
strength to the determined stand which he made, in
what he deemed an effeminate age, for the vigorous,
courageous, straight-forward aspect of true religion —
the sense that justice and truth and courage were as
essentially saint-like as tenderness, beneficence, and
devotion.

It was this which in his earlier life roused his chival-
rous defence of those whom, perhaps in excess, he
thought oppressed and neglected. It was this which
in his later life roused his chivalrous defence of those
whom, also perhaps in excess, he • regarded as sacrificed
to popular prejudice. It was this profound feeling
of the rights of the poor and the duties of the rich
that kindled the fiery pages of " Alton Locke " and
of "Yeast."

It was this JQst impatience of a sickly sentimental
theology which denounced alike the monk of the 13th
century and the fanatical preacher of the 19th. It was
this moral enthusiasm which, in the pages of " Hypa-
tia," has scathed with an everlasting brand the name
of the Alexandrian Cyril and his followers, for their
outrages on humanity and morality in the name of a

CHARLES KINGSLEY. 221

hollow Christianity and a spurious orthodoxy. Read,
if you would learn some of the most impressive lessons
of ecclesiastical history — read and inwardly digest
those pages, perhaps the most powerful that he ever
wrote, which close that wonderful story by discrimi-
nating the destinies which awaited each of its charac-
ters as they passed, one after another, " each to his own
place."

It was this righteous indignation against what seemed
to him the glorification of a tortuous and ambiguous
policy, wliich betrayed him into the only personal con-
troversy in which he was ever entangled ; and in which,
matched in unequal conflict with the most subtle and
dexterous controversialist of modern times, it is not sur-
prising that for the moment he was apparently worsted,
whatever we may think of the ultimate issues that were
raised in the struggle, and whatever may be the total
results of our experiences, before and after, on the
main question over which the combat was fought — on
the relation of the human conscience to Truth or to
authority.

It was this passion for gallant deeds and adventurous
daring that created the characters of Lancelot and
Thurnall and Amyas Leigh, that revived the heroes of
Greece for the young, and the heroes of the Elizabethan
age for the old.

And it was this sense that he was a thorough English-
man, one of yourselves, working, toiling, feeling with
you and like you — that endeared him to you, O arti-
sans and workingmen of London, to you, O rising youth
of England. You know how he desired with a passion-
ate desire that you should have pure air, pure water,
habitable dwellings ; that you should be able to share
the courtesies, the refinements, the elevation of citizens
and of Englishmen ; and you may therefore trust him

222 CHARLES KINGSLEY.

the more when he told you from the pulpit, and still
tells you from the grave, that your homes and your
lives should be no less full of moral purity and light,
that vice and idleness, meanness and dishonesty, are
base, contemptible, and miserable. It is for this that he
speaks to you with especial force, you whom he would
have called the sons of Esau — the frank, the generous,
the self-forgetful ; and bids you rise to higher spiritual
spheres. It is for this, also, that the religious world,
the orthodox world, the sons of the believing but yet
timid, wily Jacob, ought to feel that in his presence
they had the best, because the most severe, of monitors,
that in his departure they have lost the most faithful
of friends because the severest of critics.

Quit you like men, and be strong — strong against
your vices as well as your weaknesses, strong in body
and strong in imder standing, strong in spirit.

As he lay, the other day, cold in death, like the stone
effigy of an ancient warrior, the '' fitful fever " of life
gone, the strength of immortality left, resting as if after
the toils of a hundred battles, this was himself idealized.
From those mute lips there seemed to issue once more
the living words which he spoke ten years ago, before
one who honored him with an unswerving faithfulness
even to the end. " Some say " — thus he spoke in the
chapel of Windsor Castle — " some say that the age of
chivalry is past, that the spirit of romance is dead.
The age of chivalry is never past, so long as there is a
wrong left unredressed on earth, or a man or woman
left to say, I will redress that wrong, or spend my life
in the attempt. The age of chivalry is never past, so
long as we have faith enough to say, God will help me
to redress that wrong, or if not me. He will help those
that come after me, for His eternal Will is to overcome
evil with good. The spirit of romance will never die,

CHARLES KINGSLEY. 223

as long as there is a man left to see tliat tlie world
might and can be better, happier, wiser, fairer in all
things than it is now. The spirit of romance will
never die, as long as a man has faith in Qod to believe
that the world will eventually be better and fairer than
it is now ; as long as we have faith, however weak, to
believe in the romance of all romances, the wonder of
all wonders, in that wonder of which poets have
dreamed, and prophets and Apostles have told, each
according to his light — that the earth shall be filled
with the knowledge of the Lord, that nation shall no
more rise in war against nation — that wonder which
our Lord Himself bade us pray for, as for our daily
bread, and say. Father, Thy kingdom come, Thy will
be done on earth as it is in heaven."

3. And this leads me to that clause in the Apostle's
warning which I have kept for the last — "Standfast
in the faith." I have hitherto spoken of our lost friend
in his natural, God-given genius, not in his professional
or pastoral functions. He was what he was, not by
virtue of his office, but by virtue of what God had
made him in himself. He was, we might almost say, a
layman in the guise or disguise, and sometimes hardly
in the guise, of a clergyman — fishing with the fisher-
men, hunting with the huntsmen, able to hold liis own
in tent and camp, with courtier or with soldier; an
example that a genial companion may be a Christian
gentleman, that a Christian clergyman need not be a
member of a separate caste, and a stranger to the com-
mon interests of his countrymen. Yet human, genial,
layman as he was, he still was not the less — nay, he
was ten times more — a pastor than he would have
been had he shut himself out from the haunts and
walks of men. He was sent by Providence, as it were,
"far off to the Gentiles" — far off, not to other lands

224 CHARLES KINGSLEY.

or other races of mankind, but far off from the usual
sphere of minister or priest, "to fresh woods and pas-
tures new," to find fresh worlds of thought and wild
tracts of character, in which he found a response to
himself, because he gave a response to them. Witness
the unknown friends that from far or near sought the
wise guidance of the iniknown counsellor, who declared
to them the unknown God after whom they w^ere seek-
ing if haply they might find Him. Witness the tears
of the rough peasants of Hampshire, as they crowded
round the open grave, to look for the last time on the
friend of thirty years, with whom were mingled the
passing hunter in his red coat and the wild gipsy wan-
derers, mourning for the face that they should no more
see in forest or on heath. Witness the grief which fills
the old cathedral town of my own native county and
of the native county of his ancestors, beside the sands
of his own Dee, for the recollection of the energy with
which he there gathered the youth of Chester round
him for teachings of science or religion. Witness the
grief which has overcast this venerable church, which
in two short years he had made his own, and where all
felt that he had found a place worthy of himself, and
that in him the place had found an occupant worthy to
fill it. In these days of rebuke and faintheartedness,
when so many gifted spirits shrink from embarking on
one of the noblest, because the most sacred, of all pro-
fessions, it ought to be an encouragement to be re-
minded that this fierce poet and masculine reformer
deemed his energies not misspent in the high yet hum-
ble vocation of an English clergyman ; that, however
much at times suspected, avoided, rebuffed, he 3^et, like
others who have gone before him, at last won from his
brethren the willing tribute of honor and love, which
once had been sturdily refused or grudgingly granted.

CHARLES KINGSLEY. 225

Scholar, poet, novelist, he yet felt himself to be, with
all and before all, a spiritual teacher and guide.

We do not claim for him, wliat he never claimed for
himself, the character of a profound theologian. For
the disentanglement of the historical growth of Chris-
tian doctrine, so indispensable to the right understand-
ing of its language and its meaning, for the critical
researches which have in our time endeavored to trace
back to their remote origin the sacred books, and have
given new life to their history, philosophy, and poetry
— he had little inclination ; perhaps he rendered scant
justice to those who ventured on that arduous but
necessary service of Divine truth, opening the horizon
and clearing the path for all who would enter on the
sacred ministry of the Word of God, even as the scien-
tific discoveries in which he himself so much delighted
did the same for the Works of God.

One fatherly friend and counsellor he followed close-
ly ; he felt that to him he owed his own self, and would
sometimes playfully say it was enough for him to be to
the outside world the interpreter of Frederick Maurice.
But with or without that inspiring influence, it was
still a noble pastoral function that, amidst all the
wavering inconstancy of our time, he called upon the
men of his generation, with a steadfastness and assured
conviction that of itself steadied and reassured the
minds of those for whom he spoke, "to stand fast in
the faith." " In the faith." On what special form of
the Christian faith did he most insist ? In what special
fastness and fortress of the ancient Catholic faith of
former times, or of our own English Protestant faith,
did he plant his foot with this undoubting firmness?
Doubtless for him, as for many, the old walls seemed
sufficient for the coming strife, and he cared not to
repair their breaches; the old vessels seemed to him

226 CHARLES KINGSLET.

strong enough to contain the new wine, and he cared
not to make new vehicles even for the fermentation of
the "yeast" which he himself had stirred. But still
there were two main doctrines — old as eternity, yet
forever needing to be renewed with each age of the
world — which he held with a fervor and tenacity all
his own, with a freshness and a vigor that amounted
almost to the originality of genius — which, in his
teaching, enlightened and controlled and colored even
the most antique and the most trite of the ordinary
teachings of past or present tunes.

One of these fixed, paramount, over-ruling persua-
sions was the belief, often forgotten, often derided,
sometimes even severely discountenanced, that the
main part of the religion of mankind and of Christen-
dom should consist in the strict fulfilment of the duty
of man, which is the will of God. Alike in the Old
Testament and in the New, he delighted to bring
together the golden passages which exalt the law, the
statutes, the testimonies, the commandments of God;
and he set forth their ancient meaning, for our modern
days, in his own plain, strong English words, which
none can mistake or forget, and which have the rare
merit of being at once perfectly intelligible and per-
fectly true.

Nothing can be a substitute for purity or virtue.
" Man will always try to find a substitute for it. But
let no man lay any such fiattering unction to his soul.
The first and last business of every living being, what-
ever be his station, party, creed, tastes, duties, is Moral-
ity. Virtue, virtue, always virtue ! Nothing that man
ever invents will absolve him from the universal neces-
sity of being good as God is good, righteous as God is
righteous, and holy as God is holy."

And this leads me to the other doctrine, which also

CHARLES KINGSLEY. 227

shall be stated in his own Avords, as we heard him from
this i)lace, when he delivered his farewell sermon before
starting for the American continent, in conclusion of
that brilliant and solemn course to which, Sunday after
Sunday, the eager multitudes came to hear the new
preacher of our Abbey.

"And now," he said, "new friends, and almost all
fiiends unknown, and alas ! never to be known by me,
you who are to me as people floating down a river,
while I, the preacher, stand upon the bank and call, in
hope that some of you ma}^ catch some word of mine
ere the great stream shall bear you out of sight — oh
catch, at least, catch this one word, the last which I
shall speak here for many months, and which sums up
all which I have been trying to say to you of late. Fix
in your minds, or rather ask God to fix in your minds,
this one idea of an absolutely good God ; good with all
forms of goodness which you respect and love in man ;
good as you, and I, and every honest man, understand
the plain word good. Slowly you will acquire that
grand and all-illuminating idea ; slowly and most im-
perfectly at best ; for who is mortal man that he should
conceive and comprehend the goodness of the infinitely
good God? But see, then, whether, in the light of that
one idea, all the old-fashioned Christian ^ ideas about
the relations of God to man — whether a Providence,
Prayer, Inspiration, Revelation; the Incarnation, the
Passion, and the final triumph, of the Son of God —
whether all these, I say, do not begin to seem to you,
not merely beautiful, not merely probable, but rational
and logical and necessary moral consequences from tlij3
one idea of an Absolute and Eternal Goodness, the
Living Parent of the Universe. And so I leave you
to the Grace of God."

So he spoke, standing here as I stand now, as on the

228 CHARLES KINGSLEY.

banks of this great river of life. So he speaks to us
still, standing on the farther bank of another vaster,
deeper, darker river, the river of death. Whether he
sees us or not, we know not ; whether in that light into
which we trust he has passed, those strong impassioned
words may have become weak and pale ; how far, " when
that which is perfect has come, that which is partial in
them shall vanish away," like the half-formed thoughts
and inarticulate utterances of a child, we know not ;
but this we cannot and we will not doubt, that as they
were his last message to us at that last parting, so they
contain in substance and spirit the message which he
would have delivered to us down to his last moment
on earth, and, if possible, beyond it. When the shad-
ows of death were closing him round, still, we are told,
the same beatific vision of that which alone makes the
blessedness of heaven was before his failing sight —
" How beautiful," he said, " how beautiful is God ! "

Stand fast, O my brethren, stand fast in that faith,
in the faith that God is good, and that man, to be well-
pleasing to God, must be good also. That faith which
is indeed the " Good news of God " to man, " that Name
of the Eternal," was to him " a strong tower, in which
the righteous could take refuge and be safe " — " the
stronghold and the castle to which he would always
resort," from which he derived whatever strength and
force there was in his creed or in his life.

Stand ye fast in this faith, O wavering, perplexed,
anxious souls, and you shall not be shaken by doubt,
nor undermined by superstition. Stand fast in this
faith, O sorrowing, suffering, bereaved friends, who feel
that in the removal of those whom you have loved or
admired the splendor of your life is dimmed, and you
shall not be sorry as men without hope for those that
sleep in Him who is Perfect Grace and Perfect Truth.

CHARLES KTNGSLEY. 229

Stand fast in this faith, and by it correct, enlarge, en-
lighten, strengthen, whatever other faith you have.

And not only stand fast in it, but folloAV it onward
whithersoever it leads you. Be not only "steadfast
and unmovable," but be also " abounding," overflowing
in the ever-increasing " work of the Lord " which lies
before us all, "forasmuch as you know " and have seen
in him that his labor was " not in vain in the Lord."

On his last journey in America, in answer to one who
had wished him long life, he replied : — " That is the
last thing that I desire. It may be that, as one grows
older, one acquires more and more the painful conscious-
ness of the difference between what ought to be done
and what can be done, and sits down more quietly when
one gets on the wrong side of fifty, and lets others start
up to do for us the things we cannot do for ourselves.
But it is the highest pleasure that a man can have who
has turned down the hill at last (and to his own exceed-
ing comfort) to believe that younger spirits will rise up
after him, and catch the lamp of truth, as in the old
lamp-bearing race of Greece, out of his hand before it
expires, and carry it on to the goal with swifter and
more even feet."

The lamp has fallen from that hand : it is for us, for
you, to hand it on, with increased light, to the genera-
tions yet to come.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

February 28, 1875, after the funeral of Sir Charles Lyell.

The earth was without form and void ; and darkness was upon the
face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the
waters. — Genesis i. 2.

These words, from the Book of Genesis, of which
the lessons are now in our church services drawing to
a close, convey a sense wider than their mere literal
transcript. They express the transition from that gulf
which by the ancient Greeks was called " Chaos," to
that grace and order which, under the name of " Kos-
mos," has been adopted by a famous modern philoso-
pher to describe the sj^stem of the universe. The words
which portray the formless void of the earth, convey
in the original, in the most forcible manner, the image
of the old discordant elements of conflict, whilst the
word used for the moving of the Divine Spirit on the
face of the waters expresses the gentle brooding and
yearning as of a parent-bird over the troubled deep.^
The language, however poetic, childlike, parabolical,
and unscientific, yet impresses upon us the principle
in the moral and the material world, that the law of
the Divine operation is the gradual, peaceful, progres-
sive redaction and development of discord into har-
mony, of confusion into order, of darkness into light.

To unfold and to exemplify that law is in various

1 "Dove-like sat brooding o'er the vast abyss." —Milton's Paradise
Lost, Book 1.
2S0

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 231

degrees one of the chief missions of the nobler souls in
whom the Divine Spirit, according to the diversity of
its gifts, leads on the human race towards perfection.
It has so chanced that within this short month of Feb-
ruary, by a most unusual coincidence of mortality, twice
have the gates of this Abbey been opened to pay the
last honors to two men, widely apart in all else, but
alike in the fulfilment of this Divine Law — the one
the acknowledged chiefs of the English musicians of
our time ; the other, who was yesterday laid in his
grave, the acknowledged chief of those who have de-
voted tliemselves to the study of our mother-earth.

I. Suffer me before passing to this, the main subject
of our thoughts, to say a few words of the first of these
two gifted persons ; the more so, that his special work
was no unapt commentary on the sacred text, no un-
suitable prelude to that which shall follow.

Of all the branches of art and letters, none more
reveals the hidden capacities of the human soul, or of
"the fearful and wonderful" structure of the human
frame, than the slow and yet certain process through
which from the simplest and the most barbarous sounds
that Art, which both heathens and Christians have not
scrupled to call Divine, has called into being worlds
of melody and harmony, which have entranced the ear,
and calmed the heart, and elevated the mind of suc-
ceeding generations of mankind, gaining in volume and
complexity and force, as time has rolled on. The spirit
which brooded over the rude lyre of Orpheus or the
rough harp of David, is the same spirit which breathes
through the anthems of our great cathedrals or the
choral strains of our oratorios ; but what a pathos, what
a majesty, what a glory, of which David ^ never dreamed,

1 Sir "William Sterndale Bennett, who was buried in the Abbey on
Feb. 6, 1875.

2 " I think," said Luther, in the sixteenth century, " that if David

232 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

has been inspired into these sounds, by the genius of a
Purcell or a Beethoven, a Handel or a Mendelssohn !
Some of us may recall the well-known words in which
the contrast of this deveh pmcnt has been drawn out
by one whose insight into the secrets of musical art, and
whose complete mastery over the musical cadences of
our English tongue are unquestioned, liowevcr much
we may lament the uncertain tone of his theological
trumpet, or wonder at the oblique march of his wayward
genius.

There are seven notes in the scale ; make them fourteen ; yet
what a slender outfit for so vast an enterprise 1 What science brings
so much out of so little ? Out of what poor elements does some
great master in it create his new world ! ... Is it possible that
that inexhaustible evolution and disposition of notes, so rich yet so
simple, so intricate yet so regulated, so various yet so majestic,
should be a mere sound, which is gone and perishes ? Can it be
that those mysterious stirrings of heart, and keen emotions, and
strange yearnings after we know not what, and aw^f ul impressions
from we know not whence, should be wrought in us by what is
unsubstantial, and comes and goes, and begins and ends in itself?
No, they have escaped from some higher sphere ; they are the out-
pourings of eternal harmony in the medium of created sound;
they are echoes from our home ; they are the voice of Angels ; or
the JNIagnificat of Saints ; or the living laws of Divine Governance ;
or the Divine Attributes ; something are they besides themselves
which we cannot compass, which we cannot utter — though mortal
man, and he, perhaps not otherwise distinguished above his fellows,
has the gift of eliciting them.^

To elicit these marvels, to elevate that glorious art,
was the mission of the gentle musician who, three weeks
ago, was laid beside those who, in earlier days in this
church or nation, in the words of the sacred ^ writers,
have "handled the harp and organ," and "found out

rose from the dead, ho would wonder much to find how far we have
advanced in music."

1 Dr. Newman's University Ser^nons, pp. 348, 349.

2 Gen. iv. 21; Ecclus. xliv. 5.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 283

musical tunes;" by such heavenly strains he soothed
his own soul and the souls of others, when they have
sat down " wearied with the journey " ^ of life ; and
again and again will his memory be recalled to us, as
we hear the sacred melody on which he has written, as
on waves of light, those Divine words which describe,
as it were, tlie second creation of the world, which ought
to stand as the principle of all Christian worship — " God
is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him
in spirit and in truth."

II. I have said that this passing allusion to the de-
parted musician, this indication of the latent capacities
for spiritual emotion wrapped up even in abstract and
inanimate things^ in elements seemingly without form
and void, is no unfitting prelude to the consideration of
that study of nature, of which he who has just followed
to the same long home was so bright an example. A
celebrated teacher of our age, to whom music was a
sealed book, but to whom objects of natural beauty were
full of enjoyment, used to say, " Wild flowers are my
music ; " 2 and so, in like manner, to all students of
nature, earth and sea, with their hidden harmoaiies, have
indeed a music of their own, which, like the secrets of
of the vocal art, have to be drawn out by the fire of
genius, by the persevering vigilance, by the active search,
of scientific study. In this spirit I propose to call your
attention for a brief space to the religious aspect of
" that noble science of Geology," which a great historian
has called " the boast of our age," ^ and of which the
words of the text might well, especially in regard to
the work of him whom we now commemorate, be called
the first germ and the abiding motto.

1 The Woman of Samaria, by Sir W. Sterndale Bennett.

2 Arnold's Life, p. 185.

8 Hallam's Uist. of Literature, vol. iii. pt. iv. cli. 8.

234 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

It is well known that when the science of Geology
first arose, it was involved in endless schemes of at-
tempted reconciliation with the letter of Scripture.
There were, there are perhaps still, two modes of recon-
ciliation of Scripture and science, which have been each
in their day attempted^ and have each totally and de-
servedly failed. One is the endeavor to wrest the
words of the Bible from their natural meaning, and
force them to speak the language of science. Of this,
the earliest, and perhaps the most memorable, example
was set by the Greek translators in the time of the
Ptolemies — the Seventy, as they are called. They
came, in the course of their ^ translation, to that verse of
Leviticus 2 containing the well-known stumbling-block
which they probably were the first to discern, which
speaks of the hare as one of the animals that chew the
cud. In the old world, before the birth of accurate ob-
servation, that which had the appearance of rumination
was mistaken for the realit}^ and was so described.
But, by the time that the Greek translation of the Bible
was undertaken, the greatest naturalist of antiquity,
the world-famous Aristotle, had already devoted his
sagacious mind to the study of the habits of animals,
and through his writings the true state of the case had
become known in Alexandria. The venerable scholars
who were at work on the translation were too conscien-
tious to reject the clear evidence of science ; but they
were too timid to allow the contradiction to appear, and
therefore, with the usual rashness of fear, they boldly
interpolated the word " not " into the sacred text, and
thus, as they thought, reconciled it to science by mak-
ing the whole passage mean exactly the reverse of that
which was intended. This is the earliest instance of
the falsification of Scripture to meet the demands of

1 The Septuagint version. 2 Lev. ad. 6.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 235

science ; and it has been followed in later times by the
various efforts which have been made to twist the ear-
lier chapters of the Book of Genesis into apparent agree-
ment with the last results of geology — representing
days not to be days, morning and evening not to be
morning and evening, the deluge not to be the deluge,
and the ark not to be the ark. On the 'other hand,
there has sprung up in later times the equal error of
falsifying science to meet the supposed requirements of
the Bible. Of this, the most signal example was when
the discoveries of Galileo were condemned by the Su-
preme Judge of faith and morals in the Roman Church,
and when the Jesuits in their edition of Newton's " Prin-
cipia" announced in the preface that they were con-
strained to treat the theory of gravitation as a fictitious
hypothesis, because else it would conflict with the " de-
crees of the Popes against the motion of the earth."
This mode of reconciliation has also been tried in our
times, at each successive advance of science. Every
generation of the ecclesiastical or religious world has
been tempted to the hazardous enterprise of denying
the voice of God as He speaks to us in His works, and
in His laws, and often the plain conclusions of careful
observation have been set aside as impious and danger-
ous.

But there is another reconciliation of a higher kind
which, we humbly trust, will never fail — or rather not
a reconciliation at all, but an acknowledgment of the
affinity, the identity which exists between the sjnrit of
Science and the spirit of the Bible. And this is of two
kinds — first, there is the likeness of the general spirit
of the truths of science to the general spirit of the
truths of the Bible ; and, secondly, there is the like-
ness of the general spirit of the method of science to
the general spirit of the method of the Bible.

236 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

1. Let me exemplify both of these in the instance of
Geology, and of the illustrious student of geology who
has just pafesed away from us. First, let us see what
is the geological truth which he was the chief instru-
ment in clearly setting forth and establishing on a new
foundation. It was the doctrine, wrought out by care-
ful, cautious inquiry in all parts of the world, that the
frame of this earth was gradually brought into its
present condition, not by violent or sudden convulsions,
but by slow and silent action, the same causes operat-
ing, as we see operate now, through a long succession
of ages, stretching back beyond the memory or imagi-
nation of man. We have already indicated that there
need be no question raised whether or not this doctrine
agrees with the letter of the Bible. We do not expect
that it should ; for if there were no such scientific re-
searches and conclusions, we now know perfectly well,
from our increased insight into the earlier Biblical rec-
ords, that they were not, and could not be, literal and
prosaic matter-of-fact descriptions of the beginning of
the world, of which, as of its end, " no man knoweth,"
or can conceive except by figure and parable. It is
now clear to diligent students of the Bible, that the
first and second chapters of Genesis contain two narra-
tives of the Creation, side by side, differing from each
other in almost ever}^ particular of time and place and
order. It is now certain that the vast epochs demanded
by scientific observation are incompatible both with the
six thousand years of the Mosaic chronology, and the
six days of the Mosaic Creation. No one now infers
from the Psalms that " the earth is set so fast that it
cannot be moved," or that " the sun " actually " comes
forth as a bridegroom from his chamber" — or that
" the morning stars sang " with an audible voice at the
dawn of the creation. To insist on these details as

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 237

historical or scientific, is as contrary to the style and
character of the sacred books themselves as it is to the
undoubted facts of science. But when from these we
rise to the spirit, the ideal, the general drift and pur-
pose of the Biblical accounts, we feel ourselves in an
atmosphere of moral elevation which meets the highest
requirements that philosophy can make ; we find exactly
that affinity which we should expect to find between
the most sacred, the most majestic of ancient records
(even if we say no more), and the most certain and
sublime of modern discoveries.

I have often spoken before of this inner harmony
between tlie highest flights of Scripture and the highest
flights of science or genius. Look at the discoveries
of Geology in this light, and they will appear to us not
only not irreligious, but as filling the old religious
truths with a new life of their own, and receiving from
those truths a hallowing glory in return. When the
historian of our planet points out to us that the succes-
sive layers of the earth's surface were formed not by
strange and sudden shocks, but by the same constant
action of wind and wave, of falling leaves, and silent
stream, and floating ice, and rolling stones, that we see
in operation daily before our eyes ; that there were not
separate centres of creation, but one primal law, which
formed and governs all created beings; what is this
but the echo of those voices which of old declared that
" in the beginning the heavens and the earth were cre-
ated," 1 not by conflicting deities, but by One supreme
and indivisible ; which told us tliat '' God's word en-
dureth forever in heaven ; " that '' His faithfulness
continues throughout all generations ; " that " as He
established the earth, so it abideth ; " that " all things
continue according to His ordinance ; " ^ that '' He who

1 Gen. i. 1. 2 Ps. cxix. 89-91.

238 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

laid out the foundation of the world above the waters,
for His mercy endureth forever," is the same as He who
" daily giveth food to all flesh," for it is the same mercy
that endureth forever ; " ^ that " He has given a law
which shall not be broken." And are we not reminded
that long ago there was one who stood in the cave of
the cliffs of Horeb, and waited for the sign of the Di-
vine operations,^ and that it was then borne in upon his
soul that the Lord was not in the earthquake, the hur-
ricane, or the fire, but in the still small whispering
murmur of the gentle air, and the silence of the desert ?
Do we not in those deep descents into the ocean gulfs,
those subtle transformations of land and sea and all
that in them is, discern a reflex of that Presence which
has "searched us out and known us; " which ''did see
our substance yet being imperfect, and in whose book
were written all the members " of the human race, and
its habitation, " which day by day were fashioned while
as yet there was none of them ?" ^ And when, further,
we contemplate the vast infinitudes of time and space,
that long ascending order, that gradual, insensible prog-
ress, which Geology demands, do we not feel that much
as the Bible may contain of detail and expression and
imagery running in another direction, yet its general,
though not its uniform teaching, its highest, though not
its constant utterances, would encourage us to believe
that the world is something deeper and wider than we
in our narrow view should imagine it to be ; that crea-
tion is something which reaches further back and deeper
down than our childish and limited notions would sug-
gest to us ; that the distance of its first beginning, how-
ever remote, melts into a distance remoter still ? It is
only the doubly doubtful Second Book of the Macca-
bees * which contains the text that the world was made

1 Ps. cxxxvi. 0, 25. 2 1 Kings xix. 9-12. 3 ps. cxxxix. 1-16.
4 2 Mace. vii. 28.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 239

"of things that were not." The earlier loftier teaching
of the Bible enters into no such metaphysical labyrinth.
There " deep still calls to deep." There it is still the
" earth without form and void, and darkness gathering
over the face of the deep." In the Prophets of the
Bible, as in the prophets of Science, there is a sense,
dim and vague, yet strong and earnest, of the infinite
variety of the treasure-house of creation, the infinite
patience and perseverance of the Creator, " A thousand
years in Thy sight are but as yesterday, and one day
as a thousand years." ^ " My father worketh hitherto
and I work." ^ " Oh the depth of the riches both of
the wisdom and knowledge of God ! How unsearchable
are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!"^
" Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the
earth ? whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened,
or who laid the corner-stone thereof? . . . Hast thou
entered into the springs of the sea, or walked in the
search of the depth ? " * *' There is one glory of the
sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory
of the stars. The first is that which is natural, and
afterward that which is spiritual." ^

Surely to expressions such as these, however little
they can be pressed into scientific exactness, the cor-
relative theory of science is not that which limits the
duration of earth to the space of a few brief centuries,
but that which expands it to illimitable ages. Surely
the view which shows the long preparation of the earth
for man gives a grander prelude to his appearance on
this globe, than that which makes him coeval with the
beasts that perish. Surely the intimations of future
progress, which are suggested by observing the latent
faculties wherewith he is endowed, are more consonant

1 Ps. xc. 2; 2 Pet. iii. 8. 2 John v. 17. 8 Rom. xi. 33.

4 Job xxxviii. 4-16. 5 1 Cor. xv. 41-46.

240 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

to the hope of a glorious and fruitful immortality than
the view which regards him as a stationary being, know-
ing at once all that he can ever know, and contented
with the narrow horizon that is alone open to him. All
honor to the peaceful conqueror who, by years of
unhasting, unresting research, annexed these new prov-
inces of thought to the knowledge of man, and there-
fore to the glory of God ! All honor to the herald and
archaeologist of our race, who has unrolled in all its
length and breadth the genealogy of the antiquity of
man, and the antiquity of his habitation! All honor
to the bold yet reverent touch which, in the Temple
of the Most High, not made with hands, rent asunder
from the top to the bottom the veil that concealed its
full proportions, and revealed its ever-widening, ever-
lengthening vistas backward into the farthest past of
memory, and forward to the endless future of hope.
Not the limitation, but the amplification of the idea of
God, is the result of the labors of such a student. Not
the descent, but the ascent of man is the final result
of his speculations. If, as he used to say, " we have
in our bones the chill " of that contracted view in which
we had been brought up, yet the enlargement which he
effected for the view of the past ought to give a warmth,
a fire to' our heart of hearts, to our soul of souls, in
proportion as we feel that we are not the* creatures of
yesterday, but " the heirs of all the ages " — even the
ages that cannot be numbered, and of worlds that have
perislied in the making of us ; the ancestors, let us trust,
of those who, compared with us, shall seem to have
attained to " a new heaven and a new earth," wherein
" old things shall have passed away, and all things shall
have become new," ^ under the breath of that Spirit
which is forever brooding over the face of the troubled
universe.

1 2 Pet. iii. 13: 2 Cor. v. 17.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 241

2. This leads me to the likeness of the general spirit
of the method of the philosophic geologist, and the
general spirit of the method of the Bible. If there be
any one point in which the whole structure of the Bible
and the whole plan of its teaching is a model to the
student, whether of nature, of man, or of God, it is the
slow " increasing purpose " of Revelation, through
*' sundry times and divers manners," working as if with
the persistence of unconscious instinct and the patience
of deliberate will towards the fulness of time, with the
constant warning to each succeeding age to have the
eyes and ears of its mind open to the reception of Light
and Truth. Thus, as in art, so in science, the whole
race of mankind, and each individual member of it,
must aim to deserve that proud yet lowly title by which
the Founder of Christianity called His followers — Dis-
ciples, that is, "scholars," learners even to the very
end ; scholars bent on the attainment of that Truth in
all its parts, " to bear witness to which He was born,
and for which cause He came into the world." ^ To
invest the pursuit of Truth with the sanctity of a reli-
gious duty, to make Truth and Goodness meet together
in one holy fellowship, is the high reconciliation of
Religion and Science for which all scientific and all
religious men should alike labor and pray. "Sacred,
no doubt," said one of the greatest of astronomers,
" sacred is the authority of the Fathers ; sacred was
Lactantius, who denied the earth's rotundity; sacred
was Augustine, who admitted the earth to be round,
but denied the antipodes ; sacred is the authority of the
moderns, who admit the smallness of the earth, yet
deny its motion ; yet, more sacred to me than all these
is — Truth." So spoke Kepler. Yes; more sacred
than all things is Truth, next after or along with Good-

1 John xviii. 37.

242 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

ness, and therefore to be sought calmly, temperately,
deliberately, as in the Holy of Holies and in the pres-
ence of the Most High.

Such a union of patient research and reverential
piety has been the special glory of the great school of
English Geology. Amidst all the alarms of the reli-
gious world, and all the embitterments of the scientific
world, it has been our just pride in England that the
tv/o pioneers of this newborn science, at a time when it
had to fight its way against prejudice, and ignorance,
and apathy, towards its present hard-won place, were
honored dignitaries of the National Church. One was
the illustrious Professor of Cambridge, whose generous
heart, and brilliant fancy, and heavenward hope enlight-
ened and warmed his whole being, and continued to
irradiate a life prolonged beyond the allotted term of
man's existence. The other was the eager, indefatig-
able student, who left his chair at Oxford only to pre-
side over this ancient Church, whose very stones and
dust were dear to him, but by him examined and sifted
as never before by hand or eye of English layman or
ecclesiastic. And now within these walls, beneath the
monument of Woodward, the earliest of English geol-
ogists, lies the latest of that distinguished group, the
friend of Sedgwick and the pupil of Buckland. The
tranquil triumph of Geology, once thought so danger-
ous, now so quietly accepted by the Church, no less
than by the world, is one more proof of the groundless-
ness of theological panics in the face of the advances
of scientific discovery.

Of him, who is thus laid to rest, if of any one of our
time, it may be said that he followed Truth with a zeal
as sanctified as ever fired the soul of a missionary, and
with a humility as child-like as ever subdued the mind
of a simple scholar. For discovering facts, confirming

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 243

or rectifjdng conclusions, there was no journey too dis-
tant to undertake. Never did he think of his own fame
or name in comparison with the scientific results which
he sought to establish. From early youth to extreme
old age it was to him a solemn religious duty to be in-
cessantly learning, constantly growing, fearlessly cor-
recting his own mistakes, always ready to receive and
reproduce from others that which he had not in himself.
Science and Religion for him not only were not divorced,
but were one and indivisible. He felt with another
eminent votary of science in our time, that this divorce,
unhappily so welcome to some on either side, is " a mere
pretence," neither true in fact, neither Christian nor
philosophic in idea. ^ " The spiritual world and the in-
tellectual world are no more to be separated in this
fashion," than are the secular and the religious, the
Church and the Commonwealth. The instinct which
impels us to seek for harmony between the highest
truths of science and the highest truths of the Bible is
an instinct far nobler and truer than that which would
seek to part them asunder. In this higher instinct, he
who has departed fully shared. The great religious
problems of our time were never absent from his mind.
The infinite possibilities of nature gave him fresh ground
for his unshaken hope in the unknown, immortal future.
His conviction of the peaceful, progressive combination
of natural causes towards the formation of our globe
filled him with a profound and ever profounder sense of
" the wonder and the glory of this marvellous universe."
The generous freedom allowed to religious inquiry in the
National Church, the cause of humanity in the world at
large, were to him as dear as though they were his own
personal and peculiar concern. With that one faithful,
beloved, and beautiful soul, who, till witliin the last two

1 The Duke of Argyll in Tlie Reign of Law, pp. 57, 58.

244 THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY.

years of his life, shared all his joys and all his sorrows,
all his labors and all his fame, he walked the lofty path,
" which the vulture's eye hath not seen, nor the lion's
whelp trodden " ^ — the pathway of the just, " that shin-
eth more and more unto the perfect day," in which we
humbly trust that they are now at last reunited in the
presence of that light which they both so sincerely
sought.

There is an unusual solemnity in the last thought of
one who passes into that Eternal World, on which, as in
a shadow or mirror, he had so long and anxiously medi-
tated, in the unknown ages of which he was, as it were,
the first discoverer. That " lofty and melancholy
Psalm," as a famous historian has called it, which an-
cient tradition has ascribed to Moses, the man of God,
well represents the feeling of one grown gray with vast
experience, who here takes his stand at the close of his
earthly journeyings, and contrasts the fleeting genera-
tions of men with the huge forms of the granite moun-
tains at whose feet they have so long wandered, and
contrasts yet more mountains and men alike with the
eternity of Him who existed and exists before, above,
and beyond them all. "Lord, Thou hast been our
refuge, our dwelling-place from generation to geneia-
tion. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever
the earth and the world were made, from everlasting to
everlasting Thou art God."^ Whether or not it was
the funeral hymn of the Lawgiver of Israel, it has be-
come the funeral hymn of the world. And it seems to
sum up with peculiar force the inner life of the Chris-
tian philosopher, who concluded his chief work with the
contrast of "the relations which subsist between the
finite powers of man and the attributes of an Infinite
and Eternal Being," ^ who felt persuaded that after all

1 Job xxviii. 7. 2 Psalm xc. 1, 2. (See Ewald.)

8 Principles of Geology, id. 621.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GEOLOGY. 245

the magnificent discoveries and speculations on moun-
tain and valley, on earth and sea and sky, the religious
sentiment still remained the grandest and most inde-
structible instinct of the human race ; strongest, most
sublime in those individuals of our race that are most
fully and perfectly developed. At such a solemn fare-
well to the benefactors of mankind, we feel that the
True, the Just, the Good is the Eternal Principle and
Cause which outlasts and outweighs all outward and
visible things. "Before the mountains were brought
forth, or ever the earth and the world were made, from
everlasting to everlasting Thou art God."

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

August 1, 1875, being the Sunday preceding the funeral of Connop
Thirlwall, late Bishop of St. David's.

Where shall wisdom be found ? and where is the place of under-
standing?— Job xxviii. 12.

This chapter of Job, appointed to be sung for the
anthem this afternoon, is not an unworthy glorification
of that grace and gift of God, to which sometimes we
pay little heed, but which in the Bible occupies so con-
spicuous a place — the gift of Wisdom — the religious
use of Wisdom. Not only the Book of Job, but the
Book of Proverbs, the Book of Ecclesiastes, the Book
of Wisdom, the Book of Ecclesiasticus, and the charac-
ter and history of Solomon, which have just been com-
pleted in our Sunday services, are full of it. In the old
Calendar of Lessons, in this respect perhaps unduly
reduced, a larger proportion of Scripture was taken on
Sundays from the Book of Proverbs, in the description
of Wisdom, than was taken from almost any other book
of the Old Testament; more than is devoted to the
commendation even of Faith, or Mercy, or Truth, or
Love. And one name of Christ Himself, which has
given its title to the greatest of Eastern Churches, is
the Eternal Wisdom.

I. What, then, is this grace of wisdom, and why is it
so highly exalted ? Let us take the words of the text.
" Where," in the Divine economy, " shall wisdom be
found ? where is the " religious " place of understand-
ing?"

216

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 247

1. First, wisdom, as described in the Bible, is that
eager desire of knowledge which rests unsatisfied so
long as a corner of darkness is left unexplored ; that
passion for learning which, like the fleets of Solomon,
penetrated into the furthermost regions of the then
known world, and brought back from the furthermost
shores the stores of natural history, and which asked
and answered questions from all the surrounding na-
tions, and which dived, as in the Book of Job, into the
mysteries of the creation, " making the weight for the
winds, a decree for the rain, a way for the lightning of
the thunder ; " ^ " entering into the treasures of the
snow, and seeing the treasures of the hail," examining
" out of whose womb came the ice, and who gendered
the hoary frost of heaven." ^ Such a grand inquisitive-
ness it is which sends out our ships to the Arctic seas,
which united in the same tragical and romantic story
the beloved chief, the gallant crews, and the devoted
and venerable widow, who herself has just departed,
and left her memorial behind her in our midst.^ That
joint career alike of husband and of wife was one illus-
tration amongst a thousand of the elevating, inspiring
result of efforts after knowledge. It showed how,
instead of drying up the heart, or depressing the moral
nature, a thirst for truth enkindles and elevates. A
spirit of inquiry may, no doubt, become frivolous and
useless. But that is not its heaven-born mission, and it
was no profane or worldly critic, but the holy author
of the " Saints' Everlasting Rest," who commended, by
precept as by example, the religious duty of learning
all that can be possibly learnt of God, of man, or of

1 Job xxviii. 25, 26. 2 job xxxviii. 22, 29.

8 The monument to the memory of Sir John Franklin was erected in
the Abbey July 31, 1875, in the week following Lady Franklin's death,
and the day preceding this sermon.

248 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

nature. Listen to some of these stimulating injunc-
tions. " He that can see God in all things, and hath
all things sanctified by the love of God, should above
dll things value each particle of knowledge of which
such holy use may be made, as we value every grain of
gold." " Every degree of knowledge tendeth to more ;
and every known truth befriendeth others ; and like fire
tendeth to the spreading of our knowledge to all neigh-
bor truths that arc intelligible." "Look well to all
things, or to as many as possible. When half is un-
known, the other half is not half known." Such is the
value, the eternal value, of learning.

2. But there is another kind of wisdom — and far the
larger part — which, although it may be united with
learning, is also often found quite apart from it, and
which furnishes most of the elements which go to make
up the biblical, the religious, idea of wisdom. The
exercise of "practical judgment and discretion;" "a
wise and understanding heart to discern between good
and bad ; " " largeness of heart " to take in the varying
affairs of men ; the capacity for "justice, judgment, and
equity ; " — this also, if the Bible, if human experience,
is true, is a heavenly gift of the first magnitude. No
doubt, wisdom is not of itself goodness. The Proverbs
are not the Psalms, Solomon was not David. But wis-
dom is next door to goodness, and religion leans upon
her. How many benevolent schemes have been endan-
gered, how many missions foiled, how many bitter con-
troversies engendered and perpetuated, how many wild
superstitions encouraged, simply because wisdom has
not been allowed to have her perfect work ; because
men have refused to acknowledge that common sense is
a Christian grace ; because the children of light have
been in their generation less wise than the children of
this world ; because we have failed to bear in mind for

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 249

how many evils the real remedy is to be found, not in
ancient precedent, or popular agitation, or resplendent
principles, but in a few homely maxims such as those
of the Book of Proverbs, a few grains of discretion,
sense, and foresight ! What a new aspect would be put
upon the idleness, the selfishness, the extravagance of
youth, if we could be taught to think not only of its
sinfulness, but of its contemptible ft>lly, if we could be
induced not only to confess how often we were misera-
ble sinners, but also how often we have been miserable
fools ; what a great security for human welfare if we
were to set ourselves not only to become better, but
wiser, not only to gain holiness and virtue, but, as
Solomon says, to "get wisdom, get understanding; " to
pray that He Who giveth liberally and upbraideth not
would, in addition to His other blessings, "give us
wisdom ! "

And now may I exemplify these remarks in the life
of one who has this week been removed from amongst
us, and who will shortly be laid within these walls, in
whom both sides of this Divine gift were shown forth
in no ordinary degree ? In the opening of that fine
recapitulation of the different gifts of God, which we
heard in the Epistle of this day, the Apostle says, " To
one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to
another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit."
To the great scholar and prelate who is gone we may
truly say that by the same Divine Spirit the word of
knowledge and the word of wisdom were given in equal
proportions.

IT. Let 1 me freely speak to j^ou for a few moments
of this patriarch of our national Church in his two ca-

1 The latter portion of this sermon has been already printed as a
Preface to the Bishop's Letter to a Friend, edited by the late Dean of
Westminster.

250 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

pacities of a universal scholar and of a wise ecclesias-
tical statesman.

1. Of that thirst for knowledge in all its parts of
which the Bible speaks, of the mastery of all ancient
and modern learning, few, if any, have been more won-
derful examples than he, who from his eleventh till his
threescore and eighteenth year was always gathering in
fresh stores of understanding. Of him, as of Solomon,
it might be said, '' Thy soul covered the whole earth." ^
There was hardly a civilized language Avhich he had not
explored both in its structure and its literature. He
was the chief of that illustrious group of English scholars
who first revealed to this country the treasures of Ger-
man research, and the insight which that research had
opened into the mysterious origin of the races, institu-
tions, and religions of mankind. Many are now living
who never can forget the moment when in the transla-
tion of " Niebuhr's Roman History " they for the first
time felt that they had caught a glimpse into the dark
corners of ancient times before the dawn of history had
begun. There are many who gathered their knowledge
of the Grecian world from the first history which brought
all the stores of modern learning to bear on that glorious
country and its glorious people, and which still, after
all that has been done, remains the only history filled
with the continuous sense of the unity of its marvellous
destinies in their decline as well as in their rise. Many
there are who have never lost the deep impression left
by the attempt to trace the refined and solemn irony of
ancient tragedy and human ^ fate; many also who in
his masterly analysis of the Evangelical narratives first
found a key at once to the diversity and unity of Gospel
truth, to the structure and the substance of the sacred

1 Ecclus. xlvii. 14. 2 jEssay on the Irony of Sophocles.

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 251

volume.^ Such a man is a boon to a whole generation,
both by the example of his industry and by the light of
his teacliing. Even to the very last, even in old age,
in blindness, in solitude, he continued with indomitable
energy the task of acquiring new knowledge, of adding
another and another finish to the never-ending educa-
tion of his capacious mind ; becoming, as he said when
at the age of seventy-six he released himself from the
cares of his diocese — becoming a boy once again, but a
boy still at school, still growing in wisdom and under-
standing. Hear it, laggards and sluggards of our laxer
days ! hear it, you who spend your leisure in the things
and the books that perish with the using! hear and
profit by the remembrance that there has been one
amongst us to whom the word of knowledge came in
all its force and beauty ; to whom idleness, ignorance,
and indifference were an intolerable burden ; to whom
the acquisition of a new language or a new literature
was as the annexation of a new dominion, or the inven-
tion of a new enjoyment ! Well may he rest amongst
the scholars of England, beneath the monument of Isaac
Casaubon, whom we have of late learnt to know again
as if he had lived in our 2 days, in the grave of his own
famous 3 schoolfellow, of whose labors in the same field
of Grecian history he once said, with a fine union of
simple modesty and noble disinterestedness, that to
himself had been given the rare privilege of seeing the
work which had been the dream of his own life super-
seded and accomplished by a like work on a larger scale,
and in more finished proportions, by the beloved and
faithful friend of his early youth.

2. But this was not the half of the* wisdom which

1 Introduction to his translation of Schleiermacher's Essay on St.
Luke.

2 Memoir of Isaac Casaubon. By Mark Pattison.

3 George Grote.

262 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

will lie buried in that narrow vault. There is an old
Eno-lish word which has now somewhat changed its
meaning, but which was in former times applied to one
of our greatest divines, Richard Hooker — the word
"judicious." In its proper meaning it signified ex-
actly that quality of judgment, discretion, discrimina-
tion, which is the chief characteristic of the Biblical
virtue of wisdom. Hardly, perhaps, has there been any
English theologian, rarely even any professional Judge,
to whom this epithet, in this its true sense of judicial^
judge-like^ was more truly applicable than to the serene
and powerful intellect that has just passed away. In
that massive countenance, in that measured diction, in
that deliberate argument, in those weighty decisions,
it seemed as though Themis herself were enshrined to
utter her most impressive oracles ; as if he were a living
monument (so said a venerable friend of his own) on
which was inscribed "Incorrupta fides, nudaque Veri-
tas ; " as if he had absorbed into his inmost being the
evangelical precept, ''Judge not according to the ap-
pearance, but judge righteous judgment." We would
not deny — it would be false to human nature, it would
be false to himself to deny — that there were occasions
when even inliis firm hand the scales of justice trem-
bled from some unexpected bias, when his clear vision
was dimmed for a time by a glamor which fascinated
him the more because its magical influence was so unlike
to any thing in himself, when his majestic serenity was
ruffled by the irritation of some trivial contradiction or
small annoyance. But for the larger part of his career
the even current of his temper, the piercing accuracy
of his insight, the calm dignity of his judgment, even
when we might differ from its conclusions, remained
unmoved and immovable ; and thus, when he rose to
the Episcopal office, it almost seemed as if in this respect

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 253

it had been created for him, so naturally did he from it,
as from a commanding eminence, take ah oversight of
the whole field of ecclesiastical events — so entirely did
his addresses to his clergy assume the form of judicial
utterances on each of the great controversies which
have agitated the Church of England for the last thirty
years, and thus become the most faithful as well as im-
pressive record of that eventful time. Such a character,
moving or standing amongst us, insensibly acted as a
constant check on extravagance, a silent rebuke to
partisanship, a valuable witness to " the entire domin-
ion which prudence has (to use the words of Burke)
over every exercise of power committed to his hands,"
" especially (again to use the words of the same great
statesman) when we have lived to see prudence and
conformity to circumstances wholly set at naught in
our late controversies, as if they were the most con-
temptible and irrational of all things." To have beheld
such a judgment-seat established amongst us is a warn-
ing and a blessing for which we shall often crave in
vain now that its oracle is dumb, but which it is for us
to reproduce, so far as we can, by the memory of the
extent to which we once admired it, and of the strength
wherewith it strengthened us.

And there is yet this further lesson : — " Where was
it that this wisdom was found ? or where was the place
of this wonderful understanding ? " It was on a throne
where experience has often told us that it is missing, in
a place where we are often cynically warned not to look
for it. It was in that sacred calling, which, by the very
reason of its sacredness, is exposed more than the other
great professions of our country to the fits of sudden
fanaticism, to the hurricanes of well-intentioned panics,
to the convulsions of blind party-spirit. It was on the
heights of that Episcopal order which, by the very reason

254 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

of its eminence, often becomes the prey of timid coun-
sels, unequal measures, and narrow experiences ; but
which, when wortliily occupied and worthily used, gives
room and scope as no other office, either in Church or
State, to the exercise of that width of view and impar-
tiality of judgment of which the " wisdom " of the Bible
is the Divine expression.

When we sometimes hear it said that in our day there
are fewer attractions for the nobler intellects and the
more gifted spirits to enter the sacred ministry ; when
we hear it regretfully said that those who enter often
become demoralized in their highest mental aspirations
by taking holy orders — let us ask what was the experi-
ence suggested by the career which is now closed. He
had been destined to another lofty calling, that of the
Bar, where, if anywhere, some of his most peculiar gifts
might have had the fullest development and gratified
the highest ambition. But he found that in the minis-
trations of the Church of England there was a field for
a yet larger development of his moral and intellectual
stature, for the exercise of a yet nobler ambition. If
from any cause since that time the calling of an English
clergyman has become less congenial to such characters,
if its sphere has become more contracted, if the diffi-
culties placed in the way of embarking upon it have
increased, or the inducements to enter upon it have di-
minished— it is well for all those who are concerned
to look to it, for few graver evils can befall a Church,
no more formidable prospect threaten its dignity and its
usefulness. And as we so regard the question, let us
think once and again what were the advantages which
he brought to the ministry and hierarchy of the English
Church, and what were the advantages which it offered
to him. He brought to it the assurance that in the
ranks of its clergy there was no reason why the love of

THE RELIGIOUS USEf OF WISDOM. 255

truth and of learning should not abound, why critical
inquiry should not pursue its onward course, why the
intellectual and spiritual elements of Christianity should
not constantly prevail over those which are material and
formal. There are those who remember that when he
was raised by a courageous statesman to a seat in the
English Episcopate, while some trembled with alarm at
the entrance of this bold intruder, as he was deemed,
others confidently predicted that this intrusion, if so it
were, would give to the Church of England a new lease
of enduring life. Have not the prophets of hope been
justified in their anticipation of good, ten times more
than the prophets of fear in their anticipations of evil ?
Are there any now. from one end of the Church to
the other who are not proud of the man who has thus
adorned their calling, and ennobled the career of the
humblest curate of the most secluded hamlet? Are
there any who do not feel that English Christianity
and English literature would have been the poorer if
Connop Thirlwall had become a mere successful lawyer,
or remained a mere private scholar, instead of giving by
his presence in the Episcopate an example and a guar-
anty that liberal sentiment, even-handed justice, free
research, had their proper sphere in the high places of
our Zion ? He stood not alone in that former genera-
tion of noble students, in those days which " they that
are younger now have in their derision." Others there
were, perhaps, in their own way, as gifted as he, who
certainly left a deeper and wider impress on the writings
and the actions of our time, and who Avere less restrained
in their utterances by caution or reticence. But of all
that memorable band who found their natural calling
in the ministry of the English Church, he was the only
one, at least in England, who mounted to its highest
ranks, and visibly swayed its counsels. That long and

256 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

honored existence bids us not to despair of our Cliurch
or of our Faith ; but it also warns us to keep them at
least on the same level that made his presence amongst
us possible. It may be that, whatever betides, there
will always be an inducement for the simple enthusiast,
the stirring administrator, the eager partisan, the zealous
dogmatist, to take his place in the ranks of the evangel-
iL^ts or pastors of the Church. But if there are to be
pillars of the House of Wisdom amongst the clergy like
to him that is gone, there must be something more than
this ; and is it too much to say that one main attraction,
which drew him and like characters to the sacred minis-
try of our Church, was its national character, and there-
fore comprehensive, varied, and onward destiny? To
nothing short of this, to no meaner service, beneath the
dogmatic or ceremonial yoke of no lesser communion,
would the giants of those days have bowed their heads
to enter. Other advantages, moral or material, may be
furnished by the separated, disintegrated, or exclusively
ecclesiastical sects or churches of our country. Many
are the excellent gifts possessed by our Nonconformist
brethren which we lack, and perhaps shall always lack.
But they themselves would confess with us that such as
he of whom we speak would have found, and could have
found, no abiding place in their ranks. And only, or
almost only, in a national Church — where the perma-
nent voice of the nation, and not only a fraction of it,
takes part in the appointment of its highest officers —
was such an appointment possible, or at least probable,
as that which gave to us the prelate whom we all now
alike delight to honor, and mourn to lose.

Such was the public career of him whom on Tuesday
next we are to lay beneath this roof. Some perhaps
will lament, with a natural regret, that the prelate who,
of all its occupants, has most conspicuously adorned

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 257

through a long Episcopate the ancient see which reaches
back to the earliest beginnings of British Christianity,
should not have found his last resting-place in the lone-
liness and grandeur of his own cathedral of St. David's,
in the romantic solitude of that secluded sanctuary,
beside the storm-vexed promontory that overlooks the
western sea. But it was also a natural feeling, in which
his own clergy and people proudly share, that one
whose fame belonged not to a single diocese, but to the
whole Church of England and to the whole world of let-
ters, should claim his rightful place amongst the schol-
ars and philosophers of our country. And in these days
of doubt and rebuke there is a satisfaction in the thought
that at least one great Churchman by general consent
found his way into the innermost circle of the sages
of our time ; that, on the one hand, there was at least
one Greek to whose lofty intellect the religion of Jesus
Christ was not foolishness ; and, on the other hand, at
least one reverent believer to whom its reasonable ser-
vice, its philosophic depth, its wide-reaching charity, its
unadorned simplicity, were not stumbling-blocks.

3. And this brings me to one concluding remark. I
have hitherto spoken only of the mental grandeur of him
whom we mourn. It is this chiefly which concerns us
on this occasion. It is the vindication of the religious
mission only of learning and wisdom that I have thus
briefly put before you. Yet those who knew the man
in his inner life knew well that within that marble in-
tellect, behind that impassive severity, beneath that
ponderous eloquence, there was a moral fire which
warmed and fused the whole length and breadth of the
granite mass through which it breathed. That was
no mean sense of duty which constrained him, when
in middle life he entered on the Episcopate, to throw
his vast linguistic power into the homely and perhaps

258 THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM.

ungrateful task of learning, as no English Bishop, I be-
lieve, since the Conquest, had ever learnt, the language
of his Cambrian diocese. That was no inconsiderable
effort of moral courage and farsighted justice which led
him on one occasion in his earlier years to vindicate,
amidst obloquy and opposition, the solution of a great
academical ^ difficulty which, since that time, all have
accepted ; or, on another occasion in his later years, to
vindicate the solution of a great ecclesiastical ^ difficulty
which all modern statesmen had abandoned, but which
all eminent statesmen of a former generation had com-
bined in urging. That was no cold or callous heart
which found its chief earthly comfort in the faithful
affection of those who grew up around him as his own
children and grandchildren, receiving instruction day
by day from the boundless stores of his knowledge, and
attracted by his paternal care. That was no proud or
hard spirit which lived a life of such childlike simpli-
city, in the innocent enjoyment of his books or of his
dumb creatures, or in steady obedience to the frequent
call of often irksome duty, or in humbly waiting for his
heavenly Master's summons.

It was an undesigned but impressive coincidence that
during the last days of his life he was employing his
dark and vacant hours in translating, through succes-
sive dictations, into Latin, Greek, German, Italian,
Spanish, French, Welsh, the striking apologue which
tells us that, " as Sleep is the brother of Death, thou
must be careful to commit thyself to the care of Him
who is to awaken thee both from the Death of Sleep
and from the Sleep of Death,*' and which tells us fur-
ther that " the outward occurrences of life, whether
prosperous or adverse, have no more effect than dreams

1 The admission of Dissenters to the Universities.

2 The plan of Concurrent Endowment for the Irish Churches.

THE RELIGIOUS USE OF WISDOM. 259

on our real condition, since virtue alone is the real end
and enduring good." These words, thus rendered with
all the energy of his unbroken mind into those seven
languages, contain, by hazard, as I have said, yet surely
not without significance, the simple, sublime elements
of religion — the two conclusions which, not only in
those closing hours, but in the fulness of his life, pene-
trated his reason and his faith : unwavering reverence
for the supreme goodness of God, unshaken conviction
of the true grandeur of goodness in man. Suddenly
the summons came. With one call for him who had
been as his own son on earth ; with one cry to his Lord
in heaven. Who to his upward gaze seemed yet more
visible and yet more near — he passed, as we humbly
trust, from the death of sleep, and from the sleep of
death, to the presence of that Light in which he shall
see light.

'^ Where shall wisdom be found? and where is the
place of understanding?"

" Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to
depart from evil is understanding." i

1 Job xxviii. 28.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHI-
TECTURE.

March 30, 1878, being the Sunday after the burial of Sir George Gilbert

Scott.

/ ivas (jlad ichen they said unto ?ne, Let us go into the house of the
Lord. — Psalm cxxiii. 1.

" The house of the Lord." It is an expression which
we at once recognize as figurative. " Behold, the heaven
of heavens cannot contain Thee ; how much less this
house that I have builded ! " So it was said even in
the Jewish dispensation. In the Christian dispensation
it is still more strongly expressed that the only fitting
temple of the Most High is the sacred human conscience,
or the community of good men throughout the world,
or that vast unseen universe which is the true taberna-
cle, greater and more perfect than any made by hands.
Nevertheless, like all familiar metaphors, the expression
" the house of God " has a deep root in the human
heart and mind. Our idea of the invisible almost inev-
itably makes for itself a shell or husk from visible things.
This is the germ of religious architecture. This is the
reason why the most splendid buildings in the world
have been temples or churches. This is the reason why
even the most spiritual, even the most Puritanical, reli-
gion clothes itself with the drapery not only of words,
and sounds, and pictures, but of wood, and stone, and
marble. A Friends' meeting-house is as really a house
of God, and therefore as decisive a testimony to the

2G0

RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 261

sacredness of architecture, as the most magnificent
cathedral. The barbaric artificers of tlie tabernacle in
the desert were as really inspired in their rude manner,
as the Tyrian architects of the temple of Solomon.
Who is there that does not feel a glow of enthusiasm
when coming back after long absence — it may be like
him who addresses you to-day — or long illness, he finds
himself once more in the old familiar, venerable sanc-
tuary, which has become the home of his affection, the
outward and visible sign of his country's and of his own
hopes and duties? Wlio is tliero tliat having grown
with the growth and strengthened witli the strength
of an institution like this, does not feel that it is part of
himself, that its honor or dishonor is his own glory
or his own sliamc? That which a humorous saying
usually ascribed to the witty Canon ^ of a neighboring
cathedral, treated as an impossibility, is in fact the
simple truth. We who live under the hull or frame-
work, the vaults or the dome of a building like West-
minster Abbey or St. Paul's, are conscious of a thrill
of satisfaction when the hand of an approving public
is placed on our outward shell ; a thrill whicli penetrates
to our inmost souls, because we witliin, and that superb
shell without, constitute but one and the same living
creature. It is the consciousness of this intimate con-
nection between the spiritual and the material temple,
between the grandeur of religion and the grandeur of
its outward habitation, which gives a living interest
to the thought which I would this day bring before

1 It is told of Sydney Smith that he onco said to a child who thought
that it was pleasing a tortoise by stroking the shell, "You might as
well hope to i)lease the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's by patting the
dome." {Memoirs of Sydney Smilh, vol. i. 324.) It would seem, how-
ever, that the story liad an earlier origin. The remark was made;, in
the first instance, or at least simultaneously, by the present Sir Fred-
erick Pollock to his brother.

262 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

you — the religious aspect of the noble science and art
of the architect. We yesterday laid within these walls
the most famous builder of this generation. Others
may have soared to loftier flights, or produced special
works of more commanding power ; but no name within
the last thirty years has been so widely impressed on
the edifices of Great Britain, past and present, as that
of Gilbert Scott. From the humble but graceful cross,
which commemorates at Oxford the sacrifice of the three
martyrs of the English Reformation, to the splendid
memorial of the Prince who devoted his life to the
service of his Queen and country ; from the Presby-
terian University on the banks of the Clyde, to the
college chapels on the banks of the Isis and the Cam ;
from the proudest minster to the most retired parish
church; from India to Newfoundland — the trace has
been left of the loving eye and skilful hand that are
now so cold in death. Truly was it said by one, who
from the distant shores of a foreign land rendered yes-
terday his sorrowing tribute of respect, that in nearly
all the cathedrals of England there must have been a
shock of grief when the tidings came of the sudden
stroke which had parted them from him, who was to
them as their own familiar friend and foster-father.
Canterbury, Ely, Exeter, Worcester, Peterborough,
Salisbury, Hereford, Lichfield, Ripon, Gloucester, Man-
chester, Chester, Rochester, Oxford, Bangor, St. Asaph,
St. David's, Windsor, St. Alban's, Tewkesbury, and last,
not least, our own Westminster, in which he took most
delight of all buildings in all the world — are the silent
mourners round the grave of him who loved their very
stones and dust, and knew them to their very heart's
core. But it is good on these occasions to rise above
the personal feelings of the moment into those more
general lessons which his career suggests.

BELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 263

I. It was the singular fortune of that career that it
coincided with one of the most remarkable revolutions
of taste that the world has witnessed. That peculiar
conception of architectural beauty which our ances-
tors, in blame and not in praise, called Gothic, was
altogether unknown to Pagan or Christian antiquity.
It was unknown alike to the builders of the Pyramids
and the Parthenon, to the builders of the Roman Basil-
ica, and the Byzantine Sta. Sophia. Born partly of
Saracenic, partly of German parentage, it gradually
won its way to perfection by the mysterious instinct
which breathed through Europe in the Middle Ages.
It flourished for four centuries, and then died as com-
pletely as if it had never existed. Another style took
its place. By Catholic and Protestant it was alike repu-
diated. By the hands of English or Scottish prelates,
no less than of English or Scottish Reformers, its traces
wherever possible were obliterated. Here and there a
momentary thrill of admiration was rekindled by the
high-embowed roof, or by the stately pillars of our
ancient churches, as in the '' Penseroso " of Milton, or
in the " Mourning Bride " of Congreve. But as a gen-
eral rule it was regarded as a lost art, and our poets of
the sixteenth century make no more allusion to it than
if they had been born and bred in the new world of
America.

Look through the popular writers of the sixteenth century, the
unconscious exponents of the sentiments of the age that followed
the Reformation, examine the writings of Spenser, for instance,
and Shakspeare, the many-sided, to whom all the tones of thought
of all ages see-ni to have been revealed and familiarized, of Chap-
man and IVIarlow and the rest, and I question whether you will find
a line or a word in any one of them indicating the slightest sym-
pathy with the aesthetics of ecclesiastical architecture, which exer-
cise such a fascination over ourselves. Not one line, not one word,
I believe, of the charms of cloistered arcades and fretted roofs, and

264 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

painted windows, and the dim religious light of the pensive poets
of our later ages. No wail of despair, no murmur of dissatisfac-
tion reaches us from the generation that witnessed the dire eclipse
in which the labor of so many ages of artistic refinement became
involved. Their children have betrayed to us no remembrance
of the stifled sorrows of their fathers. As far as regards its taste
for ecclesiastical monuments, the literature of Elizabeth might
have been the production of the rude colonists of the Antilles or
of Virginia.^

Here and there an antiquarian, like Gostling at Can-
terbury or Carter at Westminster, allowed the genius
of the place to overpower the tendencies of the age.
And if a protest against the indiscriminate disparage-
ment of mediaeval art came at last from Horace Wal-
pole, it was more in deference to his rank, than from
conversion to his sentiments, that the authorities in
Church and State consented to preserve what else they
would have doomed to destiuction. At last in the
first half of this century a new eye was given to the
mind of man. Gradually, imperfectly, through various
channels — in this country chiefly through the minute
observations of a Quaker student — the visions of the
strange past rose before a newly awakened world. The
glory and the grace of our soaring arches, of our stained
windows, of our recumbent effigies, were revealed, as
they had been to no mortal eyes since the time of their
erection. To imitate, to preserve this ancient style in
its remarkable beauty was the inevitable consequence,
we might say the overwhelming temptation, of this new
discovery. The hour was come when the ecclesiastical
architecture of the past was to be roused from its long
slumber, and with the hour came the man. We do not
forget that splendid if eccentric genius who gave him-
self, though not with undivided love, to the service

1 Sermon preached at Harrow, on the Founder's Day, Oct. 10, 1872,
by Charles Merivale, D.D., Dean of Ely.

RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 265

of another communion. We cannot but remember the
giftecj architect who raised the stately halls and the
commanding towers of the palace of the imperial legis-
lature, and who was laid long years ago — in fit prox-
imity to his own great works — within these walls,
where he has been followed by him of whom I now
would speak. For there was one who, if younger in
the race, and at the time less conspicuous than either
of them, was destined to exercise over the growth of
Gothic architecture in this country a yet more enduring
and extensive influence.

When in this Abbey the first note of that revival was
struck by the erection of Bernasconi's plaster canopies
in the place of the classic altar-piece, given by Queen
Anne,i a boy of fourteen years old was in the church
watching the demolition and the reconstruction with a
curious vigilance, which from that time never flagged
for fifty years. That was the earliest reminiscence
which Gilbert Scott retained of Westminster Abbey;
that was the first inspiration of the Gothic revival
which swept away before its onward progress not only
the plaster reredos of this Abbey, but a thousand other
crudities of the same imperfect period. He imperson-
ated the taste of the age. Antiquarian no less than
builder, he became to those fossils of mediaBval architect-
ure what Cuvier and Owen have been to the fossils
of the earlier world of nature. It may be that others
will follow on whom the marvellous bounty of Provi-
dence shall bestow other gifts of other kinds. But
meanwhile we bless God for what we have had in our
departed friend and his fellow- workers. The recovery,
the second birth, of Gothic architecture, is a striking
proof that the human mind is not dead, nor the creative
power of our Maker slackened. We bless alike the
1 Memoriah of Westminster Abbey, p. 530.

266 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

power which breathed this inspiration into the men
of old, and that which even from their dry bones has
breathed it once again into the men of these latter
days.

II. But it is not enough to rejoice that a great gift is
resuscitated or a great style imitated. We must ask
wherein its greatness consisted, and in what relation
it stood to the other gifts of the Creator. There are
many characteristics of the mediaeval architecture, as
of the media3val mind, which have totally perished, or
which ought never to be revived ; which represent ideas
that for our time have lost all significance, and pur-
poses which are doomed to extinction. The Middle
Ages have left on the intellect of Europe few, very few,
enduring traces. Their chronicles are but the quarries
of later historians ; their schoolmen are but the extinct
species of a dead theology. Two great poems and one
book of devotion are all which that long period has be-
queathed to the universal literature of mankind. But
their architecture still remains

" Of equal date
With Andes and with Ararat," ^

and the reason of this continuance or revival is this,
that in its essential features it represented those aspira-
tions of religion which are eternal. As in mediaeval
Christianity there were elements which belonged to the
undeveloped Protestantism of the Western Churches, so
also in mediaeval architecture there are elements which
belong to the churches of the Reformation as well as to
the churches of the Papal system. Its massive solidity,
its aspiring height, its infinite space, these belong not
to the tawdry, trivial, minute, material side of religion,
but to its sobriety, its grandeur, its breadth, its sublim-

1 Emerson.

KELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 267

ity. And therefore it was that when this revival of
Gothic architecture took place, it was amongst the
Protestant churches of England, rather than in the
Catholic churches of the Continent, that its first growth
struck root. The religious power of our great cathe-
drals has, as has been well remarked,^ not lost, but
gained, in proportion as our worship has become more
solemn, more simple, more reverential, more compre-
hensive. There is a cloud of superstition doubtless
which, with the latter half of the nineteenth century,
has settled down over a large part of the ecclesiastical
world ; but the last places which it will reach will be
the magnificent architectural monuments which defy
the introduction of trivial and mean decorations, or, if
introduced, condemn them for their evident incongruity
with other portions of the buildings. The great anti-
quaries, the great architects of this century, are but too
well acquainted with the differences between the loftier
and the baser aspects, between the golden and tlie copper
sides of their noble art, to allow it to become the hand-
maid of a sect or part}^, or the instrument of a senseless
proselytism.

III. And this leads me to one more point of the mar-
vellous revival of which he who lies in yonder grave
was the pioneer and champion. For the first, or almost
for the first time in the history of the world, the archi-
tecture of the nineteenth century betook itself, not to
the creation of a new style, but to the preservation and
imitation of an older style. With perhaps one excep-
tion,2 every age and country down to our own has set
its face towards superseding the works of its predeces-

1 Dean Milman's History of Latin Christianity, vol. vi. p. 91.

2 The continuance of the Pharaonic style in Egypt under the Ptole-
maic princes and Roman emperors. There are also a few examples in
Mediaeval Architecture, such as the completion of the nave of West-
minster Abbey. — See Memorials of Westminster Abbey, chap. iii.

268 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

sors, by erecting its own work in their place. The
Normans overthrew the old Romanesque churches of
the Saxons. Henry III. in tliis place "totally swept
away, as of no value whatever," the noble Abbey of
the Confessor. Henry VII. built his stately Chapel in
marked contrast to all the other portions of this build-
ing. The great architects of the cathedrals of St. Peter
at Rome, and St. Paul in London, adopted a style vary-
ing as widely from the mediaeval, which they despised,
as from the Grecian, which they admired. But now,
in our own time, the whole genius of the age threw all
its energies into the reproduction of what had been,
rather than into the production of what was to be. No
doubt it may be said that there is; in the original genius
which creates, something more stimulating and inspir-
ing. Yet still the very eagerness of reproduction is
itself an original inspiration, and there is in it also a
peculiar grace which, to the illustrious departed, was
singularly congenial. If one had sought for a man to
carry out this awe-striking retrospect through the great
works of old, to gather up the fragments of perishing
antiquity, it would have been one whose inborn mod-
esty used to call the color into his face at every word
of praise, whose reverential attitude led him instinc-
tively to understand and to admire. And yet in him
this very tendency, especially in his maturer age, took
so large and generous a sweep as to counteract the
excesses into which, in minds less expansive and less
vigorous, it is sure to fall. Because the bent of his own
character and of his own time led chiefly to the restora-
tion of mediaeval art, he was not on that account insen-
sible to the merits of the ages which had gone before, or
which had succeeded. With that narrow and exclusive
pedantry which would fain sweep out from this and
other like buildings all the monuments and memorials

RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 269

of the last three centuries, he had little or no sympathy.
He regarded them as footprints of the onward march of
English history, and whilst feeling a natural regret for
the inroads which here and there they had made into
the earlier glories of the Plantagenet and Tudor archi-
tecture, and willing to prune their disproportionate
encroachments, he cherished their associations as ten-
derly as though they had been his own creations, and
would bestow his meed of admiration as freely on the
modern memorial of Isaac Watts as on the antique
e&igy of a crusading prince or a Benedictine abbot. It
was tliis loving, yet comprehensive care for all the hete-
rogeneous elements of the past, this anxious, unselfish
attention to all their multifarious details, which made
him so wise a counsellor, so delightful a companion, in
the great work of the reparation, the conservation, the
glorification of this building, which, amidst his absorb-
ing and ubiquitous duties, it is not too much to say was
his first love, his chief, his last, his enduring interest.

Such is the loss which the whole Church and country
deplore, but which we of this place mourn most of all.
We cannot forget him. Roof and wall, chapter-house
and cloister, the tombs of the dead and the worship of
the living, all speak of him to those who know that his
hand and his eye were everywhere a^iongst us. But
these very trophies of what he did for us must render
lis more alive to do what we can for him. His memory
must stimulate us who remain to carry on with unabated
zeal those works in which he took so deep a concern :
the completion of the Chapter-house by its long-prom-
ised and long-delayed windows of stained glass; the
northern porch, which he desired above all things to see
restored to its pristine beauty ; the new cloister, which
he had planned in all its completeness as the link for
another thousand years between the illustrious dead of

270 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

the generations of the past, and those of the generations
of the future. So long as these remain unfinished, his
grave will continue to reproach us. When they shall
be accomplished, they will be amongst the noblest monu-
ments of him whose ambition for his glorious art was so
far-reaching, and whose ideas of what was due to this
national sanctuary were so exacting.

IV. But there is yet a more sacred and solemn
thought which attaches to the immediate remembrance
of so faithful a servant of this State of England, of so
honored a friend of this church of Westminster.

It has been sometimes said that it was by a strange
irony of fate that the great leader in the revival of
mediaeval architecture should have* been the grandson
of that venerable commentator who belonged to the re-
vival of evangelical religion. Yet in fact, from- another
point of view, it was a fitting continuity. It is always
useful to be reminded that the revival, or, as we may
better put it, the increase, of sincere English religion,
belongs to a generation and a tendency long anterior to
the multiplication of those external signs and symbols
of which our age has made so much ; and in the deep
sense of that inward religion, that simple faith in the
Great Unseen, the grandson who multiplied and dis-
closed the secrets of the visible sanctuaries of God
throughout the land, was not an unworthy descendant
of the grandfather who endeavored, according to the
light of 'his time, to draw forth the mysteries of the
Book of books. We in this place, who knew him and
valued him, who leant upon him as a tower of strength'
in our difficulties, who honored his indefatigable indus-
try, his childlike humility, his unvarying courtesy, his
noble candor, we who remember with gratitude his gen-
erous encouragement of the students of the rising gener-
ation, who know how he loved and valued the best that

RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE. 271

we also have loved and valued — we all feel that in him
we have lost one of those just, gentle, guileless souls who
in their lives have lifted, and in their memories may still
lift, our souls upwards. And when we speak of the work
which such a career bequeaths to those that remain, let
us remember that although, as we said at the beginning
of this discourse, the shell, the framework, of a great
building like this, is an inestimable gift of God, its crea-
tion and preservation one of the noblest functions ot
human genius and national enterprise, yet on us who
dwell within it, to whose charge it is committed, de-
pends in no slight manner its continuance for the future,
its glory and its usefulness for the present. There are
some eager spirits of our time, in whom the noble pas-
sion for reform and improvement has been stifled and
suspended by the ignoble passion for destruction, who
have openly avowed their desire to suppress all the
expressions of worship or of teaching within this or like
edifices, and keep them only as dead memorials of the
past — better silent with the solitude of Tintern or of
Melrose, than thronged with vast congregations or re-
sounding with the music of the psalmist or the voice
of the preacher. It is for us so to fulfil our several
duties, so to people this noble sanctuary with living
deeds and words of goodness and of wisdom, that such
dreams of the destroyer may find no place to enter, no
shelter or excuse from our neglect or ignorance or folly.
The grave of our great architect is close beside the
pulpit which he erected to commemorate the earliest
establishment of services and of sermons in the nave,
which then for the first time were set on foot by my
predecessor, and which have since spread tliroughout
the whole country. That reminds us of the kind of
support which we, the guardians and occupants of abbeys
and cathedrals, can give even to their outward fabric.

272 RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF GOTHIC ARCHITECTURE.

It has been well said by a gifted author, who, if any of
his time, has been devoted to the passionate love of art,
that in the day of trial it will be said even in those
magnificent buildings, not '' See what manner of stones
are here," but " See what manner of men." ^ Clergy,
lay-clerks, choristers, teachers, scholars, vergers, guides,
almsmen, workmen — yes, and all you who frequent this
church — every one of us may have it in our power to
support it, by our reverence and devotion, by our eager-
ness to profit by what we hear, by our sincere wish to
give the best that we can in teaching and preaching, by
our honest and careful fulfilment of the duties of each
day's work, by our scrupulous care to avoid all that can
give needless annoyance or offence, by our constancy
and belief, by our rising above all paltry disputes and
all vulgar vices. In the presence of this great institu-
tion of which we are all members, and in the presence
of the Most High God, whom it recalls to our thoughts,
and in whose presence we are, equally within its walls
and without them — every one of us has it in his power
to increase the glory, to strengthen the stability, to
insure the perpetuity of this abbey. That is the best
memorial we can raise, that is the best service we can
render, to all those, dead or living, who have loved, or
who still love, this holy and beautiful house, wherein
our fathers worshipped in the generations of the past,
and wherein, if we be but true to its glorious mission,
our children and our children's children shall worship
in the generations that are yet to come.

1 Euskin's Lectures on Art, p. 118.

THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE.

December 22, 1878.

She that hath home seven languisheth ; she hath given up the ghost ;
her sun hath gone down while it was yet day. — Jeremiah xv. 9.

It is impossible for me, in this ancient sanctuary of
the joys and sorrows of English Princes, not to say a
few words on the mournful event which, since I last
entered these walls, has cast another and a deeper
shadow on the day already thrice linked with the lives
and deaths of the Royal House. Even as a domestic
calamity in a private family it would strike a pang
through many hearts to hear of a husband suddenly
left desolate — himself hardly rescued from the gates
of death ; the seven children, of whom we are reminded,
in the words of the English poet, that, though two
of them had gone before to their rest, they " still are
seven ; " the wife and mother falling a victim to her
vigilant care for those she loved, the sudden termina-
tion of a brilliant career in the midst of unclouded
brightness — these thoughts combine to make this event
almost literally a reproduction of the grief which the
prophet selected as the type of .the heaviest misfortune.
But there is a sense in which even the cynical critic
will acknowledge that this private sorrow bears some-
thing of a national aspect ; and therefore on this occa-
sion, as we take a last look at the sepulchre which has
closed on so much happiness and usefulness ; on this
day — when the shadow of mourning still rests, not

273

274 THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE.

only on the British Isles, but on the remotest extremi-
ties of the earth where the English language is spoken ;
even amongst the children of that New England be-
yond the sea, now parted from the English Crown, but
mingling their sympathy for that Crown while they
celebrate, as it happens on this day, their own national
birthright — it may not be unfitting to ask what per-
manent lessons we here may carry away with us from
the event which has left so deep an impression on palace
and cottage, abroad and at home, wherever the tidings
have reached.

The lesson which we may carry away is two-fold.
The first is a homely lesson, but not unimportant for
us to remember, the universality and identity of human
suffering and human affection. We all feel tliis shock,
because we all know what it is. We know that the
mourners in this case are mourners like the mother,
husband, and children in every household throughout
the land. We know that the tears which flow from
them, and for them, flow from the same fountain of
grief that exists in every human heart. We know that
the parental love which ended in this heart-stirring
world-felt sorrow is the same which sustains the home
of every private circle. When we hear the funereal
music ; when we read of the solemn service over the
dead; when we see rival statesmen suspending their
fierce strife for a moment in order to render their
touching tribute to the self-sacrificing love of a mother
for her child, or the simple, manly affection of a brother
to a much loved sister ; we are touched with the depth
and the grandeur of those pure domestic feelings of
which we sometimes think too little, but which, at such
moments as this, we acknowledge to be the very life-
blood of families and of nations. Every man, woman,
and child, as they feel for the untimely loss of this de-

THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE. 275

voted parent, faithful sister, and affectionate daughter,
may well be reminded that they, each in their place,
can be and ought to be what she was. The more we
recollect that circle of good children, to whose culture
and education so much care was given by her whom
they have lost, so much more each of us should feel the
responsibilit}^ of the burden which every parent bears
in the little souls that God has intrusted to our keep-
ing. The more we learn of the elevating and softening
effect which sorrow had already wrought on the mind
and heart of the mother mourning over her dear first
lost child, so much the more should we each of us know
that through the dark hours of bereavement and mis-
fortune an unseen hand may be leading us upw^ards to
some higher and wider life. Our Christmas homes will
not be the less happy if they are lightened with the
holy thought that our permanent home is not here;
and that there is a brighter and better world even
than the brightest and the best Ihat we have known
on earth.

There is another lesson. I have hitherto spoken of
that experience which is common to all the sons and
daughters of men ; but the very fact that this domestic
grief is a likeness of that which befalls us all, reminds
us that there is another class of reflections aroused, not
by the equalities but by the inequalities and varieties
of the human race. It is one striking result of the ere- .
ation and growth of those high offices which break the
level monotony of human existence that they bring
before us common things and common feelings in a
concentrated, personal, and yet public form. A Royal
personage or an exalted character is — we none of us
need to be told it — one of the same flesh and blood
as ourselves. But the fact that by historical tradition,
and by the inextinguishable sentiment of mankind,

276 THE LATE PKINCESS ALICE.

they are necessarily naarked out from their fellow-men,
gives to all that they do or suffer a power for good or
a power for evil beyond that which belongs to those
who live and die unknown. The " mute, inglorious
Miltons," the undeveloped Plantagenets, Cromwells, or
Washingtons in our country churchyards may have
been, in themselves, as precious in the sight of God,
and as excellent in their dealings with their neighbors,
as the greatest and most favored of mankind. But
Providence has so ordered it that conspicuous eminence
is and can be given only to a few ; and those few who
stand on their eminences are as a city set upon a hill.

" That fierce light which beats upon a Throne "

reveals lessons and gives opportunities which escape
notice in the homelier or obscurer corners of the life
of men. This is the second lesson conveyed to us by
the event which we are now considering. It was not
only that she who is gone discharged those ordinary
duties which belong to every wife and mother, but that
she was aware of the moral power and of the large
responsibility with which her high position of neces-
sity invested her. The active kindness, the gracious
attention, the wise interest in benevolent objects which
would be useful in every one were, as she well knew,
intensified in usefulness by coming from one in her
place. Her rank, her name, were used by her not for
purposes of selfish indulgence or pleasure, but for be-
neficence and enlightenment. Those external advan-
tages were, as she felt, special talents committed to her
trust for the good of mankind ; and as such she used
them. It is this use — this good use — of the talents
committed to each of us that we would now urge on
all. We do not need to be of Regal rank, or to pos-
sess a world-wide fame, to have special opportunities

THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE. 277

intrusted to us. Nor do Regal rank or world-wide
fame insure that such opportunities shall be rightly
used. But wherever, and in proportion as, they are
not used, every institution, or rank, or place, which fur-
nishes them, loses one large part of the object for which,
in the order of Providence, it exists ; and wherever,
and in proportion as, these opportunities and talents
are used, there not only is the welfare of society in-
creased, but the existence of the institutions themselves
is justified ; because it then becomes apparent that they
are the vantage grounds, without which the benevolent
intentions and the beneficent works of individuals would
often lose the fulcrum and the stimulus which every
effort for good in this difficult world so much needs.
Those who, in any important station, fulfil the duties
of that station well ; those who make it a matter of
conscience to reward unquestionable merit and to ad-
vance the obscure deserving ; those who make a stand
against an evil fashion, or a selfish luxury, or the de-
graded vices of our age, not only render a service to
their immediate generation, but they render a still
more enduring service to the generations that are yet
to come by helping to preserve the institutions which
shall, in future times, be the standing ground whence
others may diffuse like benefits hereafter. Those, on
the other hand, who in important stations see only the
means of encouraging low tastes, foolish fashions, miser-
able aims ; who abuse their power of trust and patron-
age, or live a life of selfish ease, as if there were none
to care for but themselves — these, in proportion as
they do this, are not only useless or mischievous in
their own time, but are traitors to their country and
destroyers of its future hopes. Those who, in whatever
station, high or low, make use of their spare moments
or their peculiar gifts and graces to diffuse light and

278 THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE.

happiness in their immediate neighborhood, are walking
in the steps of the most princely benefactors of man-
kind, simply because they are employing to the utter-
most the gifts that God has lent to them. There is a
saying of our Lord not recorded in the four Gospels,
but full of meaning — " Be ye trustworthy bankers ; be
ye like banks that will not fail." If this sacred say-
ing falls with a keener edge on the ears of those who,
during the last few months or weeks, have watched the
wide-spreading calamities that have flowed from the
want, of giving heed to this solemn duty in its most
literal sense, yet none the less is the saying always true
in that more extended meaning, in which doubtless it
first was used. " Be ye trustworthy guardians ; " such
must have been the meaning of the phrase — "Be trust-
worthy guardians of the sacred trust of the time, the
health, the influence, and the rank committed to you."
Give to every effort for good that wider usefulness
which your position can furnish. Sift, test, discrim-
inate" every plan or purpose or part intrusted to your
keeping. Forget not the gracious smile, the generous
word of compassion which comes with so much larger
power if it proceeds from those who are in any way
raised above their fellows. Grudge not the cheering
welcome, the hearty laugh, the delightful encourage-
ment which the feeble or the helpless so doubly value
from the stronger, or the younger from the elder — or,
it may even sometimes be, the elder from the younger ;
which matured genius or saintly wisdom can bestow on
the struggling inquirer or the returning penitent. So
let us labor ; and then, though we also perchance may
pass away in the prime of our existence, though our
sun may go down while it is yet day, yet " honorable
age is not that which standeth in length of time, nor
that which is reserved for length of years." He or she

THE LATE PRINCESS ALICE. 279

who pleases God, and is " beloved of Him, . . . being
made perfect in a short time, has fulfilled a long time." ^
This day is the turn of the year, when the days begin
to lengthen, when the darkness begins to shrink, and
the light begins to spread. May it be so with the
mourners for whom the darkest hour has passed ! May
it be so with the distress and perplexities of sufferers
throughout our land at this trying season ! May we,
each and all of us, learn to rejoice always as we cherish
the glimpses of a better world which come to us, at
least, through these two lessons on which we have
endeavored to dwell — the sacredness, the everlasting
sacredness, of human affections ; and the sacredness of
opportunities for public duty and private kindness !

1 Wisdom of Solomon, iv. 8-13.

AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

July 6, 1879, being the Funeral Sermon of Lord Lawrence, late Gov-
ernor-General of India.

Be strong and of a good courage : for unto this people shalt thou
divide for an inheritance the land ivhich I sware unto their fathers to
give them. Only he thou strong and very courageous^ that thou mayest
observe to do according to all the law, which Moses My servant com-
manded thee: turn not from it to the right hand or to the left, that thou
mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest. — Joshua i. 6, 7.

There are few more saddening experiences of human
life than the sight of great opportunities offered and
lost, of characters suddenly breaking down, of the ruin
effected by want of vigilance and firmness. We look
back over the fields of liistory ; we see what the actors
of those events could not see, or only saw imperfectly ;
how on the weakness and the wavering of men who
knew not what depended on their efforts all depended,
and all was lost. We see, in times past and present,
the calm before the tempest, when reform was still
possible and revolution might still have been averted.
We see in great political and ecclesiastical emergencies
how truly it has been said that the timidity of the
horse which will not leave his stable lest he should run
into the fire, is as dangerous as the rashness of the
moth which flies into it. We see how the moral
cowardice of those who shrink from responsibility is
often more calamitous than the physical cowardice
which shrinks from pain and death. We see the panic

280

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 281

in armies, when the boldest lose their heads, and, from
some bewilderment and confusion, precious lives or
noble causes are thrown away. We see in churches
the waste of days, and weeks, and years in discussion
on the most trivial questions, whilst the weightier con-
siderations of removing stumbling-blocks, and enlar-
ging liberty, and strengthening the mental and moral
resources of the whole institution, are passed by as
though they did not exist. We see in the cases of
individuals a splendid birthright, a great position, a
new opening of life coming into view. We see how in
some religious experience, such as a confirmation and
first communion, or a fresh awakening of serious
thoughts, a crisis comes that might change the whole
character of the man and the boy, that might develop
his usefulness, awaken his disposition, purify the whole
atmosphere in which he will live. It comes, the crisis
comes ; and perhaps through his own weakness, perhaps
through the folly and weakness of others, it fleets away
unheeded, and through that weakness a soul is embit-
tered and ruined, a life is mis-spent, a wide circle of
light extinguished.

But in proportion to this grief at the sight of great
occasions wasted — which an ancient writer calls the
bitterest of all griefs — is the delight of seeing oppor-
tunities seized and filled; characters under the stress
of misfortune, or danger, or temptation, tried and
tested, and not giving way ; the cttsclosure of moral
forces such as, perhaps, may always have existed, but
never would have had an occasion of displaying them-
selves at all except under some urgent pressure. We
yejoice in the appearance of such characters on the
scene, as the compensation for all the wear and waste
of the toil and struggle of life. We rejoice to think
that there are times when circumstances give full

282 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

employ to " hands which the rod of empire might have
swayed." We are roused to a new sense of the value
of great institutions and high offices when we see that
they call forth virtues which before we hardly knew ;
but which, when called forth, are at once a vindication
of those offices and institution^, and also diffuse their
own savor far and wide instead of being buried in
obscurity. This is what the Apostle means when he
speaks of "the earnest expectation of the creature
waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God," the
" manifestation," or, as perhaps we ought more properly
to say, '' the revelation," " the unveiling," of those god-
like characters which only in adversity are fully recog-
nized, which only by trial are fully perfected. This
application of our existing knowledge to the anxious
problems of human life ; this unflinching determination
to see things as they really are, and to act independ-
ently of what is thought or said of us by others ; this
perception at the right moment of the right thing to be
done and the' right word to be said ; this presence of
mind, which can bring all the faculties to bear on the
very danger by which they seem most likely to be dis-
persed and dissipated, in the accidents of fire and ship-
wreck, in the sudden alarms of revolutions — these are
the qualities which, in some measure, the humblest of
us should strive to attain, and which the most gifted
of us should beware of losing or squandering. It is
the sense of these manifestations of unexpected strength
which gives a zest and charm to those famous scenes of
fiction where Achilles suddenly breaks out from the
Grecian camp, or Ulysses throws aside his rags and
stalks with his dreadful bow across the threshold of the
suitors. These are the qualities which blaze forth in
the first and finest description ever given of a soldier-
statesman which I have selected for my text from the

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 283

Book of Joshua. " Be strong and of a good courage."
That is the first, second, and third requisite of a leader
of men; the courage which makes a man master of
himself and master of those around him ; the strength
inherent in the will which is determined not to turn
aside to the right hand or to the left from the duty
which is placed in front of him. And the same passage
further describes the inspiring stimulus which turns
the soldier into the statesman and the statesman into
the soldier, and both into the man of God. " For unto
this people shalt thou divide for an inheritance the
land which I sware unto their fathers to give them ; "
that is to say, the greatness of the mission intrusted
by the providence of God to the hands of men is the
measure and motive of indomitable and devoted en-
ergy. And the reason of this courage and confidence
is, '' FoY the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever
thou goest." That is to say, we must have the assur-
ance that eternal justice and goodness are with us —
an assurance sufficient to sustain us through good
report and evil, through failure and through success,
through ruin and through victory. " Joshua was no
teacher or prophet: he was the simple, undaunted,
straightforward warrior. He was known always by
his spear or javelin, slung beneath his shoulders or
stretched forth in his hand. His character was drawn
out of obscurity by the great task placed before him.
It was the command to conquer and to retain the land
of promise that first set his soul on fire. From that
purpose he never swerved ; but at the head of the
hosts of Israel he went forward from Jordan to Jeri-
cho, from Jericho to Ai, from Ai to Gibeon, from Beth-
horon to Merom. He was here, he was there, he was
everywhere, as God called him. He had no words of
wisdom except those that were dictated by shrewd

284 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

common sense and a strong public spirit. To him the
Divine revelation was made, not on the solitary heights
of Horeb, nor in the still small voice, nor in the courts
of temple or tabernacle, but as the Captain of the
Lord's host, with a drawn sword in his hand ; and that
drawn and glittering sword was the vision which went
before him until all the kings of Canaan were subdued
beneath his feet." ^

Such a character, such a mission, was that whose
earthly close we yesterday commemorated. Let us
first speak of the mission which moulded the character.
It was like that of Joshua — if not to found, yet to
save an Empire. The Indian Empire ! In that name
what an inheritance has been handed down from our
fathers to us ! India, the new world, which Alexander
the Great first revealed to Europe ; India, the seat of
the earliest traditions and languages of the civilized
races of mankind, the birthplace of the most widely
spread faith that has dawned upon the earth ; India, the
scene of the mighty conflicts between the most absolute
Monotheism and the most elaborate Polytheism in the
world, the scene of the desperate struggles by which a
handful of our countrymen built up our own porten-
tous Empire, illuminated by the dubious yet dazzling
splendor of the genius of Clive and Hastings, by the
purer lustre of the beneficence of statesmen like Ben-
tinck ; sanctified by the missionary zeal of Martyn and
Schwartz, of Duff and Wilson, by the enlightened wis-
dom of prelates like Heber and Cotton ; India, alike by
its natural grandeur, and its long historic recollections,
inspiring the imagination of Burke and of Macaulay
with their finest bursts of enthusiastic eloquence ;
endeared to many of us as the second home of our
childhood, as the scene of our youthful fortunes; en-

1 See The Jewish Church, vol. i., Lecture X.

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 285

deared by graves far away, but not less beloved, be-
neath the shadow of the Himalayan heights, or in the
bed of the rolling Ganges, or by the surf-beaten shores
of Madras, or the swarming thoroughfares of Bombay.
This is the land we have inherited. Into this we have
in part transfused, and it is our business to transfuse,
the soul and mind of Christian England. For this we
have received in return the wealth and power "showered
upon us by the gorgeous East with richest hands."

And this Empire, thus fearfully and wonderfully
formed, is the mightiest instrument which God has
placed in the hands of any nation for the purification
and the regeneration of Asia.

It was this vast fabric which, twenty years ago, sud-
denly tottered to its ruin. Never, perhaps, in history
had a larger demand been made on the efforts of indi-
vidual responsibility ; never had so niuch depended on
the instant, energetic efforts of a few. But in that
dark hour, from behind the veil of ignorance which so
often separates the mind of the English people from the
affairs of India, there appeared character after character
— let us say, hero after hero — who by the strength of
individual purpose and of unwavering consciousness
m the goodness of their cause, not only warded off the
world-wide calamity which had burst upon them, but
also disclosed to the minds of Englishmen a host of
warriors and statesmen such as we hardly knew that
we possessed. It; was the very darkness of that crisis,
the overclouding of the brightness of the fortunes of
England, that enabled us to see, as we could not have
seen in broad daylight, the constellation of brilliant stars
that adorned the courts and camps of India. Some of
them still live amongst us ; most of them are gone to
their rcAvard ; and it is of these last only that I now
speak. There were the two Viceroys of India, present

286 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

and future, who met in Calcutta at the very crisis of its
fate ; the one who lies in the northern transept of this
church, who in all that city showed " the only face un-
blanched by fear," as afterwards almost the only judg-
ment unmoved by the cry for vengeance ; the other,
whose self-sacrificing magnanimity relinquished for the
safety of India the troops that were to have secured his
own success in China. There was Nicholson, who, for
his stainless purity and awful integrity, was not only
beloved with passionate love by the soldiers amongst
whom he fell, but was worshipped even with Divine
honors by the surrounding natives. There was Ed-
wardes — whose monument, also, is amongst us here —
who by the sole magic spell of his own brilliant and
winning character kept in check at that critical time
the wild, untamable tribes beneath him in defence of
our frontier. There was Havelock, the stern Puritan,
whose march to Lucknow this whole country followed
with the eagerness of unparalleled anxiety, crowned
by the mingled exultation and lamentation with which
almost at the same hour we heard of the relief of the
beleaguered city and the death of its deliverer. There
was Outram, the Bayard of our Indian warfare, whose
chivalrous soul made over to his less-known comrade
the chance of winning the glory of that great achieve-
ment, even as in his earlier days he refused to receive
any profit or pay for his successful guidance of a war
of which he did not approve. There was Clyde, the
veteran of a hundred fights, who from the day when, as
a mere boy, in his youthful, unstained uniform, he scaled
the hostile fortress, rose through every vicissitude of the
successive wars of our country to the heights of military-
fame. Side by side, those two rival chiefs sleep together
in the nave of this church, which has so often before
mingled together in its sepulchral chambers those who

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 287

were in life estranged. And now, himself laid at the
feet of these mighty soldiers, as they also at the feet
of their predecessor in the early wars of Afghanistan,
there comes the last and greatest of all, the survi^^or of
the two heroic brothers, of whom it is not too much to
say, that during the moments of that terrible crisis they
bore on their Atlantean shoulders the whole fabric of
English existence in India. Of the elder I will only
say that the name of Henry Lawrence can never be
parted from the name of John Lawrence as long as the
history of our Eastern Empire is told. Although in
death they were far divided ; although even in their sev-
eral careers difference of character and policy at times
held them asunder, yet they were both alike " lovely in
their lives," and " terrible as an army with banners." It
is of the younger of this splendid pair (and, in saying
this, we do not forget the two who are still amongst us)
that we now would speak.

It was his happy fortune, let us rather say, our happy
fortune, that he survived to make his countrymen at
home familiar with his form and features, with his soul
and character. He belonged, indeed, to that type of
men of which the English race — I trust we may say
it without boasting — is so grand a representation. It
was with good reason that when an illustrious artist
wished to depict in the stately hall of one of our great-
est palaces of justice the signing of the Magna Charta,
he selected the stern, rugged countenance and magnan-
imous, manly bearing of John Lawrence as the like-
ness of the chief among the barons of England who, by
their uncompromising independence, won for us our
liberties against King and Pope. English, yet also, as
has been truly said, Scotch and Irish both by race and
character ; Irish in that wild, generous, impulsive bold-
ness which belongs more or less to all the sons of Erin,

288 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

and not least to those who have been nurtured in the
traditions of the historic city of Derry ; Scotch also in
the Scottish blood which of old gave such a steadfast-
ness to that refuge of our Imperial race, when it stood
there at bay against the overwhelming odds of siege and
famine; English and Scotch together, alike in the cau-
tion and in the independence which he inherited both
from his Scottish descent and also, let us say, from his
Yorkshire birthplace on the beautiful banks of the
Swale. Some one since his removal spoke to me in
quaint expressive phrase of "his great, deedful life."
" Deedful," indeed, it was, full of daring deeds which
belong rather to a soldier than to a statesman, deeds
which will make the hearts of Englishmen beat for
many a long day to come as they read of the retention
in liis iron grasp of the province of the Five Rivers, the
Punjab, with which his name is forever united, and of
that tremendous march of thirty miles a day under the
burning heat of the summer sun, which, by his absolute
reliance on the power of that grasp, he alone organized
and made possible, and by which, if by any one single
measure, the Indian Empire was preserved.

But on an occasion like this we would rather dwell
not so much on the outer deeds as on the inward spirit
which lightened and thundered through them ; the in-
ward spirit, which is as much needed by England as by
India ; which is, perhaps, especially needed in the gene-
ration through which we are passing. It is in no indis-
criminate eulogy that we would indulge. He had, no
doubt, his failings of judgment and his faults of charac-
ter, but so much the more conspicuous for warning and
encouragement are the traits which those who knew him
best have communicated to me in such a form as to
enable me to use their very words. We sometimes hear
it said that ostentation and luxury are gaining ground

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 289

on the " plain living and high thinking " of former times.
It may be so: at least, if it is so, let us recall, as a
counteractive and antiseptic to these corrupting influ-
ences, the example of that Spartan simplicity, carried
sometimes to excess, but rooted in a genuine modesty
and granite solidity, which, if we could not always
imitate or commend, we could not help admiring. We
hear, also, in these modern days that the responsibility
of great officials in our distant dependencies is of neces-
sity relaxed and enervated because of the increasing
control exercised from the central source of power. It
may be so : it may be inevitable : but, nevertheless, there
will always be a lesson of profound instruction in the
example of a man who had the foresight to discern what
needed to be done and the boldness to do it without
fear of consequences and without regard to his own
fame and fortune. We often hear it said, also, that to
the cause of party all other interests must be subordi-
nated ; that for the sake of keeping a party together no
interests are too sacred or too enlightened to be spared ;
that, in deference to its claims, appointments must be
made regardless of the fitness of the man to the place
or the place to the man. But to India that distortion
of party bias never reaches. Whatever else may be the
faults of its governors, it is the welfare of India, and
not the personal disputes of English politics, that sway
their minds. No such thought, still less any thought
of selfish aggrandizement, entered into the noble soul
which has passed away. Doubtless in this, as I have
said, he stood not alone ; yet it is worth remembering
how, in this conspicuous example, we have had amongst
us a spirit permeated through and through by the rare
virtue of unshaken impartiality, and fruitful of that
class of good deeds which, as regards their effects on
human happiness and virtue, rank almost the very high-

290 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

est, that which the Emperor Alexander Severus placed
as amongst the chief graces of the early Christians, that
they gave away their offices to the best men without
respect of persons.

Again, stern as he was in action and forward in
decision, it was action and decision depending on the
knowledge that he had acquired. If in England he
failed in some of his undertakings, it was, as he himself
felt, from the want of sufficient knowledge ; but if in
India he was confident of success, it was from the ful-
ness of knowledge which gave him the power to do
with all his might whatsoever his hand found to do.
He strove to the utmost to make himself acquainted
with all forms and varieties of the native races which
he was called to govern. He was a fine example of
the value — the inestimable value — of India as a
school of training for the bringing up of a race of civil
and military administrators, in whom it is ingrained,
not as a theory, but as a duty, to study those complex
forms of human character so unlike ours and yet so
deeply instructive for us to contemplate, even without
regard to the usefulness of such a study for their effec-
tive governance. It was this wide circumspection
which made every word of rebuke or reproof from him,
whether to Englishmen or to natives, come with such
peculiar force. There is a story worth repeating as an
instance of his lofty dealing with inferior minds. Dur-
ing his conduct of some important cause for a young
Indian Rajah, the Prince endeavored to place in his
hands under the table a sack of rupees. He answered
at once, " Young man, you have offered to an English-
man the greatest insult which an Englishman can pos-
sibly receive. This time, in consideration of your
youth, I excuse it. Let me warn you from this experi-
ence never again to perpetrate so gross an offence

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 291

against an English gentleman." How many are there
who will never forget the moral effect produced upon
themselves by his indefatigable, untiring industry so
long as health and eyesight were left to him, and his
profound contempt for the idle, lounging, loitering
habits by which so much of human existence in our
time is expended and destroyed ! He worked, we are
told, morning, noon, and, in the literal sense of the
word, night, as well as day. He was free to receive
communications of all sorts from all sorts of people.
If a murder, or party fight, or flagrant robbery was
reported to him, he was at once in the saddle and away
to any part of his district, regardless of sun or tempest.
If a dispute about land was threatening the public
peace, he flew at once to the spot, with the proverb
ever on his tongue, " Disputes about land must be set-
tled on the land," — a homely proverb, full of truth on
many other questions than that of land, and in many
other countries than India.

Such virtues and graces as I have spoken of may,
perchance, be thought too homely, too far removed
from the burning and thrilling atmosphere of inspired
genius or brilliant wit or impassioned piety to deserve
the tribute of honor awarded to him by a sorrowing
nation. But it is the very homeliness of these gifts
and graces that makes them so instructive for a mixed
congregation or for a whole nation to contemplate.
He was, indeed, a hero even after the manner of the
heroes of his favorite Plutarch, or of his favorite Wal-
ter Scott ; but he became a hero through the means of
those quiet, intelligible, and, so to speak, ordinary
virtues which are not beyond the reach of the youngest
or the humblest of those who hear me. It was, as has
been said, by reason of those heathen, often-despised
yet cardinal and most Christian virtues of justice, for-

292 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

titude, temperance, and prudence, exercised by him on
a grand scale, that the Empire of India was sustained.
Yet one step farther. We may be allowed to pene-
trate beyond the manifestation of great deeds, behind
the manifestation of great qualities. Any one who
saw him felt at once in his presence a certain majestic
dignity, a calm repose, which made us confident that
with him, under whatever emergency, we were safe.
He was not only a leader of men, but a leader on
whom men could rely without the apprehension of
those sudden weaknesses and betrayals by which some
of the most gifted among the human race have diffused
around them a sense, not of security, but of mistrust.
We were reminded, when we saw him, of that passage
in the Book of Isaiah, which says, ''Who among us
shall dwell with the devouring fire? who among us
shall dwell with everlasting burnings ? " That is to
say, in the true sense of the passage, " Who shall
endure the scorching flames of temptation, or trial, or
danger, or pain, in order to gain that supernatural
strength which bids defiance to the wrong-doings of
earth?" And the answer of the prophet is the only
true one : " He that walketh righteously, and speaketh
uprightly; he that despiseth the gain of princes, and
that shake th his hands from the holding of bribes,
and that stoppeth his ears from hearing of blood, and
shutteth his eyes from seeing evil ; " that is to say, he
who scorns to do wrong ; he who would not go against
his conscience for any advantage ; he who has no eyes
to see, and no ears to hear the allurements to evil —
he, and he only, will be certainly prepared for every
thing that can come upon him. We ask yet further,
Why and how is this? What is it, whether in the
ordinary trials of everyday life, or the sterner trials of
the State or the Church, that gives us this security?

AN INDIAN STATESMAN. 293

The prophet's next words give the reply: "He shall
dwell on high; his place of defence shall be the strong
rocks ; his bread shall be given him ; his water shall be
sure." That is to saj, he shall be like a man in an
impregnable fortress ; though the castle be wrapped in
a circle of flames, he will look down on the raging sea
of fire without the fear of its reaching his soul ; his
provisions will certainly hold out; there is within his
citadel a perennial well of water.

This is exactly the description of the upright Chris-
tian man, whether martyr or missionary, whether
statesman or soldier. He looks down as from a moun-
tain cliff. He looks down on pain and weakness as
contemptible. This is the very intention of calling
such a man a man of high soul, of high mind, of high
principle. He is lofty; he is in the "munitions of
rocks." He has his own resources in himself. He has
the bread and water which shall not fail, the food of
noble thoughts, of inspiring recollections, and devout
prayer. He has that well of living water, an undefiled
conscience, a pure heart, clean hands, communion with
the invisible world.

Such, or something like this, was, we may believe,
the inner character which formed the spiritual basis of
that mountain of moral strength. We know that in
the narrower sense of the word religion, he was never
ashamed or afraid to profess his belief in those simple
truths of Christianity which he found enough for his
soul's support. To societies for the diffusion of the
Bible, or for promoting missionary efforts, he gave his
sincere and public adhesion. In the welcome rendered
to the unfettered faith of the Indian Reformer, Chun-
der Sen, outside the pale of every church, he cordially
joined. But it is not these more external expressions
of Christian belief that bear the best witness to his

294 AN INDIAN STATESMAN.

religious lilo. It is tlio (act tluit his wliulo conduct
was grounded on tlio iissuriinco that he was working
with and for Eternal Righteousness and Love. Those
virtues of which we have sjjoken — of just dealing and
indomitable industry — were touched by the light as of
a better world, were purilii'd and softened as time went
on. "He only feared his fellow-men so little" — I
-quote the words of one who knew him well — *■' because
he feared liis (Jod so much." In early days, his friends
used to call him ''■Iron John." Their feeling towards
him was more, perhaps, of respect and awe than of
affection ; but as years advanced, and his solid charac-
ter yielded more and more to religious and domestic
influence, his gentler nature was developed. Those
who enjoyed his inti'rcourse more and more perceived
a gracious pleasantness which was rathivr connnended
by his outward ruggedness and sternness. There was
a touching magnanimity brought into relief by the
entire resignation with which, regardless of sullcring
and weakness, he submitted to the })rivations and trials
— alas! how severe to him and to us all — of failing
powers and failing eyesight. I^^ach year he seemed to
those around him to become more i)repared for that
great change which has now suddenly overtaken him.

Farewell, great pro-consul of our English Christian
Empire ! Where shall we look in the times that are
coming for an abounding knowledge and disinterested
love of India like his? Where shall we lind that reso-
lute mind and countenance which seem to say —

this rock shall lly

From its tirm base as soon as I?

He has gone ; but he has not been amongst us in vain,
and we have not lost him altogether, if he has left behind
him a standard of integrity to which every Indian ruler

AN INIHAN urA'nilMMAN

im

diiii look l)iirK nil o\iiiii|il<^ lor rvoiy Kii^-liuli iiuiii itiid
(UM'i'v l'-ii)';li;ili hoy of wliiil, iiii I'Jif'liMliiiiiiii iiimI n, ( 'liria
(iiiii iiiiiy Im\ it. tiiio iKTViiiil ol (lie l'lii;>li;.li Sliilr, ii ( nio
HiTViiiil mI" (MM Lunl .Iriiiiii ('liri;.(. In lliiil^ (oiirjnii^^
|)t'ityrr Imin*! ni IIm' IihikIwi il iii^; *•!' Ili<^ \<>iiii}; li'it'iiiji
|>nii(-o wJloiir illililiii'l\ tir.illi llui (MiiiillV i;i mo MImIIv

iiioiii-iiiiij.^, lliiM'i^ iir<^ (lii'Mo iiiomI, Iriio iiml tu^niiHrnJili

Uordil, \vlli«'ll lOlllo lliiliio lo «^V^'I^• Itrl ('II Vt'd lli'lll'l iiihI
<.\,.|y lirlCII V<'(| tiilllnli ; "HI \n\yr{. llin.K^ wlio i\H' <|r

piti'l'iMJ, I iiliiiJI ill my I III II l>(^ riiij'nl ten. IMny I iinvrr
)nvo wii.y (<t IIkmiikI mii;'|;i';i( khi IIiiiI (iiiio cHimcm «<vrry
lliiii]',! (iniiil. Iliiil llidn mil V i^iiilv (l<'(*|iri' iiml (lro|M'r
iiilo my licjiil Mm ron \ irl mn lli.il, lliotin wiio iirc |'(iiin
n.i'<^ wil iK'HMoii of iill my iii'liomi. IMy jijo iijiitjl llicii lin
WorMiy lo lin iii'i'ii liy IIhmii. IMy iiiiinniioiil, (lioiip,lilii
hIi.iII IIkii I)(' Minli iiii will iK'vrr niinK^ mo lo Miinli lor
llinii. "

'I'llill, ill il. Hill rower or il rillllicl <lrj^rrn in I lie Irrlili}.^
W III! Ii, iiiMle III IcilM, Wn Oll"lll, ,lll ol' 11,1, III nilrlllMII nl'

Mil' ilr:iil. I licy, ill llicir McMr n'.lnle, imi^ wiI iintiini lo
11,1 nl wliiil, (lioy woiiM liii,vo MM lo lin. Tlirir memory

IH 11. IiIjUhIiiij^ relniKe, nr Ji. elieenil|^.; eiill, ni I lie llDlint

of I'liiliire, iunl l<Mii|>hi.l ion, iiml iioirow. I'Vom Mm ^rnun
ol' liiieli II oiK^ iiii lie whom we hil ve loi.l, (heii^ eoliieii lip
Mie iiiimMllK(Mtr lii:i IMV, mil, only lo I he iiiilioit iij, \i\i\/,i\
hiir lo I. ho vviMM'y iiimI litMivy hiileii, Mh^ (huHoliilo imkI Mm
JI.HIi('.|e«l : '* liiM-tl I'oll)^ nn<l ol" n. f»'oo«| eni||'ii|i[e : |»e iiol,
ilfniJih neilher he Ihoii di; imiyed , loi Mie Lord Ihy
(I'til Mie MleriDil 'ri'iiMi iind Mmcy iii uiid hhiill \u)
Willi IheiMii Ihiii world mid in Mm nexl. vvhilJienionvnr

Iholi gO<!llL"

THOMAS CARLYLE.

February 6, 1881, on the occasion of the death of Mr. Carlyle.

The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good
seed in hisjield. — Matthew xiii. 24. .

The Gospel of this clay starts with a comparison of
the kingdom of heaven to a sower. It is the same as
that with which the more celebrated parable begins, " A
sower went forth to sow." They both fix our minds
on the manner in which God's kingdom — the kiiigdom
of truth, beautjs and goodness — is carried on in the
world. The kingdom of all that is good is fostered, not
so much by direct and immediate plautation, or grafting,
or building, or formation of any kind ; but rather by the
sowing of good seed, which in time shall grow up and
furnish a rich harvest.

It is so with regard to the truths of the Bible. They
are sown in the world ; the good which grows up after
them is never in outward form like the truth which
came from the actual source. Institutions spring up.
They may derive their vitality from the " corns of wheat
which fall into the ground and die ; " ^ but they cannot
be the very thing itself. There is not a single form or
a single doctrine of Christendom of which the outward
shape is not different in some way from the principle of
life which gave it birth.

There is only one instance in the whole Bible of a

1 John xii. 24.

THOMAS CARLYLE. 297

ready-made scholastic doctrine, and that has been long
known to be spurious. It is not the verse of the three
witnesses, but the parable of the Good Shepherd, the
poetry of the Prodigal Son, the pathetic story of the
Crucifixion that have been the true seeds of the Chris-
tian life. In this way it is that the Divine origin of
tkese truths proves itself. The bright and tender words
can never grow old, because they are not flowers cut
and dried, but seeds and roots, wliich are capable of
bearing a thousand applications.

Again, this is the ground of our looking forward with
a hope which nothing can extinguish towards the trans-
formation, the renewal of the human life, for a moment
perishing, to re-appear, we trust, in some future world
instinct with the capacities for good or evil with which
it was endowed or which it has acquired in the world
that now is. " The seminal form within the deeps of
that little chaos sleeps," which will, we trust, in the
Almighty Providence of God, restore that chaos of de-
cayed and broken powers into conditions more elevated
than now we can dream of.

Again, characters appear in the world which have a
vivifying and regenerating effect, not so much for the
sake of what they teach us, as for the sake of showing
us how to think and how to act. What Socrates taught
concerning man and the universe has long since passed
away ; but what he taught of the method and process of
pursuing truth — the inquiry, the cross-examination,
the sifting of what we do know from what we not know
— this is the foundation, the good seed, of European
philosophy for all time. What St. Paul taught con-
cerning circumcision and election or grace is among
the things hard to be understood, which the unlearned
and the unstable may wrest to their own destruction,
or which, having served their generation, may be laid

298 THOMAS CARLYLE.

asleep ; but what he taught of the mode and manner of
arriving at Divine truth, when he showed how "the
letter killeth and the spirit maketh alive ; " when he
sets forth how charity is the bond of all perfectness ;
when he showed how all men are acceptable to God by
fulfilling, each in his vocation, whether Jew or Gentile,
whether slave or free, the commandments of God —
when he said these things he laid the true foundation
of Christian faith ; he planted in the heart of man the
seed, the good seed, of Christian liberty and Christian
duty, to bear fruit again and again amidst the many
relapses and eclipses of Christendom. When Luther
dinned into the ears of his generation the formulas of
transubstantiation and of justification by faith only,
this was doomed to perish and " wax old as doth a gar-
ment ; " but his acts, his utterances of indignant con-
science, and of far-sighted genius, became the seed of
the Reformation, the hope of the world. When John
Wesley rang the changes on the well-known formula of
assurance, it was the word of the ordinary preacher;
but his whole career of fifty years of testifying for holi-
ness and preaching against vice — that was the seed of
more than Methodism ; it was the seed of the revival
of English religious zeal. Such seeds, such principles,
such infusions, not of a mechanical system, but of a new
light in the world, are not of every-day occurrence ;
they are the work of a few, of a gifted few ; and it is
therefore so much the more to be observed when any
one who has had it in his power to scatter such seeds
right and left passes away, leaving us to ask what we
have gained, what we can assimilate of the peculiar
nourishment which his life and teaching may have left
for our advantage. Few will doubt that such a one
was he who yesterday was taken from us. It may be
that he will not be laid, as might have been expected,

THOMAS CARLYLE. 299

amongst the poets and scholars and sages whose dust
rests within this Abbey ; it may be that he was drawn
by an irresistible longing towards the native hills of his
own Dumfriesshire, and that there, beside the bones of
his kindred, beside his father and his mother, and with
the silent ministrations of the Church of Scotland, to
which he still clung amidst all the vicissitudes of his
long existence, will repose all that is earthly of Thomas
Carlyle. But he belonged to a wider sphere than Scot-
land; for though by nationality a Scotchman, he yet
was loved and honored wherever the British nation
extends, wherever the English language is spoken.
Suffer me, then, to say a few words on the good seed
which he has sown in our hearts.

In his teaching, as in all things human, there were,
no doubt tares, or what some would account tares,
which must be left to after times to adjust as best they
can with the pure wheat which is gathered into the
garner of God. There were imitations, parasitic exag-
gerations, of the genuine growth, which sometimes
almost choked the original seed and disfigured its use-
fulness and its value ; but of this we do not speak here.
Gather them up into bundles and burn them. We
speak only of him and of his best self. Nor would we
now discourse at length on those brilliant gifts which
gave such a charm to his writings and such an unex-
ampled splendor to his conversation. All the world
knows how the words and the deeds of former times
became in his hands, as Luther describes the Apostle's
language, " not dead things, but living creatures with
hands and feet." Every detail was presented before
us, penetrated through and through with the fire of
poetic imagination, which was the more powerful be-
cause it derived its warmth from facts gathered together
by the most untiring industry. Who can ever, from

300 THOMAS CARLYLE.

this time forward, picture the death of Louis XV., or
the flight of the king and queen, without remembering
the thrill of emotion with which, through the " History
of the French Kevolution," they became acquainted
with them for the first time? Who can wander
amongst the ruins of St. Edmund's at Bury without
feeling that they are haunted in every corner by the
life-like figure of the Abbot Samson, as he is drawn
from the musty chronicle of Jocelyn ? Who can read
the letters and the speeches of CromAvell, now made
almost intelligible to modern ears, without gratitude to
the unwearied zeal which gathered together from every
corner those relics of departed greatness? What Ger-
man can fail to acknowledge that not even in that
much-enduring, all-exhausting country of research and
labor — not even there has there been raised such a
monument to Frederick the Second, called the Great,
as by the simple Scotchman who, for the sake of de-
scribing what he considered the last hero-king, almost
made himself for the time a soldier and a statesman ?

But on these and many like topics this is not the
time or place to speak. It is for us to ask, as I have
said, what was the good seed which he sowed in the
field of our hearts, and in what respects we shall be, or
ought to be, the better for the sower having lived and
died among us.

It was customary for those who honored him to speak
of him* as a "prophet." And if we take the word in
its largest sense he truly deserved the name. He was
a prophet, and felt himself to be a prophet, in the
midst of an untoward generation ; his prophet's mantle
was his rough Scotch dialect, and his own peculiar dic-
tion, and his own secluded manner of life. He was a
prophet most of all in the emphatic utterance of truths
which no one else, or hardly any one else, ventured to

THOMAS CARLYLE. 301

deliver, and which he felt to be a message of good to a
world sorely in need of them. He stood almost alone
among the men of his time in opposing a stern, inflex-
ible, resistance, to the whole drift and pressure of mod-
ern days towards exalting popular opinion and popular
movements as oracles to be valued above the judgment
of the few, above the judgment of the wise, the strong,
and the good. Statesmen, men of letters, preachers,
have all bowed their heads under the yoke of this, as
they believed, irresistible domination, under the impres-
sion that the first duty of the chiefest man is not to
lead but to be led, the necessary condition of success
to ascertain which way the current flows, and to swim
with it as far as it will bear us. To his mind all this
proved an insane delusion. That expression of his
wdiich has become, like many of his expressions, almost
proverbial in the minds of those who like them least,
will express the attitude of his mind — his answer to
the question, ''What are the people of England?"
^^ Thirty millions — mostly fools." The whole frame-
work and fabric of his mind was built up on the belief
that there are not many wise, not many noble minds,
not many destined by the Supreme Ruler of the uni-
verse to rule their fellows ; that few are chosen, that
'"'• strait is the gate and narrow is the way, and few
there be that find it." But when the few appear, when
the great and good present themselves, it is the duty
and the wisdom of the multitude to seek their guidance.
A Luther, a Cromwell, a Goethe, were to him the born
kings of men. This was his doctrine of the work of
heroes ; this, right or wrong, was the mission of his life.
It is, all things considered, a fact much to be meditated
upon ; it is, all things considered, a seed which is
worthy of our cultivation.

There is another feeling of the age to which he also

302 THOMAS CARLYLE.

stood resolutely opposed, or, rather, a feeling of the age
which was resolutely opposed to him — the tendency
to divide men into two hostile camps, parted from each
other by watchwords and flags, and banners and tokens
which we commonly designate by the name of party.
He disparaged, perchance unduly, the usefulness, the
necessity, of party organization or party spirit as a
part of the secondary machinery by which the great
affairs of the world are carried on ; but he was a signal
example of a man who not only could be measured by
no party standard, but absolutely disregarded it. He
never, during the whole course of his long life, took an
active part — never, I believe, even voted — in those
elections which, to most of us, are the very breath of
our nostrils. For its own sake he cherished whatever
was worth preserving ; for its own sake he hailed what-
ever improvement was worth effecting. He cared not
under what name or by what man the preservation or
the improvement was achieved. This, too, is an ideal
which few can attain, which still fewer attempt ; but it
is something to have had one man who was possessed by
it as a vital and saving truth. And such a man was the
Prophet of Chelsea. But there was that in him wliich;
in spite of his own contemptuous description of the
people, in spite of his scorn for the struggles of party,
endeared him in no common degree even to those who
most disagreed with him, even to the humblest classes
of our great community. He was an eminent instance
of how a man can trample on the most cherished idols
of the market-place if yet he shows that he has in his
heart of hearts the joys, the sorrows, the needs of his
toiling, suffering fellow-creatures. In this way they
insensibly felt drawn towards that tender, fervid nature
which was weak when they were weak, which burned
with indignation when they suffered wrong. They felt

THOMAS CARLYLE. 303

that if he despised them it was in love ; if he refused
to follow their bidding it was because he believed that
their bidding was an illusion.

And for that independence of party of which I spoke,
there was also the countervailing fact that no man
could for a moment dream that it arose from indiffer-
ence to his country. He was no monk ; he was no
hermit dwelling apart from the passions which sway
the destinies of a great nation. There is no man living
to whom the thrift, the industry, the valor of his coun-
trymen was so deeply precious. There is no man
living to whom, had it been possible for him to have
been aroused from the torpor of approaching death,
the news would have been more welcome that the Par-
liament of England had been in the past week saved
from becoming a byword and reproach and shame
amongst the nations of the earth. And all this arose
out of a frame of mind which others have shared with
him, but which, perhaps, few have been able to share
to the same extent. The earnestness — the very word
is almost his own — the earnestness, the seriousness
with which he approached the great problems of all
human life have made us feel them also. The tides of
fashion have swept over the minds of many who once
were swayed by his peculiar tones ; but there must be
many a young man whose first feelings of generosity
and public spirit were roused within him by the cry as
if from the very depths of the heart, " Where now are
your Hengists and your Horsas? Where are those
leaders who should be leading their people to useful
employments, to distant countries — where are they?
Preserving their game ! " Before his withering indig-
nation all false pretensions, all excuses for worthless
idleness and selfish luxury fell away. The word Avhich
he invented to describe them has sunk perhaps into

304 THOMAS CARLYLE.

cant and hollowness ; but it had a truth when first he
uttered it. Those falsities were shams, and they who
practised them were guilty of the sin which the Bible,
in scathing terms, calls hypocrisy.

And whence came this earnestness? Deep down in
the bottom of his soul it sprang from his firm convic-
tion that there was a higher, a better world than that
visible to our outward senses. All who acted on this
conviction — whether called saints in the middle ages,
or Puritans in the seventeenth century, or what you
like in our own day — he revered them, with all their
eccentricities, as bright and burning examples of those
who "• sacrificed their lives to their higher natures, their
worser to their better parts." In addressing the stu-
dents at Edinburgh he bade them remember that the
deep recognition of the eternal justice of heaven, and
the unfailing punishment of crimes against the law of
God, is at the origin and foundation of all the histories
of nations. No nation which did not contemplate this
wonderful universe with an awe-stricken and reveren-
tial belief that there was a great unknown, omnipotent,
all-wise, and all-just Being superintending all men and
all interests in it — no nation ever came to very much,
nor did any man either, who forgot that. If a man
forgot that, he forgot the most important part of his
mission in the world. So he spoke, and the ground of
his hope for Europe — of his hope, we may say, against
liope — was that, after all, in any commonwealth where
the Christian religion exists, nay, in any commonwealth
where it has once existed, public and private virtue,
the basis of all good, never can become extinct, but in
every new age, and even after the deepest decline,
there is a chance, and, in the course of ages, the cer-
tainty, of renovation. The Divine depths of sorrow,
the sanctity of sorrow, the life and death of the Divine

THOMAS CARLYLE. 305

man — these were to him Christianity. We stand, as
it were, beside him whilst the grave has not yet closed
over those flashing eyes, over those granite features,
over that weird form on which we have so often looked,
whilst the silence of death has fallen on that house
which was once so frequented and so honored. We
call up memories which occurred to ourselves. One
such, in the far past, may perchance come with peculiar
force to those whose work is appointed in this place.
Many years ago, whilst I belonged to another cathe-
dral, I met him in St. James's Park, and walked with
him to his own house. It was during the Crimean
War ; and after hearing him denounce with his vigor-
ous and perhaps exaggerated earnestness the chaos and
confusion into which our Administration had fallen,
and the doubt and distrust which pervaded all classes
at the time, I ventured to ask him, " What, under the
circumstances, is your advice to a Canon of an English
Cathedral?" He grimly laughed at my question. He
paused for a moment and then answered in homely and
well-known words ; but which were, as it happened,
especially fitted to situations like that in which he was
asked to give his counsel — '' Whatsoever thy hand
findeth to do, do it with all thy might." That is no
doubt the lesson he leaves to each one of us in this
place, and also to this weary world — the world of
which he felt the weariness as age and infirmity grew
upon him ; the lesson which, in his more active days,
he practised to the very letter. He is at rest ; he is at
rest ; delivered from that burden of the flesh against
which he chafed and fretted ! He is at rest I In his
own words, " Babylon, with its deafening inanity, rages
on, innocuous and unheeded, to the dim forever." From
the " silence of the eternities " of which he so often
spoke, there still sound, and will long sound, the tones
of that marvellous voice.

306 THOMAS CARLYLE.

Let us take one tender expression written three or
four years ago, one plaintive yet manful thought which
has never yet reached the public eye. " Three nights
ago, stepping out after midnight, and looking up at
the stars which were clear and numerous, it struck me
with a strange, new kind of feeling — Ha! in a little
while I shall have seen you also for the last time.
God Almighty's own theatre of immensity — the infi-
nite made palpable and visible to me — that also will
be closed — flung to in my face — and I shall never
behold that either any more. The thought of this eter-
nal deprivation (even of this^ though this is such a
nothing in comparison) was sad and painful to me.
And then a second feeling rose upon me, What if Om-
nipotence that has developed in me these pieties, these
reverences, and infinite affections, should actually have
said. Yes, poor mortal, such as you who have gone so
far shall be permitted to go farther? Hope, despair
not ! — God's will. God's will ; not ours if it is un-
wise."

God's will, not ours, be done. Yes, God's will be
done for us and for him. The Lord gave and the Lord
taketh away.

THE DAYS OF OLD.

February 13, 1881, the Sunday following the death of Lord John
Thynne, Sub-dean of "Westminster.

/ have considered the days of old : and the years that are past. —
Psalm Ixxvii. 5 (Prayer-book version).

/ have considered the days of old, and the years of ancient times. —
Ibid. (Bible version).

The Psalmist is in a state of deep depression ; he
wonders whether the Eternal will absent Himself for-
ever ; he asks whether His mercy is clean gone for-
ever, and His promises come utterly to an end for ever-
more. We know not the special causes of this anx-
iety, but we see in the Psalm the manner in which
his troubled spirit was composed, and the thoughts in
which he took refuge. He dwelt on the days of old ;
on the history of the years that were past. He remem-
bered the wonders that God had wrought in old time ;
he thought of all His works ; he went back especially
to the days long ago when the people of Israel were
brought up out of the land of Egypt ; he seemed to see,
almost as in a vision, the passage which they accom-
plished through the Red Sea ; the storm of the strong
east wind that drove the waters back, the thunder
which shook their souls with dread, the lio^htnino^ which
illuminated the darkness of that memorable night, the
earthquake which caused the ground beneath them to
tremble, the mysterious pathway through the great
waters, the inscrutable footsteps of the Most High in

307

308 THE DAYS OF OLD.

the waves of the Red Sea, and the leadmg of the
people like a flock of terrified sheep by the hand of
their venerable rulers, Moses, the mighty Prophet, and
Aaron, the sacred Priest.

Such a backward view towards the past is still one
chief remedy for times of despondency. It is true that
to look forward is the best of all remedies. The belief
that in the progress of mankind there is a hope of
ultimate perfection was the prevailing sentiment of the
highest spirits in the Jewish race. The Jewish race
itself had, as has been said, its golden age not in the
past but in the future. The same thought has de-
scended to Christian times. The Apostle forgot those
things that were behind, and reached forward to those
things which were before. The whole creation, accord-
ing to him, was constantly reaching forth its hand in
the earnest expectation of the manifestation of some
future glory in the sons of God. But this prospective
glance is not the only consolation. At any rate, with-
out a retrospective look into the times that we have
already known, the forward apprehension of what is
to be becomes unsteady and unstable. A great states-
man,i whose monument is in this church, has combined
the expression of the two feelings in a motto which is
now engraven upon the pedestal — Per ardua stabilis,
that is to say, constantly ascending the most arduous
and adventurous precipices, yet still never losing, his
footing. It is written under the mountain goat, which,
climbing constantly, and yet firm in its hold on the
rock, is the emblem of the house of Russell — but also'
the emblem of every wise statesman. That hold, that
footing, is best preserved by having an anchor, so to
speak, in the thoughts and memories of the past.

There are two special lessons which this study of the

1 The late Earl Russell.

THE DAYS OF OLD. 309

days of old enforces upon us. First, in face of the
temptation to which we are all liable of regarding our-
selves as " the foremost in the files of time," it is the
natural corrective to be from time to time reminded
that there have lived "famous men " in old time — that
there have been the "fathers that begat us"— that, as
the Roman poet sings, "there were mighty men who
lived before Agamemnon," and who, perchance, have
only fallen out of our knowledge because there was no
bard to trumpet forth their praises, or because we are
so ignorant as not to know what they did or what they
thought. "Art thou the first man that was born, or
wast thou made before the hills?" Such a belief is
very common at the present time. It shows itself in
many ways ; it shows itself in a mode of feeling widely
diffused, as if Christianity had been born into England
about thirty years ago, or at least as if the revival of
religious life in England dated from a modern move-
ment of yesterday. Without going back to the earlier
times of the eighteenth century, which, whatever draw-
backs it may have had, yet produced the solid, massive,
enduring faith of Butler, Burke, Johnson, and Paley,
and embraced the whole of the splendid career of
John Wesley and his followers — without going back
to that period, there was, in the beginning of this cen-
tury, a general awakening of the deeper and higher life
in a thousand quarters, breathed into the world by the
seriousness which was the natural outgrowth of the
great events subsequent to the French Revolution. Of
these convulsions it may well be said in the words of
the Psalm from which the text is taken : " The waters
saw Thee, O God, the waters saw Thee, and were
afraid: the depths also were troubled. The voice of
Thy thunder was heard round about. The lightnings
shone upon the ground: the earth was moved and

310 THE DAYS OF OLD.

shook withal. Thy way was in the sea, and Thy paths
in the great waters, and Th}^ footsteps were not known."
This seriousness expresses itself in many forms — in the
profound poetry of Wordsworth, in the heart-stirring
romances of Walter Scott, in the deep earnestness of
Thomas Carlyle, in the thoughtful philosophy of Cole-
ridge, in the stimulus given to religious education by
Arnold, in the practical fervor of Wilberforce and of
Simeon, in the more sober but not less effective energy
of laymen like Joshua Watson, and clergymen like
Blomfield and his compeers on the Episcopal Bench.
These were all in full operation before the first growth
of that movement which claims to itself in the present
day the exclusive privilege of having enlightened and
purified the country. All honor to those who in our
time, by any means in their power, whether by the
adornment of worship, or by throwing life into old
forms and light into old truths, have carried on the
work which their fathers began for them ! But not the
less is the first honor due to those who in the early
years of this century awoke to the duties of their posi-
tion, and fulfilled its high calling. And if, as was the
case, they performed their duties and fulfilled their task
with the more difficulty because they were the first to
attempt it ; if they did good not for the sake of glori-
fying themselves or the party to which they belonged,
but simply for the sake of doing good, and of render-
ing the best service to the Church and Commonwealth
in which their lot had been cast, so much the more
praise is due to them in their often thankless and unre-
warded mission.

Again, the study of the past teaches us the intrinsic
value of qualities which we do not possess. The young
are always apt to believe that in their sanguine, lively,
forward imaginings there is something superior to the

THE DAYS OF OLD. 311

wisdom and experience of old age. Doubtless each
generation must learn not only from that which has
gone before but from that which is coming after it.
The rising generation has grasped some truth which
the older generation may have failed to apprehend.
Even a child can instruct its elders by good exam-
ple, by innocent questions, and by simple statements.
Elihu, in the Book of Job, was " very young," and the
three friends were " very old," yet to the younger and
not to the elder was intrusted the message of pointing
out the answer to the difficulties which had perplexed
them. " I am wiser than the aged," says the Psalmist,
" because I keep Thy commandments." This is a truth
which we must bear in mind in dealing both with men
and with nations. But nevertheless reverence for age
is a duty of all times and all places. Diffidence and
modesty are the virtues which ought to belong to youth
alike in the East and in the West. There is a kindred
.nation across the Atlantic which, with all its excel-
lences, has not possessed in any eminent degree this
modesty of thought or action. That is chiefly because
it has, or thinks it has, no venerable ancestry at its
back, and no long traditions to hold in reverence. The
respect due to age is founded on the qualities which
long experience brings with it, and the wide and com-
prehensive view of human affairs which, unless it falls
grievously below its calling, is unquestionably its own.
I have frequently mentioned, and will yet again men-
tion, that most touching of all the expressions of auto-
biography, the reminiscences in which Richard Baxter,
at the close of his long and eventful life, sums up the
points in which the excesses and the crudities of his
youthful opinions were checked by the moderation and
the calmness and the charity of old age. From such
counsellors every one may pause in the hurry of life to

312 THE DAYS OF OLD.

learn the lessons of a truth which is not our own, and
a wisdom which, if not from above, is at any rate not
of this world. " Reverence is the angel of the world "
— so said the great master of the human lieart. So
remarked upon the words the oldest and one of the
wisest of our statesmen tlie other day, before he sank
to his long rest, " Reverence is what softens, elevates,
refines, the minds of men."

You will have perceived what is the thought that
has suggested these reflections. A long and venerable
career in this Abbey has just closed. A link — almost
the only surviving link — which united us with the ear-
lier years of this century has been snapped asunder.
That stately figure, those courtly manners, that high
bearing, that grand form and fashion as of the antique
world, will no more be seen amongst us. For nearly
fifty years has the second office in this collegiate church
been in the same hands, and the continuous tradition
of six decanal reigns has been summed up in the exist-
ence which has passed away.

He was one of those on whom were poured some at
least of the beneficent influences of the opening years
of the nineteenth century. He was one of those of
whom I spoke, to whom belongs the singular merit of
having been an unconscious reformer before the time
when reform became so fashionable ; one who, while
himself a stanch adherent of ancient usage and estab-
lished custom, nevertheless saw the possibility and the
necessity of purifying them of their ingrained abuses.
He did this at a time when such work was difficult
in proportion to its novelty. He found this Abbey
infected with maladies which the negligence or the
altered circumstances of preceding years had intro-
duced into its very core. The free admission to its
sacred walls, which had been debarred by tolls and im-

THE DAYS OF OLD. 313

posts at almost every entrance, he forced on the reluc-
tant authorities, regardless of the panic fears which
would have protected the building at the cost of ren-
dering it useless. Down to his time nave and transepts
were alike closed to the wayfarer and the worshipper
in London. All these restrictions were done away ;
and if there still remain some obstacles to the full and
free enjoyment of every part of the Abbey, it will be
following in the footsteps of his policy to sweep them
away when time and opportunity shall permit. The
vast congregations which now assemble Sunday after
Sunday are enabled to enjoy free air and free hearing,
by the courage and confidence with which, under his
sanction, the wooden screens were thrown down on
either side, which cut off all communication between
the choir and the transepts. The reredos, with its
mosaics and its statues, may have been arranged and
designed by other hands and other minds, but its whole
form and fabric is owing to his active watchfulness
and foresight, as was also the pulpit from which the
preacher speaks. The bald walls of the Jerusalem
Chamber, from a like source, have resumed something
of their original splendor, and the tapestries which
adorn them are chiefly gifts from the stores of his an-
cient home. The services which have gathered thou-
sands within the sound of the preacher's voice on
Sunday evenings were first inaugurated by him when,
in the year of the Great Exhibition, multitudes from
all the ends of the world were congregated in this
metropolis, and many heard, for the first and last time
from an English pulpit, in his own French language,
the words of a vigorous preacher,^ now no more. The
whole architecture of this Abbey received a new life
from the introduction, under his patronage, of that

1 Dr. Jeune, afterwards Bishop of Peterborough.

314 THE DAYS OF OLD.

famous architect whose name is identified with almost
every Gothic church in England. The choral service,
with all its arrangements, was by him rescued from the
neglect and disorder into which for many years it had
fallen. The addition of a Great Cloister, which should
extend the glory of the Abbey, and provide for the
future interment of the eminent men of our country,
was never absent from his mind. His wish still re-
mains unfulfilled; but if there should revive in the
nation or its rulers any thing of the munificent spirit
of former times, it will be remembered that the idea
first arose -with him, and was by him encouraged and
fostered at every turn, with all the fondness of a par-
ent for a long-expected child.

In earlier times, it may be, from the gradual steps of
the increase in the population around it, the Abbey of
Westminster had taken but little heed of the multitudes
which at last pressed upon it with an intolerable bur-
den. He was the first who recognized the fact that to
this vast neighborhood the Abbey had a duty to per-
form. Long ago, before any public attention had been
called to the need, he urged the wants of the surround-
ing parishes on those concerned ; and it was owing to
his incessant exertions that thousands were given to
the support of churches which are now the standing
witnesses of his energy. He was the zealous assistant
of his colleague, the present estimable Bishop of Lin-
coln, in starting that fund for relieving the spiritual
destitution of the people of Westminster which long
preceded the agencies since set on foot for the same ob-
ject. The times have moved, the special work is accom-
plished ; but the originators ought not to be forgotten,
and the enterprise then set on foot has still to be car-
ried on, though the head and the heart which first
planned it have been chilled by age and infirmity, and
are now cold in death.

THE DAYS OF OLD. 315

And far away from Westminster, in Somersetshire
and Cornwall, there are many who will remember the
good works which, whether in his own peculiar field or
in the wider sphere of the rising wants of the Church,
he fostered and favored by bringing to bear upon them
his administrative ability and his honest intentions.
May I mention two instances of this? One shall be
the effect which he produced on Nonconformists. In
the western parish in which he long labored there was
a colony of the Society of Friends. Separated from
them by every feeling, political and ecclesiastical, he
was yet so drawn to the good Quakers by their singular
purity and piety, and they were so drawn to him by his
singular straightforwardness and uprightness, that ' a
steady friendship resulted, never broken, and which
lasted to the very end. The other example will endear
his memory to many of my own profession. He was
the virtual founder of the first of theological colleges —
nearly the first in time, and absolutely the first in im-
portance— the college at Wells. There is no doubt
much to be said for and against theological colleges,
much to be said in favor of the larger, more generous,
education that young men receive at the two ancient
Universities. But there can be no doubt that there
was room for at least one such college; there can be no
doubt that a real want was supplied by the institution
which sprang up in that loveliest of all cathedral pre-
cincts, in that beautiful Vicars' Close, under the shade of
that stately palace and that exquisite cathedral, which
had once been the home of Ken. Not a few will trace
back their rescue from frivolous pursuits, their sense
of a deeper religious earnestness, to the parental coun-
sels of the good old man whom he chose as its chief,
and whose snow-white head and benignant face will be
remembered by every student in the college as the

316 THE DAYS OF OLD.

sign and symbol of all that was venerable and lova-
ble.i

" I have considered the days of old, and the years of
ancient times." For half a century he has been part of
this Abbey — almost like one of its own massive pillars,
unchanged while all around has changed, with the air,
the manners, the aspirations of another age. He, of all
our body, most united us with the days, as it were, be-
before the flood — before the flood of stir and change
broke in upon us in the far-off age of the first Reform
Bill. He most faithfully represented the time when
the nobles of the land were not ashamed to bear office
in the high places of the English Church. As these
changes whirled and wheeled around him he acknowl-
edged their power, although he never shared their in-
fluence. Like the aged poet, whom a younger bard
celebrates —

He grew old in an age he condemned ;

He looked on the rushing decay

Of the times that had sheltered his youth ;

Felt the dissolving throes

Of a social order he loved. ^

In that long succession of Deans, to whom he acted
as vicegerent, of Canons, to whom he acted as col-
league, there were varieties of character which might
well have vexed, and which doubtless did vex, his un-
bending nature. But, nevertheless, he well knew his
position as in one of the most national and all-embra-
cing institutions of our national and all-embracing
Church. He did not shrink from companionship with
the widely tolerant and multifarious learning of Mil-
man. His aged heart warmed at the fiery enthusiasm

1 The Rev. John H. Finder, first principal of the Theological Col-
lege, Wells.

2 Matthew Arnold on Wordsworth, in Tlie Youth of Nature.

THE DAYS OF OLD. 317

of Charles Kingsley. He delighted to work with the
bold geologist who for a time ruled over us. He de-
livered over the powers that he had long enjoyed with
chivalrous gallantry to the accomplishments and graces
of my honored predecessor. And, last of all, he bore
with one who must have sorely tried his endurance,
and who would fain take this occasion of expressing his
heartfelt gratitude for a loyal and generous forbearance,
never to be forgotten.

As years rolled on he faded away from our sight, but
we still remained in his thoughts. The time drew near
for the term of residence, which with unshaken fidelity
he had kept for fifty years. He came as usual. Like
an ancient warrior, he would still, so long as life was
granted, be found at his post. But on the threshold
the Angel of Death met him, and, he passed away in
the sacred cloisters endeared by the recollection of his
beloved partner, whose loss had taken away so much of
the brightness of life — passed away in the effort to dis-
charge the last remaining relic of duty which was left
to him, and amidst the family to whom his patriarchal
presence and domestic virtues were so long an example,
a support, and a delight.

The shades have closed thick upon us — "fast falls
the eventide," — sorrow after sorrow, parting after
parting, has "rent our sheltering bowers." Not only
ourselves but the times are changed ; tasks new and
unknown lie before us. But our duty and our hope
remain the same. That maxim which I quoted last
Sunday from the old prophet and sage of Scotland ^ is
still our motto : " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do,
do it with all thy might." Tliat was what he whom
we have lost from among us, so long as strength was
granted him, did, according to his light and according

1 Carlyle. See Sermon, p. 263.

318 THE DAYS OF OLD.

to his capacity. He persevered in what was often a
thankless toil ; he set a falling house in order ; he laid
the solid foundation whereon we must build. All of
us, through all our degrees, have to do the work of
edifying, beautifying, elevating, enlarging the Church
of England, through this its most august and character-
istic edifice. All of us have a high calling before us,
which every difficulty, every obstacle, ought to stimu-
late us to fulfil. The voices of the dead, the claims of
the living, the greatness of England, the far-reaching
future of the everlasting Gospel of Christ our Lord,
entreat us not to be weary or faint. The last of an
ancient race is gone from us. Let us do our best
rightly to honor the trust which was once committed
to him, and which he and his generation have handed
down to us.

Something ere the end,

Some work of noble note may yet be done . . .

'Tis not too late to seek a newer world, . . .

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will,

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

May 1, 1881.

So the dead tchich he slew at his death were more than they which
he slew in his life. — Judges xvi. 30.

These words describe the death of Samson. A grim
satisfaction breaks out of the sacred narrative as it re-
cords the circumstances of the hero's end. The vigor
with which this feeling is expressed has given to the
words a sense far more general than, they bear in their
immediate context. They rise above themselves — as
is the fashion of words inspired by the feeling of men
or by the Spirit of God — into regions far more exalted
than tliey originally embraced. It has even been the
custom, by a strange excess of exaggeration, to apply
them to the greatest of all deaths, that of our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ. But they have also been fre-
quently applied to the deaths of men, on all occasions
where advantages arise from dwelling on death and its
concomitants. It has been felt to be so in cases where
the manner of the death has redeemed the faults of an
imperfect life ; as when King Charles the First by his
execution awakened a feeling which had been extin-
guished by his many faults, but was revived by the
tragical nature of his end. As was nobly sung by the
poet ^ of his enemies : —

He nothing common did, or mean,
Upon that memorable scene,

1 Andrew Marvell, Iloratian Ode upon CrornweU's return from Ireland.

319

820 ^ THE EAPwL OF BEACONSFIELD.

But with his keener eye

The axe's edge did try ;
Nor call'd the gods with vulgar spite
To vindicate his helpless riglit —

not, as he was called, a martyr, but still an example of
the effect which an impressive death may have in recti-
fying the mistakes of a life, rallying round himself and
his cause a tender sentiment which had become almost
extinct, but which, reviving from his blood, restored
the fallen Church and monarchy. Sometimes it has
been that the death has been such as to give a seal to
the life, and be accordant with it, crowning and carry-
ing it on to the end. Such have been the deaths of
martyrs, according to the well-known saying of the
seventeenth century, ^' The blood of the martyrs is the
seed of the Church." Sometimes the effect has been
produced by the last words of dying men, those swan-
like strains which have in them a kind of prophecy,
like music sweetest at its close, and which all the world
afterwards delights to gather up as expressing a sense
which no words in life would have equally conveyed.
Sometimes it has happened in the case of eminent and
gifted men that only their deaths have revealed to us
their true value, and the value, or the failure, of our
judgments respecting them. Not once or twice only
within our own experience have we acknowledged too
late the genius, the goodness, the intellect, of those
whom in life we disparaged, neglected, or attacked.
Not once or twice onl}^ has death converted many a
bitter enemy, caused, we may almost say, a nation to
do penance by the graves of those who were recog-
nized at last, when they were passed beyond the
reach of human praise and blame. Again and again
have misrepresentations been explained by death more
completely than ever could have been done by life.

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD. 321

This application, mingling more or less with the
others, is suggested by the singular tribute of respect
and grief which throughout England and Europe has
attended the death of the celebrated statesman who
has in the past week been laid in his quiet grave. It
is not my intention to pronounce a funeral discourse
upon the qualities which by universal consent rendered
his career so remarkable. Such a treatment has been
precluded by the circumstance of his not receiving the
sepulchral honors within this Abbey to which in the
judgment of his mighty rival and of a consentient
country he was entitled. It is also rendered unneces-
sary by the eloquent words which on last Sunday were
spoken to the vast congregation assembled within these
walls.

But dismissing all thought of the judgments which
may have been framed at the different points of his long
and varied career, or of the religious and political ques^
tions which his life in its different parts suggested, I
wish, before the shadow of the event has passed away
from our recollection, to fix your thoughts for a few
moments on the permanent lessons to be drawn from a
sympathy so general as that which followed, not with-
out surprise, on the close of this eventful life. It was
a sympathy, not indeed to be named as equal, either in
kind or degree, to that which accompanied to his grave
the great warrior of our age some thirty years ago, but
it is remarkable that, beyond doubt, it approached more
nearly to that sentiment than any other wliich we have
since witnessed, and as such is commemorated in that
funeral anthem which has not been, and could not have
been, repeated on any other occasion since the time
when it was first composed for the funeral of that great
man to whom I just now referred. "And the king
himself followed the bier; and the king lifted up his

322 THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

voice and wept at the grave, and all the people wept." ^
These words at any rate correspond in some degree to
the feeling which has now been roused, and they have
on the whole corresponded to none other within the
present generation. Let us see what we may learn
from the expression of a grief which, whether right or
wrong, whether well-grounded or ill-grounded, whether
it pass away with the moment or whether it endure for
posterity, is not unworthy of consideration in a Chris-
tian Church and in a national edifice.

First, there is something in the character of such a
sentiment which is of itself ennobling. It is true that
there was nothing sudden or striking in the departure
of which we speak. It was not like the deaths to
which I referred just now of Charles the First or of
the early martyrs, nor yet did it bear any resemblance
to the dreadful shock produced by the terrible murders
of kings and emperors. It was a death, expected and
prepared for, of one who was gathered like a full shock
into the garner, passing away calmly and peacefully in
the grasp of dear and faithful friends. But for this
very reason there is something in it which appeals to
our common nature, to our ideal of what we desire
for ourselves and Our children. There is in the great
National Museum of France a touching likeness, from
an Egyptian monument of four thousand years ago,
representing the soul of the departed, clothed in the
white garments of the grave, being led with calm and
unmoved features into the unseen world by the strange
and dark divinity who, with tender embrace, draws the
dead man onwards into the presence of the impartial
and awful Judge. What that image represents to us in
outward form and in the earliest ages of the world, is

1 2 Sam. iii. 31, 32. Composed by Sir John Goss, Mus. Doc, for the
funeral of the Duke of Wellington in St. Paul's, November 18, 1852.

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD. 323

the true figure of what the thought of death in its natu-
ral and constantly recurring shape suggests to every
son of Adam. Death, whenever it appears on the grand
stage of the world, must have a solemn and impressive
aspect. Tlie end of a peasant is equally mournful and
equally significant to those of the little circle who assist
at the last hours ; but when on an occasion of this kind
the curtains of the sick room are withdrawn and the
last scene is described to hundreds and thousands of
human beings in all parts of the civilized world, it is
then, in the words of our greatest living orator, though
in another sense, as if the Angel of Death passed near
to every one of us, as if the beating of his wings were
felt in every household, and the shadow of the sepul-
chre embraced us all within its precincts. The flash-
ing eye is quenched, the commanding voice is silent.
Each one is reminded that there is an end of human
things, and a beginning of things eternal, inconceivable
yet certain.

Secondly, there is a natural sentiment in the human
heart, by which, in the presence of death, not only all
rancorous and ignoble feelings die and wither away, but
there is an irresistible tendency to view the dead for the
moment as transfigured by the light of his better quali-
ties, and to dwell, not on the points wherein we widely
differ, but on the points wherein we closely agree. I
dwelt on this aspect of such events some weeks ago,
when speaking on another subject; but what I then
said has since received a striking and unexpected com-
mentary in the unanimity of expression by which even
the severest judgments of the departed have been con-
trolled, and the bitterness of alienation has been trans-
formed into affectionate remembrance. I will not ask
how far this alienation or that severity were deserved
or undeserved, how far this kindly feeling was justified

324 THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

or not justified ; but we may all ask wliicli of the two
sentiments is the more elevated, the more worthy of
rational human beings, the more becoming to English-
men and to Christians. If such a sympathetic senti-
ment is in itself superior to the common expression of
an acrimonious hostility, it may be worth Avhile to ask
whether we could not afford a little more, on one side
and the other, to introduce such a noble tone of thought
and feeling into our political and ecclesiastical strife,
whether after all there is not a more excellent way than
the constant interchange of fierce recriminations and
angry personalities. This may seem a chimerical
dream. It may even appear a condition of our exist-
ence which is not to be sought after ; it may even com-
mend itself to the light of reason and of Christianity
that the darker elements of human nature, the eager,
impetuous denunciation of what we deem wrong, must
have always their full sway, that rage and indignation
are the only true parts of eloquence, the only safe-
guards of right against injustice. One cannot help be-
lieving that, however just this may be for thg time, yet
there is such a thing, even in this sphere, as striving
after Christian perfection. In the glimpses of a higher
state of feeling which now and then flash upon us in
moments of loftier sentiment and purer devotion, there
is brought before us something of that condition which
the Gospel describes to lis, of the higher and the lower
state, in which Martha, the busy, incessant, indefatiga-
ble, uncontrollable worker, is cumbered about many
things, whilst Mary, her eye fixed on the brighter,
nobler aspect of sorrow, on the far-off intimations of
the Divine, has chosen the better part which shall not
be taken away from her. If any of us now look back
with satisfaction on the thought that in former days
they acknowledged in the departed the conscientious

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD. 325

endeavor to accomplish the duty of an English states-
man, is not this a proof that such expressions were in
themselves admirable, and that, at the time, we were
fortunate to have given them vent? Or if, on the
other hand, we have used expressions which any of us
now regret, if we were so immersed, confined, cribbed,
and cabined within our own narrow views as to have
no eyes for what we now admire, is it not something to
have had a wider horizon opened before us in which
human characters appear as they will appear in the
presence of the All-just and the All-merciful?

Thirdly, there is another reflection akin to this. I
have several times spoken from this place of the hollow-
ness of what are called popular judgments, of the fu-
tility of seeking after popularity, from whatsoever side
it comes. Sometimes popular judgments are generous,
sometimes they are ungenerous; sometimes they are
wise, sometimes they are foolish ; sometimes they rest
on foundations which after ages may approve, some-
times they rest on absolutely no foundation at all.
But whether generous or ungenerous, wise or foolish,
groundless or well grounded, they are in all cases
worthless themselves. They are echoes, and not voices.
They breathe indeed an atmosphere round them, which
may be turned to good or evil account by those who
have the control of human affairs. But they have over
and over again been proved to shift with every gust of
feeling and fashion. Witness the rapid changes in the
French Revolution ; the hero of to-day, the rejected of
to-morrow ; the heresy of }' esterday, the fixed principle
of to-day. Witness the changes that have taken place
with regard to persons and systems in our own time
and country. Such were in very great measure the
varying opinions respecting him who is gone. There
was the expression of strong approval some years ago ;

326 THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

there was the expression of no less strong disapproval a
year ago ; there is again the strong expression of sym-
pathy now, almost universal. We do not venture to
pronounce which of these various judgments most
nearly corresponds with the truth. What is certain is
that this popular voice has represented in this instance,
as in a thousand other instances, widely opposite sides,
and that it is to other than popular judgments that we
must refer for our linal decision on the characters or
the events that come before us. We feel now, as it
were, the breath of genial spring, the disappearance of
a cutting wind. He on whom the favoring breeze now
blows would have rejoiced in its gentle airs, but not
the less did lie bravely bear the blast when it came from
an opposite quarter, and was black with storm and
whirlwind. So it must be always. Like the Fortune
of the poet, we do well to cherish the popular voice
whilst it goes with us, we do well to bask in the good-
will of our fellow-men and our fellow-citizens whilst it
gives its great and often just impetus to our natures.
But we should be not the less aware of its fleeting tran-
sitory value ; we should be able to puff it away without
a sigh, and be content with that only judgment which
is truly beyond dispute, the judgment of our own con-
science, the judgment of Almighty God, who judges not
as man judges, and who trieth the very secrets of the
heart.

Fourthly, those of us who lament over the departed,
those also who do not lament over him, must nerve our-
selves to do what in us lies, on one side or the other of
political life, to supply the qualities which we imagine
ourselves to have lost in him. It was said on the occa-
sion of the death of the last great statesman who was
cut off in the prime and vigor of life that the darkest
side of the calamity was that we '-'bitterly thought of

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD. 327

the morrow." There is beyond question a great gulf
and void created, whenever we lose one who has filled
a vast space in the eyes of our own and other countries.
It disturbs the balance of power and parties, it changes
the hopes and the fears of almost every class. And it
is not only in the camp to which the departed states-
man belonged that this sense of a vacancy is felt. The
great statesmen, the acknowledged leaders of parties,
are by that very fact raised above those parties them-
selves. They are, in fact, much more nearly allied to
each other, in purpose and principle, than the ordi-
nary common-place herd who form the rank and file of
their supporters would suffer us to believe. The great
natures of Pitt and Fox, widely different in a thousand
points, were yet bound together by a closer kindred in
largeness of soul, in genuine patriotism, than either the
one or the other could allow in their lifetime. And in
like manner the great twin brethren of our own day,
though in all their varied endowments the very oppo-
site of each other, yet each supplied what the other
needed ; of each it might be said that

Never on earthly anvil
Did such rare armor gleam.

Each, though coming from widely differing hosts, will,
we may hope, be acknowledged by posterity to have
fought for what he deemed the right in the cause of
England's empire and England's commonwealth. As
was finely said of them some years ago. Castor and
Pollux were both indispensable to us, the one as much
as the other, and both have left the print of their im-
mortal hoofs on the rock of the Capitol. If one was
more dexterous in training his forces, and the other was
more distinguished in attack, both will be recognized
to have had qualities which raised them into a region

328 THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.

above the ordinary strife, and made their combat wor-
tliy the combat of giants, their union, in that which is
highest and noblest, worthy of the union of gods. It
is these godlike qualities we can all of us admire ; it is
these qualities which some of us perchance may feebly
imitate. It is these gifts which in the departed (I speak
for a moment only) rose above every narrow section of
political life. Moderation where moderation was possi-
ble, the genius which knew when to give way and when
to resist, the passionate love of the honor and greatness
of England ; these are virtues which belong to no party,
which may at times be exhibited more by one than the
other, but which are in themselves wholly independent
of the artificial lines that divide party from party, and
which they who can most truly claim the name of Eng-
lish citizens and Christian patriots will most truly honor,
and, when gone, most deeply lament.

These are some of the reasons why the mourning of
the Sovereign and of all the people for the great man
who has fallen in Israel may bear fruit in every class,
whether high or low, whether agreeing or disagreeing.
He rests not here. A tender and generous feeling, the
expressed wish of her who had been most near and dear,
drew him to the spot where he now reposes. But his
name will live amongst us here to remind us in future
days of the extraordinary career which led the alien in
race, the despised in debate, the romantic adventurer, the
fierce assailant, the eccentric in demeanor, by unflagging
perseverance, by unfailing sagacity, by unshaken fidelity,
by constantly increasing dignity, by larger and larger
breadth of view, to reach the highest summits of fame
and splendor.

In the intricate entanglements of strife and thought,
in the ever-shifting fortunes of our country, so great
yet so little, so far reaching in its aims yet so confined

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD. 329

in its immediate action, it is hardly possible to forecast
in any degree the future wliich is in store for us, per-
haps gloomy with disaster and shame, perhaps bright
with the promise of unknown glory. The words with
which Milton concludes his poem on the. death of that
Jewish warrior with whose name I began this discourse,
are still the best consolation and the best instruction
for us to bear away from the contemplation of one of
whom, as of Samson, it may be said in the widest sense
that the dead which he slew at his death were more than
they which he slew in his life : —

All is best, though we oft doubt
What the unsearchable dispose
Of Highest Wisdom brings about,
And ever best found in the close.
Oft He seems to hide His face.
But unexpectedly returns.

His servants He, with new acquist
Of true experience from this great event,
With peace and consolation hath dismiss'd,
And calm of mind, all passion spent.

CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY.

St. Andrew's Day, November 30, 1874, appointed as the day of interces-
sion for Missions, preparatory to the Lecture on "The Universal
Religion," delivered in the nave of the Abbey, by the Very Rev.
John Caird, D.D., Principal of the University of Glasgow.

He first jindelh his own brother Simo7i. — John i. 41.

It has been vehemently contested whether St. An-
drew's Day was a fitting day to choose for the anniver-
sary of missions. There is, however, one characteristic
of the Apostle which brings out one aspect of missions
peculiarly interesting in our time, and on which I will
venture for a few moments to fix attention.

It is the characteristic contained in the text — what
we may call the principle of Christian Fraternity ; of
Fraternity not in that indiscriminating sense in which
the word has been used by our brilliant neighbors in
their times of revolution — a sense in which a country-
man ^ of our own has severely and forcibly criticised it
— the sense of confounding all differences of institution,
family, rank, countr}^, under one unmeaning compliment.
Not in this sense, but in the almost contrary sense of
the word — the sense of recognizing, first and foremost,
before all other ties, the bond of brotherhood, of neigh-
borhood, of likeness and homogeneousness of charac-
ter and principle. " He first findeth his own brother
Simon." Andrew, the first Evangelist, was before all
else a good brother. In the great church 2 at Rome,

1 Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. By J. Fitzjames Stephen.

2 St. Andrea della Valle.

CHRISTIAN FRATEENITy. 331

Which is dedicated to him, no other inscription could be
lound suitable, except "Andrew, the brother of Peter "
Before casting his nets here and there on Jew or Gen-
tile, on priest or publican, he first bethought him of the
one fellow-creature who was near to him by the ties of
home and family. "Blood is thicker than water" in
sacred as well as in social life. " If a man cares not for
his own household, how shall he care for the Church of
^jod ! " If a man loves not his brother " - his nearest
and dearest — his brother, whom he sees everyday —
"how can he love God" or God's scattered children,
whom he has not seen ? "

This is a principle which has often been quoted as an
argument against missions altogether. It is a principle
which certainly needs to be constantly re-asserted as a
corrective of the excesses of the missionary or prose-
lytising spirit ; but on the present occasion I propose to
show how It also contains within itself some of the best
methods of the true conversion of the outside world
even whilst it seems at first sight to withdraw us from'
It. This may be seen under three separate aspects of
the subject.

1. It exemplifies the undoubted truth that the best
the most permanent mode of diffusing Christianity in
the world is by enliglitening, purifying. Christian nations
and Christian families at home, by converting our own
countrymen, our own brethren, who have settled abroad.
Jt has been well said that the chiefest missionary of the
Apostles, he who was especially the Apostle of the Gen-
tiles, in every case made his own Jewish countrymen
the nucleus round which the heathen converts were to
be gathered. Of all the Epistles of St. Paul, there is
not one which is addressed exclusively to Gentiles. In
every city he first found his own brothers, the sons of
Israel. In every church that he founded, it is to them

332 CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY.

that the chief of his arguments are addressed. It was
part of what we may call the Providential preparation
for the propagation of Christianity, that these centres
of light were already created, by the vast dispersion of
the Jewish settlers in every province of the Roman Em-
pire. This is a practical lesson for all of us in respect
of foreign missions. Every English settler in a distant
land is already, by his good or evil conduct, a mission-
ary for God or for the devil ; nay more, every country
in Euro^De, according as it holds up Christianity in a
repulsive or an attractive form, repels or attracts the
outside world from the light of the Gospel. It is said
that some of the Japanese envoys who lately visited
the nations of Europe and America had come with the
predisposition to establish Christianity in Japan on their
return, but that after witnessing its actual fruits they
in disappointment relinquished the project. The story
may be true or false, but it conveys a warning which
we should do well on this day to take to heart. If they
had seen our best institutions, our best hospitals, our
best schools, our best colleges ; if they had been led to
regard our splendid literature, our ancient liberties, our
continuous progress, as products of our religion ; if they
had been led to admire the most disinterested, most
generous, most truthful characters that Christendom
has produced — then we cannot but think that, in spite
of all our failures, they might perhaps have felt that it
would be worth while to try, in their distant empire,
the great experiment which has here produced such
magnificent results. But if they had been present at
one of those miscalled holidays, when so large a part
of our population is given up to drunkenness or degrad-
ing vice ; if they had read the rancorous animosities of
our so-called religious journals ; if they had witnessed,
throughout Europe, the obstacles thrown in the way of

CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY. 333

education, of peace, of progress, by theological passion
and prejudice ; if they had heard in our own country
of the fierce controversies which have raged on the
shape of a vestment, the direction of a face, or the pla-
cing of a table — we could hardly be surprised at their
doubting whether it was worth while to transplant into
their own country a religion which, by its own adher-
ents, was identified with such noxious or trifling mat-
ters. No : let us first find and convert and elevate our
own brethren and our own kindred, and we shall then
go with clean hands to convert the Jew, the Turk, the
heretic, and the infidel. This is a missionary enterprise
in which every man, woman, and child who hears me
can bear a part. Find each of jon thine own brother
— each of you is his brother's keeper, his brother's
guardian — make thy brother better than thyself, as
good as thyself. Be good thyself, that thy brother
may learn good from thee, if from no one else. In this
way the Home Mission becomes the mother of all mis-
sions; in this way the humblest may contribute his
mite to this day's solemnity.

2. But the same principle which thus fixes our main
attention on our own immediate circle, also points out
to us the best access to the hearts and minds of the
unknown strangers of heathen lands. There, too, are
to be found our own brothers, not merely in that gen-
eral sense in which sometimes, with indiscriminate
generality, all mankind are called our brothers — but
in that more specific sense indicated by the natural
affection with which Andrew first found his own
brother Simon. In every heathen country, in every
savage tribe, there are those whom we may call our
own brothers, for the nobler qualities which raise them
above their fellows, and bring them nearer to the
civilized and the Christian type. In every heart, or

334 CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY.

almost every heart, that God has placed in the human
breast, there are sentiments which correspond to ours,
and which make us feel that those to whom w^e speak
are our fellow-men in the sight of God, our fellow-
scholars in Christ Jesus. Often, indeed, this fraternal
sympath}' has been rendered impossible on the one
hand by the impurities, the cruelties, the follies of
heathen nations, on the other liancl by the pitying
scorn, or the iniquitous dealing, with which the Euro-
pean, the Christian, even the missionary, has looked
down on what are called, in one sense truly, the infe-
rior races of mankind. But happy, thrice happy, are
those Englishmen, those missionaries who have taken a
more generous view of their calling ; who have made it
a point first to find their own brothers in those strange
faces. Such was the philanthropic spirit of the long
line of English statesmen and governors whom, for this
reason, David Livingstone hailed as the best of mission-
aries— statesmen who labored for the welfare of for-
lorn and distant tribes as if for their own countrymen,
governors who have felt that there were moments when
their brothers were discerned, not in the stronger party
that cried for vengeance, but in the weaker that en-
treated for mercy. Such was the spirit of that prince
of missionary travellers whom I named just now, and
who lies beneath the floor of this Abbey; who was
never tired of repeating that he found amongst the
native races of Africa the same feelings of right and
wrong that he found in his own conscience, and that
needed only to be enlightened and developed to make
the perfect Christian. Such an one was that martyr
Bishop of Polynesia,^ who won the hearts of his simple
converts by treating them as his children, his brothers,
his friends, detecting the Christian beneath the heathen,

1 Bishop Patteson.

CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY. 335

the civilized man beneath the savage. Such an one (if
I may for a moment speak of one who in this respect,
whatever else we may think of him, stands in the fore-
most rank of living missionaries) is that South African
Bishop 1 who, of all those who have been sent to that
distant land, has given to it the fullest and largest
share of his laborious life ; who was amongst the first
of the Colonial Bishops to translate the Holy Scrip-
tures into the native language of those whom he was
sent out to instruct ; who, by dealing with his simple
converts not as inferiors, but as companions and fellow-
scholars, had the grace to learn from them with a new
force some old truths, Avhich, though sometimes pushed
to excess, have been, in essential points, almost accepted
at home ; who stands conspicuous amongst the mission-
aries of our time in the noble self-forgetfulness with
which he has sacrificed his dearest prospects and sev-
eral valuable friendships, cemented by the most trying
circumstances, in order to vindicate the rights of a bar-
barous tribe,2 which (whether truly or not, I do not
here pronounce) he believed to have been unjustly
treated through the misapprehension or the misjudg-
ment of his fellow-colonists. Such a sacrifice, made
fearlessly and freely, whilst others, from whatever
motive, either kept silence, or swelled the popular
panic, is an example of missionary enterprise and of
Christian chivalry which, wholly apart from any ques-
tion of theological opinion, the Church of England is
justly proud to claim, and ought on this day (when we
call over as it were, the roll of missionary martyrs and
confessors) to commend to the honor which it deserves
on earth, and which it will, we humbly trust, receive in
the sight of Him who seeth not as man seeth — in the

1 Bishop Colonso.

2 Lanyalahalele and the Amahlahi Tribe. By the Bishop of Natal.

336 CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY.

judgment of Him who has said of any kindness done
to the friendless stranger, even though he be an Afri-
can savage, " Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the
least of these my brethren, ye have done it;unto Me."

3. There is one further application of the principle
of Christian fraternity, of choosing first our own
brothers as fellow-disciples. I refer to the duty, obvi-
ous, though often neglected, of seeking for our co-oper-
ators in this, as in all good works, not those who are
far away, but those who are close at hand. There is in
this congregation at this moment a venerable stranger
from distant parts — the Syrian Patriarch of Antioch
who has been received with all courtesy and respect by
the authorities of our Church, but with whom the dif-
ference of manners and customs and language precludes
us from holding any other than the most outward and
formal intercourse. Most Christian, most becoming
was the welcome which has been given to that aged
representative of an ancient Church, a kindred branch
of which had excited sympathy centuries ago in the
heart of the Saxon Alfred., and which, in our own day,
wakened a spark of enthusiasm in the poetic soul of
Reginald Heber. Most Christian, most becoming has
been his simple j^et profound reply to his English hosts
— "I was a stranger, and ye took me in." Neverthe-
less we cannot but feel that this and all like manifesta-
tions of sympathy must be, comparatively speaking,
transitory and external. The chiefs of far-off com-
munions, whether in the Eastern or the Latin Church,
can be co-operators with us only in a remote and sec-
ondary sense. Let us cultivate by all means a friendly
intercourse with them, as with all Christian people
throughout the world. But an intimate, organic union
can only be with those who are near at hand, or of the
same race and nation and culture as ourselves. The

CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY. 337

divergence of sentiment, language, geographical limits,
outweighs a hundredfold any apparent ground of union
supplied by the retention of a form of the Christian
ministry, which in name only, or hardly in name,
resembles that which is retained by ourselves. Like
Andrew, we must first find out our brother Simon,
those who are our own brothers by national kinship, by
common liberties, common traditions, by neighborhood,
by language, by inheritance of the same glories of the
British name, the same aspirations breathed into us by
the Protestant Reformation. It is because the work of
evangelizing the heathen has a direct tendency to bring
all English Christians together that this day is doubly
blessed ; blessed alike in what it gives and in wdiat it
receives. It lays upon us the duty of finding first our
own brethren of the same flesh and the same blood, to
carry on the task which no others can equally well
execute together, because with all our divisions we
understand each other better than we understand any
one else.

Let us first find those of our own communion ; let
us try to make the most of all the various schools and
shades of thought which make up our national Church ;
remembering that each supplies something which the
other lacks, and that only by their joint co-operation
can the Church attain the likeness of that great Apos-
tle who was all things to all men. Our differences may
be wide and deep, but they are not wider or deeper
than those which have always existed in every civilized
Church, not so wide or deep as they are at this mo-
ment in that portion of Western Christendom (the
Roman Church) which has been accustomed the most
to pride itself on its outward unity. Let our first
effort, therefore, be, before we go far and wide for other
fellow-workers, to make the most of the fellow-workers

338 CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY.

we have at hand in our own Church — our own laity,
our own clergy, our own bishops, through all the vari-
ous shades of English feeling and thought.

But next to our own Church, and before any combi-
nations with foreign Christians, however estimable, let
us find out our own brethren in the British Islands,
who, however parted from us, through the misfortune or
the misconduct of their ancestors or ours, are yet heirs
of the same national traditions and of the same inspir-
ing future. Such are our brethren amongst the Non-
conforming communions of England, whose praise for
their missionary zeal, even if sometimes not according
to knowledge, is in all the Churches ; whose sympathy
in this, as in all good works, is dear to every Church-
man ; whose " watchful jealousy," if so it be, it is ours
to disarm by frank generosity and straightforward cour-
tesy and equal dealing.

And yet once more. Foremost amongst those who,
being thus divided from us, yet are one with us, let us
name the sister Church of Scotland ; like our own, the
Church of the nation ; like our own, a Church recog-
nized both in solemn prayer and legislative enactments ;
like our own, if I may venture so to magnify ourselves,
abounding in works of active charity, of enlightened
faith, of Christian tolerance. On this day, St. An-
drew's Day, the day of Scotland's national saint, whose
bones, according to the ancient legend, were believed
to have drifted without oar or sail to the rocky head-
land which now bears his name ; the cross of whose
martyrdom on the shores of Achaia is still emblazoned
on the escutcheon of the northern kingdom ; on this
day, which in both Churches is observed for the same
sacred missionary cause, I have thought that I should
best be acting in accordance with the principle which
I have endeavored to set forth, and with the exigencies

CHRISTIAN FRATERNITY. 889

of the times in which we live, by invoking the assist-
ance of the wisdom and the learning of the chief of
the greatest Scottish University, the first preacher and
theologian of the Scottish national Church. As last
year we listened to the voice of the distinguished Ger-
man scholar ^ who had explored the depths of heathen
religions and of primeval language, so this year we
shall hope to listen to the voice of our own country-
man,^ who has explored as few else in this island, on
the one hand, the " Religion of Common Life," and on
the other hand, the links which bind together Philoso-
phy and Christianity in that indissoluble unity which
can alone win for the glad tidings which we profess to
carry throughout the world a solid basis and a perma-
nent triumph — the promise of the life that now is and
of that which is to come.

1 Professor Max Miiller.

2 The Very Rev. John Caird, D.D., Principal of the University of
Glasgow.

DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

St. Andrew's Day, November 30, 1877, being the day of intercession for
Missions ; preparatory to an Address on " Missions " in the nave, by
the Rev. John Stoughton, D.D., Professor of Historical Theology in
the Independent College, Hampstead.

In the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four
^Hiving creatures," full of eyes, before and behind. And the first
" living creature " was like a lion, and the second " living creature '*
was like a calf, and the third " living creature " had a face as a man^
and the fourth " living creature " was like a flying eagle. — Revela-
tion iv. 6, 7.

There is an argument often used against Christian
Missions which is supposed to be fatal to their effect.
It is said that the natives of heathen countries are dis-
turbed by the various forms under which Christianity
is presented to them, and that it is, therefore, difficult
for them to accept as true what appears under such
diverse and sometimes rival aspects.

It is an argument which is also used at home in favor
of suppressing these different forms, as far as possible,
and substituting for them some one system which shall
supersede all the others.

This objection, if sound, would strike at the very
root of all missions as they now exist, and it may,
therefore, be worth while to meet it ; and the more so
as the statement of the counter principle is full of edi-
fying reflections.

So far from its being the case that a uniform or abso-
lutely homogeneous statement of the truth is necessary

340

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 341

for all times and circumstances, the whole structure of
the Bible is a direct testimony to the contrary posi-
tion ; namely, that there are, as St. Paul says, diversi-
ties of gifts, of ministrations, of operations, through
which the same Father reigns, the same Lord is serveli,
the same Spirit works ; that Divine light can only be
received in the world through the refractions, as St.
Peter says, of ''many colors and many shapes" — de-
livered, as the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews
says, in "many parts and in many fashions " — repre-
sented, as St. John represents it, by the widest diver-
sity of figures that the prophetic imagination could
conceive; image upon image, metaphor upon meta-
phor; not one lamp, but seven; not the throne only,
but the rainbow; not the sight only of sapphire or of
emerald, but the sound of thunder and trumpet, and
the roar of many waters; the Supreme Unity encom-
passed and surrounded by venerable sages, and strange
animals, and ten thousand times ten thousand heavenly
messengers.

Amongst those figures, that which I have chosen for
my text has been consecrated by the long usage of the
Church to the special subject of the evangelization of
mankind. The four Living Creatures which surround
the throne of God have, fancifully perhaps, yet not
without a profound meaning, been appropriated by
early tradition to the four Evangelists. In ancient times
there was no fixed appropriation of these several im-
ages, each to each. It was only the general fact of the
fourfold figure that suggested the comparison. The
man, the lion, the calf, and the eagle, so entirely unlike
each other in form and aspect, have been assigned in
varying degrees to St. IMatthew, St. Mark, St. Luke,
and St. John. But this diversity truly represents the
divergence of the four delineations which the Gospels

342 . DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

contain of the Saviour's life and character. It might
have been that they should all have been fused into
one ; it might have been that the peculiar traits or
ideas represented respectively in the four Evangelists
should have been altogether suppressed, that so the
world might have been saved the perplexities and
stumbling-blocks which the strange contradictions and
varieties of the several accounts have left to trouble
the mind of Christendom. But it was not so ordered;
and in spite of these momentary difficulties, we may
well be thankful that the fourfold picture has been
allowed to remain, and that the world has been left to
explore and to reconcile, as best it may, these widely
differing reports.

What is thus exemplified in the case of the four
Evangelists has more or less continued in the work of
evangelization ever since. Vehement as have been the
attempts to reduce into one single system the various
modes by which Christian doctrines or Christian insti-
tutions have been developed, human nature and Divine
grace have been too strong to be bound in any such
artificial restraints ; and those portions of mankind
which lie outside the Christian pale have no just cause
to complain of the sameness of the points of view from
which the message of the Gospel has been conveyed to
them.

In the seraphic hymn which in the services of the
Eastern Church forms one of the most solemn parts of
the Communion office, the words in which praise is ex-
pressed have, by the singular richness of the Russian
language, been represented by four phrases, which, whilst
they all contain the same common idea of thanksgiving,
enable the hearers, as it were, to catch, through the con-
cordant music, sounds as of the roaring of a lion, as of
the scream of an eagle, as of the bellowing of an ox, and

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 343

as of the speech of a man. This well explains to us the
general effect which may be, which ought to be, and
which to a large extent has been conveyed to the world,
by the diversity and the unity of Christendom.

No doubt to a mere childish or barbarian intellect
the idea of such complexity is difficult to grasp ; but
after all, in presenting to uncivilized or half-civilized
nations the truths of a religion, which, if it be any thing,
ought to correspond with the results of the highest civ-
ilization, we must be content to trust OLU-selves in some
degree to the common sense and common reason of
mankind, which, even in the most barbarous races, is
not wholly extinguished ; and, when such an objection
is brought forward, it must be met, as many other
objections are to be met, not by acquiescing in the stu-
pidity or perversity of those we address, but by appeal-
ing to the highest light that is in them, and drawing the
lessons which they themselves might acknowledge in
their common experience.

The fact is, tliat the offence given in the eyes of
heathen nations by the differences of Christendom, is
in great measure occasioned not b}'' the mere fact of
those differences, but by the fierce rivalries, and unhal-
lowed jealousies, and overleaping ambitions by which
different phases or forms of Christianity have attacked
and endeavored to absorb each other in the race of pros-
elytism. These inhuman passions are justly calculated
to alienate the unsophisticated consciences, whether of
civilized or of savage heathendom ; but they would
be equally odious even though there were not a single
heathen to be converted. They are amongst the vices
of Christian society, like drunkenness, gambling, im-
purity, such as we have been told have in our Australian
colonies provoked an army of Brahmin missionaries to
the good work of endeavoring to convert our benighted

344 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

fellow-countrymen — in these respects truly benighted
— to a better and purer life. But these are quite
another matter from the innocent divisions which have
parted Churches from each other. " It is not," as was
well said by an excellent Nonconformist, who Avas edu-
cated within these walls two centuries ago, ''it is not
the actual differences that do the mischief, but the mis-
management of those differences." In point of fact it
has been found that Christian missionaries in heathen
parts do for the most part forget their divisions in the
face of the heathen. It was the testimony of the Re-
port presented to both Plouses of Parliament in 1872,
that, ''from tlie nature of their work, and from their
isolated position, they co-operate heartily together, and
that, with few exceptions, it is a fixed rule among tliem
that they v/ill not interfere with each other's converts
or each other's spheres of duty."

We propose, therefore, to guard against the growth
of these exceptions, and to uphold this fixed rule ; to
shov/ that, so far from such a diversity being contrary
to the genius of Christianity, it was involved in the reli-
gion of our Divine Founder from the very beginning ;
that so far from its being a reasonable obstacle in the
way of its reception, it ought to be one of the chief
commendations of it to the reception of those to whom
it is addressed.

Let me illustrate tliis position by several great exam-
ples in the history of Christian missions.

(1.) Let us first take the diversity of creeds. When
we consider how variously constituted are the powers
cf human apprehension, how mixed are the ingredients
out of Avhich any human representations of truth are
composed, it is an almost inevitable result that every
creed and confession of faith v/hich Christendom has
produced must partake of that mingled, complex, and

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 345

imperfect character which belongs to human speech and
human thouglit. No one creed or confession can claim
absolute truth ; or, even if it does claim absolute truth,
it cannot claim to represent the exact form of truth
which will be most opportune for each varying country.

There are, no doubt, some truths so divine, so trans-
parent, so universal, that even the imperfections to
which we have referred can hardly obscure their bril-
liancy; there are some falsehoods so absurd, so mis-
chievous, so narrow, that even the most uneducated
conscience might be expected to reject them if they
stood alone ; but what has usually happened is, that
these truths and these falsehoods, though not in the
same proportion, have become inextricably mixed to-
gether, and thus the imperfection of one creed is almost
of necessity rectified by some countervailing clause in
another. To use a homely proverb, '^ It is not safe to
put all our eggs into one basket." This is a maxim of
common life : it is not less a rule for the evangelization
of the world. And how remarkably is this borne out if
we look on a large scale at the conversion of mankind !

Who Avas it that evangelized our ancestors, the Gothic
tribes of Northern Europe ? It was Ulfilas, an Arian
bishop ; a missionary, that is to say, who adhered to a
particular form of the Christian faith which, at the time
when he lived, was denounced with the severest penal-
ties, both civil and ecclesiastical, by the then rukrs of
the Catholic Church, and which has long ago become
extinct in every part of the world. But from him was
derived the first translation of the Scriptures into our
own mother tongue — the precursor of the versions of
Wycliffe, of Luther, of Tyndale, and of our own pres-
ent English Bibles. He was the Moses, as he was
called, the leader'and deliverer of our Gothic ancestors ;
the precursor of Augustine and Boniface and Adelbert.

846 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

And who was it that established the first missions
through the whole of Central Asia, the great exception
to the usual lethargy of the Eastern Church ? It was
the Nestorian Christians, the Christians who clung to
the faith of the once persecuted, exiled, and detested
Nestorius.

And who was it that in later days conveyed the first
germs of the Christian faith to the vast tribes of India
and of China ? Whose name is it that is still invoked,
as I am told, by the boatmen of Madras as they dash
through the jDerilous waves which encircle their surf-
beaten shores ? It was Francis Xavier, the representa-
tive, not merely of the Roman Church, but of that most
repulsive and offensive phase of the Roman Church, the
Society of Jesuits.

And who was it that first undertook the colonization
and Christianization of Greenland, with its unpromis-
ing races, its ungenial climate, its dark future ? It was
the simple-minded Moravians, whose principles and
whose tenets were even more different from those of
Ulfilas, or of Francis Xavier, and of the Nestorians, than
any of these from each other.

And yet, not only did these several agencies succeed
in presenting Christianity in a shape which more or less
struck root in these diverse countries ; but as we look
back on their distant laboi^s — distant both in time
and space — we must acknowledge that they were sev-
erally the fountain-heads from which the native Chris-
tianity of Europe, of Asia, and of North America, has
received the fullest streams of Christian life.

(2.) Again, let us leave the question of the diversity
of creeds, and look at the diversities of organization.
From very early times, Episcopacy was regarded as the
one outward channel through which the evangelization
as well as the ordinary government of the Church was

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 347

to be carried on. Baptism, preaching, marriage — noth-.
ing could be done without the bishop. But it was not
long before immense exceptions began to be, as it were,
scooped out of the Episcopal system.

In a large part of Europe the chief work of proclaim-
ing the Gospel, and its concomitant message of civiliza-
tion, to the unconverted or half-converted races, was
conducted, not by bishops, but by presbyters — by those
presbyters who, under the name of abbots and monks,
carried on their work, not only irrespectively, but inde-
pendently of, and above, the Episcopate. Such was
Columba, the apostle of Scotland. Such, during the
larger part of his missionary career, was Cuthbert of
Lindisfarne. Such was Columbanus, the apostle of
Burgundy. Such was St. Gall, the apostle of Switzer-
land. Such was St. Benedict, the founder of that great
Benedictine order which was for centuries the cliief
nurse of learning and culture in Europe.

In like manner in our own later days, in the Churches
of the Reformation, the first attempt to evangelize our
heathen dependencies was maintained and executed,
not by the regular Episcopal system, so well suited as
it is to our wants at home, but by the great societies,
called by diverse names, through which, irregularly,
perhaps, but not with any greater irregularity than the
system of Columba or Benedict, the light of Christian
truth was handed on by a succession of noble-minded
torch-bearers, whose torches flamed not the less brightly
because they were shaken in the winds of a wide and
unlimited field, and not confined within the more re-
stricted limits of a constant supervision.

Those who knew India in former days used to tell
us that, great as were the advantages produced by the
more complete organization introduced through the
foundation of the Anglo-Indian Episcopate, yet still

348 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

there was a fire and a fervor enkindled by the wander-
ing lives of Schwartz and his contemporaries, which we
vainly seek for in our more orderl}- generation. We
would not for a moment disparage the benefits con-
ferred on English Churchmen settled in those regions
by the establishment of a regular, unfailing supply of
pastors and chief pastors, whose function Avas specially
to raise up and foster in our English settlers those who,
after all, must, by their lives and examples, be the true
missionaries of Christianity to the heathen. We do
not underrate the blessing of prelates, who, by the win-
ning grace of a Heber, or the long-continued devotion
of a Wilson, or the Avise and fatherly counsel of a Cot-
ton, or the indefatigable zeal of a Milman, became, as
it were, the patriarchs of Indian missions of whatsoever
persuasion. But still, any attempt to disparage, over-
rule, and override the efforts of those societies which
have performed in our time a work corresponding to
that effected by the great monastic orders in the Middle
Ages, implies, not merely a want of evangelical large-
ness of heart, but an ignorance of those ecclesiastical
principles Avhich acted so large a part in the conversion
of modern Europe.

(3.) Again, there is an analogous difference of organ-
ization with which we are more familiar at home, but
which must be allowed to play freely its part also in
the distant countries of the world. There has been in
this country, since the Reformation, an acknowledged
divergence in the mode of disseminating truth which
may be described, if I may use the expressive language
of a highly valued brother ecclesiastic, as "the public
and the private way." " The public way " is that
whereby the nation has taken advantage of an organ-
ization which has come down with much continuity,
although with much discontinuity, from the earliest

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 349

times of our history ; which is controlled by national
laws, which is guarded by national principles, which is
regarded as on the whole the exponent of the national
faitli. This is the system which by various names is
called the Established Church, the National Church,
the Church of England. But, side by side with this,
there is another " way " in which individuals fired with
peculiar zeal, or endowed with peculiar gifts, have taken
advantage of the liberty gradually and increasingly left
by the nation to those who deviate from the more pub-
lic and established system ; a way in which, partly by
their own special energies, partly by founding new
organizations, which have themselves in the course of
time become a mixture of the more public and the more
private systems, they have filled up the deficiencies and
increased the usefulness of that larger and more compre-
hensive institution intended to cover the whole nation.
By these two channels the flood of Christian doctrine
and civilization has forced its way through our own
land. On one side we see, as it were, a majestic river,
swollen with many tributaries, bearing on its bosom
stately fleets, feeding populous cities which else would
languish, fertilizing large tracts which else would wither
and die ; on the other side we see foaming torrents
penetrating through rocks which perchance nothing
else could break, attracting attention by the roar of
cataracts which arouse the most heedless ear, forcing
their way into devious corners which lie outside the
main current of the larger stream. And what has been
productive of such beneficent results at home, cannot
but, we believe, be capable of like results abroad.
Wherever the two systems come into contact, it is
surely the dictate at once of Christian wisdom and of
Christian charity, that each should use the other as its
best and indispensable ally.

350 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

In former times it was the temptation of the public
national form of religion to repress and suppress by
legislative enactments the private utterances of Non-
conformity. In our times it is the temptation of the
Nonconforming elements of religion to endeavor to
repress, and suppress by legislative enactments, all ex-
pression of the public and national form. The means
adopted in the two cases are different, but the end
sought is the same. In either case, the error was and
is equally impolitic, equally illiberal. Let us hope
better things for the age that is coming. Let us re-
member, both at home and abroad, the speech of Abram
to Lot — " Is not the whole land before thee ? If thou
wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right ; or
if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the
left." Let us remember the same maxim translated
into the language of the Apostle — " We will not boast
in another man's line of things made ready to our
hand." " Every way, whether in pretence or in truth,"
whether, we may add, by a public or a private way,
" Christ is preached ; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and
will rejoice." " Wh}', when both organizations exist,"
so it has been pertinently asked, "why should one of
the two be taken from us ? " In point of fact, the con-
tributions to missions, so far as we can judge from sta-
tistics, bear out this conclusion, that not by repression
of variety, but by encouragement of variety, is the
chief result produced.^

In the British dominions, the largest amount is con-
tributed by the Church of England, that is to sa}^ the
communion in which, our enemies themselves being our
judges, the largest diversity of thought exists and is
allowed. It is 500,000?. The next largest contribution

1 " Church and Dissent," in Quarterly Review, cxxx. 452, ascribed to
the Dean of St. Paul's.

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 851

is that of the Nonconformists, who are also a very
mixed body. It is nearly 400,000/. But the contribu-
tions from the Roman Catholic Church, which refuses
to acknowledge any such diversity, throughout the
whole world amount only to one-quarter of what is
collected by the various Protestant Churches and socie-
ties within the United Kingdom alone, and the sum
collected from British churches of the Roman persua-
sion does not amount to 7,000/.^

No doubt the Church of Rome and the Protestant
Churches have each their separate grooves. But in the
generous efforts for the cause of missions, it would seem
that the freedom of the Reformation has been far more
potent than the authority of the Papal See. It would
seem further that if either the Church of England were
destroyed, according to the wishes of some ardent Non-
conformists, or Nonconformity absorbed, according to
the wishes of some ardent Churchmen, the cause of
Christian missions would grievously suffer.

(4.) There is yet one further exemplification of the
principle, which lies behind all the others ; namely, the
effect of the differences, deeply rooted and ineradicable,
of human character and pursuits. The fierceness of
the lion, the rapidity of the eagle, the strength of the
ox, the intelligence of the man, are not more strongly
impressed on the differences between Arian and Catholic,
Greek and Latin, Roman and Protestant Churchmen
and Dissenters, than they are on the deep lines of
demarcation which divide the studious scholar, the soar-
ing philosopher, the bold warrior, the zealous pastor,
each from each ; and yet every one of these distinct
characters may, through the one Divine Spirit working
in each, be brought to bear on the world of sin and

1 British Conti'ibtitions to Foreign Missions in the year 187G, by the Kev.
W. A. Scott Robertson, M.A.

862 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

ignorance, as confidently as though each one existed by
itself. The barbarian, the heathen, the Mohammedan,
the Hindoo, are not distracted by these divergencies of
character. They are rather drawn towards the central
fire which gives to each of them its life and energy.

And it is this necessity of the joint action of the
most diverse elements of character which throws such a
power and such a responsibility on all of us. No one,
whether in England or in foreign couiitries, can say
that he is freed from any concern in missionary influ-
ence. Every one, prince or peasant, soldier or settler,
has his own influence, even although he may never
have opened his lips as a preacher. I have seen pic-
tures of a distinguished English ruler, Sir Donald
M'Leod, I have heard of another of a gallant soldier.
General Nicholson, in which the Hindoos represent
•them, with their British costume, and with their genu-
ine English features, in the attitude of their own divini-
ties, to whom they are offering worship and sacrifice.
And what was it that won for them this adoring re-
spect, that made these poor heathens feel that these
Englishmen were superior beings — messengers of
heaven ? It was simply this : they knew them to be
thoroughly just, thoroughly truthful, thoroughly chaste.
Who is there that cannot help in producing this holy,
this Divine impression ? Is there any one, however far
removed by office or character from ordinary clerical
or missionary life, who cannot strive by stainless honor
and purity to convince the heathen "of sin, of right-
eousness, and of judgment " ?

These, then, are some exemplifications of the mani-
fold grace of God in the work of evangelization.

The Proteus of human nature, as Lord Bacon happily
allegorizes the ancient fable, and as it has been finely
drawn out of late by an eminent physician, will go

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 353

through many shapes before he will speak at last the
words of the heaven-sent seer. But this is the Divine
message which he is commissioned to speak. We must
be patient with him, we must watch for him, but at the
last he will tell us what we want to know, not the less
because his unity of purpose has been veiled in such
immense diversity of action.

In all these various forms of approach there is no
need for sacrificing our convictions that one is superior
to the other. We may believe that Athanasius was
more sound than Ulfilas; that the Protestant is better
than the Jesuit; that the Episcopate in the long run
has been a more usefid agency than the monastic
orders ; that the comprehensive system of the National
Church is more efficient than the more limited systems
of individuals or sects ; that Mary, who sat at Jesus'
feet, chose a better part than Martha, who was cum-
bered with much serving. All this may well be ; but
what we wish to show is, that there has been, that there
is, that there will be to the end of time, room for the
weaker as well as for the stronger, for the lower as well
as for the higher, for the eagle as well as for the ox, for
the man as well as for the lion, in the vast and complex
work of the regeneration of the world.

(5.) And now may I, as on former occasions, ask
your attention to the mode in which, year after year, I
have endeavored to make St. Andrew's Day in some
measure serve to vindicate this principle ?

On the first occasion you were invited to hear the
words of a world-renowned scholar of another country;
on the second occasion you heard the discourse of the
most eloquent orator of the Northern kingdom ; on the
third you listened to the homely address of the patri-
arch of British missionaries ; on the fourth to the close
reasoning of a minister of the Church of Ireland, parted

354 DIVERSITY IN UNITY.

from ours by a recent convulsion, yet not without affini-
ties derived by long connection. I now invite you to
attend the teaching of one who, belonging to one of
those great organizations which I have already de-
scribed as growing up outside the Established Church
of this country, has proved himself, by a long pastoral
lif(3 and by studies which traverse one of the most dis-
tracted portions of our ecclesiastical divisions, capable
of understanding both the excellencies of his own com-
munion, and also the excellencies which belong to the
larger system of the Church of England. Others before
our time have written histories of the Puritans, in which
we hear of nothing but the glories of the Puritans ;
others have written histories of the Church of England,
in which we hear of nothing but the glories of the
Church of England. He who will address yon this
evening is the first who has written of both with equal
candor, and courtesy, and gracious appreciation. He
will speak to yon in the name of those illustrious dead,
whose characters he has so well portrayed ; of Chilling-
worth, Jeremy Taylor, and Cudworth, on the one side,
of Baxter, Howe, and Owen on the other side, whose
voices were once heard within these walls, and of which
the echo, we trust, will be prolonged this evening. He
will, in the same kindly and truthful spirit, endeavor
to set before you, as in a fourfold vision, some of the
diversities of human character and Christian culture
by which, in various fields of missionary labor, the
kingdom of God has, in these our latter days, been
advanced.

And if, perchance, the record of what he has said
under this venerable roof shall reach those distant
regions for which we this day pray, it will be to them,
I trust, not a stumbling-block or cause of offence, but
rather a proof and example of the Divinity and Univer-

DIVERSITY IN UNITY. 355

sality of the Faith which we profess — an exemplifica-
tion of those beautiful lines which he has himself
quoted with fervent admiration from a Clnistian ^
philosopher of the seventeenth century :

But true Religion sprung from God above,

Is like her fountain — full of charity ;
Embracing all things with a tender love,

Full of good-will and meek expectancy ;
Full of true justice and sure verity,

In voice and heart ; free, large, even infinite ;
Not wedged in strait particularity,

But grasping all in her vast active spright —
Bright Lamp of God! that men would joy in thy pure light 1

To this Divine Light may God in His mercy lead us
all!

1 Henry More.

THE CLOSE OF THE MISSION SERVICES
ON ST. ANDREW'S DAY, 1879.

St. Andrew's Day, 1879, prior to the Lecture bv the Rev. Principal Tul-
loch, of St. Andrew's University, Scotland, delivered in the Abbey
on the same day.

The Jield is the world. — Matthew xiii. 38.

In the grounds of a secluded college amidst the hills
of North America, is a pillar which marks the spot
where four young Presbyterian students bound them-
selves by a solemn vow to found missions for the propa-
gation of the Gospel in distant countries. It was the
first awakening of that missionary spirit amongst the
Americans which has issued in such extended enter-
prises, and which only this year drew from the lips of
tlie ruling statesmen of this country unwonted expres-
sions of eulogy. On that pillar are written the words —

"THE FIELD IS THE WORLD."

I have said that this monument commemorates the
first revival in the New World of missionary zeal to
the distant regions of the earth ; but it followed upon
and was part of the like zeal which arose for the first
time in all Protestant Churches at the close of the last
century and the beginning of this.

The ancient mediceval Church, at the time of the set-
tlement of the barbarian tribes, had no doubt con-
ceived the noble ambition of extendino;- the frontiers of
Christianity beyond the empire which it had already
converted; and the same tradition was continued in

356

CLOSE OF MISSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREW'S DAY. 357

the later Roman Church in the splendid adventures on
which the Society of the Jesuits embarked in China, in
India, in Canada, and in South America. But these
missions have on the whole left but feeble traces, and
the contributions of the whole Roman Church at this
moment to the missionary cause do not amount to one-
third of what is contributed by the Protestant commun-
ions of Great Britain alone.

It was in those Protestant communions, after a long
apathy, for which various causes may be assigned, that
the ancient fire of missionary ardor was rekindled
towards the close of the eighteenth century.

The Church of England and the English Noncon-
formists then began to feel that they had a duty to the
heathens within or without our dominions, such as
before they had only acknowledged towards our own
race, or jDossibly the races immediately dependent upon
us. In the Church of Scotland the question was form-
ally discussed in its General Assembly, and was all but
extinguished by the philosophic arguments of one of
the distinguished ecclesiastical leaders of that time, had
it not been for the sudden and vehement appeal, which
I have once before quoted from this place, made by a
zealous minister to the Holy Bible, as it lay on the taJDle
before the seat of the Moderator.

The principle on which that appeal and all like
appeals are founded, is contained in the sacred words
which I have chosen for my text, "The field is the
world." There are no limits to the advance of truth
and goodness, and therefore no limits to the advance of
Christianity, save those which are interposed by the
extremities of space that bound the habitable globe.

Whatever may be the failings in the methods of
missionary enterprise, however much they need to be
transformed from age to age, yet that enterprise rests

858 CLOSE OF MISSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREWS DAY.

in all its forms on these two fundamental truths, That
all, or almost all, branches of the human race are capa-
ble of moral improvement; and That the Christian
religion is sufficiently wide to comprehend, and take its
part in, every form of moral improvement of which the
human race is capable.

Such are the grounds on which, from time to time, I
have advocated, on the successive anniversaries of this
solemnity, the cause which the Primate of All England
has commended to our attention at this season of the
year. This is the last occasion on which I shall have
an opportunity of bringing the subject forward on St.
Andrew's Day. For various reasons it has seemed good
to transfer the day of intercession for missions from the
festival of St. Andrew to another time of the year — a
transference which will probably change, at least in
this place, the character of the celebration. I have,
therefore, thought that it might be suitable briefly to
sum up the methods by which it has been endeavored
to carry out the designs of our Church in these oppor-
tunities.

It appeared to me that the principle that " the field
is the world" required a yet further exemplificatiou
than could be given to it by the ordinary appeals of
Churchmen from the pulpit. Accordingly it was deter-
mined, after ascertaining that such procedure was in
entire accordance with the laws of this Church and
realm, to invite others than those of our own ministry
or communion to take their part in showing that they,
too, joined, on various grounds, in this common work
of ours, and that, at least in this place, the heathen
world should not be scandalized by the echoes of a dis-
united Christendom.

The first who undertook this office was a German
scholar of world-wide renown ,i who, beyond any other

1 Professor Max Miiller.

CLOSE OF IVnSSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREW'S DAY. 359

living man, has deeply studied the various religions and
languages of mankind, and was sure to speak of them
with that union of reverence and truthfulness which in
itself is a model to all teachers of the heathen every-
where. In this spirit he spoke on the missionary aspect
of the various religions of the world ; and when, at a
later date in this very year, he further developed the
same truths from a somewhat different point of view in
the ancient Chapter House adjoining this Abbey, the
permission to him so to lecture within those venerable
walls was granted at my special request, and with my
full sympathy and responsibility, because I felt that he
was still carrying out the same principles, namely, that
through the whole field of the world, wherever we can
find one sacred spot in the soil of the human heart,
there the seed of religion, which is the Word of God,
may be sown, and may yield fruit, some thirty-fold,
some sixty -fold, some a hundred-fold.

The next who was invited to take this duty was one
who, occupying one of the highest positions of education
in a sister Church,^ was known as combining, in no ordi-
nary degree, the eloquence of the Christian preacher,
with the depth of the Christian philosopher. He also,
in tones which I would we could oftener hear within
these walls, dwelt in the most touching, and at the
same time most convincing, strain, on the universal
character of the Christian religion.

The third was far different from either of the two
who had preceded him. He was a man great, not in
speech, but in action ; venerable, not from office, but
from years ; the patriarch of British missionaries,^ the
near kinsman of the famous explorer who lay beneath

1 The Very Rev. John Caird, D.D,, Principal of the University of
Glasgow.

2 The Rev. Dr. Moffat, father-in-law of Dr. Livingstone.

360 CLOSE OF MISSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREW'S DAY.

his feet, and partaker with him in the labor of evangel-
izing the tribes of Africa. He, though born and bred
in another communion and ministry than ours, and
showing in his simple style how little he had partaken
of the larger knowledge or culture of the seats of learn-
ing, yet bore not the less a powerful testimony to the
height and breadth of the missionary sphere.

For the fourth teacher in this succession there would
have been, but for the imperative duties required by
the like celebration in his own communion beyond the
border,^ one whom the late Chief Ruler of India had
designated as, amongst all living names, the one that
had carried most weight amongst the Hindoo and Mo-
hammedan nations of our vast empire, as a faithful
pastor and a wise and considerate teacher. Though he
belonged in his later years to a communion which had
broken off from its parent stock, yet his generous spirit
eagerly welcomed the call made to him, and, but for the
accidental circumstance to which I have referred, would
gladly have responded to it.

His place was filled by a representative preacher from
the Church of Ireland ^ — divided from our own through
causes over which it had no control, divided in its con-
stitution, in its forms of worship, and in its national
character ;. but not therefore the less entitled to take
its share with the scholars and the preachers of other
countries and other Churches in a work that seemed
especially to befit the Communion that had produced
such mighty missionaries as the Evangelizers in early
times of Scotland, of Switzerland, and of Western Ger-
many.

The fifth was a distinguished scholar and pastor of
our own English Nonconformists,^ who, by his gracious

1 Tho Rev. Dr. Duff. 2 Archdeacon Reichel.

8 The Rev. Dr. Stoughton.

CLOSE OF MISSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREWS DAY. 361

and loving spirit, has perhaps done as much as any one
in our distracted time could effect to reconcile the dif-
ferences which divide our Churches. He, with his larcje
historical knowledge and capacious sympathies, was able
to illustrate this spirit and to confirm our work by show-
ing the unity amidst diversity of the various types of
Christian biography in the field of missionary labor.

And now on this, the last St. Andrew's Day on
which the cause of missions will be pleaded in this
place, it has seemed a not unsuitable occasion to invite
the chief ecclesiastical head of the Church of Scotland,
who is also the chief theological professor in that ancient
university which bears the name of the Apostle from
whom this day is called, to bear his witness in proclaim-
ing that the world, and every part of the world, is the
field on which Christianity must thrive and triumph.
He has taught us, as no one else has yet taught us, the
quiet strength and the temperate light which lay within
our own Church of England, in the distinguished suc-
cession of philosophic and apostolic divines who glori-
fied the seventeenth century in this country. He has
taught his own Church the greatness of its position as
the Church, not of a sect, but of a nation — as the
Church which of all ecclesiastical institutions in the
northern kingdom is most emphatically the refuge of
learning, of culture, and of freedom. And if this occa-
sion should assist in binding more closely together the
two nations whose union has been cemented after so
many years of bloodshed and dissension, not only by
law, but by the dearest and nearest affections ; if it
should tend to a closer sympathy between two sister
Churches, which have the same purpose of civilizing
and enlightening the national elements «\vith which
they are connected, it will be carrying out the principle
on which the Church and Realm of England have always

362 CLOSE OF MISSION SERVICES, ST. ANDREWS DAT.

recognized the Church of Scotland, the principle that
all who call themselves Christians shall pursue the
unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace and in right-
eousness of life. Let us trust that on this the last of
our missionary services on St. Andrew's Day, we shall
be taught to carry away the vital principle of the Gos-
pel from which all missions spring; let us trust that
some reason may be given for the hope that, whoever
else goes astray to the right hand or to the left, we may
truly find in the life of our Divine Master those words
of eternal life, of which the most learned historian of
Christianity has said in the most solemn passage of his
work, that " these, and these alone, are the primal, in-
defeasible truths of Christianity which shall not pass
away " — and which, in proportion as we reach to a
more practical use of those undying truths, shall trans-
form and purify the whole field of the world.

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

February, 1871 , before the Lord Mayor of London.

How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people ! how is she
become as a widow ! she that was great among the nations, and prin-
cess among the provinces.

Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the watches pour out
thine heart like water before the face of the Lord : lift up thy hands
towards Him for the life of thy young children, that faint for hunger
in the top of every street.

Remember, 0 Lord, what is come upon us: consider, and behold
our reproach. — Lamentations i. 1 ; ii. 19 ; v. 1.

The full instruction of this sacred book, the Lamen-
tations of the Prophet Jeremiah, can be understood only
by considering the previous position of the Prophet
himself. We dwelt last Sunday on the joyous, hope-
ful, confident tone of the Prophet Isaiah. The language
of the prophecies of Jeremiah is just the reverse. He
lived at a time when his country was reaping the bitter
fruits of former corruption and sin. The throne of
Judah had long been occupied by Princes unworthy of
that great position. The priests and prophets fed the
people with falsehoods, and the people loved to have
it so. Jerusalem had become the seat of selfish luxury
and of extravagant superstition. The Temple had
become a den of robbers. Jeremiah almost alone of
his countrymen saw things as they really were ; he was
the messenger of unwelcome truth, without illusion
and without deception; for forty years, day by day,
he delivered his testimony against king and priests and

364 THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

prophets, like a pillar of iron, like a wall of brass,
solitary, fearless, undismayed.^ And when the judg-
ments closed around himself and his people, he alone
had the courage to counsel submission to a fate which
seemed inevitable. Not from indiiference to his coun-
try, hut from a deeper insight into its higher destiny,
he advised the concessions which others despised. Un-
like the ordinary leaders of political or religious parties,
he had the wisdom to surrender a part for the sake of
the whole, to concede the loss of the short to-day for
the sake of gaining the long to-morrow.

At last, however, the end came ; at last the queenly
city fell ; at last the cup of misery was drunk to the
dregs. Then the whole tone of the Prophet changes.
His exhortations, his invectives, his counsels of modera-
tion and of prudence are suspended. One only feeling
takes possession of his mind. ''After the captivity of
Judah, and the desolation of Jerusalem," so we are
told in one ^ of the oldest of Jewish traditions, " Jere-
miah sate down and wept, and lamented his lamentation
over Jerusalem." A rocky cave outside the walls is
still shown as that in which the Prophet buried himself
in liis passionate grief. His awestruck figure, his atti-
tude of hopeless sorrow, remain forever enshrined in
the genius of Michael Angelo. His words themselves
are preserved to us in the Book of the Lamentations.
There we see how his agony was allowed free course.
Here and there he still dwells for a moment on the
sins and follies of his people ; here and there for a
moment he cries for vengeance on their enemies. But
for the most part these thoughts are gone. What
fills his mind is the ruin of the royal city, the black
and ghastly forms of the once polished and luxurious

1 Jer. i. 17, 18; iii. iv.; v. 30; vii. 11.

2 The Preface to Lamentations, in the Septuagint version.

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS. 365

nobles wasted into skeletons, the high-born women in
their crimson robes vainly striving to eke out from the
foul heaps of filth the failing supply of food ; above all
the little children, with their parched tongues, fainting
in the streets, asking for bread, crying to their mothers
for corn and wine.^

The Book, from beginning to end, is a heart-rending
picture of calamities which have only to be compared
with the actual experience of like events in succeeding
ages, to make us feel the literal truth of every part.
It is the one Book which the Bible contains filled
from first to last with the almost unalloyed expression
of unrestrained ai:!guish, and utter, inconsolable deso-
lation.

From this Book of Lamentations, thus placed among
the sacred Scriptures, what do we learn ?

First, there is the general principle which it involves,
old indeed as the heart of man, but sometimes forgot-
ten, and always needing to be re-enforced, that over
and above, and beyond, and beside, and across all other
calls and claims on our thoughts, is the cry of suffering
humanity. However much Jeremiah had to say and
to think of the sins of his people, and the superstitions
of their prophets, or of the great prospects of the
future kingdom of God ; however much he had dwelt
on these things in former times, yet now, in the pres-
ence of this overwhelming sorrow, they were put aside,
they were almost, if not altogether, forgotten. He who
had been regarded by his countrymen as a traitor, was
once more drawn into the closest sympathy with them.
He who had been excommunicated by the priests and
prophets of his Church was again one with them
through the constraining bonds of their common woe.
The Book of Lamentations is the standing testimony

1 Lam. i. 1; ii. 9, 11, 12, 19; iv. 4, 5, 7, 8.

366 THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

to the absorbing, predominant sacredness of human
suffering. " Death quits all scores " — misery makes
companions of the most widely estranged. The soul,
the intellect, the spirit, are indeed higher than the
body. But there are times when physical distress has
the first and deepest claim — when the homely maxim
of St. James takes precedence of all philosophy and all
theology. " If thy brother or thy sister be naked, or
in lack of daily food, and one of you saith unto them.
Go in peace, be ye warmed, and filled, — and yet ye
give them not the things needful to the body, what
doth it profit? "1 On such occasions, the mere supply
of outward wants, the simplest attention to the call of
humanity, becomes a solemn, religious obligation, the
first, second, and third duty of every Christian. It
breaks down partitions, it opens all hearts, it finds its
way through all Churches, it unites all nations. One
touch of sorrow and pain, like one touch of nature,
makes the whole world kin.

And if this be the general lesson of the Book of
Lamentations, who can doubt its special application to
the subject which to-day fills our thoughts? Here
again, as in the time of the Prophet, such a spectacle
is presented to us as at once arrests all the various con-
flicting emotions and opinions which the events of the
last six months have inevitably produced amongst us.
Whatever we may any of us have felt on the origin of
this dreadful war, however much we may have con-
demned its authors, however bitterly we may have
mourned over the means, on one side or the other, by
which it has been prolonged and carried on — all these
thoughts now sink to the second place ; we think, we
dream only or chiefly of the overwhelming misery of
the two millions of human beings, exposed to want,
1 James ii. 16.

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS. 367

to cold, to discomfort of every kind, increasing in
intensity till it reaches famine, starvation, and death.
My brethren, such a spectacle so produced has not
been within the experience of this generation, in some
respects not within the experience of any generation of
modern history. There have been great national visita-
tions, like the Irish Famine of 1846, like the Cotton
Famine of our Northern districts in 1862 ; there have
been also sieges both in ancient and modern times in
which greater miseries have been endured. But a
siege on so vast a scale has never been seen before in
the world's annals — a distress at once so widely spread
and so suddenly revealed has never been, before this,
disclosed to mortal eyes. In the presence of such a
misfortune, it is, I will not say the cliief duty, it is the
chief consolation of the bystanders, to do what in them
lies to lighten it. It draws us out of ourselves. It
compels us to feel that we too are part of the great
human family. It invites us, it cries to us, to come to
the rescue.

There are two special calls which this vast disclosure
of misery makes upon us. One is of a more remote
but of a more permanent kind — the other, more imme-
diate and pressing. Let us speak of the more remote
reflection first.

It is now nearly thirty years ago that a great aca-
demical audience was thrilled by the moving descrip-
tion which one of the wisest and best of England's
teachers ^ gave of the siege of Genoa during the last
great European war. It was told with the view of
fixing public attention upon the cruel necessities im-
posed on armies and on nations by the present condi-
tion of the laws of war ; and the speaker urged, with
an impressive earnestness, which none who heard it can

1 Arnold's Lectures on Modern History, pp. 168-72.

368 THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

ever forget, that great cities should no longer be turned
into fortresses, and that, whatever have been the hor-
rors of war in past times, the)" might for the future be
relieved of this terrible aggravation. We may be
thankful that in this country the calamities which Paris
has been called upon to endure can never be witnessed ;
for in England no large city can be converted into a
besieged camp, no vast population is enclosed within a
circle of forts which could compel us to suffer, or our
enemies to inflict, what became inevitable in France
from the moment that its capital Avas invested. It may
be that in the conflict of fierce passions, even when
peace is concluded, the hope, the desire to avert such
miseries for the future may wax feeble, and that no
voice of Christian minister or wise philanthropist will
be strong enough to root out for ever this special cause
of human suffering. Yet it may be worth while to
remind ourselves and others of the cause of its exist-
ence. It is something even in the way of consolation
to remember that this particular form of suffering
ought to have been avoidable, that it is not even one of
the necessary consequences of invasion or defence, but
is the result of an exceptional, abnormal state of
things; brought about by a policy which, Avhatever
incidental occasions it may have furnished for the dis-
play of noble endurance, yet was founded on expecta-
tions and calculations confessedly erroneous. May the
widely ramifying miseries which have sprung from this
single root of bitterness, induce those whose high con-
cern it is at least to reconsider the whole question
involved ; may God in His mercy give to them the
mind to know, and the will to act, for the alleviation
at least of this one evil in the times that are yet to
come !

But, as I said before, it is not of evils or remedies in

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS. 369

the far future, or even in the nearer future, that T have
chiefly to speak. It is of a want, pressing, immediate,
close at hand ; it is the want not of a month hence, but
of this week; not of to-morrow, but of to-day. Now
is the time, and ours is the privilege, to unite with the
two contending nations to do what neither of them can
do alone, or even together, for the deliverance from
sickness, from poverty, from famine, of the crowds of
sufferers who, within a day's journey (or what used to
be a day's journey) from our doors, are pining and per-
ishing for lack of food.

Let us think for a moment of the scene of these
unnamed, unnumbered woes — Paris, the capital of
France. Let us for once speak of that great city not
in its frivolous but in its nobler aspects ; not as the
Babylon which made the nations drunk with the cup of
her sorceries, but as the Athens of modern refinement,
the clear luminous eye of Europe ; not as the Lucifer
who made the nations tremble, and scattered terror
and desolation over the earth, but as the bright star of
the morning which has heralded the dawn of many a
glorious day in the progress of humanity ; not as the
city of despotic rule, or of reigns of terror, incredulity,
and fanaticism, of the massacre of St. Bartholomew
and the massacres of September, but as the city of
heroic virtues all its own, of saintly and illustrious
names, which are the glory of all lands, whose praise is
in all the churches — St. Louis and Gerson, Coligny
and Duplessis-Mornay, Descartes and Cuvier, L'HOpital
and D'Aguesseau, Bossuet and Fenelon, Pascal and
Racine, and (coming down almost to our own day,
though still speaking only of the dead) Adolj^he Monod
and Athanase Coquerel, Lacordaire and Montalembert.
Let us think of all that, in these and many more of its
sons, it has embraced of whatever is gracious and gen-

370 THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

erous, benignant and chivalrous, in former ages and in
the present ; enlivening, illuminating, engaging, attract-
ing the best affections round the noblest of human pur-
suits. Let us think of it as the nurse of some of the
tenderest feelings of the human heart, now so sorely
wrung ; of children towards their aged parents, of sons
towards their mothers ; as the second home, may we
not say, to many an English and to many an American
household, bound up with the dear memories of our
own past years, with the thought of happy days and
delightful converse, of friends whose faces recall the
glad recollections of times which now seem parted from
us as if by a chasm of ages, or whom we thankfully
remember to have been snatched away from the evil to
come. Let us enfold these thoughts in the familiar
framework and form of that beautiful city; its encir-
cling hills, its abounding river, its glorious quays, its
brilliant streets, its world-historic squares, its spacious
palaces, its venerable churches, its magnificent muse-
ums, its lengthened avenues, its lovely gardens — the
glory of the world's greatness, the focus of the gayety
of the human heart, the joy of the whole earth.

These are the scenes where death, they tell us, is
now busy, these are the homes where want and misery
has taken the place of splendor and plenty, where, as
in Jerusalem, the young children faint for hunger in
the top of every silent street. " How doth the city sit
solitary that was full of people ! how is she become as
a widow ! she that was great among the nations, and
princess among the provinces." " How is the gold
become dim, and the most fine gold changed ! " " They
that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets."
"They that be slain with the sword are better than
they that be slain with hunger: for they pine away,
stricken through for want of the fruits of the field."

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS. 371

" The elders have ceased from the gate, the young men
from their music; the joy of their heart is ceased; the
dance is turned into mourning. For this their heart is
faint ; for these things their eyes are dim." " Remem-
ber, O Lord, what is come upon them ; consider, and
behold their reproach." In these sacred words I have
described the misery which can be described by none
other so well. None other so fitly belong to a catastro-
phe so awful.

We judge not the vanquished. We judge not the
victors. We would remember that those on whom the
tower in Siloam fell were not sinners above the rest of-
mankind. We would remember that the successful
nation has itself greatly suffered, and would, had the
tide of war not been driven back from its borders, have
suffered yet more deeply. Neither do we dwell on the
prospect of what has been wrought for the future of
France and Paris by this fiery baptism, — what purifi-
cation, what regeneration, in ways till now unheard of,
towards ends till now undreamed of!

These are not the thoughts which should now fill
our minds. We are with Jeremiah on the rocky mount,
weeping over Jerusalem, not with Jeremiah denouncing,
prophesying, warning, condemning, judging the nations.
We are called simply to assist in a great calamity, which,
by God's good providence, we are specially enabled to
remedy. That close neighborhood of England to France
which has in former ages led to many a bitter rivalry, to
many a cruel war,- to many a threat of invasion, is now
turned for us and for them into a blessed opportunity
for charity, for beneficence, for healing many a worn«-
out frame, for soothing many a stricken heart, for saving
many a precious life. To no other nation in Europe has
the task been so visibly assigned by the finger of God
as it is to us. To none other has such an occasion been

872 THE DISTRESS OF PARIS.

afforded of showing that Christian charity is above dif-
ference of race and creed, above divergent judgments
and clashing sympathies. To us, with our abundant
wealth, with our untouched stores, with our ports close
at hand, to us it has been permitted, in the most literal
sense, to love our neighbor — our great, our suffering
neighbor — as ourselves. To us even the all-powerful
conquerors, in this dread emergency, appeal to aid them
in their truly chivalrous and generous mission of di-
viding with their enemies the sustenance which they
can ill spare. To us, with a yet more urgent entreaty,
the thousands of sufferers themselves cry for assistance ;
the widow and the orphan, left without the hand which
should have worked for their support ; the sickly and
the weakly, to whom even the delicacies of life are
necessaries ; the lower ranks of the middle classes, whose
frugality had hitherto enabled tiiem to struggle against
the bitter poverty which has come in upon them like
an overwhelming flood ; the little babes, whose inno-
cent joyousness might yet have cheered many a deso-
late home, but whose tender lives fade away like flowers
amidst the chilling cold, and biting hunger, and wasting
miseries of this terrible winter.

I venture on no details, for none are known. I use no
elaborate arguments, for none are needed. It is enough
that a great neighboring nation is perishing within sight
of our shores. It is enough that the wisdom and the
necessity of supplying their wants is recognized by all
those who have the best means of knowing. It is enough
that this vast metropolis, and this whole nation, through
its Government, its municipalities, its Churches, and its
sects, responds to the call. It is enough that London
— if any city in the world, the sister city of the capital
which is thus afflicted — has come forward to head this
enterprise of mercy ; and that in this historic church,

THE DISTRESS OF PARIS. 373 (

I

where lie mingled together the illustrious dust of French- !

men and of Englishmen, should be litly made this first
appeal. Give what you can now, for the time is short,
and the labor is long, and the need is urgent, and the
work is great.

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH.

July 4, 1869 (the anniversary of the Declaration of American Inde-
pendence).

I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his trother without
a cause shall he in danger of the judgment : and lohosoever shall say
to his brother, Raca ! shall he in danger of the council: hut whosoever
shall say, Thou fool I shall he in danger of hell fire. — Matthew
V. 22.

The Gospel of this day (the sixth Sunday after
Trinity) requires first to be explained, and then to be
applied to individuals, to Churches, and to nations.

I. It contains certain allusions to the Jewish lan-
guage and customs which need to be brought out in
order to be understood. The phrases " Raca," " coun-
cil," "judgment" — the words which are translated
"Thou fool," and "hell fire " — all imply some thoughts
and usages which were familiar at that time, but which
we have lost.

Our Lord is speaking t)f the sin of thoughts and
words, as separate from acts, of anger. There is first
the causeless anger. No doubt there is such a thing
as righteous indignation, just anger : our Lord Him-
self showed it ; no character is perfect without it. But
there is such a thing as anger merely for anger's sake ;
readiness to take affront ; rudeness, because we do not
take the trouble to be civil ; irritation, because we allow
every thing to irritate us. We sometimes think it no
matter whether we quarrel or not. It does matter a
great deal. Never quarrel, if you can possibly help it.

874

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH. 375

This is the first thing which our Saviour urges. It is
not enough to keep from striking a man dead ; we must
keep ourselves from those quarrels which lead to mur-
der. " Whosoever shall be angry with his brother with-
out a cause shall be in danger of the judgment" — that
is, although it may not be a very great fault, yet it is a
fault, a fault fully as worthy of condemnation as many
of those acts which are condemned by the judgment of
the courts of justice when they sentence a man to a
month's imprisonment or to a pecuniary fine for some
assault or theft.

But besides the feeling of anger, there is the still fur-
ther mischief of angry words ; and of these our Lord
takes two instances. One is " Raca." That is a Syriac
word, meaning ''empty," "shallow," "thoughtless," such
an expression of contempt as is often used in common
conversation, and which leaves a rankling sore behind,
because it is contemptuous. " Whoever uses such a
word," he says, "ought to feel that he deserves such
a severe condemnation as would be pronounced by
the highest court of appeal in the whole country —
by the great council or Sanhedrim itself." It is another
step in the scale of offences ; and though it is quite
true that no council, civil or ecclesiastical, can take
cognizance of mere expressions, though the law of Eng-
land has long since ceased to regard words as treason-
able, yet, in the judgment of God, and in the court of
conscience, these light and contemptuous phrases hare
a significance which does injury both to those who utter
them, and to those who hear them.^

There is yet another form of angry words- that is still
more mischievous. There are some words which not
merely express general contempt, but gather into them-

1 This is well put in Professor Maurice's Kingdom of Christ, vol. ii.
p. 322.

376 THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH.

selves an intensity of virulence, from being associated
with political or religious passions, and thus convey
a bitterness of meaning far beyond their own. Such a
word was that which in our English version is trans-
lated " Thou fool." It may be interesting to those who
can follow the original to know that this is not, as is
often supposed, a Greek word, nor does it perhaps mean
"fool." It is a Hebrew or Syriac word, moreh^ like the
other word raca ; and though it probably gains an
additional strength of meaning from its likeness to the
Greek word more ("fool"), its own proper signification
is " rebel " or " heretic," one who wilfully breaks the
laws of his Church or country — one who would pre-
sume to teach his own teachers. It is the same word
which Moses (Num. xx. 10) uses to the Israelites :
" How now, ye ' rebels ' .? " i It was, according to the
Jewish tradition, for using this offensive word to God's
people that he was forbidden to enter the promised
land. And, accordingly, it is this which our Lord visits
with His severest condemnation. He says that though
it is beyond the reach of any earthly tribunal, though
it is a word used by religious men and grave authori-
ties in their own defence, yet it deserves as much shame
and reproach as belongs to those whose carcases were

1 This meaning of the word, and the mistake of the usual version of
the New Testament, was first brought before me in a tract by Professor
F. W, Newman. It is also noticed by Dean Alford, as one out of two
or three interpretations. This is confirmed by Mr. Deutsch, who adds
this important comment : — " ' The word more,' says the Midrash, * has
many meanings. It means " rebel ; " it means " fool," for thus they call
a fool in the sea towns (i.e. the Greek colonies). It means such as
would presume to teach their own teachers. It means throwers of poi-
soned arrows, calumny, etc' "

I am further indebted to the learning of Mr. Deutsch for a parallel
in the Talmud to the whole passage : — " He who calls his neighbor a
slave shall be anathematized ; he who calls him a bastard shall receive
forty stripes ; he who calls him rasha (wicked) shall answer for it to the
offended one in his own person (i.e. the law has nothing to do with an
intangible offence)."

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH. 377

thrown out into the valley of Hinnom — Ge-henna, as it
was called — where they were burned up in the fires
which consumed all the offal of the city. (This is the
meaning of the words which we translate in this place
"hell fire." It is the fire, the funeral pile, the burning
furnaces of that dark valley, the Smithfield, the slaugh-
ter-house, the draught-house of Jerusalem.) It is like
that other saying : " Salt is good ; but if the salt has
lost its savor, it is good for nothing but to be trodden
under foot of man." All such words may have had a
grave religious use once, but when used for mere po-
lemical or revengeful purposes, they are as irreligious
and as profane as the common cursing and swearing
which belongs not to the city of Zion, but to the valley
of Gehenna.

II. This is the original meaning of the passage. Now
let us turn to its general application. It teaches us,
like all other parts of our Lord's teaching, that not the
outward act, but the inward spirit, is that which God
judges. But it also calls our special attention to the
mischief and the sin of our words. This is what He
said on another occasion : " By thy words thou shalt be
justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned : "
and it is what His apostle St. James insists upon as the
distinguishing mark between true and false religion —
the power of governing the tongue. Considering the
vast number of words that issue from our lips, consid-
ering how much of our life is carried on in talking,
speaking, preaching, writing, reading, listening — this
is a truth which cannot be too much insisted on. No
doubt there is a precision in words which is pedantic ;
but all honor and praise to those who, consciously or
unconsciously, obey their Lord's command, and try to
measure their language, to define what they mean to
themselves, to avoid phrases without meaning, or which

378 THE chuistian rule of speech.

may injure and hurt the interests and feelings of others.
No doubt there are cases where, like our Lord Himself,
we are bound to use strong words against folly and sin.
But there are some whose lips act not as a fence to
their tongues, but as a mere opening, through which
flows an unceasing cataract of words — good, bad, light,
heavy, wise, foolish — without care or thought of who
may hear or of what may follow. There are also some
whose pens are dipped in gall, who seem to delight in
saying what will vex or annoy their neighbors; who
have a cynical sneer, a scornful jest, a bitter insult for
every one whom they meet. Their whole conversation
is one long repetition of " Raca, Raca." Truly they
are in dangfer of condemnation of the council — not of
any earthly council, but of the council of all good and
wise men everywhere, of the council of the calm, and
just, and holy, of those who know, with our own
Hooker, that "the time will come when three words
spoken in charity will be worth more than ten thousand
words of disdainful scorn."

But there is yet a still more special application. The
judgment of our Lord is yet more penetrating. There
are many men who, whilst they avoid the common pro-
fane terms of abuse and contempt, yet think it even a
duty to use those words of bitter inextinguishable
hatred which have come down to us, like the Hebrew
word 7noreh, charged with the passions and prejudices
of a thousand generations — those names which having
been invented long ago by political or religious ani-
mosity, perhaps almost with an innocent intention, con-
vey now a depth of offensiveness which no other words
from the mouth of men could convey. I hardly venture
in this sacred place to call up the black catalogue of
such names before you, yet from places as sacred as
this they have unhappily been often heard. They are

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH. 379

legion. On one side they are " heretic, schismatic,
rationalist, infidel, deist, socinian, atheist ; " on the other
they are "papist, antichrist, Babylon, idolater, blas-
phemer, traitor ; " on one side or on the other they are
followed by a brood of other like names. They are
one and all repetitions of the same old word, " rebel,"
"heretic," expressed by the Hebrew word moreh — they
combine within themselves, as did that word, the in-
tense virulence, both of the Jewish and of the Gentile
race ; they have one and all been applied in their day to
the best and wisest of men ; and they are one and all
good for nothing but to be thrown into the valley of
Hinnom, and burnt up with the filth and offal, and off-
scourings of dead abuses, and worn-out hatreds, and
extinct controversies. Even though, like the word
moreh itself, they may once have come out of Scripture,
and from the pure fountain of life, they have now be-
come full of fire and brimstone ; they are as worthless,
as mischievous, as polluting, as the coarse oaths and
scurrilous epithets which are used by the less refined
in their daily quarrels and wrangles in taverns and in
fish-markets.

These thoughts are unhappily never out of place.
Everywhere there will be some who are tempted to use
these or like words against their neighbors ; everywhere
there will be those who in sermons, or in newspapers,
or in speeches, if not in common conversation, think it
a sacred duty to use them. And thus our Lord's warn-
ing needs to be everywhere lifted up. We have given
up the ancient practice of killing our neighbors by slow
torture in deep dungeons, or of carrying out our quar-
rels with murderous weapons. Feudal vengeance and
the barbarous custom of duelling^ are both abandoned.
The more necessary is it that we should be reminded
that this is not enough, unless we restrain our tongues

880 THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH.

from those fierce words of scorn which duelling at
least attempted to control ; the more do we need to be
reminded that not only is every duellist a murderer,
but he who says to his brother '' Raca," that is, who
uses those insulting words which set the human heart
on fire, and leave a blister there forever.

And again, we have given up the practice of killing
our neighbors by fire, and sword, and rack, and scourge,
for holding different opinions from ourselves. So much
the more necessary is it for us to remember that this is
not enough, unless we restrain our tongues from those
biting and burning words which show that we nourish
in our hearts the same feelings of undying wrath that
our ruder forefathers expressed by carrying fagots to
the stake, or tearing the flesh from the bones of our
victims. So much the more do we need to be reminded
that not only the old Inquisitors or the old Puritans
were persecutors, but all who say to their brethren,
Moreh^ that is, "rebel," "heretic," that is, who use
those anathemas and furious words of ancient heredi-
tary reproach, which are meant to break up Christian
union, and destroy Christian fellowship.

These expressions are beyond the reach of earthly
tribunals of judgment and of council; but not the less
are they doomed to that extremity of condemnation of
which the valley of Hinnom was the type and symbol.
They belong to that mass of worthless chaff, and of
stinging briers and brambles, which will be burned up
at last, as we hope, in a fire unquenchable.

III. This warning, spoken first against the language
of individuals, is also needed for the language of
Churches and nations. It is needed for them even
more, because the interests at issue are greater; be-
cause also their temptation to indulge in these words is
stronger. Look at the Churches of Christendom. How

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH. 381

many a solemn document has issued from press or
pulpit, whicli is, after all, nothing but a long reverbera-
tion of Moreh, moreli^ " Thou fool ! thou rebel ! " Look
at the anathemas hurled in former times by East against
West, and by West against East, by Presbyterians
against Prelates, and by Prelates against schismatics.
Listen to their echoes in our own times — fainter, let
us hope, but still coming of the same stock, springing
out of the same bottomless pit. Look, too, at the
contemptuous insolence with which nations have in-
vented words of reproval for hostile or oppressed or
subject nations ; words which stick in the memory when
the occasion, the excuse for them has long ceased;
fountains of bitterness, which from generation to gen-
eration keep alive the sense of soreness and revenge,
and stimulate to deeds of bloodshed and war.

What is the check to all this? It is contained in
one word, which occurs throughout this passage — " Thy
brother." Each man, in common life, has a brotherly,
family relation to his neighbor, even to his enemy, which
ought to make him feel and practise towards him some-
thing of a brother's respect, something of a brother's
consideration. Each Church and nation — at least of
Christendom — has a brotherly, sisterly relationship
with all other Churches and nations ; flesh of the same
flesh, bone of the same bone, called by the same sacred
name; which ought at least to induce courtesy, sym-
pathy, fear to give offence, wish to bury the past, deter-
mination never to quarrel, hope to avoid irritating
words, as well as irritating acts, and malignant names,
which are but covers of malignant deeds.

There are many cases to which these remarks might
specially appl}^ There is one immediately at hand.
This day is the Fourth of July. It is the anniversary
of the Declaration of American Independence — the

882 THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH.

anniversary of the breach between the mother and the

daughter country. On such a day may we not feel

that our Lord's warnings have a peculiar significance

and force ? The sons of that great Republic are, indeed,

our brothers — brothers in a sense in which no other

two great nations on the face of this earth are brothers

and sisters to each other ; speaking the same language,

inheriting the same traditions, descended from the same

ancestors, intwined with the same dearest relationships,

rejoicing in the same history, in the same faith, in the

same hopes.

Both, no doubt, of these two mighty brothers have,

like the actual brothers of an actual family, had their

temper tried or their passions roused, sometimes the

elder by the younger, sometimes the younger by the

elder ; but not the less are the ancient bonds of union

indissoluble, not the less of them are the poet's words

true : —

No distance breaks the tie of blood ;

Brothers are brothers evermore ;
Nor wrong, nor wrath of deadliest mood,

That magic may o'erpower.^

And how specially true is it of these brothers that hard
words may kill, and gentle words save, the peace and
life between them ! How deeply was that first breach
widened on the first anniversary by the bitter recrim-
inations of king and statesmen, of the mother country
and of the daughter colony ! How fiercely were the
words tossed to and fro across the Atlantic — " Raca "
on one side, and '^ Moreh " on the other; "tyrant" from
the one, and " rebel " from the other ! Yet how speedily,
how easily was that wound closed ! how soon did the
Declaration of Independence become the name for the
peaceful birth of a new and glorious nation ! how soon
1 Keble's Christian Year, 2d Sunday after Trinity.

THE CHRISTIAN RULE OF SPEECH. 383

did the minister of the young Republic pay respectful
homage, and receive respectful recognition, in the court
of the ancient sovereign ! What American is there
who is not now proud of that history, which he then
spurned behind him ? What Englishman is there who
is not now proud of the once dreaded name of Wash-
ington ?

So, as years roll on, may all those fierce watchwords
of party strife and national hatred perish and cease to
be ! So may each succeeding generation learn to leave
those ancient curses to consume away in the fires of
the dark valley whence they came, among the offal and
carrion from which they originally sprang !

Woe on either side to those who revive those relics
of barbarous days, those signals of strife and bitter-
ness I Blessings on those peacemakers who, from
either side, by gentle phrase, by conciliating temper,
by determination not to give or take offence, by rigid
abstinence from insulting words, as from something
altogether unholy and accursed, bind together the two
nations in one communion and fellowship of good
deeds, great thoughts, and undying hopes of a yet
more blessed future for both, in the far distant history
of which this day was the first inauguration — when
neither distance of space nor wrath of man shall put
asunder those whom God, by speech, by blood, by the
wonders of Science, and by the grace of Religion, has
joined together.

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

June 6, 1866, at the first annual service for the Bishop of London's Fund.i

Build Thou the walls of Jerusalem. — Psalm li. 18.

We are met together to consecrate a great religious
effort. Let us for a moment look at such religious ef-
forts and consecrations in former times. They will
teach us what is meant by enthusiasm in a holy cause.
These walls themselves speak to us of it in language
not to be mistaken. Had we been present here at such
a meeting as this in the twelfth or thirteenth century,
every one would have known what had called us to-

1 Prayer before the Sermon. — O Lord, raise up, we pray Thee, Thy
power and come among us, and with great might succor us ; that
whereas through our sins and wickedness we are sore let and hindered
in running the race that is set before us, we may daily increase and go
forwards in the knowledge and faith of Thee and of Thy Son, by the
Holy Spirit: so that as well by these Thy ministers, as by them amongst
whom they minister, Thy holy Name may be forever glorified, and Thy
blessed Kingdom enlarged. Grant unto them grace and wisdom to
hold up the weak, heal the sick, bind up the broken, bring again the
outcasts, seek the lost, in this vast city, scattered abroad as sheep with-
out a shepherd. Put it into the hearts of those whom Thou hast blessed
with wealth and power, as they have freely received, freely to give of
their abundance. Take away from us all hatred and prejudice, and
whatever else may hinder us from godly union and concord in all good
works; that as there is but one Body, and one Spirit, and one hope of
our calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us
all, so we may henceforth be all of one heart and one soul, united in one
holy bond of Truth and Peace, and Faith and Charity; through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen.

Service for the 7)a?/. — First Lesson, Isa. Ixi. Second Lesson, St.
John X. 1-16. Anthem, " Hallelujah Chorus." Introit, " Jerusalem the
Golden." Epistle, 1 St. John iv. 7-21. Gospel, St. Luke xvi. 19-31.

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 385

gether. , The object which then occupied the whole
religious world was one which admitted of no mistake,
and no wavering allegiance. We should have been
inaugurating one of the mighty efforts for the redemp-
tion of the Holy City from the hands of the Saracens.
To this work the first Crusading king was devoted
almost on the da}'' of his coronation in this place. Into
this work two of the princes who here lie close to each
other flung themselves no less eagerly. Another ex-
pired almost beneath this roof, with the expression on
his lips of the long-cherished hope that he should die.
in Jerusalem. Another, his still more stirring son, the
conqueror of Agincourt, as he lay on his deathbed, and
heard the chanting of the penitential Psalm, bade them
halt at the words, " Build Thou the walls of Jerusalem,"
and with the dying wish that he could have fulfilled
that prayer, as once he had hoped, passed away from
the earth. The venerable ancestress of the House of
Tudor, no less saintly than wise, carried on the strain,
and breathed the last sigh of those inspiring times, when
she- declared that if the Christian princes would again
combine in one final effort, she would attend the army
in the humblest and meanest of all capacities. So gen-
eral, so ardent, was that great enthusiasm. All shared
in it. Even those that remained aloof dared not con-
demn it. Even the second founder of this noble edifice
was hardly excused by all his splendid works for his
unwillingness to join in the universal effort. Princes,
nobles, peasants, women, soldiers, clergy, even little
children caught the grand contagion. None liked to
be behindhand. It was discreditable, it was unortho-
dox, it was unworthy, it was cowardly to hang back.
Many motives, worldly, superstitious, religious, — ex-
citement, romance, love of adventure, — mingled in the
persuasion that drew them on. Still the thing itself was,

886 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

as we say, in the air ; there was a fixed belief that to join
in the attempt was the AVill of God, and for that Will
they were prepared to spend fortune and life, in the full
conviction that in so doing they were doing the best for
themselves, for the world, and for God.

This enthusiasm has long since passed away. The
Crusader sleeps on his marble tomb, and no successors
have risen to follow in his train. It may even be said
that the effort itself was founded on a mistake, and was
for an object which has come to naught. But I have
called your attention to it, because it exactly exemplifies
what sort of passion and energy that is which is needed
to accomplish mighty works ; and because, as we think
of it, the question irresistibly rises in our minds, Is
there no new Crusade which we can preach, and you
can fight, now that the old Crusades are dead and
gone ? Is there no New Jerusalem to be built again,
its waste city raised up, its desolations of many genera-
tions repaired ?

Yes ; there is assuredly the vast Christian effort, of
which one part at least has called us here together.
The Crusade of the nineteenth century is not less holy,
not less stirring, than that of the thirteenth. The
Jerusalem for which we must live and die is that which
lies all around us in this enormous city, ground down
by evils as gigantic and as terrible as ever were the
oppressors under whom the Syrian Jerusalem groaned,
but to be raised, repaired, restored, enlarged. Look
to the Gospel and Epistle of this week ; the Gospel
which proclaims the rich man's duties, the Epistle in
which the beloved disciple entreats us "to love one
another:" ''If God so loved us, we ought also to love
one another." These are the war-cries of our Crusade ;
this is the enthusiasm which we are to enkindle. To
love, that is, to make the best and the most of every

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 387

human soul, to make this the chief object of our politi-
cal, ecclesiastical, and social life, — this is what we have
to proclaim. To hang back from this war of charity,
this chivalric attack of beneficence, on sin, and igno-
rance, and selfishness, and misery, and want, is as he-
retical, as discreditable — may I say, as unworthy of a
nobleman, or a gentleman, or a Christian? — as ever was
thought the conduct of recreant knight, or selfish prince,
or worldly merchant, who refused to take the Red Cross
under Richard or Saint Louis.

The object surely is ten thousand times greater. It
is not, as then, for the mere name of Christ, or for the
outward sepulchre of Christ, but for the very work
and command of Christ Himself that we are now called
to fight. In a certain limited sense He was with the old
Crusaders, as He was with the ancient Jews. But in
the call to universal charity, in the call to build up the
ruins of human society, to repair the breaches, and
guard against the decay, of ages, we are in the most
absolute and literal sense obeying the summons which
He made to His first disciples, and which is of the very
essence of His character. It is for the sake of rais-
ing, recovering, purifying, sanctifying, humanizing those
very souls for which He died, that we are called to make
a new effort, to receive a new commandment, to sound a
new Crusade, to awaken a new devotion.

And that devotion, let us be sure, is there to arouse,
if we know how to find it, and how to employ it. Per-
suade by your success, by your sincere and enlightened
zeal, the powerful, the intelligent, the wealthy classes
of this metropolis and of this country, that any good
work in which you are engaged is one of pure, unmixed
usefulness ; and then, depend upon it, the spirit of the
Crusaders will once more rise in the hearts of us their
descendants ; the generosity of the ancient princes and

888 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

prelates of the Middle Ages will revive, as it actually
has revived in the minds of at least two illustrious and
munificent individuals of our own day, who have had
the discernment to see their object clear before them,
and the grace to accomplish it by their ample means ;
and this spirit will spread with a force as much more
mighty, an effect as much more visible, as the resources
of our age are vaster than those of five centuries past,
as the victories of zeal according to knowledge, and
faith working by love, ought to be greater than of zeal
almost without knowledge, and faith almost without
charity.

If henceforth it could become the rule of English life
that all should devote at least a tenth of their income to
the good of others in any form that seems best to the
mind of each, what a revolution might be effected in
the condition of the poor, what an alleviation of human
suffering, what a blessed change in the prospects of
Christianity itself!

So much for the general call of our age. Let me
state some of the reasons why, in this call, the work of
the evangelization of London, for which we are now
met together, may justly take a chief place ; why it is,
humanly speaking, full of the promise of the utmost
good, with the slightest admixture of evil.

First, whatever it may effect, it professes no other
object than to promote the welfare of the people of
London. It attacks no one, it attacks nothing, except
sin and ignorance. - It is not intended to exclude any,
but to include all. It represents no party in the
Church of England, but the Church of England itself.
Whatever the Church of England is, that also in its
measure is the Bishop of London's Fund. It holds out
its resources to all within the Church who choose to
use them. It does not throw over this or that person,

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 389

this or that party, because they happen for the moment
to be unpopuhxr. It has the courage rather to support
them, even at the cost of temporary sacrifice. No
forms of Christian belief within our pale, however
extreme, are exempted from a share in its aid, if only
they are combined with active usefulness in the Lord's
vineyard. The name of "the Bishop of London's
Fund " is itself a guaranty for its true character. It
owes its origin to the unwearying charity and energy
with which, at the cost of ease and health, your present
Chief Pastor has thrown himself into this and every
other movement for the welfare of his great diocese.
But it takes its permanent stand on that diocese itself.
Each of the leading sees of the English Church has,
no doubt, its own historical influences which may trans-
form its occupant into something beyond himself. But
of all these influences, though some may be more
elevating, others more magnificent, others more re-
straining, others more enlightening, others more poetic,
none can be more inspiring of large beneficence, of
practical sense, of wide impartiality, of lofty designs,
than those which belong to the see of this immense
metropolis. Here, if in any see in Christendom, the
magnitude of the task may well humble the proudest,
the vainest of men ; before its multiplicity of conflict-
ing views and interests the narrowest may become wide;
the very thought of presiding over the greatest city
which this earth contains, with all its world-wide power
and wealth, might well raise the most prosaic and most
worldly of men above the petty struggles of the mo-
ment in Church and State, into the atmosphere of those
deeds and thoughts which belong not to party, but to
mankind, the love of human souls, and the fear of God
Most High. Other sees may lose their significance, but
the see of London never, so long as England remains a

390 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

nation. In the result of this effort, the Church of Eng-
land is on its trial, failing with its failure, triumphant
in its success.

Secondly, the work before us belongs exactly to that
kind of duty in which the teaching of the Gospel and
the circumstances of our time coincide with the utmost
force.

The sin which Christ most frequently denounces (with
one exception, of which we are not now speaking) is the
sin of doing nothing. It is the sin of the rich man of this
week's Gospel, of whom no ill is recorded, except that a
poor man lay at his gate, and received no comfort or
sympath}^ It is the sin to which the easy, the wealthy,
the prosperous, are constantly tempted. It is the sin
— or the virtue, as we sometimes call it — of letting
well alone, of not meddling in other men's matters, of
trusting that Providence will find a way for escape.
That old maxim of ecclesiastical wisdom, " to let things
go as they are going," has a kind of prudence of this
world, of prudence in one sense, but in all higher senses
a rashness how portentous ! To let things go as they
are going ; to let this vast population go on increasing,
multiplying, with no restraining, regenerating influences,
till it becomes uncontrollable, unmanageable, illimitable,
as the sea in its strength, as the fire in its fury ; to let
this huge train of human society, with all its precious
freight of human lives and souls, rush on towards the
chasm which lies before it ; to let it pass, because per-
chance it will last our day, because we have not taken
the trouble to look ahead, or go forwards with the sig-
nal of danger, or repair the broken line which it has to
traverse ; — this neglect, this indifference is, as we say,
only negligence, only indolence, only want of fore-
thought. But oh ! with what tremendous consequences,
with what crash of hopes and lives, even in the smaller

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 391

spheres of human duty ! with what still greater crashes,
sooner or later, in the history of nations ! All honor
to any one who has the courage at least to look the
peril in the face ; to wave the danger-flag ; to discard
that old maxim, of which I just now spoke, so popular
in the days of old ; to "go before his flock," in the true
spirit of the Good Shepherd, if with no other purpose,
at least to show what is to be done, what to be feared,
what to be hoped.

Truly, in this matter of the neglect of the moral con-
dition of our humbler population, as in the matter of
the neglect of the material resources of our country,
we may listen to that warning voice which was raised
but the other day in the great Council of the nation,
reminding us of the sacrifices we are bound to make
for the sake of posterity ; reminding us of the immense
debt we owe to posterity, which it is our bounden duty
to repay. " In the name of that dutiful concern for
posterity which has been strong in every nation that
ever did any thing great, and which has never left the
mind of any such nation until it was already falling
into decrepitude," ^ our philosophic statesman called
upon us to husband our natural resources, that we
might still bequeath to the coming generations the
gifts which former generations have bequeathed to us.
In the name of that same dutiful concern for posterity,
the Christian Evangelist may well labor to see that we
do what in us lies to diminish that festering mass of
barbarism, and irreligion, and ignorance, against which
the most heroic virtue of after times will else contend
in vain, — may well labor to be the unseen, unknown
yet not unremembered, benefactor cf ages yet unbprn.
It is not too late now : it may be too late a few years
hence.

1 SiDeech of Mr. J. S. Mill, on the Malt Duty, April 17, 1866.

892 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

And tliirdl}^ how is this good work so auspiciously,
so opportunely begun, to be carried on ?

It must be carried on, like all good works in this
complicated age of ours, not by solitary efforts, not by
the Red-Cross knight pricking forth alone in quest of
adventure, but by organization, by co-operation, by dis-
cipline, by comprehension of all the gifts you can com-
mand. There should be a place for every one who is
ready to work in the army of God. " The enthusiasm
should not be allowed to die out in an}^ one for want
of the occupation best calculated to keep it alive."
This work should be the natural outlet for all the pent-
up energies of our multifarious age. All the random
enterprise, honest doubt, imperfect faith, eccentric ac-
tivity, eager zeal, homely sense, ardent aspirations of
the rising generation should here find that they have
their proper work to do under their willing leaders.
Let one, if he can, win souls by his ritual ; another,
if he can, by his schools; another by his preaching
and teaching; another by his provident clubs or his
lectures ; another by his personal intercourse from
house to house ; let one throw himself into the force
of the everlasting Gospel of Jesus Christ in its original
fulness and freshness; let another, if he finds it more
easy, work it out in its later dogmatic manifestations.
"There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit . . .
differences of administration, but the same Lord . . .
diversities of operations, but it is the same God which
worketh all in all." Here, it may be, a sudden, strong
inroad is to be made to clear out one of those nests of
corruption which infect a whole neighborhood ; there,
we see the beneficent effect of the better dwellings and
purer habits to which modern philanthropy at last has
turned its serious attention ; here (which, I am told,
is now the special need and opportunity) districts,

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 393

separated from the overgrown parishes of which they
form a part, are to be turned into separate, and, as it
is hoped in time, self-supporting spheres of pastoral
ministration. Only in all let us bear in mind the end
for which we labor; the end for wliich the walls of
Jerusalem are to be built up ; the end for which, in
simpler and more Christian language, "he who loves
God is to love his brother also." It is to make the
people of London better than they are now. It is to
make them more temperate, more pure, more truthful,
more devout. In comparison of this all our appliances
are merely as means to ends. Ritual, preaching, schools,
church-going, chapel-going. Religion itself, are but so
many means which God in His infinite mercy has given
to bring men nearer to Himself, by making them like
to Himself in holiness, goodness, and truth. Individu-
als, households, streets, reclaimed from vice and sin,
and living justly, soberly, and reverently, in the fear
of God and in charity with their neighbors — these are
the one convincing proof of the reality of your mission,
of the efficiency of your work. For the sake of mak-
ing men good — it is a homely phrase, but it is no less
certainly true — Christ lived, died, and rose again.
For the sake of making men good, we must not disdain,
after His example, and in His Spirit, to spend, and to
be spent. Choose for this end, let this Fund choose
for this end, whatever means, after mature experience,
are thought best to secure it. But in God's name, in
the name of Christ our Saviour, remember that this
is our end, and that unless we in some measure accom-
plish it, the Church and the Avorld alike will believe
that we have spent our time for naught. Be this your
boast, be this your joy, that you have toiled not for
exalting yourselves or your party, or even your Church ;
but for making men like Christ, and earth like heaven ;

394 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

for making these hundreds and thousands of forgotten
souls worthy of Christian England, manly, upright, citi-
zens, alike of the earthly and of the heavenly city.

And for this object we have a peculiar advantage,
and a peculiar reward. It is the peculiar honor and
privilege of our Established Church, that, whatever its
defects, it has this one advantage, possessed by none
of the unendowed priesthoods and ministries of other
Churches and sects, that it can preach the Gospel to
the poor, literally, without money and without price.
You depend on no voluntary contributions from them ;
you have not to obtain, as others have, the hard-won
savings of those amongst whom you minister for your
own maintenance ; you are " independent " in the best
sense of the word. This Fund, if it enables you to do
nothing else, enables you, in the true spirit of the
Church of England, to go to those from whom you
have nothing to gain, and who can owe nothing to
you, except their own selves. Oh, value this privilege
rightly ! value it as the greatest of ancient philoso-
phers, the greatest of Christian Apostles, declare that
they valued it ! It is the only solution, in our com-
plicated society, of that difficult problem on which they
so touchingly dwell, how to combine the purity and the
delicacy of the relation between teacher and taught,
with the honest hire of which every laborer is worthy,
with the freedom from mere worldly care, which for
every high calling is so indispensable.

And it is also the peculiar reward of your labors that
you have to deal with classes so little known, yet so
deeply interesting, as the vast population of the poor
of England. We are sometimes told of the romance of
missionary enterprise, the charm which leads adventur-
ous spirits across the sea, to preach the Gospel to dis-
tant and heathen races of mankind, . Not for a moment

THE CRUSADE OP CHARITy. 395

would I disparage such a soaring ambition as this. The
lonely death of a lonely missionary preacher, unknown
and unrequited, amongst the savages of Australia has,
believe me, moved the admiring envy of one of the
calmest and most philosophic of modern inquirers.
Yet surely there is a romance and charm at least as
powerful, in purifying and elevating the future hope
of our own country, the sturdy race of our own flesh
and blood, the deep substratum, from which the heart
of our nation is formed, out of which rise, from time to
time, even the nobles and teachers of our land. To ex-
plore that unknown region (I will not say, as some
would say, of heathen darkness, but) of twilight dawn
or of fading day ; to track the strange, mysterious, in-
extricable traditions of dim relio^ious belief floatino: in
those unsophisticated classes ; to ascertain for ourselves
b}^ hearing and seeing what is the real unfeigned creed
of the great mass of the people of England ; to catch
the growth of new thoughts, new customs, new habits
in the dark corners and dusky outskirts of our prime-
val barbarism; to watch the strivings of the Holy
Spirit of God, with groanings that seek in vain for
articulate utterance, yet intercede not in vain before
God and man, as they make themselves felt in the
natural conscience and the domestic affectioTis even
of the worst of men, against all the force of outward
degradation and of inward temptation — surely this is
a voyage of discovery, which, to' the mere intellectual
seeker after truth, much more to the Evangelist of
Christ, has all the charm of an entrance into a new
world, of a passage beyond the pillars of Hercules,
into a region, rich in virgin soil, and unexhausted
mines of knowledge and experience.

And not merely the interest, but the instruction of
such an enterprise ought to be its own sufficient reward.

896 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

In that simple, undefined religious belief of the poor,
defying all the untoward conditions of their outward
life; in that instinct of immortality, proof against all
the trials, and sufferings, and oppressions of their hard
lot; in that deep unfathomable sense, which neither
vice nor ignorance can eradicate, of a Supreme Judge,
and of an all-merciful Saviour ; what an encouragement
to our wavering faith, what a rebuke to our artificial
systems, what a light shining in a dark place to cheer
us onwards ! In their simple, honest, truthful questions,
in their keen insight into the difficulties Avhich have
perplexed the learned of all ages, what a warning to us
to deal with them in all sincerity, what a straight and
easy clew to guide us through all the labyrinths of the
half-informed and the ill-educated to the simplicity of
true wisdom, which is the simplicity that is in Christ !

This, then, is your Crusade. This is that warfare
of Christian Love, to which in the Holy Communion of
this day you pledge yourselves by your sacramental
oath of allegiance to your heavenly Captain. The
work will be slow and gradual. But it will not, it
cannot, like those old Crusades, die and be forgotten,
except through our own fault. They ceased with the
change of times and modes of thought. But "the
poor," the suffering, ignorant poor of London will, I
fear, " be always with us," as long as London lasts ; and
the summons to assist them will, I trust, become louder
and louder as England rises more and more to the sense
of her lofty calling. As often as you see, or as any
of us see, the helmet of Agincourt, the helmet of that
last of the Crusaders, — a Crusader in heart, if not in
act, — towering above our heads in the far vista of this
sacred edifice, let it remind you of those dying words of
his which I have chosen for my text, "Build Thou the
walls of Jerusalem." To his mind, doubtless, they

THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY. 397

conveyed the sense of an expiring effort, which was
come too late to accomplish its object. To our minds,
translated into true Christian language, they ought to
convey the sense of an effort but just begun, of a prayer
which depends on this generation for its fulfilment, of
a trumpet-call which speaks not of that which is ready
to wax old and vanish away, but of that which is full of
life, and energy, and hope.

The heavenly Jerusalem cannot be built in a day,
but it can be built stone by stone, and tower by tower,
even in the midst of Babylon, wherever there is a good
pastor to lead, and a faithful clergy to follow, and a
gallant laity to' advise and assist, and a noble people to
edify and enlighten. And if we sometimes dream of
more zealous faith or of fairer prospects in other ages
or other lands, or of an ideal standard which seems
never to be reached, yet here *and not there, now and
not then, with the resources of the present, not of the
past or of the future, our lot is cast. Be our words
those of the inspired genius of the painter i and poet,
whose illusions were sometimes more solid than other
men's realities —

And did those Feet in ancient time

AValk upon England's mountains green,

And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen ?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded " heights,"

And was Jerusalem builded here,

Among those dark Satanic " streets ? *'

Brmg me my bow of burning gold,

Bring me my arrows of desire ;
Bring me my spear — O clouds unfold,

Bring me my chariot of fire 1

1 Blake.

398 THE CRUSADE OF CHARITY.

I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,

Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.

THE GREEK MASSACRE.

May 15, 1870, being the day after the arrival in England of the remains
of Edward Herbert and Fredericlc Vyner, murdered in Greece with
Edward Lloyd and Count de Boyl on April 21, 1870.

Thy tea?/ is in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters, and Thy
footsteps are not liioion.

Thou leddest Thy people like sheep by the hand of Moses and
Aaron. — Psalm Ixxvii. 19, 20.

This Psalm, ^ sung in this morning's service, is one
of which we know not the exact origin, but which
almost for that very reason appeals more deeply to the
heart of all ages. It describes a soul torn by some
deep grief, some trial which could not be unravelled
or explained, some calamity wliich cut off all the ordi-
nary means of consolation.

The Psalmist cannot sleep for the visions of distress

1 PSALM LXXVII.

I.

"I will cry unto God with my voice,

even unto God will I cry, and He shall hearken unto me."
In the time of my trouble I sought the Lord,

I stretched out my hand and ceased not in the night season,
my soul refused comfort:
" when I think upon God I am in heaviness,
I mnse in mine heart and my spirit waxeth faintl *^

Thou didst hold fast mine eyelids,

I was troubled and spake nothing,
I considered the days of old,

and the years that are past:
" let me call to remembrance my song in the night,

and commune with mine hearti " —
«nd my spirit inquired thus' within Itself : — '

400 . THE GREEK MASSACRE.

that haunt him — " Thou hast held mine eyes waking."
He cannot find words to express his anxiety — "I am
so troubled that I cannot speak." In the long restless
night '^ he stretches out his hand, and cries in vain for
help." Like Jacob, when they brought to him his
son's coat rent and stained with blood, "he refused"
(the same words are used) "he refused to be com-
forted."

It almost seems as if there were something hard and

" Will the Lord absent Himself forever,

and will He be no more entreated ?
is His mercy clean gone forever,

and His promise come utterly to an end for evermore ?
hath God forgotten to be gracious,

will He shut up His lovingkindness in displeasure ? "

Then said I: — " tins is my affliction,

even during the years of the right hand of the Most Highest
I will think of the works of Jehovah,

yea, I will call to mind Thy wonders of old time,
I will sing also of all Thy works,

and my talking shall be of Thy doings."

Thy way, O God, is holy;

who is so great a god as our God ?
Thou art the God that doeth wonders,

and hast declared Thy power among the nations;
Thou didst mightily deliver Thy people,

even the sons of Jacob and Joseph.

The waters saw Thee, O God, the waters saw Thee and were afraid;

the depths also were troubled;
the clouds poured out water, the air thundered,

and Thine arrows went abroad;
the voice of Thy thunder was heard in the whirlwind, lightnings
shone upon the world;

the earth was moved and shook withal.

Thy way was in the sea,

and Thy jiaths in the great waters,
and Thy footsteps were not known, —
Thou leddest Thy people like sheep
by the hand of Moses and Aaron.

The Fsalms, chronologically arranged, by Four Friends.

THE GREEK MASSACRE. 401

cruel in the fate that has overtaken him — an iron law
which has crushed him, a relentless Nemesis that has
struck him down ; — '' Will the Lord absent Himself
forever, and will He be no more entreated? Is His
mercy clean gone forever, and hath His promise come
utterly to an end for evermore ? Hath God forgotten
to be gracious, and will He shut up His lovingkindness
in displeasure ? "

Such despairing, overwhelming thoughts have, no
doubt, in every age and in every country, fallen upon
the heart of many a son and daughter of man. Let us
see to what quarters the Psalmist turns for consolation.
It is, perhaps, somewhat unexpected, yet not on that
account the less capable of being used by us. He goes
out of himself altogether ; he goes out of his own time
and circumstances ; he looks upon himself as part of a
vaster, deeper system. " I have considered the days of
old — the years that are past — the years of the right
hand of the Most Highest. I call to mind His wonders
of old time. I meditate on all His works, and commune
with myself on His doings." He goes back to the
earlier history of his race. He draws his comfort, not
from the thought of his individual condition, but from
his identification with the joys and sorrows of a great
and mighty people. He summons before his imagina-
tion, by a vivid effort, the scene of that famous night
when the Jewish nation was delivered from Egypt in
the passage of the Red Sea. He puts it before himself
and before us in an aspect which, true as it doubtless
was, escapes us in the more measured and tranquil
march of the Mosaic narrative. He speaks of it as
effected not to the sound of trumpet and timbrel, not
in the clearness and calmness of daylight, nor in the
broad and ample spaces left by the receding walls of
water, but in the depth of midnight, amidst the roar

402 THE GREEK MASSACRE.

of the hurricane which caused tlie sea to go back, with
the army pressing close behind, and the driving spray
on either side, amidst a gloom lit up only by the glare
of the lurid lightning, as the Lord looked out from the
thick darkness of the cloud, along a mysterious and
unknown pathway over which the returning waves
relentlessly broke, and which no after age has been able
to discover with certainty. " The waters saw Thee, O
God, the waters saw Thee and were troubled ; yea, the
depths also were troubled and shuddered. The clouds
also poured out water: the skies thundered : Th}^ light-
ning-arrows went abroad : the voice of Thy thunders
rolled along in the whirlwind: the lightnings glared
upon the earth : the earth trembled and shook. Thy
way ivas hi the sea^ and Thy paths in the great waters^ arid
Thy footstej^s were not knoiunr Such was the surprise,
such the mystery, such the terror, such the uncertainty ;
and yet in the midst of all this, a solemn deliverance was
wrought. In one brief abrupt conclusive sentence, the
Psalmist sums it up, as sufficient for them, as suffi-
cient for himself. Through this dark and terrible night,
through that deep and awful baptism, through that long
and perilous way, " Thou leddest Thy people like sheep
hy the hand of Hoses and Aaron.'''' The watchful Shep-
herd was there, through unknown ways, guiding them,
by the hand of the two faithful brothers, leading them,
as a later prophet ^ expresses it, " through the deep, as
a horse in the wilderness, that they should not stumble ;
as a beast goeth down into the valley, the Spirit of the
Lord caused him to rest: so didst Thou lead Thy
people, to make Thyself a glorious name."

This peculiar source of the consolation of the Psalmist
is indeed applicable to many earthly griefs; of some
griefs it is almost the only thing to be said. There

1 Isa. Ixiii. 13. 14.

THE GREEK MASSACRE, 403

may be calamities so strange, so bewildering, so entan-
gled Avitli the mistakes of men, and the chances of acci-
dent, that they seem to send us back at once for our
only comfort to the wide system of the universe of
which they are part, and of which God is the centre.

There is a striking passage in which a great philoso-
pher, the famous Bishop Berkeley, describes the thought
which occurred to him of the inscrutable schemes of
Providence, as he saw in St. Paul's Cathedral a fly
moving on one of the pillars. " It requires," he says,
" some comprehension in the eye of an intelligent spec-
tator to take in at one view the various parts of the
building, in order to observe their symmetry and de-
sign. But to the fly, whose prospect was confined to
a little part of one of the stones of a single pillar, the
joint beauty of the whole or the distinct use of its parts
were inconspicuous. To that limited view, the small
irregularities on the surface of the hewn stone seemed
to be so many deformed rocks and precipices." That
fly on the pillar, whether of that Cathedral of which'
the philosopher spoke or of this Abbey in which we are
assembled, is the likeness of each human being as he
creeps along the vast pillars which support the universe.
The sorrow which appears to us nothing but a yawning
chasm or hideous precipice may turn out to be but the
loining or cement which binds together the fragments
of our existence into a solid whole. That dark and
crooked path in which we have to grope our way in
doubt and fear, may be but the curve which, in the full
daylight of a brighter world, will appear to be the ne-
cessary finish of some choice ornament, the inevitable
span of some majestic arch.

Again, there are calamities where, as in the case of
the Psalmist, we derive a certain comfort, not to be
despised (for it comes from Him who has made us),

404 THE GREEK MASSACRE.

from feeling that not only the events of the world, but
ourselves, in our own individual being and circles, are,
in a still closer sense, parts of a larger whole. It may
be that we are enabled to feel the consolation of being
one of a wide famil}^ or race, which is bowed down with
us in our sorrows, which makes our sorrows its own, as
we make theirs ours. It may be, that we have a grief
which by its very suddenness and severity strikes the
hard cold heart of the outer world and neighborhood,
and brings out from their unknown depths those springs
of natural affection which it is the very object, if one
may say so, of such startling, inexplicable dispensations
to evoke and make manifest. It may even be that our
grief is one in which a whole nation joins ; in which the
hearts of a mighty people are moved with us, " as the
trees of the forest are moved with the wind ; " in which
the whole community suddenly fmds itself, under the
inspiration of deep and strong emotion, one heart and
one soul, drawn together as one family, mourning for
its children, as " Rachel " on her rocky hill was " weep-
ing for her children, and refused to be comforted be-
cause they were not." Then it is that the fountains of
the great deep of the human heart are broken up, and
hundreds and thousands may feel together, and, by the
mysterious sympathy of a common grief, comfort those
whom they have never seen ; and the iron hand of sor-
row holds the golden key by which the secret affinities
and hidden charities of mankind are unlocked and
poured forth.

It is from the consciousness that such an event has
occurred in our history within the last few weeks, and
that on this day and to-morrov\^ it will be present, in its
most affecting form, to hundreds of our countrymen,
that I have ventured, in this the centre of English life,
to touch on a chord, else perhaps too private and too

THE GREEK MASSACRE. 405

sacred to be stirred, and to give to the services of this
day a funereal character which else they could hardly
have worn.

On this day have been deposited, in their respective
homes, the loved remains of two of our unfortunate
countrymen, whose untimely and tragic fate in Greece
has roused the pity, the indignation, and the sympathy
of Europe. One, the third, rests still in that fated land.
The fourth victim reposes in his own not less famous
country beside the Arno.

This is not the place to dwell on any of the circum-
stances of that dreadful week. Others, doubtless, will
draw the just conclusion — calmly, wisely, faithfully —
which, perchance, even out of this frightful calamity,
will bring good to the world. On this day, and in this
place, we are not on the seat of judgment. We are
rather at the grave and gate of death, which is the gate
of Heaven. Let us, for a few moments, for ourselves,
and for those here or far away, whose mourning we
have made our own, draw from this event the lessons
which the Psalmist's words suggest.

Surely to us, as to him, such sorrows as this bring
the thought that there is a wider, higher world, of which
this little round of life is but a part. ''Lord, if Thou
hadst been here my brother had not died." So Martha
and so Mary, each with their different characters, ex-
claimed in the bitterness of grief, at the thought of the
unexplained delay which, as it seemed, had cost that
precious life. " If thou hadst been here, if this or that
had been otherwise, if this had but been foreseen, ar-
ranged, prevented — all might yet have been well."
So, again and again we think; yet let us rise into a
loftier region. It is our main comfort. " I am the
Resurrection and the Life," was the answer. Far
above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God ;

406 THE GREEK MASSACRE.

far above, where all secondary laws resolve themselves
into the primar}- Source of Being, " Our Father which
is in heaven ; " thither let us ascend. Let us remember
the "years of the right hand of the Most Highest."
From how much evil to come in this life, into what
blessedness in the Better Land, they may have been
taken, how and why it was expedient for them and for
us that they should have gone awa}^ — we know not
now, but we shall know hereafter.

Again, let us take comfort in the thought that the
very greatness and suddenness of the grief which gathers
the sympathy of so many round the hearts of a few, has
in itself an exalting, elevating, transfiguring conse-
quence. Over those graves we seem to see lamenting
the forms of Two, may Ave not say of Three, ancient
nations. The stern anger and bitter grief of Two, the
yet more bitter shame of the Third, Avill forever invest
the names of those who have been thus loved and lost
with a tragic solemnity which, if not the best balm to
the broken heart, yet has, in spite of ourselves, a heal-
ing, soothing, invigorating effect. The ghastly visions
of those nights and days will fade away, and in their
place will come the remembrance that with those fa-
mous " old poetic mountains," with those scenes of sur-
passing grandeur which almost to the last moment
moved the admiration and cheered the spirits of the
suffering captives themselves, their memories will
henceforth be indissolubly blended ; that the hills and
valleys, the very sound of whose names now awakens
a shudder, will, in after years, come back to us again
charged with a new and peculiar pathos as the everlast-
ing monuments of the beloved and lamented English-
men whose last days were spent beneath their graceful
and majestic heights, and in their deep romantic dells.
The mountains of Gilboa, the high places where the

THE GREEK MASSACRE. 407

beauty of Israel fell, were forever enshrined in the
chant of David over his lost friend. ^ So may the old
immortal names of Athens, Thebes, and Marathon,
bitter as they now seem, become at last even sweet to
the memory by association with those who there met
their end with a courage unpremeditated, unpretending,
but not the less worthy of the deeds of the great old
days which once ennobled those ancient scenes.

And finally, in the recollection of the suddenness,
the untimeliness of the stroke, is there not this last
thought for all of us — Where, how, when, did that
stroke find them ? Where, how, Avhen, will it find us ?
That uncertainty of death which we all know, but
which we all find so difficult to remember — what is
the lesson which it ought to teach us ? It is that old
familiar word which our Master taught — " Watch, for
ye know not the hour." Watch; be watchful; keep
your conscience clear, your judgment calm, your pres-
ence of mind steady, your faith cheerful and strong,
for the last dread emergency which will tax every
faculty whenever it shall come. It is only these sudden
wrenches from the bloom and fulness of life that brins:
before us that truth so well set forth by one who for-
merly occupied this place ^ —

Thou inevitable day,

When a voice to me shall say —

"Thou must rise and come away;

All thine other journeys past,
Gird thee, and make ready fast,
For thy longest and thy last " —

Day deep-hidden from our sight

In impenetrable night,

Who may guess of thee aright ?

1 2 Sam. i. 19, 21. « " The Day of Death," by Archbishop Trench.

408 THE GREEK MASSACRE.

Shall I lay my drooping head
On some loved lap, round my bed
Prayers be made and tears be shed?

Or at distance from mine own,

Name and kin alike unknown, *

Make my solitary moan ?

Suddenly, like thunder in a clear sky, in the midst of
innocent enjoyment, came the blow which thus has
ended. We know the verse of the poet which tells how
"fierce " is the "light that beats upon a throne," reveal-
ing every speck and spot in the character that, by its
conspicuous eminence, is thus exposed to the public
gaze. Something, too, of that "fierce light" belongs
to the sudden test and trial of characters involved in
some great catastrophe, which for the time makes even
the inmost souls and simplest words of those concerned
the property, as it were, of the world. Such is the
disclosure of the noble bearing of these our country-
men, in the days of their last trial, in the touching
letters which last reached us from those distant shores.

Happy, thrice happy, may any one be, who can hope
that, in the like unexpected call, in the like agony of
conflicting fears, he might show tlie same grand forget-
fulness of self, the same gallant resolve, not once only,
but twice and thrice repeated, to save the lives of others
by the sacrifice of his own ; the same calm collected
judgment that nothing should be done even for the
preservation of life that was not in itself just and
reasonable ; the same simple Christian trust in God's
goodness; the same modest yet proud hope, in the
prospect of the coming end, to die bravely as English-
men should do. Those affecting lines, that last and
latest request for the sending of a Bible, for the prayers
of a friend, will be read by hundreds as though they
had lost a brother, will be cherished by those who

THE GREEK MASSACRE. 409

possess them, as though they had gained a king's
treasure.

They have died as Englishmen and as Christians
should die ; they have been mourned for, as England
alone can mourn for her children.

The mortal tabernacles of those two blameless, gentle
spirits are now on the native soil where they desired to
rest — " lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their
deaths not divided." Their souls are with Him who
gave them. . The way was dark and terrible. The foot-
steps of the merciful God were hard to trace. Yet
through the deep waters He led them, we may humbly
hope, to the haven where they would be. " God be with
us," was the short all-embracing prayer which closes
one of those brief heart-rending letters, written but
tvvo days before the close. That prayer, we may sin-
cerely trust, was heard. Yea, though they walked
through the valley of the darkest shadow of death, we
need fear no evil for them, for He was with them — His
rod and His staff comforted them, as they comfort us.
He led them to the still waters." ^ All is over now.
He led them to the long last home, where there shall
bo no more parting, and where " the former things are
passed away."^

1 Psalm xxiii. 2, 4. 3 Eev. xxi. 4.

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if St rluvl ^^^^^^^^' ^y ^^"^ Very Rev R. W. Church, M.A., DcaS

The AGE of ANNE. By Ei ward E. Morris, M.A., Editor of the Series.

fho NORMAN KINGS and the FEUDAL S7STEM. By the Rev A M
T0.INSON, ALA. EDWARD III. By the Rev. W. Wakburton,"^ M A.? late H^
Majesty's Senior Inspector of Schools. ' ^

FREDERICK the GREAT and tiie SEVEN YEARS' WAR. By F. W. Longmam.
of Ualhc College, Oxford. oy r. w. i.oNGMAi^.

The above 13 Volumes m Roxburg Style. Leather Labels and Gilt Top. Pn
up m a handsome Box. Sola only in Sets. Price per Set, §13.00.

•*• TAe aiave book for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent, post *r tx^tm
iknri^t^id, upon receipt of the price by the publishers,

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,

743 AND 745 Broadway, Nsw Yowi

The

Conflict of Christianity

WITH HEATHENISM.

By DR. GERHARD UHLHORN.

TRANSLATED BY

PROF. EGBERT C. SMYTH and REV. C. J. H. ROPES

One Volume, Crown 8vo, $2. SO.

This volume describes with extraordinary vividness and spirit ths
religious and moral condition of the Pagan world, the rise and spread
of Christianity, its conflict with heathenism, and its final victory. There
is no work that portrays the heroic age of the ancient church with equal
spirit, elegance, and incisive power. The author has mSde thorough and
independent study both of the early Christian literature and also of the
contemporary records cf classic heathenism.

CRITHCAEi NOTICES.
" It is easy to see why this volume is so highly esteemed. It is
systematic, thorough, and concise. But its power is in the wide mental
vision and well-balanced imagination of the author, which enable him to
reconstruct the scenes of ancient history. An exceptional clearness and
force mark his style." — Bosion Advertiser.

" One might read many books without obtaining more than a fraction
of the profitable information here conveyed ; and lie might search a long
time before finding one which would so thoroughly fi.x his attention and
command his interest." — P/i/7. S. S. Times.

"Dr. Uhlhorn has described the great conflict with the power of a
master. His style is strong and attractive, his descriptions vivid and
graphic, his illustrations highly colored, and his presentation of the subject
earnest and effective." — Providence Journal.

"The work is marked for its broad humanitarian views, its learning:,
and the wide discretion in selecting from the great field the points oi
deepest interest." — Chicago /nter-Ocean.

"This is one of those clear, strong, thorough-going books which aro
a scholar's de.\\ghi."—Hari/ord Religious Herald.

^^^ For sale by all booksellers, or seyit post-paid upon receipt of
^rice^ by

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,

Nos. 743 AND 745 Broadway, New York.

THE ORIGIN OF NATIONS

By Professor GEORGE RAWLINSON, M.A.

One Volume, 12mo, With maps, . . . $lMOo

The first part of this book, Early Civilizations, discusses the antiquity
of civilization in Egypt and the other early nations of the East. The
second part, Ethnic Affinities in the Ancient World, is an examination of
the ethnology of Genesis, showing its accordance with the latest results of
modern ethnographical science.

"An attrnctlve volume, which is well worthy of the careful consideration of every
reader." — Ohserzier.

"A work of genuine scholarly excellen'-e, and a useful ofl'set to a great deal of the
superficial current literature on such subjects." — Cougregationalist.

" Dr. Rawlinson brings to this discussion long and patient research, a vast knowledge
and intimate acquaintance with what has been written on both sides of the question." —

Brooklyn Union- A rgus.

THE DAWN OF HISTORY.

AN INTRODUCTION TO PRE-HISTORIC STUDY.
Edited by C. F. KEARY, M. A.,

OF TIIK EKITISII MUSEUM.

One Volume, 12mo., - * - - $1.2S.

This work treats successively of the earliest traces of man in the
remains discovered in caves or elsewhere in different parts of Europe ; of
language, its growth, and the story it tells of the pre-historic users of it ;
of the races of mankind, early social life, the religions, mythologies, and
folk-tales of mankind, and of the history of writing. A list of authorities
is appended, and an index has been prepared specially for this edition.

"The book may be heartily recommended as probably the most satisfactory summary
of the subject that there is." — Nat ion.

"A fascinating manua', without a vestige of ihe dullness usually charsrcd against
Bcientifi" works. . . . Jn its way, the work is a model of what a popular scientific
work should he ; it is readable, it is ea-ilv understood, and its style is simple, yet dig-
nified, avoiding equally the affectation of the nursery and of the laboratory." —

Bos t Oft Sat. Eve. Cazette»

•••-.;:.•••• For sale by all booksellers, or sent, post-paid, vpon receipt cf
tricc^'by

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, Pudlisiiers,

743 AND 745 Broadway, New York.

Tfie Great Theological Work of the Age,

DR. HODGESJHEOLOGY.
Hgslpmat'ir ^|FoIogg.

By CHARLES HODGE, D.D., LLD.,

of Princeton Theological Seminary.
Three volumes ^vo.^ including Index ,^ $I2.00

la tkese volumes are comprised the results of the life-long labors and investdgadons of
cow of the most eminent theolos;ians of the age. The work covers the ground usually 00
Cuyied by treatises on t^ystematic Theology-, and adopts the commonly received divisions 0I
tho subject, —THEOLOGY, Vol. I.; AInTHROPOLOGY, Vol. II.; SOTERIOLOGY
AND ESCHATOLOGY, Vol. III.

Tlie INTRODUCnON is devoted to the consideration of preliminary matters, such as
M-thod, or the principles which slionld guide the student of Theology, and the different
theories as to the source and standard of our knowledge of divine things, Rationalism,
Mysticism, the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Rule of Faith, and the ProtesUnt doctrine
tn tliat subject.

The department of THEOLOGY proper includes the origin of the Idea of God, the
Being of God, the Anti-Theistic systems of Atheism, Polytheism, Materialism, and
Pantlieism ; the Nature of God, the DiWne Attributes, the Doctrines of the Trinity, tha
Divinity of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit ; the Decrees of God, Creation, Providence, and
Miracles.

The department of ANTHROPOLOGY includes the Nature, Origin, and Antiquity of
Man, his Primitive State and Probation; the Fall ; the Effect of Adam's Sin upon himself
and upon his Posterity ; the Nature of Sin ; the Different Philosophical and Theological
ITieories on that subject.

SOTERIOLOGY includes the Plan or Purpose of God in reference to the Salvation ol
Men ; the Person and Work of the Redeemer ; his Offices as Prophet, Priest, and King ;
the Work of the Holy Spirit in applying the redemption purchased by Christ; Commoa
and Efiicacious Grace, Regeneration, Faith, Justification, Sanctification, the Law or Rula
of Life, and the means of Grace.

ESCHATOLOGY includes the State of the Soul after Death ; the Second Coming ol
Clsrist : the Resurrection of the Body ; the General Judgment and End of the World, acd
Hi* Dcctrina concerning Heaven and Hell.

The plan of the author is to state and vindicate the teachings of the Bible on these
^l/fous subjects, and to examine the antagoniitic doctrines of different classes of Theolo-
^ans. His book, therefore, is intended to be both didactic and elenchtic.

The various topics are discussed with that close and keen analytical and logical power«
combined with that simplicity, luciditj', and strength of stj'le which have ahreafiy given Dr-
HobGS a world-wide reputation as a controversialist and writer, and as an iuveatiaUar ol
^ jteat theological problems of the day.

Sini^ Cpfiies sent post-paid on receipt of the price.

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,

743 AND 745 Broadway, New York.

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