{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_64717/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_64717","id":"gutenberg_64717","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/64717","summary":null,"tags":["Bible. Samuel, 2nd, VIII, 14-15 -- Sermons","Category: History - British","Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: History - Religious","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Church of England -- Sermons","Sermons, English -- 19th century"],"text":"Transcribed from the 1859 Rivingtons edition by David Price.\n\n\n\n\n\n                                 A SERMON\n\n\n                               PREACHED AT\n\n                        CHRIST CHURCH, KENSINGTON,\n\n                             On May 1, 1859,\n\n                  BEING THE DAY APPOINTED FOR A GENERAL\n                      THANKSGIVING TO ALMIGHTY GOD,\n\n          FOR THE SUCCESS GRANTED TO OUR ARMS IN SUPPRESSING THE\n               REBELLION AND RESTORING TRANQUILLITY IN HER\n                       MAJESTY\u2019S INDIAN DOMINIONS.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                  BY THE\n\n                        REV.  WILLIAM WRIGHT, M.A.\n              SENIOR CURATE OF ST. MARY ABBOTTS, KENSINGTON.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                 LONDON:\n                       RIVINGTONS, WATERLOO PLACE.\n                 WINTER, HIGH STREET TERRACE, KENSINGTON.\n                                  1859.\n\n                                  * * * * *\n\n                            2 SAMUEL viii. 14, 15.\n\n    \u201cAND HE PUT GARRISONS IN EDOM; THROUGHOUT ALL EDOM PUT HE GARRISONS,\n    AND ALL THEY OF EDOM BECAME DAVID\u2019S SERVANTS, AND THE LORD PRESERVED\n    DAVID WHITHERSOEVER HE WENT.\n\n    \u201cAND DAVID REIGNED OVER ALL ISRAEL: AND DAVID EXECUTED JUDGMENT AND\n    JUSTICE UNTO ALL HIS PEOPLE.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nA SERMON,\nETC.\n\n\nAS an aggregate of individuals professing faith in Christ, we, the people\nof Great Britain, may with truth and reason venture to assert that our\nQueen and our Legislature are on a footing, as to God\u2019s protecting care,\nwith highly favoured and heaven-honoured David of old.  If Almighty God,\nunder his earlier revelation, did actually guard and help in temporal\nmatters a ruling prince of this lower world, who was a man \u201cafter his own\nheart\u201d\u2014as David\u2019s plainly-told history everywhere assures us that He\ndid\u2014none can reasonably say that it is either impossible or improbable\nthat He should vouchsafe to guard and help our presiding Monarch and our\nlaw-giving Senate in the administration of public affairs, baptized as\nthey are \u201cin the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy\nGhost;\u201d educated as they are in the very details of his later and last\nrevelation; and supposed, pledged, and believed as they are to be seeking\n_individually_ after the mind which is in Christ, and the sanctifying\ninfluence of the Holy Spirit of God.  All, indeed, must at once see, and\ngrant as a foregone conclusion from which there is no appeal, that our\nmonarchical and representative government, being _essentially_ and\n_generally Christian_\u2014being so in spite of the Judaism, vice, and\ninfidelity which may be discerned in it, and which in no way interfere\nwith our present argument\u2014is, by virtue of its admitted and\npreponderating Christianity, brought under the immediate guardianship and\nprotection of the Most High.\n\nSuch being the case, or since we believe such to be the case, we most\nnaturally, and, I may add most consistently, pray for the \u201cHigh Court of\nParliament\u201d which assembles from time to time \u201cunder our most religious\nand gracious Queen.\u201d  Our prayer in this matter is as simple as it is\nbeautiful.  A prayer is it which none who are in the habit of praying at\nall for others can possibly object to.  It simply asks of God that He\nwould \u201cbe pleased to direct and prosper all their consultations to the\nadvancement of his glory, the good of his church, the safety, honour, and\nwelfare of our Sovereign and her dominions.\u201d\n\nOften and often, let me trust, have we loyally and faithfully prayed\nafter this most becoming and time-hallowed fashion.  Especially, most\nespecially, let me also trust, did we do so\u2014I feel confident that we did,\nif our hearts were not steeled against every patriotic impression\u2014some\ntwo years ago, in this very place, as also in the still larger chamber of\na thoughtful spirit,\u2014at a time which all must well remember,\u2014a time of\ndeep national distress and heaviness of heart into which, under God\u2019s\nfearful and probationary providence, we as a people were cast headlong\nand unawares by the event of an Eastern mutiny.  Recall the occasion\nreferred to.  By so doing we shall be reminded of the great need there\nthen was for prayer for help, and of the petition we then put up, and so\nbe enabled to appreciate more livingly and heartily the answer which God\nhas given us this day in the blessing of peace and restoration of\n\u201ctranquillity in her Majesty\u2019s Indian dominions.\u201d  Let memory\u2019s wand\nconjure up to our imagination, or, if we please, let fancy\u2019s pencil\nsketch to our view the scene, the hour, in which, at the period in\nquestion, we had recourse, with more than ordinary interest and\nearnestness, to prayer in our difficulty on behalf of our Queen and\nCouncil of State\u2014prayer to the effect that they might be \u201cdirected and\nprospered\u201d in all their momentous \u201cconsultations\u201d on which, humanly\nspeaking, hung the dignity, the happiness, and the missionary usefulness\nas well as the safety of our beloved country.  You will suppose, then,\nthat we are just released from the cruel bondage of a warfare into which\nwe were compelled, as men of faith and feeling, to enter for humanity\u2019s\nsake.  Our laurels of awarded victory are still fresh on the hero\u2019s brow.\nOur triumphant attitude is, to all appearance, keeping at bay a tyrant\nworld, and securing \u201cpeace on earth and goodwill towards men.\u201d  Time is\nabout to commence her gracious task of lessening our sorrows for the\nbrave and bold who are no more on earth amongst the children of men, and\nwhose remains are swelling with their sad accumulations the once\nunbroken, but now grave-studded Crimean plain.  Our minds are turning\nhomeward.  We dwell upon reforming ourselves.  Social progress and fair\nplay in all matters, ecclesiastical as well as civil, are points which\nmuch interest us.  We are musing with practical intent upon such things\nas become enlightened and well-disposed minds.  We are thoroughly\nenjoying national repose, dwelling each man \u201csafely under his own vine;\u201d\nand we are doing, and anxious to do, the great, the civilizing work of\npeace.  Alas!  \u201cAll is vanity and vexation of spirit.\u201d  Our fondest hopes\nare broken up, and, in a moment of time, vanish away as a vision of the\nnight when one awakes.  A cry is heard abroad amongst us; it is no less\nthan a cry of war\u2014that hell-cry which despots love to raise, and which\nall godless and loveless spirits echo in sympathetic sinfulness!  At the\ngates of science do we listen, in dread suspense, to hear the\ncontradiction or confirmation of the evil tidings.  Our worst suspicions\nare soon confirmed.  In rapid successions does the magic whisper steal\nacross the deep, and tell its brief but bloody tale, that ours have risen\nup against us in the far East; that many a bitter Shimei has come forth\nto curse our rule; that many a mutinous and rebel Sheba has blown the\nsignal blast of insurrection; that men, women, and children, \u201cbone of our\nbone, and flesh of our flesh,\u201d are being scattered abroad by a cruelly\norganized persecution, some seeking in hopeless flight a desert solitude,\nthere to die unfriended and alone; others hastening to the nearest\nfastness, there to hold out, a scanty and surprised handful, against an\narmed and swarming adversary; and that, once more, numbers of our\nfellow-countrymen, together with their wives and little ones, have\nactually perished, if not by more hideous means, by the edge of the\nsword.  A trembling for the present, and a fear for the future, take hold\nof us.  With deepest anxiety do we turn, in this our moment of sharp\ndistress and bewilderment, to our ruling representatives, bidding them do\nin our common name what seemed to them good under the circumstances of\nour emergency, and dismissing them to their onerous work with the\nbenedictory prayer, that Almighty God would of his infinite goodness \u201cbe\npleased to direct and prosper all their consultations to the advancement\nof his glory, the good of his Church, the safety, honour, and welfare of\nour Sovereign and her dominions.\u201d  So it was, I doubt not, that we, as a\nGod-fearing people, prayed for our rulers when they were summoned to\nconsider and prepare for the suppression of that Indian mutiny of 1857,\nwhose simply detailed history is of itself, its plain, unvarnished,\nunembellished self, the most cruel and the most heart-rending tragedy\nthat has ever been recorded!  Of this enough.\n\nAnd now, my believing and prayer-using brethren\u2014so I would style you\n_all_\u2014it is high time for me to challenge your hearty attention to the\njoyous and indisputable fact, that your reward for having prayed for your\nrulers is at hand.  Your petition on their behalf has been heard on high,\nif petition on any national account be ever hearkened to above, or if\nwhat we see before us is not the merest coincidence of blindest chance.\nOpen wide your eyes, and read for yourselves the heaven-sent answer to\nyour prayer.  Your Sovereign\u2019s will, your senators\u2019 wisdom, have both\nalike worked marvellously well for you and yours.  All their\nconsultations, resolutions, and decrees, in the matter of the suppression\nof the Indian mutiny, have, up to the present moment, been accompanied by\nthat triple result which you have so often prayed for\u2014\u201cthe advancement of\nGod\u2019s glory, the good of his Church, the safety, honour, and welfare of\nour Sovereign and her dominions.\u201d\n\nLet me somewhat enlarge.  God\u2019s _glory_, we do not hesitate to affirm,\nhas been more or less advanced by the conduct and policy of England in\nand during the warfare which has been recently accomplished in the East.\nAll that we have done in it worthy of praise or remembrance, we have\ndone, so we believe and confess, through Him, through his strength,\nthrough his teaching, through his Gospel, through the very circumstances\nunder which He has placed us, and through the very constitutional\ndispositions which He has given us.  All, therefore, that has been done\nin it worthy of praise or remembrance, do we feel bound to ascribe,\npurely and simply, to God, as its author and finisher, entering as we did\nupon every work, every encounter, with these words of humility upon our\nlips:\u2014\u201cNot unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name, give glory,\nfor Thy mercy and for Thy truth\u2019s sake;\u201d and checking the thought of\npride and self-sufficiency which from time to time rose up within on\noccasion of our having done well, with the apostolic inquiry and\nreproof\u2014\u201cWho maketh thee to differ from another?  And what hast thou that\nthou didst not receive?  Now, if thou didst receive it, why dost thou\nglory as if thou hadst not received it?\u201d\n\nMuch, indeed, from this point of view, does our national behaviour in the\nEast during unparalleled difficulties redound to the _glory_ of that God\nfrom whom all \u201choly desires, all good counsels, and all just works do\nproceed.\u201d  Never have we been in such straits.  Never have we acted so\ngraciously and so in accordance with the spirit of our Gospel.  Before us\nstood\u2014a sickening and never-to-be-forgotten sight\u2014a vast army in deadly\nand rebellious array\u2014an army made up of men with whom we had gone side by\nside to victory over a common foe\u2014men our familiar friends, to whom we\nhad extended, and were learning more and more to extend, the right hand\nof social fellowship\u2014men whom we had not only treated kindly, but, as was\nreported and believed, had verily spoiled by forbearing gentleness.\nThere they stand\u2014a rebellious horde\u2014raging \u201cfuriously,\u201d and imagining a\n\u201cvain thing,\u201d doing all they can, by slaying the innocent and\ndishonouring the chaste, to tempt us to forget our nature and our\nnature\u2019s God, and to assimilate ourselves to their unholy and fiendish\ntemperaments.  Nothing, however, that they do disturbs for a moment the\nbalance of Christian power and influence in our national and common mind.\nTo war, indeed, do we sally forth in saddest necessity and from a sense\nof duty, but it is to a war of a _purely defensive_ character on our\npart, and nothing more.  No hunting down the adversary, no trampling upon\nhim, no tearing away the suckling from the breast, for the sweetness of\nbeing revenged, have characterized our doings.  Vengeance have we\nrepudiated, or rather, I should say, not dared to handle, being, as we\nconceive, an attribute belonging solely to God, and too fearful to be\nentrusted to fallen man.  Here and there, it is true, the pulpit and the\npress, losing their moral self-possession, raised awhile in our hearing\nthat ancient Christ-condemned cry of retaliation\u2014\u201can eye for an eye, and\na tooth for a tooth;\u201d but soon, very soon, was that harsh and ugly sound\nlet die away and for ever perish in the softer strain of the Son of\nGod\u2014\u201cBut I say unto you, _that ye resist not __evil_; but whosoever shall\nsmite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.\u201d  Yes.  No\nvengeance, no retaliation\u2014God\u2019s holy name be praised\u2014have stained the\nbanner of England.  We fought honourably and for noble ends.  We have\nslain, alas! but only those on whom the law of God and the law of man\nwould have passed sentence of death, if required so to do.  We have\nfought, who can deny it? but fought that we might \u201clive and let\nlive\u201d\u2014that the world might be peaceably ordered\u2014and that \u201cpeace and\nhappiness, truth and justice, religion and piety,\u201d might be established\namongst us, amongst the people committed to our charge, even the hosts of\nIndia, \u201cfor all generations.\u201d  We are ashamed neither of our deeds nor\nour motives.  They, indeed, are not ours; this is _why_ we are not\nashamed of them\u2014but as we have said, they are God\u2019s\u2014God\u2019s, that is, so\nfar as they are pure, holy, merciful, upright, manly\u2014in a word, so far as\nthey are Christian.  To Him, therefore, let them be ascribed in the\npresence of the whole world, and from them, as from a moral mirror, let\nthere be reflected, not our national, but his everlasting \u201cGlory.\u201d\n\nInseparably connected with the glory of God, which has in a measure been\nworked out, as we maintain, by the events to which we refer, is the \u201cgood\nof his Church\u201d\u2014a result we ever pray may attend all our political\nconsultations and movements.  Who can doubt that the spectacle presented\nto the Indian mind in all our transactions of war\u2014our wisdom, our mercy,\nour justice\u2014is doing its silent work in many a thoughtful bosom, and\nadding some new soul to the Church of Christ even whilst we are speaking?\nMany and many a man, depend upon it, has been made to think for himself,\nin these troublous times, of the real value and working of his ancestral\ncreed.  He has often, may be, had doubts as to the superstitions of his\nnation, and the doctrines of his overseers.  He has for years, perhaps,\nheld in secret and deep admiration the aspirations and longings of his\nnatural conscience, and felt that they ran counter to the senseless\ncommandments and idle traditions of the world with which he and his race\nhave been overburdened.  He has longed for a creed which should not\nsuppress and smother, but fan into a living flame of sterling piety,\nthose smouldering elements of natural religion which he has treasured\namidst the follies of heathenism on the hearth of a not yet abandoned\nconscience.  His wish is gratified.  He has at length found, or rather,\nwe should say, seen at work, such a creed\u2014seen it in the warrior of the\nCross, seen it in one who can fight and yet be merciful, who can have\nwithin his power a cruel relentless enemy, yet find room for compassion;\nwho can show at all times and in all places that he has a heart which\nbeats true to the instincts of our nature, when not lost and sensualized.\nHe has rejoiced with exceeding great joy to have fallen in with a\nreligion which is far from contradicting conscience or nature, but which,\ncontrariwise, advocates and enforces \u201cwhatsoever things are true,\nwhatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever\nthings are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report;\u201d things which\neven in his childhood\u2019s superstitions and the ignorance of his more\nadvanced years have never altogether forsaken him.  He has pondered over\nthese things in his heart, and contrasting the plain, true, useful life\nof the Cross, with the wicked follies and fancies of the Crescent, has\nyielded himself up to the former, and added himself to the Church of\nChrist.  May it have been so in many, many instances!\n\nAs to the last result of legislative labour on our behalf, \u201cthe safety,\nhonour, and welfare of our Sovereign and her dominions,\u201d which we prayed\nmight follow our rulers\u2019 consultations, it is needless to say anything.\nEach of us can see the finger of God at work in, and trace its divine\nimpress upon, the facts of to-day, which call us together to thank and\npraise the Lord.  Each has faith and wit enough of soul, let us believe,\nto read, in the spirit of the words of the text, the manner in which God\nhas been with our Sovereign, our national interests, yea! ourselves\u2014\u201c_And\nthe Lord preserved David whithersoever he went_.\u201d\n\nAnd now, my brethren, what is the most appropriate thank-offering that\nwe, Sovereign and people, can make to Almighty God for his mercies\nvouchsafed to us?  Undoubtedly that which follows up our advantages and\nshows that we are worthy, or labouring to be thought worthy, of the great\nposition with which God has entrusted us, even the thank-offering which\nDavid made after his preservation, and which is unpretendingly recorded\nin the words, \u201cAnd David executed judgment and justice to all his\npeople.\u201d  This it is ours to see carried out, so far as in us lies, and\nthis we trust is being carried out fully and conscientiously by our\nrepresentatives.\n\nBut something more have we to offer up to God than judgment and justice\ntoward the people subject to our rule, though this offering be great and\nto be had in highest esteem.  We have heard and seen what kings and\nprophets desired of old to hear and see.  Our knowledge is increased, and\nso is our responsibility.  All type, all figure, all mystery, are removed\nfrom us, and \u201cGod, who at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in\ntime past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days\nspoken unto us by his Son\u201d\u2014spoken a word of salvation in the Gospel which\nexceeds, in point of moral beauty and spiritual comfort, all that we can\nimagine or desire.  This word we dare not enjoy to ourselves.  On we must\npass it, together with judgment and justice, to our people.  It has made\nus great, and caused us to \u201cshine like lights in the world.\u201d  Why should\nit not make them so, and cause them so to shine?  On we must pass it, not\nonly as a matter of ordinary and evident duty, but as a matter of\nfeeling.  Each true believer is, by his very impulse of faith, a\nsoul-seeking power amongst men.  In his heart is deeply sown the\nmissionary germ\u2014only requiring the light and heat of a living faith to\nraise and mature it to its appointed height and grandeur\u2014when its\nbranches are sure to spread themselves forth in sheltering love over all\nliving within their reach.\n\nTo this passing on of blessings received to others are we ever invited.\nNow, this very day, are we so especially.  \u201cA great door and effectual\u201d\nis open to us in the East.  By the violence of\ncircumstances\u2014circumstances, those emissaries of the great Creator\u2019s\npurpose\u2014have the gates of superstition been torn from their hinges, and a\nway made for us to enter, unmolested, into the very sanctuary and\nstronghold of Belial, there to preach to our heart\u2019s content \u201cthe way,\nthe truth, and the life.\u201d  It is as if an angel\u2014opportunity had been sent\nfrom on high to \u201cprepare the way of the Lord,\u201d and had cried aloud to the\nlong pent-up and isolated heathen world to receive us\u2014the _missionary\nnation of the Cross of Christ_; saying unto them, \u201cOpen ye the gates,\nthat the righteous nation which keepeth truth may enter in.\u201d  Oh! who is\nthere amongst us that does not now desire to enter in?  Who is there that\ndoes not sorrow over his indolence in not having done more hitherto for\nhis fellows?  Who does not burn with indignation at his own\u2014his\ncountry\u2019s\u2014missionary apathy, when he contemplates before him, in India\nand her immortal millions, a vast sea of souls, now surging with\ninfidelity, now again raging with superstition, bearing as it does on its\nsin-heaving and lust-swelling surface but few, very few, labourers in the\nemploy of that blessed and acceptable merchandize, the toiling, as\n\u201cfishers of men,\u201d for the Son of God?  Who, when he contrasts the\ngreatness of the work to be accomplished with the contemptibly limited\nmeans he has brought to bear on its fulfilment\u2014one pastor to a million\nsouls being the provision made by Christian England\u2019s National Church for\nthe restoration of heathen India to her God and Saviour\u2014who, when he so\ncontrasts, is not lastingly impressed with a sense of unworthy\nselfishness?\n\nOnce more\u2014accept, my beloved brethren, whilst it is to-day, this, this\nfor all we know last, last challenge to visit, gospel in hand, the\ndegraded millions of India.  Plant amongst them a church.  Erect for them\na school.  Provide them with a minister.  Give them freely the means\nwhich have made you under Providence what you are.  Let them know that\nthese means are to be the implements of your new spiritual warfare amidst\nthem.  \u201cFight,\u201d before them and their children, \u201cthe good fight of\nfaith.\u201d  Tell them you seek, and wish them to seek, that \u201cpeace which the\nworld cannot give,\u201d and \u201cwhich passeth all understanding.\u201d  Show them\nthat you delight not in brandishing over their heads the cold and deadly\nsteel, nor take pleasure in witnessing the fire-flash which heralds a\ncreature\u2019s death, but that you would rather wield the sword of the Spirit\nover their immortal souls, by means of the preached word, and rejoice for\never and ever in heaven that they were preserved with you and yours unto\neverlasting life.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                                 THE END.\n\n                                * * * * *\n\n                 H. WINTER, PRINTER, HIGH STREET TERRACE,\n                               KENSINGTON.","title":"A Sermon preached at Christ Church, Kensington, on May 1, 1859: being the day appointed for a general thanksgiving to Almighty God, for the success granted to our arms in suppressing the rebellion and restoring tranquillity in Her Majesty's Indian Dominions.","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":3710}