The Express.
London, England, 1855-03-22 00:00:00

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I disasters, and bemuse it rested with the Almighty &loses
who was emphatically and repeatedly in Barlptsre Galled the
81" the victory which we desired to Sur
fiesta and armies. We entered fate this war with no NUM
Purim': WI Mr that Europe was already darkened by the
shadow of • colossal power, whisk was ever pushing forward
its boundary; sad it was not for England to sit tamely
by whilst country after mangey lost its independence.
If we had no fears for ourealves—if we could net
contemplate the probability that the advancing lid*
would break on our own shores, at least it was in our
charter not to suffer the weak to be borne down by the
strong. Therefore did we give oareelves to tke war. It
was no war of ambition, no war of aggrandisement. Ws
took up the championship of the oppressed, and if WI
looked beyond the immediate case it Wan that we saw the
world's liberties in peril, and resolved ere too late to make
a stand for civilisation, enlightenment, human progress, and
human happiness. And if we had unsheathed the sword
only to maintain rights which ought not to have been in-
veded,and to prevent aggressions which threatened even worse
disasters then themselves, we might the better hope that
God would look favourably on our humiliation, and that be
would not turn a deaf ear when, falling low at his footstool,
the ashes in our hearts, sod the sackcloth on our
souls, we exclaimed in the words of the test," Hear thou in
Heaven our prayer and supplication, and maintain our
cause." TOO preacher then, pointed out the peculiarity
of the terms " that it is is Heaven we desire our prayers to
be heard." The peculiarity belonged also to the Lord's
Prayer, which was addressed to " our Father in Heaven."
Of course the Divine omnipresence must always be assumed
and taken for granted in prayer. We could have no confi-
dence in prayer if we knew nothing of God but that be
dwelt M some far-off depth of infinite space. Admitting
this, however, there ware two reasons explanatory of the
desire to be heard in H . The first was that it gave great
solemnity and also great esenuesgement to prayer losuppose
it to be offered in Heaven, where God manifests his Splen-
dours. If it were a comforting thing that God wee ever pre-
sent to receive our prayers, it was an elevating and eonobling
thing, that through some mysterious translation he received
those prayers above. There was not the inhabitant of any
of those bright worlds with which immensity was thronged,
who was admitted to a nobler presence chamber than our-
selves. Tbssoldier who, amid the furies of toe battle, or by
his lone'y wateh•fire, breathed from the heart a petition unto
God, hie utterenoe was on high, fat away from the tented
field and the er.sh of war, in that tranquil abode where
there could be no strife, because there could be no Sill
and this, whilst it should check presumption, should
also give confidence. The second remain why we should
desire that prayer be heard in II , was drawn from the
fact that Heaven was the residence of the glorified
humanity of the Redeemer, in and through whom alone
would prayer be beard with acceptance. We bad seat
foyth our armies to the war. In spite of all their courage,
all their constancy, and all their cohquest, they were
wasted and worn—hardship and dimities had sapped their
strength, and the nation had met this day to entreat the
Lord God Almighty that they might be upheld in the
struggle, mad might yet, if indeed it were for giod—
plant their colours on the proud forte' walls which
they were now besieging. And our hope sad com-
fort should be, that we present this petition where
the captain of our salvation, he who, as seen in the
sublime vision of the Apocalypse, "seated on a white hone
clothed in a vesture dipped in blood," is ri:hteousnesa
cloth judge and make war, where he ever beet,' as the
advocate of his church. Yea, it should give heart to the
national humiliation that we could say with Solomon,
"Hear thou in Heaven our prayer and supplication and
maintain our cause." The preacher then recurred in the
following terms to topics suggested by the occasitn:—We
were assembled to confess the hand of the Almighty in the
*amities with which we had been visited, and to beseech of
film that in his own good time he would vouchsafe us &secure
and prosperous peace. We were not in that place at least to
look at second causes, but meekly and submissively to
own that whether or not wo had done all which might have
been dons towards procuring success, we hid be en smitten
by God, to whom human errors as well as human triumphs
' were but as instrument+, for furthering his will. But at the
same time we ought thankfully to acknowledge many bright
points in an otherwise dark picture. The war, for example,
bad set before the world the noble spectacle of two great
endow, lung separated by jealousies and rivalries, laying
aside ancestral enmities, and combining in the mum of
eivilisation and freedom. All honour to our brave allies!
It was • fine augury for the interacts of our race that
Prance was one with England in festering opp
Then the valour of our troops, then patient en-
durance of frightful privations, their undaunted
bearing not merely is the face of hostile battalions, but of
far worse foes, the biting hunger, the pitiless frost, the
sweeping storm; who could sufficiently admire, sufficiently
be thankful fur this. Our brave fellows had won other
laurels besides those which were stained with blood, nod we
gave them in their midnight wetchings, in their suit. rings
(borne without a murmur), in their cold, heuger, and sick-
ness, as high, nay, • higher admiration than when they
climbed the perilous steep, or beat back a host numbering
hundreds to their tens. Then the evidence of a better educa-
tion, of a wider diffusion of enlarged and religious sentiment
than one had ventured to leek for. Why, many of the
published letters of private soldiers would do credit
to the head and heart of men trained by all the
processes of a refined and Christian education.
Moreover, the war bad given occasion to the display of tin-
e:emoted generosity. The rich and pour alike, the inha-
bitarts of palaces and inmates of ragged reboots, had eagerly
oontvilmted to the relief of the widow and the orphan. Nay
more, we had seen the most touching and graceful 'peva-
des : royalty itself had bent from its high estate, end the
wounded soldier had been gladdened and dignified by the
visit of his Queen. Above all, the war had brought out one
fine and noble trait. It had shown that iiumben of the
weaker sex, though born to wealth and bred in luxury,
were ready to renounce every comfm t and breve every
hardship, that they might minister to the suffering, tend
the wounded in their agony, and soothe the last struggles of
the dying. God bleu them in that the it heroic miesein—
he had almost said their heroic martyrdom—and he might
have said it, for he did thick that in walking those long
lines of sick beds, in giving themselves to all the ghastly
duties of a hospital, they were doing a harder thing than
was allotted to many woo bad mounted the scaffold or dared
the stake. Passing from these cheering cimunatencer, the
preacher dwelt on national sin as producing national cala-
mity. He showed in general that we had not acted up to
our high calling as a people specially entrusted with the
" oracles of God," and that with regard to the present war
in particular, we had entered on it in too boastful and con-
fident a spirit. He called on all classes to do their part in
the great work of national ameedment. Legielators, by the
countenance they could give to true relieion, by the exten-
sion of the machinery of a sound and Mignon education,
and by the enactment of measures for ropressitig vice and
ungodliness ; others by self-examination, by repentance, by
holiness of thought, and word, and deed. He concluded as
follows; " Yes, it most be done at once. Who will reckon
on tomorrow
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almost incredible; and yet it was so. The potentate who
had been foremost in this war, the man who stood out from
et-
the rest of his race, the most conspicuous, perhaps, in power,
in energy, in the strength of will, in the firmness of purpose,
in the sweep of enterprise—he was dead ! Dead, with count-
less squadrons waiting his bidding; deed, with coavolsed
kingdoms watching his movements ; dead, whilst a whale
world, I might almost say, was being shaken by his tread.
Then, I again ask, who will reckon on to-morrow 1 At
once, lest death overtake us, let each resolve to be a better
patriot by being a better Christian. Thus may all be in-
strumental towards obtaining those bleuings for which the
nation has now humbled itself in prayer. Better and
brighter times may break upon the land. We may live to
welcome back victorious armies. If thousands lie buried
on a foreign strand, they lie burled in no ignoble grave; for
their resting place shill be a spot at which, (or ages
to come, Valour shall gain fresh life, aid Freedom trim
her torch. We may live to rejoice that they have nut died
In vain—that their death has procured for us a peace Se-
wing the rights of nations, and throwing on a rampart
against future aggression. Then, in the beautiful imagery
of prophecy, we may " sit every man under his vine and
under his Bg-tree, and none shall make us afraid." There
shall be " no decay, no leading into captivity, and no com-
plaining in ear streets;' but we shell experience all the
emphasis all the richness of the saying—. Atm is that
people thati is in snob • case ; yea, happy is that people
Mines God is the Lord."