The Express.
London, England, 1857-10-08 00:00:00

LONDON, THURSDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 8, 1857.

THE DAY OF HUMILIATION.

[We subjoin the names of the preachers in the
WPilmetropolitan churches yesterday, together with
teits ; and in some instances an enable of the
Moon) •

WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
THE TEST REV. DEAN TRENCH.

Lamentation' W., 40, 41.
" Let us smelt and try our w• end tarn again to the
Lord. Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God
in the heavens."

Oa this purge, the preacher obaerved—Would God that
England, m the hour of her confusion, might search as de-
sire( to find, and having found, as prepared to oar sat
wheeler accused things may bo lurking within her, and
rGod's wrath end indigestion upon her. And send-
t behoves her, at this time societally, to do this is re-
of her dealings with that land from whence their
anguish has broken upon bar. How hen she oceopied the
great talent committed to her there? Joshua deceiver but
one Aran in hie search ; It is to be feared that sit:Eite-
core many. But with many things which ono speak
at there is one matter on which I cannot keep If
them is one matter which, more than another, is the accord
Ebbs In England's relations with‘lier Indian possessiams,lt is
the swig India Company's traffic in opium— the hideous far
that the government of India raised • revenue of several na
Boos from trafficking in this poisonous drug—a revenue mired,
in feet, upon the vice, the Dairy, the degradation, the ruin la
body sad soul—for the use of opium is equal rain to both—of
millions in the East. One hundred thousand &sets eloper
the East India Company annually exports, frrn it upon
unwilling nations, on China above all, despite of ask ler,
and in defiance of their remonstranor. My bretlerem, the
crying sin is their sin, but it is oars as well. It is Gun for
this reason—the goventrasett of England is le otarilred, Is
so responsive to the national voice end feeling, that wtterere
the people of England are resolved that this shall be, or that
shall not be, those who administer our affair.
effect. Thus, the of
have to
e_tla..thrr resolution into
were resolved that the slave trade, so far r
was cemented, should be abolished; and It was.
They were resolved that slavery itself should MOO
within the British dominions • and it did so. If
the Christian conscienceof England were equally aroused to
the enormity of the opium trait —demanded with se firm a
voice the suppression of it—this iniquity, like those before It,
would oar. But, my brethreet, to a certain degree it may
be admitted that this of which I have Just spoken is a sin of
others, rather then our own. Other sins there arc which sit
closer tone; for example, the little which we have done in
advancing the knowledge of Christ end His Gospel in India.
There ere some who say that far too much has been done
has, lam bold to my that it lea been far too little ; but
this subject of our duties as a Christian people in India, the
extant to which we am debtors to it, and bow we may dis-
charge the debt, this tarter I must reserve to rear of till
this afternoon. Leaving, then, this for the present let ua
further search and try our ways, not merely in regard of our
own or our ruler's sine and shortcomings in regard of our
Irian dominions, but let us acknowledge the whole series
of our pest unthankfulneseee to God, that so many
mercies have left us so little thankful ; that so many
chasteninge have left us so little holy ; above all, Ist us
confer our guilt in this matter, that preceding visitations
left us we little Letter than they found w; so perhaps this
one may not Le wholly thrown Away. fir said of bred,—
'My people dolt not consider. Do not let na oblige Him to
say this of ua ; but if we have not in past time, let us now
consider Ilia dealings with :us, and consider our ways in
which we have walked. Seems it not, brethren, as though
He led a controversy with our land r It is manifest that
there are three chief wearies of indignation in the armoury
of God—three wideent woes wok which He visits
nations and people. These, as all bleary informs us, as
He word teaches as, are famine, peetilonce, end war; it
being the choice of these three that lie offered to David
when he had sinned. Within the last ten years we have
known theca all—and in respect of the pestilence and the
war It has been stroke upon stroke, breach upon breach.
If the famine during this time has wasted but once, at-
though then it devoured its millions, twice the peetdence
has swept over our land; to he the war lute demanded
of Engird that she should shed, like water, the
best blood of her children—and this, the reond visit of this
scourge of nation., how far more dr 'wind than the first
That other scourge which we have warcely left two years be-
hind ea, was dreadful enough —it !teemed ri took our energies
of endurance to the uttermost; we thought that uo beerier
tidings could ever reach us than red to reach us then. No
sadder death-rolls than the death-rolls of the gallant erne of
England, which were then unfolded I.eforo cur eyes. And
yet things so much worse have now comm upon us, that we
cm& look back almost with envy at our condition then ; when
we wire at war, indeed, but with a Christian netion, with one
observing, in the main, the law. of Chrietien warfare ; when
the horrors of that which must be always horrible were
mitigated in part by those mutual cc:urn:re, which worthy
foes delight in showing one another; while now—bit
I need not draw the contrast. Let me rather ask—what

wore thing could we have ? This Is worse than that which
went before; there may be still worse behind. Sheller, in
our impenitence and pride, in our coldness or hardier of
heart, make proof of God, what other 'repro, shaper,
more piercing, yet may be in hot armoury ? Shall in pro-
voke Him to more wrath ? Are we stronger than Her Is
It not enough that it is now in this our England almost se It
WWI In Egypt when the Lord passed through the land and
there was wailing in every hors ? Who is there that ...ore
nearly or more remotely boa not been smitten; or un•
scathed till now, is not waiting, with trembling fear, fa the
burden of sorrow and anguish which another post may
bring ? What shall we say then? Let this be such a fast
as God has chosen. There is only one way of repine it
right. He baa told us what that is Wadi put ;
make you clean; put away the evil of your dung;
confess your own sins, and your people's ; say, be-
came of thew things, therefore is this evil come upon us;
search and try your ways, and turn again to the L•rd."
I will not soy a word, my lasthren, in respect of the collection
which is now about to be made on behalf of the eutteren in
India. I should be well nigh ashamed to think such a cord
were required. Our hearts are full—full of heaviness, fill of
bleeding compassion for our suffering brethren. The deeper
grief', which are the portion of many of them, we cannot
amigo. They crave a higher hand than ours. ilut chat
we can do that we will, rejoicing. Wo shall rejoice India
burden thoee full hearts, not merely In words of pity, bit In
dude of love.
The collection amounted to ill. lie, Bd.

ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL.
Tilt REV. B. M. EtilVIE.
let Seminal, chap. Kali., e. 47 la tie battle it tie
ford's.'

The Rev. B. M. Cowie preached in the marring
In the afternoon the ChATCSI was again crovded
to amen. The Lord Mayor, accompanied by his chapsin,
the Rev. Herbert Aleton. the Sheriffs, Alderman Lawman,
end Mr. Allen, the Under-Sheriff& Aldermen Salomon&
Wire, Hall, and Rene. the Common Sergeant, City Solicitor,
Secondary, Reteeribrant er, 5,c., proceeded in state (ton the
Mansion-how* to the cathedral. The procession wet not,
however, on foot, as originally intended, owing to the ncle-
Meney of the weather. his lordship occupied his anal
stall in the centre of the ehoir, and on either aide of him eat
the aldermen, the common councilmen occupying the ma-
jority of the salla on the other side of the church. The
prayers were read by the Rev. B. M. Cowie, and the lemons
by the Rev. J. V. Pevah. There was no daunting, and,
with the exception of the anthem, " Give peace in our time,
0 Lord," and the concluding " Dead March in Stu]," the
organ not heard.
Rev. Canon Dote selected for his test 26th chapter
' of Jeremiah, part of 9th verse—" When Thy judgments
are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will
learn eighteen/mese." It was not, however, always en
There were some among the inhebitente of the world who
denied God in his judgetente, while they did not deny Him
In himself—come who, while treeing the source of events
only to secondary LIMIT'S, and tsiiog no account of that
never Ailing Providemo which " ordereth all thing.. both
in heaven and earth," yet would, if netted, confers His power
and their belief in Hie deercee. To act thus was reputed
wisdom, while in truth it wee consummate folly; for what
could be more contrary to ',neon than to derogate from the
attributes of the Deity while admitting His ex.Mteam—what
more contrary to reason than to limit the exerclee
of Ilia power, which wee confessed almighty, and to dream-
aril* the range of Hie vriedrin rielmowled to be infinite;
to exclude the right of the Almighty from dominion over the
works of His own hands—to 'ammo without any show of
reason or shadow of authority whatever, that Ile who had
crested could not control, or that where His creatures had
formed themselves into countries and compsaim, they would
be Ere rewarded by Ilim than when secret in families or
iodated as individual'? Thie in conception was euroly the
extreme of folly, and this in application was the
extreme of prieumption. T. deny the operations of
God and His judgment& whether the form of them be the
famine or pestilence, the warfare or the mutiny, was practi-
cally to deny God himself. It was, an the prophet Jere-
had so terribly declared, to " belie the Lord. ' When,
therefore, as now, His judgments were abroad in a remote
but moat important part of the empire—when fear had come
upon our countrymen as a desolation, and destruction as a
whirlwind ; when distress and anguish had fallen on
those whose security seemed so strong (for where Int a few
brief months since could there have seemed fairer promise
of unbroken order than in India), let us enpplicate on behnit
of all that the "inhabitants of the world might learn
righteownseza"—let us unite in heart and voice and may,
Some put their thud in chariots, and some is hone& but
we will remember the name of the Lord our God," Now,
God's judgmente were declared in Scriptures to be the con-
sequencee of man's sine, but it did not follow from this that
particular judgments were the consequences of particular
In& nor yet that, in the case of a nation at least, the
retribution was or leapt row ted from the name persons by
whom the transgresaion bad been committed sad the penalty