Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-10-08 00:00:00

THE NORTHERN TIMES.--LIVERPOOL, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1857.

not believe it. lam persuaded in the sight of God, and
in the sight of the whole country this day, that this was
deeply at the root. though not the whole cause of this
tremendous rebellion. The Government of India ought
to have avowed themselves Christians, but ought not to
have forced any native to become a Christian. And see
how this would have been treated ? How has the
missionary been treated ? The missionaries have been
respected wherever they went, because they had avowed
themselves Christians, and said to the natives, " we think
you wrong—we come to set you right; " and the natives,
though they did not agree with them, respected their
sincerity. It is true that some of them have suffered in
the violence of this outbreak, but the missionary stations
have suffered little compared to the military stations. I
say, then, here was the grand sin that we ought to
be ashamed of before God this day, and our country
should be ashamed of, and our Indian Government
ashamed of; and now, my dear brethren, look
most seriously at this matter. Do you think our
Government are ashamed of it? Do you think there is
the slightest intention on their part to alter this ? Do
you think there is the slightest intention on the part of
the East India Company and Government to declare them-
selves wrong, and to restore the Bible to the Government
schools ? Do you think there is any intention of amend-
ment to-day before God? Then what do they mean by
confessing their sins and asking pardon ? Men who have
no real religion themselves, who are guided in life by
human kindness and public opinion, imagine that other
men will be guided by human kindness and public opinion
also, and that whatever their religious principles may be,
they will be guided in this way as they themselves arc.
Now this is a delusion—it is a great mistake. The human
heart is superstitious, and men cleave to the principles
they call their religion. For a time and for a purpose they
may serve von under the most sacred oath; for a time and
for a purpose they may eat your salt, and receive your pay
and fight side by side with you, but all the while they
reserve an allegiance higher than you ; and when it an-
swers their purpose and they see an opportunity, they
will consider) themselves doing their God service when
they turn and rend you. It is the policy of Popery at
home—it is the policy of Hindooism and Mohammedanism
abroad. True, it is, there will be found exceptions—
individuals practically better than the principles of the
system they belong to, but those individuals are men who
have no strong opinions, and who cannot be depended
upon when it comes to the point. This policy has been
acted upon both at home and abroad ; we have got the
recoil as regards Mohammedanism and Hindooism, and
we are rushing straight in the very direction to provoke
the recoil from Popery. We are impartial between ido-
latry and Christianity at home—we are impartial between
the worship of the Virgin Jury and the worship of G) I.
Im ,artiality, I say again, is practical infidelity; and
though they for a time will eat our salt and fight by our
side, they are still wedded to their system whenever they
exist; Dr. Cullen in Ireland, or Cardinal Wiseman to
England—these men, when the opportunity serves, will
think they do God service when they turn and rend
us. I have:told you many times before, and you did not
believe me, and I tell you now again. I confess humbly
before God, that until this time my soul was never moved
with regard to Hindooism or Mohammedanism, but it
was moved with reference to popery, which I believe in
my soul to be as offensive to God as either Hindooism
or Mahommedanism. The sins of the Indian Govern.
ment have not been merely this omission, grand and
primary as it is, but they have been guilty of sins o f
commission also. I cannot enter into details in this, bu
will merely remind you how the Government officers
gathered tribute for the temple of Juggernaught. That
indeed has been done away with, but while the Bible is
excluded from the Government of Calcu'ta, immodest
paintings and sculpture in the temples are protected. I
will refer but to one other feature in the list of com-
missions, and that has reference to the opium traffic.
The Government of India has not been content with
growing opium ; they have made a monopoly of it—they
prepare it for exportation to China, and they defend
illicit smuggling of it into China, in defiance of the Chinese
authorities. They have persevered in doing so,
and have broken down the resistance of that poor,
weak nation, and so they have succeeded in making
in Chine as many drunkards as there are in our
own towns. Oh, we should be ashamed before G 31,
for the sins of the Government of India! Now,
my dear brethren, do not imagine that this is
intended as either a reproach to them, or a justification
of rebellion. God forbid. In conclusion, the reverend
gentleman declared that in the history of war, there was
nothing to surpass the ferocity of this rebellion, and that
the horrors of the Inquisition alone surpassed it, and
wound up by eloquently exhorting his hearers to sub.
scribe generously towards the relief of our suffering
fellow-countrymen in India.

there was little fear of England,s needing thi
warning. Her courage would be, as ever, true and fire ;
and now that some formal difficulties regarding the height
of recruits had been reduced, men would enlist in
thousands. There was more need we should be warned
not to be overcome of evil in the sense of sot being inoc-
culated with erne' revenge under tremendous provocation.
There should be no three days' licence given to the soldiers
upon the capture of Delhi. Let there not be another
scene worse than Badajoz. Vengeance, as a first ebulli-
tion of feeling, was almost inevitable, and hardly culpable ;
but as a deliberate act, or a premeditat-d purpose, it was
directly contrary to the text and to the Lord's Prayer.
We should beware of stimulating the wrath of soldiers,
who would and must be angry enough. We should thus
hearken to the apostles warning, while

lII.—We obeyed the precept of the text by over:
coming evil with good. By s'rength, by manly cour—
age, and by justice, we should overcome the evil in
India. Not by vengeance—that was the wrong word and
the forbidden act; but by justice, the dreadful justice
when man could not discriminate and God alone discerned
the innocent from the guilty. Sach dreadful justice in
the siege and capture of a Delhi was needful, and was
England's duty. Then nu licence after the capture, but
discriminating justice, which made the leaders and the
inhuman, upon proof of guilt, to die the death ; and which
devised for the masses of the mutineers expatriation, or
some other great and merited infliction. Presently,
as soon as might be, Jet Indian evil be over-
come, too, by patience on our part, by wisdom in our
Governments, by kindness in all our intercourse.
The sermon was closed by an appeal for sympathy and
help on behalf of those who were suffering, or should
suffer by the mutiny.

Tae sum of £3O 193 was collected. In the evening the
text was Psal. xxix. 11.

The preacher's object was to rEminl his audience that
we were not met to curse our foes, or to enrage one
another against them, Lut to humble and purify oar
minds, and to fix our resolutions on holy purposes.

I.—The text suggested an enquiry—Who were the
Lord's people ?

~~ •

All man—C iffres, Russians, Chinaman, and Indians—
were God's people, as created and loved by Him, and
intended by Him for virtue and goodness.
Those who, in the proyidenJe of God, wero made ac-
quainted with Christ and His gospel, were, in a higher
sense, privileged and responsible as the Lord's people.
these were, rightly and worthily, in a Christian sense,
the Lord's people who loved God and Christ, and made
themselves conformable to the mind and spirit of Jesus.

Then followed an appeal to his hearers, as to their per-
sonal' regard for Christ, and the means they had taken to
teach and Oxemplify the Gospel in India.

11. To us—if we be the Lord's people indeed—are
promised in the text, strength and peace; the strength.
viz., of moral, thoughtful, brave, manly Christians ; and
the peace of those who, feeling goodwill to all men, are
employed in doing good, commercially and otherwise, and
are blessed with the sight of knowledge, and truth, and
piety, more and more filling the earth, even as the waters
fill the seas.

---
If the IRdian mutiny and this day's services taught us,
as a nation and as a congregation, to set ourselves thus to
think and thus to work, we should be the Lord's people,
receiving from Him invincible strength and unfailing
peace, and we should ever have cause to bless this our
assembling together.

After another appeal for the sufferers by the mutiny'
the sum of Z 9 43 21 was collected, making, together with
10 sent through Me. MAcnaught,
,the sum of
_A:SO 33 2d
as St. Chrysostom's contribution.

chapter, concluding at the 53rd verse. A. collection
amounting to nearly £l4 was made.l

THE EVENING SERVICES.

Similar prayers, as above, were used in those churches
which were opened in the evening for Divine worship.

rpowerful nation, and discreditable to a Christian govern—
ment. There was no eollectioe.

CHRIST CHURCH, CLAUGHTON.

IYr.. Blakeney, the incumbent of this church. preached
a powerful sermon yesterday morning, before a numerous
and attentive congregation. The rev. gentleman took for
his text, the 12th verse of the 60th chapter of Isaiah.
After insisting upon the necessity of governments recog-
nising religion, and arguing that we did so in Eagland, by
appointing national days of humiliation, in spite of what
was said in and out of Parliament, the rev. doctor said
that national sine were punished in this world, and as a
nation having a responsibility, we were now suffering for
our misdeeds. In India, we not only encouraged idolat rens
religions; even going so far as to call upon heathens and
Mahommedans to pray to false gods and prophets for our
country on fast days ; but we set bad examples to the
natives, our national sin of intemperance, giving heathens
opportunities of pointhig us out in the public streets, and
sneering at us, as " followers of Jesus Christ." After
hinting that our countrymen in India sinned much on the
score of immorality, the preacher then alluded to our
fearful ca,'alogne of national sins at home, all of which he
said called for a sincere and immediate repentance. In
conclusion, Dr. B'akeney denounced the fearful cruelties
of the ungrateful and merciless Sepoys, and gave a very
affecting account of the massacre at Cawnpore, where the
chaplain read the burial service calmly and serenely, a few
minutes before he and those around him were brutally
murdered. The collection for the Indian relief fund
amounted to £46 7s 91, and the rev. gentleman announced
that he should resume his discourse in the evening, when
another collection would be made•]