The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-12-22 00:00:00

LIVERPOOL SUNDAY-SCHOOL INSTITUTE

On Friday evening last, the Rev. W. Withers Ewbank,
A.B. delivered a most interesting and instructive address
to the members and friends of the above institute, in the
Portico, Newington. The subject of the lecture was
"The use or abuse of the Bible." Although it was an
unfavourable, wet evening, the house was well filled.
Afte r some preliminary observations, the reverend lec-
turer spoke nearly as follows :
One of the first abuses of the Bible, is a habit, of late
exceedingly common, of not taking the plain, natural in-
struction from any pacsage of the word of God. When
I speak of "abuses," I speak:more of unintentional abuses.
I abide not here to infidels, who 'speak evil cf the Bible,
nor to our Roman Catholic brethren, who would conceal
the Bible, but of Protestant Christians, who, with the
best intentions put their own meaning upon the Scrip-
tures, instead of the real plain natural meaning dictated
by the spirit of God. It libts been well said, that the
instruction derived from the Bible should be as the first
pressure of wine from the grape. Whatever, therefore,
we see by the teaching of God's spirit to be the plain,
literal. primary meaning of God's word, that we should
press to our own hearts, and seek to impress it upon the
hearts of others.

A second source of abuse arises from forgetfulness or
ignorance of what the Bible really is. Now, what is the
Bible? You say, it is the word of God, and you say true.
But many persons, in thinking of the Bible, think of it as
one single book. It is a book, it is true, bound up within
two covers—but it is not a single book. It is a collection
of bot.ks which occupied in writing, at different periods, a
thousand years—so that it is not right to treat the Bible
as if it were written in a day, or a year, or an age, or as
having reference to one time and one place. The Bible is
for the most part an eastern book, and was written in an
east country. When, therefore, the Holy Spirit of God
inspired men to write the Bible, he did not make the
character of their minds western instead of eastern. I
think great harm has been done by commentators straining
the sense of Scripture, as if it were written in our colder
dish-et. As an instance of the eastern character of the
Bible, turn to Psalm xviii.—a psalm supposed to have
been penned by David on ascending the throne, after he
had passed through many difficulties : read the 7th to
the 16th verses :—" He rode upon a cherub and die fly :
yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind." Now, when
did God do all this ?—he never did it at all. He never
actually rode upon a cherub. But this was the eastern
way of expressing the idea of God's greatness and ma-
jesty., David, in saying this, said nothing wrong. He
merely meant by it all, that God, by his gracious provi-
dence, had delivered him from all hisenemies. Hence be
says in the 17th verse :—" He delivered me from my
strong enemy and from them which hated me, for they
were too strong for me." Some of you may say : What
is the evil of this sort of interpretation to which I have
alluded ? Precisely like the last evil. For persons
wishing to explain this and other passages of Scripture in
a western way, bring forward this psalm, and so make
nonsense of it. For when they read,—" He rode upon a
cherub and did fly," they say :—This has never taken
place yet, and therefore one day it will take place. Thus
they take away a large portion of God's word, and set it
down to some future period.
Another great source of a bad interpretation of Scrip.
ture is, the forgetfulness that the Bible was written at
various times and periods. Hence the importance of a
knowledge of chronology to the reader of the Bible. The
study of the Chronology of the Bible, is one of the most
difficult studies. Various systems have been given—as
that of Usher, and others—none of them, probably, in
every instance correct. Now let any man open at Gene-
sis, and treat it in the same way as he would do if be
opened at Matthew, and he will get into confusion.
Really to hear some people explain the word of God, it
seems as if they supposed, that, because certain passages
are alike, therefore they mean the same thing. As an
instance of this, the reverend gentleman referred to the
first verse of the 16th chapter of Isaiah, to shew that
that passage might be referred, through an ignorance of
chronology, to a still future restoration of the Jews to
their own land; whilst in reality it referred to their return
from Babylon, which was future at the time Isaiah wrote.
To strengthen this view, the lecturer proceeded to com-
ment upon the next verse of the chapter.
Always, then, remember, in explaining the Scriptures,
to inquire when the books were written—►ook carefully to
the context, and learn the precise meaning of that portion
of Scripture which you wish to explain.

Another source of abuse arises from the want of consi-
deration as to the object of the Bible. What is the object
of the Bible? It is not to teach us science. If you wanted
for example, to learn astronomy, you would not go to the
Bible for it. You would learn nothing of astronomy there,
with the exception that " God created the sun, and the
moon, and the stars." But is this against the Bible?
Certainly not. It is surely not against a thing not to do
that which it was never intended to do ! The Bible is a
religious book—intended to teach men that they are sin-
ners—to reveal God's dealings with his chosen people,
His dealings with us through Christ—and to point the
way to everlasting happiness through Christ. This is its
object, and its oily object.
It is true that there are other things beside these con-
tained in the Bible. But they are only incidental. We
have, for example, an account of Nebuchadnezzar. But
it is not the intention of the sacred historian to give us a
history of that king. So much of his history is given as
is necessary to the connexion of the history of God's
chosen people and no more ; and so it is with many other
allusions and passages of God's Word. Beware, then, of
trying to gain the Bible to this side or to that side, as to
any other object than that which ►he Bible seeks : for if
we do this, we are abusing that Holy Book, because we
are using it as God never intended it to be used. You
have all heard of the famous Galileo. Before his time
the earth was supposed to be a fixed point in space. The
sun, it was believed, went round the earth ;—in short,
the earth was the centre of the planetary system And
when Galileo found out the truth, what did they say to
him ? They said he was an Infidel !—an Infidel, just as
you and I are, for we believe in his theory. Though he was
not convinced, his enemies obliged him to declare, on his
hended knees, that the earth stood still. He was a man
before his age ! Like many others, hefore and since, he
went faster than the Church of Rome could so. liis
was the truth ! But, did it shake the Bible ? No ! Do
you not now say, pointing to the Rock and Fort at the
entrance of Liverpool, that the sun sets ? And as you
use the common language of the times, so did the sacred
writers. The Bible was written to teach men the way to
salvation, and not the truths of science. As with
astronomy, so with geology. I know little about
geology. But I am sure of this, that none need
be afraid of the truth, and that if we search with a
humble mind into the revealed will of God, we shall never
fear geology, or phrenology if you like, or any other
ology. As the Bible stood the truth of Galileo, so it will
stand, not against, but in harmony with all other discove-
ries and investigations to the end of time.

Another source of error arises from party spirit. There
is a feeling of party spirit more or less in the breasts of all
of us. Few of us can look into the Bible with an honest
desire to get out of it the entire truth. In whatever cir-
cumstances a man may find himself placed by early edu-
cation or association, he will be anxious to find a warrant
for it in the Bible. There is the question of slavery, for
example. We all abominate slavery ! Yet in the Bible
we find mention made of slavery without that distinct re-
probation and horror with which we ate accustomed to
view it. In the Mosaic law, there appears a sort of tole-
ration of slavery. Now, even in the New r stawent, we
find St. Paul sending back Onesimus, a runaway slave, to
his master, and exhorting slaves (for the word " servant"
is, as you know, in a e original " slave") to he obedient to
their master ! Nlany men seeing this in the Bible, argue
that the Bible sanctions slavery. But there is nothing
more untrue. Does the Bible sanction polygamy because
it records that David and Solomon had their wives and
concubines? Does the Bible sanction war, and recom-
mend it, and say it is a good thing, because Joshua was
commanded to exterminate the Canaanites ? or infanticide
because Abraham was required to offer up his son Isaac?
We know very well it does not. No ! God has
introduced truth into the world as men were able to bear
it. He has given us great principles, and has left them to
work themselves out ; and if the principles of the Gospel
prevail they will sweep away slavery and every other evil
from the face of the earth. Surely slavery can nevi-r
stand against the Gospel precept—" Love thy neighbour
as thyself ;" nor war against the command, to " Love our
enemies." Nothing, then, is more unfair than to take
certain wick d eases—real wickednesses which God h s
tolerated, winks at, to use the Apostle's language, in ano-
ther state of society and uniler another dispensation—and
apply them to the days of our own Gospel light, as though
God were responsible for the wickedness of men.
After giving his views more at length on this subject,

and alluding to other passages of Scripture corroborative
of this principle, the rev, lecturer proceeded to consider
the " Uses of the Bible"—under the following heads :
Its historical use—the application of its promises to our-
selves, and the necessity of possessing the experience of
it in our own hearts.

After adverting to the importance of the office of the
Sunday School teacher, iu preparing the people for the
right understanding of the truths of the gospel, as pro-
pounded from the pulpit, the reverend lecturer concluded
a most instructive lecture with the expression of his best
wishes for the prosperity of the undertaking to which the
teachers bad set their hands.
A vote of thanks to the lecturer was then moved by
Samuel Stitt, Esq., the benediction pronounced, and the
meeting separated.

COLONEL GAWLER AND THE COLONY OF
SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

(From the Dai.'y News.)
SlR,—Among the editorial articles in your journal of
Saturday last, there is one in reference to the colony of
South Australia, which, in the great body of its observa-
tions, is, so far as it goes, most correct. As having been
led to look somewhat closely into colonial history, and,
moreover, as being of necessity intimately acquainted
with the progress and prospects of South Australia, I can
bear witness with confidence, that, in proportion to its
age as a British possession, there has not appeared in mo-
dern times so fine and promising a colony. A population
of about 23,000 souls, and exports of its own produce
amounting in value, for the first quarter of this year, to
£101,718 155., in the course of the tenth year only of ab-
solute existence, are results which modern society has
never before seen, and which, even in the energetic days
of PhcenicLai, Grecian, and Rowan colonization, were
probably never, in any very distant settlement, equalled.
While, however, your article is very correct in its com-
mendation of South Australia, it is, I assure you, most
incorrect and unjust in some subordinate sentences of its
observations. As the weight of this inaccuracy bears
upon me, I roust beg leave to set the matter in its right
position. The sentences to which I refer stand as
follow :

" During the ten years of its existence, South Australia
has frequently been the object of vehement attacks. We

Dec. 22, 1846.

have no intention to deny that there was often good cause
for severe criticism. Mismanagement on the part of
those to whom its direction was first entrusted, and an
unlucky spirit of gambling speculation that arose among
the settlers, rendered the colony at one time fairly
bankrupt."

In the hitherto short history of South Australia, no
one in the " direction" of its affairs has ever been " the
object of frequent and vehement attack s"* in this country,
but myself. Taking, therefore, your censures to myself,
I must offer to them, with a few additional observations,
the following letter on the same subject, which appeared
lately in the Times, and which 1 beg you to do me the
favour to insert in your columns:—

" SIR,—In your city article of this morning, under the
head of " Late Advices from South Australia," a compa-
rison is drawn between the expenditure and produce of
that colony for the years 1840 and 1845 respectitely, in
apparent censure of the former, and praise by " ccntrast"
of the latter. As the responsibility of the former rests
upon me, I would offer a few words on this subject. A
man's public reputation is of no small importance to him,
if it only be in reference to the future work into which, in
the providenc.. of God, he may be thrown.

"The year 1840 was the fourth only of the absolute ex-
istence of South Australia as a British possession. I
found it in 1838, with the exception of two or three small
patches near the sea shore, an unexplored, intricate wil-
derness. Settlers poured in by thousands. and land was
most rapidly purchased, sufficient to occupy the available
tracts of a district as large as our home principality of
Wales. The colonists were certainly in a state of bitter,
not to say fierce, political dissension : the original survey
department had resigned, and my means of meeting the
emergency consisted of one young draughtsman for the
office, and one retired corporal of Sappers for the field;
the latter a fine fellow certainly, who would have an-
swered all my purposes if I could have cut him up into
ten or twenty living portions, but who, unhappily for me,
was not thus divisible. Besides these difficulties, the
original tents, instruments, &c., were almost wholly de-
stroyed ; provisions and wages were immensely high,
there were very few draught animals in the province, and
the nearest points of supply for almost every thing re-
quired were at distances from 1,000 to 1,500 miles across
a stormy and very indifferently known ocean. Let any
intelligent man realise in his mind such a position, adding
to my brief sketch of it all those circumstances connected
with a new climate, country, and community, w bleb I
have not space to describe, and let him judge whether it
was possible to meet and conquer such an emergency
without a great outlay. I certainly did overcome it ; for
when I left the province in 1841, the latest demands for
land were, after immense exertion, in the very act of
being answered.

" In a leading article which your journal did me the fa-
your, with much good feeling towards me, to devote to
the subject in October, 1844, witness was borne to this
fact. The article says of me, ' Had the eternal solitudes
of Australia been as fleeting and precarious as a shoal of
herrings, he could not have been in a greater hurry to cast
his net over the prey.' I did indeed survey in haste, but
no more with the object of catching the solitudes of Aus-
tralia, than the fisherman has in view the catching of the
bottom of the sea. His object is the shoal of herrings,
and mine was the shoals of settlers which were then set-
ting upon South Australia, as ready as herrings to alter
their course if they had found what they wanted. I would
now beg attention to the Jesuit of the above-described,
combined with other measures ; it is this, that by far a
grater number of settlers were caught (if you please) and
retained in South Australia, than were ever before io mo-
dern history, at the same comparative period of time,
caught and kept in any distant colony. The net was
strong with good faith; the commissioners stood publicly
pledged to give purchasers their land without delay. I
was one of their body by commission under the sign ma-
nual, and was their representative in the colony.
" I will not enlarge upon other unavoidable causes of
great outlay, such as providing for the labouring emi-
grants who could not find regular employment until the
settlers got their land, and who were most eagerly longed
for in the neighbouring colonies, at a time when those
colonies were in high prosperity, or the necessity for
erecting public buildings to meet the wants of a population
of 15,000 souls, which might, moreover, have as rapidly
gone on to double its numbers; but I will only point to
the fact, that when I left South Australia it was in bene-
ficial results, population, harmony, civil order, and pro-
tection, produce, exports, surveys, communications, and
public constructions, what I have before called it—by far
the finest colony in proportion to its duration in modern
history, produced at a cost to the parent state not greater
at most than has been required to bring other colonies to
the same comparative condition, and, moreover, contain-
ing in itself the foundation of all its present extraordinary
prosperity. Every one knows, that in the instance of a
young tree borne to a great dista.ce from its parent
earth, the risk, cost, and anxiety, are in the removal and
planting. Once firmly set in a good soil, it is not sur-
prising that it should flourish and fruit at little expense.
Discovering, by very laborious personal research, that the
capabilities of South Australia were (what they are now
known in England to be) very great, 1 took decided mea-
sures to establish the colony, and of necessity incurred a
large primary expenditure in so doing.
" I remain, sir, your obedient servant,
" G. GAWLER.

" Brunswick-square, November 5.

THIS LARGE PRIMARY EXPENDITURE HAS TURNED
OUT TO BE WHAT 1. AT THE TIME, WAS PERSUADED IT
WOULD BE, THE HIGHEST ECONOMY.—Tbe colony, with
its communications, both maritime and internal, well
opened, and almost every essential provided for its early
cradition, is supporting its publ;c establishments from
its own resources, with a considerable surplus of revenue.
Firmly planted and well watered, it is springing with an
innate vigour before unknown, to spread its branches far
and wide, and to fill the " far East" with its fruit. Storms
have, indeed, passed over it; but upon what new colony
have they not fallen? Is not the history of modern early
colonisation a series of struggles for existence ? South
Australia was never " nearly bankrupt ;" it always pos-
sessed assets amply equal to its debts, and the appearance-
of bankruptcy which it bore for a time, arose from the
severity with which, for a time, its debts, under doubts of
its solvency, were visited.

In justice to the colonists I am bound to remark, that
their so-termed " unlucky spirit of gambling speculation,"
has also been regarded in England with by far too much
severity. Sufficient allowance has not been made for the
aberrations of the high energy, combined with human
failings, which men must throw into a work so difficult,
as that of rapidly turning an unexplored wilderaess at
the antipodes of their mother country, into a country
like that which they have left. Settlers in a r.ew colony,
as compared with the inhabitants of an old established
community, are like troops in the field as compared
with an army in home quarters ; but if the officers
and soldiers in a field day in H vde-pat k, were to exhib -
energy in expressions and actions, as it was shown on the
fields of Salamanca, Vittoi ia, or 'Waterloo, the Com-
manding Officer would probably find the card of the
Commissioner of Lunacy on his table by breakfast time
the next morning. That which was regarded in England
as the " madness" of the Colonists of South Australia
has, taking it all in all, achieved a victory of which the
beneficial effects in the " far East" shall last, when even
Salamanca, Vittoria, and Waterloo, may be there almost
forgotten. In high social feeling, energetic industry,
sound morality and religion, and loyal attachment to the
mother-country, there are very few such colonies in ex-
istence, and with such a basis the edifice must stand
firmly and rapidly increase.-1 remain, Sir, your obedient
servant, G. GAWLER.
Brunswick square, Dece:nber 1, 1816.

" * The vehement attacks ~t which we spoke were directed
ainst the colony. The ' severe criticism' on those to whom
its direction was intrip.ted, was cirected more against Colonel
Gawler's employers than himself, who was but a subordinate
agent."