A SERMON,

DELIVERED IN THE TRON CHURCH, GLASGOW, ON WEDNESDAY, NOV. 19, 1817.

THE DAY OF THE FUNERAL OF HER ROYAL HIGHNESS,

THE

PRINCESS CHARLOTTE OF WALES.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE following Sermon is the fruit of a very hurried and unlooked-for exertion-and never was there any publication brought forward under circumstances of greater reluctancy, and with a more honest feeling of unpreparedness, on the part of the author. The truth is, that he was at a great distance from home, when the urgency of the public demand for his personal appearance on the nineteenth of November, reached him, and that so late, that he had no other resource than to write for the pulpit during the intervals, and after the exhaustion of a very rapid and fatiguing journey. It is true that he might revise. But to revise such a composition, would be to re-make it; and he has chosen rather to bring it forward, and that as nearly as possible, in the literal terms of its delivery.

But, it may be asked, if so unfit for the public eye, why make it public? It may be thought by many, that the avowal is not a wise one. But wisdom ought never to be held in reverence separately from truth; and it would be disguising the real motive, were it concealed, that a very perverse misconception which has gone abroad respecting one passage of the Sermon, and which has found its way into many of the newspapers, is the real and impelling cause of the step that has been taken; and that, had it not been for the spread of such a misconception, there never would have been obtruded on the public, a performance written on a call of urgent necessity, and most assuredly without the slightest anticipation of authorship.

But, it may be said, does not such a measure as this bring the pulpit into a state of the most degrading subordination to the diurnal press, since there is not a single sermon which cannot be so reported, as, without the literality of direct falsehood, to convey through the whole country, all the injuries of a substantial misrepresentation; and if a minister should condescend publicly to notice every such random and ephemeral statement, he might thereby incessantly involve himself in the most helpless and harassing of all controversy?

Now, in opposition to this, let it be observed, that a person placed in this difficult and disagreeable predicament, may advert for once to such a provocation, and that for the express purpose, that he may never have to do it again. He may count it enough to make one decisive exposure of the injustice which can be done in this way to a public instructor, and then hold himself acquitted of every similar attempt in all time coming. He thereby raises a sort of abiding or monumental antidote, which may serve to neutralize the mischief of any future attack, or future insinuation. By this one act, though he may not silence the obloquies of the daily press, he has at least purchased for himself the privilege of standing unmoved by all the mistakes, or by all the malignities which may proceed from it.

Yet, it is no more than justice to a numerous and very important class of writers, to state it as our conviction of the great majority of them, that they feel the dig

nity and responsibility of their office, and hold it to be the highest point of professional honour, ever to maintain the most gentlemanly avoidance of all that is calculated to wound the feelings of an unoffending individual.

There is one temptation, however, to which the editors of this department of literature are peculiarly liable, which may be briefly adverted to, and the influence of which, may be observed to extend even to a higher class of journalists. There is an eagernesss to transmute every thing into metal of their own peculiar currency-there is an extreme avidity to lay hold of every utterance, and to send it abroad, tinged with the colouring of their own party-there is a ravenous desire of approbation, extending itself to every possible occurrence, and to every one individual whom they would like to enlist under the banners of their own partisanship, which, for their own credit, they would be more careful to repress, did they perceive with sufficient force, and sufficient distinctness, that it makes them look more like desperadoes of a sinking cause, than the liberal and honest expounders of public politics and literature, which claim so respectable a portion of the intelligence of the country.

The writer of this sermon has only to add, that he does not know how a sorer imputation could have been devised against the heart and the principles of a clergyman, than that, on the tender and hallowed day of a nation's repose from all the sordidness and all the irritations of party, he should have made the pulpit a vehicle of invective against any administration; or that, after mingling his tears with those of his people, over the untimely death of one so dear to us, he should have found room for any thing else than those lessons of general Christianity, by which an unsparing reproof is ministered to impiety, in whatever quarter it may be foundeven that impiety which wears the very same features, and offers itself in the very same aspect, under all administrations.

SERMON.

“For when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.”

Isaiah xxvi. 9.

I AM Sorry that I shall not be able to ex-such remarks as, to the eyes of many, may tend the application of this text beyond its wear a more public and even political commore direct and immediate bearing on that plexion, than is altogether suited to the event on which we are now met to mingle ministrations of the Sabbath. And yet I our regrets, and our sensibilities, and our cannot but advert, and that in such terms prayers-that, occupied as we all are with of reproof as I think to be most truly applithe mournful circumstance that has bereft cable, to another set of men, whose taste for our country of one of its brightest anticipa- preaching is very much confined to these tions, I shall not be able to clear my way great and national occasions-who, habituto the accomplishment of what is, strictly ally absent from church on the Sabbath, are speaking, the congregational object of an yet observed, and that most prominently, to address from the pulpit, which ought, in come together in eager and clustering atevery possible case, to be an address to the tendance, on some interesting case of pathos conscience-that, therefore, instead of the or of politics-who in this way obtrude upon concerns of personal Christianity, which, the general notice, their loyalty to an earthly under my present text, I might, if I had sovereign, while, in reference to their Lord space for it, press home upon the attention and Master, Jesus Christ, they scandalize of my hearers, I shall be under the necessi- all that is Christian in the general feeling, ty of restricting myself to that more partial by their manifest contempt for him and for application of the text which relates to the his ordinances-who look for the ready matters of public Christianity. It is upon compliance of ministers, in all that can grathis account, as well as upon others, that I tify their inclinations for pageantry, while rejoice in the present appointment, for the for the real, effective, and only important improvement of that sad and sudden visita- business of ministers, they have just as little tion, which has so desolated the hearts and reverence as if it were all a matter of hollow the hopes of a whole people. I therefore and insignificant parade. It is right to share feel more freedom in coming forward within the triumphs of successful, and to shed

the tears of afflicted, patriotism. But it is also right to estimate according to its true character, the patriotism of those who are never known to offer one homage to Christianity, except when it is associated with the affairs of state, or with the wishes, and the commands, and the expectations of

statesmen.

power over all the hopes and fortunes o. our species!-Our blooming Princess, whom fancy had decked with the coronet of these realms, and under whose gentle sway all bade so fair for the good and the peace of our nation, has he placed upon her bier! And, as if to fill up the measure of his triumph, has he laid by her side, that babe, who, but for him, might have been the mo

done that, which by no single achievement he could otherwise have accomplished-he has sent forth over the whole of our land, the gloom of such a bereavement as cannot be replaced by any living descendant of royalty-he has broken the direct succession of the monarchy of England-by one and the same disaster, has he wakened up the public anxieties of the country, and sent a pang as acute as that of the most woful domestic visitation, into the heart of each of its families.

In the prosecution of the following discourse, as I have already stated, I shall satisfy myself with a very limited application of the text. I shall, in the first place, offer a few remarks on that branch of the righteousness of practical Christianity, which consists in the duty that subjects owe to their governors. And in the second place, I shall attempt to improve the present great national disaster, to the object of impressing upon you, that, under all our difficulties and all our fears, it is the righteousness of the people alone which will exalt and perpetuate the nation; and that therefore, if this great interest be neglected, the country, instead of reaping improvement from the judgments of God, is in imminent danger of being utterly overwhelmed by them.

But the frivolous and altogether despicable taste of the men to whom I am alluding,narch of a future generation; and he has must be entirely separated from such an occasion as the present. For, in truth, there never was an occasion of such magnitude, and at the same time of such peculiarity. There never was an occasion on which a matter of deep political interest was so blended and mixed up with matter of very deep and affecting tenderness. It does not wear the aspect of an affair of politics at all, but of an affair of the heart; and the novel exhibition is now offered, of all party-irritations merging into one common and overwhelming sensibility. Oh! how it tends to quiet the agitations of every earthly interest and earthly passion, when Death steps forward and demonstrates the littleness of them all-when he stamps a character of such affecting insignificance on all that we are contending for-when, as if to make known the greatness of his power in the sight of a whole country, he stalks in ghastly triumph over the might and the grandeur of its most august family, and singling out that member of it on whom the dearest hopes and the gayest visions of the people were suspended, he, by one fatal and resistless blow, sends abroad the fame of his victory and his strength, throughout the wide extent of an afflicted nation. He has indeed put a cruel and impressive mockery on all the glories of mortality. A few days I. But here let me attempt the difficult ago, all looked so full of life, and promise, task of rightly dividing the Word of truth— and security-when we read of the bustle and premise this head of discourse, by adof the great preparation-and were told of mitting that I know nothing more hateful the skill and the talent that were pressed than the crouching spirit of servility. I into the service-and heard of the goodly know not a single class of men more unattendance of the most eminent in the na- worthy of reverence, than the base and intion-and how officers of state, and the terested minions of a court. I know not a titled dignitaries of the land, were charioted set of pretenders who more amply deserve in splendour to the scene of expectation, as to be held out to the chastisement of public to the joys of an approaching holiday-yes, scorn, than they who, under the guise of and we were told too, that the bells of the public principle, are only aiming at persurrounding villages were all in readiness sonal aggrandizement. This is one corrupfor the merry peal of gratulation, and that tion. But let us not forget that there is anthe expectant metropolis of our empire, on other-even a spurious patriotism which tiptoe for the announcement of her future would proscribe loyalty as one of the virmonarch, had her winged couriers of des-tues altogether. Now, I cannot open my patch to speed the welcome message to the ears of her citizens, and that from her an embassy of gladness was to travel over all the provinces of the land; and the country, forgetful of all that she had suffered, was at length to offer the spectacle of one wide and rejoicing jubilee. O Death! thou hast indeed chosen the time and the victim, for demonstrating the grim ascendancy of thy

Bible, without learning that loyalty is one branch of the righteousness of practical Christianity.-I am not seeking to please men, but God, when I repeat his words in your hearing-that you should honour the King-that you should obey Magistratesthat you should meddle not with those who are given to change-that you should be subject to principalities and powers-that

you should lead a quiet and peaceable life | principle, on which all the lessons of Chrisin all godliness and honesty. This, then, is tianity will rise into visible and consistent a part of the righteousness which it is our exemplification. And it is he, and such as business to teach, and sure I am that it is a he, who will turn out to be the salvation of part of righteousness which the judgment the country, when the hour of her threatnow dealt out to us, should, of all others, ened danger is approaching—and it is just dispose you to learn. I know not a virtue in proportion as you spread and multiply more in harmony with the present feelings, such a character, that you raise within the and afflictions, and circumstances of the bosom of the nation, the best security country, than that of a steadfast and deter- against all her fluctuations—and, as in every mined loyalty. The time has been, when other department of human concerns, so such an event as the one that we are now will it be found, that, in this particular deassembled to deplore, would have put every partment, Christians are the salt of the restless spirit into motion, and set a guilty earth, and Christianity the most copious ambition upon its murderous devices, and and emanating fountain of all the guardian brought powerful pretenders with their op- virtues of peace, and order, and patriotism. posing hosts of vassalage into the field, and The judgment under which we now laenlisted towns and families under the rival bour, supplies, I think, one touching, and, banners of a most destructive fray of con- to every good and christian mind, one tention, and thus have broken up the whole powerful argument of loyalty. It is the peace and confidence of society. Let us distance of the prince from his people which bless God that these days of barbarism are feeds the political jealousy of the latter, and now gone by. But the vessel of the state is which, by removing the former to a height still exposed to many agitations. The sea of inaccessible grandeur, places him, as it of politics is a sea of storms, on which the were, beyond the reach of their sympathies. gale of human passions would make her Much of the political rancour, which festers, founder, were it not for the guidance of hu- and agitates, and makes such a tremendous man principle; and, therefore, the truest appearance of noise and of hostility in our policy of a nation is to christianize her land, is due to the aggravating power of subjects, and to disseminate among them distance. If two of the deadliest political the influence of religion. The most skilful antagonists in our country, who abuse, and arrangement for rightly governing a state, vilify, and pour forth their stormy elois to scatter among the governed, not the quence on each other, whether in parliaterrors of power-not the threats of jealous ment or from the press, were actually to and alarmed authority-not the demonstra- come into such familiar and personal contions of sure and ready vengeance held tact, as would infuse into their controversy forth by the rigour of an offended law. the sweetening of mere acquaintanceship, These may, at times, be imperiously called this very circumstance would disarm and for. But a permanent security against the do away almost all their violence. The wild outbreakings of turbulence and disas- truth is, that when one man rails against ter, is only to be attained by diffusing the another across the table of a legislative aslessons of the Gospel throughout the great sembly, or when he works up his fermentmass of our population-even those lessons ing imagination, and pens his virulent senwhich are utterly and diametrically at anti-tences against another, in the retirement of podes with all that is criminal and wrong a closet-he is fighting against a man at a in the spirit of political disaffection. The distance-he is exhausting his strength only radical counteraction to this evil is to against an enemy whom he does not know be found in the spirit of Christianity; and he is swelling into indignation, and into though animated by such a spirit, a man all the movements of what he thinks right may put on the intrepidity of one of the old and generous principle, against a chimera prophets, and denounce even in the ear of of his own apprehension; and a similar reroyalty the profligacies which may disgrace action comes back upon him from the quaror deform it-though animated by such a ter that he has assailed, and thus the conspirit, he may lift his protesting voice in the troversy thickens, and the delusion every face of an unchristian magistracy, and tell day gets more impenetrable, and the disthem of their errors-though animated by tance is ever widening, and the breach is such a spirit, he, to avoid every appearance always becoming more hopeless and more of evil, will neither stoop to the flattery of irreparable; and all this between two men, power, nor to the solicitations of patronage who, if they had been in such accidental -and though all this may bear, to the su- circumstances of juxta-position as could perficial eye, a hard, and repulsive, and hos- have let them a little more into one another's tile aspect towards the established dignities feelings, and to one another's sympathies, of the land-yet forget not, that if a real would at least have had all the asperities of and honest principle of Christianity lie at their difference smoothed away by the mere the root of this spirit, there exists within softenings and kindlinesses of ordinary huthe bosom of such a man, a foundation of man intercourse.

Now let me apply this remark to the mu- | pine with disease, and taste the sufferings tual state of sentiment which obtains be- of mortality, and be oppressed with anguish, tween the different orders of the community. and love with tenderness, and experience Among the rich, there is apt at times to in their bosoms the same movements of rankle an injurious and unworthy impres- grief or of affection that we do ourselves. sion of the poor-and just because these And thus it is, that they labour under a poor stand at a distance from them-just real and heavy disadvantage. There is not because they come not into contact with in their case, the counteraction of that that which would draw them out into cour- kindly influence, to alleviate the weight or teousness to their persons, and in benevo- the malignity of prejudice, which men of a lent attentions to their families. Among humbler station are ever sure to enjoy. In the the poor, on the other hand, there is often a case of a man whose name is hardly known disdainful suspicion of the wealthy, as if beyond the limits of his personal acquainthey were actuated by a proud indifference to tance, the tale of calumny that is raised them and to their concerns, and, as if they against him extends not far beyond these were placed away from them at so distant limits; and, therefore, wherever it is heard, and lofty an elevation as not to require the it meets with a something to blunt and to exercise of any of those cordialities, which soften it, in those very cordialities which are ever sure to spring in the bosom of man the familiar exhibition of him as a brother to man, when they come to know each of our common nature is fitted to awaken. other, and to have the actual sight of each But it is not so with those in the elevated other. But let any accident place an indi- walks of society. Their names are familiar vidual of the higher before the eyes of the where their persons are unknown; and lower order, on the ground of their common whatever malignity may attach to the one, humanity-let the latter be made to see that circulates abroad, and is spread far beyond the former are akin to themselves in all the the limits of their possible intercourse sufferings and in all the sensibilities of our with human beings, and meets with no common inheritance-let, for example, the kindly counteraction from our acquaintance greatest chieftain of the territory die, and with the other. And this may explain the report of his weeping children, or of his how it is, that the same exalted persondistracted widow, be sent through the neigh-age may, at one and the same time, be sufbourhood-or let an infant of his family be fering under a load of most unmerited obin suffering, and the mothers of the humble loquy from the wide and the general pubvicinity be run to for counsel and assist- lic, and be to all his familiar domestics an ance or in any other way let the rich, in-object of the most enthusiastic devotedness stead of being viewed by their inferiors and regard.

through the dim and distant medium of that Now, if through an accidental opening, fancied interval which separates the ranks the public should be favoured with a doof society, be seen as heirs of the same mestic exhibition-if, by some overpowerfrailty, and as dependent on the same sym-ing visitation of Providence upon an illuspathies with themselves-and at that moment, all the floodgates of honest sym pathy will be opened-and the lowest servants of the establishment will join in the ery of distress which has come upon their family-and the neighbouring cottagers, to share in their grief, have only to recognise them as the partakers of one nature, and to perceive an assimilation of feelings and of circumstances between them.

trious family, the members of it should come to be recognised as the partakers of one common humanity with ourselves-if, instead of beholding them in their gorgeousness as princes, we look to them in their natural evolution of their sensibilities as men-if the stately palace should be turned into a house of mourning-in one word, if death should do what he has already done, he has met the Princess of England in the Let me further apply this to the sons and prime and promise of her days, and as she the daughters of royalty. The truth is, was moving onward on her march to a hethat they appear to the public eye as stalk-reditary throne, he has laid her at his feet. ing on a platform so highly elevated above Ah! my brethren, when the imagination the general level of society, that it removes dwells on that bed where the remains of them, as it were, from all the ordinary sympathies of our nature. And though we read at times of their galas, and their birthdays, and their drawing-rooms, there is nothing in all this to attach us to their interests and their feelings, as the inhabitants of a familiar home-as the members of an affectionate family. Surrounded as they are with the glare of a splendid notoriety, we scarcely recognize them as men and as women, who can rejoice, and weep, and

departed youth and departed infancy are lying-when, instead of crowns and canopies of grandeur, it looks to the forlorn husband, and the weeping father, and the human feelings which agitate their bosom, and the human tears which flow down their cheeks, and all such symptoms of deep affliction as bespeak the workings of suffering and dejected nature-what ought to be, and what actually is, the feeling of the country at so sad an exhibition? It is just