alifornia 
 
 jional 
 
 ility
 
 Ex Libris 
 C. K. OGDEN 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 SERMONS 
 
 FOR CHILDREN
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE 
 LONDON
 
 SERMONS FOR CHILDREN 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 THE BEATITUDES AND THE FAITHFUL SERVANT 
 
 PREACirr.D t.\~ U'ESTMIXSTER ABBEY 
 
 BY ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, D.D. 
 
 LATE DEAN OF WESTMINSTER 
 
 LONDON 
 
 JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLR STREET 
 1887 
 
 All rights reserved
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THKSK SERMONS, having been found to interest 
 many young persons into whose hands they came 
 when privately printed, are now published in the 
 hope that they may be of use to a wider circle of 
 readers. 
 
 They have been reproduced as correctly as the 
 rough state of the Author's Manuscript permitted ; 
 but it is obvious that, in some places, either the 
 manuscript has been inaccurately deciphered, or 
 the Preacher supplemented what he had written by- 
 additions at the moment. 
 
 The concluding Sermon, on 'The Faithful 
 Servant,' though not addressed specially to children, 
 and not preached in the Abbey, seemed from its 
 personal and familiar character to have a proper 
 place in this volume.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 HKKMON 
 
 I. THE CHILD JESUS (1871) . 
 
 II. LITTLE CHILDREN, LOVE ONE ANOTHER 
 
 (i73) , . 10 
 
 III. THE USE OF CHILDREN (1874) . . 20 
 
 IV. THE ' GOLIATH' BOYS (1875) . . . 32 
 V. THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS (1876) . . 44 
 
 VI. SICK CHILDREN (1877) . . . . 54 
 
 VII. ST. CHRISTOPHER (1878) . . -67 
 
 VIII. THE CHILDREN'S CREED (1879) . . 76 
 
 IX. TALITHA CUMI (1880) . . -87 
 
 X. THE BEATITUDES (1881) . . -95 
 
 XI. THE BEATITUDES (1881) . . . 104 
 
 XII. THE BEATITUDES (1881) . . .113 
 
 XIII. THE BEATITUDES (1881) . . . 122 
 
 XIV. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT (1856) . .132
 
 SERMONS FOR CHILDREN. 
 
 i. 
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 (December 28, 1871.) 
 
 And the child grcu>, and waxed strong in spirit, filled ~uith 
 wisdom : and the grace of God was upon Him, LUKE ii. 40. 
 
 THIS day is called the day of the Holy Innocents, 
 because it calls upon us to remember the death of 
 those little children who were killed at Bethlehem 
 at the time of our Saviour's birth, when He also 
 was a little child like them. It is also a day 
 famous in this Abbey, because it was on this day, 
 more than eight hundred years ago, that this great 
 church was finished by its first founder, King 
 Edward the Confessor, who was himself an inno- 
 cent, guileless man, almost like a little child. We 
 have thought, therefore, that it might be good to 
 mark this day by gathering together here as many
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. SERM. i. 
 
 children as could come, and putting before them 
 the example which our Saviour set to all children, 
 He having been Himself a little child and a little 
 boy, such as those who are here to-day. For this 
 purpose the different passages of Scripture have 
 been chosen that have been sung or read to- 
 day ; the eighth Psalm in order that you might 
 see how little children may find out the glory of 
 God in the great works of nature, the beautiful 
 sights and sounds that they see and hear around 
 them ; the fifteenth Psalm in order to show how, 
 from our earliest years down to our latest age, 
 that in which God finds most pleasure is the 
 humble, pure, truthful, honourable mind ; and the 
 one hundred and twenty-seventh Psalm in order 
 to impress upon parents what precious, inestim- 
 able gifts are given to them in their little children. 
 And the anthem has been chosen in order to 
 remind all who are young how precious to them 
 are the days of their youth, and how the one thing 
 which they must bear in mind from first to last 
 is to ' fear God and keep His commandments, for 
 this is the whole duty of man ; ' and the hymn in 
 order to show how all of us, even the youngest, 
 may come to our gracious Saviour to ask Him to 
 have pity upon us. And the lessons were chosen,
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 the first in order to remind you how little Samuel 
 knelt upon his knees at morning and evening, 
 waiting for the voice of God to tell him what he was 
 to do ; and the second lesson which is what I will 
 specially speak of now because in it we have the 
 example of our Saviour Himself as the little child. 
 Let me, then, draw from these words what may be 
 useful both for the parents and friends of those 
 children who are here, and also, I hope, for the 
 children themselves, if they will listen to what I say. 
 First of all it is said, ' The child ' that is, 
 the child Jesus 'grew.' He grew in stature, and 
 He grew in character and goodness. He did not 
 stand still. Although it was God Himself who 
 was revealed to us in the life of Jesus Christ, yet 
 this did not prevent Him from being made like 
 unto us in all things, sin only excepted. It has 
 been reverently and truly said, 
 
 Was not our Lord a little child, 
 
 Taught by degrees to pray ; 
 By father dear and mother mild 
 
 Instructed day by day? ' 
 
 Yes, He was ; we need not fear to say so, and in 
 this lies the example for us. Each one of us, 
 whether old or young, must remember that pro- 
 1 Christian Year : The Catechism.
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 gress, improvement, going on, advance, change 
 into something better and better, wiser and wiser, 
 year by year that this is the only condition, the only 
 way of our becoming like Christ, and, therefore, 
 like God. Do not think that you will always be, 
 that you must always be, as you are now. No ; 
 you will grow up gradually to be something very 
 different ; you must increase and grow in mind as 
 well as in body, in wisdom as well as in stature. 
 The world moves, and you and all of us must move 
 with it. God calls us, one and all, ever to some- 
 thing higher and higher, and that higher stage you 
 and I and the whole world must reach by steadily 
 advancing towards it. 
 
 And then come three things especially which 
 the text puts before us as those in which our 
 Lord's earthly education, the advance and im- 
 provement of His earthly character, added to His 
 youthful and childlike powers. First, it speaks of 
 His strength of character. It says, He ' waxed 
 strong in spirit.' Strong ! What a word is that 
 for all of you, my dear children. You know 
 little boys especially know how you value and 
 honour those who are strong in body. The strong 
 limb, the fleet foot, the sturdy arm, the active 
 frame, you do well to value these things ; they
 
 SERM. i. THE CHILD JESUS. 5 
 
 are God's gifts. The hardihood which can endure 
 blows without flinching, and toil without fatigue, 
 which can win the race, conquer in the game, 
 or vanquish in the struggle of life these are ex- 
 cellent gifts ; and it is one of the worst evils of 
 intemperance or dissipation that they spoil and 
 destroy this glory of natural health and vigour 
 which God gives to you. But it is not of this 
 strength that the text speaks, or that I would now 
 speak to you. What natural vigour is to the body, 
 strength of character is to the mind. A stout 
 heart, that is what you want a stout heart which 
 will be able to resist all the temptations to do 
 evil, which scorns to tell a lie, which will never 
 consent to be betrayed into doing what is wrong ; 
 a strong, hardy conscience, which fixes itself on 
 matters of real importance, and will not trifle, 
 will not waste its powers on things of no concern. 
 Therefore, I say, be stronger and stronger every 
 year. I could not say to you, perhaps, be stronger 
 in body every year, for that is not within our own 
 power, if we have it not ; but I can say be stronger 
 in spirit, be strong in mind, be strong in character, 
 be stout in heart, for this does come by trying to 
 have it. It conies by being always reminded that 
 it will conic if you strive to get it. It conies to
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 those who are determined to seek it. Be strong, 
 therefore, and very courageous. 
 
 And the next thing which the text speaks of 
 is wisdom. It says the child was ' filled with 
 wisdom.' Wisdom, as it were, was poured into 
 Him, and His mind opened wider and wider to 
 take it in. He drank in whatever wisdom there 
 was in the knowledge of those about Him ; He 
 drank in the heavenly wisdom also which comes 
 down from the fountain of all wisdom. You, too, 
 have this to gain day by day. Those of you especially 
 who are at school are sent to school for that very 
 purpose, to have your minds opened, to take in all 
 that your teachers can pour into them, to be ready 
 for this instruction whenever it comes to you from 
 books, from looking at what you see about you, 
 from conversation, from experience as you grow 
 older in life. You need not be old before your 
 time, but you must even now be making the best 
 use of your time. These are the golden days 
 which never come back to you, which if once lost 
 can never be entirely made up. Our great King 
 Alfred used to regret in after years nothing so 
 much as that, owing to his long wanderings and 
 troubles when he was young, he had not had the 
 opportunity of regular instruction at school. Seek,
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 therefore, for wisdom, pray for it, determine to 
 have it ; and God, who gives to those who ask, will 
 give it to you. Try to gain it as our Lord gained 
 it when He was a child, by hearing and by asking 
 (juestions. By hearing ; that is, by being teachable, 
 and humble, and modest, by fixing your attention 
 on what you have to learn. And also by asking 
 questions, as He did ; that is, by trying to know the 
 meaning of what you learn, by cross-questioning 
 yourselves, by inquiring right and left to fill up the 
 blanks in your minds. Nothing is more charming 
 than to see a little child listening, not interrupting, 
 but eager to hear what is taught. Nothing is more 
 charming than to hear a little child asking questions. 
 That is the only way in which we are able to know 
 whether you take in what has been taught you. 
 
 And the next thing is the grace or favour of 
 God, or, as it says at the end of the chapter, the 
 grace, or favour, of God and man ; the grace, the 
 goodness, the graciousness of God, which calls 
 forth grace, and goodness, and gratitude in man. 
 Our blessed Lord had this always ; but even in 
 Him it increased more and more. It increased as 
 He grew older, as He saw more and more of the 
 work which was given Him to do ; He felt more 
 and more that God was his Father, and that men
 
 THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 were His brothers, and that grace and loving- 
 kindness was the best and the dearest gift from 
 God to man, and from man to man, and from 
 man to God. He was subject to his parents ; He 
 did what they told Him ; and so He became dear 
 to them. He was kind, and gentle, and courteous 
 to those about Him, so that they always liked to 
 see Him when he came in and out amongst them. 
 So may it be with you. Look upon God as your 
 dear Father in heaven, who loves you, and who 
 wishes nothing but your happiness. Look upon 
 your schoolfellows and companions as brothers, 
 to whom you must show whatever kindness 
 and forbearance you can. Just as this beautiful 
 building in which we are assembled is made up of 
 a number of small stones beautifully carved, every 
 one of which helps to make up the grace and 
 beauty of the whole, so is all the state of the 
 world made up of the graces and goodnesses not 
 only of full-grown men and full-grown women, 
 but of little children who will be, at least if they 
 live, full-grown men and full-grown women. Re- 
 member, then, all you who are parents ; remember 
 still more especially, all you who are children, 
 remember this day ; and if ever you are tempted 
 to do wrong, or to be idle, or to be rude and
 
 SF.RM. I. THE CHILD JESUS. 
 
 careless, or to leave off saying your prayers, then 
 think of your Saviour's good example which has 
 been put before you to-night in Westminster 
 Abbey.
 
 II. 
 
 LITTLE CHILDREN, LOVE ONE 
 ANOTHER. 
 
 (December 27, 1873.) 
 
 / write unto you, little children, because ye have known 
 the Father. I JOHN ii. 13. My little children, let us not 
 love in word, neither in tongue ; but in deed and in truth. 
 iii. 18. Little children, keep yourselves from idols. v. 21. 
 / have no greater joy than to hear that tny children walk in 
 truth. 3 John 4. 
 
 THE day on which this service is usually held is 
 called Innocents' Day, from the little innocent 
 children that were killed at Bethlehem. But as 
 this year Innocents' Day falls on a Sunday, I have 
 invited you here on this the day before, which 
 is called St. John's Day, because it is the day on 
 which we are called to think of the good apostle 
 St. John. I shall say a few words to you about 
 him. His memory was very deeply cherished by 
 the good king who on Innocents' Day founded the 
 Abbey, and it has been very dear to Christians
 
 SERM. ii. LITTLE CHILDREN. n 
 
 always, When he was first a disciple of our Lord 
 he was quite young, perhaps not much more than 
 a boy. But there was something so winning about 
 him that our Lord always kept him close to Him, 
 and he was called the disciple whom Jesus loved. 
 When our Lord was gone away into heaven, this 
 disciple St. John, after living some time at Jerusa- 
 lem with the other apostles, went to the great city 
 of Ephesus, and there he lived on after all the 
 other apostles were dead, and he was the only 
 one left. There is a beautiful picture which 
 some one has painted of the old man sitting on a 
 rock quite alone, and looking up into heaven, and 
 seeing there his former companions in that better 
 world still busying themselves with doing good and 
 holy things, as we hope that all those whom we 
 have loved and admired on earth are doing still. 
 It was whilst he was living there that various 
 stories are told of him that we do not find in the 
 Bible, and we cannot be sure that they are quite 
 certainly true. But they are what the early 
 Christians believed about him, and they agree so 
 well with the letters or epistles which he wrote at 
 that time, and from which I have taken the texts 
 of this sermon, that I will try to tell them to you, 
 and see what we can learn from them.
 
 LITTLE CHILDREN^ SERM. n. 
 
 One is this. There came one day a huntsman 
 who had heard so much of this great, wise old man, 
 that he went out of his way to see him ; and to his 
 surprise he found St. John gently stroking a par- 
 tridge which he held in his hand, and he could not 
 help saying how surprised he was to see so great 
 a man employed on anything so small. Then St. 
 John said, 'What have you in your hand?' And he 
 said, 'A bo\v.' And St. John said, 'Why is it not 
 bent ? ' And the huntsman said, ' Because then it 
 would lose its strength.' ' That is just the reason,' 
 said St. John, 'why I play with the partridge. It is 
 that my mind may be kept strong by sometimes 
 being at play.' What do we learn from this story, 
 my dear children? We learn from it that St. John, 
 and great and good men like St. John, are glad 
 now and then to see you at play, and to play like 
 you. They are glad to see you happy ; and they 
 wish to be little children again like you, because 
 that helps them afterwards to work better. We learn 
 from it to be kind as he was to little birds and 
 beasts : never to torment them ; to remember that 
 kindness to dumb animals is a part of what God 
 requires of you. There was an aged lady, very 
 excellent, wise, and wonderfully learned, who lived 
 to be very nearly as old as St. John, and who died
 
 LOVE ONE ANOTHER. 13 
 
 last year in her ninety-second year. She said, a 
 very short time before her death, ' I hope that the 
 time may come when children shall be taught that 
 mercy to birds and beasts is part of religion.' Yes, 
 it ought to be part of our religion. I trust that 
 we shall make it so. Play, too, with your com- 
 panions, like St. John ; remember always that all 
 play and all holidays are given by God, to be like 
 the unbending of a bow, to help you to work better 
 for the future. It is as when he said in his epistle, 
 ' I write unto you, little children, because ye have 
 known the Father.' You have known our loving 
 Father in heaven. He gives you all good things, 
 work and play, play and work, to make your minds 
 and hearts stronger, and better able to do His will. 
 He gives you beautiful birds and beautiful ani- 
 mals to play with and to love. They, too, are His 
 creatures ; He has made you their guardians and 
 playmates, and he has made them your com- 
 panions and teachers. 
 
 Another story is this. There was a young 
 man who had grown up under St. John's care in 
 doing what was right, and St. John was very fond 
 of him. At last, after a time, St. John had to go 
 away, and gave this young man in charge to the 
 bishop or chief pastor of Ephesus, and told him
 
 LITTLE CHILDREN, 
 
 on no account to let him go astray. But when 
 St. John came back and went to the bishop, 
 with whom he had left his young pupil, he saw 
 from the bishop's face that something sad had 
 happened. ' What is it ? ' he said ; and the bishop 
 told him how this young man had fallen in with 
 bad companions, who tempted him away into the 
 mountains, and there they were living the wild 
 life of robbers, and used to come down from the 
 hills, as the robbers still do. in those countries, to 
 carry off travellers and ask a ransom for them. As 
 soon as St. John heard this, he immediately set off 
 into the mountains. He was not frightened by the 
 thought of the robbers, he cared only to save this 
 poor young man from his bad courses. And when 
 the robbers saw him coming, they said amongst 
 themselves, ' Here comes some one that we can 
 carry off; ' and down rushed the young man who 
 had become their chief, and found himself face to 
 face with his beloved old master and friend St. 
 John. And the moment he saw him he burst into 
 tears and fell at his feet, all his better feelings 
 revived, and instead of his carrying off St. John, 
 St. John brought him back to good ways, and he 
 never went astray afterwards. 
 
 What do we learn from this ? Is it not some-
 
 I.Ol'E ONE ANOTHER. 15 
 
 thing like that which St. John himself said in that 
 chapter which you have just heard ? He had taught 
 this young man as a little child to love and know 
 the good Father of all. He had taught him as a 
 young man to overcome the wicked one ; that is, to 
 get the better of the evil that there is even in the 
 best things. And now when he went astray he 
 never lost his interest in him ; he went after him, 
 even at the risk of his own life, to bring him back, 
 and he succeeded. This story is full of instruction 
 even for us. It brings back to us some of St. 
 John's own words, ' Little children, keep yourselves 
 from idols.' Although we have now no idols like 
 those which the heathens worship, yet there are 
 many idols still. If a little brother or sister will 
 insist on having a toy for himself, and not let any 
 one else play with it, that is his ' idol.' If any 
 boy who is growing up thinks of nothing but 
 games and amusement, and neglects his lessons, 
 then games become his idol. If a young man 
 goes, as did that one in the story, after bad com- 
 panions, they become his 'idols.' Keep yourselves 
 from all these idols ; and all of you, O children, 
 boys, and young men, remember that there is no 
 greater pleasure you can give to your parents and 
 teachers than to continue in the good thoughts
 
 1 6 LITTLE CHILDREN, SERM. n. 
 
 and words that they have taught you ; remember 
 that there is no greater pain for them than to 
 think that you have forgotten what they told 
 you, that you have ceased to care for them, and 
 have gone off into evil ways. And oh, how happy 
 for you, how happy for them, if when you have 
 gone astray, or done anything wrong, you come 
 again like that young man and acknowledge your 
 faults ! and the good old friend, whoever it is, 
 father, or uncle, or brother, or teacher, will receive 
 you back again as if nothing had happened. ' I 
 have no greater joy,' St. John said, 'than to hear 
 that my children walk in truth.' Be truthful 
 in all things, acknowledge your faults as did 
 the young robber chief, do not keep them back 
 from your parents or friends. Never tell a lie 
 to conceal what you have done wrong. Have 
 no tricks or schemes to make others think you 
 better than you are. Tell the truth, and shame 
 the devil. 
 
 There is one other story. When St. John was 
 very old indeed, when he was almost a hundred, 
 when he could no longer walk or speak as he had 
 done in his youth, he used to be carried into 
 the market-place in the arms of his friends, and 
 the people, old, and young, and children, gathered
 
 SERM. ii. LOVE ONE ANOTHER. 17 
 
 round him to hear the farewell words of their 
 venerable teacher. And then he would say, ' Little 
 children, love one another ; ' and when they asked 
 for something else, he said again, ' Little children, 
 love one another ; ' and when they asked him yet 
 again, still he said, ' Little children, love one another. ' 
 And they said, ' Why do you always say this, and 
 nothing else ? ' And he said, ' Because this is the 
 best thing I can say ; if you love one another, that 
 is all that I have to tell you.' What do we learn 
 from this? We learn that the thing which St. John, 
 the beloved disciple, was most anxious to teach, 
 was that those whom he cared for should love one 
 another. It is the same as when he said in his 
 letter to them, ' My little children, let us love one 
 another in deed and in truth.' And that is what 
 we say to you now, ' Little children, love one 
 another.' Little brothers, be kind to your little 
 brothers and sisters. Boys at school, be kind to 
 those who are younger and weaker than you. You 
 can show them kindness and love in many, many 
 ways ; you can keep from teasing or hurting them, 
 you can prevent others from teasing or hurting 
 them ; and that will make them love and be kind to 
 you. Little boys will never forget the kindness they 
 have received from bigger boys at school. Brothers
 
 i8 LITTLE CHILDREN, SERM. n. 
 
 and sisters who have given up lovingly and kindly 
 when they were quite small will give up lovingly 
 and kindly all their lives. Love one another in 
 deed and in truth ; do not pick out each other's 
 faults ; make the best of what there is good in each 
 other ; be glad when you hear anything good of 
 those who live with you. Never quarrel ; it does 
 no good to any one. Never be jealous ; jealousy 
 is one of the most mischievous, hateful things that 
 can get into any one's mind. Never tell bad 
 stories one of another. Never listen to bad 
 stories of other people. When you ask to be 
 forgiven in your prayers every night, always try 
 in your hearts to forgive and forget what has 
 been done to vex you in the day. 
 
 This is the love which St. John wished to see. 
 This is the love which Jesus Christ wishes to see 
 in all His disciples, old and young. 
 
 Always bear in mind that the first thing to be 
 done is to try to help and befriend some one else. 
 That will make you generous and just ; that will 
 make you active and courageous ; that will make 
 you feel how wicked it is to lead others into wrong, 
 and how happy and excellent a thing it is to help 
 others to be good. That will make you better able 
 to love and to do good to men when you grow
 
 SERV. ii. LOVE ONE ANOTHER. 19 
 
 up to be men yourselves. That will the better 
 enable you to love God, who can only be loved 
 by those who love their fellow-creatures. There- 
 fore I end this address to you, as St. John ended 
 his long life, saying, ' Little children, love one 
 another.'
 
 III. 
 
 THE USE OF CHILDREN. 
 (December 28, 1874.) 
 
 And Jesus called a little child unto Him, and set him in 
 the midst of them, and said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye 
 be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter 
 into the kingdom of heaven. MATT, xviii. 2, 3. 
 
 THE Festival of the Innocents, which is the festival 
 of little children, brings us in the course of the 
 services of the Church to this incident in the 
 Gospel history. Jesus called a little child, and 
 set him in the midst of them. That is what is 
 attempted here every Innocents' Day. We wish 
 once a year to call the little children of London 
 together and place them in the midst of this great 
 church in this great metropolis, and ask them, and 
 ask their friends and parents, what it is that these 
 little faces ought to teach us, as they taught the 
 first disciples of Jesus Christ. 
 
 First, what do they teach us about God and 
 our Saviour ? There was a very wise man, William
 
 SF.RM. in. THE USE Of CHILDREN. 
 
 Paley, who lived a hundred years ago, who used to 
 say that of all the proofs that the world gave him 
 of the benevolence, the good-will of God, our 
 Creator, the chief was the pleasures of little children. 
 And there is a great deal in this : when we see the 
 innocent, radiant happiness of children, without 
 care and without sorrow, we cannot help thinking 
 that we then see something like what is meant by 
 Paradise, something like what God intended man- 
 kind to be. They are like the flowers, like the gay 
 plumage and the flight of birds, like the dancing of 
 brooks and rivulets ; we cannot imagine why they 
 should be as they are, except because God delights 
 in such happiness, and would wish us to enjoy it. 
 And so, too, in the Gospel history, where we hear 
 how often our Saviour took notice of little children, 
 how He set them up in the midst of His disciples, 
 how He took them up in His arms and laid His 
 hands on their little heads and blessed them, and 
 by His outward gesture and deed declared His 
 good-will towards them this shows us how He 
 enjoyed what we enjoy. It is the answer to the ques- 
 tion which is sometimes asked we hear that our 
 Saviour wept, and we ask, But did He ever smile ? 
 Yes, He did srnile. He must have smiled as He 
 fondled these little ones. No one can mix thus
 
 22 THE USE OF CHILDREN. SERM. in. 
 
 with children, and not have his brow relax, and his 
 eyes brighten, and his lips move with gaiety and 
 laughter, as he handles them, and looks at them, 
 and learns from them. And then, in this en- 
 joyment and appreciation of little children, our 
 Saviour teaches us the enjoyment and appreciation 
 of all innocent happiness. He bids us enjoy this 
 season. He bids us be as a child with children. 
 He bids us be as little children. He bids us feel 
 that He loves us as a father pitieth his own 
 children. Surely the sight of little children set 
 in the midst of full-grown men is a rebuke to our 
 passions, a solace to our sorrows, an example for our 
 imitation. ' Except ye become as little children, 
 ye cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.' 
 No doubt there are bad children, there are vain 
 children, who are no comfort and no examples to 
 anybody ; but a good child is in some respects more 
 of a comfort, more of an example, than a good man. 
 And why ? Because a little child knows nothing of 
 our quarrels, of our doubts, of our disputes, of our 
 ambitions, of our cares. -It can come into a sick 
 chamber, or a chamber of sorrow, when no one 
 else can come in, because it awakes no painful 
 feeling ; it is unconscious in its joy, it is gentle in 
 its grief. It produces a holy calm which enables
 
 SERM. in. THE USE OF CHILDREN. 23 
 
 the sufferer to reflect and decide, and look upwards 
 and inwards with the trustful confidence which the 
 confidence of the child itself inspires. And do we 
 not feel that in their presence, if anywhere, we are 
 among those who see things as they really are ? 
 
 And how often has a little child of a rough, hard 
 father or mother, set in the midst of an unhappy 
 household, been by its innocent ways the saving 
 of such a parent or such a household ! What pro- 
 tection there is in the smile of an innocent infant ! 
 What a sermon there is in the eyes of an inquiring, 
 honest, fearless little boy ; of a gentle, pure little 
 girl ! How impressive and how true to nature is 
 the story of the old miser, Silas Marner, whose 
 suspicious, irritable mind was gradually transformed 
 and transfigured by the treasure of a little child 
 that he one day found unexpectedly placed in his 
 miserable home ! That exactly expresses what our 
 Saviour meant by setting a child in the midst of 
 them. How striking the letter of Luther to his 
 little boy John, or his letter on the death of his 
 little daughter Magdalen ! These children seem 
 to have been given to him that all the world might 
 know what a kind, tender heart there was in that 
 strong, strict, energetic man. Or in the history of 
 England is there any crime in the bloody civil wars
 
 24 THE USE OF CHILDREN. SEKM. in. 
 
 of York and Lancaster, or any of the cruelties of 
 the kings and barons in those savage times, which 
 has so touched the hearts of all Englishmen in 
 later days as the murder of the two little princes in 
 the Tower? 
 
 Thus lay the gentle babes girdling one another 
 Within their alabaster innocent arms ; 
 
 A book of prayers upon their pillow lay. 
 
 We feel, as we read that story, a glow of 
 righteous indignation against grasping ambition 
 and selfish tyranny of every kind, past or present. 
 Or in the history of the horrors of the French 
 Revolution is there any deed of blood which has 
 left so dark and deep a stain on the violent party- 
 spirit and revolutionary fanaticism of those days as 
 the inhuman treatment of that unfortunate child, 
 the son of Louis XVI., who died at ten years old 
 of the misery and insults inflicted upon him by the 
 agents of the ruffians who then trampled on the 
 liberties of France ? I have seen an ivory cross, 
 said to have been worn by the queen his mother 
 on her way to the scaffold. But the figure on the 
 crucifix is not the dying Redeemer in his full-grown 
 stature, but the infant Jesus stretched on the cross, 
 with His gentle smile and innocent gestures.
 
 EF.RM. in. THE USE OF CHILDREN. 
 
 Whether or not it was that she, in that last hour, 
 was thinking of her own unhappy child, that little 
 figure at least represents what has been the feeling of 
 humanity in the whole course of history that there 
 is nothing which so touches the heart, or elevates 
 the thought, or stirs the just anger of the better 
 portion of mankind, as the wrongs or the sufferings 
 of a little child. Such thoughts as these ought to 
 strike home to the hearts of all who have anything 
 to do with children, parents, friends of children, 
 ay, and children themselves. This is the meaning 
 of those words of our Lord, when on this same 
 occasion He said, ' Whoso shall offend one of these 
 little ones, it were better that a millstone were hanged 
 about his neck, and that he were drowned in the 
 depths of the sea.' Think what it is to mislead, or 
 to pervert, or to corrupt, or to give needless pain to 
 any of these children, who were sent to us with the 
 special view of keeping alive within us whatever 
 there is of good or pure or just. An ancient 
 heathen poet has said, ' There is nothing which 
 demands greater reverence at our hands than the 
 conscience of a little boy : ' 
 
 Maxima debetur pueris reverentia. 
 To accustom them in their early years to sounds or
 
 26 THE USE OF CHILDREN. SERM. in. 
 
 sights of cruelty or vice, to teach them by precept 
 or words those bad habits, those slang, vulgar 
 words, which confuse their delicate sense of right 
 or wrong, which deprave their taste for what is 
 beautiful ; to encourage, by foolish laughter or by 
 reckless indulgence, the tricks or the mistakes or 
 the frivolities of those who soon learn to know 
 what it is that amuses their elders, and who have 
 a fatal facility of imitating what is bad as well as 
 what is good ; these are so many ways of offend- 
 ing God's little ones, causing them to stumble, go 
 astray, spoiling them (to use that homely but most 
 expressive word) for any good word or work in 
 after-life. And, on the other hand, how much can 
 be done to develop, to unfold, to enlighten them 
 from the very first ! They are to us the types and 
 likenesses of the whole human race of religion 
 itself. Every generation is bound to contribute what 
 it can to the formation of that perfect man which is 
 to grow up into the fulness of the stature of Jesus 
 Christ. And so every parent, every teacher, is bound 
 to pour all the light and knowledge and grace that 
 he can into the souls, the eager receptive souls, of 
 those who will grow up to take our place when we 
 are dead and gone. ' Take heed that ye despise not 
 one of these little ones.' No, indeed, they are not
 
 SF.RM. in. THE USE 01- CHILDREN. 
 
 to be despised, they have in them the future of 
 the world. ' Their angels,' as the Saviour says, 
 ' behold the face of My Father which is in heaven.' 
 That is to say, their immortal destinies are trea- 
 sured up in the eternal councils of Providence, 
 as the means by which the world shall be regene- 
 rated. That little child which the Saviour held in 
 His arms was, according to the tradition, to grow up 
 to be the future martyr of the early church, Ignatius, 
 the heroic Bishop of Antioch. The children of 
 England at this moment who knows what may- 
 be the lot of any one of them ? We remember the 
 mournful regret of the poet in the country church- 
 yard at the thought how there might there be 
 mouldering 
 
 Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed, 
 Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre ; 
 
 how 
 
 Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest, 
 Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood. 
 
 But the same thing may occur to any thoughtful 
 man, as he looks over an assembly of children, not 
 with useless regret at what might have been and 
 is not, but with inspiring hope at what may be, and 
 perhaps shall be. They are the rising generation ; 
 they contain the poets, the scholars, the discoverers,
 
 28 THE USE OF CHILDREN. SERM. in. 
 
 the statesmen, the Christians of the future. Their 
 guardian angels, their ideals (so to speak), are at 
 this moment contemplating, in the face of the 
 Eternal Father, the possible destinies of glory, of 
 grace, or of goodness which they may accomplish, 
 and which need only our helping hands to enable 
 them to help themselves, and reach forward to the 
 prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. 
 
 And in this, you, my dear children, can take 
 your part. I have hitherto spoken more to your 
 friends and your parents than to you, but you will 
 have heard what I have been saying, and you will 
 feel how great a blessing you can be to them and to 
 all of us if you are good, sweet-tempered, and kind ; 
 and how great a misery if you are naughty, cross, 
 selfish. If you look at the face of your father or 
 mother, your uncle or aunt, or your tutor, you will 
 often seen a dark shade come over it, as if they had 
 some very bad news ; and what do you think it is? It 
 is because they have seen something in you that has 
 distressed them, that has made them fear that you 
 are not going on as you ought, that you have been 
 unkind, or untruthful, or rough. Oh ! drive away 
 that dark shade from their faces, for you only can 
 do it ; you love them, and you would not make them 
 unhappy. And have you not also seen their faces
 
 SERM. in. THE USE OF CHILDREN. 29 
 
 sometimes shine with joy, and their eyes sparkle ? 
 and even if they are ill or suffering, have you not 
 seen them cheered up, and seem, for the moment, 
 almost well ? Why is it ? What has helped them ? 
 Have they had a great treasure sent to them ? Has 
 a good fairy given them some beautiful palace or 
 kingdom ? No. I will tell you what it is. They 
 have heard, they have seen, that their child is going 
 on as they would wish ; that their little son or 
 their little nephew shows himself more manly, more 
 attentive to his lessons, more courageous, more 
 kind to dumb creatures, more thoughtful for his 
 brothers and sisters ; or that their little daughter or 
 their little niece is growing up more modest, more 
 willing to help her father and mother, more gentle, 
 more compassionate ; less thinking of herself, and 
 more of those about her. And can you not also 
 help each other ? For it is not only parents that 
 sometimes spoil their children, it is sometimes 
 children who spoil one another. And it is not 
 only parents and teachers who educate and teach 
 their children, it is children who educate and teach 
 one another. Even in the nursery you can keep 
 quiet whilst your little brother and sister are saying 
 their prayers. By giving or keeping back your 
 playthings you can make one another happy or
 
 30 THE USE OF CHILDREN. SERM, in. 
 
 miserable. And as you grow older you little boys 
 especially, when you go to school you can be like 
 guardian angels to those who are weaker and 
 younger than you. You can watch over them. 
 You can encourage them in telling the truth, and 
 in keeping from bad words. You can prevent 
 others from teasing them ; and when you grow to 
 be men, you will find, perhaps, that the good which 
 you have done to them has never been forgotten ; 
 and when some one presses your hand more warmly, 
 or looks gratefully in your face, it will be because 
 he remembers the kindness you did to him when 
 you both sat side by side on the same bench, or 
 played together in the same playground at school. 
 And if any good thought has been put into your 
 hearts to-day, do not let it pass away. Remember 
 that each of you may grow up to be a light in the 
 world, beloved by all good men there, as you are 
 beloved by your brothers and sisters and play- 
 fellows. It is told of one recently buried in this 
 Abbey David Livingstone that he began to im- 
 prove himself quite as a young boy in Scotland, 
 reading his books at any odd moment, amidst all 
 the noise and clatter around him when he was at 
 his work ; and he ended his life by having made 
 himself so honoured and beloved by the Africans
 
 SERM. in. THE USE OF CHILDREN. 31 
 
 amongst whom he died, that they carried his dead 
 body through every kind of difficulty and danger, 
 till at last it was laid where you see his name and 
 his fame inscribed for ever. And remember that 
 Jesus Christ Himself, the great and good Saviour, 
 began as a child like you. A good man, 1 whose 
 monument was erected in this church by one 2 who 
 loved his poetry dearly, and who is himself de- 
 parted from us, was always thinking of little chil- 
 dren and writing verses for them, and of the love 
 which Jesus Christ had for them ; and with some 
 of these verses I will end what I have to say. 
 
 Was not our Lord a little child, 
 
 Taught by degrees to pray ; 
 By father dear and mother mild 
 
 Instructed day by day ? 
 
 And loved He not of heaven to talk 
 
 With children in His sight ; 
 To meet them in His daily walk, 
 
 And to His arms invite ? 
 
 In His arms may you all remain to the end of your 
 lives. 
 
 1 Keble. Edward Twisleton.
 
 IV 
 THE 'GOLIATH' BOYS. 
 
 (December 28, 1875.) 
 
 There remaineth yet the youngest, and, behold, he keepeth 
 the sheep. i SAM. xvi. n. 
 
 I PROPOSE to set before you to-day an example of 
 what may be expected from children, from little 
 boys, from little girls, when they are quite young ; 
 to show you how they may do and say things 
 which will be of the greatest use to those about 
 them, and which will do the greatest good to their 
 own characters. Sometimes we think that they can 
 only do very little, but I will show you that they can 
 do a great deal. Look at David : when Samuel 
 first came to his father's house and asked to see 
 the sons, they came one after another, tall, grown- 
 up men ; no one thought of the little boy who was 
 with the sheep. When the huge giant, Goliath of 
 Gath, defied the armies of Israel, he looked round 
 disdainfully, as though he saw no one. But
 
 SERM. iv. THE ' COLT A 7V7' BO K9. 33 
 
 running across the valley there came to the Philis- 
 tine giant this young boy, with his bright auburn 
 hair, and his fierce quick eyes, and his little satchel 
 round his neck, and his little switch in his hand, 
 with which he kept the sheep-dogs in order. It 
 was he who had sung his songs on the hill-side, 
 where he saw the sun and moon and stars. It was 
 he who had had the courage to run after the lion 
 and the bear, and snatch his sheep or his lambs out 
 of their mouths. It was he who, though his tall 
 brothers thought nothing of him, and the proud 
 Philistine treated him as a mere child, yet was able 
 to do for his country what no one else could do, 
 and with his sling and his stone, with his fleet feet, 
 and his certain aim, and his strong faith, and his 
 undaunted spirit, to overthrow his gigantic enemy. 
 This is a story which is often repeated. It has 
 been repeated in the example of some of the 
 early martyrs ; not only of those children who are 
 commemorated to-day as the Innocent Babes 
 whom Herod killed, and who died not knowing 
 how or why, but later in the history of the Church ; 
 as in the cases of the little boy Pancratius, who is 
 believed to have been a martyr at fourteen, and of 
 the little girl Agnes, who is supposed to have been 
 a martyr at thirteen. There have been some of our
 
 34 THE ' GOLIA Tff' BO VS. SERM. iv. 
 
 own good young princes who are buried in this 
 Abbey. There was that wonderfully gifted boy, 
 Edward VI., who was only sixteen when he died, 
 and who before that time had by his diligence and 
 his honesty made himself beloved and trusted by 
 all about him, and who even had the firmness 
 to resist doing a very cruel act when urged to it 
 by a much older man, who should have known 
 better. There is the good Prince Henry, eldest 
 son of King James I., who when his foolish atten- 
 dants provoked him to swear because a butcher's 
 dog had killed a stag that he was hunting, said, 
 ' Away with you ! all the pleasure in the world is 
 not worth a profane oath.' There was, again, that 
 other Henry, Duke of Gloucester, who sat on the 
 knees of his father, Charles I., on the day before 
 his execution, and who, when his father said to 
 him, ' They will try to make you king instead of 
 your elder brother,' fired up like a little man, and 
 said, ' I will be torn in pieces first.' Well might 
 all these princes be mourned, and have a place 
 in English history, and a place in this Abbey ; 
 because, though they died early, they showed of 
 what stuff they were made, and that they would 
 have been fit to be kings, and to be with kings, 
 because they had wills and consciences of their
 
 THE ' GOLIATH' 1 BOYS. 35 
 
 own ; because they were afraid of nothing except 
 doing wrong ; because they cared for nothing so 
 much as doing their duty. 
 
 But perhaps some of you, or of your parents 
 and friends who have the charge of you, will say : 
 ' Oh, but these were young princes, with all the 
 advantages which a great education could give ; 
 or, these were martyrs who lived long ago, when 
 times were so different ; or, that bright-eyed, light- 
 haired boy, the youthful David, was inspired by 
 God's especial grace to do and say great things, 
 which could not be expected of us.' 
 
 But now let me give you an example which 
 comes nearer home. I will speak to you of what 
 has been done by little boys of seven, of eight, of 
 twelve, of thirteen, as young as the youngest of 
 you ; little English boys, and English boys with 
 very few advantages of birth, not brought up as 
 most of you are, in quiet, orderly homes, but taken 
 from rough workhouses. I will speak to you o;~ 
 what such little boys have done, not three thou- 
 sand, or fifteen hundred, or two hundred years 
 ago, but last week last Wednesday ' on this very 
 river Thames. Do you know what I am thinking 
 of? It is of the little boys who were brought 
 1 December 22, 1875. 
 
 i> 2
 
 36 THE 'GOLIATH' BOYS. 
 
 from different workhouses in London, nearly five 
 hundred, and were put to school to be trained as 
 sailors on board the ship which was called after 
 the name of the giant whom David slew the 
 training-ship Goliath, down the Thames. This 
 great ship suddenly, about eight o'clock on Wed- 
 nesday morning, caught fire. It was hardly light ; 
 one of these dark winter mornings when we can 
 hardly see to dress ourselves. In three minutes 
 the ship was on fire from one end to the other, 
 and the fire-bell rang to call the boys each to his 
 post. What did they do ? Think of the sudden 
 surprise, the sudden danger, the flames rushing all 
 round them, and the dark cold water below them. 
 Did they cry, or scream, or run, or fly about 
 in confusion ? No, they ran each to his proper 
 place ; they had been trained to do it ; they knew 
 it was their duty, and no one forgot himself, none 
 lost his presence of mind. They all, as the 
 captain says, ' behaved like men.' Then, when 
 it was found impossible to save the ship, those 
 who could swim, at the command of the captain, 
 jumped into the water, and swam for their lives. 
 Some at his command got into a boat ; and then, 
 when the sheets of flame and clouds of smoke 
 came pouring out of the ship upon them, the
 
 THE GOLIATH' BOYS. 37 
 
 smaller boys for a moment were frightened, and 
 wanted to push away. But there was one among 
 them the little mate his name was William 
 Bolton. We are proud here that he came from 
 Westminster. A quiet boy, they tell us, and one 
 much loved by his comrades. He had the sense 
 and the courage to say, ' No ; we must stay and 
 help those that are still in the ship.' He kept the 
 barge alongside of the ship as long as possible, 
 and was thus the means of saving more than one 
 hundred lives. And there were others, who were 
 still in the ship while the flames went on spreading, 
 and they came and stood by the good captain who 
 had been so kind to them all, and whom they all 
 loved so much ; and in that dreadful moment they 
 thought more of him than of themselves ; and one 
 threw his arms round his neck, and said, ' You'll 
 be burnt, captain ; ' and another said, ' Save your- 
 self before the rest.' But the captain gave them the 
 best of all lessons at that moment ; he said, 'That's 
 not the way at sea, my boys.' He meant to say 
 and they quite understood what he meant that the 
 way at sea is to prepare for danger beforehand, to 
 meet it manfully when it comes, and to look at the 
 safety not of oneself, but of others. ' And thus,' as 
 says the public journal in speaking of it, ' the captain
 
 THE 'GOLIATH' BOYS. 
 
 not only had learned that good old way himself, but 
 knew how to teach it to the boys under his charge.' 
 And now let me ask you to consider what we 
 may all learn from this story of the good conduct 
 of the boys in the Goliath ship. First, what an 
 encouragement it is to parents, teachers, nurses, all 
 who do anything for children, as showing that 
 their labour is not spent in vain ! These little 
 boys were taken from a rough, neglected class, 
 which had before been a trouble and vexation 
 to all about them. By the foresight and energy 
 of the Minister of State who began this system 
 of training-ships, and then by the constant, genial, 
 wise kindness of the captain and his wife and 
 daughters, always having a kind word and look 
 for these little boys, making them feel their ship to 
 be their home, instructing them in habits of order 
 and duty and religion, they were being trained 
 to be the servants of their country and their God 
 in that noble profession of an English sailor. And 
 now that they have been suddenly put on their 
 trial in this great calamity, we see how all this had 
 told upon them. What seeds of goodness were 
 there in these little hearts ! what energy given to 
 those little minds ! This is what education can 
 do ; this is what can be done by making a good
 
 SERM. iv. THE ^GOLIATW BOYS. 39 
 
 beginning. I know, we all know, that good be- 
 ginnings may have bad endings ; .that these little 
 heroes, as we may call them, of the Goliath ship 
 may, if they are spoiled by foolish flattery, or meet 
 with wicked companions, turn out very differently 
 from what they are now. There has been a dreadful 
 example, within the last month, of one who began 
 as a charming, enterprising, intelligent, religious 
 boy, but who, from giving way to evil courses and 
 bad associates, ended in committing a frightful 
 crime, and died last week, with the infamy of a 
 selfish, hard-hearted murderer. 2 But these things 
 are the exceptions. Let us hope and believe that 
 whenever care, forethought, and kindness are ex- 
 erted on young children, they will lead the rest of 
 their lives according to that good beginning. It 
 is the best we can do for them ; it is the best we 
 can do for our country. 
 
 And you, children, turn your thoughts once 
 again back to that burning ship, and the example 
 of the little boys all doing their duty so nobly. 
 What is it that this teaches you ? It teaches you 
 that you ought to be always ready to do what is 
 right at a moment's notice. These boys could 
 never have guessed, when they got up on the 
 ' Waiuwright.
 
 40 THE 'GOLIATH' BOYS. SERM. iv. 
 
 morning of that day, that in three minutes they 
 would have to be all working to save their lives, 
 and the lives of those about them. But they were 
 ready, and they did it. There is a fine old motto 
 of an old Scottish family, ' Ready, aye ready ' : 
 let that be your motto. When a sudden alarm 
 comes perhaps fire in the middle of the night, 
 perhaps some other danger try to keep what is 
 called presence of mind ; do not run about here 
 and there, as if you had lost your senses, but be 
 quiet, be calm. Do what you are bid, and you may 
 save father, mother, brothers, and sisters. And 
 again, when a sudden temptation comes upon you 
 to go after what is wrong, saying foolish, filthy 
 words, or telling a lie, or over-eating yourselves, 
 or being unkind, remember those boys in the 
 Goliath. They stood firm to what they knew 
 was their duty. They stood firm though the 
 flames were raging round them ; they were like the 
 three children in the midst of the burning fiery 
 furnace, who were as true to their conscience, and as 
 calm, as though the fire had been a moist whistling 
 wind. And remember how, when those who were 
 in the boat were a moment dismayed, there was 
 one, the little mate, who had the courage to persist 
 in keeping close to the ship, and so saved many,
 
 SERM. iv. THE 'COLIATIT BOYS. 41 
 
 many of his dear friends. Be like that little mate : 
 when you are pressed to do anything wrong, have 
 the boldness to say No. A very wise man has said 
 that any one who has learnt to say JVo has made 
 the first step to being a good, useful, great man. 
 Do not care how many there may be against you ; 
 do not think of the trouble of doing right. Do it, and 
 take the consequences. Even if the burning masts 
 had fallen upon the Goliath boys and killed them 
 all, it would have been better for them all to have 
 died in that way, and be buried by the little boy 
 who is this day laid to rest in the village church 
 of Grays, than that they should have weakly 
 given way, and shown the white feather, or 
 failed in one atom of their duty. And think what 
 a reward, what an exceeding great reward, you give 
 to your parents and your teachers by any such 
 good conduct. When that little boy clasped his 
 arms round the captain's neck, and begged him to 
 go, and said, 'You'll be burnt, captain, if you stay,' 
 do not you think that that moment must have made 
 up to the captain for all the trouble and pains he 
 had spent on these boys, to see that they loved him, 
 and would have given their lives for him ? Remem- 
 ber that short speech of the captain when they 
 asked him to leave the ship : 'That's not the way at
 
 42 THE 'GOLIATH' BOYS. SERM. iv. 
 
 sea, my boys.' That is the best advice for all of us. 
 We are all on our voyage through life, over many 
 waves of this troublesome world. There is one way 
 of getting out of these troubles it is by selfishly 
 thinking of ourselves, by leaving our companions 
 in the wood, by taking the best for ourselves, by 
 avoiding risk and danger and pain, and seeking our 
 own profit and pleasure. This is what is done by 
 many children, and by many men. ' But that is 
 not the way at sea, my boys.' It is the way of the 
 world. It is the way of cowards, and spendthrifts, 
 and spoiled children, and selfish men ; but it is not 
 the way of English sailors, it is not the way of 
 Christian Englishmen, it is not the way to noble 
 lives and glorious deaths. There 'is the way at 
 sea' the way of standing by your post till the last, 
 doing your duty whatever comes, thinking more of 
 others than of yourself, jumping into the face 
 of danger rather than flying away in dishonour, 
 working away quietly and calmly and manfully to 
 do as much good as you can whilst life is granted 
 to you. 'That's the way at sea, my boys.' That 
 was the way of the boys in the burning ship. That 
 is the way in which England's sailors, like Commo- 
 dore Goodenough, have won for themselves an 
 immortal name. That is the way of good children,
 
 SERM. iv. THE GOLIATH' SOYS. 43 
 
 honourable boys, and gallant men ; the way of 
 Christian heroes and Christian martyrs That is 
 the way in which we trust that this day will teach 
 you to walk henceforth, and till the latest day of 
 your lives.
 
 44 
 
 V. 
 
 THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. 
 
 (December 28, 1876.) 
 
 Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast Thoii or- 
 dained strength. Ps. viii. 2. Like as the arrows in the hand 
 of the giant, even so are the young children. Ps. cxxvii. 5 
 (Prayer Book version). Lord, who shall abide in Thy taber- 
 nacle? who shall dwell in Thy holy hill? Ps. xv. i. 
 
 WHEN, year by year, we see a congregation of chil- 
 dren with their parents assembled, it is, or ought to 
 be, a joy and comfort to those who feel the burden 
 of life, the darkening shades of sorrow, and the 
 weight of care. Why is this? Why is the sight 
 of children a consolation? Parents, perhaps, will 
 understand best what I have to say at first, although 
 I shall also have to say something which children 
 will understand for themselves. I have taken these 
 verses from the three Psalms which are sung on occa- 
 sion of these gatherings to express what I mean. 
 I. The first is from the eighth Psalm. That is
 
 SERM. v. THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. 45 
 
 a Psalm which almost certainly was written by 
 David. He wishes to unravel his thoughts, and to 
 have a clear idea of God ; and he finds it in two 
 things ; in the moon and the stars, which we see 
 in the sky on a cloudless night, and which cause him 
 to think of the order with which this great universe 
 has been arranged ; and in the bright faces and the 
 blameless talk of little children. Little children, 
 give him an idea of what man, who was born in 
 the image of God, was meant to be. No doubt 
 there are bad children, naughty children ; and 
 even in good children there is something which 
 may become very bad. Still, in children there 
 is an innocence, a lightness of heart, an ignorance 
 of evil, a joyousness, and a simplicity, which ought 
 to be refreshing to every one. It was this which 
 made our Saviour so fond of them taking them 
 up in His arms and saying, ' Of such is the kingdom 
 of heaven ; ' and it is this which is well expressed 
 by a good English poet, who says, as he looks back 
 regretfully to his childhood 
 
 Happy those early days when I 
 Shined in my angel infancy ; 
 
 Before I taught my tongue to wound 
 My conscience with a sinful sound ;
 
 46 THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. SERM. v. 
 
 But felt through all this fleshly dress 
 Bright shoots of everlastingness. 
 Oh, how I long to travel back, 
 And tread again that ancient track ! ' 
 
 And this it is, also, which gives a soothing thought 
 to any who have lost their darlings in infancy or in 
 early childhood. Their lives were complete. They 
 had shown us the glory of God in their dear little 
 ways. They have gone to be with Him. ' We 
 reckon not by years and months where they have 
 gone to dwell.' May I read to you the words of a 
 great scholar and philosopher 2 after the death of a 
 sweet daughter ? Parents may take the words to 
 themselves, and children may know from them 
 what a comfort they may be for their parents if 
 they have been good and gentle and diligent. ' As 
 soon as her last breath was gone I was able to 
 thank God that He had taken my child into His 
 arms, where she is safe for ever from all the troubles 
 and the sorrows of life. The first chapter of her 
 existence has closed. Who knows what troubles 
 might have been in store for her? But she was 
 found worthy to enter the kingdom of heaven as a 
 little child. Here we have toiled for many years, 
 and been troubled with many questionings, but 
 
 1 Henry Vaughan, The Retreat. - Max Muller.
 
 SERM. v. THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. -17 
 
 what is the end of it all ? We must learn to become 
 simple again like little children. That is all we 
 have a right to be ; for this life was meant to be 
 the childhood of our souls, and the more we try 
 to be what we were meant to be, the better for us. 
 Let us use the powers of our minds with the greatest 
 freedom and love of truth ; but let us never forget 
 that we are, as Newton said, " like children playing 
 on the sea-shore, while the great ocean of truth lies 
 undiscovered before us."' 
 
 II. But we must not, in thinking of children, 
 think only of them in the past. We must think of 
 their future ; and here let us look at another Psalm, 
 the hundred and twenty-seventh, a Psalm which 
 some of the Jewish teachers long ago thought might 
 have been written by the great King Solomon. 
 At any rate, it expresses what a man of vast ex- 
 perience of human life might well have said. It 
 tells us that we must console ourselves in the sor- 
 rows and troubles of the present time by thinking 
 of what the children who stand around us may be 
 in the time which is coming. They are like the 
 arrows which a mighty archer can shoot far away 
 into the distance and the darkness, and so strike a 
 target which we, perhaps, can hardly see, but which, 
 if these little arrows are winged with good thoughts,
 
 48 THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. SERM. v. 
 
 and pointed with good resolves, and polished by 
 a good training, they will surely reach. We may 
 sometimes, as we look towards the immediate 
 future of our country, think sadly perhaps how 
 few great characters or glorious gifts there are to 
 enlighten the close of this nineteenth century, as 
 we and our fathers were enlightened by the great 
 characters and the glorious gifts of those who 
 adorned its beginning. But our consolation may be 
 that those who are the children of this generation 
 shall grow up to fill this void, and to comfort those 
 who are still unborn. Amongst the children who 
 are now present here, there must be many who will 
 live to the twentieth century. Let them remember, 
 when the first year of the next century shall dawn 
 upon them, that they were called upon, as now in 
 this Abbey, to take their part in rendering their 
 country a great, a happy, and a Christian nation. 
 Where we have failed, let them succeed ; where we 
 have succeeded, let them improve ; where we have 
 lost, let them recover. Happy is that country which 
 has its quiver full of good, strong, active, honest, 
 Christian children. She shall not be afraid when 
 she speaks with her enemies in the gate. There is 
 a long, long day before many of you. Make the 
 very most of it. Let us feel assured that when we
 
 SERM. v. THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. 49 
 
 die and pass away we shall have left our country, 
 our religion, and our honour, safe in your hands. 
 
 III. And this brings me to the third lesson 
 which we may take from these Psalms. The 
 fifteenth Psalm also is almost certainly written by 
 David. It was what he wrote, we may suppose, 
 when he had conquered Jerusalem, and asked who 
 was worthy to live in the holy city ; that is, what 
 are the characters that God loves and wishes to be 
 with Him ? There is no difficulty in understanding 
 what David says in the verses which follow the 
 first ; and when people talk of the difficulty of 
 teaching religion to children, let them remember 
 these verses of the fifteenth Psalm. They will 
 find how very easily they can be learned, and 
 hpw very easily they can be applied. I will try 
 to apply them now ; and so I turn to you, my 
 children, and having told you how much we anl 
 your country expect from you, I will tell you 
 who it is that shall be thought worthy of the house 
 of God and His holy hill ; and I will ask those who 
 are parents and friends, or who have any influence 
 over any of these children, to try to make a good 
 atmosphere round about them, so that these 
 conditions may become possible and easy for them. 
 What, then, is it that we may recommend to all 
 
 i:
 
 50 THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. SERM. v. 
 
 children if they would wish to please their parents, 
 to please God, and to go to heaven ? Love honest 
 work. Love to get knowledge. Never forget to 
 say your prayers morning and evening, never be 
 ashamed to say them. It will help you to be good 
 all through the day. Always keep your promises. 
 Do not pick up foolish and dirty stories. Never, 
 never tell a lie. Never strike, or hurt, or be rude 
 to a woman or a girl, or to any one weaker or 
 younger than yourselves. Be ready even to risk 
 your own lives to save a friend, or a companion, or 
 a brother, or a sister. Be very kind to poor dumb 
 animals. Never put them to pain. They are 
 God's creatures as well as you ; and if you hurt 
 them you will become brutal and base yourselves. 
 Remember always to be gentle and attentive to 
 older people. Listen, and do not interrupt when 
 they are talking. If you have an old father or 
 grandfather, or a sick uncle or aunt, remember not 
 to disturb them. by loud talking or rough playing. 
 Be careful and tender to them. You cannot think 
 what good it does them. And if it should hap- 
 pen that any amongst you have poor fathers or 
 poor mothers who have to get up early in order to 
 go about their business, and to earn their bread 
 and your bread, remember what a pleasure it will
 
 SERM. v. THE CHILD REN'S PSALMS. 51 
 
 be to them to find that their little boy or their little 
 girl has been out of bed before them on a cold 
 winter morning, and lighted a bright, blaz.ing fire, 
 so as to give them a warm cup of tea. Think 
 what pleasure it will be to them if they are sick, or 
 if they are deaf, or if they are blind, to find a little 
 boy or a little girl to speak to them, to read to 
 them, and to lead them about. But there is not 
 only the comfort which is experienced in being 
 thus helped ; there is the still greater comfort of 
 knowing that they have a good little son or a good 
 little daughter who is anxious to assist them, and 
 who, they feel sure, will be a joy, and not a trouble 
 to them, by day and by night. No Christmas 
 present can be so welcome to any father and 
 mother as the belief that their children are 
 growing up truthful, manly, courageous, courteous, 
 unselfish, and religious. And do not think that 
 any of these things are too much for any of you. 
 I know that many of you have great temptations. 
 Perhaps you may have homes where it is very 
 difficult to be tidy and clean. Perhaps, as you go 
 to school along the streets, there may be wicked 
 people who endeavour to lead you astray, and who 
 try to make you steal, and use bad words. Yet I 
 am sure that, if you do your best, you will find 
 
 K 2
 
 52 THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. SERM. v. 
 
 such delight in doing your duty that you will go 
 on in what is good. Let the good frighten the 
 bad ; let the light drive away the darkness ; let 
 the whole world know that there are little English 
 boys and girls who are determined to do their duty 
 whatever befalls them. Some of you may re- 
 member that, last year, I spoke of the gallant boys 
 who behaved so well on board the Goliath ship 
 when it was on fire. Well, these same boys have 
 just begun their training over again. It was only 
 on Tuesday last that they got on board their new 
 ship, the Exmouth ; and there they are working for 
 their country once more. God .bless and prosper 
 them, and may they still be examples to all of us. 
 It was only the other day, also, that I heard of a 
 brave, modest little boy Hammond Parker was 
 his name who was only just fourteen years of age, 
 but who had saved, at different times, the lives of 
 no fewer than four other boys by plunging into 
 the rough sea after them on the coast of Norfolk. 
 Now, that shows what you may all do not, 
 perhaps, by plunging into the stormy sea, but, at 
 any rate, by saving little brothers or little sisters 
 from going wrong. You can do far more for them 
 than, perhaps, any one else, because you are 
 always with them. Stand by them, protect them ;
 
 SF.RM. v. THE CHILDREN'S PSALMS. 5; 
 
 stand by each other ; and then the foolish, wicked, 
 and cruel people who want to mislead you will 
 very soon run away. Bad people are almost 
 always afraid of good people, even though the 
 good are much fewer ; even, indeed, though the 
 good may be only a little child. I knew once a 
 very famous man (it was Adam Sedgwick), who 
 lived to be eighty-eight years old, and who was the 
 delight of every one about him. He always stood 
 up for what was right. His eye was like the eagle's 
 when it flashed fire against what was wrong. And 
 how early do you think he began to do this ? I 
 have an old grammar which belonged to him, all 
 tattered and torn, which he had when he was a 
 little boy at school ; and what do I find written in 
 his own hand on the first page of it ? I find these 
 words from Shakespeare : ' Still in thy right hand 
 carry gentle peace, to silence envious tongues. Be 
 just and fear not.' That was his rule all through 
 life, and he was loved and honoured down to the 
 day when he was borne to his grave. Be just, be 
 good, and fear not. Let that be your rule ; and God 
 and Jesus Christ will be with you now and always.
 
 54 
 
 VI. 
 SICK CHILDREN. 
 
 (December 28, 1877.) 
 Is it well with the child? . . . It is well. } 2 KINGS iv. 26. 
 
 I HAVE usually spoken to you on this day of the 
 life and happiness of children. I wish to speak to 
 you this evening of the sufferings and sorrows of 
 children, and concerning children or rather, I will 
 say, of the happiness which out of their sufferings 
 and sorrows God intends to bring to us. 
 
 First let me speak of the death of children. It 
 is one of the chief thoughts placed before us by the 
 Festival of the Innocents the Holy Innocents, as 
 they are called. We know nothing about those 
 little children of Bethlehem, except that they died. 
 What is the good which can be brought to any of 
 
 1 I have been reminded that a sermon on this text was 
 preached by Dr. Doddridge on the death of a beloved child, 
 the words having been written actually on the child's coffin.
 
 S/CA' CHILDREN. 55 
 
 us, old or young, by the death of those dear little 
 ones, who had been lent to us for so short a time 
 that we seem to have lost them almost before we 
 have time to know them ? ' Is it well with the 
 child ? ' said Elisha to the mother of the little boy 
 that he had known from his birth. The little boy 
 was dead ; but the poor mother was still able to 
 say, 'It is well.' Yes, there are several ways in 
 which, even in this hard trial, w r e may say, ' It is 
 well.' ' It is well,' because in God's sight all that 
 happens is well, if only we use it rightly. ' It is 
 well,' because the child that dies in its innocence 
 is taken, if any human creature is, to the presence 
 of God and of Jesus Christ. He Himself has told 
 us that the characters of little children are the 
 likeness of the characters in heaven. When we 
 think of heaven we think of them. ' It is well,' 
 because it makes, or ought to make, on our hearts 
 an impression which perhaps nothing else can 
 make. Even a hard-hearted man, when his child 
 dies, or his little brother dies, is deeply moved. 
 He thinks that he might have been more kind 
 whilst they lived. He looks at the little vacant 
 chair, and his eyes fill with tears. 
 
 And we are comforted by thinking of them. 
 
 I have heard of a little child dying with suth
 
 56 SIC A' CHILDREN. 
 
 bright and beautiful visions before him that his 
 countenance was quite transfigured, and glowed as 
 with heavenly colours ; and his parents, as they 
 looked at him, were more than consoled. They 
 went away strengthened in their faith and hopeful 
 in their good deeds. 
 
 This Abbey is full of the remembrances of great 
 men and famous women. But it is also full of the 
 remembrances of little boys and girls whose death 
 shot a pang through the hearts of those who loved 
 them, and who wished that they never should be 
 forgotten. 
 
 Almost the earliest royal monument in this 
 Abbey is of a beautiful little deaf and dumb girl of 
 five years old the Princess Catherine, daughter of 
 King Henry III., who loved her dearly. She has 
 not been forgotten, nor have her two little brothers, 
 and perhaps four little nephews, who were buried 
 close to her, as if to keep her company. And so 
 there are two small tombs in Henry VII. 's chapel of 
 the two infant daughters of King James I. Over 
 one of them are some touching lines written by an 
 American lady, which all mothers should read. 
 And to these tombs of these two little girls were 
 brought in after days by their nephew, Charles II., 
 the bones of the two young murdered princes,
 
 SF.KM. vi. S/CA' CHILDREN. 57 
 
 which in his time were discovered at the foot of 
 the staircase in the Tower. 
 
 And there is in the chapel of St. Nicholas 
 another tomb of a little child that died from a 
 mistake of its nurse ; and we know a from her will 
 that she never ceased to lament the little darling, 
 and begged very urgently, if possible, to be buried 
 beside it. And there is in the cloisters the 
 monument mentioned on a previous occasion, 3 
 which contains only these words, ' Jane Lister, 
 dear child,' with the date and the record of her 
 brother's previous death. It is an inscription which 
 goes to the heart of every one. It was in the year 
 1688, just a month before the great English 
 Revolution, but the parents thought only of ' Jane 
 Lister,' their ' dear child.' 
 
 Do not forget the dead children. They are 
 not forgotten in Westminster Abbey, they ought 
 never to be forgotten elsewhere. Mothers, parents, 
 who, like Rachel, mourn for some dear daughter 
 or son, think that they are still yours, to animate 
 and urge you forwards. That was a true answer 
 which the little girl made to the poet Wordsworth, 
 who asked how many they were 
 
 - Colonel Chester's edition of The Registers of ll'cst- 
 ntinster Al>l>ey, p. 220. * See p. 20.
 
 58 SICK CHILDREN. SERM. vi. 
 
 ' Seven boys and girls are we ; 
 
 Two of us in the churchyard lie, 
 
 Beneath the churchyard tree.' 
 
 ' How many are you then ? ' said I, 
 
 ' If they two are in heaven ? ' 
 Quick was the little Maid's reply, 
 ' O Master, we are seven ! ' 
 
 And there is another beautiful poem by the father 
 of three sons : 4 two were living, but the third was 
 dead. Of him he thus speaks : 
 
 I have a son a third sweet son ; his age I cannot tell, 
 For they reckon not by years and months where he is gone 
 
 to dwell. . . . 
 
 I cannot tell what form is his, what look he weareth now, 
 Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining seraph 
 
 brow. . . . 
 
 But I know, for God doth tell me this, that he is now at 
 
 rest, 
 Where other blessed infants be, on their Saviour's loving 
 
 breast. . . . 
 Whate'er befall his brethren twain, his bliss can never 
 
 cease ; 
 Their lot may here be grief and fear, but his is certain 
 
 peace. 
 
 But I would not speak only of dead children. 
 
 I will speak of sick children, of children who have 
 
 some illness or infirmity, crippled, or weak, or 
 
 ailing, like some of those who are here to-day from 
 
 4 Moultrie's poem on ' The Three Sons.'
 
 SERM. vi. SICK CHILDREN. 59 
 
 the Royal Infirmary for Children. l ls it well ' with 
 those suffering little ones ? Yes, ' it is well,' for 
 them and for us, if we take the sickness as it is 
 intended by our heavenly Father. 
 
 There is a beautiful picture, by the famous 
 painter Holbein, of a family who are praying, or 
 perhaps giving thanks, for the recovery of their 
 sick child ; and the prayer is supposed to be 
 granted by the appearance of the child Jesus in 
 the midst of the family, happy and strong, whilst 
 the poor sickly child is represented as in the arms 
 of the Virgin Mother, taken as her own. That is 
 a. likeness to us of what we ought to hope for in 
 the case of our sick and ailing children. The sick- 
 ness may perhaps continue, but the sufferer may 
 be under the protection of our good Father, and 
 nursed as it were for Himself ; and amongst us 
 the child, the inner spirit of the child, which will 
 grow up amidst suffering and weakness, is like the 
 spirit of the holy child Jesus, happy and strong, 
 and pure and good. 
 
 Sickness and illness may make a child fretful 
 and selfish, and the people about a sick child may 
 spoil it by giving up everything to it, and encourag- 
 ing it to ask for everything. But it may also teach 
 a child to be patient and considerate, and grateful
 
 60 SICK CHILDREN. SERM. vi. 
 
 for all the care it gets ; and then, instead of being 
 a source of sorrow and vexation in the household, 
 it becomes a source of instruction and comfort to 
 all. 
 
 I will try to make this clear to you from several 
 examples. One is taken from a story : it is one 
 which some of you may have read, called the 
 ' Heir of Redclyffe.' In that story is described a 
 sickly boy called Charles. He is, at the beginning 
 of the story, like one of those fretful, peevish in- 
 valids of whom I spoke just now ; speaking sharply 
 and crossly to every one, and making every one's 
 will bend to his. But in the course of the story 
 there comes into the house another boy full of 
 health and life, but also full of generosity and 
 kindness, and the sickly, selfish boy turns over a 
 new leaf ; his character is transformed as the story 
 goes on. He still remains a suffering cripple, but 
 he becomes the stay and support of the house ; 
 instead of always demanding comfort from them, 
 he, in all the troubles of the family, gives comfort 
 to all the others. 
 
 This is from a story, an imaginary tale of what 
 might happen. Now I will tell you of what has 
 happened. It is a contrast between two boys in 
 Scotland, to which my attention was called some
 
 SERM. vi. SIC A' CHILDREN. 61 
 
 time ago by an excellent Scottish judge, now dead. 5 
 They were boys who both became famous in after 
 life, and many of you have heard of their names. 
 One was Lord Byron, the other was Sir Walter 
 Scott. Well, both these boys had the same kind 
 of misfortune. Both Lord Byron and Walter Scott, 
 from their earliest years, were lame. Each of them 
 had what is called a club foot, or something very 
 like it. But now what was the different effect pro- 
 duced by this lame foot on the two boys ? Lord 
 Byron, who was a perverse, selfish boy, was made 
 by this club foot discontented and angry with every 
 one about him. It entered like iron into his soul. It 
 poisoned his heart. It set him against all mankind, 
 and it injured his whole character. He had a 
 splendid genius, but amidst many fine qualities it 
 was a genius blackened and discoloured by hatred, 
 malice, uncharitablcness, and the deepest gloom. 
 Walter Scott, on the other hand, never lost his 
 cheerfulness. His lame foot made him turn to the 
 reading of good old books, and to the enjoyment 
 of the beautiful sights and sounds about him, and 
 he too grew to be a great poet and the writer of 
 stories which will live in every age and in every 
 country. But in him the lameness which he had 
 ^ Lord Ncavcs.
 
 62 SICK CHILDREN. 
 
 borne patiently and cheerfully in childhood never 
 interfered with his kindliness and his good-humour 
 to those about him. He was a delight to all that 
 came across him, and even when he was at last 
 overtaken by heavier misfortunes he never lost his 
 loving, generous disposition. The lameness which 
 in Byron turned to what St. Paul calls a savour of 
 death unto death, became in Walter Scott a savour 
 of life unto life. 
 
 This, then, is the lesson which I would wish to 
 teach to all children who are sickly and suffering, 
 or who may become sickly and suffering : Do not 
 think that you are without an object, do not think 
 that you cannot be useful, do not think that every- 
 thing has gone against you. No. It is well with 
 you : you can be most useful, you can be the 
 useful child ; and when you grow up you can be 
 the useful man or the useful woman in the home. 
 You can arrange plans of amusement for the others 
 who are too busy to arrange them for themselves. 
 You can show by your constant cheerfulness that 
 happiness does not depend on the good things 
 which you eat, or on the active games which you 
 play, but on a contented, joyful heart. You can 
 make them feel that there is a better world above, 
 where you hope to be, and where you may be
 
 SERM. vi. SICK CHILDREN. 
 
 almost now, because your thoughts are with God 
 and with Jesus Christ. And you children who are 
 strong and healthy, remember that to you this 
 little sick brother or little sick sister is a blessing 
 that God has given you. // is well for you to have 
 them. They may not be able to share in your 
 games ; you will often be obliged to be quiet in 
 their sick room, or when they come amongst you. 
 But that is good for you, because it makes you see 
 very early the joy, the happiness, the usefulness, of 
 having some one weaker than yourselves whom you 
 can protect ; some one in pain or suffering to whom 
 you can minister like a ministering angel. Do not 
 be hasty or angry with a deaf brother, or I may 
 say a deaf mother or aunt, because they cannot 
 hear you ; or a blind sister, or I may say a blind 
 father or uncle, because they cannot see you ; or 
 with a lame or deformed brother or cousin or com- 
 panion, because they cannot take an active part 
 in your amusements. No. They cannot do this ; 
 but they can do much better than this for you, 
 because they make you feel for deafness and blind- 
 ness and lameness everywhere. When you have 
 seen it in those you love, you will be reminded of 
 it in those you do not love. 
 
 And if you have had any of these misfortunes
 
 64 SICK CHILDREN. 
 
 yourselves, and have grown out of them, the recol- 
 lection of what you have suffered may make you 
 of much use to others. There is a distinguished 
 man, very high in rank, and of absolutely indispens- 
 able value in the public service of his Church and 
 country, who when a little boy was very lame. 6 He 
 recovered, but he never lost his fellow-feeling for 
 lame people j and once, when we were walking 
 together, I remember that he gave some money to 
 a poor lame man who opened the gate for us, and 
 he told me that he always did so, in remembrance 
 of his own lameness. 
 
 Learn to be tender to your suffering brothers or 
 sisters. You who are sick or weakly, always keep 
 up that fellow-feeling. It will make your weakness 
 or illness a blessing, and not a curse. You who are 
 well and have sick friends, you also try to keep up 
 that fellow-feeling. In the story of Elisha and the 
 sick child, we are told that when he hoped to re- 
 store the child to health ' he went up and lay upon 
 the child, and put his mouth upon the child's 
 mouth, and his eyes upon the child's eyes, and his 
 hands upon the child's hands ; and he stretched 
 himself upon the child,' and the flesh of the 
 child waxed warm. This is a likeness of the sym- 
 6 Archbishop Tait.
 
 SERM. vi. S7CA' CHILDREN. 65 
 
 pathy which all in health, whether old or young, 
 should try to have for those who are in pain or 
 infirmity. We give life and happiness to the sick 
 by giving them, as it were, a taste of our life and 
 happiness ; our words are words to them, our eyes 
 are eyes to them, our hands are hands to them. 
 There were some sailors who were stranded on a 
 desert rock on a freezing night. There was one 
 little midshipman amongst them; they put their 
 clothes upon him, they covered him up. They all 
 were found dead in the morning ; but, if I remem- 
 ber right, the little boy, through their kindness, 
 survived their warmth had saved him, they died 
 that he might live. And so, even without such 
 great efforts, we should try to put ourselves in the 
 place of our sick and suffering companions. We 
 should try to feel for them, as we should wish them 
 to feel for us, to tell them of the happy and beau- 
 tiful things of the outside world, to make them 
 understand that they are not forgotten, to show 
 them what is the sphere in which they can be useful. 
 It is for this reason that hospitals for sick 
 children are so much to be encouraged. In old 
 barbarous heathen times the life of a sick or de- 
 formed child was not thought worth preserving. 
 The sickly children were thrown on the road as 
 
 F
 
 66 SICK CHILDREN. SERM. vi. 
 
 not worth saving. But they are worth saving ; 
 they may be the saving of those about them. One 
 of the first great changes that were made by 
 Christianity was that those sick children left to 
 perish were adopted by kind men and women, who 
 brought them up as their own. And so not only 
 in hospitals, but in every family where there is a 
 sick child, remember that it is your duty, your 
 privilege, to look after such. If you are kind to 
 them God will be kind to you. They are your 
 special charges ; they are the good things committed 
 by God to us for our keeping. They are our ear- 
 liest and best teachers in the good way. Who- 
 ever does anything for them does it to the good 
 God and merciful Saviour who entrusted them to 
 us. And we shall not lose our reward. // will be 
 well for the children and it will be well for us.
 
 VII. 
 
 ST. CHRISTOPHER. 
 
 (December 28, 1878.) 
 
 Like as the arrcnvs in the hand of the giant, even so are 
 the young children. Ps. cxxvii. 5. 
 
 THERE is an old story, a kind of Sunday fairy tale, 
 which you may sometimes have seen represented 
 in pictures and statues in ancient churches (there 
 are two sculptures of it in King Henry VII. 's 
 chapel in this church), of a great heathen giant 
 who wished to find out some master that he should 
 think worthy of his service, some one stronger 
 than himself. He went about the world, but 
 could find no one stronger. And besides this, he 
 was anxious to pray to God, but did not know how 
 to do it. At last he met with a good old man by 
 the side of a deep river, where poor wayfaring 
 people wanted to get across, and had no one to 
 help them. And the good old man said to the
 
 68 ST. CHRISTOPHER. SERM. vn. 
 
 giant, ' Here is a place where you can be of some 
 use ; and if you do not know how to pray, you will, 
 at any rate, know how to work, and perhaps God 
 will give you what you ask, and perhaps also you 
 will at last find a master stronger than you.' So 
 the giant went and sat by the river-side, and many 
 a time he carried poor wayfarers across. One 
 night he heard a little child crying to be carried 
 over ; so he put the child on his shoulder and 
 strode across the stream. Presently the wind blew, 
 the rain fell, and as the river beat against his knees 
 he felt the weight of the little child almost greater 
 than he could bear, and he looked up with his 
 great, patient eyes (there is a beautiful picture in a 
 beautiful palace at Venice, where we see him with 
 his face turned upwards as he tries to steady him- 
 self in the raging waters), and he saw that it was 
 a child glorious and shining ; and the child said, 
 ' Thou art labouring under this heavy burden 
 because thou art carrying One who bears the sins 
 of all the world.' And then as the story goes 
 on, the giant felt that it was the child Jesus, and 
 when he reached the other side of the river he fell 
 down before Him. Now he had found some one 
 stronger than he was, some one so good, so worthy 
 of loving, as to be a master whom he could serve.
 
 SERM. vn. -ST. CHRISTOPHER. 69 
 
 In later days the thought of the giant Christopher 
 (the ' bearer of the child Christ ') was so dear to men, 
 that his picture was often painted very large on the 
 churches, so that those who saw it far off should 
 have a pleasant and holy remembrance through the 
 day which would save them from running into evil. 
 But we all may learn from it two useful lessons, 
 which may keep us from evil and lead us into good. 
 The first lesson is that often, when we know 
 not how to believe or how to pray, we at any rate 
 may know how to work for the good of others, and 
 then God accepts this as if it were a prayer. There 
 is an old Latin saying, Laborare est orare or, if we 
 were to turn it into English, we should say, 
 
 Good working and good playing 
 Is almost like good praying. 
 
 Or, as some one else has said, 
 
 He prayeth well who loveth well 
 Both man and bird and beast. 
 
 We ought all of us to say our prayers ; they will 
 help us to do what is good : but we must also all 
 remember that our prayers are no use unless we 
 strive, both in our work and in our play, 
 
 To live more nearly as we pray.
 
 70 ST. CHRISTOPHER. SERM. vn 
 
 This is one lesson which we may carry with us 
 from the story of St. Christopher, and one which 
 applies to all, whether grown-up people or children. 
 Pray and work, work and pray, do as much good as 
 you can, and God will reward and receive you at last. 
 
 But there is another lesson which more es- 
 pecially applies to the sight of a congregation of 
 children with their parents and friends. The child 
 Jesus, who, according to the story, was carried on 
 the shoulders of the giant, was the type and like- 
 ness of all children. That is one reason why we 
 think so much of Christmas ; why Christmas is so 
 much more loved than even Easter or Whitsun- 
 tide. It is because we feel that the birth and the 
 childhood of our Lord contained the promise of 
 His manhood, because we have our hearts drawn 
 towards the tender, innocent child who, when He 
 grew up, suffered so much and endured so much 
 for the good of mankind. And that may be the 
 case, more or less, with all children. That is why 
 our Saviour looked upon them with such confid- 
 ence, such reverence, and such affection. ' Of 
 such,' He said, ' is the kingdom of heaven.' Of 
 such and out of such characters as were wrapped 
 up in the little beings which He saw before Him, 
 and which we now see before us, is the hope of the
 
 SERM. vii. ST. CHRISTOPHER. 71 
 
 coming time. You who are the parents, you who 
 are responsible for the training of these children, 
 you bear upon your shoulders a burden like that 
 which the giant of the old story carried ; you bear 
 a burden greater, perhaps, than you know how to 
 bear the burden of forming their characters ; the 
 burden, perchance, of the destinies of the coming 
 age. Rejoice in them, and while remembering 
 how heavy is the responsibility which presses upon 
 you, be encouraged to carry your little burdens 
 safely over the great river of life, which is also the 
 great river of death. Remember also that as St. 
 Christopher in the old story was saved by carrying 
 the Child, so we may be saved by the children 
 carrying us ; they may help by their innocence and 
 truthfulness to teach us now and to help us here- 
 after ; they may be as that little child which 
 Elisha cured, who it was supposed afterwards grew 
 to be the great prophet Jonah ; or that other little 
 child in the Gospels who, as the early Christians 
 believed, grew to be the great Christian martyr 
 Ignatius. 
 
 But as the children are the burden, the quiver 
 on our shoulders, so they are, as the text says, 
 ' like as the arrows in the hand of the giant,' like 
 the arrows which a mighty archer shoots into the
 
 72 ST: CHRISTOPHER. SERM. vn. 
 
 darkness, piercing hearts which are far away. These 
 children, if rightly trained and rightly nurtured, 
 may indeed be the blessing of times to come ; nay, 
 more, they may be blessings even while they are 
 yet children. Let me give you one simple in- 
 stance. It is a story, not like that old fairy story 
 with which I began this sermon, but a real story of 
 our own time. I found it in a sermon 1 by a power- 
 ful preacher in one of the strange cities of North 
 America, but describing what happened in our own 
 country on a cold winter day like those which 
 we have just had. Listen to it, parents ; listen 
 to it, dear children, for if you have understood 
 nothing else of what I have said, you will under- 
 stand this. Not long ago, in Edinburgh, two 
 gentlemen were standing at the door of an hotel 
 one very cold day, when a little boy with a poor 
 thin blue face, his feet bare and red with the cold, 
 and with nothing to cover him but a bundle of rags, 
 came and said, ' Please, sir, buy some matches.' 
 'No, I don't want any,' the gentleman said. 'But 
 they are only a penny a box,' the poor little fellow 
 
 1 ' The Life that now is : ' Sermons, by Robert Collyer, 
 of Chicago, pp. 260-64. The story is taken from this 
 volume almost word for word, and I have incorporated 
 some of the preacher's forcible remarks.
 
 SERM. vii. ST. CHRISTOPHER. 73 
 
 pleaded. ' Yes, but you see we don't want a box,' 
 the gentleman said again. 'Then I will gie ye 
 twa boxes for a penny,' the boy said at last ; ' and 
 so to get rid of him ' (the gentleman who tells the 
 story says) ' I bought a box ; but then I found I 
 had no change, so I said, " I will buy a box to- 
 morrow." "Oh, do buy them to-night, if you 
 please," the boy pleaded again ; " I will run and 
 get ye the change, for I am verra hungry." So I 
 gave him the shilling, and he started away. I 
 waited for him, but no boy came. Then I thought 
 I had lost my shilling ; still there was that in the 
 boy's face I trusted, and I did not like to think ill 
 of him. Late in the evening I was told that a 
 little boy wanted to see me. When he was brought 
 in I found it was a smaller brother of the boy that 
 got my shilling, but if possible still more ragged 
 and poor and thin. He stood a moment, diving 
 into his rags as if he was seeking something, and 
 then saidf " Are you the gentleman that bought 
 the matches frae Sandie ? " " Yes." " Weel, then, 
 here's fourpence out o' yer shilling ; Sandie cannot 
 come ; he's very ill ; a cart ran ower him and 
 knocked him down, and he lost his bonnet and his 
 matches and your sevenpence, and both his legs 
 are broken, and the doctor says he'll die ; and
 
 74 ST. CHRISTOPHER. SERM. vn. 
 
 that's a'." And then, putting the fourpence on the 
 table, the poor child broke down into great sobs. 
 So I fed the little man, and I went with him to see 
 Sandie. I found that the two little things lived 
 almost alone, their father and mother being dead. 
 Poor Sandie was lying on a bundle of shavings : he 
 knew me as soon as I came in, and said, " I got the 
 change, sir, and was coming back ; and then the 
 horse knocked me down, and both my legs were 
 broken ; and oh, Reuby ! little Reuby ! I am 
 sure I am dying, and who will take care of you 
 when I am gone ? What will ye do, Reuby ? " 
 Then I took his hand, and said that I would 
 always take care of Reuby. He understood me, 
 and had just strength to look up at me as if to 
 thank me : the light went out of his blue eyes ; in 
 a moment 
 
 He lay within the light of God, 
 
 Like a babe upon the breast, 
 Where the wicked cease from troubling, 
 
 And the weary are at rest.' 
 
 That story is like an arrow in the hand of a giant. 
 It ought to pierce many a heart, old and young. 
 Whenever, dear children, you are tempted to say 
 what is not true, or to be hard on other little boys 
 and girls, or to take what you ought not to take,
 
 SERM. vii. ST. CHRISTOPHER. 75 
 
 we want you to remember little Sandie. This poor 
 little boy, lying on a bundle of shavings, dying and 
 starving, was tender, and trusty, and true ; and so 
 God told the gentleman to take poor little friend- 
 less Reuben, and be a friend to him, and Sandie 
 heard him say he would do it -the last thing he 
 ever did hear ; and then the dark room, the bundle 
 of shavings, the weary, broken little limbs, all faded 
 away, and Sandie was among the angels, who could 
 look at him in his new home, and say one to 
 another, ' That is the little boy who kept his word, 
 and sent back fourpence ; that is the little boy who 
 was tender, and trusty, and true, when he was 
 hungry and faint, and when both his legs were 
 broken, and he lay dying.' This story is told 
 you now because, whether it be hard or easy, we 
 want you to be tender, and trusty, and true, as 
 poor little Sandie, who did not forget his promise, 
 and who loved his little brother to the end.
 
 7 6 
 
 VIII. 
 
 THE CHILDREN'S CREED. 
 (December 27, 1879.) 
 
 / have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in 
 truth. 3 JOHN 4. 
 
 As once before, so now, we have brought you 
 together on St. John's Day, because Innocents' Day 
 falls on a Sunday. Those words which I have 
 read from St. John well express what all of us 
 ought to feel ' We have no greater joy than that 
 our children, than that the rising generation, should 
 walk in truth.' And I have, therefore, thought it 
 useful to set forth what are the religious truths 
 which we should try to teach our children, and 
 which our children should try to learn. Some of 
 what I say will be chiefly addressed to parents 
 and friends ; some of what I say will be chiefly ad- 
 dressed to children. But I hope that most will find
 
 SERM. viii. THE CHILDREN'S CREED. 77 
 
 some in one part, some in another something 
 to instruct them. 
 
 There are two points to be mentioned at the 
 outset which might seem difficult to reconcile, but 
 which in fact wonderfully agree, and are a support 
 to each other. On the one hand, what we teach 
 to children should be truths which will stand the 
 wear and tear of time as they grow up. Solomon 
 says, ' Train up a child in the way he should go : 
 and when he is old, he will not depart from it.' 
 That is very true, but in order that he should not 
 depart from it when he is old, it must be a way 
 which, when he is old, he will find to be as good 
 for him as it was when he was young. On the 
 other hand, we must try to teach a child what he 
 will understand, in the simplest and not in the 
 hardest words, in the words which sink deepest 
 into his soul and lay most hold on his heart. This, 
 perhaps we might think, cannot be the truth in 
 which the child will feel most delight when it grows 
 older. Not perhaps in the very same forms ; but 
 we may be sure, and our Saviour Himself has told 
 us, that the instruction which is most suitable for 
 a little child is also the most suitable for the oldest 
 and wisest of men. 
 
 I. What then shall we teach our children to
 
 78 THE CHILDREN^ CREED. SERM. vm. 
 
 believe, which when they grow up they may find 
 that later experience does not require them to 
 alter ? 
 
 (i) We must teach them that, beyond what they 
 feel and see and touch, there is something better 
 and greater, which they can neither feel nor see nor 
 touch. Goodness, kindness to one another, un- 
 selfishness, fairness, and uprightness these are the 
 best things in all the world. It is true that good- 
 ness and kindness have no faces that we can kiss 
 no hands that we can clasp ; but they are certainly 
 close to us, both in the midst of our work and our 
 play. And this goodness and kindness which, ex- 
 cept in outward acts, we cannot see, is something 
 which existed before we were born. It is from this 
 that we have all the pleasant things of this world 
 the flowers, the sunshine, the moonlight all these 
 were given us by some great kindness and good- 
 ness which we have never seen at all. And this 
 Goodness and this Love are the Great Power out of 
 which all things come, which we call by the name 
 of God. And because God is so much above us 
 and so good to us, we call Him by the name which 
 is most dear to us of all earthly names our Father. 
 When a father goes away from home, still his 
 children know that he is somewhere, though they
 
 SERM. viii. THE CHILDREN^ CREED. 79 
 
 cannot see him, and they know what to do in order 
 to please him. So it is with the great unseen 
 Father of us all. Let us then teach our children 
 that God is Goodness and Justice ; that the rules 
 which He has laid down for the government of the 
 world are His will and wish for us ; even frost and 
 cold, even sickness and pain, are for our good, and 
 we must trust that he has some good reason for it, 
 perhaps to make us strong, and brave, and healthy. 
 It is for this reason that you see in the Abbey, on 
 the monument of Sir John Franklin, who was so 
 long shut up in the ice, the words, ' O ye Frost and 
 Cold ; O ye Ice and Snow; bless ye the Lord ; 
 praise Him, and magnify Him for ever.' This, 
 then, in various ways, is our way of expressing our 
 belief in our Father in heaven. 
 
 (2) But this highest kindness and fairness are 
 like what we have seen and heard of in the world. 
 Children can see it in their good parents, their 
 good uncles and aunts, their good brothers and 
 sisters ; and as they grow older they will find that 
 there have always been good people, and they will 
 hear that there was once one Child, one Man, so good 
 to all about Him, so good to little children, that 
 He has shown us better than any one else what is 
 the true likeness of that unseen Goodness which
 
 8o THE CHILDREN'S CREED. SERM. vnr. 
 
 we call God, and which we still hope to know in 
 heaven. Children should be taught what Jesus 
 Christ did and said when He went about doing 
 good, and should be made to understand that only 
 so far as we are like to Jesus Christ, or like what 
 Jesus Christ loved when He was in the world, 
 can we be His friends or followers. He was good, 
 and He went through all sorts of trouble and pain, 
 even to His death on the cross, for no other reason 
 but to make us good. This will help us to under- 
 stand why He is called the Son of God, the Saviour 
 of men. 
 
 (3) And children should learn to know that 
 there is in the heart of every one of us something 
 which tells when we have done right or wrong, 
 which makes the colour come into our cheeks when 
 we have said what is not true, something which we 
 must treat with honour and respect both in ourselves 
 and others. What is this ? There are many names 
 by which you will hear it called in after life, but there 
 is one name which we speak of almost in a whisper, 
 because we do not like to think or speak of it as if 
 it were a common thing. We call it ' the voice of 
 God,' the invisible Power all around, which also is 
 within us the 'Breath' or the 'Spirit of God,' 
 which we cannot see any more than we can see our
 
 SERM. vni. THE CHILDREN'S CREED. 81 
 
 own breath or spirit and because it is so good we 
 call it ' the Holy Spirit of God.' And from this 
 ' Breath or Spirit of God ' comes all the good not 
 only in ourselves but in other people ; and children 
 cannot learn too early to admire and love all that 
 is admirable and lovable in the men, women, and 
 children that they see around them. They may, 
 perhaps, also be able to learn the great lesson that 
 there are things to be admired and loved in people 
 they do not like, in people that hurt and annoy 
 them, or even in those whom they ought to avoid. 
 And if, as sometimes happens, children are brought 
 up in other countries where they see that people 
 do not always go to the same church, or utter the 
 same prayers as they and their parents, they may 
 learn thus early a lesson which they never will 
 forget namely, that our heavenly Father has those 
 who serve Him and do good in many different 
 ways, but still in and by the same Good Spirit. 
 
 II. These are the chief things which we ought 
 to learn from our catechism as to what the young 
 should believe. And now, what must we teach 
 them as to what they should do? St. John, when 
 he was a very old man, so old that he could not 
 walk, and could hardly speak, used to be carried 
 in the arms of his friends into the midst of the
 
 82 THE CHILDREN^ CREED. SERM. vin. 
 
 assembly of Christians, and then he would lift him- 
 self up and say, ' Little children, love one another ; ' 
 and again, ' Little children, love one another ; ' and 
 again, ' Little children, love one another.' When 
 asked, ' Have you nothing else to tell us ? ' he 
 replied, ' I say this over and over again, because if 
 you do this there is nothing more needed.' Now, 
 that is something like what I would say to you. 
 What you have to be told to do is very simple. It 
 is that you should be kind and loving to one 
 another, for then you will be loving towards God, 
 because you will be doing that which He most 
 desires. Try not to vex or tease your smaller 
 brothers or sisters ; try to help them when they are 
 in difficulty; do not be jealous of them; do not 
 tell stories against them ; above all, do not lead 
 them into mischief, because the worst harm you 
 can do to a young child is to tempt him to do what 
 is wrong. If he once begins you cannot stop him, 
 and many years afterwards he will remember with 
 bitter grief and indignation that you were the first 
 to lead him astray into evil ways. A lie that is 
 told, a deceit that is practised, a bad word that is 
 heard, a bad act that is lightly spoken of, often 
 enters into the mind of a young child, and remains 
 there all his life. There is a proverb which says,
 
 SERM. vin. THE CHILDREN'S CREED. 83 
 
 ' Little pitchers have long ears ;' and it means that 
 little children often hear more than you think they 
 hear, and keep in their memory things which you 
 think they must have forgotten. It is the same, in 
 other words, as a Latin proverb, which those boys 
 who understand Latin will translate for themselves 
 maxima debetur pueris rererentia. The greatest 
 reverence, the greatest fear should restrain us from 
 doing anything by false, or vulgar, or foolish words 
 to spoil the conscience, or the taste, or the charac- 
 ter of a little boy. You know what you mean by a 
 spoiled picture, or a spoiled book ; the colours are 
 blurred, the leaves are rumpled. That is what 
 we mean by a child whose character is spoiled or 
 stained by the foolish indulgence or neglect of those 
 about him. Parents, try not to spoil your children. 
 Children, try not to spoil one another : and take 
 care not to be spoiled yourselves. That is one 
 of the most important ways of fulfilling St. John's 
 precept both for old and young, ' Little children, 
 love do not spoil one another.' And there is 
 another part of this precept which children should 
 be taught : it is that love and kindness include not 
 only our brothers and sisters and relatives, but also 
 poor people who are in suffering or want ; and not 
 only these, but also the poor dumb creatures that
 
 84 THE CHILDREN'S CREED. SERM. viir. 
 
 depend upon us. Never be rude to any poor man 
 or woman because they are in rags, or because they 
 look and talk differently from ourselves. Never be 
 cruel to any dog, or cat, or bird. There was once a 
 very cruel Roman emperor cruel to men, women, 
 and children who, when he was a little boy, used 
 to amuse himself by tormenting flies. Perhaps if 
 he had been stopped then he would not have had 
 his heart hardened against his fellow-men. 
 
 III. And now how are you to be strength- 
 ened to believe and to do these things ? There 
 are many ways, but I will mention only two. By 
 reading good books and by learning good prayers. 
 
 (i) Good- books. First of all, the best parts 
 of the Bible ; for even in the best of all books, 
 the Bible, there are some parts more useful, more 
 easy, more likely to stand the trials of time than 
 others. Learn these, teach these, and you will 
 then find that the more difficult parts will not per- 
 plex those who in their early childhood have had 
 a firm grasp of those parts of which the truth and 
 beauty belong not to the vesture that is folded up 
 and vanisheth away, but to the wisdom and grace 
 which endure for ever. And of other good books, 
 let the stories of the good and great men of our 
 own or former times be fixed in our remembrance.
 
 SERM. vni. THE CHILDREN'S CREED. 85 
 
 How many such stories there are, which, as Sir 
 Philip Sydney said of Chevy Chase, stir our souls 
 and spirits as with a trumpet ! How many are 
 there which will make our blood boil against the 
 evil-doer, or our hearts beat with admiration for 
 generous and noble deeds ! There was a famous 
 French soldier of bygone days whose name you will 
 see written in this Abbey on the gravestone of Sir 
 James Outram, because in many ways he was like 
 Bayard. Bayard was a small boy, only thirteen, 
 when he went into his first service, and his mother 
 told him to remember three things : ' first, to fear 
 and love God ; secondly, to have gentle and 
 courteous manners to those above him ; and 
 thirdly, to be generous and charitable, without 
 pride or haughtiness, to those beneath him : ' and 
 these three things he never forgot, which helped to 
 make him the soldier 'without fear and without 
 reproach.' These are the stories which are part of 
 the heritage of all the families of the earth, and 
 ought to be cherished from the first to the last. 
 
 (2) And what must we teach, what must be 
 learnt about prayer? Let no parent forget, let no 
 child forget, to say a prayer, however short, at 
 morning and at evening. It will help to make you 
 better all the day. The Lord's Prayer will never fail
 
 86 THE CHILDREN'S CREED. SERM. vm. 
 
 you. The child will be able to understand it, the 
 old man will find it expressing all that he wants. 
 And there is also that form of prayer which is 
 expressed in hymns. There are hymns which can 
 be remembered better than anything else, and 
 which in restless, sleepless nights of pain and 
 suffering will come back to our minds, many, many 
 years after they were learnt in childhood. Amongst 
 these let me recommend the Morning and Evening 
 Hymns, written by one of the best of Englishmen, 
 Bishop Ken the first beginning, 'Awake, my soul, 
 and with the sun ; ' and the other, 'Glory to Thee, 
 my God, this night.' Not long ago I was visiting 
 an aged and famous statesman, 1 and he repeated 
 to me, word by word, the Evening Hymn, as he 
 had learnt it, he told me, from his nurse ninety 
 years before. So may it be with you, my dear 
 children, not only with hymns, but with the other 
 good things which you may learn now, and perhaps 
 when you are like that old, very old man, grown 
 gray in the service of his country, and full of years 
 and honours, you may remember that when you 
 were children you heard something which you have 
 not forgotten on the festival of St. John, on the 
 eve of Innocents' Day, in Westminster Abbey. 
 1 Lord Stratford de Redcliffe.
 
 IX. 
 
 TALITHA CUMI. 
 (December 28, 1880.) 
 
 LET me take this evening the story of our Saviour's 
 kindness to a little girl. There was in Capernaum 
 a well-known house where lived one of the chief 
 officers of the synagogue. His name was Jairus. 
 In that house was one only child, a little daughter 
 of twelve years old, just at the age when a child 
 has had time to endear itself to its parents, when 
 its character first comes to be seen and known. 
 The child was thought to be dying. The father 
 heard that the Great Healer had just crossed the 
 lake. He was feasting in the house of Levi, the 
 publican. The father rushes in ; he falls at His feet ; 
 he entreats Him to come and save his daughter. 
 The Lord arose ; that little life was as precious 
 in His sight as the souls of those whom He was 
 convincing by His divine wisdom. He who said,
 
 TALITHA CUMI. 
 
 'Suffer the little children to come unto Me,' was 
 as eager, if one may so say, to soothe the sick 
 bed of this small Galilean maiden as though He 
 had nothing else to do. For Him the thought of 
 human sickness, the call of a suffering parent, was 
 the most sacred of human duties. He came at 
 once. All along the shore and all through the 
 streets He had to force his way through the dense 
 crowd, thronging ever more and more closely 
 round Him. Whilst He thus struggled with the 
 crowd, a messenger broke through the press with 
 the sad tidings that it was too late. ' Thy daughter 
 is dead.' Amidst the surging of the crowd, and 
 above the hum of many voices, the Master's wakeful 
 ear heard the whisper of the messenger. He bade the 
 father still keep up his heart. ' Fear not,' He said, 
 ' only believe.' ' Fear not,' He says to all anxious 
 mourners. 'Fear not the dark and dreary void into 
 which thy loved one has passed. Fear not that 
 God will desert thee in thine hour of need. Fear 
 not but that thou wilt once more see the child, the 
 parent, the brother, the sister thou hast lost. Only 
 believe in the lovingkindness of God our Saviour. 
 Only believe that He who makes the flowers to 
 spring and the buds to come forth again, will raise 
 that little flower, will help that bursting blossom of
 
 TALITHA CUML 89 
 
 the human soul.' He reaches the house. The hired 
 mourners of Eastern countries are already there, 
 wailing and shrieking, as is their wont. He put 
 them all aside. He said to the parents, 'She is not 
 dead, but sleepeth ' ; words that have often brought 
 comfort to parents hanging over the face of their 
 dead child in the hope of the general resurrection ; 
 words that are written in this church, on the pede- 
 stal of one of the children of the great family of 
 Russell, who died in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 
 He touched the hand of the child, as she lay on 
 her couch as if in the sleep of death. He addressed 
 her in words which have been handed down liter- 
 ally. It is doubtful, in His discourses generally, 
 what language our Saviour spoke whether Greek 
 or Syriac ; but here, at any rate, the Syriac words 
 are given. They are, ' Talitha cumi ' ; that is, ' My 
 little lamb, my little pet lamb, rise up.' With these 
 endearing appellations He roused the sleeping soul. 
 By these He showed to the parents that He was one 
 with them in their parental love, in their domestic 
 joy as well as in their domestic sorrow. And she 
 came again to life, and was to them as before. 
 
 Now let me apply this both to parents and 
 children. Parents, remember what a gift, what 
 an inestimable gift, is given to you in the soul
 
 90 TALITHA CUMI. SERM. ix. 
 
 of a little child ; how its playful ways are to you 
 the special gift of God. Think what a sight it is 
 to see an innocent little girl ; reflect how to any 
 cne except the most brutal of mankind such a 
 sight banishes all thoughts of filthy language or 
 foul deeds; remember that the tenderness and 
 gentleness which the sight of such a little girl 
 awakens is one of the best parts of your nature. 
 If any of you doubt whether it is in you to be self- 
 controlled and masters of yourselves, remember 
 that, unless you are very bad indeed, you must 
 be so in the presence of such a little being. Sir 
 William Napier describes, in his 'History of the 
 Peninsular War,' how affecting it was to see, at the 
 battle of Busaco, in Portugal, a beautiful Portuguese 
 orphan girl coming down the mountains, driving an 
 ass loaded with all her property through the midst 
 of the armies. She passed over the field of battle 
 with a childish simplicity, scarcely understanding 
 which were French and which were English, and 
 no one on either side was so hard-hearted as to 
 touch her. And let me give two stories which show 
 how the strongest men are open to those tender 
 kindly feelings which little children are given by 
 our heavenly Father to promote in all of us. That 
 same Sir William Napier once in his walks met
 
 SERM. ix. TALITHA CUMI. 91 
 
 with a little girl of five years old sobbing over a 
 pitcher she had broken. She in her innocence 
 asked him to mend it. He told her that he could 
 not mend it, but that he would meet her trouble 
 by giving her sixpence to buy a new one, if she 
 would meet him there at the same hour the next 
 evening, as he had no money in his purse that day. 
 When he returned home he found that there was 
 an invitation waiting for him, which he particularly 
 wished to accept. But he could not then have met 
 the little girl at the time stated, and he gave up the 
 invitation, saying, ' I could not disappoint her, she 
 trusted in me so implicitly.' That was the true 
 Christian gentleman and soldier. Another exam- 
 ple is that of Martin Luther, one of the fiercest 
 and most courageous men that ever lived. But 
 when he thought of his little children, especially of 
 his little daughter, he was as gentle and kind as 
 any woman. His daughter Magdalen died when 
 she was thirteen years of age, and it is most affecting 
 to read his grief, and, at the same time, his resigna- 
 tion. ' Magdalen, my little daughter, thou wouldst 
 gladly stay with thy father here, and thou wouldst 
 also gladly go to thy Father yonder.' 'Ah ! thou 
 dear little thing, thou shalt rise again, and shine 
 like a star ; yea, like the sun.' ' Her face, her
 
 92 TALITHA CUMI. SERM. ix. 
 
 words, cleave to our heart, remain fixed in its depths, 
 living and dying the words and looks of that most 
 dutiful child. Blessed be the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 who called, chose, and magnified her. I would for 
 myself, and all of us, that we might attain to such 
 a death ; yea, rather, to such a life.' 
 
 And you, children, these words are also ad- 
 dressed to you. ' My little lamb,' the very word 
 tells to you how precious you are to the Good 
 Shepherd. Arise, get up, bestir yourself! get up 
 from any slothful habit, from any idle, selfish habit 
 you have formed. Let His voice reach your inner- 
 most heart, and raise you from the deepest sleep. 
 
 There was a boy who used to carry parcels 
 from a bookseller to his customers. He went 
 every day trudging through the streets with a heavy 
 parcel of books under his arm, and one day he 
 was sent to the house of a great duke with three 
 folio volumes of Clarendon's ' History of England.' 
 The parcel was so heavy, his shoulders were so 
 tired, that as he passed through Broad Sanctuary, 
 opposite Westminster Abbey, he laid down the load, 
 and sobbed at the thought that there was nothing 
 higher in life for him to look forward to than being 
 a bookseller's porter. Suddenly he looked up at 
 the great building which towered above him. He
 
 SERM. ix. TALITHA CUMI. 93 
 
 thought of the high thoughts and the great men 
 enshrined within it. He brushed away his tears, 
 replaced the load on his shoulder, and walked 
 on with a light heart, determined to bide his time. 
 And his time came at last. He became one of the 
 best and most learned of our Indian missionaries. 1 
 There was a little girl living with her old grand- 
 father. She was a good child, but he was not a 
 very good man, and one day when the little child 
 came back from school he put in writing over her 
 bed, ' God is nowhere' ; for he did not believe in 
 the good God, and he was trying to make the little 
 child believe the same. What did the little girl 
 do ? She had no eyes to see, no ears to hear, what 
 her grandfather tried to teach her. She was very 
 small ; she could only read words of one syllable 
 at the time ; she rose above the bad meaning 
 which he tried to put into her mind ; she rose as 
 we ought all to rise, above the temptation of our 
 time ; she rose into a higher and better world ; 
 she rose because her little mind could not do 
 otherwise, and she read the words, not ' God is 
 nowhere] but ' God is noiv /iere.' That is what we 
 all should strive to do. Out of words which have 
 no sense, or which have a bad sense, our eyes, our 
 1 Dr. Joshua Marshman.
 
 94 TALITHA CUM I. 
 
 minds, ought to be able to read a good sense. The 
 old grandfather was touched and made serious, and 
 we ought all of us to be made serious in like 
 manner by the innocent questions and answers of 
 our little children. God is noiv here. God is now, 
 at this moment, watching over them and us. God 
 is here, in this very Abbey, watching over the little 
 children here assembled. God is in your homes, in 
 your play, in your prayers, listening to you, as He is 
 in this church, and He says to each one of you, to 
 each one of us, ' Talitha cumi ' My little lamb, rise, 
 mount up, be better this year than you were last 
 year. Mount up, become better and wiser ; mount 
 up, rise up, as if you were climbing a long ladder ; 
 mount up, rise up, as if you were climbing a high 
 mountain, and then you will be able to read those 
 words, ' God is nffivherej in their truest sense. 
 They mean that God is in no particular place. 
 That is true ; but it is not the whole truth it is 
 only half the truth, or, rather, it is, when taken 
 by itself, the reverse of the truth. But when we 
 make it ' God is now here] it becomes a great truth, 
 for it tells us that because God is in no particular 
 place, therefore He is in all places. God is now 
 here, for God is always everywhere your help in 
 ages past, your hope for years to come.
 
 95 
 
 X. 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 (Saturday Afternoon, June 18, 1881.) 
 
 And seeing the multitudes, He went up into a mountain : 
 and ivhen He was set, His disciples came unto Him. 
 
 MATT. v. i. 
 
 IT has been my wish, for some time since, to invite 
 those who may be disengaged at this time of the 
 year, and at this time of the day, to hear a few 
 words which may perchance be useful to them on 
 some of the serious matters connected with reli- 
 gion. The season of the Christian year which we 
 are now entering upon is not marked by any solemn- 
 ity which conspicuously attracts us : Christmas is 
 over, Lent is over, Easter is over, Whitsuntide and 
 Trinity Sunday are over, and there is nothing to 
 break the long and even tenor which continues 
 onwards towards Advent. The absence of any 
 such particular solemnity appears to leave a vacant
 
 96 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. x. 
 
 space in which we may possibly have an oppor- 
 tunity of calling attention to those truths through 
 which alone all other facts and doctrines of the 
 Christian religion are important. 
 
 I propose to speak of the Beatitudes pronounced 
 by our Saviour on the characters in which He most 
 delighted. They are all-important in several ways. 
 
 First, they open that discourse which, whatever 
 may be the difficulties of particular parts of it, has 
 always been recognised as the most important 
 part of the New Testament. Nothing else in 
 the Gospels, nothing in St. Paul's Epistles, can 
 compare with the interest which attaches to the 
 words derived from our Saviour's lips on this occa- 
 sion. It is, as it has been well called, the Magna 
 Charta of Christianity. These Beatitudes corre- 
 spond in the Christian religion to the Ten Com- 
 mandments delivered on Mount Sinai they were 
 intended by some good reformers of our Church 
 Service to take the place of those Ten Command- 
 ments on the three great festivals of the Christian 
 Church which are now past. They are not ques- 
 tioned, at least in their essential parts, by any of 
 those various inquiries which have thrown some diffi- 
 culty in the way of accepting this or that saying 
 of our Saviour, this or that writing of His apostles.
 
 SERM. x. THE BEATITUDES. 97 
 
 Secondly, they put before us what are those 
 qualities, and what are those results, which the 
 Founder of our religion regarded as alone of supreme 
 excellence. He does not say, ' Blessed are the 
 Churchmen,' or 'Blessed are the Nonconformists'; 
 He does not say, ' Blessed are the Presbyterians,' 
 or ' Blessed are the Episcopalians ' ; He does not 
 say, 'Blessed are the Methodists,' or 'Blessed are 
 the Baptists ' ; He does not say, ' Blessed are the 
 Roman Catholics,' or 'Blessed are the Protestants': 
 but He says, ' Blessed are they who show those 
 graces and virtues in their characters which may 
 be found in every one of these communities, and 
 under every one of these forms of belief.' 
 
 In proportion as we show any of these in our 
 lives, we do what our Master tells us ; in propor- 
 tion as we do not show them, we fail in the 
 purpose for which He lived and died for man. 
 Often in revivals, and in confessions on death-beds, 
 people ask, * Are you happy ? ' ' Are you saved ? ' 
 Christ gives us the answer : ' You are happy, you 
 are saved, if you seek the happiness, first, of 
 modesty ; secondly, of compassion for sorrow ; 
 thirdly, of gentleness ; fourthly, of an eager desire 
 for justice ; fifthly, of purity and singleness of 
 purpose ; sixthly, of kindness to man and beast ; 
 
 H
 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 seventhly, of pacific and conciliatory courses ; 
 eighthly, of perseverance in spite of difficulty.' 
 
 Again, the form of the ' Beatitudes,' as they are 
 called or, in other words, the declaration of the 
 happiness of those who fulfil these things in their 
 own lives is perhaps the best way of leading us to 
 practise those things. He does not say, 'Be merci- 
 ful,' or ' Be pure in heart ' ; but He says, ' Happy 
 are the merciful, happy are the pure in heart ' : 
 that is to say, He points out that the happiness of 
 which we all of us, rich and poor, are in search, 
 can be found in one or other of these Divine 
 qualities. 
 
 In this respect the same course was laid down 
 by a great teacher of religion who existed among 
 the heathen in the world of former times, 1 in words 
 which it may perhaps be well for me to read to 
 you, both because they are instructive in them- 
 selves, and also because they show the same deep 
 feeling of desire that man should be happy and 
 not miserable, which lay at the bottom of our 
 Saviour's heart. 
 
 A disciple of that great teacher of whom I 
 speak came to him and said, 'Many angels and 
 men have held various things to be blessings when 
 1 Buddha.
 
 SERM. x. THE BEATITUDES. 99 
 
 they were yearning for happiness: do thou declare to 
 us the chief blessing.' This great teacher answered 
 and said, 'Not to serve the foolish, but to serve the 
 wise, to honour the worthy of honour this is the 
 greatest blessing. To dwell in the pleasant land, 
 to have former good works to look back upon, 
 and right desires in the heart this is the greatest 
 blessing. Much insight and instruction, self-con- 
 trol and pleasant speech, and whatever word be 
 well spoken this is the greatest blessing. To sup- 
 port father and mother, to cherish wife and child, 
 to follow a peaceful calling this is the greatest 
 blessing. To bestow arms and live righteously ; to 
 give help to kindred, to do deeds which cannot 
 be blamed these are the greatest blessings. To 
 abhor and cease from sin, to abstain from strong 
 drink, not to be weary in well-doing these are the 
 greatest blessings. Reverence and lowliness, con- 
 tentment and gratitude, the hearing of the law at 
 due seasons these are the greatest blessings. To 
 be longsuffering and meek, to associate with those 
 who are quiet, and have religious talk at due 
 seasons these are the greatest blessings. Self- 
 restraint and purity, the knowledge of noble truths, 
 the knowledge of the value of rest this is the 
 greatest blessing. On every side all are invincible
 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 who do acts like these ; on every side they walk in 
 safety, and theirs is the greatest blessing.' 
 
 I have read these words to you, not in order 
 that they may take the place of our Saviour's 
 teaching in the eight Beatitudes, far from it ; but 
 in order that you may see how, in this method of 
 instruction, the great lights our God has sent into 
 the world speak, on the whole, in the same voice. 
 These are the Beatitudes of millions of our fellow- 
 creatures in India. The Beatitudes of Jesus Christ 
 are far simpler and nobler, but they both spring 
 from the same spirit. 
 
 Fourthly, I have taken this subject of the states 
 of mind which our Saviour calls ' blessed ' because 
 they furnish to us the great goal or end which 
 will solve many difficulties in the great battle of 
 life which we all have before us. This day is the 
 anniversary of the battle of Waterloo the greatest 
 battle of modern times. It involved the ques- 
 tion, Who should be master of the world ? You 
 know the object which sustained our soldiers in 
 that great conflict. It was for the officers and 
 generals the hope of vanquishing the great enemy 
 of England ; it was for all the soldiers the great 
 object of fulfilling their duty to their country, and 
 of obtaining that honour which is the soldier's
 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 great reward. These are noble motives, and they, 
 no doubt, serve to nerve the heart and will against 
 hardships and sufferings and death. We need not 
 disparage such motives ; but we are not all soldiers, 
 and there are honours even greater than the reward 
 of a grateful country. Those qualities of which 
 our Saviour spoke are within the reach of all of us, 
 and they amply serve to sustain us in all the con- 
 flicts of poverty and distress with which many of 
 us are encompassed. There are, no doubt, many 
 lesser kinds of happiness and virtue. There are, 
 no doubt, many successes in life which attend on 
 the swaggerers, the self-asserting, the common- 
 place, the listeners and retailers of gossip, the 
 people who turn about with any evil wind that 
 blows. But there is something beyond. In moun- 
 tain countries there is, over and above all the lower 
 hills, one range, one line of lofty summits which 
 conveys a new sense of something quite different ; 
 and that is the range of eternal snow. High above 
 all the rest we see the white peaks standing out in 
 the blue sky, catching the first rays of the rising 
 sun, the last rays of the sun as it departs. They 
 are not the rounded hills which can be climbed by 
 every one. They are not a range of extinct vol- 
 canoes, from which all fire has departed ; they are
 
 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. x. 
 
 the same always wherever we see them. Such are 
 the Beatitudes. High above all earthly ordinary 
 virtues, they tower into the heaven itself. They 
 are white with the snows of eternity. And when 
 the shades of sickness and sorrow gather round us, 
 when other common characters become cold and 
 dead, then those higher points stand out brighter 
 and brighter ; the glow of daylight can be seen 
 reflected on their summits when it has vanished 
 everywhere beside. 
 
 There are many examples of these different 
 virtues. Sometimes in some rare cases we meet 
 a man or a woman of whom it might always be 
 said that you see all the eight Beatitudes written 
 upon their faces. They belong to that circle of 
 a very few by whom the whole world is made 
 happier and better. But also we may meet with 
 each of them separately ; and we may, by dwelling 
 on their separate existence, as exemplified by the 
 living or the dead, be enabled to see that such 
 virtues are possible ; we may find comfort in dwell- 
 ing upon them. I shall endeavour to take from 
 those who are commemorated in this Abbey some 
 one or two persons for each of these Beatitudes, who 
 may give us something of a glimpse of what is meant 
 by the ' pure in heart,' by the ' merciful,' by the
 
 SERM. x. THE BEA TITUDES. 103 
 
 'poor in spirit,' by the 'peacemakers,' by those who 
 1 hunger and thirst after righteousness,' and those 
 who are ' persecuted for righteousness' sake.' If I 
 can raise your minds to the appreciation of such 
 virtues, if I can do this in any way so as to produce 
 an impression upon you that we have something 
 in life worth striving for, and that this Abbey, 
 by its various examples, has something worth 
 teaching, I shall not have spoken in vain.
 
 IO4 
 
 XI. 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 (Saturday Afternoon, June 25, 1881.) 
 
 Blessed are the poor in spirit : for theirs is the kingdom 
 of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be 
 comforted. MATT. v. 3, 4. 
 
 I PROPOSE, in accordance with the plan which I 
 laid down last Saturday, to take in order what are 
 called the Beatitudes, in which our Saviour selected 
 for His approbation the qualities which He most 
 cherished. It will not be supposed that these 
 qualities are equally found in all persons, or that 
 their exemplification will always be equally applic- 
 able to Christians in different times of the world. 
 The different Beatitudes, as it were, fill up the 
 deficiencies which some of them leave ; and they 
 must be looked upon rather as describing to us 
 points of character that are each in themselves 
 good, and which when we see we cannot help
 
 SERM. xi. THE BEATITUDES. 105 
 
 admiring. It is the admiration of good qualities 
 which is the best proof of spirit rising above 
 matter. In whatever way these qualities are pro- 
 duced in man, whether inherited or acquired, it 
 still remains certain that so long as there is a spark 
 of enthusiasm enkindled for them in any human 
 being, so long is the living proof retained of their 
 undying excellence. 
 
 ' Blessed are the poor in spirit.' This, like so 
 many of our Saviour's words, is, as it were, a little 
 parable in itself. As the poor man is with regard 
 to the substance of this world, so is the ' poor 
 in spirit ' with regard to the various attractions of 
 the soul and spirit. Blessed are the unselfish ; 
 happy are those who live for others, and not for 
 themselves ; happy are those among us who leave 
 a large margin in their existence for the feelings 
 which come to us from what is above, and also 
 from what is around us. We know what a man 
 is when inflated by the sense of his power, his 
 wealth, and his intellect ; how he goes about the 
 world asserting himself, claiming everything on 
 which he can lay his hands as his own. That is 
 the man whom we may call purse-proud in spirit, 
 rich with the prosperity and the aggressiveness of 
 a powerful, wealthy man. The quality which our
 
 io6 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xi. 
 
 Saviour admired was the reverse of this. It is to 
 be found among the rich as well as among the 
 poor, although, perhaps, poverty more conduces 
 to it than riches. There was a story in old times 
 told of a severe, cynical philosopher visiting the 
 house of one who was as far his superior in genius 
 as in modesty. He found the good philosopher 
 living in a comfortable house, with easy chairs 
 and pleasant pictures round him, and he came in 
 with his feet stained with dust and mud, and said, 
 as he walked upon the beautiful carpets, 'Thus I 
 trample on the pride of Plato. ; The good philo- 
 sopher paid no attention at the time, but returned 
 the visit, and when he saw the ragged furniture and 
 the scanty covering of the floor of the house in 
 which the other ostentatiously lived, he said, ' I 
 see the pride of Diogenes through the holes in his 
 carpet.' Many a one there is whose pride is thus 
 shown by his affecting to be without it ; many a 
 one whose poverty, whose modesty in spirit, can 
 best be appreciated by seeing how the outward 
 comforts and splendour of life can be used by him 
 without paying any attention to them. 
 
 There is another way in which this unselfish 
 feeling expresses itself feeling for what is above us. 
 'Reverence,' Shakespeare says, 'is the angel of the
 
 SERM. xi. THE BEATITUDES. 107 
 
 world.' It is the angel of the world by smoothing 
 and softening, and bringing into their right propor- 
 tions, all the jarring elements of the human mind 
 and human heart. It is what Burke described as 
 produced by the entrance into this Abbey. ' The 
 moment we enter into the Abbey,' he said, 'the 
 very silence seems sacred ' ; and Wordsworth says : 
 
 Be mine in hours of fear 
 Or grovelling thought to seek a refuge here ; 
 * * * * 
 
 Where bubbles burst, and folly's dancing foam 
 Melts if it cross the threshold. 
 
 Some one has described how a great American 
 orator and statesman, Webster, first entered the 
 Abbey. He walked in, he looked around him, and 
 he burst into tears. That is the acknowledgment 
 of something undefined, mysterious, superior to 
 ourselves, and superior to all common things, which 
 is the root of all religion, and which springs from 
 that modesty and humility of spirit which is de- 
 scribed in the first Beatitude. 
 
 It is well said that 'theirs is the kingdom of 
 heaven.' We do not, perhaps, perceive at once 
 the success of those who are thinking of this or of 
 higher things ; but, nevertheless, in the long run it 
 is sure to be theirs. There is a story told of a Welsh
 
 io8 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xi. 
 
 chieftain, who, on coming with his followers to 
 a river, said, ' He who will be master must first 
 make himself a .bridge ' ; and he carried them, one 
 after another, on his back until they reached the 
 opposite shore. That is what we must all do. We 
 must make ourselves the slaves of others, doing 
 their work, securing their interests ; if we wish to 
 be in a high sense their lords and 'masters, we must 
 be, all of us in our way, the servants of the public, 
 not by doing their bidding, but by defending their 
 interests ; not by listening to their follies, but by 
 seeking their good. There are two characters 
 whose memory is enshrined in this church, who 
 may be chosen out of many as instances of un- 
 selfish qualities. One is its first founder, Edward 
 the Confessor. There was nothing in him of 
 ability or power to commend him ; he had just 
 one single merit, that he thought more of the poor 
 and the suffering than he did of himself ; and for 
 that reason the poor and the suffering for long 
 years afterwards remembered him with gratitude ; 
 and when the Abbey was rebuilt by Henry III., it 
 was in commemoration of these unselfish quali- 
 ties of the last Saxon king. Another example is 
 to be seen, of a very different kind, at the very ex- 
 tremity of the nave, where is a monument erected
 
 SERM. xi. THE BEATITUDES. 109 
 
 to a young philosopher, a clergyman, who, in the 
 short space of a life which lasted only twenty-one 
 years, made discoveries in science of a most sur- 
 prising kind. His name was Jeremiah Horrocks. 
 There was one thing which he felt, however, had a 
 higher claim upon him even than science. It was 
 the doing his duty in the humble sphere in which 
 he found himself; and when he was on the eve of 
 watching the transit of the planet Venus across the 
 sun, and was waiting with the utmost keenness of 
 observation for this phenomenon, he put all these 
 thoughts aside, and went on the Sunday on which 
 this sight was to be observed to perform his 
 humble parish duty in the church where he was 
 pastor. He mentions it in his journal in words 
 which are now written over his monument : 
 ' Called aside to greater things, which ought not to 
 be neglected for the sake of subordinate pursuits.' 
 Subordinate, secondary, in one sense, those pur- 
 suits could not be, for they were the discovery of 
 the glory of God in the greatness of His works ; but 
 subordinate, in another sense, they were, for they 
 came across, in that instance, the single-minded dis- 
 charge of the duty which he owed to his parishioners 
 and to his Divine Master. It was a true example 
 of what an old poet has called 'high humility.'
 
 no THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xi. 
 
 Whatever you have to do, do it, whatever and how- 
 ever great may be things that would take you from it. 
 I turn to the next Beatitude, which falls in not 
 unnaturally with this. It is ' Blessed are they that 
 mourn.' The whole Abbey is indeed filled with the 
 shadows of those that mourn. Every funeral, or 
 almost every funeral, even the most splendid that 
 takes place within these walls, has some sincere and 
 heart-rending sorrow involved in the separation of 
 death ; always, or almost always, I have observed 
 there have been sad faces in the long funeral pro- 
 cessions which have accompanied the great and 
 famous to their end ; sad faces indifferent to the 
 splendour of the scene around them, and lost in 
 the thought of the dear friend or father or husband 
 or son who had gone down into the dark grave. 
 ' What,' we ask again and again ' what is the 
 object of these dreadful sorrows? What is the 
 gracious purpose which may be intended in these 
 repeated strokes of human calamity?' It is hard 
 to say ; but thus much we may say that if every 
 one were to lift up his mind to the thoughts which 
 arise at such moments, he would be in a condition 
 far indeed raised above the frets and cares and sins 
 of common life. There is in the grief of such 
 times a tranquillising, solemnising, elevating wisdom,
 
 SRKM. xi. THE BEATITUDES. in 
 
 which transports even the most hardened amongst 
 us into a region beyond himself. Any one who 
 thinks how greatly he would regret bitter or foolish 
 words or acts toward the dead as they lie before 
 him, has a constant reminder that such acts and 
 words are against the best spirit of a man as he 
 actually lives and moves among his fellows. Think 
 of what you are in sorrow. That is a true likeness 
 of the high thoughts that we ought to have, that we 
 may have always. In this sense, therefore, we may 
 truly say that in the mourning of which this house 
 of God is the constant memorial, there is a true 
 source of comfort which never can be effaced. 
 Because it is the temple of silence and recon- 
 ciliation, it is the temple of God and the home of 
 man. One touch of nature, it is said, makes the 
 whole world kin ; but it is because one touch of 
 nature lifts us up into that higher and nobler state 
 in which we are kindred of each other, because 
 we then feel that we are kindred also with God. 
 All the graves in the Abbey more or less convey 
 this lesson. Let me name one, which has nothing 
 else to commend it except its suggestive sorrow. 
 It is in the Cloisters, where the parents have 
 written on a tablet over their little girl, ' Jane 
 Lister, dear child, died October 7, 1688.' That
 
 112 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xi. 
 
 is all. It was at the time when every one was 
 thinking of the stirring events which were lead- 
 ing to the revolution of 1688, but these parents 
 thought of nothing else than their dear little child ; 
 their hearts were not on earth, but in heaven, 
 where they hoped that she was. We cannot doubt 
 that in so mourning they were comforted.
 
 XII. 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 (Saturday Afternoon, July 2, iSSl.) 
 
 Blessed are the meek : for they shall inherit the earth. 
 Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteous- 
 ness : for they shall be filled. MATT. v. 5, 6. 
 
 I PROCEED with my statement of those whom our 
 Saviour has called ' happy.' 'Blessed are the meek.' 
 Those of you who have followed the changes made 
 in the translation by the Revised Version, will have 
 observed that these Beatitudes are left entirely un- 
 changed ; and this is due to the great solemnity 
 which attaches to the words. But in this instance 
 the word ' meek ' hardly expresses the quality 
 which is meant in the original. It is too passive a 
 word ; it does not sufficiently represent the active 
 character which is intended. Those of you who 
 can understand French will recognise this in the 
 French translation : ^ Bicnhcurciix sent les dcbon- 
 
 i
 
 H4 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xn. 
 
 naires' ; that is to say, ' Happy are the gracious, 
 graceful, Christian characters who, by their cour- 
 tesy, win all hearts around them, and smoothe all 
 the rough places of the world.' Perhaps ' Blessed 
 are the gentle ' would best express it. If we give to 
 the word ' gentle ' all the meanings that it properly 
 implies, it is the opposite of ' vulgar,' ' coarse,' 
 ' barbarian ' ; it is the ' delicate,' 'refined,' 'civilised,' 
 ' chivalrous.' We know its meaning when it is 
 mixed up with another word, as in 'gentleman,' or 
 'gentleman-like.' 
 
 Our Saviour on one occasion said, f Come unto 
 Me ; for I am meek and lowly in heart.' It really 
 was, ' For I am gentle ' ; and it is said by an old 
 poet of our Saviour that He was 'the firsc true 
 gentleman that ever breathed.' Both the word 
 ' gentle ' and the word ' gentleman ' rise very high 
 above the common acceptation of the term. A 
 peasant, an artisan, if he has this gracious quality 
 of feeling for others, the courteous eagerness to 
 avoid offence, may be as great a gentleman, in 
 the true sense of the word, as any duke or any 
 prince. ' He was a very perfect, gentle knight,' 
 was the description given by Chaucer of a true 
 gentleman in his day ; and the words may be 
 applied to one of our own time who is buried in
 
 SERM. xii. THE BEATITUDES. 115 
 
 our Abbey George Grote, the historian of Greece, 
 whose urbanity lives in the recollection of all who 
 knew him. 
 
 These are the kind of qualities which penetrate 
 into every corner, and which may be, therefore, 
 truly said to inherit the whole earth. How very 
 much may be done by a kind answer at a railway 
 station by a railway porter ! How very much 
 pleasure, and even happiness, may be given by the 
 policeman at the corner of the streets ! How fully 
 the duties of life are transformed into graces and 
 pleasures by such gentle acts ! 
 
 It has been sometimes said of persons, both in 
 high stations and in humbler stations, that, next 
 to being Christians, the great thing was that they 
 should be gentlemen ; that even if they were not 
 called Christians, it was a great comfort to feel 
 that one had a gentleman to deal with. And the 
 happiness they distribute returns on themselves ; 
 for what can be more charming than to be gifted with 
 those divine qualities which pass, one hardly knows 
 how, into the rough feelings and habits of those 
 around us, and diffuse all about us an atmosphere 
 of gratitude and contentment the determination 
 not to give or take offence ; the instinct that 
 tells us that it is our business to pay attention 
 
 I 2
 
 Ii6 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xn. 
 
 especially to the neglected, and not to think only 
 of the great ? These are qualities which we may 
 well call blessed, which may be found both in man 
 and woman ; and an example of it I will choose 
 from this Abbey is a lady who lived more than 300 
 years ago. Her tomb maybe seen in Henry VII. 's 
 Chapel, and it is the most beautiful and venerable 
 figure that this church contains. It is Margaret, 
 the mother of King Henry VII., who is said, by 
 her gracious and gentle manners, to have attracted 
 all hearts towards her. ' Every one that knew her ' 
 so it was said in her funeral sermon, ' every one 
 that knew her loved her, and everything that she 
 said or she did became her.' She was full of noble 
 thoughts for her country ; she counted it to be her 
 sacred duty to end the Civil War of the Roses by 
 securing the marriage of her son with Elizabeth of 
 York. She founded colleges of learning at Cam- 
 bridge; she bequeathed money for the poor of 
 Westminster; and, as if to show how the gracious 
 and beautiful conduct which was so characteristic 
 of a lady in the highest walks of life could de- 
 scend to the humblest station, she used to say 
 that if the Christians would combine against their 
 common enemy the Turk, she would undertake 
 to go as their washerwoman. She felt, no doubt,
 
 SERM. xii. THE BEATITUDES. 117 
 
 that she could carry the dignity of a lady into that 
 humble sphere : and, in like manner, every washer- 
 woman or servant in this church might perform 
 their duties of laundress and servant with the true 
 grace and dignity of a lady. 
 
 The next quality which our Saviour blesses is 
 thus expressed : They who 'hunger and thirst after 
 righteousness.' He does not say, ' Those who 
 have attained righteousness,' but those who have a 
 hungering and craving after that which they per- 
 haps have not reached, which they perhaps never, 
 in this life, may fully attain to, but which to seek 
 after is the truest ambition of the children of God. 
 
 When we look out into the world, when we 
 see how much there is of falsehood and injustice 
 and oppression all around, there is one consoling 
 thing ; and that is to see some who are filled with 
 an earnest desire to make things better than they 
 are. 
 
 There was a band of youthful scholars who met 
 many years ago in Germany, and they bound 
 each other by a simple resolution that they would 
 not die until they had done something to leave the 
 world better than they found it. There is such a 
 thing, we know, as thirst after knowledge. Every 
 one knows what a craving there exists, even
 
 ii8 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xn. 
 
 amongst the humbler classes, for knowledge and 
 learning. And the same figure of ' thirst ' best 
 expresses the ardent feeling of the soul for a 
 nobler and purer life than that which we now 
 have. ' Like as the hart ' like as the stag 
 ' desireth water brooks, so longeth my soul after 
 Thee, O God.' We may have read how a stag a 
 stricken solitary deer, with the tears streaming down 
 its cheeks, panting and heaving with its weary toil 
 at the end of its day's long chase plunges into 
 the mountain torrent to bathe its worn-out limbs, 
 or revels in the refreshing lake. It is a likeness 
 of what, in common life we recognise the thirst 
 of the soldier on his march as he approaches 
 the rushing river ; the thirst of the politician, 
 after his weary nights and days of toil, for moments 
 of repose; the thirst of the labourer and the artisan 
 after a long day's work. There is a representation 
 in the Catacombs, on one of the Christian tombs, 
 of a stag drinking eagerly at the silver stream, 
 figuring the first sign of the Christian life. 
 
 This is the true likeness of hungering and 
 thirsting after righteousness. When we are toiling 
 towards the close of our earthly course, or in any 
 especial period of it ; when we feel stifled by the 
 sultry and suffocating sense of the hardness and
 
 SERM. xii. THE BEATITUDES. 119 
 
 selfishness of the world about us ; when our breath 
 is, as it were, choked by the trifles and forms and 
 fashions of the world we live in, or our ears deafened 
 by the clattering of the world's vast machinery, we 
 may still join the cry, ' I thirst for the refreshing 
 sight of any pure, upright, generous spirit ; I thirst 
 for the day when I may drink freely of God's 
 boundless charity ; I thirst for the day when I shall 
 hear the "sound of abundance of rain," and see 
 a higher heaven than that which now incloses us 
 round.' 
 
 Happy are they who, when they see generous 
 deeds, and hear of generous characters higher than 
 their own, long to be like them. It is our business 
 to keep up the chase ; not to cease our efforts to 
 quench this thirst ; never to be ' weary in well- 
 doing,' and to believe that in this hunger and 
 thirst is the spring of all true religion. 
 
 There was once in this country and in this 
 church a wild young prince, who selfishly indulged 
 in all the enjoyments and passions of youth. By 
 his father's death-bed he was brought to a sense of 
 better things, and from that moment his soul went 
 on constantly aspiring to higher and severer courses 
 of duty. It was King Henry V., whose tomb you 
 may see behind Edward the Confessor's Chapel.
 
 120 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xn. 
 
 He especially attended to the complaints of the 
 poor, and those who had none to help them. 
 Unlike his ancestors and his kindred, he never 
 swore any profane oath. He had only two words 
 to express the strength of his determination and 
 show what his resolution was. When anything was 
 proposed to him that was wrong, his one word was 
 'Impossible'; when anything in the shape of a 
 duty came before him, he had only one word, ' It 
 must be done.' During many days his life as a 
 soldier was unlike what one would desire ; but he 
 almost always had before him the sense of holier 
 things ; and when at last his end grew near, his 
 dying words were, ' Build thou the walls of Jeru- 
 salem ' ; and, as if speaking to the evil spirit that 
 had haunted his youth, he cried, 'Thou liest ! thou 
 liest ! my heart is for the Lord Jesus Christ.' This, 
 in times long ago, was an example how they which 
 ' hunger and thirst after righteousness ' can be 
 filled can be satisfied, at last> with the hope of 
 having mastered their evil passions, and attained 
 to' that conquest over themselves which is more 
 glorious than conquest over their enemies. 
 
 There are many others in this church who may 
 recall to our minds the same thoughts as we wander 
 round it many who had before them a great and
 
 SERM. xn. THE BEATITUDES. 121 
 
 bright idea of human life, and who did something 
 to realise it ; such as those who laboured for the 
 abolition of the slave trade, like Granville Sharp, 
 Zachary Macaulay, and Wilberforce ; those, also, 
 who laboured for the revival of more serious 
 thoughts and more just principles of action 
 amongst their countrymen, like John and Charles 
 Wesley. Let us seek to aspire in some degree 
 towards their goodness, and humbly trust that, 
 when we wake up from our long sleep, we may 
 awake after their likeness and the likeness of the 
 God whom they followed, and may be 'satisfied 
 with it.'
 
 XIII. 
 THE BEATITUDES. 
 
 (Saturday Afternoon, July 9, 1881.) 
 
 Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. 
 Blessed are the piire in heart: for they shall see God. 
 MATT. v. 7, 8. 
 
 ' BLESSED are the merciful.' This especially illus- 
 trates what I said at the beginning of these dis- 
 courses, that the object of each of the Beatitudes 
 is to bring out the beauty of one particular quality 
 without commending the other qualities which may 
 exist in the same character with it We see many 
 men of very imperfect morality, and yet in whom 
 this quality of mercy is such as to make us feel that, 
 if it were universal amongst mankind, the whole 
 world would be the happier for it, and that in those 
 in whom it is found it is a redeeming virtue in the 
 proper sense of the word a virtue which redeems 
 from condemnation and detestation the whole cha-
 
 SERM. xni. THE BEATITUDES. 123 
 
 racter in which it is found embedded. It is said 
 that Lord Brougham made a resolution that he 
 would count that day no day on which he had not done 
 some one act of kindness towards some one fellow- 
 creature. Lord Brougham was a man of many faults ; 
 but, if this resolution were sincerely made and sin- 
 cerely acted upon, it is wonderful how much good 
 it implies in the course of his long life. We see the 
 same thing by examples where the reverse has been 
 the case, where men have so hardened their hearts, 
 or had their hearts so hard from the beginning, 
 that they are steeled against all approaches to pity 
 and compassion. Look at the cases of the betrayal 
 of innocent girls to their ruin. Much else may 
 be said of these cases ; but one thing is that which 
 the prophet urged against David that he had no 
 pity. 
 
 Look, again, at the case of assassinations 
 those assassinations which during the last few 
 months have become so formidable. I do not now 
 speak of the unsettling of all the bonds of society; 
 I speak only of the total want of compassion and 
 mercy which they show towards the individuals 
 who are the victims of this frenzy. The Emperor 
 of Russia ' was a man with the same affections and 
 1 Alexander II. assassinated March 13, iSSl.
 
 124 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xin. 
 
 feelings as yourselves, with sons and daughters as 
 you have; the President of the United States 2 had 
 friends and family, who are dearly attached to him. 
 It is said that the assassin did for a moment waver, 
 because he felt a passing weakness in the presence 
 of the wife whom he was about to deprive of a 
 husband. We often say that Emperors, Kings, and 
 Presidents are ' the same flesh and blood ' as ourselves, 
 meaning that they have the same infirmities and 
 the same faults. In all these cases it is for the wel- 
 fare and the safety of mankind that the common say- 
 ing should have a more extended meaning given to 
 it. Yes, it is because these great personages are the 
 same flesh and blood as ourselves that they demand 
 from us the kindly consideration which we should 
 give to our own brothers, sisters, daughters, and 
 husbands. Look, again, at the French Revolution 
 and the Inquisition, and at the cruelties per- 
 petrated in the name of Liberty in the one case and 
 of Religion in the other. What was the cause of 
 this ? It was simply that the feeling of humanity, 
 of mercy, had died out in the hearts of those 
 unhappy men who rose to the highest places of 
 authority, and that therefore they had no eyes to 
 
 2 President Garfield, shot by an assassin, July 2, died 
 September 19, 1 88 1.
 
 SERM. xni THE BEATITUDES. 125 
 
 see and no ears to hear the tears and misery that 
 they produced. 
 
 But let us take a wider sphere of compassion, 
 which is due not only to human beings, but to 
 all living creatures, whether of our own or of the 
 animal creation. Martin of Galway ! see what an 
 immense circle of happiness he has diffused by 
 reason of the Acts for restraining cruelty to animals 
 which he carried through Parliament amidst ob- 
 loquy of every kind, in defiance of the press, in 
 defiance of popular opinion. How many a wearied 
 horse, and jaded ox, and suffering dog, if they had 
 voices to speak, would bless the name of Martin 
 for the long-continued blessings which he has 
 showered upon them ! It is surely not too much 
 to ask that this mercy or compassion to dumb 
 animals should be made part of the very religion of 
 childhood, that children may grow up to manhood 
 with something of the same horror of cruelty to 
 beasts and birds that they would feel with regard to 
 each other. 
 
 There are two persons connected with this 
 church whom I will specially name as examples 
 of the virtue of mercy, even when surrounded 
 by many qualities which we cannot admire or 
 approve. One was the statesman, Charles James
 
 126 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xin. 
 
 Fox, whose monument you see in the nave of this 
 Abbey. At his feet there kneels a negro, with 
 clasped hands, and with the strongly marked 
 physiognomy of his race, seeming to plead for 
 the generous-minded benefactor, in whose heart, 
 immersed as it was in public affairs and in private 
 pleasures, the wrongs of those whom he had never 
 seen awakened a spark of deep compassion and of 
 just indignation, which causes him to be remem- 
 bered in that noble band whom I mentioned last 
 Saturday as hungering and thirsting after righteous- 
 ness, but who was himself drawn towards that holy 
 fellowship solely by this feeling of mercy and com- 
 passion. The other is Charles Dickens. There 
 are many charges that might be brought against 
 his style, and perhaps against his behaviour ; but 
 there was one quality which attracted to his grave 
 the honour and the tears of English men and Eng- 
 lish women of all classes, especially the poor it 
 was that he had a tender heart for their sufferings, 
 that he had that insight, which, perhaps, he was 
 the first to display, into the squalor and temptations 
 and wretchedness of their position, which won him 
 an everlasting name among the benefactors of the 
 humbler classes. Truly is it said that the merciful 
 shall obtain mercy. We cannot believe that the
 
 SERM. xnr. THE BEATITUDES. 127 
 
 generous and merciful acts of such men as these 
 can ever be lost in the sight of God by reason of the 
 other faults with which they are surrounded. It is 
 the very quality on which our Saviour's blessing has 
 been most distinctly pronounced. 'Forgive,' He 
 says, ' and ye shall be forgiven.' ' Give, and it shall 
 be given unto you.' And the feeling of posterity 
 and the feeling of contemporaries is, after all, some 
 slight index of what we may call in this respect the 
 final judgment of God. 
 
 ' Blessed are the pure in heart.' This is the 
 next Beatitude, but one altogether different from 
 that of which we have just been speaking. The 
 one quality is found sometimes not coupled 
 with the other ; nevertheless, in this case also 
 we feel that our Saviour's blessing has gone 
 straight to the point. The words may bear a two- 
 fold meaning pure, disinterested love of truth, 
 and pure and clean aversion to everything that 
 defiles. Pure love of truth ! How very rare, yet 
 how very beneficent ! We do not see its merits 
 at once ; we do not perceive, perhaps even in the 
 next generation, how widely happiness is increased 
 in the world by the discoveries of men of science 
 who pursued them simply and solely because they 
 were attracted towards them by a single-minded
 
 128 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xm. 
 
 love of what was true. Look at Sir Isaac Newton, 
 the most famous grave which this church contains. 
 It was said by those who knew him that he had 
 the whitest soul they had ever known the whitest 
 soul, perhaps, in other points also, but the whitest 
 especially in this, that no consideration ever came 
 across his desire of ascertaining and propounding 
 the exact truth on whatever subject he was engaged. 
 Corrupt elections, corrupt motives, are the very 
 reverse of this Beatitude. Open your eyes ! Take 
 the mask off your faces ! 
 
 Again, pufity from all that defiles or stains the 
 soul. Filthy thoughts, filthy actions, filthy words 
 we know what they are without attempting to 
 
 
 
 describe them. How can the mind best be kept 
 free from their intrusion? How is society best 
 guarded from their corrupting influence? Let us 
 take three examples from those who are buried or 
 who have monuments in this church. Milton has 
 not only told us that he was from his earliest youth 
 entirely free from such defilements, but he imprinted 
 it in such a manner in the words of his poems 
 that no one can read those poems and admire 
 them without feeling as if he had passed into a keen 
 and frosty atmosphere, where all low and debasing 
 thoughts vanish away. Look at his description
 
 SERM. xin. THE BEATITUDES. 129 
 
 of chastity in ' Comus ' ; look at his description of 
 the purity of married life in ' Paradise Lost.' Are 
 they not as a sword and shield with which we may 
 defend ourselves against all the fiery darts of temp- 
 tation ? Addison, again, lived at a time when the 
 profligacy which broke over England in the reac- 
 tion against the too great severity of the Puritans 
 overran and undermined all literature and all mo- 
 rality. Addison furnished a literature in which there 
 was at once everything to please, and nothing to 
 give countenance to those gross and dark images 
 which had haunted the imagination of his contem- 
 poraries. It shows what can be done by one man 
 in this respect, that Macaulay, who lies beside his 
 statue, and who has written an essay to commemor- 
 ate the benefactions which Addison bestowed upon 
 England, has given foremost place to this, that 
 Addison effected a great social reform, and recon- 
 ciled wit and virtue after a long and disastrous 
 separation, in which wit had been led astray by pro- 
 fligacy, and virtue by fanaticism. Wordsworth has 
 the glory of having not only abstained from anything 
 which can injure or defile the soul, but of fixing 
 the mind upon those simple affections and upon 
 those great natural objects of beauty and grandeur 
 which are the best preservatives against any such
 
 130 THE BEATITUDES. SERM. xm. 
 
 attempts to corrupt and stain our existence. We 
 sometimes hear it said that these dark and fleshly 
 ideas are necessary accompaniments of genius or of 
 poetry. Not so. In the case of Shakespeare, and 
 even more remarkably in the case of Byron, what 
 they have written that is low and filthy is not poetry, 
 is not that which commends them for ever to the 
 gratitude of their contemporaries and countrymen. 
 It is in proportion as they are pure, in proportion 
 as they are clean, in proportion as they are elevated 
 above anything like such corrupt thoughts, that 
 they become our guides and our delight. 
 
 And what is the reason that our Saviour gives 
 for this blessedness of the ' pure in heart ' ? It is 
 that ' they shall see God.' What is the meaning of 
 this ? It is that of all the obstacles which may 
 intervene between us and an insight into the 
 nature of the invisible and the Divine, nothing 
 presents so coarse and so thick a veil as on the 
 one hand a false, artificial, crooked way of looking 
 at truth, and on the other hand the indulgence of 
 brutal and impure passions ; and nothing can so 
 clear up our better thoughts, nothing leaves our 
 minds so open to receive the impression of what is 
 good and noble, as the single eye and the pure con- 
 science ; which we may not, perhaps, be able to
 
 SERM. xni. THE BEATITUDES. 131 
 
 reach of ourselves, but which are an indispensable 
 condition of having the doors of our minds open, 
 and the channel of communication kept free be- 
 tween us and the supreme and eternal fountain ot 
 all purity and of all goodness. 
 
 [This was Dean Stanley's last Sermon. It was 
 preached on July 9, 1881, and he died on the i8th 
 of the same month.] 
 
 K 2
 
 132 
 
 XIV. 
 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 
 
 (Preached at Alderley, on February 10, 1856, on the death 
 of Sarah Burgess, for thirty-eight years the devoted and 
 beloved servant of the family of the Rev. Edward 
 Stanley.) 
 
 Well done, good and faithful servant ; thou hast been 
 faithful aver a few things : I will make thee ruler over many 
 things : enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. MATT. xxv. 23. 
 
 THE Parable from which these words are taken is 
 one of the most important in the whole Bible. It 
 describes mankind not only according to the general 
 division of the good and bad ; but according to 
 those many varieties and divisions of character, 
 pursuits, opportunities, which we actually see with 
 our eyes in this world. ' The kingdom of Heaven 
 is as a man travelling into a far country, who 
 called his own servants and delivered unto them 
 his goods ; and unto one he gave five talents, to
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 133 
 
 another two, and to another one, to every man 
 according to his sc-ceral ability? ' Look round any 
 congregation, any circle of our acquaintance, any 
 family, this is exactly what we see ; no two 
 persons have the same gifts, or the same advan- 
 tages ; one has five talents, another has two, 
 another has one. Scripture and experience speak 
 here the same language ; every one will feel that 
 thus far he is sure from his own knowledge that 
 what the Parable says is true. And to every one 
 it has its lesson to give as it proceeds. Many 
 passages of Scripture are intended to alarm the 
 very wicked, or to console the very good ; but 
 this Parable is intended for by far the larger class, 
 who are neither very good nor very wicked ; whose 
 sin consists not in doing what is wrong, but in 
 neglecting to do all the good they might do with 
 the gifts entrusted to them. Our Master is gone 
 away into a far country. He has left His goods 
 with us, to use or to neglect. He will not help us 
 unless we help ourselves. It is no excuse to say 
 that our. opportunities were small, that we had 
 but one talent, and that therefore we ' hid it in the 
 earth ' : this was the very reason why we should 
 have made the most of it, why we should have 
 ' Matt. xxv. 14, 15.
 
 134 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 ' put it out to the exchangers,' so that when our 
 Lord comes again ' He may receive his own with 
 usury.' 2 As the Parable thus contains a warning 
 to the unfaithful servants, so it contains an en- 
 couragement to all those faithful servants, be they 
 high or low, who have traded with their talents, 
 few or many, great or small It reminds us that 
 talents, used well and faithfully, bring with them, 
 both in this world and in the next, their own great 
 reward ; that in the great toil and struggle of life 
 the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the 
 strong, but to those who out of little have made 
 much, who out of weakness have perfected strength ; 
 who having been faithful over ' few things ' have 
 been made and will be made ' rulers over many 
 things.' 
 
 This great truth, like all the truths and doctrines 
 of Scripture, is best understood by example ; by 
 the knowledge of our own hearts, or by the know- 
 ledge of one with whose character and end we 
 have been ourselves acquainted. Such an one we 
 have known in her whose remains we last week 
 committed to the grave ; whose name, whose life, 
 whose voice and countenance have been long 
 familiar to almost all in this place ; who was a 
 2 Matt. xxv. 27, 28.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 135 
 
 constant testimony to the truth of these words of 
 our Saviour. 
 
 Let us consider what we may all of us learn 
 from a character and a life which was not granted 
 to us for nothing. It was itself one of God's gifts 
 for our use. Let us see how we can still keep it 
 amongst us, how we can still ' put it out to die 
 exchangers ' : let us not ' hide it ' in the grave 
 which was ' digged in the earth ' 3 to receive that 
 which was 'of the earth, earthy,' but let us treasure 
 up the memory of that part which was ' heavenly,' 
 that, though we ' have borne the image of the 
 earthy ' to her last home, we may ' bear ' with us 
 ' the image of the heavenly,' till we also meet 'the 
 Lord from Heaven.' 4 
 
 What, then, was the talent which was com- 
 mitted to her keeping? All who ever knew her 
 will feel that in her was lost a true servant, a true 
 friend, a true sister, a true mother ; to many here, 
 as to many elsewhere, she was the best likeness of 
 Heaven, and heavenly things, that they had ever 
 known. What was it that she thus faithfully used? 
 and how did she use it ? 
 
 Was it wealth, or station, or fame? No. She 
 was born and bred in the humble rank of so many 
 * Matt. xxv. 1 8. 4 i Cor. xv. 47, 48, 49.
 
 136 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 amongst us. No books tell of what she did ; no 
 great means of guiding, or ruling, or helping others 
 were granted to her : she died, as she had lived, 
 ' not ministered unto, but ministering.' Or was it 
 strength and health, such as enables many of us 
 to bear much, and do much, ' rising up early and 
 late taking rest, eating the bread of carefulness,' 
 ' going forth to work and to labour till the even- 
 ing ' ? No. You know well that these were not 
 granted her ; you remember well her fragile form, 
 her wasted features, faint and weary with the 
 journey of life before her years were half numbered ; 
 like a withered leaf, that a breath of wind might 
 blow away in a moment. This was what she was 
 outwardly. 'The flesh indeed was weak' and frail; 
 but the 'spirit was willing' 5 and ready. It was 
 this readiness and quickness of spirit which God 
 had given to her, which, carefully trained by 
 others, carefully trained by herself, carefully trained 
 by God's grace, rose above all weakness and in- 
 firmity of body ; rose above all humbleness and 
 lowliness of station ; rose above all selfishness of 
 the flesh and of the spirit ; and has risen, we may 
 humbly trust, above the power of death and the 
 grave. 
 
 5 Matt. xxvi. 41.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 13? 
 
 Let us see, piece by piece, through her life, 
 how this was carried out. Let me especially 
 commend her example to the young amongst 
 us. Such as they are now, such she was once. 
 Let them think, as they hear me describe what 
 she was, how they may at last be as we trust she 
 is now. And first, in her earliest years, in the 
 school of this parish, she laid the beginning 
 of that ready quickness of which I have spoken. 
 What she learned she learned well : what she 
 did she did with her whole soul. There are 
 those who can remember her as she sat working 
 at her humble task, with that fixed attention 
 which alone makes work good and sure. Here 
 she first took in that interest in things around her, 
 in things above her, which she never afterwards 
 lost : here she first learned to know and value 
 those whom afterwards it was the happiness of her 
 life to serve, living or dying : here she first laid in 
 that store of knowledge of hymns and sacred texts 
 and chapters, which she never forgot in after times. 
 Long, long afterwards, far away from this place, in 
 years and months of illness, in the long nights when 
 she would lie awake from pain and restlessness 
 during her last sickness, she would find rest and 
 comfort in repeating to herself the hymns and
 
 138 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 passages 6 from Scripture which she had learned 
 in Alderley School. Consider this, my younger 
 hearers, you who think it time lost to lay up in 
 your memory what you will never again have the 
 opportunity of gaining, remember that, here or at 
 your homes, you have, now or never, the chance of 
 receiving what will come back to you with usury in 
 after years ; that your solitary hours, your bed of 
 sickness, will be cheered or darkened according as 
 you have made the most of the one talent, small 
 though it be, which God gives you in the school of 
 your childhood. 
 
 From school she passed, as so many of you will 
 pass or have passed, into service. For a short time 
 she was in the service of your present venerable 
 Minister. Then she passed into the family which 
 for the remaining thirty-eight years of her life she 
 never left. All that she was in that family it is not 
 possible, it is not necessary for me fully to speak. 
 How she was one with them in their joys and their 
 sorrows, how every change of place and station 
 
 6 It may be mentioned that amongst the passages thus 
 learned, in which she took special delight, were the Sermon 
 on the Mount, in the 5th, 6th, and 7th chapters of St. 
 Matthew's Gospel; the I2th, I3th, and I4th chapters of 
 the Epistle to the Romans ; and the 3rd and th chapters of 
 the Epistle to St. James.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 139 
 
 was shared by her with them, you know almost as 
 well as I do. You know how, through her, every 
 intelligence which could affect us was felt by your- 
 selves ; how in her happiness or joy was reflected 
 every good or evil fortune which befell every 
 member of the family, far or near, old or young. 
 But you can hardly tell how great is the blessing 
 which such a union between master and servant 
 sheds around on all who come within its influence. 
 To know that in the midst of that household there 
 sat one who, through all the changes and chances 
 of life, thought far more of the interests and com- 
 fort and welfare of those whom she served than of 
 her own ; who never thought of what she wished 
 or liked, but only of what they wished or liked ; 
 who in all sickness and distress, in all difficulty 
 and prosperity, in all time of our tribulation, and 
 in all time of our wealth, was ever ready with a 
 bright smile, with a kind look, with a wise word, 
 with a gentle touch, with a quick eye, to calm, to 
 cheer, to assuage, to counsel ; this was indeed a 
 light shining in the darkness of this evil world. It 
 was an example to those who served with her to 
 see in her what they ought to be not the servants 
 only, but, 'as in the sight of the Lord,' the guardians, 
 the friends, the support and stay of the interests of
 
 140 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 those whose interests could not be divided from 
 their own. It was a never-failing source of refresh- 
 ment and consolation to those whom she served, 
 that whatever else changed in the world around, 
 or within their circle, she was there, unchanging 
 and unchangeable. When the heavens were dark 
 around, and when troubles came thick and fast, or 
 when the ' faithful seemed to fail from among the 
 children of men,' one true heart was there, to prove 
 that there is a constancy and a peace which the 
 world has not given, and which the world cannot 
 take away. It was a living parable to all, to remind 
 us that what she was to her earthly master we all 
 ought to be and may be to our heavenly Master. 
 ' Behold, even as the eyes of servants look unto 
 the hand of their masters, and as the eyes of a 
 maiden unto the hand of her mistress.' This first 
 part of the verse was the exact likeness of her con- 
 stant life ; would that we could all learn the con- 
 clusion that the Psalmist draws from it ' Even so 
 our eyes wait upon the Lord our God until He 
 have mercy upon us.' 7 In her the two services 
 were united. Through her earthly service she 
 wrought out her heavenly service also : but how 
 forcibly does such an example bring before us what 
 7 Psalm cxxiii. 2.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 141 
 
 our relation should be to our heavenly Father, of 
 whom 'every family in heaven and earth is named,' 8 
 making His will our will, His love our love, His 
 joy our joy. Bear this in mind, all masters of 
 households, who have known this or any like ex- 
 ample of fidelity to your interests, ' knowing that 
 ye also have a Master in Heaven.' 9 Bear this in 
 mind all ye that are or will be servants, ' in single, 
 ness of heart as unto Christ ' ; ' not with eye-service 
 as men-pleasers, but as servants of Christ doing the 
 will of God from the heart : with good will doing 
 service as to the Lord and not to men ; knowing 
 that whatever good thing any man doeth, the same 
 shall he receive of the Lord.' l Do not despise it, 
 do not think it beneath you. The service of men, 
 as the apostle thus tells you, may indeed be in the 
 fullest sense the service of Christ : from your ex- 
 ample lessons may be taught which would never 
 be taught by anything else ; from your faithfulness 
 in a few things, those who in this world are rulers 
 over many things may often learn lessons of 
 humility, of faith, of love, which in their own sta- 
 tions they might else never have learned at all. 
 But there was yet another field in which 'our 
 
 Eph. iii. 15. Col. iv. i. 
 
 1 Eph. vi. 5, 6, 7, 8.
 
 142 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 dear sister here departed ' used to the uttermost all 
 the talents that were committed to her. ' Our dear 
 sister here departed? How touchingly, how power- 
 fully, must those words have come to the hearts of 
 those mourners, who stood round the grave last 
 week ! ' Sister,' indeed, in no common sense, 
 sister by all the ties of earthly relationship, sister 
 by all the ties of Christian brotherhood, in all 
 sisterly and family affections ; never ceasing to re- 
 member the place of her nativity, the home of her 
 childhood, the friends of her youth, the father and 
 mother who trained her in the way that she should 
 go, the brothers and sisters whom she had faithfully 
 loved, the brothers' children and the sisters' children, 
 to whom she became, as it were, a second mother, 
 as they grew up round about her. Others, often, 
 become faithful' servants in distant households ; and 
 by degrees their early haunts know them no more ; 
 lapse of years and change of place, without any 
 fault of theirs, loosens, and dissolves the bond of 
 ancient natural affection. Not so, my brethren, 
 not so with her, whom you, as well as we, have now 
 lost. Dear as were to her the interests of the family 
 which she served, no less dear were the interests of 
 the family from which she was born. She did not, 
 as many do, make one duty the excuse for neglect-
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 143 
 
 ing another duty ; she fulfilled them both. The 
 school, the church, the cottages of her native parish 
 were always present with her ; she never lost her 
 old simple habits : she always delighted to return 
 amongst you : she wrote to her absent family, often 
 twice or thrice a week, what they wished or what 
 they needed to hear : she always loved to talk of 
 her early days, of her home beside the wood, of 
 her prizes at school, of her kinsfolk and acquaint- 
 ance. Long and tenderly she ministered to her 
 aged mother : only a few days before her end, she 
 spoke to me at length of her father's goodness and 
 simple piety, of his daily prayers before he went 
 to his work, of his reading of the Bible by his fire- 
 side, of a rebuke which he had given to her for a 
 hasty expression in her childhood, by which she 
 had never ceased to profit. When she came down 
 amongst you, you know how she would gather the 
 rising generation of her family around her : how 
 she would give to her little nephews and nieces, as 
 they stood beside her, words of wise counsel for 
 this world and for the next ; how she watched over 
 their welfare ; how she guarded and guided them 
 onwards and forwards and upwards. You also 
 know how deeply she had set her heart on laying 
 her last remains amongst her own people, in the
 
 I 4 4 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 grave of her father and her mother. Long ago she 
 had made those near her promise that whenever 
 and wherever her last hour found her, she should 
 be laid nowhere but here. And when at last it did 
 approach with certainty, then her longing for her 
 native place grew stronger ; the recollection of the 
 churchyard seemed to draw her homewards ; and 
 home at last she has been brought ; her mortal 
 remains to her home here on earth, her spirit to 
 that home where the weary are at rest for ever. 
 
 It is not without cause that I speak of that 
 strong family affection. It reminds you that she 
 was truly your own, that whatever good she had 
 was hewn out of the same rock, cast in the same 
 mould as yourselves ; what she was you may be ; 
 what she longed that you, her younger kinsfolk, 
 might be, that, remembering her wishes, you ought 
 to become, and, with God's grace, you may become 
 hereafter. It reminds you also of the value of 
 these affections : honour them, cherish them ; they 
 are not enough in themselves to guide us to Heaven, 
 but they are the beginning of all heavenly and holy 
 thoughts. The very desire which she expressed so " 
 strongly to be laid amongst you, is that same ancient 
 feeling of which you read in the patriarchs and 
 saints of old, who, when dying in strange lands,
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 145 
 
 charged that their bones should be taken and 
 buried with their fathers in the cave of Machpelah, 
 in the land of promise : 2 so that even in death 
 their union should not be broken. So may it long 
 be with you : so may this place, this church, this 
 churchyard, always draw you to each other, to 
 those who have gone before us, and to God in 
 Jesus Christ. . . . 
 
 It was only a short time before her end, that 
 I asked her one day what was her favourite text 
 in the Bible. Without a moment's hesitation she 
 answered, and dwelt on every word as she repeated 
 it : ' Come unto me, all ye that labour and are 
 heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My 
 yoke upon you, and learn of Me ; for I am meek 
 and lowly in heart ; and ye shall find rest unto 
 your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden 
 is light.' We have long known the text ; we read 
 it often ; we hear it often ; whenever the sacrament 
 of the Lord's Supper is administered we hear it : 
 it needs no human recollections to add anything to 
 the sweet music of its sounds, or to the abiding 
 strength of its consolations. Yet even divine words 
 like these may be brought nearer home to every 
 one of us, if we have seen their comfort and their 
 1 Gen. xlix. 29, 30 ; 1. 25. 
 
 L
 
 146 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 truth exemplified in any one whom we ourselves 
 have known. 
 
 Ponder well the words ; and how naturally do 
 they recall the image of her whose stay and support 
 they had become. 'All ye that labour and are 
 heavy laden.' How exactly does this describe her 
 outward form and manner of life ! Think of her 
 failing strength, her frequent pains, her slow step, 
 vainly striving to keep pace with her active spirit ; 
 think, especially as years advanced, of the toil and 
 difficulty with which she dragged along her weary 
 limbs, heavy laden with ever-increasing infirmity ; 
 think of the brave struggle with which, under all 
 this burden, she yet laboured and travailed to the 
 last. Yet this life, so full as it might have seemed 
 of pain and misery, was a life of true and constant 
 happiness. Think of her once more : and you will 
 see that she had indeed come to Him who said ' I 
 will give you rest,' ' I will refresh you.' Think 
 of that patient, contented, ever-brightening smile ; 
 think of those kind, cheering, happy words, always 
 ready for those who came in and went out amongst 
 us ; recall her as she passed to and fro amongst her 
 kindred here, always bent on doing some little 
 act of thoughtful goodness, never forgetting, never 
 omitting any : recall her as she sat silent and com-
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 147 
 
 posed in her chair, plying her daily task or turning 
 over the leaves of her little hymn-book or prayer- 
 book ; remember the calm resignation with which, 
 without fear, without excitement, she was ever ex- 
 pecting her latter end ; ever thankful for the mercies 
 she had enjoyed through life, ever filled with the 
 thought that the daily words of parting for her 
 evening rest might be for the last time ; and you 
 will indeed see that hers was the happiness and 
 peace of one who had found 'rest to her soul' 
 where only it can be found. 
 
 And how she had sought and found it ? Still 
 the words of her text guide us. She had ' taken 
 His yoke upon her,' she had learned of Him who 
 was ' meek and lowly of heart.' Humbly, faithfully, 
 lovingly, in childhood, in youth, in age, in all the 
 intercourse of life, she had striven to take upon her 
 the yoke of His words, of His commandments, of 
 His will. Steadily, firmly, she strove to be guided 
 in all things, not by her own pleasure, not by her 
 convenience, not by her feelings, but by a fixed 
 sense of duty, of truth, of justice, of honest and 
 loving obedience ; as ever in the presence of Him 
 who is ' without variableness or shadow of turning,' 
 in the service of Him who, as she delighted to 
 remember, was ' Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, 
 
 L 2
 
 I 4 8 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 and to day, and for ever.' 3 And this she did, labour- 
 ing to be like Him in all ' meekness and lowliness 
 of heart.' Loved, honoured, esteemed as she was by 
 all around her, she never rose above her station ; 
 she never joined together things that were incon- 
 gruous or unsuitable ; she never grasped at power, 
 or wealth, or consideration for herself; she bore 
 always the same simple, humble heart, that she 
 brought with her from her early childhood. By 
 her lowliness only she was exalted ; by her meek- 
 ness only she ' inherited the earth.' 4 
 
 And of her most truly it may be said, that ' His 
 yoke was easy, and His burden was light.' You 
 who are young, you who are in full enjoyment of 
 health and life, and spirits, you who think that a 
 serious and religious life must be mournful and 
 difficult, that the Lord whom you are called upon 
 to serve is an ' austere and hard Master, reaping 
 where he has not sown, and gathering where he has 
 not strawed ' ; 5 look at what you know, remember 
 whr.: you have heard, of her who is gone from us. 
 There was indeed much to make her life sad ; 
 much, as I have said, of pain and suffering ; much 
 of sorrow and mourning for the loss of those she 
 
 8 Heb. xii. 8. This was also a favourite text of hers. 
 4 Matt. v. 5. 5 Matt. xxv. 24 ; Luke xix. 21.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT, 149 
 
 dearly loved ; for the parting from scenes and 
 places where she had struck deep root ; much of 
 anxious care that her duty might be fully performed. 
 But every one who knew her will say, as she herself 
 often said, that her life had been full of happiness. 
 No innocent enjoyment passed within her reach, 
 but that it lighted up her face with a cheerful 
 gleam ; no means of adding to the comfort and 
 pleasure of others was ever neglected by her ; to 
 smooth down family trouble, to promote every- 
 where agreement and good-will, and brotherly and 
 sisterly affection, was her constant aim. And the 
 pleasure she gave to others was reflected back on 
 herself. They, who live for others and not for 
 themselves, are always rewarded by this very thing ; 
 even if they have no joy themselves, they rejoice 
 in the joy of others ; the health of others, the 
 prosperity of others, the peace of others, becomes 
 to them as it were in the place of their own health, 
 covers their own adversity, enlightens their own 
 obscurity ; like the apostle, of whom we have read 
 in this day's service ; 6 ' as unknown, and yet well 
 known ; as sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing ; as poor, 
 yet making many rich ; as having nothing, yet 
 possessing all things.' But more than this, there 
 6 2 Cur. vi. 9, 10.
 
 150 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 was the joy within ; ' the peace ' of those ' whose 
 mind is stayed on God.' It is the special blessing 
 of the yoke of Christ, not only that it is easy, but 
 that it makes all other things easy ; it is the special 
 blessing of the burden of Christ that it is not only 
 light itself, but that it makes all other things light. 
 So it was with her. Because she had taken upon 
 her the yoke of Christ, therefore the yoke of service, 
 which some find heavy and grating and painful, 
 was to her easy and delightful ; because she had 
 taken upon her the burden of Christ, therefore the 
 burden of care and the burden of sickness and 
 suffering, became but as ' a light affliction, which 
 was but for a moment, working for her a far more 
 exceeding and eternal weight of glory.' 7 All around 
 partook of the heaven which was within : there was 
 no struggle against itself, for self was swallowed up 
 in faith and love. 
 
 In the 35th 8 chapter of the Book of Genesis 
 you may read a touching scene in the story of the 
 Patriarch Jacob, which bears witness how from the 
 earliest times all respect has been paid to such long 
 and honourable service as that of which we are 
 speaking. He had been a far wanderer in a strange 
 country : he had seen many changes of good and 
 7 2 Cor. iv. 17. 8 Verses 6, 7, 8.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 151 
 
 evil fortune, many forms of human character ; he 
 had come back to his native land ; with his staff he 
 had crossed over the Jordan many years before, 
 and now he had become two mighty bands : and 
 he came to Bethel in the land of Canaan, 'the 
 place where God appeared to him when he fled 
 from the face of his brother.' There he halted, in 
 the middle stage of his journey ; in the middle 
 stage of the years of his pilgrimage through life ; 
 and there, we are told, ' Deborah, Rebekah's nurse,' 
 the nurse that had come with his mother from her 
 own people years before, ' she died and she was 
 buried beneath Bethel, under an oak, and the name 
 of it was called Allon Bachuth, that is, the oak of 
 weeping.' Many griefs had befallen him in times 
 past many griefs were yet to befall him in times 
 to come. But this grief was not to be forgotten. 
 Under the old gray stones which had been set up 
 in Bethel, the ' house of God,' where he first awoke 
 to a consciousness of the presence of his Lord 
 and Maker ; under the shade of the aged oak-tree 
 which from generation to generation had spread 
 and would still spread its branches over the con- 
 secrated spot, the faithful servant of his father's 
 house was laid ; and the memory of the spot was 
 long preserved, and under the oak of Deborah,
 
 152 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 beside the house of God, in many a distant time, 
 the wayfarer would often rest, and remember the 
 name of her whose remains reposed beneath. 9 
 Even so, my brethren, long may that spot be known 
 and remembered where the faithful friend and 
 servant of many years has been laid beside the 
 well-known tree, under the ancient tower, in that 
 quiet and secluded corner, which she knew and 
 loved so well, in the grave of her parents and her 
 kindred. 
 
 But let us think not only of the earthly grave 
 and its earthly sorrows ; let us think of all which 
 that grave is intended to teach us ; what thoughts 
 not only of sorrow, but of joy and comfort and 
 heavenly hope we may carry away with us, when- 
 ever we pass by it, or whenever we think of her 
 who there sleeps her last sleep. It was indeed 
 when we stood beside it last week, what Jacob 
 called the grave of Deborah ' the oak of weeping ' 
 ' the oak of tears.' But it may also be to those 
 who view it rightly, 'the oak of gladness,' ' the gate 
 of Heaven ' ; the entrance into that joy which 
 shall never pass away. 
 
 It costs us all a pang when standing at the open 
 grave which is to receive the last remains of any 
 9 I Sam. x. 3 ; I Kings xiii. 14.
 
 SERM.XIV. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 153 
 
 near and dear to us, to ' give our hearty thanks to 
 God for their deliverance from the miseries of this 
 sinful world.' Yet when we consider in any case 
 when we consider in her case what those miseries 
 are from which she is now for ever set free, we shall 
 be able to feel that the loss we so deplore is yet a 
 cause of thanksgiving. Think what she has been 
 spared ; think of her ' deliverance from the burden,' 
 as it was fast becoming, the burden of the weak and 
 suffering flesh : think of the successive pangs which 
 would have entered like iron into that loving and 
 devoted soul, had she lived, as in the ordinary 
 course of human things she might have lived, to 
 see one by one the departure of those whom she 
 so loved and served on earth. Think also of the 
 deliverance, for which she, if she could but speak, 
 would give the deepest thanksgiving of all ; the 
 deliverance from all those little infirmities, trials, 
 temptations, with which even the best and most 
 saint-like of us are compassed about in this mortal 
 life. It is the peculiar trial of characters like hers, 
 that they cannot bear to see anything done by 
 others which they can by any possibility do them- 
 selves. In some this may arise from other causes 
 from love of power, from jealousy, from mistrust. 
 In her this infirmity, so to call it, was occasioned
 
 154 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 not by reasons of this kind, but by the exactness, 
 the nicety, the eagerness, of her desire to see all 
 done in the best way in which she thought it could 
 be done ; from her great unwillingness, also, ever 
 to take from others that service and that trouble, 
 which she thought it to be her station and duty 
 always to be rendering, never to be receiving. She 
 knew well that she had this trial ; and she spoke 
 with humble hope that He who is perfectly just, 
 and who knew whereof she was made, would judge 
 and receive her, according to that ' faithfulness and 
 truth,' in which she put her entire trust. But from 
 this and all like trials, from this craving, never 
 satisfied, after perfection on earth, we may feel sure 
 that she is especially delivered in that world to 
 which she has gone. There they 'who hunger and 
 thirst after righteousness ' are blessed, for there 
 their longings shall at last be filled. There she 
 will no more vex her righteous soul with the sight 
 of good which she cannot accomplish, and of evil 
 which she cannot prevent. There she will no more 
 be fretted by the thought of ministrations imper- 
 fectly rendered, by the sight of good designs half 
 finished. In that better world there is no pavement 
 strewed with good intentions unfulfilled ; in that 
 world there will be no let or hindrance to the full
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 155 
 
 service always given with all the energy of that 
 love, which, as the apostle tells us, ' never fails ' ' 
 ' for the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in 
 it ; and His servants shall ser-ce Him? 2 Yes, my 
 brethren, dim and distant, and 'seen through a 
 glass darkly,' are all our notions of another world. 
 Yet, if anything be certain respecting it, this is 
 certain, that according to our faithfulness in a few 
 things here, will be our rule over many things there. 
 Her last words, uttered as if with a consciousness 
 that her end was at hand, as she retired to rest on 
 her last night, were, ' My work is done.' 1 Done it 
 was, ' well done ' on earth ; but not done, rather 
 still to be continued, and begun afresh, in the 
 eternal state beyond. 
 
 In this world, our faculties, our gifts, our talents, 
 are limited by outward circumstance, by humble 
 station, by small fields of duty. Many who have 
 acquired a great name in history have gained it not 
 because they were better or wiser than others, but 
 only because they had here greater and wider op- 
 portunities. Not so in the world to come. There 
 the spirits of all will find their appointed services. 
 Our heavenly home has room and verge enough 
 for all the energy which in this narrow spot of earth 
 1 I Cor. xiii. 8. Rev. xxii. 3.
 
 156 THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. SERM. xiv. 
 
 has been cramped and shackled down. In our 
 Father's house are many mansions ; 3 and in one 
 or more of those many mansions the ever-increas- 
 ing ' number of His elect ' will, in ways which eye 
 hath not seen nor ear heard, fulfil their Father's 
 will. Then will be seen that union of rest and 
 labour, of repose and active energy, in this world 
 vainly though earnestly sought by all the true 
 disciples of Him to whom rest and work are one. 
 Both will then be possible ; of both, we have the 
 promise in those strains, few and far between, which 
 reach us from that higher state. On the one hand, 
 we ' hear a voice from heaven saying, Blessed are 
 the dead which die in the Lord ; for they rest from 
 their labours : ' 4 on the other hand, we see a vision 
 as of living creatures ' round about the throne, which 
 rest not day and night ; and give glory and honour 
 and thanks to Him that sits on the throne, who 
 liveth for ever and ever.' 5 And again we hear the 
 sweet plaintive tones of a still small voice, which 
 saith, ' Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are 
 heavy laden, and I will give you rest ' ; 6 but it is 
 mingled with the stirring, cheering, strengthening 
 sounds, ' as it were of a trumpet talking with us ' : 7 
 
 3 John xiv. 2. 4 Rev. xiv. 13. 5 Rev. iv. 8. 
 
 6 Matt. xi. 28. " Rev. iv. I.
 
 SERM. xiv. THE FAITHFUL SERVANT. 157 
 
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 been faithful over a few things, I will make thee 
 ruler over many things. Enter thou into the joy 
 of thy Lord.' H 
 
 8 Matt. xxv. 
 
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