HVERS//J \\\E UNIVERS/A >jclOS-ANCElfj> 3n fIDemon? of tbe Queen. pftX A SERMON DELIVERED AT THE MEMORIAL SERVICE HELD FOR HER LATE MAJESTY QUEEN VICTORIA, AT THE NEW WEST END SYNAGOGUE, ST. PETERSBURGH PLACE, LONDON, W., BY THE Rev. S. SINGER, Minister of the Congregation. lottoon : GEO. YOUNG, Printer, 9, Harp Lane, E.G. 1901. * 3n flDemot 3 of tbe Queen, DELIVERED AT THE MEMORIAL SERVICE HELD FOR HER LATE MAJESTY QUEEN VICTORIA, AT THE NEW WEST END SYNAGOGUE, ST. PETERSBURGH PLACE, LONDON, W., 2nd February, 1901, BY THE REV. S. SINGER, Minister of the Congregation. PSALM xxxv. 14. VVintf T1J3 DK'KS " Grieving > 1 bowed me down, as one that mourneth for a mother." DEAR FRIENDS AND FELLOW MOURNERS, 1. Amid tokens of a love and veneration, unparalleled in the history of our country, all that was mortal of Queen Victoria has been brought to its consecrated resting place. In her obsequies more have taken part than those who joined, or could gaze upon, the sad pro- cession. A nation, an empire, the whole family of nations, have participated in them, and count themselves among the mourners for one whom with good reason they had learned to honour as the noblest of queens and of women. 2116605 2. Those whose fate it has been, in the vicissitudes of human experience, ' to follow some beloved being to the grave, will know that there is no moment when the sense of loss so oppresses and overpowers the heart as that when the survivors return to the abode of the departed and miss the familiar face and form, the tone, the touch, with all which the idea of home is associated, without which it ceases to have its old meaning for us, and even the wider world beyond is no longer to us as and what. it was. Then it is, even more than at the awful moment of death itself, that we realise the void that has been made in our lives, and the surging emotions break their bounds, and our hearts overflow" with a yearn- ing for what we know but too well to be \ 7 ain : " 0, for the touch of a vanished hand, And the sound of a voice that is still ! " 3. In some measure all this applies to the great loss we are gathered here to com- memorate. There was that about the Queen which has rendered her death a very personal bereavement to millions. Even those who never saw her, those who never came near her, those who may have been separated from her bodily presence by half the round world, 5 yet seemed to know her, to come under and confess her influence, to feel that they had a share in her and she in them. And now that the last farewells have been spoken, and all men's thoughts have been bent upon her as she was borne to the last abode she prepared for her beloved consort and herself, the change which it all implies is reflected in the void of which we are keenly conscious, and which makes us feel as if our country, as if the world were not quite the same to us now that we no longer live under Her Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria. Wig Tip DK-^3 . Many a heart to-day will re-echo that cry, " Grieving. I bowed me down, as one that mourneth for a mother," mourneth, that is, for the loss incom- parable, the loss irreparable. 4. Over the triple doorways of the Cathedral of Milan there are three inscriptions spanning the splendid arches. Over one door- way may be read the legend, " All that which pleases is only for a moment." Over the other are the words, " All that which troubles is but for a moment." At the great central entrance is the inscription, " That only is of import which is eternal." It is true of kings and queens as of meaner mortals. It is as true of those who pass the frontier of fourscore years 6 as of those whose life's journey ends much nearer the starting point. When the end is reached and life is only retrospect, then all pleasures and all pains, be they ever so lowly or ever so princely, appear to have come and gone in a momentary flash, as if to prove how unsubstantial they were. Only that is of con- sequence which is eternal. Not what we have enjoyed or suffered, not that matters any longer, but what we have done, the impress we leave on the lives and souls of others, to be by them transmitted to their successors and PO on again, in infinite progression, only that is of import, and over its existence death has no power. 5. It is this thought that tempers a nation's grief to-day. That august life, singled out for the supremest privileges as well as for some of the sharpest trials that ever fell to a mortal's lot, has passed away. But death- less is the record the Queen has left on the brightest page of English history ; deathless, too, is the memorial she has imprinted on the hearts of her people', whom she has taught to honour the noblest ideals of womanhood, and themselves to rise to loftier heights through the very love her life and example inspired. 6. Most potent among the influences for good Qujeen Victoria lias bequeathed to England and the world is this, that she has become the type on which those who after her may be called to occupy the throne will be expected to model themselves. Henceforth it will be by the standard she has herself estab- lished that the private as well as the public life of the monarch will be judged. She has undoubtedly made sovereignty a harder task for her successors, for kings and queens everywhere. But she has shown them also how to strengthen the foundations of the throne more effectively than by any number of legal enactments or the exercise of any amount of physical force. 7. Sweet is it, too, to think in these times, when we a.re still in the long drawn-out agonies of a deplorable war, that the Queen's influence was ever on the side of peace. If her reign was not privileged to pass in unbroken peace, if especially her latter days were darkened by the shadow of war, not hers, we may be sure, was the blame. On many an occasion her moderating influence, as responsible statesmen have recently informed us, made itself felt in allaying international irritation, and saved this country and others 8 from a too ready recourse to the fierce arbitra- ment of war. Truly has it been said by an illustrious servant of his Queen and country, "Even those who loved not England loved the Queen." 8. So also in victory she set an example of consideration and generosity, in noble con- trast to other conquerors, whose motto is still the ancient and barbarous " Woe to the vanquished!" Take this in illustration. A letter of hers has been published, written after the suppression of the Indian Mutiny. It relates to a proclamation that was to be issued to the Indians, regarding the direct assump- tion by the Crown of the government of their country. The first draft submitted to Her Majesty did not satisfy her it was too harsh and imperious in tone. She expressed her objections to the document, and asked that the Prime Minister (Lord Derby) should write another, " bearing in mind that it is a female Sovereign who speaks to more than a hundred millions of Eastern people on assuming the direct government over them, and, after a bloody civil war, giving them pledges which her future reign is to redeem, and explaining the principles of her government. Such a document should breathe feelings of generosity, 9 benevolence and religious toleration, and point out the privileges which the Indians will receive in being placed on an equality with the subjects of the British Crown, and the prosperity following in the train of civilisa- tion." No jewel in the regalia of Queen and Empress shines with a lustre more bright and beautiful than sentiments so noble, so nobly expressed. 9. And what do not we Jews in particular owe to her reign ! In the status of the Jews of the British Empire a revolution has taken place, astounding alike in its completeness and in its rapidity. Six decades have accom- plished what the previous six centuries have not been equal to. One by one the barriers have been broken down that kept the Jew from the rights and privileges of a citizen, and from th gratification of every laudable ambition. Before the accession of her gracious Majesty the unpardonable sin of his Judaism overshadowed the Jew in almost every career. When she came to the throne the sun of civil and religious liberty was just beginning to burst through the clouds. Since her accession it has shone forth more and more unto the perfect day. Never can we forget what the Victorian era has done for us, as well as for 10 others who have been fettered by disabilities almost as galling as ours. 10. The keynote of one great part of the wise and good Queen's policy was struck whei^, shortly after she came to the throne, a Jew- die first of his faith to be elected Sheriff of London received the honour of knighthood at her hands. It was one of the earliest acts by which the Sovereign, the fountain of honour, indicated what manner of spirit she was of. But it is not by honours though these have been neither scanty nor insignificant that our obligations are to be measured. As we look back over all the centuries of our history, since Providence decreed our dispersion, it is the barest truth to say that there has never been a period so charged with blessings for the followers of our faith as the threescore and three years they have passed under the rule of Queen Victoria. Let it not be said that in all this Her Majesty had no part ; that she was a passive instrument, a mere spectator amidst events she could neither hinder nor advance. To a great extent it is as true to-day as in the day of the writer of Proverbs, that " When a ruler hearkeneth to words of falsehood, all his ministers will be evildoers ;" as true as in the times of the pon of Sirach, that " As the judge of the people is liimself, so are his officers ; and what manner of man the ruler of the city is, such are all they that dwell therein." And, notwithstanding all the powers of self-govern- ment, now the inalienable possession and the most treasured glory of the English people, it is doubtful whether the triumph of civil and religious equality would have been so complete, if there had not been from the first a deep-rooted conviction on the part of the Queen that dis- tinctions that have no foundation injustice or in reason ought to cease, and a sincere desire to be known, loved and honoured as the impartial ruler over the millions, of many races and creeds, whom destiny had brought under her benign sway. 11. Another feature there is in her character and another aspect of her career on which one may fittingly dwell on this day of national mourning. She taught us what is meant by the sanctification of grief. The great sorrow of her life, now that we can look back upon that life as a whole, seems to have rounded and perfected it with the heavenly grace of an all-embracing sympathy. Every tender and loving sentiment of that loyal heart became deepened and strengthened when, after twenty-one years of blissful marriage, 12 during which she could not but adore what was adorable, she entered upon a lone widow- hood destined to last nearly twice the period of her wedded life. 12. We are all. liable to chafe against the visitation of sorrow. We are sometimes even stirred to rebellion against a Providence which seems to give its most precious blessings but to take them away. But, mysteriously com- pounded as is every human character, the noblest is ever that in which, among other elements, adversity and sorrow have their place. Thus only is the human soul divinely harmonised. Thus only does it give forth its sweetest tones. " To be acquainted with grief gives to the sufferer a power of consolation which seems to corne direct from the great Comforter Himself." And the Queen was a woman acquainted with griefs. Again and again she was destined to see her dearest press, as though against the course of nature, before her to the grave. In the loss of all the com- panions of her youth and of most of those upon whom she leaned for support and counsel in her later days, she had to pay the inevitable penalty of long life. But her sympathy with others' suffering was boundless ; it was spon- taneous ; it was expressed with a. warmth, 13 a sincerity and a delicacy that at once took every heart captive. It found its way to cottage and to mansion, among armies in the field, and the sick and maimed in the hospital, among the miners entombed in their dungeons, among the brave men who go down to the sea in ships and are worsted in their battle with the elements, among the famine and the plague- stricken multitudes, among the bereaved and the sorrow-smitten everywhere. " The mother of her people " that phrase now in everyone's mouth is no mere posthumous glorification of her. Hers was a mother's sympathy, and has not God Himself exalted that by employing it as the worthiest image human language can furnish to express His own heavenly love and compassion? "As one whom his mother coin- forte th, so will I comfort you." 13. Most of us can remember the time when certain people in these kingdoms, grow- ing impatient at the prolonged seclusion of^ the Queen and her avoidance of the pomp and pageantry of state, began to give utterance to their discontent. If they had had their way, it is doubtful whether the country's gain would have been equal to its loss. A great nation is no longer held together by splendid ceremonials, by dazzling entertainments, by 14 imposing military displays. These are the well-known resources of rulers who think them necessary to amuse a childish, or to distract or impress a turbulent people. A nation that has ripened into political manhood, and in self-government has learnt to respect itself, will not set over much store by such methods of winning either allegiance or admiration. Yet, if for awhile she shunned the parade and glitter, the mere spectacular side of royalty, in duty, in constant, faithful, untiring devotion to the essential work of the state she was never wanting. One after another her ministers have testified to the scrupulousness with which she discharged every obligation of her royal office, to her thorough grasp of every important question affecting the welfare of the empire and its relations with other countries, no less than to the soundness and wisdom of the Queen's judgment. Even at the time when she was bowed down by the great master sorrow of her life there was, after the first few weeks, during which heart and mind were alike numbed by the blow, there was no relaxation in the tasks her station demanded from her. One (Dr. Norman Macleod) who had especially won her confidence in those days, has put his experience on record : " She met 15 me with an unutterably sad expression ; and began at once to speak of the Prince. She spoke of his excellence, his love, his cheerful- ness, how he was everything to her. She said she never shut her eyes to trials, but liked to look them in the face ; how she would never shrink from duty ; that her highest idea of purity and love was obtained from him, and that God could not be displeased with her love." Neither could man be displeased with it. That fidelity to one dear memory gave to her whole character the stamp of the sublime. Surely there is no one among us now who would not choose rather to remember her for a love passing the love of all women, than for a magnificence passing the magnificence of all queens. 14. And now she has gone to her reckon- ing, to render account before Him, who is no respecter of persons, of her trust as daughter, wife, mother and Queen. If it be true that 13DT! nmj Dipan nn iao*n nnu nman nntfte ; v T IT-- v T : - - if the voice of the people be the voice of God, then, assuredly, God's blessing meets her now even as our blessing follows her. And we natural as grief is at such a time not by mourning for her shall we best honour her, but by remembering her, and her life, so fair, 10 so pure, so full, so strong with the strength that comes of striving for the right ; by seizing each for himself the example and the inspira- tion she has left for all. How can we mourn like those who are bereft, When every pang of grief Finds balm for its relief In counting up the treasure she has left ? Faith that withstood the shocks of toil and time, Hope that defied despair, Patience that conquered care, And loyalty whose courage was sublime. Oh, noble woman ! never more a queen Than in the laying down Of sceptre and of crown To win a greater kingdom yet unseen, Teaching us hosv to seek the highest goal, To win the true success, To live, to love, to bless, And make death proud to take a rojal soul. Amen ! < 2 *