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THE THREE VOICES:
'1 SERMON
PREACHED ON TUESDAY, NOYEMBER 29, 1853,
(BEING THE DAY OF HUMILIATION FOB THE PESTILENCE.)

THE REV. D. T. K. DRUMMOND,
INCUMBENT OF ST. THOMAS' EHGLISH EPISTOPAl CHAPEL.

THE THREE VOICES:

A SERMON
PEEACHED ON TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1853,
(BEING THE DAY OF HUMILIATION FOB, THE PESTILENCE.)

THE REV. D. T. K. DRUMMOND,
INCUMBENT OF ST. THOMAS' ENGLISH EPISCOPAL CHAPEL.

PUBLISHED BY REQUEST.

THE PROFITS TO BE GIVEN TO ST. THOMAS' MISSION, O&tfONGATE.

EDINBURGH:
W. P. KENNEDY, SOUTH ST. ANDREW STREET.
GLASGOW : D. BRYCE. LONDON : HAMILTON, ADAMS, & CO.
MDCCCLIII.

The following Sermon is published at the request of many-
Members of the Congregation of St. Thomas. Having been
written out for this purpose after it was preached, there must
necessarily be some difference between what was addressed to
the Congregation and that which is now placed in their hands.
The Author trusts, however, that this difference is not great,
and he earnestly prays that the Divine blessing may rest on this
effort to give somewhat of a permanent expression to the
humiliation of the recent fast-day.
Montpeliee, 5th December 1853.

SERMON.

" A voice of noise from the city, a voice from the temple, a voice of the Lord that
rendereth recompense to his enemies." — Isaiah lxvi. 6.

I need scarcely remind you, that frequently throughout
Scripture, the word " voice", is used, without necessarily imply
ing any articulate sound, or word uttered. In this poetical and
figurative sense, it gives forcible expression, as it were, to the
main feature in some important transaction,— it lends for a time
to inanimate creation a living character, so as to exhibit its
relations with the Great Creator ; and it gives to the dispensa
tions of Providence the stamp of the direct and immediate will
of Jehovah. Thus, in the early history of the world, on that sad
day when the first murderer imbrued his hands in his brother's
blood, and vainly thought no eye had seen the deed, he found to
his horror and amazement, that the very ground beneath his
feet was bearing a testimony against his crime, even up to the
throne of God. " The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto
me from the ground." Again, if we turn to the twenty-ninth
Psalm, we observe God's dealings and judgments thus emphati
cally set forth : " The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. . . .
The voice of the Lord is powerful ; the voice of the Lord is full
of majesty. The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars. . . .
The voice of the Lord divideth the flames of fire. . . . The
voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness." And so with great
force in the forty-sixth Psalm : " He uttered his voice, the
earth melted." And farther, we have in the second chapter of
the prophecies of Habakkuk, perhaps one of the sublimest por
tions of the Old Testament, the following singularly grand
description of the ocean, moved and troubled at the presence of

God, as when a stormy tempest sweeps over its waters : " The
deep uttered his voice, and lifted up his hands on high."
It is in this manner that the word " voice" is used in the
text. There is " no speech nor language," and yet there is " A
voice of noise from the city, a voice from the temple, a voice of
the Lord that rendereth recompense to his enemies."
Time will not admit of my attempting, however briefly, to
apply these words to the Jewish people, of whom they were
originally spoken. This, indeed, of itself would furnish a wide
and most profitable field of inquiry. We cannot, however, even
touch it now. This day of humiliation, in which we have met
together within these walls, demands that we at once proceed to
consider the passage before us, as supplying most profitable and
seasonable reflections for ourselves under the present circum
stances of the country. May the Spirit of all grace and truth
open to us treasures of wisdom and of knowledge in Him, whose
testimony is " the spirit of prophecy."
I. Listen, then, to what the Prophet says regarding the first
voice : " A voice of noise from the city." Now, brethren, I
conceive these words fairly set forth such a condition as that
which belongs to our nation at the present day. There is some
thing ever ascending up, from the midst of us, to the presence
of God — some voice as of Abel's blood from the ground, but
not of that solemn character ; — the voice from our people is a
voice " of noise :" it is loud, passionate, discordant, and turbu
lent. It is a tumultuous sound from a people whose sin has
increased over their head, and their trespass gone up into
heaven. Let us endeavour calmly to distinguish, and faithfully
to look at the various national sins which together swell this
" voice of noise from the city."
1. The first I mention may almost be regarded as the parent sin
of all the rest, — I mean the sin of drunkenness. Terrible and wide
spread is this degrading vice among the whole body of the people.
Secret habits of drunkenness, I fear, either from stimulants or nar
cotics, exist among many of all classes. Open, shameless indul
gence in this vice prevails among a vast proportion of the poorer
classes. And we may well narrow our consideration of this sin,
by taking the city in which we dwell, as a type of its general
and extensive prevalence. This city, of which we are often

tempted to be proud — alas, how loud the cry, how appalling the
voice ascending up from this vice in it ! When we look into
the pages of the Bible, and see in the dark catalogue of sins,
which are specially marked as excluding from the kingdom of
heaven, this too named there, and then turn our eyes to the
lanes and alleys of this town, and read the history of this appal
ling vice, not in tens or hundreds, but in thousands of the dwellers
therein, a " horror of great darkness" falls on us, and instead of
wondering at any amount of misery and calamity that we may
have suffered, or are suffering, we are amazed at the long-suffer
ing of God, in not overwhelming us, even as he did the guilty
cities of the plain. Beloved brethren, I do not exaggerate the
evil. I cannot do it. Visit the hovels of this city — penetrate
into its secret places, and then "judge ye what I say;" or if
you cannot do this, ask your missionary, who is earnestly and
faithfully labouring in only one limited district, and if you have
" ears to hear," they will tingle when you hear his testimony.
We and our fathers, in all classes of the community, have
much guilt with which to charge ourselves in this matter. I do
not wish to. palliate the case of the large number of the poor and
working-classes who indulge in this vice. Their reckless im
providence, their lavishing of millions on this sin, leave a wide
enough margin for charging home on them their guilt. But
have the upper and more educated classes done what they could
to elevate those under them in the social scale ? Have we
watched over their temporal as well as spiritual condition'?
Have we sought by every means in our power to improve their
dwellings, and to limit the numbers who now throng them?
Have we made such arrangements that their wages shall be paid
at a time, and in a way, as to be most suitable for the wellbeing
of their families, instead of supplying a temptation for the sin we
deplore 1 Alas, we ourselves, and those who have gone before
us, must humble us before God, and acknowledge that we are
verily guilty in this respect, and that our country at large is only
reaping the harvest which might have been anticipated from
past neglect. " Deliver us from blood-guiltiness, O God."
It is, indeed, matter of deepest thankfulness to God, that we
are not slumbering on in negligence now, as we did formerly,
and that strenuous efforts are being made on every side to reduce
the gigantic dimensions of this great crime, which covers us with

8
such dishonour. We have at least begun to put away tempta
tions to the indulgence of this vice, as much as possible from the
poor. We are looking more to their sanitary condition, their
food and their clothing, and above all, to their spiritual interests,
and fruit has not been wanting to cheer us on in such paths ; but
with all this, how little impression seems to be made on the mass
of ungodliness 1 We thank God for tokens here and there of
social improvement, but as regards the actual reduction of the
evil nationally, can we cherish the hope that this is proceeding ?
2. Immediately connected with this sin, and fearfully swell
ing the " voice of noise" proceeding from it, is Immorality.
Habits of drinking induce disease in the body, miserably im
pair all moral feeling, and inflame every bad passion. I dare
not, from this place, open before you this dark, foul page of our
national disgrace, — but I appeal to many who now hear me, and
who have the best means of knowing, whether it is not true that
among a large proportion of our population, the moral sense has
become so deadened, that profligacy is the rule and not the ex
ception, and that we seek in vain for even a momentary recoil
from acts of the grossest immorality. Doubtless the picture was
truly drawn by inspired hands, of Jerusalem of old— not the less
truly does the picture represent our country now, " From the
sole of the foot, even to the head, there is no soundness in it, but
wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores."
3. Again, closely allied with both these evils, and indeed, in very
many instances, both a cause and a symptom of them, is the
sin of Sabbath-breaking. How sad it is to think, that the day
which by its very name suggests thoughts of calm, holy, serene
tranquillity, should have its rest broken by the tumult of the un
godly despisers of it, and who thus add to the jarring discord of
the " voice of noise from the city." How many evil ways have
begun their course on a Sabbath-day neglected ! How many
have plunged into an abyss of sin and misery, never to be re
covered, from yielding to a temptation by a breach of the sanctity
of that day ! How many, from " seeking their own pleasure1' in
it, have been " drawn away and enticed," and fallen, to rise no
more ! If we examine into the statistics of our penitentiaries,
our jails, and our asylums, we shall often find that while drunk
enness and immorality loom darkly out, as the proximate causes
of the misery within them, there stands a little removed in the

background, as the first link in the chain dragging down the
victim, — the sin of dishonouring the Lord's own day.
4. Another national sin, which must not be omitted, but which
I can do little more than place in its due position in the cata
logue — is Covetousness. " The love of money" is indeed deep-
rooted in the nation's heart. What an appalling exhibition of
this spirit had we but a few years ago, when young and old,
high and low, rich and poor, educated and illiterate, seemed
wholly given to the idolatry of mammon ; and the " hasting to
be rich" was not checked by the nation repenting of its sin, but
by the merciful interposition of Providence, in arresting its career
of covetousness, by failure and misfortune.
5. But even in this general review of- national sin, we have
not yet touched upon some of the harshest tones of " the voice of
noise" from our country. There is infidelity, for example, widely
diffused and daring. Look at it as It appears in the lower ranks
of society. In these its voice of blasphemy is rugged and ob
scene. It openly glories in its shame. " Who is the Lord, that
he should reign over us 1" they cry with avowed hatred. " ' There
is no God' to bring us into judgment, so ' let us eat and drink,
for to-morrow we die.' " And then if we look higher up, yea, even
to the highest levels of the social edifice, the harshness of the
voice is indeed no longer to be discovered, but what it loses in
this respect, it gains in depth and volume of sound. The gross
blasphemy of the open infidel is exchanged for the more refined,
but deeper rooted blasphemy of the sceptic, who denies God
under the pretence of doing him honour — who seeks to array his
deadly enmity against the truth in the garb of an angel of light,.
and to be esteemed religious, while he is in truth profane.
6. Once more, another sound mingles its strange and startling
tones in this " voice of noise," and it proceeds " out of the mouth
of the Beast and of the False Prophet" — " a mouth speaking great
things and blasphemies." This enemy is, indeed, coming in like
a flood upon us. The man of sin is, day by day, both secretly
and openly making steady advances among us — while, on the
other hand, we appear to be supinely tolerating his encroachments.
Union and strength on 'his side, seem only to be met by division
and weakness on ours. He has one object in view, and his
willing servants, steadily and constantly co-operate with him, in
order to attain it — namely, the bringing of our once Protestant
a 2

10
country under the domination of the Bishop of Eome. We are
frequently told, that this is the fault of this or that Government.
That it is by their encouragement directly-given to Home, or by
more secret connivance at her schemes, that they have brought
us to this crisis. It may be very true, that men in authority
have acted, and are acting in this manner, and terrible is the
responsibility they thus incur, but let us never forget that the
chief blame lies with the nation. In such a country as ours, no
Government could stand a day in opposition to what is the clear,
unhesitating, and determined will of the people. We have never
yet exhibited anything like this. We have never acted on the
determination to labour as one man, not to persecute and calum
niate those opposed to us, but to defend and protect all that is
dear to the heart, and precious to the conscience of the child of
God. We have never yet shewn a united front against a com
mon enemy ; and my firm conviction is, that unless this speedily
be done, the days of the prosperity of our country are numbered.
Such, brethren, is in some of its most prominent features the
aspect which this country presents before the eyes of Him with
whom we have to do. It is indeed truly described by the words
of the text, — " A voice of noise from the city ;" and, alas ! I
fear I must add, that " the tumult of those " who, in all the sins
which have been noted, thus " rise up" against God, " increaseth
continually." II. Let us then pass on to the second clause in the text, — " A
voice from the temple." The first voice " from the city" is
distinguished for its " noise," to mark, as I am disposed to be
lieve, the aggressive, bold, and active wickedness of the people,
their rebellion against God, and flagrant violations of his law ;
and we have seen how well our country might be regarded as
uttering such tumultuous sounds. The second voice has no such
characteristic. Rather, it would seem, that as the first suggests
what is boastful and daring against Jehovah, the second suggests,
by contrast, what is deficient towards Him. The first is loud,
the second not loud enough. The first is strong, and makes itself
be heard — the second is weak, and speaks only in a whisper.
And when we turn to consider the state of the Church of God,
his professing people in these lands, who are as much dis
posed to boast of their privileges, and with as little propriety, as

11
the Church of old, who cried, " The temple of the Lord, the
temple of the Lord are we," we find the voice proceeding from
them to be indeed sadly deficient in clearness as well as fulness
of sound.1. Consider the vast mass of mere external discipleship, with
the comparatively small band of the faithful and sincere, in the
midst of it. Think of the chaff in comparison of the wheat in
the professing Church. It is now, just as it was in Isaiah's time,
" a very small remnant" that exists in the midst of that which
has " a name to live," and little else. How feeble must be the
voice which rises up to God of real, sincere, and heartfelt love,
and of willing devotedness, from his Church, if the whole body
of nominal believers be taken into account ! What a contrast
between the scarcely perceptible voice from the temple now, and
the burst of that grand melody which shall pour forth from the
opened temple in Heaven : — " And I heard as it were the voice
of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as
the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia."
2. And if the volume of sound in the voice from the Church
of God collectively be small and deficient, is it not equally feeble,
in comparison of what it ought to be, in each individual believer ?
Which of us, brethren, can lay his hand upon his heart, and say
that we have never known religious declension, but that the
flame of spiritual-mindedness has always been steadily ascending
to God from the altar of our hearts? Have we not been often in
danger of " leaving our first love?" And do we not feel that
nothing but the continued and altogether unmerited grace of God
alone prevents it from being extinguished ? Oh, amid the loud
and impious voices of ungodliness, how attenuated is the sound
which ascends from the spiritual being of a child of God !
3. But farther, the " voice from the temple " is defective,
inasmuch as the people of God have to deplore their numerous
shortcomings. It is not only that the inner man is feeble in its
aspirations, and lacking in spirituality, but outward acts fall miser
ably short of what they ought to be. We know well what is
right, but, alas ! do we always practise it ? If Paul himself could
say, " The good I would I do not," how much more must we?
4. But the " voice from the temple " is also defective, because
of our lack of earnestness. There is earnestness in the man of
pleasure, as he runs his race of selfish enjoyment. There is

12
earnestness in the merchant who diligently adds to his store.
There is earnestness in the man of business, in the painter, the
poet, the historian. There is earnestness in the man who travels
over half the world to pick up a handful of gold-dust. There is
earnestness in the man who braves the horrors of the Arctic
winter on behalf of science. There is earnestness in the devotee,
who seeks the praise of man. There is earnestness in those who
are-troubling the Church by diverse and strange doctrines, hav
ing all their affinities in the Church of Rome, while they belong
to another — yea, earnestness so great, that no difficulty discour
ages, no danger daunts, no miscarriage deters them ; — but where
is the earnestness of the people of God ? Alas ! the children of
this world read them in this respect a wholesome lesson. The
voice from the carnal worshippers of mammon and the votaries
of the world, is full and clear. The voice from the temple is
weak and wavering indeed.
4. Again, there is a great deficiency among us of that mu
tual forbearance with which we ought to regard each other in
the Lord. Here too, " the voice from the temple " is plainly
defective. How little consideration do we shew to the feelings,
the opinons, or even the prejudices of those in the family of
Christ who differ from us ? Ours are too often harsh words and
censorious judgments, instead of the law of charity, " bearing all
things, believing all things, hoping all things." How poorly also
have we acquired the Apostle's lesson, — " Bear ye one another's
burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ !" Ready, it may be, to
rejoice with them that rejoice, are we not often slow " to weep
with them that weep ?"
5. And once more, how languid our love is to the brother
hood, — to all who love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. We
are both slow in discerning the image of Christ in others, and
we are likewise slow in loving it as we ought to do, when we
have discovered it. " The voice from the temple" in this respect
ascending to God, must be small and weak indeed, since John
pointedly asks, " If we love not our brother whom we have seen,
how shall we love God whom we have not seen ?" Hence also
the divisions among us. I do not mean those outward sectional
distinctions which exist in the visible Church of Christ. I see
nothing bad in these things by themselves. I see no reason why
such external varieties of worship and discipline should not

13
exist, and continue to exist, without in the least marring the
beauty and unity of the Church of Christ. No ; the real source
of disunion is not in the fact of external difference. This is only
made use of by the master evil within each believer's heart for
its own bad purpose. Ah ! if " we loved one another with a
pure heart fervently" then outward things would never for one
moment reach with their chilly breath that blessed fellowship of
love which ought to mark the whole brotherhood of Christ.
See, then, brethren, what we have to confqss on this our day
of humiliation, — loud, crying, national sins, — and the voice from
God's people so feeble, that it can scarce be heard at all amid
the din and tumult of their " voice of noise."
III. The text urges us one step farther. It first makes us
look around, then within, and now it points upward. It calls
our sins to our remembrance, and then ushers us into the pre
sence of God. The Prophet's scroll passes from its searching
appeal to conscience, to the dread tribunal of Jehovah. — " The
voice of the Lord that rendereth recompense to his enemies."
The first occasion in which we meet with this expression,
" The voice of the Lord," in Scripture, is one which is only
exceeded in solemn interest and deep importance by the history
of the Garden of Gethsemane and the Cross of Calvary. We
read of our first parents stealthily gliding among the trees of the
garden of Eden, earnestly seeking for concealment from the
presence of God, and with all the horrors of new-born fear in
their guilty breasts. Sin had done its work in them, though
the fatal consequences were not yet seen in their lovely habitation.
Still Eden's sky shone brilliantly — still the teeming earth sparkled
with all the loveliness of young and yet untarnished beauty.
The culprits, we are told, seeking to hide themselves in some
deep thicket, " heard the voice of God walking in the garden in
the cool of the day." It was the beginning of Judgment. The
next moment Adam and Eve were at the bar of God. They
were heard — they were convicted — they were condemned.
Again, not to multiply passages, in which this expression
occurs, turn to what Ezekiel says in the forty-third chapter of
his prophecies, " And behold, the glory of the God of Israel
came from the way of the East, and his voice was like a noise of
many waters, and the earth shined with his glory." In the his-

14
tory of the Fall we read of " the voice of God" in the act of con
demning. In this inspired description by the Prophet, we have
the dread majesty of that voice significantly represented before us.
It is " like the noise of many waters" — or " the sound of many
waters," as in Revelations. This may refer either to the rushing
sound far up among the hills, which strikes terror into the hearts
of the dwellers in the plain, as it tells them that the flood of
waters is out, and that they will find them soon resistlessly sweep
ing by, overwhelming everything in wide-spread desolation ;
or it may have reference to the mighty deep with its ceaseless
movement — apt emblem of the judgment of God, which never
sleeps though it may appear for ia while at rest, and which indeed
may often be preparing for the most fearful storms of divine wrath
at those very moments when the cry is, " Peace, peace." Besides,
nothing that we can look upou in nature around us, can suggest
such thoughts of eternity as when we go down to the deep, and
see a boundless expanse of water on every side, — and when it
" utters its voice and lifts up its hands on high," we cannot but
feel the sublimity of the prophet's words, " His voice was as the
voice of many waters."
Is that voice then, specially sounding in our ears now, beloved
brethren, " whether we will hear or whether we will forbear ?"
I think it is, and that the mode by which Jehovah has chosen to
speak to us, is the Pestilence. And here let me guard against
any misapprehension. We have no right to assume, that in
individual cases of special calamity, there is special guilt in each
which has drawn it down. We have no right to say, when
sudden violence hurries a man into the presence of God, when
the stroke of death falls without warning on the strong man, and
in a moment leaves him a heap of dust, or when the winged
lightning blasts him in an instant with its scorching touch, or
the pestilence that walketh in darkness, and wasteth at noon-day,
cuts him down like the grass of the field, — -we have no right to
say that these things came upon the sufferers, because they
were "sinners above others." The case of the man born blind,
and our Lord's remarks in Luke xiii. 1, &c, strongly, and
even sternly, forbid such a habit of judging one another.
Nor, still farther, when any great calamity befalls a nation,
have we any right to affirm, in the absence of a distinct revela
tion from God, that it has been sent as a punishment for any

15
one national sin, rather than another. David was divinely in
formed that the three days' pestilence which swallowed up thou
sands of his people, was the direct and immediate penalty for the
numbering of them ; but as we have no such intimations now,
we must carefully avoid the danger of tracing national calamity
to any one specific cause. Were all of us united in a clear and
heaven-taught conviction, that one and but one national sin
blotted the annals of our country and stained her history, as a
professedly Christian nation, then there would be no difficulty in
at once assigning the true cause for droughts and floods — for
famines and pestilences — for the scanty supply of one very essen
tial portion of food for our people, and the sudden blighting of
another. But as this is manifestly not the case, and our national
sins are, on the other hand, " Legion," then it is obvious that
it will depend upon a great number and variety of opinions,
what each may set down as the direct cause of any pressing
trouble in the land. One national sin will appear more heinous
in the eye of one man, another in another, and so forth ; and
thus anything like certainty is out of the question, while the
substantial, practical, personal use which ought to be made by each
one of us of all national calamity, is in the meantime in danger of
being overlooked ; for I suppose there can be no doubt, that
when we endeavour to mark off some one national sin against a
national visitation, we are prone first to select that as the cause
with which we have ourselves apparently the least connexion,
instead of beginning national by personal humiliation, like
Daniel of old, who put himself first in the list for humble con
fession in the day of rebuke : " Whiles I was speaking, and
praying, and confessing my sin, and the sin of my people Israel."
But how, then, are we to regard calamity when under any
form it lights upon a nation, seeing that nations can only be
dealt with as nations in this world, and not in the next? Surely
the answer to this question is not difficult. God has a perpetual
controversy with the generations of man as they pass over this
earthly scene. The beginning of that controversy on the side
of man, was sin. The end of that controversy, so far as we
can trace it here, is death. Man struggles on in his sin, for
a brief period, against God, and the grave closes over him and
concludes it. Death therefore, however rapid, or however slow

16
in his approach — whether, after long pining sickness, or the
sudden seizure of a moment — whether by the wasting of disease,
or by what are called accidental causes — whether constantly
recurring before our e3res, or appearing at longer intervals of
time, death is the penalty directly inflicted by the hand of God
on sinful man ; in every case, it is " the voice of God " saying,
" Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." With our
open Bibles before us, and the belief that not " a sparrow falls
to the ground without our Father," we cannot, whatever may
have been the proximate cause or causes of death, do otherwise
than record the verdict, over each tenement of lifeless clay,
" Died by the visitation of God."
Sicknesses, diseases, and so-called accidents, are but various
paths, all converging to this one point. Shall we then recognise
the hand of God in this closing scene, and shut him out from
view in that which leads to it ? Is it only when we stand beside
the inanimate body that we can say, " This is God's hand ;"
while we have failed in sickness, or the calamity which has gone
before, to acknowledge, " This also is from the Lord ?" The
air we breathe is tainted with disease, and laden with the seeds
of death. An act of carelessness, a slight neglect, or something
we could not guard against, is the immediate channel by which
the subtle poison enters our veins, and dries up the well-springs
of our life. Do we refuse, for either or all of these second causes,
as they are sometimes, though not very suitably called, to con
fess that the sickness is from God ? The sickness of Lazarus
undoubtedly commenced like any other. It was not, however,
the less sent by God.
And thus, when the pestilence moves on in its path of sudden
sickness and death among us, it is no doubt perfectly true that
its career may have been hastened by the vice and immorality
of some, by the carelessness and neglect of others ; but it is not
the less true that it is the " voice of God" speaking in his con
troversy which he hath with us. And when thus brought in
front of God so dealing with us, shall we sublimize the awful
verities of that controversy into the light product of such a
poor dogma, that God suffers the pestilence to destroy its thou
sands, in order that we may pay greater attention for the future
to the laws of sanitary improvement ? — the marrow of the con-

17
troversy — *sin and death — being in fact eaten out of it, and the
miserable notion substituted, that in such terrible dispensations
God would only have us pay attention to certain physical laws !
No, brethren, the pestilence, whatever may be its proximate
causes, is a visitation from God — a visitation for sin. " Shall I
not be avenged on such a nation as this?" Is the dark cata
logue of transgression, with which I began these remarks, not
abundantly^ sufficient to account for it ? One, or another of them
alone, would do this, how much mpre when we reckon them all
together ! With abounding national sin of every description,
no wonder that national judgments abound ; nay, the wonder is
that God should forbear and deal with us as gently as he does.
But does this argue any indifference to the use of all proper
means within our power to check, if possible, the advance and the
ravages of the pestilence ? Very far from it. It is not only
right and lawful — it would be sinful, and wrong not to make
diligent use of all earthly skill within our reach to arrest the
progress of disease and death, and the pestilence as well as every
other deadly thing. But shall we stand by the side of the sick
bed, and vainly count up the things directly inducing disease ; or
shall we, together with the use of all possible means, lift up our
souls to him who is able to save from death, and ask him to
rebuke the disease, symptomatic as it is of the curse of sin?
And shall we do otherwise as we look on our national troubles ?
Shall we spend our time in unavailing regrets for a thousand
things which appear to us to have ushered them in ; or, while
with true fervency of spirit we labour to alleviate them, as if all
depended on our zeal and skill, shall we not cry aloud to
Jehovah, as we acknowledge the sum of our national transgres
sions, " Spare thy people, O Lord ?"
There is one point, however, to which I desire briefly to
allude. Many persons have fallen into the habit of talking of
the pestilence of cholera, which is now amongst us, as if its
presence were simply to be traced to the neglect of proper sani
tary regulations, and, as a necessary consequence, that if the
latter be duly attended to, the pestilence would itself be stayed.
This is a natural habit of the human heart ; namely, to keep
God as much in the background as possible, and to shut him out
from any direct and immediate dealing with us. But how

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stands the fact ? The misery and destitution of our population
have existed for years. They have for years been crowded
together in unwholesome localities ; but it is only recently that
the pestilence has appeared, and that too at intervals. While,
therefore, there exist predisposing causes in the condition of the
people at large, let us never forget, that from time to time there
has gone forth a special voice from Jehovah, who " rendereth re
compense to his enemies," to afflict us with this calamity, — that
the destroying angel has received his commission, — and that,
while sanitary measures are right and good, it is not the mere
use of these that will make him sheath his flaming sword.
And is there not something terribly mysterious in the course
of this dread visitant? Its sudden breaking out with fearful
virulence in one place, perhaps the neighbouring locality hardly
touched ; every dwelling on one side of a street entered, and not
one on the opposite side ; one year its ravages greater in one
place than another ; and then the fearful rapidity and -intense
suffering with which it does its work. All these things, brethren,
should surely tell us, with a voice sufficiently distinct, that we
have " fallen into the hand of God."
It is strange indeed that any one who professes to be taught
by the Word of God, should look on the pestilence otherwise
than as a direct chastisement sent from God. If the rain from
heaven is withheld, and the parched ground refuses to give forth
its nourishment, and so bread, the staff of man's life fails ; or if
the windows from on high are opened, and the fruits of the earth
ripen not, or if ripened, are destroyed by floods, and so scarcity
ensues; or if the atmosphere becomes so tainted that a large
proportion of the food of the poor is blighted ;— if in all these
it is manifest that it is God who has commanded and sent them,
shall we not discover his pleading with us in judgment by
"the noisome pestilence?" He has indeed repeatedly linked
together in his Word, — drought, and famine, and pestilence, as
immediately sent by himself; and we would, therefore, do well
to take heed when in this latter visitation God " hath spoken
once, yea, twice" among us.
It is then our privilege this day to turn to our God right
humbly, and to pray to him to avert from us this dire calamity.
Let us do for the nation jirst as we should for a friend suffering

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under some grievous illness. Let us pray that the affliction may
be removed, but specially that it may be sanctified — that the future
may prove that it has been the correction of a tender Father,
not the punishment of an offended God. Let us pray that the
nation may forsake its sins and be turned back again, and so the
the Lord be " entreated for the land."
And let us seek the Lord God, each one for himself, that He
may cleanse away our personal sin by the blood of Jesus — that
our measure of guilt in the national sin may be forgiven for
" his own name's sake," and that he may give us of his grace
to turn from everything that displeases him, and to be more
watchful for the time to come — to walk humbly, consistently,
and closely with God. It is well to have our attention steadily
fixed on everything which is likely to prove salutary to the con
dition of those among us, who may be more exposed than others
generally to the inroads of pestilence ; but doing these things,
let us not leave the other undone. It will be a dark day for our
country, when, under the pretext of mere attention to physical
laws and sanitary reform, we shut out thereby the weightier
matters, — "repentance, and works meet for repentance."
Finally, brethren, I call on you to mark your day of humilia
tion by an act of kindness and love to your poorer brethren.
The district in a portion of this city where your missionary
labours, where you have schools on the week-day and the Sab
bath, and where some of you, I rejoice to say, visit, claims your
support. Among the inhabitants of that district something at
least is being done for their spiritual as well as their temporal
benefit. I beseech you to enlarge and increase the means at
the disposal of the Mission for both these purposes. Set the seal
of an act of love upon your day of humiliation, — not indeed as a
work of merit, but as a thanksgiving for God's sparing mercy to
you, and a token that all that you have is his. In thus doing,
you will tread in the path so strikingly sketched out by the
Prophet, — " Is not this the fast which I have chosen, to loose
the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let
the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke ? Is it not
to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor
that are cast out to thy house ? when thou seest the naked, that
thou cover him, and that thou hide not thyself from thine own

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flesh ?" In such a course as this, beloved, with prayer and
hearty repentance, and " looking unto Jesus" both as your
righteousness and your example, while you look away from your
selves, you will not have humbled yourselves in vain this day for
your country's sins. It may be the Lord will hear from heaven
his dwelling-place, and forgive and send an answer of peace.
But if wrath come upon us to the uttermost, you will be kept in
perfect peace under the shadow of the Almighty, and inherit the
special blessing promised to him who " considers the poor," —
Jehovah will " deliver you in the day of trouble."

SDINBURQH : T. CONSTABLE, TRINTUE TO HER MAJESTY.

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