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No. 407, January 9, 1858.] THE LEADER. 3...
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DEATH OF GENERAL HAVELOCK. TJpoit the ge...
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WORK FOR 1853. Entering now into tho Now...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Workmen In The Church. There Is A Stir O...
of bis future mansion ; you can take him from Iris own dark thoughts of suffering and of penury , the company of the public-house tod the penny theatre , and show him with « that inner eye which no calamity can darken ' the angels of God ' flinging down on the iasper pavement their crowns of amaranth and gold . ' But you will omit the best part of vour task if you fail to lead him back to
his daily life . Becal him from anticipations of the bright future—his garments , like Pilgeim ' s , still shining with the light of another world lead him back to the narrow street and the small room . Teach him that even there he can make an array of pure thoughts to ornament his house ; he can bring imaginings of Heaven to light and to li ghten hourly work :
Who sweeps a floor as in God s sight Makes that and the action fine . It must not be taken as ungenerous if we say that the new movement in the Church has emulation for its mainspring . The Puseyite clergy commenced it . Their theory of a church is Eoman Catholic and despotic ; they would all be high priests , independent of the State and above their congregations . The theory has sometimes worked well—in the middle ages , when monks resisted lawless men , or popes cowed kings . Contrast the pope , in the first days of American discovery , proclaiming Indian slavery an abomination , and modern Protestants truckling to slavery
in the South . In our day we do not like spiritual dictators , and the Puseyites have been unpopular . But if they have been arrogant , it has sometimes been that they arrogated all the hard work of the parish ; that they were brothers and sisters of mercy in truth and reality . The aching heads they have supported , the parched lips they have refreshed , a nd the dying eyes they have cheered , have never thought or expressed horror at their monastic habits and ' glittering cross . ' If the light beauty of Pope ' s heroine could win forgiveness for that symbol worn as a trinket , should not the beauty of holiness in some of the good women of this section of our Church teach us to forgive
them a little fanciful parade r The Evangelical clergy have their own faults and their own merits . They seek too much to make Christianity a claptrap . Instead of drawing the people to church they go into some rather unholy haunts , catch sinners where they congregate , and then they are ' in for a sermon . ' When thousands have heard a sermon , the work is said to be ' successful , ' and it is rejoiced over as if so many souls were saved—as if , in this fast age , souls were saved en masse . And all this while the
churches , sanctified by holy associations and the prayers of successive generations , are deserted and mouldy—echoing the sexton ' s tread and the pew-opener ' s lonely cough . There is in this a seeking after novelty and ' drawing houses ; ' if it flourishes and extends , we shall , in a few years , have Exeter Hall and the Surrey Music Saloon denounced as slow and . unsuitable , while the real fast preacher will insist upon holding forth in Cremornc Gardens , or making his sermon an interlude at the Adelphi . But the Evangelicals have the redeeming merit of not shutting
themselves up in the Church ; they admit Pissentera to co-operation , and they ignore minor differences of doctrine . Their most recen . t-ooncession-. to-tho ^ spirit-oLgoodjACork i s their union with the High Church clergy in this movement of Church services for the working clnsses . When wo see preachers in one series alternately chosen from the rival sections of the Church , we have some slight hope that the groat work to bo done maybe fulfilled by the energies of the Church of England ifcsolf , and that tho Church of England may become in truth the Church of the People of England .
No. 407, January 9, 1858.] The Leader. 3...
No . 407 , January 9 , 1858 . ] THE LEADER . 37
Death Of General Havelock. Tjpoit The Ge...
DEATH OF GENERAL HAVELOCK . TJpoit the general intelligence announced in the- telegraphic despatches from India it would be premature to offer an opinion . "We simply know that General Windham ' s detachment bad received a severe check from the Gwalior rebels , and that the Gwalior rebels themselves were afterwards defeated by Sir Coi-in Campbell , who had marched upon them from L-ucknow . But the dark and definite spot in the news is the loss of General Havelock . That able and gallant
commander had achieved a sudden fame by his intrepid advance upon Cawnpore ,. and the signal services rendered by him to the garrison of Lueknow . He was no common conqueror . Upon the march and in the field he exhibited those noble qualities that endear a soldier to his comrades of all ranks . It is not too much to say that the nation has literally sorrowed over the announcement of his untimely death . But can we really say that the
story of Havelock s career is an encouragement to the young ? Havelock served a lifetime in India ; at forty-three years of age he obtained his company ; at sixty-two he was a colonel . Then arose the Indian mutiny , and men of genius and valour were summoned by events from comparative obscurity . The gallant colonel took command of a column . In eight days he marched a hundred and sixty-five miles , fighting eight battles , and within the last three months of his
life , he led his troops victoriously into ten severe engagements . Was this encouraging , to be a captain at forty-three , and a colonel at sixty-two , and then to begin acquiring a public reputation ? WTien Havelock ' s achievements were known at home , slowly and grudgingly was doled out the official reward . First , a good-service pension ; secondly , after a popular protest , the dignity of a Companion of the Bath ; thirdly , the rank of a field-officer ; fourthly , a knighthood ; fifthly , a baronetcy ; then a
pension ; lastly , the colonelcy of the Buffs . Of the baronetcy , the pension , and colonelcy , he did not live to hear ; the baronetcy dates after his death , the pension has still to be voted ; but Ministerial writers had paraded the lengthening list of rewards as though it redounded to the honour of the administration . But we will suppose a case . Had Sir Kicuakd Airey gone out to India instead of Sir Colin Campbell —this , we believe , was the original scheme of the Horse Guards—and had ho seen a battle , how long would he have waited for a coronet ? scarcel
Havelook ' s services were y paralleled by those of any of his contemporaries . For far less Sir John Keane obtained his peerage . But Havelook had no high friends at court . His was a modest name ; his were the achievements of an unostentatious hero . Living , he did not obtain justice ; dead , he claims a monument . To tho British people it is left to do all that remains in honour of General Sir Henry Havelock , of Cawnporo and Lucknow , a man whose memory the world will not willingly let die . Ilia mortal part may moulder in Indian dust : but to men like Havelook all the world's a monument .
Work For 1853. Entering Now Into Tho Now...
WORK FOR 1853 . Entering now into tho Now Year , in what spin'I shall its work be undertaken P Wo may follow a marked course , or drift with tho tide Drifting was tho principle of 1857 ; 1858 , if not worthless , must bo a year of policy , not in Parliament or tho Cabinet only , but in Ino country . Lot droams bo loft to sleepers unuwakonod ; it is not tho Utopia of time that wo arc approaching . Erom this January forth , until tho borry is rod on tho holly again , tho four seasons will very much rosomblo those
which have just elapsed . And yet , if there is to be no progression , why all these flourishes of trumpets heralding nothing ? We have to atone for our national sins . India has been criminally neglected ; the price lias been paid ; and surely , unless this people be dead to reason and justice , it will tighten the reins of constitutional responsibility in its [ Eastern empire . The records of the next session will show whether Parliament repents of its omissions : and how many times the House of Commons
is counted out by a motion on an Indian subject . If not once , 1858 will be a year of political grace , for the representatives of Great Britain have never hitherto consented to forsake an opera , or suffer a dull speech in the interest of British India . Then , they are summoned to amend the system which makes them what they are—to purify the genesis of the Legislature , to take from family insolence its privilege , from moneyed craft its power , from Government its faculty of curbing popular majorities . We should believe much of the new vear if we
hoped that this task would be honourably undertaken pr consistently carried through . Hitherto , real Conservatism—not the Conservative partyhas been a ponderous , impenetrable mass , and Reform has hung over it like a vapour ; -will the one dissolve and the other become concrete ? Not , we think , in the twelve months , whose revolving march has begun . An optimist eye sees an avatar on the horizon ; but it is a quality of optimism to be dazzled , and it is a quality of the horizon to recede as the explorer advances .
Nevertheless ., the new year can scarcely fail to leave a deep imprint upon history . It must produce an administrative revolution in India , and date in that region as the inauguration of a political epoch . It must bring s to an issue long-pending questions between Great Britain and China , and thus immediately influence the affairs of five hundred millions of people . Nor can it elapse without at least advancing the question of self-government throughout Great Britain , thus cutting off the future from the era opened in 1832 . After a quarter of a century , there will be a new stamp affixed to the principle of Parliamentary Reform , and the concession is due a . d . 185 S . Here are three great works to be carried out—two of war and one of peace . In
India , nothing but complete victory , in all quarters , can terminate the war . We are not fighting an enemy with whom we can open negotiations . Treaties are out of the question . We have to resume our supremacy over several vast provinces of which the military classes are in full revolt . In a spirit of humane equity and politic severity , we have to crush this insurrection , not staining our arms with indiscriminate ' slaughter , yet not so sparing the rebels as to create doubts of our courage or authority . Nothing could be worse than that the mutiny of 1857 should engender in the English mind a feeling of hatred or contempt for the people of India . The insurgent army , whatever have been its crimes , has at least reminded us of our duty .
In China , diplomacy has been set aside . Indeed , a diplomatist in that empire , unaccompanied by a fleet , is a paradox . There , gun-boats negotiate with more success than Excellencies . But , after all , Admiral Seymour is only Lord Eigxn ' s Iron-Maco-iu-Waiting ; his share of the work is to break open the doors of the imperial audience chamber . Afterwards , Lord Elgin will have to break through something more dense than slabs of . gilded cedar , or even Cantonese ramparts twenty tcct thick : a system of restrictive enactments aggravated by habitual insolence and brutality , winch shuts out
our merchants and manufacturers from an immense field of commerce . We have a right to say that , should Canton be captured , it would be madness to restore it , until satisfactory relations had been established wifh the Chinese Empire , admitting our trade into tho interior , and allowing our exporters to compete with thoso AsiUtic artisans who clotho in blue cotton garments three hundred millions of persons . If our oporntions of artillery and diplomacy aro rightly conducted and concluded , the year 1858 will leave its murk upon China . At home , wo lmvo our domestic ouestions , to which scparuto
TftfoTftToirTiniSirBr ^^ and Law Reform , Religious Liberty , Education , Public Works , Administrative and Military linprovonicnts , stand high on tho list ; but , on , tlio threshold of a new year , Id ; us suy , if no spirit of oarncst energy bo thrown into tho work , class interests und jobbery will retain thoir power , and the best that can bo hoped is that tho servants of tho publio will blunder ut times into some nieasuro for ho publio advantage .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 9, 1858, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_09011858/page/13/
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