A REVOLUTIONARY RELIC.
A SERMON,
Preached on the Eve of the Battle of Brandywine, Sept. 10, 1777,
BY THE
REV. JOAB TROUT.
"They that take the Sword, shall perish by the Sword."
Soldiers and Countrymen:--We have met this evening perhaps for the last time. We have shared the toil of the march, the peril of the fight, and the dismay of the retreat, alike; we have endured the cold and hunger, and the contumely of the infernal foe, and the courage of the foreign oppressor. We have sat, night after night, by the camp-fire; we have together heard the roll of the reveille, which called us to duty, or the beat of the tatoo, which gave the signal for the hardy sleep of the soldier, with the earth for his bed, and his knapsack for his pillow.
And now, soldiers and brethren, we have met in the peaceful valley on the eve of the battle, while the sun-light is dying away, behind yonder heights, the sun-light that, to-morrow morn, will glimmer on scenes of blood. We have met amid the whitening tents of our encampment; in time of terror and of gloom, we have gathered together--God grant it may not be the last time.
It is a solemn moment. Brethren, does not the solemn voice of nature seem to echo the sympathies of the hour? The flag of our country droops heavily from yonder staff; the breeze has died away along the green plain of Chadd's Ford--the plain that spreads before us glittering in the sun-light--the heights of the Brandywine arising gloomy and grand beyond the waters of yonder stream--all nature holds a pause of solemn silence on the eve of the uproar, of the blood-shed and strife of to-morrow.
"They that take the sword shall perish by the sword."
And have they not taken the sword?
Let the desolated plain, the blood-sodden valley, the burned farm-house, blackening in the sun, the sacked village, and the ravaged town, answer--let the whitening bones of the butchered farmer strown along the fields of his homestead, answer--let the starving mother, with her babe clinging to her withered breast that can afford no sustenance, let her answer, with the death-rattle mingling with the murmuring tones, that mark the last struggle of life--let the dying mother and her babe answer.
It was but a day past, and our land slept in the quiet of peace. War was not here--wrong was not here. Fraud and wo, and misery and want, dwelt not among us. From the eternal solitude of the green woods, arose the blue smoke of the settler's cabin, and golden fields of corn looked forth from amid the waste of the wilderness, and the glad music of human voices awoke the silence of the forest.
Now, God of Mercy, behold the change! Under the shadow of a pre-text, under the sanctity of the name of God, invoking the Redeemer to their aid, do these foreign hirelings slay our people! They destroy our towns, they darken our plains, and now encompass our posts on the plain of Chadd's Ford.
"They that take the Sword, shall perish by the Sword."
Brethren, think me not unworthy of belief when I tell you the doom of the British is near! Think me not vain, when I tell you that beyond the cloud that now enshrouds us, I see gathering, thick and fast, the darker frown and a blacker storm of Divine indignation!
They may conquer us to-morrow. Might and wrong may prevail, and we may be driven from this field--but the hour of God's own vengeance will come!
Aye, if in the vast solitude of eternal space, if in the heart of the boundless universe, there throbs the being of an awful God, quick to avenge, and sure to punish guilt, then will the man George, of Brunswick, called King, feel in his brain and his heart, the vengeance of the eternal Jehovah! A blight will be upon his life--a withered brain and accursed intellect; a blight will be upon his children, and upon his people. Great God, how dread the punishment!
A crowded populace, peopling the dense towns where the man of money thrives, while the laborer starves; want striding among the people in all its forms of terror; an ignorant and God-defying priesthood chuckling over the miseries of millions; a proud and merciless nobility adding wrong to wrong, and heaping insult upon robbery and fraud; royalty corrupt to the very heart, and aristocracy rotten to the core; crime and want linked hand in hand, and tempting men to deeds of wo and death--these are a part of the doom and retribution that will come upon the English throne and the English people!
Soldiers--I look around upon your familiar faces with a strange interest! To-morrow morning we will all go forth to the battle--for need I tell you that your unworthy minister will march with you, invoking God's aid in the fight, to fight for your homesteads, for your wives and children?
My friends, I might urge you to fight by the galling memories of British wrong. Walton--I might tell you of your butchered father, in the silence of the night, on the plains of Trenton; I might ring his death shriek into your ears. Shellmire--I might tell you of a butchered mother, and a sister outraged; the lonely farm-house, the night assault, the roof in flames, the shout of the troopers as they dispatched their victims; the cries for mercy, the pleadings of innocence for pity. I might paint this all again, in vivid colors of the terrible reality if I thought your courage needed such wild excitement.
But I know you are strong in the might of the Lord. You will march forth to battle on the morrow with light hearts and determined spirits, though the solemn duty--the duty of avenging the dead--may rest heavy on your souls.
And in the hour of battle, when all around is darkness lit by the lurid cannon glare, and the piercing musket flash, when the wounded strew the ground, and the dead litter your path, then remember, soldiers, that God is with you. The eternal God fights for you--he rides on the battle cloud--he sweeps onward with the march of the hurricane charge--God, the awful and the infinite, fights for you, and will triumph.
"They that take the Sword, shall perish by the Sword."
You have taken the sword, but not in the spirit of wrong and ravage. You have taken the sword for your homes, for your wives, for your little ones. You have taken the sword for truth, for justice and right, and to you the promise is--be of good cheer, for your foes have taken the sword in defiance of all that man holds dear, in blasphemy of God--they shall perish by the sword.
And now, brethren and soldiers, I bid you all farewell. Many of us may fall in the battle of to-morrow. God rest the souls of the fallen--many of us may live to tell the story of the fight to-morrow, and in the memory of all will ever rest and linger the quiet scene of the autumnal night.
Solemn twilight advances over the valley; the woods on the opposite heights fling their long shadows over the green of the meadows; around us are the tents of the continental hosts, the suppressed bustle of the camp, the hurried tramp of the soldiers to and fro among the tents, stillness and awe that marks the eve of battle.
When we meet again, may the shadow of twilight be flung over a peaceful land. God in Heaven grant it.
Prayer for the Revolution!
Great Father, we bow before thee; we invoke thy blessings, we deprecate thy wrath; we return thee thanks for the past, and we ask thy aid for the future. For we are in times of trouble, oh, Lord! and sore beset by foes, merciless and unpitying. The sword gleams over our land, and the dust of the soil is dampened with the blood of our neighbors and friends.
Oh! God of Mercy, we pray thy blessing on the American arms. Make the man of our hearts strong in thy wisdom; bless, we beseech thee, with renewed life and strength, our hope, and thy instrument, even GEORGE WASHINGTON. Shower thy counsels on the Honorable, the CONTINENTAL CONGRESS; visit the tents of our host; comfort the soldier in his wounds and afflictions; nerve him for the fight; prepare him for the hour of death. And in the hour of defeat, God of Hosts, do thou be our stay, and in the hour of triumph, be thou our guide. Teach us to be merciful. Though the memory of galling wrongs be at our hearts, knocking for admittance, that they may fill us with desire of revenge, yet, let us, oh, Lord! spare the vanquished, though they never spared us, in the hour of butchery and bloodshed. And in the hour of death, do thou guide us to the abode prepared for the blest; so shall we return thanks unto thee through Christ our Redeemer-God prosper the cause. Amen.
The above is from an old copy in the possession of Henry Stevens, Esq., Burlington, Vt.
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