BV 4235 .E8 Z5 
 Zincke, F. Barham 1817-1893 
 The duty and the discipline 
 of extemporary preaching 
 
 ^ STATiniurB 
 
ON EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
THE 
 
 DUTY AND THE DISCIPLINE 
 
 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING, 
 
 BT , 
 
 F. BARHAM^mCKE, 
 
 TICAR OF T7HERSTEAD, AND CHAPLAIN IN ORDINARY TO THE QUEEN. 
 
 THE FIKST AMERICAN FROM THE SECOND LONDON EDITION. 
 
 NEM^ YORK: 
 CHARLES SORIBNER & CO, 
 
 1867. 
 
 PUBLISHED BT ARRANGEMENT WITH TH2 AUTHOR. 
 
JaS. E. llODGERS, 
 
 Electrotyper and Printer, 
 Philadelphia. 
 
 Press of 
 The New York Printing Co. 
 
2^>?;caiScT(^}i: 
 
 NOTE TO THE AMERICAN READER. 
 
 In publishing in the United States a second Edition 
 of the present work, I ask permission for a few words 
 of explanation. It is evident that the following pages 
 were written for English readers; and especially for 
 the members of the Church of England. I have not 
 thought it advisable in bringing the work out in America, 
 to make any alterations in this respect. I am not suf- 
 ficiently acquainted with the methods and style of 
 Preaching in the American Churches to enable me to 
 make any attempt to address myself directly to those 
 who minister in those Churches. I have only heard 
 from competent judges that their general style of 
 preaching is in advance of ours ; and that this in a 
 great measure arises from their having paid more at- 
 tention to Extemporary Preaching than we have. 
 Here therefore we have probably rather to learn of 
 them than they of us. 
 
 My leaving, however, everything in this Edition 
 
VI TO THE AMERICAN READER. 
 
 just as it is addressed to English Churchmen, will 
 have for our American brethren the advantage of ena- 
 bling them to understand to some extent which is the 
 existing state of things, and of practice, and what are 
 some of the ideas now at work in the Church of the 
 Old Country. 
 
 I have ahvays lived in the hope of some day being 
 able to visit the Great Republic, that I might see, and 
 judge for myself of the various aspects of Society in 
 what is the last, and bids fair to be the greatest work 
 of Time. Nor have I entirely laid aside the hope of 
 being yet able to accomplish this long cherished wish. 
 The more the two people see of each other, the better, 
 I believe, it will be for each. May God speed equally 
 on both sides of the Atlantic every effort to improve in 
 any way Man's Estate. 
 
 The events of last summer added a fourth to the 
 great, progressive, growing, imperial powers of the 
 world. Of these four three are now Teutonic. In 
 the face of these four great Powers the stationary and 
 even retrograde Latin race ceases to be of any real 
 weight in the affairs of the world. Their role is played 
 out. The destinies of mankind have passed into other 
 hands. And if it be in the Future that the sceptre 
 of the world shall be held by the Western Continent, 
 and that it shall become the centre of mental activity, 
 and the home of moral and social progress, then the 
 
TO THE AMERICAN READER. vii 
 
 Parent, his own day not having been ill-spent, may 
 well rejoice to see his vigorous Child advancing still 
 farther along the old familiar path ; and as has ever 
 been the custom of the race, teaching the nations how 
 to live. 
 
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 On looking over my completed Avork I feel that it 
 argument and recommendations are so presented a& 
 almost to assume tlie character of a chapter of Mental 
 Autobiography. This has been done to a far greater 
 extent than was contemplated in the forecast of the 
 book. I find in fiict that I have given but little heed 
 to the proverbial caution, if I may be allowed a ref- 
 erence to it here, against admitting spectators behind 
 the scenes; and which ought to be observed most 
 carefully when the indiscretion to be guarded against 
 is that of revealing what passes behind the scenes of a 
 man's own mind. But I shall not regret having neg- 
 lected it, if by so doing I shall have been enabled to 
 impart to the treatment of my subject some of that 
 kind of interest, which it could not have possessed, 
 had it been dealt with in an abstract and impersonal 
 form. Perhaps, also, it will be better that what I 
 submit to the consideration of my brethren in the 
 Sacred Ministry, should not be set forth didactically, 
 but as the experience of a brother Minister of the 
 Word. At all events, whatever may be the estimate 
 viii 
 
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. IX 
 
 put on mj specific recommendations, most people will, 
 I suppose, agree with me in thinking that it would be 
 of advantage to the Church that some effort be made, 
 and that is mj aim, to improve the delivery of the 
 spoken Word. 
 
 I take this opportunity to say that in the Notes 
 and Studies of Sermons, which form the latter part 
 of the volume, I had but one object in view — that of 
 illustrating in some particulars my previous remarks 
 on Preaching. In selecting the Sermons that seemed 
 suitable for this purpose from those I preached during 
 the time I was engaged in writing the first part of the ' 
 book, I passed by all that were of a purely doctrinal 
 character, because I shrank from dissecting, and from 
 regarding, in a rhetorical light, the treatment of the 
 most sacred of all subjects. 
 
 Many are asking how the efficiency of the Church 
 may be so increased as to enable her to meet the 
 peculiar and pressing difficulties of the times. No 
 one would think of limiting the reply to any single 
 measure, or recommendation. The following pages 
 endeavor to direct attention to vrhat I would beg per- 
 mission to call a more instructed, and if so, then a 
 more fruitful use of the oldest and most necessary of 
 all the means that have been committed to the Church 
 for enabling her to propagate the Faith. 
 
 Wherstead Vicarage, 
 Oct. 1, 18G0. 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 Several readers of the first edition of this work have 
 asked what proportion of the Clergy I suppose capa- 
 ble of becoming Extemporary Preachers? This may 
 mean, either what proportion of the existing body of 
 the Clergy, many of whom, of course, are now inca- 
 pacitated in one way or another for making the at- 
 tempt ; or it may mean what proportion of another 
 generation who may be supposed to enter Holy Orders 
 with the knowledge that they must, if possible, preach 
 in this manner, and, therefore, who will all make the 
 attempt to satisfy public opinion on the point. I have 
 heard this question answered by another. Every 
 Barrister acquires the power of speaking in public, 
 and as the education of the two Professions is the 
 same, why should not every clergyman? This is not 
 a complete reply, because in respect of the point in 
 question the two cases are not precisely similar. No 
 one becomes a Barrister who supposes that he has any 
 disqualification for speaking in public; while many 
 who believe, with or without reason, that they labor 
 under disqualifications of this kind enter Holy Orders. 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. XI 
 
 Besides tlie subjects the Clergyman lias to handle are 
 inuch more difficult to speak upon than the matters of 
 fact on wliich the Barrister founds his addresses. And 
 the style, too, of speaking required of the Clergyman, 
 demands more accuracy of expression, more smooth- 
 ness, and more finish. Against this, however, we may 
 set, for what it is worth, the consideration that the 
 pulpit the Clergyman must enter every Sunday sup- 
 plies to him, from the beginning of his career, more 
 constant opportunities for practice than the bar does 
 to young Barristers. And in large parishes, there 
 are many occasions, and in all some, besides the regular 
 Sunday Sermons, upon which addresses of one kind or 
 another are now required from a Clergyman. 
 
 But I would ask any one of my reverend brethren, 
 who may be disposed to take a lower estimate than I 
 do of the capacity in this respect of the Clergy, to call 
 over mentally the muster-roll of the Incumbents of the 
 Deanery to which he belongs, considering, as he goes 
 along, what kind of a Preacher each would probably 
 have become had he through several years (and in this 
 matter little can be done in a year or two) set himself 
 resolutely to the task of acquiring the mastery of his 
 general subject, and of the particular subject of each 
 discourse, together with a proper understanding of 
 the best way of presenting what he has to say to the 
 minds of the congregation. Whoever will make this 
 survey of his neighbors, will, I think, come to the 
 
Xll PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 conclusion that in the case of almost every individual, 
 something far better than his present power of de- 
 livering the Word would have been attained. In 
 some, of course, this point would be very far in ad- 
 vance of what it would be in others ; and some would 
 require a much shorter time to reach it than others ; 
 but, in every case, the gains would presumably be very 
 great. No one would doubt that it would be so in 
 writing. But as speaking is the most natural method 
 of communicating thought and feeling, while writing 
 is, if not an artificial method, at all events a less na- 
 tural one, I believe that every one who has become, 
 or who would have become, a moderately good writer, 
 which is the alternative supposed, would with the 
 same amount of pains, I cannot but think a less 
 amount, have become a moderately good speaker. 
 We must suppose a considerable amount of pains 
 taken, because a Clergyman, with a view to properly 
 qualifying himself for his sacred office of delivering 
 the Word of God, cannot give himself less trouble 
 than artists, barristers, literary men, or those who be- 
 long to any secular occupation do, to perfect them- 
 selves in the work of their professions or trades. If 
 then this were begun early and resolutely persevered 
 in, I believe the cases would be very few in which the 
 Clergyman would fail in the power of grasping his 
 subject with sufficient firmness, and of expressing with 
 sufficient correctness and readiness what he had firmly 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. XIU 
 
 grasped, for a discourse of half an hour. There is no 
 question in these pages except of Clergymen who en- 
 deavor conscientiously to do their duty; it is, there- 
 fore, conceded that the writer of Sermons goes on year 
 after year taking pains with the composition of his 
 sermons, and doing this part of his work to the best 
 of his ability. Imagine then, that instead of these 
 pains having been bestowed on writing only, he had 
 labored with equal honesty and perseverance at the 
 other method of preparation and delivery; and what- 
 ever success would have attended him as a writer, 
 would also, I presume, and generally to a higher de- 
 gree, have attended him as a speaker. 
 
 I remember having been told by the present Bishop 
 of British Columbia, (he was then incumbent of Great 
 Yarmouth) that he had up to that time engaged 
 twenty-seven curates — he kept what might be called a 
 corps of six — and that in engaging each, he had stipu- 
 lated for a certain amount of Extemporary Preaching. 
 The rule was that the new comer was to commence 
 with school-room expositions, and week-day lectures; 
 and that after some months of this preliminary work 
 he must preach without book once on the Sunday. 
 Dr. Hills had found that in every case of this large 
 number of curates, no matter what the man's antece- 
 dents, or disposition, or habits; no matter how timid, 
 or studious, or unstudious, he might have been, the 
 
XIV PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 desired result had been attained. The man became 
 capable of speaking in public. In this matter, I would 
 not, however, apply the iron rule the incumbent of 
 Great Yarmouth did, and with such complete success. 
 Perhaps it would be better that public opinion should 
 require of every Minister of the Word (a point towards 
 which I think we are moving) that he should endeavor 
 to the best of his ability, to attain to the most effective 
 method of addressing a congregation on the things that 
 belong: unto their salvation. If, under such a state of 
 things, one out of three should fail to attain his direct 
 object, still he will have received no injury, either 
 morally or intellectually, from having made the at- 
 tempt; and the Church will be a very great gainer 
 from the success of the other two. 
 
 One word more. We are obliged to presume that 
 every youth who is admitted to Holy Orders, is already 
 qualified for preaching the Word. At all events, it is 
 our practice to exact it indiscriminately from all from 
 the day of their ordination. This may be, and probably 
 is, under the circumstances of the case, a necessity. 
 It may also be really the wisest thing to do — to set the 
 young Minister to work to learn this part of his duty 
 in the best way for learning any thing, that is by 
 doing it. A main part of the aim of the following 
 pa.ges is to convince the understanding and the con- 
 science of those about to seek, or who have lately 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. XV 
 
 been admitted to Holy Orders, that, however earnest 
 and devoted they may be, still they have many years 
 of hard intellectual work in prospect, before they can 
 hope to become thoroughly furnished and able Min- 
 isters of the Word. 
 
C^^TV OT rnnc, 
 
 ^*?/calS9A^ 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Note to the American reader v 
 
 Preface to the first edition viii 
 
 Preface to the second edition x 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 MY OWN MOTIVES AND REASONS FOR PREACHING EX TEMPORE. 
 
 SOME OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 
 
 SECTION. PAGE. 
 
 1. Object and plan of the work 1 
 
 2. "Why confined to the wi'iter's personal experience ... 2 
 
 3. Difi&culties of sermon-writing at the beginning of my 
 
 clerical life. My first year 3 
 
 4. The six following years 5 
 
 5 — 7. Become persuaded that it would be better to preach 
 
 ex tempore, than to read written sermons .... 6 
 
 8. Reasons that weighed with me. Sermons often spoken 
 
 disparagingly of. Not so with other kinds of public 
 speaking 9 
 
 9. Fondness for hearing public speaking a characteristic of 
 
 European civilization 10 
 
 10. Why so 11 
 
 11. The advantages the preacher possesses for public 
 
 speaking 12 
 
 12. Good preachers would be of much service to the Church 13 
 13 — 16. Shown by the history of the Church ib. 
 
 17. The Minister of the Word cannot be, what he ought to be, 
 
 a Teacher, unless he be able to speak in public . . IG 
 
 18. This his speciality; for good moral character is required 
 
 of the laity as well as of the clergy 18 
 
 19. Its utility to the clergy at vestry and other parochial and 
 
 public meetings 21 
 
 20. Useful also as it enables them to give lectures .... 22 
 
 2* xvii 
 
XVlll CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION. PAGE. 
 
 21. Of more use to our Clergy tlian to tlie Priest of the Church 
 
 of Rome or Dissenting Ministers 23 
 
 22. We should acquire this power out of consideration for 
 
 the wishes of our parishioners 25 
 
 23. Not an answer, that the Church does not formally require 
 
 this of the Clergy 27 
 
 24 — 2G. Why we must consider the wants and wishes of the 
 
 lower classes 29 
 
 27. How the question — Which is best, to read written ser- 
 
 mons, or to preach ex tempore ? ought to be put . . 33 
 
 28. Extemporary Preaching secures continuous study and 
 
 improvement 35 
 
 29. As it presupposes writing, it will also secure accuracy . 38 
 
 30. This is the natural and most impressive method of delivery 39 
 
 31. Answer to the objection, that it is an offering which 
 
 costs nothing 41 
 
 32. And that it takes too much time. It is not learning a 
 
 sermon by rote, but mastering the subject .... 43 
 
 33. It is a security against verbal repetitions 44 
 
 34. It is too earnest and direct for some hearers .... 45 
 
 35. False inferences in favor of reading, from false analogies 4G 
 
 36. The true Preacher very different from the popular Preacher 4G 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 MY OWN METHOD O? ACQUIRING THE POWER OF PREACIIING 
 EX TEMPORE. 
 
 1. The method I adopted. How sermons for Extemporary 
 
 Preaching should be studied and composed ... 49 
 
 2. Necessity of previous study and composition .... 51 
 
 3. Sermons written for reading proved quite unfit for Ex- 
 
 temporary Preaching, 54 
 
 4. Advisable to prepare MSS. for Extemporary Preaching on 
 
 all Scriptures upon which one would wish to preach 55 
 
 5. Result of twelve years' experience. The Extemporary 
 
 Preacher will never preach the same sermon twice . 56 
 
 6. The chief difficulty is to make the first effort .... 58 
 
 7. What feelings harder to bear than the distress of having 
 
 to speak ex tempore 60 
 
CONTENTS. Xix 
 
 SECTION. PAGE. 
 
 8. In some cases Exposition may be nsed as training for Ex- 
 
 temporary Preaching GO 
 
 9. Reflections and hints on the actual practice of Extemporary 
 
 Preaching suggested. The years 1854, 1855, 185G . 64 
 
 10. The year 1857 66 
 
 11. The same year continued 71 
 
 12. The year 1858 , 73 
 
 13. The year 1850 76 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SOME REMARKS ON THE COJIPOSITION OF SERMONS. 
 
 1. Composition of sermons — their effectiveness depends 
 
 upon it 78 
 
 2 — 3. They must, first of all, be vertebrate compositions . ib 
 
 4 To be regarded as works of art of a high order ... 79 
 
 5. Must have unity of purpose 80 
 
 6. What better in sermons than natural eloquence . ! . 82 
 7 — 10, Respective claims of ordinary phraseology and that 
 
 of our English Bible 83 
 
 11. Openings of sermons will generally be composed last . . 87 
 
 12. Further remarks on the opening sentence 88 
 
 13 — 15. Concluding sentence difficult, and of different kinds ib 
 
 16. What to be avoided in conclusions 90 
 
 17. Uniformity of plan to be avoided. How. Announcement 
 
 of divisions to be avoided 92 
 
 18. Repetition of ideas to be avoided 93 
 
 19. Exhortation necessary — in what it consists 94 
 
 20. Light and shade necessary 96 
 
 21. 22. Correct emphasis. Natural in speaking, diflficult in 
 
 reading ib 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SOME REMARKS ON THE AIMS AND SUBJECTS OF SERMONS. 
 
 1. Subjects and aims of Modern Preaching. Several epochs 
 
 in the history of the Church. Each has its own dis- 
 tinctiye character 102 
 
 2. The character of the age must be attended to. The safe- 
 
 guard provided against carrying this to an extreme. 102 
 
XX CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION, PAGE. 
 
 3. How Christ is all in all in the Word. He must be so to 
 
 the Preacher 105 
 
 4. It would be mischievous, if it were possible, to revive a 
 
 bj^gone epoch 106 
 
 5. Sermons must not be regarded as Confessions of Faith . 109 
 
 6. Nor, on the other hand, as mere Bridgewater Treatises, 
 
 or moral essays Ill 
 
 7. How the preacher must regard the increased scientitic 
 
 knowledge and the historical and Biblical criticism 
 
 of the present day Ill 
 
 8. He must consider the change in the relation of the intel- 
 
 ligence of the congregation to that of the preacher . 113 
 
 9. Also the enlargement of the means of instruction . . . 114 
 
 10. These changes suggest the justice of some of the common 
 
 complaints against sermons 114 
 
 11. Aims of different kinds of preachers. Those who aim at 
 
 strictly theological instruction. Those who take 
 wider views 115 
 
 12. Those who aim at awakening religious emotion . . .116 
 
 13. Those who regard sermons as a department of the Belles 
 
 Letires 117 
 
 14. Those who disparage sermons 118 
 
 15. Those who regard sermons as a part of the service. 
 
 Those who regard them as a part of their duty • .119 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SOME REMARKS 0\ THE PLACE ASSIGNED TO PREACHING IN THE 
 WORD OF GOD, AND IN OUR SERVICE. 
 
 1. The place assigned to preaching in the Word. First in 
 
 the Old Dispensation 120 
 
 2. Then in the New 122 
 
 3. Preacher, how far synonymous with prophet .... 123 
 
 4. The want of preachers still, and always will be, great . 124 
 
 5. Answer to the disparaging remark, that people do not go 
 
 to Church to hear sermons, but to pray 127 
 
 6. And that hearing sermons is inferior to praying . . . 128 
 
 7. A cause for these objections 
 
 The fault of giving sermons too prominent a place in the 
 
 service 130 
 
CONTENTS. XXI 
 
 SECTION. PAGE. 
 
 8. Proper length of sermons. Bad effects of making them 
 
 too long 131 
 
 9. Modern failure in making the Church attractive . . . 133 
 
 10. The fault not in human nature, which, as all history- 
 
 shows, has a strong instinct for united worship . . 133 
 
 11. Nor in Christianity 13G 
 
 12. Those who are repelled, say it is because what is pre- 
 
 sented'to them is not so much a religion as a form . 137 
 
 13. This intelligible, and not unreasonable or irreligious . .138 
 
 14. Christianity, as presented by Jesus Christ and the Apostle 
 
 to the Gentiles, had power to convert the world . .139 
 
 15. The satisfying plenteousness of God's house, as appre- 
 
 hended by the Psalmist 1-iO 
 
 16. The excellence of our form of public worship, as compared 
 
 with those services which make too much of preaching 141 
 
 17. And with those which disparage it 142 
 
 18. IIow the different factors of a religious service are bal- 
 
 anced in our Liturgy 143 
 
 19. The effect of this admirable service may be weakened 
 
 through faults in those who conduct it 144 
 
 20. The high and responsible duty of the Minister of the 
 
 Word in this matter 144 
 
 ITOTES FOE SIX SERMOTTS. 
 
 WITH OBSERVATIONS TPON EACH. 
 
 The object of giving these sermons, and of the observations that 
 accompany them, is to illustrate what has been said in the pre- 
 vious part of the work upon the composition of sermons, and 
 upon the way in which the modern preacher should treat his 
 subject. 
 
 SERMON I. 
 
 Isaiah xxviii. 10. — Here a little, and there a little .... 151 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon • 162 
 
XXll CONTENTS. 
 
 SERMON II. 
 
 2 Corinthians xi, 23— 27.— Wliat we are to seek in life . .168 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon 179 
 
 SERMON III. 
 
 Luke xi. 24 — 26. — The return of the unclean spirit . . . .185 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon ....... 194 
 
 SERMON TV. 
 
 Acts X. 1, 2. — The Centurion of Cresarea 196 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon 211 
 
 SERMON V. 
 
 Matthew viii. 10, 13 — The Centurion of Capernaum . . . 215 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon 224 
 
 SERMON VI. 
 
 Luke iii. 10 — 14. — The sense of sin and the sense of duty- 
 lead to Faith 227 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon 241 
 
 SIX SHORT STUDIES FOR SERMONS. 
 STUDY I. 
 
 Deuteronomy vii. 6, 7. — God has important work for the least 
 
 among us 245 
 
 STUDY II. 
 
 Deuteronomy xii. 8. — Some limitations to self-will .... 248 
 
CONTENTS. XXIU 
 
 STUDY III. 
 
 Psalm cvi. 14, 15. — "We tempt God hy our desires .... 250 
 
 STUDY IV. 
 
 John xviii. 38.— What is truth ? 253 
 
 STUDY V. 
 
 James ii. 10. — The offender in one point 256 
 
 STUDY VI. 
 
 1 John iv. 8. — God is revealed to us by our hearts .... 260 
 
01 EXTEMPORARY PREACHmG. 
 
 I DO not propose to write in the follow- ^- Object 
 
 and plan of 
 
 ing pages a treatise upon Preaching, for the work, 
 many treatises have already been written on this 
 subject, without, I believe, proving of the use their 
 writers contemplated. A failure of this kind might 
 have been anticipated, from the fact that the writer 
 of a treatise endeavors to take a complete view of his 
 subject, and therefore devotes a large part of his 
 work to what has little or no connection with the cir- 
 cumstances of the times and the wants of his readers. 
 Both my object and my method of procedure will be 
 different from those of the writer of a treatise. I 
 shall limit myself to the aim of submitting to those 
 among my clerical brethren who read their sermons, 
 first some considerations in favor of Extemporary 
 Preaching, and then a method by which in many in- 
 stances the power of Extemporary Preaching may be 
 attained even by those who may not make the at- 
 
Z EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 tempt to acquire it till middle life has been reached. 
 In doing this I shall have to offer some suggestions 
 on the composition and aims of sermons, and to touch 
 upon some other matters connected with mj subject. 
 2. Why In carryinsf out my plan I shall only 
 
 confined to . . 
 
 the writer's speak of those questions which I found my- 
 experience, sclf called upon to solve, and of those diffi- 
 culties with which I was myself confronted, in my ef- 
 forts to carry out what I am about to recommend to 
 others. Every body must feel repugnance to speak 
 about himself, particularly on such a subject; and I 
 trust that my readers, before we part company, will 
 have come to understand why I am setting myself to 
 do what I should have as much disinclination for as 
 any of themselves, had I not what I consider a suffi- 
 cient motive. I know that in what I shall have to 
 say about myself there is nothing of any interest or 
 importance to make it worth repeating for its own 
 sake; and if I had not in view an object which I 
 think it very desirable to promote, and which 1 thmk 
 may be promoted in this way, I should not have a 
 word to say about any thing I thought or attempted. 
 People who are entering on any course will generally 
 find something serviceable in the experience of those 
 who have gone before; and what the events and 
 thoughts of the day have brought one clergyman to 
 feel, others may now be feeling more or less dis- 
 tinctly; and some, perhaps, may find that the course 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. ^ 
 
 the writer of these pages adopted for carrying out his 
 convictions may be pursued successfully by them- 
 selves. At all events, I trust that my way of treat- 
 ing the subject will save the reader from some useless 
 discussions and unnecessary considerations. 
 
 I was ordained in the year 1840 to the 3- Difficul- 
 ties of ser- 
 curacy of Andover, in Hampshire, a town mon writing 
 
 containing a population of between four ning of my 
 and five thousand souls, inclusive of two or ^y^first ^ 
 three outlying hamlets, in one of which y®^^'* 
 was a chapel of ease to the church in the town. But 
 I confine myself to the subject of Preaching. Two 
 sermons were required of me each Sunday. I began 
 this part of my work, as I suppose was generally the 
 case at that time, perfectly unprepared. I had not a 
 single written sermon; nor had I ever attempted to 
 write one, or in any way given the subject of sermon- 
 WTiting a thought. I had supposed that, as I had 
 some fondness for literary pursuits, I should find no 
 difiiculty in doing this part of my work. So I had 
 thought. In the first week, however, I discovered 
 that I was greatly mistaken. An historical or criti- 
 cal essay, of such calibre as might be expected from 
 one of my years, or a copy of Latin verses, would 
 have been an easier task for me than writing a ser- 
 mon proved to be. At the time, I thought this was 
 to be attributed to want of familiarity with my sub- 
 ject, and with the style of composition it required. 
 
4 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 The experiencej however, of twenty-five years has 
 shown me that I was only partially right in this sup- 
 position. I now know that sermon-writing requires a 
 greater variety of qualifications than perhaps any 
 other kind of composition, and is therefore propor- 
 tionately difiicult. A sermon, just like all other 
 literary work that is presented to the attention of the 
 public, demands a certain amount of literary skill. 
 This should never be wanting; and educated people 
 have a right to complain when they find a clergyman 
 undertaking the ofiice of a public teacher and 
 preacher without this indispensable requisite. But 
 besides this it is necessary that he should possess a 
 considerable amount of logical acumen, because every 
 sermon may be regarded as the preacher's exposition 
 of a portion of what has come to be a very compli- 
 cated system of theology — of a system, at all events, 
 which is controverted at every point. Another re- 
 quirement is some acquaintance with what is under- 
 stood by the term human nature, because the preacher 
 has to deal with man's feelings and instincts, and 
 with the secret springs of conduct, both with what is 
 degrading and defiling, and with his purest and 
 highest aspirations. A certain amount also of elo- 
 quence, or at least of the power of so speaking as to 
 secure the attention, is requisite; for a sermon is an 
 address to a present audience for the very purpose of 
 moving and persuading them. I may also add, that 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHIXG. 5 
 
 if the preacher be unacquainted with the many very 
 important questions arising out of the recent enlarge- 
 ments of our historical, critical, philological, and 
 scientific knowledge, questions which are ever being 
 discussed in society, he will adopt a tone in his 
 preaching which Avill necessarily fail to conciliate the 
 attention of the most thous^htful and best informed 
 of his congregation. When I commenced sermon- 
 writing, I was but scantily provided with any of 
 these qualifications, and wholly unprovided with some 
 of them ; and, as I had to produce two sermons each 
 week, it will not surprise any one that I found the 
 task a very difficult one, and one which I was only 
 able to perform in a very unsatisfactory manner. 
 I remained at Andover a year, and 4. The six 
 
 following 
 
 then removed to the joint curacies of two years, 
 small contiguous parishes in the neighborhood of Ips- 
 wich. In the year I was at Andover I managed by 
 very hard work, to write nearly one hundred sermons; 
 but I was so ashamed of them, that on going to my new 
 curacy I destroyed them, thinking that after a year's 
 practice I must be able to write something less un- 
 worthy of my subject. I remained in this double 
 curacy for six years, having on each Sunday to per- 
 form one service in each parish. As the two villages 
 were very close to each other, a part of my morning 
 and afternoon congregations was composed of the 
 same persons. During the time I remained in these 
 1* 
 
6 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 curacies I wrote three hundred sermons. I then be- 
 came Incumbent of one of these two parishes, that of 
 Wherstead. 
 5. Become I liad now been seven years in Holy 
 
 persuaded 
 
 that it would Orders; all that time I had labored 
 
 be better to . . i i i 
 
 preach ex- honestly at sermon -writing, and had 
 toTead'writ^ thought much on the subject; but my 
 ten sermons, thought, labor, and experience, had only 
 brought me to the conclusion, that to hear written 
 sermons read was unprofitable to the congregation, 
 and that to read such sermons was very unsatisfactory 
 to the Minister. In short, I had come to regard 
 reading written sermons as labor almost entirely 
 thrown away. Sunday after Sunday the same 
 thoughts and feelings recurred to me. As I pre- 
 pared for the service, while I wa-s in the pulpit, and 
 as, when the service was over, I returned from the 
 church, there w^ould come into my mind the thought, 
 What wretched work these sermons are ! I was sure 
 the congregation took but little interest in them; and 
 so that the benefit derived from them could only be 
 indirect, and very small. I thought that they might 
 perhaps keep up and possibly sometimes add a little 
 to the knovfledge of the hearer; but that this, if 
 done, might be said to be done against his will, 
 for I saw clearly enough that no one was intent on 
 what was read. My thoughts and reflections on this 
 subject invariably brought me to the same conclusion, 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. i 
 
 that tlicre was but one remedy for this unsatisfactory- 
 way of going on, and that was to preach to the 
 people, and not to read to them. 
 
 I became so convinced of the unprofitableness ^• 
 of reading written sermons, that I ceased to write any 
 more, and for the six following years the time I had 
 hitherto given to sermon-writing I spent otherwise. 
 This of course only made the sermons I con- 
 tinued to read still more unprofitable to the congre- 
 gation, and still more irksome to myself, for we 
 cannot take any interest in what we think slightingly 
 of. My convictions, however, as to the remedy were 
 growing into a practical form, or rather my con- 
 victions as to the certainty of the remedy were 
 forcing me to devise some method for applying it. I 
 put it in this way because I vras well aware that I did 
 not possess any of that readiness either of thought or 
 of language which are necessary for extemporary 
 speaking, and that my somewhat studious life had 
 aggravated my natural deficiencies in these respects. 
 I was what is called a nervous man; and having now 
 reached my thirty-eighth year without ever having 
 addressed to any audience half-a-dozen words except 
 what was down in writing before me, the difficulties 
 of carrying out what I savf to be right had appeared 
 to me quite insuperable. Still I had gone on arguing 
 with myself — " It is the right thing to do, and there- 
 fore it ought to be attempted at all hazards and in- 
 
8 EXTEMPORARY PREACHIXG. 
 
 conveniences. No matter how disagreeable it may be, 
 no matter wliat the amount of labor it may entail 
 upon me, as it is the right thing to do, I must do it." 
 I recall these difficulties that lay in my own path that 
 any one of my brethren who may be supposing that 
 insuperable difficulties are lying in his path, may be 
 encouraged to think, that if he will honestly and per- 
 severingly endeavor to overcome them, he will in the 
 end succeed. I believe that very few will have 
 greater difficulties to contend with than the writer of 
 these pages had. If I had any advantage at all, it 
 was that the practice I had had in writing would, to 
 a great extent, save me from glaring inaccuracies of 
 expression, and to some extent also from bad logic. 
 But these are advantages which are not to be gained 
 exclusively by the practice of writing; many who 
 have written much, express themselves badly and are 
 bad reasoners; and many who have never written 
 any thing, express themselves correctly and reason 
 well. 
 
 7. At the beginning, then, of the year 1854, after 
 fourteen years' experience of the failure of the 
 method of reading written discourses, I resolved that, 
 cost what it might, I would give the remedy a fair 
 trial, and that the trial should be this, — that for the 
 next ten years I would not read a sermon ; and that 
 I would not do this in a partial manner from which 
 little could be- inferred, but that I would do it com- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 9 
 
 pletely and thoroughly, for that during that time I 
 would never once refer to any abstract or notes of 
 any kind. I determined to read my text from the 
 Bible itself (immediately afterwards closing the book, 
 that I might not be tempted to make use of memo- 
 randa), and then to preach to the congregation from 
 what I had upon the subject in the stores of my own 
 mind. This would be giving the proposed remedy a 
 real and eiiectual trial. It is now twelve years since 
 I entered on this course. T have never in my own 
 church deviated from it for a single service. The 
 labor involved in carrying it out has been very con- 
 siderable. It was so, particularly at first. But I 
 never repented, nor do I now repent, of having made 
 the attempt; and my congregation, I trust, are not 
 dissatisfied with the result. 
 
 I will presently state the method I 8. Reasons 
 
 -■• '' that weigh- 
 
 adopted for carrying out my resolution ; eel with me. 
 
 Sermons 
 
 but I will first revert to some of the con- often spoken 
 
 . -1 . ^ • ^ 1 M X T- • disparaging- 
 
 siderations which, while I was being i^^f^ Not so 
 brought to that resolution, were ever re- tinds^of'pub- 
 curring to my mind, and which indeed I ^^^ speaking. 
 may say brought me to it. I recollect frequently 
 saying to myself, Sermons, we hear on all sides, have 
 very little effect; that portion of our current litera- 
 ture which deals with what is passing day by day 
 amongst us, is ever speaking of sermons in a tone of 
 disparagement, as dull and uninteresting beyond any 
 
10 EXTEMPORAEY PREACHING. 
 
 thing else that we are expected to listen to; and this 
 is only the echo of what we hear in society, and par- 
 ticularly in that portion of society which is most cul- 
 tivated and intellectual. Yet every body knows how 
 fond Englishmen are of listening to public speaking. 
 Our public meetings, public dinners, addresses, lec- 
 tures, and other things of the kind "in numbers, 
 numberless," are very much the result merely of the 
 desire to obtain an opportunity for hearing some one 
 who is known to be able to speak in public. Even 
 though, as a speaker, he may be below mediocrity, 
 still the general feeling is, that it is better to have 
 even bad speaking than none at all. The mind, just 
 like the body, craves for food; and no kind of mental 
 food appears to give such general satisfaction as that 
 which is supplied by public speaking. 
 9. Fond- This is often regarded by ourselves as 
 
 ness for 
 
 hearing something peculiar to Englishmen, as a 
 
 Fngacharac- phenomenon of English life. But no 
 Europea^'n such thing. If we go back to the earliest 
 civilization, j.gcord of European civilization, we shall 
 find that the Greeks before Troy were just as fond of 
 listening to speeches as the Englishman of the pre- 
 sent day. They could do nothing without public 
 speaking. The chiefs never failed in this matter. 
 They were, upon every occasion that admitted of it, 
 ready to speak. Tacitus says the same of our Ger- 
 man ancestors. So was it at the dawnir^gs of Euro- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 11 
 
 pean civilization, and so has it been throughout. 
 Indeed, this is just one of the facts which distin- 
 guish the European from the Asiatic mind, and the 
 European from the Asiatic civilization. There is a 
 longing in our minds to hear the very words, spoken 
 by himself, of the man who is supposed to be able to 
 guide and to teach. We wish to see his mind work- 
 ing in our presence; to see his thoughts forming 
 themselves before our eyes, and to hear them enun- 
 ciated in the very words in which the thinker clothes 
 them, vivified by the tones which no one but himself 
 can impart to them. It would seem, in truth, that 
 as there is nothing higher in this world than mind 
 and heart, — indeed, as we are unable to form a con- 
 ception of any thing higher, so there cannot be any 
 thing more interesting to. us than to witness this 
 process. 
 
 Under our form of civilization, — and 1^- ^'*''^y so. 
 its difference from and superiority to the civilization 
 of other races is the result of nothing but our moral 
 and intellectual difference from and superiority to 
 them, — the rule has ever been, that men should con- 
 struct their opinions for themselves, their opinions 
 being the guides of their actions and of their lives. 
 No other system has ever obtained amongst us. It 
 follovv^s from this, that the mass of mankind, who 
 cannot be great readers or profound thinkers, will 
 always be desirous of hearing what public speakers 
 
12 EXTEMPOIIARY PREACHING. 
 
 have to say. They will entertain the hope of being 
 profited and instructed ; at all events, they expect to 
 derive from listening that kind of pleasure for which 
 the mind has an insatiable appetite, — the pleasure 
 which arises from having the faculties of memory, 
 imagination, and judgment awakened and called into 
 exercise in an easy and natural way, without any 
 direct effort of our own. 
 11. The ;n'ow it used to appear to me, that no 
 
 advantages 
 
 the preacher one could be in a better position for min- 
 
 T30SSGSSCS for 
 
 public istering to this generally felt want than a 
 
 spea ing. Clergyman. No one has so wide, so in- 
 teresting, so human a range of subjects to speak 
 upon. Man's nature ; man's relation to the unseen 
 world; his duty here, his destiny hereafter; what 
 will promote, and what will mar his happiness ; what 
 is the interpretation of the phenomena of human 
 life — the subjects indeed are inexhaustible, for he has 
 to instruct his hearers in that highest, that divine 
 philosophy, which, if it be possible, embraces and 
 harmonizes into an intelligible and well-compacted 
 whole, every thing which man knows, and in which he 
 is concerned. He has to speak to men about all that 
 they feel, and want, and desire; all that they hope 
 and fear; and all that they know. The man who 
 speaks on political, or social, or historical, or scienti- 
 fic subjects only, deals with some one part of that 
 wide field, the whole of which is spread out before 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 13 
 
 the preacher if he be properly prepared for his work ; 
 
 for whatever bears on the formation of our feelings, 
 
 or of our opinions, or can through these or other 
 
 means be made influential on human conduct, belongs 
 
 to the domain of the preacher. 
 
 HoAV much influence, then, might the 12. Good 
 
 preachers 
 
 Church secure in this most legitimate of would be of 
 
 inucli SGi*~ 
 
 all ways (because it would be acquired by vice to the 
 supplying the great moral wants of its 
 people, that is, by doing its duty to them), if it had 
 "a company of preachers" able to preach ^ intelli- 
 gently and persuasively on these subjects! And I 
 think that no one who is acquainted with the history 
 of the past and the wants of the present day will 
 suppose that the Church can recover the ground it 
 has lost, so readily and efi'ectually in any other way as 
 in this. Other methods of proceeding may go some 
 way towards reaching, or may assist in reaching, but 
 cannot of themselves reach, the end in view. The 
 Church, whatever else it may have to do, will also 
 have to supply itself with this army of preachers able 
 to handle properly their wide and sacred subject. 
 
 Consider the history of the Christian 13. Shown 
 
 by the his- 
 Church. It was in this way that it was tory of the 
 
 established in the world. Paul and his 
 
 fellow-Apostles came and spoke to men on those sub- 
 
 1 Here, and throughout these pages I use the term " preaching," 
 in contradistinction to reading written sermons. 
 •7 
 
14 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 jects upon wliicli men were craving for light. Those 
 were times when the old beliefs having become utterly 
 discredited, and every nation of the civilized world 
 having been thrown into the crucible of the Roman 
 empire, to be disintegrated, melted down, and recast, 
 there was, in a degree and a sense unknown before in 
 the world, a mental "distress of nations, with per- 
 plexity." AVhat Paul had to say was directly ad- 
 dressed to this state of things-. It met " the present 
 distress." He spoke to them of One who was capable 
 of becoming to them "the Way, the Truth, and the 
 Life." He spoke to them, and they listened gladly 
 to the man who spoke to them on the subject on which 
 they were so anxiously groping for light : and the 
 work so commenced was half accomplished. 
 14. And so throughout the whole subsequent his- 
 tory of the Church. Whenever a revival or an 
 advance has been effected, it has been effected by 
 preaching, by speaking, by mind addressing mind 
 through the medium of spoken words, on subjects 
 about which men's minds were at the time greatly 
 stirred. In none of these instances could the effect 
 have been produced by reading written discourses. 
 Imagine the preachers of the Crusades, or the Domi- 
 nicans and Franciscans, who by their fervid preaching 
 restored the then waning influence of the Papacy, 
 reading written discourses. The incongruity of the 
 idea is so great as to present a ludicrous image to the 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 15 
 
 mind. Their object was to move, to sway minds, to 
 persuade. Who then, but can see that for them to 
 have read what they wished to say, would have been 
 futile and nugatory? It would have been to have 
 thrown away their labor, and to have made them- 
 selves ridiculous. We cannot suppose that any thing 
 else would have resulted from their adoption of the 
 practice of reading. But to go on with this historical 
 view of our subject. Could reading written dis- 
 courses have brought about the Reformation ? Or we 
 may take a lesson from the practice of our opponents. 
 The teachers of heresy have always been preachers, 
 and not readers. Had they been readers, the Church 
 would never at any time have had cause to fear their 
 efforts. In that case their heresies could hardly have 
 spread beyond their own minds. It is the eye, the 
 tone, the living thought of the speaker, that moves 
 and persuades the hearer. These will even give 
 power to error for a time ; and for a time, without 
 their aid, truth itself is placed at a mighty disadvan- 
 ta2;e. 
 
 Had Wesley and Whitefield not been preach- 15. 
 ers, they would have effected nothing. I know they 
 prepared their sermons beforehand in writing, just 
 as Robertson in our own day did, and as so many 
 other great preachers, as distinguished from mere 
 talkers, did before them; and this is what I intend to 
 recommend to my readers ; and I trust that I shall be 
 
16 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 able to persuade them that it is what always ought to 
 be done to a greater or less extent by the preacher of 
 the Word of God. 
 
 16. But I am understating the fact. Not only was 
 the first establishment of our holy religion effected 
 by the instrumentality of extemporary preaching, 
 as were also its subsequent recoveries and revi- 
 vals, and every stirring application of it to the cir- 
 cumstances ^f the times; but, furthermore, we find 
 all Churches and communities of Christians so well 
 aware of the superiority of spoken addresses to dis- 
 courses that are li^ad, that the practice has, I believe, 
 been in all times and in all places to preach and not 
 to read, with the single exception of the Church of 
 England. The oldest Churches retain it, and the 
 newest adopt it. With us alone the rule obtains, to 
 read the written discourse. So singular a concord- 
 ance, amounting almost to complete unanimity, under 
 so great a variety of circumstances, does of itself go 
 far towards demonstrating the propriety and wisdom 
 of the practice. 
 17. The But what I now wish to direct the at- 
 
 Minister of ^ 
 
 the Word tention of my readers to, is the considera- 
 
 cannot be, . i • i • p 
 
 what he tion 01 the reasons which exist lor our 
 
 a"feacher, ' abandoning our present method. The 
 
 abiefospeak Minister of the Word, as the title implies, 
 
 in public. |g ^^ Teacher — one who ministers, teaches 
 
 the Word. But a teacher is one who is able to teach. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 17 
 
 Sir William Hamilton makes the ability 'o teach, the 
 one exclusive test of the possession of knowledge. It 
 is plain, that reading a discourse on any subject is 
 not teaching that subject. Teaching implies, first, 
 the possession of knowledge, and then the power ot 
 coiweying it, according to the circumstances and re- 
 quirements of the moment, to other minds. A man 
 who can do this, demonstrates that he knows his sub- 
 ject; and he is a teacher. The man who reads, does, 
 strictly speaking, only demonstrate his ability to read 
 what is before him. What he reads may be his own 
 digested knowledge, or it may be an undigested com- 
 position, or it may be a mere copy of another man's 
 work. But even in those cases where the minister 
 reads what is strictly his own, he is only reading, not 
 teaching. What a man reads, he wrote when he was 
 alone in his study. The mere fact that, originally, it 
 was written, and not spoken, implies a different 
 structure of sentences, and a different sequence of 
 thought. What is spoken is not always adapted for 
 reading, and what is written is still more seldom 
 adapted for speaking. The circumstances which give 
 its character to the composition in each case, are 
 widely different. In one case it is the expression of 
 the thought of a solitary thinker, who is under no 
 strong present impulse to consider any one but him- 
 self, or any thing but what is intelligible to his own 
 mind. What is said in the other case is the result of 
 
18 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 a highly conscious feeling that other minds are at the 
 moment in contact with your own mind. You feel 
 that they are following you; you feel their wants at 
 the moment in the matter before you. The congre- 
 gation do in fact, in a large degree, shape your course, 
 and give its color to your expression, and its lone 
 to your language. You know that they are thinking 
 with you ; and this affects your thought and the form 
 it outwardly assumes. This is one of the necessities 
 of teaching. What is written in solitude can hardly 
 ever be in harmony with the thoughts of the congre- 
 gation. It is the transcript of, probably, the mid- 
 night thoughts of the writer. Some portions of it 
 may possibly have been adapted from the works of 
 others, some may have been extorted from a weary or 
 unwilling brain; and when it is read there is little or 
 no power of adjusting it to the requirements of the 
 moment. 
 18. This I am prepared for the remark that the 
 
 his specia- 
 lity; for Minister of the Word is something more 
 gcod moral , _. , x i . ^ ,^ 
 
 character is than a Preacher. 1 do not deny the as- 
 theTaity as sertion, but I deny what is implied by it. 
 \veiiasofthe j reply, — Whatever else he may be, he is 
 at all events, because he is a Minister of 
 the Word, a Preacher ; and when he enters the pulpit, 
 it is then his exclusive and his high duty to minister 
 the Word, to teach, to preach. To read, although 
 what he reads may be his own composition, is but an 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 19 
 
 inadequate and sorry way of performing this high 
 duty. He will be wronging himself and his parish- 
 ioners if he supposes that good moral character will 
 be sufficient for securing their respect and regard ; for 
 of him is required furthermore that he should be able 
 to do what he has professed most solemnly to devote 
 his life to doing, that is, that he should be able to 
 teach. And till he has demonstrated beyond all 
 cavil and question his possession of this power, by the 
 constant exercise of it in the pulpit in the face of the 
 congregation (the only way in which he can demon- 
 strate it), they can have no certainty on the subject. 
 Good moral character, we must remember, is required of 
 a layman, as well as of a Clergyman. The distinctive 
 duty of the latter is teaching, ministering the Word 
 in the most effective way he can to the flock com- 
 mitted to his charge. This duty occupies a primary 
 place in the code of clerical morality, just in the sense 
 in which courage does in the case of one who has un- 
 dertaken the profession of arms. And that a Clergy- 
 man should never have given himself the trouble to 
 acquire the power of speaking and teaching, so in- 
 dispensable for the proper discharge of his sacred 
 office, must affect the estimate which men form of his 
 character. I ask my clerical brethren to regard this 
 matter from the layman's point of view, and then 
 decide what can fairly be required of them. In them 
 this neglect is a moral delinquency. The congrega- 
 
20 EXTEJMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 tion of the Minister of the Word -who reads written 
 sermons will perhaps treat him as if thej had nothing 
 to complain of. But congregations have hitherto 
 shown themselves very good-natured and patient in 
 respect of sermons, I do not think so much from in- 
 difference, as from a feeling of utter powerlessness to 
 do any thing to amend what is amiss in the matter. 
 But they may not always he so acquiescent. In their 
 hearts they know that they have a right to complain ; 
 and already allow the mouth to proclaim what the 
 heart tells them. Any Clergyman can judge from his 
 own observation how much more respect is felt by his 
 parishioners for one who, Sunday after Sunday, 
 teaches the Word from the fulness of his own mind, 
 than for one who reads to them, it is impossible for 
 them to know, whose thoughts. It is in human nature 
 to respect those who stand up before us with un- 
 doubted ability to teach us. There is no escaping 
 from this feeling. If we cannot say of all men that 
 they have more or less of an instinctive desire for 
 knowledge and improvement, at all events, we cannot 
 err in taking as much for granted of the members of a 
 Christian congregation, because it is one of the motives 
 which have brought them together to hear the Word. 
 But whether this be so or not, it is impossible to refrain 
 from respecting one who is manifestly our intellectual 
 superior. Why, we even feel a kind of respect for one 
 who is superior to us merely in physical qualities. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 21 
 
 And it is not in the pulpit only that l^- Its 
 
 ^ ^ *' utility to the 
 
 this power is indispensable for the proper Clergy at 
 discharge of the duties -which devolve on other 
 a Clergyman. Without it, for instance, and^pubiic 
 in how helpless a position will he fre- J^^eetmgs. 
 quently find himself Avhen occupying the chair at 
 vestry and other parochial meetings. He will, on 
 these occasions, be distressed and disturbed by the un- 
 comfortable feelings that will arise from his knowing 
 both that he is appearing in a very unfavorable light 
 before those whose natural, or at all events, whose 
 oflScial leader he is; and, worse than this, that the 
 interests also of his parishioners, and so to some 
 degree of the Church itself, are suffering through his 
 inability to acquit himself in a manner which all have 
 a right to expect of him. How often does it happen 
 that a clerical chairman returns home from some 
 parochial meeting with his temper rufHed in conse- 
 quence of his inability to address a few remarks to his 
 neighbors in an efi'ective manner; and with a galling 
 sense of inferiority to opponents who in other intel- 
 lectual qualifications are not his superiors; and with 
 a painful consciousness that he has been wanting to 
 the duties of his office. And all this results from 
 nothing but the practice of reading written sermons; 
 nothing else is in fault, for in the majority of cases 
 of this kind the Clergyman is the most highly-edu- 
 cated person present, and in many cases the only one. 
 
22 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 But this advantage is neutralized bj his having neg- 
 lected to acquire the power of speaking in public, 
 which it was his duty to have done, and for doing 
 which he has more opportunities than other people. 
 20. Useful Let me point out another very serviceable 
 
 also as it 
 
 enables use wliich may be made of this power, — 
 
 them to , p . . • 1 1 » 
 
 give lee- that 01 giving occasional lectures to one s 
 
 parishioners. I know that matters of this 
 kind will appear to some hardly worth mentioning; 
 but any means by which a Clergyman can gain influ- 
 ence legitimately, ceases to be unimportant to him; 
 and the influence to be gained and the good to be done in 
 this way will be in proportion to the size of the parish. 
 Such lectures will show to one's parishioners both that 
 this Minister does not confine his labors on their behalf 
 to what can strictly be required of him, and that his 
 knowledge also extends beyond the limits that are 
 usually set to theological studies. That theological 
 studies should be thus limited is always to be regret- 
 ted; but more so at the present day than perhaps at 
 any previous epoch, because many departments of 
 knowledge, bearing more or less directly on Biblical 
 interpretation and theology, have of late years made 
 great advances, some of them being almost new 
 sciences ; and the results of these recent advances in 
 various parts of the field of knowledge have been very 
 widely, I may say almost generally disseminated. 
 Many minds, even in classes which a few years back 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 23 
 
 had never been reached by such ideas, have thought of 
 their connection with Theology and Biblical interpre- 
 .tation. These are facts, they are important facts, and 
 we cannot afford to ignore them. The Clergy cer- 
 tainly ought to pay some attention to them. And if, 
 more particularly in town parishes, the Minister 
 should be able by occasional addresses to guide on 
 some of these subjects the minds of his parishioners, 
 the benefit he will do them will be great, and the sense 
 of it will be so much added to the strength of his own 
 position. And even in cases, as must frequently 
 happen, where others may not be disposed to adopt 
 his views, still their estimate of him will be raised by 
 finding that he is not unacquainted Avith questions of 
 so much interest and importance, and that he has 
 formed his own opinions upon them, and is able in 
 public to set those opinions before them. 
 
 The kind of knowledge I am speaking 21. Of 
 
 more use to 
 of here is required in an especial manner our Clergy 
 
 of the Clergy of the National Church, pnest of 
 
 It is obvious that it is not required to the o/Rome^ 
 
 same extent of the Priests of the Church ?^ ^^ff^}^^~ 
 
 mg Mmis- 
 
 of Rome or of the Ministers of Dissenting ters. 
 congregations. The Priest of the Church of Rome is 
 the minister of a system which ignores all the advances 
 of knowledge. The old stock instances exhibit both 
 the fact, and the reason why it is so. It appeared to 
 the inquisitors who imprisoned Galileo that it was be- 
 
24 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 side the question to argue from physical facts that the 
 earth moved. In the same way the doctors of Sala- 
 manca treated the reasoning of Columbus to show that 
 the earth was round. To their minds these questions 
 were to be settled by theological, not by physical 
 considerations. With the latter, the Priest of the 
 Church of Rome has nothing to do. He is not con- 
 cerned to know any thing of their bearings on theo- 
 logical questions. He and the faithful laity of his 
 Church must walk without inquiry and undeviatingly 
 along a path which has been prescribed for them by 
 infallible but far from omniscient authority. And this 
 in some degree accounts for the gulf which is ever be- 
 coming more and more impassable between the faith 
 of the Church of Rome and the knowledge of its more 
 intelligent members. On the other hand, the minister 
 of the Dissenting congregation must, but for a dif- 
 ferent reason, act in much the same way. The bulk of 
 his people, that is those for whose spiritual and intel- 
 lectual wants he must mainly provide, belong to the 
 lower classes and the lower stratum of the middle class. 
 Of course many are ever emerging from these classes 
 and carrying their Dissent with them to a higher and 
 more educated sphere of Society; but at present the 
 exceptions, I suppose, are seldom sufficient, except in 
 large towns, to affect the Minister's duty in this 
 respect. The bulk of his congregation being unedu- 
 cated, or but slightly educated, can have scarcely any 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 25 
 
 acquaintance with, or be but very slightly interested 
 in, those accessions to our stock of knowledge which 
 are the rewards of modern and, in many particulars, 
 very recent investigations. In making these remarks, 
 it must, I think, be sufficiently obvious that my only 
 wish is to make it clear that the Clergy of the Church 
 of England are in a position where it is required of 
 them to come forward as leaders of thought. This 
 arises from two facts : first, that our Church embraces 
 within her pale far the larger portion of the highly- 
 educated classes, that is, the classes that are acquainted 
 with and take an interest in the questions I have been 
 referring to — the questions that arise out of our recent 
 acquisitions in the field of knowledge; and then, that 
 she does not put herself at all in hostility to inquiry, 
 criticism, and science. The Clergy, therefore, when 
 they pay some attention to these subjects, are not to 
 be considered as going out of their way, and giving up 
 time to matters in which they are not concerned ; nay, 
 rather in so doing they are discharging duties they owe 
 to themselves, to their parishioners, and even to that 
 which is their special study. And they will be doing 
 good by giving occasional lectures upon these subjects. 
 In speaking of the conclusion it is the 22. We 
 
 should ac- 
 
 object of these pages to press upon others, quire this 
 
 T .Ti . . /» . , . power out of 
 
 I Will not omit mention of a consideration considera- 
 
 which had some weight with myself at the wishes of 
 
 time; it was, that my parishioners had °"j[g^s^^^^^' 
 3 
 
26 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 had no voice in making me their Minister; and that if 
 any influential part in the selection had been allowed 
 to thenij in all probability I should not have been the 
 person chosen ; for I could not suppose that they 
 would have preferred of their own free choice a Min- 
 ister who was unable to minister to them the Word, 
 as occasion required, from his own mind. It is just 
 possible, I thought, that as they have been accustomed 
 all their lives to hear sermons read, some of them may 
 have given little or no thought to what is the best, or 
 rather what is the right method of preaching. Or 
 perhaps, the wrong method having been so long ac- 
 ccepted in the Church of England, there might have 
 been a difficulty, whatever might have been the pa- 
 rishioners' opinion and wishes, in procuring for a small 
 rural parish a minister who would be disposed and able, 
 Sunday after Sunday, to preach extemporarily two 
 carefully-prepared sermons. But these, I argued with 
 myself, are only additional reasons for my doing 
 what I am convinced is right in this matter. I ought 
 to give my parishioners what I believe they would on 
 sufficient grounds prefer. And even if, for the reasons 
 just mentioned, they have not any clear and decided 
 opinions on the subject as yet, still I ought not to take 
 advantage of this: I ought to do just the contrary. I 
 should endeavor to show them what is right and best. 
 And, to take a wider view than that which one's own 
 parish supplies, here is a practice which I believe is a 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 27 
 
 cause of great and increasing weakness to tlio Church. 
 It ought to be discontinued as soon as possible. The 
 only way of bringing this about is for some one here 
 and some one there, as conviction comes home to each, 
 to endeavor to set the matter right in his own pulpit. 
 Those who are convinced must begin with themselves. 
 It is from those who begin in this way that the prac- 
 tice, if it be right, will spread to others. Already in 
 every neighborhood one or two are to be found who 
 have made a beginning. The effect of their preaching, 
 although iheir sermons may not be in themselves all 
 that they ought to be, proves that they are right. I 
 will begin too. I will make the attempt honestly, and 
 give the practice a fair trial. One's parishioners have 
 a right to expect as much as this from their Minister. 
 He ought also to undertake it for the Church's sake. 
 Of course there will be some who will 23. Not an 
 
 answer, that 
 
 deny that considerations of this kind the Church 
 
 does not 
 
 possess any weight; because, they will formally 
 say, the fact is, that in the Church of oflhe^ 
 England the parishioners very rarely have ^^^^^7- 
 any voice allowed them in the election of a Minister; 
 and so we may legitimately infer that no attention 
 need be paid to what they might have wished for in 
 him under different circumstances. And again be- 
 cause, as they will go on to argue, it is wrong for a 
 Minister to suppose that he can be wiser than the 
 practice and than the authorities of his Church in 
 
28 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 any matter. If, then, the Church neither condemns 
 written sermons, nor requires extemporary preaching, 
 it is presumptuous in him to have opinions of his own 
 on the subject, and still more so for him to act upon 
 them. With these persons I cannot agree. A Cler- 
 gyman ought to do what his parishioners ought to wish 
 him to do, and ought to be what they ought to wish 
 him to be. And though, as a general rule, it is proper 
 that he should not consider himself wiser than the 
 practice or than the authorities of his Church, still 
 there are exceptions to all general rules, cases to which 
 they do not apply, and just so it is with the question 
 before us. True, the Church does not require us 
 either to adopt extemporary preaching or to read 
 written sermons, but leaves the choice to our own dis- 
 cretion, the practice of the universal Church, with the 
 single exception of our branch of it, being in favor of 
 the former of the two methods. To reply that one is 
 unwilling to constitute oneself a judge in the matter 
 because the existing practice is to read written ser- 
 mons, and the existing authorities of the Church are 
 satisfied with its being so, is, I think, to misapprehend 
 the question. The very point to be considered is. 
 Are there not reasons, both of a general kind, appli- 
 cable to all times and places, and of a special kind 
 arising out of the circumstances under which the 
 Church's work has at this day to be done, which seem 
 to make it very desirable that our practice in this 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 29 
 
 matter should be changed? Doubtless it would be 
 impossible to exact extemporary preaching from all 
 existing Incumbents; by the time, however, that 
 another generation had arisen in the Church, difficul- 
 ties which now appear very great would have melted 
 away, especially should public opinion become de- 
 cidedly and openly favorable to the practice. 
 
 "We are too much disposed to think 24. Why 
 
 wc must 
 
 that nothing more can be said on any consider the 
 
 . , . , wants and 
 
 subject than what we hear said on it by wishes of 
 
 . . . , i. n . the lower 
 
 our own set in society, or, at ail events, classes. 
 than what is said by the educated classes. 
 There may be questions which it is allowable for us to 
 settle for ourselves in this way. This question, how- 
 ever, about Preaching is plainly not one of those 
 that can be so settled. It is not an uncommon 
 opinion among the educated classes, that it would be 
 better if there were no sermons at all. It is also not 
 an uncommon opinion among them that Extemporary 
 Preaching is bad. They are fastidious; the faults, 
 therefore, of bad Extemporary Preaching are dis- 
 tasteful to them. Besides which, it is often accom- 
 panied, as it ought ahyays to be, by an earnestness of 
 appeal which, again, is distasteful to many. These 
 opinions are openly expressed and frequently heard. 
 But those who hold them are not a very large propor- 
 tion even of their own class, though their number 
 appears to be very considerable from their being gen- 
 
30 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 erally so well able to attract attention to what they 
 saj. Supposing, however, it was the whole of the 
 educated classes that held these opinions, even that 
 would be very far from settling the question, for they 
 are not in the majority amongst us ; and it was not 
 from them, as is well known, that Christianity took 
 its rise. The knowledge that regenerates and saves, 
 spread not from the upper classes to the lower, but 
 from the lower to the upper. Not the rich, not the 
 noble, not the learned, not the powerful, but the poor, 
 the weak, the despised of the world, were the first to 
 understand and receive it ; and it was from them that 
 it ascended to the summits of society. They of 
 Caesar's household accepted the proffered light, three 
 hundred years before it was accepted by the Caesar 
 himself. And if we were obliged at the present day 
 to make our choice between the two in a country that 
 had relapsed into unbelief, or in a heathen land yet 
 to be brought to the knowledge of the Gospel, he who 
 had considered what would most surely and most 
 quickly conduce to the desired end, would prefer the 
 conversion of the lower to that of the higher classes. 
 The latter does not necessarily involve the former; 
 but the former, if time be allowed, necessarily involves 
 the latter. The constant pressure from the mass 
 below on the few above, is far more telling than the 
 pressure of the few above on the mass below. Besides, 
 the upper few are ever dying out, and ever being re- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACIIIXG. 31 
 
 placed by those -wlio emerge from the ranks below; 
 and "while those Avho sink from the upper to the lower 
 class are worthless, those who rise from the lower to 
 the upper are of the very best material. On this 
 question we must not take the opinions of a rather 
 talkative, but perhaps, in these matters, not the most 
 influential portion of the upper class, for more than 
 those opinions are worth ; and if we find that the 
 lower class, and a very large proportion of the lower 
 strata of the middle class hold stiffly, opinions of an 
 opposite kind, we must not pass by those opinions as 
 if it mattered little how we regarded them. 
 
 Now the fact is, that these classes have very de- ^5. 
 cided opinions on the subject of Preaching; opinions, 
 too, the very reverse of those I have just referred to. 
 They like Preaching. It is their chief intellectual 
 pleasure and excitement. There is not any great 
 variety of conversation in the society they frequent. 
 They are not much given to reading novels or daily 
 papers; nor do they attend theatres. Sermons oc- 
 cupy a much larger space in their thoughts than they 
 do in the thoughts of those whose minds are fed with 
 a great variety of other food. Religion, too, with 
 them is a more serious and engrossing matter. They 
 are more conversant with the cares than with the 
 pleasures of the w^orld. Either by a simple process 
 of reasoning, such as vre might expect in them, or 
 because they have taken up the idea from their Dis- 
 
32 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 senting neighbors (but perhaps their opinions on this 
 subject rest on both these foundations), they have 
 come to think that he is only a pretended Minister of 
 the Word, who cannot in his own pulpit minister the 
 Word from the stores of his own mind. He who, 
 when he mislays or forgets his manuscript, is obliged 
 to close the service without a sermon, they will not 
 regard as a Minister of the Word. They hear our 
 opponents calling such Ministers *' hirelings" and 
 "dumb dogs," and some of them have come to repeat 
 the opprobrious terms. It will never do for us to 
 neglect (there are good reasons for our carefully con- 
 sidering) the opinions of these classes. Their opinions, 
 by a constant pressure from below, and by the rise of 
 many from these classes to those above, are spread- 
 ing upward. And is it fair to a large part of our 
 congregations that we should put them in the dis- 
 agreeable position of hearing their Minister taunted 
 in this way by our opponents? And if they are 
 unable to answer these taunts, does not that give rise 
 to a probability that they will not always be able to 
 bear them? 
 
 2G. Hitherto I have been recalling thoughts which 
 frequently occupied my mind before I commenced the 
 practice of Extemporary Preaching, and which at 
 last determined me to make the attempt. I will now 
 proceed to some questions which the adoption of the 
 practice will at times oblige one to discuss or con- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 33 
 
 sidcr. I shall then describe the method I pursued for 
 carrying out my determination, and afterwards give 
 so much of the results of my experience in the com- 
 position of sermons, and on some other kindred sub- 
 jects, as I suppose may be of some use to others. 
 One way, but a wholly inadequate way, , 27. How 
 
 " ' "^ ^ •^' the question 
 
 of putting the question raised in these —Which is 
 
 best, to read 
 
 pages, is to ask at once. Which would be written ser- 
 the best, a sermon written and read, or pleach cx- 
 one on the same subject preached extem- ^^^^^i^I\q 
 porarily, by the same person ? I am pre- ^® P^*^- 
 pared to hear many, both among the laity and the 
 clergy, exclaim unhesitatingly, " The one that is writ- 
 ten and read, because, at all events, it will be more 
 carefully composed." In the course of what I have 
 yet to say, I trust that I shall be able to bring my 
 readers to see that the very reverse of this ought to 
 be, and will generally be the case ; but what I now 
 wish to show is, how this question ought to be put. 
 The comparison must be made, not between the writ- 
 ten and the extemporary sermons of a man who has had 
 some practice in writing and none in Extemporary 
 Preaching, but of one who has given himself the 
 trouble to put his power of Extemporary Preaching 
 somewhat on a level with his attainments in written 
 composition; for of course there can be no com- 
 parison between the sermons of one who has not done 
 this. Such an one may have acquired the power of 
 
34 EXTExMPORARY PREACHING, 
 
 writing with, as the case may be, more or less skill, 
 but may not have acquired any power at all of Ex' 
 temporary Preaching. In his case, therefore, the 
 comparison would be between something and nothing. 
 Another point to be settled in the consideration of 
 this question is. What is meant by the best sermon? 
 Plainly not the one that will read the best when in 
 print, for primarily, and ex vi terniini, a sermon is 
 something intended to be spoken and heard, not 
 something to be read; and what we are speaking 
 about is not reading, but hearing sermons. The 
 merits, then, of sermons are to be decided by the 
 effect they respectively produce upon a present lis- 
 tening congregation. The question before us, there- 
 fore, is this: Which will produce the most powerful, 
 abiding, and beneficial effect, a written and read ser- 
 mon, or an extemporary sermon; both being delivered 
 by a man who has paid as much attention to the one 
 method as to the other ; or, if they are preached by dif- 
 ferent persons, they must be persons of equal ability and 
 attainments, and who have had equal practice in their 
 respective styles of composition and delivery? If the 
 question be put in this way, and it is the only fair 
 way of putting it, I can hardly imagine any clergy- 
 man who has made some proficiency in the practice of 
 speaking, or any congregation that listens to such a 
 speaker, hesitating a moment for a reply to the ques- 
 tion. This is one of those questions which to state 
 
EXTEMPORAllY PREACHING. 35 
 
 properly is to answer. I need not, however, in this 
 
 pLace, say any thing more directly upon it, because a 
 
 great part of the contents of these pages are a reply 
 
 to it; every thing indeed throughout them having 
 
 reference to it. Here I only wish to show how the 
 
 question ought to be put. 
 
 I proceed to another point ; we should 28. Ex- 
 temporary 
 most of us be benefited by any method of Preaching 
 
 secures con- 
 carrymg on our work which might, as a tinuous 
 
 •1 I ... study and 
 
 general rule secure continuous improve- ij^prove- 
 ment in the composition and delivery of ^^"^' 
 our sermons. My own experience has taught me 
 that writing; and readins^ one's sermons does not effect 
 this, but that preachhig extemporarily sermons as 
 carefully studied as extemporary sermons always 
 ouo;ht to be, does effect it. Bacon tells us that read- 
 ing makes a full man, writing an accurate man, and 
 speaking a ready man. What I recommend em- 
 braces these three kinds of discipline. The Extem- 
 porary Preacher wdio is in the constant practice of 
 properly studying his subject with the view of 
 making his discourse as worthy of his ofiice and as 
 effective as possible, will be drawn on into many 
 fields of inquiry. So also it may be said will the 
 writer of sermons ; but not, I think so continuously, 
 or with so much benefit to himself. The man who 
 preaches extemporarily, that is, who gives himself the 
 trouble to do it properly, must have the subject-matter 
 
36 EXTExMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 of his sermons very frequently in his thoughts, and 
 must give himself a great deal of trouble in perfect- 
 ing every sermon he preaches; and this amount of 
 thought directed to his work will bring him sooner 
 or later to understand what materials his sermons 
 require. He will thus be led on to be ever adding 
 to his critical, historical, and philological knowledge ; 
 he will keep up and extend his acquaintance with the 
 works of the great writers on ethical science ; nor will 
 he allow himself to be ignorant of the controversies 
 of the present or of past times. He will find these 
 kinds of knowledge necessary, because he will find 
 that there are parts of his subject which it will be 
 impossible for him to handle properly without them. 
 He Avill, I think, become a far deeper and more varied 
 student than the man who reads written sermons. 
 He is likely to read more, and certainly to digest 
 more completely the fruits of his reading, and to make 
 them more completely his own. The man who reads 
 written sermons, supposing him to have started with 
 an equally conscientious desire to do his work 
 thoroughly, is not under the same pressure and impul- 
 sion to study widely and deeply, and to make the 
 fruits of his study his own. The pressure is neither 
 so strong nor so continuous. His method does not 
 require it. He has to produce something on paper, 
 and not in his own mind. There is a wide difi*erence 
 between these two wavs of working^, and these two 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 37 
 
 kinds of -work. lie has not so constantly before his 
 mind that which is the end of speaking — the effect to 
 be produced. When the writer of sermons has seven 
 or eight hundred by him, he must be very different 
 from the generality of mankind if he still continues 
 the labor of writing week after week. And indeed, 
 why should he? He has nothing fresh to write upon; 
 and after so much practice in writing, he can hardly 
 hope to produce any thing better than what he has 
 ready at hand. With the Extemporary Preacher it 
 is quite another thing. His work is never done. His 
 weekly preparation is incessant. His studies can 
 never be laid aside. Still as he grows old he learns 
 something every day. Of course, I never speak of 
 the ignorant ranter, the frothy declaimer, or the 
 fluent talker. Their way of discoursing will always 
 astonish the multitude, but that is not what will 
 satisfy the man who has a proper respect for himself, 
 for his congregation, and for his sacred office. He 
 will study more or less for every sermon, and will 
 make out, after careful consideration, the form in 
 w^hich his materials should be arranged on every 
 occasion: every occasion thus becoming a fresh study 
 both for matter and form. There can therefore be no 
 doubt but that in a course of years he will acquire 
 more, and learn better how to use what he has ac- 
 quired, than a reader of written sermons. 
 
38 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 Nor will tlie practice of Extemporary 29. As it 
 Preacliina: deprive a man of the advantage poses wri- 
 
 ° ^ _ ting, it v/ii: 
 
 of attaining to that accuracy which is a also secure 
 
 „ . .,. T 1 accuracy, 
 
 result of written composition, i am ad- 
 dressing myself to those who have energy enough to 
 persevere for some years, or for whatever time may be 
 required, in the practice of carefully composing their 
 sermons during the week, and then preaching them 
 extemporarily on the Sunday. The time will come 
 when full notes, containing only the more important 
 parts in extenso, will be sufficient; and at last nothing 
 more will in most cases be needed than such a sketch 
 as may be written on one side of half a sheet of note- 
 paper, the rest of the study being carried on mentally, 
 or without the aid of writing. I suppose that for 
 several years more or less of writing will be necessary, 
 because that alone will demonstrate to the preacher 
 that he has mastered his subject and properly arranged 
 his materials ; and so vrill enable his mind to rest on 
 the fact that it has already produced what it now has 
 only to reproduce in the pulpit. And I can imagine 
 persons preferring to the last to write very full ab- 
 stracts of what they intend to say, and doing this 
 from a religious regard for their work. A sermon, 
 such persons will feel, is too important a work, too 
 much depends upon it, to justify the preacher in 
 leavino^ any thino; to the chances of the moment. 
 This must be done to some extent in a debate, and it 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACIItNG. 39 
 
 may be done generally in secular oratory, -when the 
 main object is to please; but it is irreverent and un- 
 wise to trust in this way to the moment for the matter 
 or the arrangement of a sermon: it will, therefore, I 
 think, be better that the preacher, however practised, 
 should never wholly lay aside the pen. He might 
 perhaps do without it, and the majority of his congre- 
 gation be none the less pleased with him; but there 
 will always be some who would have more highly ap- 
 preciated a better studied and more carefully arranged 
 address. The preacher, too, ought to be much dis- 
 satisfied with himself should he fail to give his subject 
 every advantage. He will be aware whether it could 
 have been put better ; and if so, the knowledge of how 
 his subject and congregation have suffered by his 
 ne2;lio;ence ous-ht to distress him. We find that the 
 most perfect masters of ancient oratory wrote their 
 speeches : there are additional reasons for the preachers 
 of the Word doing the same. I think then that we 
 may conclude that, as a class, the Extemporary 
 Preachers will be fuller, not less accurate, and cer- 
 tainly readier men than the readers of written sermons. 
 Another very important advantage pos- 30. This is 
 
 •^ ^ ° ^ ^ the natural 
 
 sessed by the Extemporary Preacher is the and most 
 
 n 1 • IT n T T impressive 
 
 superiority ot his method oi delivery, method of 
 
 One of the first objects of the preacher ^^^^^^y- 
 
 and of the reader alike must be to gain the attention 
 
 of the audience. In his efforts to do this, the preacher 
 
40 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 follows the natural method — the method every one is 
 using all his life through, and with the application of 
 which to himself every one is equally familiar. It is 
 the method of conversation. It is the only way in 
 which men use language in their face-to-face in- 
 tercourse with each other. When a man speaks to 
 another, the auditor feels that his attention is chal- 
 lenged, and therefore attention is given as a matter of 
 course and of habit. It would be unreasonable if the 
 auditor did not attend. The speaker is speaking to 
 him. There seems no room for choice. The auditor 
 is called upon not only to attend, but to do what 
 attention to a speaker implies, to remember, and to 
 judge of what is being said. This is understood by 
 what is seen of the present working of the mind of 
 the speaker, in the play of his features, in the tones 
 of his voice, and in the direct bearing of what he is 
 saying, either by Avay of explanation, illustration, or 
 appeal, on the actual feelings of the hearers, or on 
 the thoucrhts that are at that moment in their minds. 
 Contrast with this the effect of reading. I hardly 
 need go into particulars. This is not the natural 
 mode of address. It is a mode with which no one 
 can be familiar. It does not challenge attention. 
 We feel that the reader's mind is not directed to our 
 mind, as a speaker's would be; but rather that it is 
 addressed to an imaginary mind. It is addressed to 
 an imaginary unbeliever, or an imaginary misbeliever, 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 41 
 
 to an imaginary worldling, or to an imaginary wrong- 
 doer of some kind or other. It is not addressed to 
 what is passing in the minds of the men and women 
 then and there present. And, as a matter of fact, the 
 effect corresponds with this difference; and the reader 
 fails to gain attention to that degree which is accorded 
 without any effort on the part of the congregation to 
 the Extemporary Preacher. We all know that read- 
 ing does not possess the requisites for enabling it 
 always to command our attention. And after all there 
 are reasonable grounds why the congregation should 
 not make much effort to listen to what is read. It is 
 not the living mind that is wrestling with their minds, 
 but in reality a MS., which through the medium of 
 the reader's voice, is addressing them. It is the MS. 
 that is dealing with them, a MS. which they might 
 read for themselves with as much profit perhaps as 
 they will derive from hearing it read to them. 
 
 I will now advert to two most opposite ^l- ^^- 
 
 swer to the 
 
 objections on this subject, both of which objection 
 are frequently urged; both, however, of oflfering 
 which result from a misapprehension of nothioff^^ ^ 
 what is meant by Extemporary Preaching. 
 I have heard a clergyman say that he disliked the 
 practice, " because, like David, he would not make an 
 offering unto the Lord his God of that which cost him 
 nothing." My reply to him was, that I thought that 
 his objection might more frequently be levelled at ser- 
 
 4* 
 
42 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 rnons that are read than at those that are preached 
 extemporarily. The most conscientious reader of 
 written sermons most frequently read what on the 
 occasion of his reading it, cost him nothing, inasmuch 
 as it was written years before. This, however, can 
 never be the case with the conscientious Extemporary 
 Preacher, for, as every sermon he preaches must be 
 studied, his preaching is indeed a perpetual offering 
 of that which costs him much. To be prepared every 
 Sunday of his life, however busy he may have been 
 during the week about other matters, with two care- 
 fully studied sermons, though not more than the 
 Minister of the Word ought to do, is more, I am dis- 
 posed to think, than those who are capable of quoting 
 David's sentiment as a reason for rejecting Extempo- 
 rary Preaching, are ever likely to do themselves. 
 This objection may be valid against those who enter 
 the pulpit merely to declaim, or to talk incoherently 
 on religious subjects for half an hour — it is not un- 
 charitable to say, — in accordance rather with the 
 darkness than with any light that is within them. 
 But I would put in the balance against such preachers 
 a class which must be far more numerous — that of the 
 readers of unimpressive, uninteresting, and unpro- 
 fitable sermons, and who, as long as they continue to be 
 readers, will never improve ; and here we must not for- 
 get that the laity tell us that to listen to such sermons 
 is on their part an offering which costs them much. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 43 
 
 Another objection, which takes just the , ^2 And 
 
 '^ ' '^ that It takes 
 
 opposite ground, is that Extemporary too much 
 
 time. It is 
 
 Preaching requires too much time and not learning 
 trouble. Those who raise this objection j-otg^ i^^t 
 generally suppose, I find, that the Ex- [J^e's^^i^ct. 
 temporary Preacher learns his sermon by 
 rote, and delivers it as a player does his part. It is 
 obvious that if this objection is made in good faith, it 
 must be made by those who have themselves such 
 small mental powers that they cannot understand how 
 any one can attain to the faculty of explaining vivd 
 voce a subject he has previously studied and digested, 
 and which he has a strong desire to convey and com- 
 mend to the minds of others. The objection, how- 
 ever, I believe is only partially made in good faith. 
 Such an objector really does find some difiiculty in 
 forming a conception of a mental effort of this kind — 
 no great thing after all, indeed not more than every 
 well-educated youth ought to be capable of making — 
 but he also, and that is probably his chief object, 
 wishes to insinuate that the Extemporary Preacher's 
 motive is vanity, and vanity of such an inordinate and 
 irrational kind, that he will, in order to gratify it, 
 give himself the trouble of learning by heart two ser- 
 mons every week of his life. If a man could be 
 found who might be able to make such an effort of 
 perseverance and memory, still, I think, he would 
 hardly be disposed to continue it after a few months' 
 
44 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 experience of the time it required. Besides, if a man 
 were to trust in this way to his memory only, he must 
 occasionally break down in the most complete and dis- 
 tressing manner. This objection is as puerile as the 
 former one. Neither of the two kinds of preaching 
 they suppose at all resembles that which I am endea- 
 voring to recommend in these pages. Still it may be 
 of some use to have made this mention of them ; for 
 marking off what is not meant, contributes towards 
 giving a definite idea of what is meant. 
 33. It is a A third objection one hears very fre- 
 
 security 
 
 against ver- quently urged is, that Extemporary 
 lions. Preaching abounds in repetitions. I dare 
 
 say a great deal of repetition is heard in 
 the so-called sermons of mere declaimers and extem- 
 porary talkers, but it ought never to be heard in those 
 of the Extemporary Preacher. He is a man who 
 knows what sermons ought to be, and takes care that 
 the matter of each of his own shall be arranged on a plan 
 for every part of which there is a good reason. Nothing 
 can be omitted or transposed. This excludes the 
 possibility of repetition. And we may ask, What 
 reason is there for repetitions in religious any more 
 than in political or judicial addresses? Indeed, there 
 is less reason; for an advocate or a parliamentary 
 speaker must often be obliged to speak when more or 
 less unprepared to do so. This can never happen to 
 a preacher. I am writing to educated men, who are 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 45 
 
 too self-respecting and have too much respect for 
 their sacred work, ever to omit the previous consid- 
 eration of what they shall say from the pulpit. There 
 will be some who will not do this as carefully as it 
 should be done, or who, from a want of skill in com- 
 position which nature has denied them the power of 
 acquiring, or from an inability to put any thing, even 
 to their own minds, otherwise than in a confused and 
 illogical manner, will be exposed to this objection; 
 but these are people who would be just as confused, 
 as illogical, and incoherent, and as full of repetitions 
 of ideas, if not of words, in written discourses. I am 
 disposed to think that this objection is frequently 
 made on very insufficient grounds, being merely taken 
 up as the readiest weapon that comes to hand, when 
 the objector for some other reason dislikes either the 
 preacher or Extemporary Preaching. 
 
 As this other reason is one that is ^4. It is 
 
 too earnest 
 rather felt than expressed, it results in and direct 
 
 1 T -n 1 .1 ^ . , . . foi" some 
 
 what i will describe as the tacit objection hearers. 
 
 of those who, not being in religion of a zealous tem- 
 perament themselves, dislike being brought in contact 
 with the zeal of others. To such persons there is an 
 earnestness and directness in extemporary preaching 
 which is distasteful. But the fault here is not in the 
 preacher, or in the method he adopts. What is really 
 objected to, is what others will regard as one of the 
 peculiar merits of that method. 
 
46 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 35. False I have secn the practice of reading 
 
 inferences in 
 
 fayor of written sermons defended on the ground 
 
 from^fifi'se that the Preacher is not a debater. True, 
 analogies. -g^^ ^^^ addresses of no kind to be de- 
 livered without book except such as are called for in 
 debate? And are we to believe that the practice with 
 respect to Preaching of all Churches in all times, ex- 
 cepting that of our own Church, is wrong? And what 
 is there in exposition, exhortation, rebuke, warning, 
 and the appeals a Minister of the Word must make 
 that renders the reading them from a MS. the most 
 appropriate method of delivering them? It is also 
 said that the Preacher is near of kin to the lecturer 
 on Moral Philosophy, and that as lectures on this 
 subject are generally read; therefore sermons also 
 should be read. No such thing. It might be better 
 if the lecturer were so completely master of his sub- 
 ject as to be able to speak upon it. But there is no 
 analogy between the two. The Preacher is not a 
 lecturer; nor is the lecturer a Preacher. A man may 
 be a very good lecturer on the Exegesis of Scripture, 
 or on Theology, and yet be a very ineffective Preacher. 
 36. The I ^vish the kind of Preacher I have in 
 
 true Preach- 
 er is very view in this book to be distinguished in as 
 
 different m i /» i , 
 
 from the trenchant a manner as possible irom what 
 
 rreaiher. ^^ Called the popular Preacher. Many 
 
 being acquainted only with the latter 
 
 have a prejudice against extemporary preaching of 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 47 
 
 every kind. I endeavor to describe in these pages 
 the learning, the never-ending study and thought, the 
 style, the aims of the former. The popular Preacher, 
 however, may be described, taking the common type 
 of the class with instances of which most persons are 
 familiar, as one in whom, regarded as a speaker, the 
 gifts of imaginative power and of great command of 
 language have mastered the understanding and the 
 judgment; and whose knowledge seldom makes his 
 hearers aware of their own ignorance. This description 
 of the popular Preacher does not lead us to infer in 
 him the possession of much capacity for doing useful 
 work in the Ministry of the Word. And, as a matter 
 of fact, very little is done, in such a way as to have any 
 permanent effect, by such Preachers. Even those who 
 are themselves of such mental calibre as to admire and 
 run after a popular Preacher of this kind would be 
 more benefited by a wise and well furnished Preacher. 
 These are the very minds that require the discipline 
 of exact thought, and accurate reasoning. Popular 
 sermons full of flights of the imagination, and decked 
 out with brilliancy of language, occupy among the 
 w^orks of the human mind the position the jelly-fish 
 holds in the animal kingdom. Its coloring possesses 
 some attractive brightness; but it is an invertebrate 
 affair, without bone or muscle. As soon as you at- 
 tempt to handle it, it collapses into nothing. Popular 
 sermons will seldom bear printing. Their appropriate 
 
48 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 element is the peculiar atmosphere which surrounds 
 the pulpit of the popular Preacher. Thej cannot 
 be carried away, or turned to any useful purpose. 
 No one expects them to yield meat for the strong 
 man; but neither in truth do they supply much milk 
 for babes. It is hard that the style of Preaching 
 which in its substance, often in its aims, is most unlike 
 this, should suffer in any body's estimation, merely 
 from their both happening to use the same method of 
 delivery. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 MY OWN METHOD OF ACQUIRING THE POWER OF 
 PREACHING EX TEMPORE. 
 
 I WILL now proceed to describe to my 1- The 
 ^ . , *^ method I 
 
 younger brethren in the Ministry the adopted. 
 
 method I adopted in carrying out my mons for 
 
 resolution. It was at the beginning of p^rary" 
 
 the year 1854, and I commenced by P^^eadnng 
 
 •^ ' -' should be 
 
 writing during the week two sermons, studied and 
 
 composed. 
 
 Knowing that they were to be preached 
 without the aid of the manuscripts, or even notes, I 
 studied the matter and arrangement of each more 
 carefully than I had ever done before for sermons I 
 had written with the vievr of their being merely read 
 to the congregation. I was led to do this because I 
 foresaw that confusion of thought and redundancy of 
 matter not properly required by the subject must be 
 avoided, as faults of this kind would very probably 
 confuse me in the pulpit; while nothing could more 
 contribute to aid my memory and smooth my path 
 while speaking than a natural and logical arrange- 
 5 49 
 
50 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ment of all that I had to say. That I might make as 
 sure as possible of this, I divided each discourse into 
 chapters, each chapter being a distinct part of the 
 subject; and each chapter I divided into paragraphs, 
 each paragraph being a distinct step in the treatment 
 of what was the subject of the chapter. To each 
 chapter was prefixed a Roman, to each paragraph an 
 Arabic numeral. Between the paragraphs I left small 
 intervals, in which I wrote, in a few words, a heading 
 of the contents of the paragraph. The headings I 
 afterwards copied on one side of half a sheet Of note- 
 paper. This enabled me to see at a glance how I had 
 treated my subject, and to judge more easily than I 
 could do by turning over the pages of the MS. whether 
 my method of treating it was natural and logical. On 
 Saturday I again looked over my two sermons, in 
 doing so, making perhaps more use of the short ab- 
 stracts than of the complete MSS. And again on the 
 Sunday, I gave the half-hour preceding each service 
 to the final consideration of what I was then about to 
 preach. These two subsequent studies enabled me to 
 make several improvements both in the way of addi- 
 tions and omissions; because what I was endeavoring 
 to do was to form each sermon into a connected and 
 coherent whole, from which every thing must be elimi- 
 nated that had not a definite purpose. My sermons, 
 then, having been written in the course of the previous 
 week, after much consideration of the subject, and 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 51 
 
 having been again studied on Saturday, and once 
 more referred to before the service on Sunday, the re- 
 sult was, that when I entered the church I almost 
 knew the MS. by heart. The line of argument and 
 every explanation and illustration were distinctly before 
 my mind. In consequence, I did not any where pause 
 for a thought or a word. I had no idea that this was 
 to be regarded as extemporary preaching, yet I was 
 not dissatisfied with it for a beginning. It encouraged 
 me to hope, that though I was only now attempting 
 what I ought to have been taught at school ^ more 
 than twenty years earlier, and though I had no na- 
 tural command of language, and was besides what is 
 called nervous, and that to a very painful degree, 
 still, that I might at last succeed in acquiring the 
 power of addressing my congregation from the stores 
 of my own mind, which I had become convinced ought 
 to be the practice of every Minister of the Word. 
 
 Some of my readers will probably be 2. Neces- 
 surprised at finding me entering at all on vious study 
 
 f 1 • 1 • 1 r\r' ^^^ COm- 
 
 particulars oi this kmd. Or course there position. 
 are many persons who would rather have it supposed 
 that they possess the power of composing and de- 
 livering sermons properly by the gift of Nature, or at 
 all events who would rather conceal from the world 
 the method by which they acquired it. But I am not 
 
 ' Boys might readily acquire at school a power which would 
 afterwards become that of speaking in public, by being made to 
 
52 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 writing these pages for the perusal of those, if there 
 be any such persons, upon whom Nature has bestowed 
 this gift. I have, hoAvever, little belief in orators of 
 any kind, and above all of good preachers, by the 
 mere grace of Nature. A man does not even become 
 a mob-orator without practice. We certainly do not 
 hear of any great orator ever having found himself in 
 ready-made possession of his power of skilfully mani- 
 pulating, if I may so speak, thought and language; 
 but we know that he attained to it by laborious study 
 and long practice. Not but that we may find many 
 who have a kind of natural fluency; but I am very 
 far from attaching much value to this, taken merely 
 by itself, whether it be a natural gift or an acquired 
 power. What I am recommending is, to use, if you 
 have it, or to acquire, if you have it not, the power 
 of delivering fluently and properly a sermon properly 
 composed by yourself; and to compose a sermon pro- 
 perly does not come by the gift of Nature. It is not 
 the result of an intuitive process, but of study, know- 
 ledge, reflection. A man must collect his materials ; 
 he must be able to judge of the value and use of these 
 materials ; and he must learn how to deal with them 
 and arrange them. I do not believe that there is any 
 royal road to the accomplishment of these things, any 
 
 give the substance of their wi'itten themes or essays vivd voce, and 
 in the same way to give an account of what they may have been 
 translating or reading. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 53 
 
 more than there is to the acquisition of any thing else 
 that is worth having. Some, of course, have a greater 
 aptitude for this work than others, but that is all that 
 can be said. Energy and perseverance will make 
 ample amends for some deficiency of natural aptitude ; 
 and no one need be ashamed of energy and perseve- 
 rance; without them a natural aptitude for preaching 
 will be of little value to its possessor or to his parish- 
 ioners. Genius, we all know, is necessary for great 
 eminence in any department of art, or literature, or 
 intellectual work of any kind, but these pages are not 
 written with the slightest idea of their being at all in- 
 strumental in producing great eminence in any of 
 those who may read them. Those who have the 
 capacity for becoming greatly eminent will know of 
 themselves, without the assistance of any thing I or 
 others can tell them, in what way to secure that emi- 
 nence. They will work, and work effectually, without 
 such guidance. My object is to invite the attention 
 of my younger brethren to that which is the subject 
 of these pages; and to show to those who may come 
 to agree with me as to what they ought to do, that 
 they may probably be able to give effect to what 
 they deem their duty in this matter, by following the 
 course I adopted and found tolerably successful. I 
 am not at all prejudiced in favor of my own method. 
 There will be some who at an early period of their 
 lives became habituated to speaking in public, and 
 
 5* 
 
54 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 tliey may therefore think the method I followed too 
 tedious and laborious. Possibly they may be able to 
 dispense with some of the writing I recommend ; but 
 not, I think, with any of the thought and study I 
 recommend. All that I am solicitous about is, that 
 we should see what is our duty as Ministers of the 
 Word, and endeavor to carry it out. If what I am 
 writing should produce such an effect in the minds of 
 some, I am quite content that others should be sur- 
 prised at my giving myself the trouble to describe 
 what I thought and what I did in this matter. 
 
 But to return to the method I was pur- 3. Ser- 
 mons writ- 
 suing. I went on as I had commenced, ten for 
 
 _■ T T • reading 
 
 Every week 1 wrote two sermons in ex- proved 
 tenso, after having carefully studied my f"r Extern- 
 subjects and arranged the plan of each p^.^^^T- 
 before sitting down to write. This pre- 
 vious arrangement of plan is necessary, otherwise the 
 probability is, that the sermon will be written without 
 a plan. I never again used an old sermon. I found 
 all I possessed unfit for Extemporary Preaching. The 
 faults which I now saw made them unsuitable for 
 being so used were faults which must have made them 
 difficult for the congregation to have followed with 
 continuous apprehension when read. They were more 
 or less full of irrelevant thoughts, words, and even 
 paragraphs. They were often unprogressive through- 
 out — that is, they did not set out with a distinct pur- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 55 
 
 pose to be reached in the end, to which every thing 
 in the course of the sermon was duly and regularly 
 subordinated. They were sometimes very disjointed 
 and unconnected, all the parts not being logically 
 parts of the same whole, but only in juxtaposition; 
 because, as in the game of dominoes, the beginning 
 of a paragraph had been suggested by the close of 
 that which preceded it. They had too little coherence 
 to be lifted off the paper. These, and other faults 
 which had not been observed, or, if observed, had not 
 been corrected when the MSS. were only to be read, 
 became apparent when I looked over them with the 
 view of preaching them extemporarily. This one 
 fact, which I am setting down just as I found it, must 
 alone go some way towards proving the probable in- 
 feriority of the method of reading written discourses. 
 I soon beo;an to study and compose 4. Advis- 
 during the week more than the two ser- pare MSS. 
 
 for Extem- 
 
 mons necessary for the coming Sunday, porary 
 
 I did this designedly, because we all on aii 
 
 know that a man can get through more up^n^vh^Jji 
 
 work by doino; one thing at a time, than one would 
 
 '^ ^ ° ' wish to 
 
 by doing several things at the same time; pi-each. 
 
 and I thought it proper that I should have sermons of 
 my own carefully studied and composed on every par- 
 agraph in the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, and 
 the Epistles of doctrinal or practical interest, and 
 on all those chapters of the Old Testament which are 
 
56 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 read as the first lessons of the Sunday morning and 
 afternoon services throughout the year. I set myself 
 down to this task with the determination to complete it 
 before I began to occupy myself with any thing else. 
 I completed it in a little more than four years, in 
 which time I had composed not far short of five hun- 
 dred and fifty sermons m extenso. AYhether I was 
 away from home, or whether I had friends staying 
 with me, I endeavored not to intermit my work en- 
 tirely. Of course I soon got ahead of what was re- 
 quired for the coming Sunday. Hence it happened 
 that I frequently preached a sermon I had written 
 some months, or even, after a time, that I had written 
 a year or more previously ; but as they had all been 
 composed with a view to being used for Extemporary 
 Preaching, I found it as easy to preach those that had 
 been written some months previously as one that had 
 been written during the foregoing week. Having now 
 completed the number of sermons I wished to have by 
 me in writing, I for some time only wrote my MSS. 
 at about half the length that would be required in 
 preaching them ; and then, after a time, I wrote only 
 short abstracts on half a sheet of note-paper. 
 5. Result Twelve years have now passed since 1 
 
 of twelve -^ ^ ^ 
 
 years' ex- began to work on this plan, and I have not 
 The Extern- yet had occasion to preach all the ser- 
 Preacher mons I wrote in these first four years. 
 
 preichThe ^<^™^ ^^ ^'^ ^^^' ^ ^'^^® ^^^^ ^^^^ *^^^ 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 57 
 
 once, but practically I have never preached same ser- 
 mon twice, 
 the same sermon twice: for as I never 
 
 preach without devoting to the subject I am going to 
 preach upon all the attention I can give it, and with- 
 out mastering all I am going to say upon it, I almost 
 in every case more or less recast the abstract, some- 
 times completely remodelling it; and as I have long 
 trusted entirely to the moment for the language and 
 the composition of what I have to say, though, after 
 five or six years I may preach from an old text, and 
 may, in preparing for the pulpit on the occasion of my 
 doing so, look over an old MS., it will not be an old 
 sermon that I shall preach, but one that will have the 
 benefit of the study and practice of the five or six in- 
 tervening years. It would surprise one not acquainted 
 with such matters, how greatly a little increase in 
 one's own knowledge, or a slight change in one's views, 
 or a change in the requirements of the times, or of 
 one's parishioners at the moment, will affect even the 
 form of a discourse, by leading to the introduction of 
 some new ideas, or by making subordinate that which 
 previously held a prominent place, or vice versd; but 
 so it is. Indeed, it can rarely happen that the Ex- 
 temporary Preacher who attends to his work will 
 preach the same sermon twice; the language of course 
 can never be repeated, for the changes that take place 
 in one's mind, even if in the meantime there has been 
 nothing that might be called mental growth, and the 
 
OQ EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 difference in one's fcclin;^s iit tlic moment of preach- 
 ing, render tliat impossible. The activity of tlie ima- 
 gination and the flow of language are ever varying, 
 as they depend in a great measure on the circum- 
 stances of the moment. 
 
 f'- '^JlJL Those who are constitutionally shy and 
 
 cuUy is to nervous, and whose natural defects of this 
 first effort. l<ind havc perhaps been increased, as is 
 frequently the case with clergymen, by 
 the habits of a studious life, will find that a very 
 great effort is required for making the first attempt. 
 It is voluntarily submitting oneself to a kind of unseen 
 martyrdom. But the first Sunday will do much 
 towards mitigating these distressing feelings, because 
 it will prove the possibility, where before all was un- 
 certainty, of carrying out one's resolve. That be- 
 ginning will enable the preacher to feel assured that 
 if he will give himself the same amount of trouble he 
 has just expended in preparing for liis first Sunday, 
 he will on subsequent Sundays do at least as well and 
 be as safe from breaking down and hesitation; or 
 rather, he may have reason for hoping that continued 
 practice will give a proportionate increase of con- 
 fidence, ease, and power. Here, as in so many other 
 things, it is the first step which is the difficult one to 
 take; that once taken, the way is smoothed for all the 
 steps that are to follow. I note this for the encour- 
 agement of those who may be thinking of making 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACIIINa. 50 
 
 the attempt. They will find their first effort far less 
 of a failure tlian tliey arc beforehand disposed to an- 
 ticipate. This will very mucli diminish Avliat they 
 may now be supposing will be the mental distress of 
 their subsequent efforts. In some cases, of course, 
 these uncomfortable feelings will only be removed 
 very gradually. Many of the most accustomed 
 speakers have told us that they never rose to speak in 
 public without experiencing sensations of tliis kind ; 
 though, indeed, there must be more reason for their 
 feeling in this way in the contests of public life, than 
 there can be for the minister of the Word, who is only 
 called upon to make a short address to his own 
 friendly congregation on his own familiar subjects. 
 Speaking from my own experience, I must say that 
 this feeling, to a painful degree, may last for several 
 years, and even afterwards may never entirely leave 
 one. But I found, even in my first years of Extem- 
 porary Preaching, when it was most troublesome, that 
 it seldom lasted beyond the first few sentences. One 
 soon becomes, from the necessity of having to attend 
 to what he is about, so completely absorbed in his 
 subject, as generally to lose all consciousness even of 
 the presence of the congregation, certainly to lose all 
 consciousness of self. The beginner is obliged to be 
 so intent on his subject, that witli him this will fre- 
 quently be the case. When practice has given him an 
 easier command of himself, he will be able to attend 
 
60 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 both to liis subject and to his congregation at the 
 same time. 
 7. What But I may be asked, Why incur these 
 
 feeling 
 
 harder to disagreeable feelings, when they may be 
 
 bear than o t 
 
 the distress escaped by reading your sermons : 1 
 t*o speak^ ^'^plj? ^^^^ I incurred them because the 
 cz tempore. feelings of humiliation and shame I ex- 
 perienced, as a Minister of the Word, at reading my 
 sermons, were more distressing. The latter were 
 more distressing, because they impelled me to en- 
 counter and to continue to bear the former. The 
 feelings that are suggested Sunday after Sunday, and 
 year after year, by the sight of an uninterested, in- 
 attentive, and uninstructed congregation, are far more 
 disagreeable. There is absolutely nothing to com- 
 pensate for these feelings, while you are amply 
 compensated for the former by the consciousness that 
 you are discharging a sacred duty to the best of your 
 ability, and to the ever-increasing benefit of those to 
 whom you have undertaken to minister the Word. 
 8- 111 The method by which a man may at- 
 
 somo capes 
 
 Exposition tempt to acquire the power of Extempo- 
 usexi as I'ary Preaching will of course depend in a 
 
 for^Extlm- gi'^at measure upon the power he has of 
 Pr^^^Tin speaking in public at the time the resolu- 
 tion is made and the attempt commenced. 
 Throughout these pages I am supposing the case, 
 which is that of a large proportion of the Clergy, of a 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 61 
 
 man "who has to begin from the beginning, or even 
 from a worse point than the beginning, — that, I mean, 
 at ^vhich a man finds himself who has always been in 
 the habit of reading:' his discourses, all the while livinor 
 a somewhat retired and studious life. Such a person 
 comes to have a profound distrust of himself, and 
 looks upon the demands that Extemporary Preaching 
 will make upon him as impossibilities in his case: he 
 feels himself utterly incapable of complying with 
 them. There are many such, and for them mainly 
 I am writing. But there are others, who have made 
 at the University or elsewhere some attempts to speak 
 in public, and found them not altogether unsuccessful; 
 and others, again, who are conscious of possessing 
 some natural powers of this kind. These persons 
 will probably be disposed to adopt some easier and 
 shorter method than the one I am recommending. 
 The following anecdote, which describes a case I am 
 acquainted with, gives one of these other methods. A 
 Clergyman, not long after his arrival in the parish of 
 which he had recently become the Incumbent, was 
 making one of his first rounds of pastoral visits. On 
 entering the house of a petty shopkeeper, he expressed 
 some regret at not having seen the man at church on 
 the previous Sunday. The man replied, that it was 
 true; he had not been at the church; and it was not 
 his habit to be there on Sunday, for he was a Dis- 
 senter. The Clergyman repeated his expressions of 
 6 
 
62 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 regret, and asked the man why he was a Dissenter. 
 The man replied, that as the reason was asked, 
 he would unreservedly give it. In the Dissenters' 
 chapels, he said, the Minister always addressed the 
 congregation from what was in his own mind; and 
 what the Minister said was said in such a manner 
 that it was understood by the people, and moved 
 their hearts. The case, however, was very different 
 in the church. There, the Minister, although they 
 were told that he spent many years at school and the 
 University, and that he was a very learned man, was 
 unable, from his own mind, to say any thing to his 
 people; and what he read to them was seldom under- 
 stood by them, and did not come home to their hearts. 
 And their conclusion was, that they could not believe 
 that God's Spirit was with the Church-Minister, to 
 guide him in what he was reading, and to aid him in 
 reaching their hearts. This statement of the reason 
 which had induced several of his parishioners to for- 
 sake the church for the chapel, the Clergyman found 
 himself quite unable to answer. It is true that the 
 argument it contains does not at every point hold 
 water; but it would have been impossible to have 
 answered it satisfactorily to the small tradesman, for 
 after all there was in it a great deal of solid truth. 
 This the Clergyman felt strongly. Here was a cause 
 of weakness to the Church, and a reproach to it which 
 was very discreditable to the Clergy. The more he 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 63 
 
 thought of what the man had said, the more clearly 
 he saw that there was but one way of replying to it, 
 and that was by doing what he was told the Clergy 
 had not the power to do. He decided at once what 
 he would do. He had never spoken in public, but he 
 determined immediately to acquire the power of doing 
 so. He was aware that he possessed some natural 
 aptitude for speaking, and he therefore resolved to 
 commence forthwith the following plan. On the ensu- 
 ing Sunday he took the Bible up into the pulpit, 
 opened it at the first chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel, 
 and announced to the congregation that it was his 
 intention to expound continuously the whole of that 
 Gospel. He was sure that he would have something 
 to say upon every paragraph, and that he would be 
 able to say it; and he trusted that, as he went on, he 
 would find that he required less and less of the text 
 for his half-hour's exposition. He was not disap- 
 pointed. Before he got through St. Matthew's Gos- 
 pel, he found himself able to preach from no more of 
 the text than he would have required formerly for 
 one of his written sermons. The objection of the 
 petty tradesman and of those who reasoned like 
 him was completely met^ and they returned, some 
 altogether and some in part, to the Church they had 
 forsaken. Here was a great advantage gained. But 
 I must remind my readers that only a part of what I 
 am recommending in these pages was accomplished. 
 
G4 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 This Clergyman had acquired, and on very easy terms, 
 the power of preaching in the way which alone can 
 secure the attention and respect of ordinary congrega- 
 tions, and which has, besides, other advantages; but 
 he had done, in doing this, nothing to enrich the 
 matter, to enlarge the views, to strengthen the rea- 
 soning, and to improve the arrangement and style of 
 what he said. Let us suppose that every thing of 
 this kind was added in time; for, if not, then the 
 petty tradesman and his fellow-seceders did not gain 
 much more from the sermons of the parish church to 
 Avhich they had returned, than they might have gained 
 from those they would have heard at the chapel they 
 had been induced to abandon. How a thing is said, 
 signifies much ; but what it is that is said, signifies 
 more. 
 9. Reflec- J -^yas in the habit for several years of 
 
 tions nnd 
 
 hints the committing to paper any thoughts which 
 
 RCtllcXl 
 
 practice of the Services of the Sunday, and particu- 
 p(^rary larly the sermons, had suggested. The 
 
 Treaching object of this practice was, to preserve 
 
 suggested. '^ ^ ^ ^ 
 
 The years any thins that occurred to me, and which 
 
 1854, 1855, -^ ^ ' 
 
 1856. I thought it might be of use to remember. 
 
 A selection from these memoranda, it now appears to 
 
 me, might have, for those of my readers who may be 
 
 disposed to give my recommendations a trial, some 
 
 little interest, perhaps even some little advantage. I 
 
 will therefore select a few for their perusal. The en- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 65 
 
 tries for the first year, 1854, have been lost. In 
 1855, those that express a sense of slowness of ad- 
 vance, sometimes of no advance at all, are frequent; 
 but I do not find one that presents any indication of 
 my having ever from the first wavered in my resolu- 
 tion, or of my having been dissatisfied either with the 
 amount of work it imposed upon me in these first 
 years, or with the abandonment it necessitated of my 
 former pursuits. At that time the labor was great 
 and the apparent fruits were but slight; this, how- 
 ever, never discouraged me. 
 
 In 1856 I find, among many I omit, the following 
 entries : — 
 
 Jan. 29. — I am now speaking with less prepara- 
 tion, and yet with more ease than I did a year ago. 
 I must therefore endeavor to be on my guard against 
 falling into any thing like slovenly fluency. By care- 
 ful attention, I suppose, the habit of speaking with 
 clearness and accuracy may be attained with as much 
 certainty as any other habit. 
 
 March 23. — Of late I have advanced very slowly, 
 if at all. But I remember that, as the advantage of 
 being able to discharge one's duty in the pulpit pro- 
 perly is great, so the difficulty of acquiring the power 
 of doing it must be expected to be proportionately 
 great. 
 
 " Nil sine magno 
 Vita labore dedit mortalibus." 
 
 6* 
 
66 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 Aug. 31. — I find that, next to a good subject well 
 prepared, what sets one most at ease, is a good con- 
 gregation. A small, inattentive congregation de- 
 presses. It implies that the service, of which the 
 exposition of the Word is an important part, has 
 failed, as conducted by the Minister, to awaken in- 
 terest. This want of interest in the congregation 
 reacts upon him who is more or less the cause of it. 
 A good congregation, for the opposite reason (for the 
 feeling of interest in what is going on is very infec- 
 tious), gives wings to the spirit of the preacher. It 
 contributes much towards loosening his tongue and 
 giving him freedom of speech. 
 
 Oct. 26. — I felt sure to-day that the attention 
 which must be given to sermons intended for Extem- 
 porary Preaching, such as I have been obliged to give 
 to mine for now more than two years, must improve 
 a Minister of the Word in sermon-writing. 
 
 JVov. 16. — I begin to feel the good effect of attend- 
 ing to what is passing in the minds of the congrega- 
 tion. The speaker is aroused by seeing or feeling 
 that the minds of his hearers are in contact with his 
 own mind. This is a stimulus to thought and expres- 
 sion of which I knew nothing while I read my ser- 
 mons. 
 
 10. 1857. Jan. 4. — I was told to-day by one of my 
 most intelligent parishioners, that the congregation 
 were, as far as he knew, without an exception, in 
 
EXTExMPORARY PREACHING. 67 
 
 favor of my having abandoned the practice of reading 
 my sermons, and adopted that of preaching them 
 extemporarily. As to my own feelings, though not 
 altogether dissatisfied with my progress, I am very 
 far indeed removed from being satisfied with my per- 
 formance. I had much to unlearn as well as much 
 to learn, and my progress is very slow; I have how- 
 ever, no thought of abandoning the attempt I am 
 making. 
 
 Feb. 8. — What I say is beginning to be better than 
 what I am capable of writing; it is much better put. 
 It was so to-day. 
 
 Feb. 15. — I find that the more entirely I trust to 
 the moment for composition, the more completely my 
 subject gets possession of me. This, I think I may 
 take for granted, makes one's speaking more natural 
 and forcible, for it then becomes the expression of the 
 present thought. 
 
 March 8. — Preached to-day from a MS. I had 
 written a year and a half ago. In studying it for the 
 pulpit I made great alterations in it. This goes some 
 way towards proving to me that I can write a better 
 sermon now than I could then. 
 
 3Iarch 22. — In the morning I did badly, though 
 I had thought I had a good MS. to preach from. 
 In the evening I did better, though I had thought 
 that my MS. was very inferior to that used in the 
 morning. In speaking, one's powers vary very much, 
 
68 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 in accordance with the circumstances of the moment, 
 though sometimes not in the manner one would have 
 supposed beforehand ; for one is often able to throw 
 off completely the feelings and thoughts which up to 
 the moment of speaking would obstinately retain pos- 
 session of the mind. 
 
 March 29. — I felt to-day that I was now able to 
 preach without a written preparation. 
 
 3Iay 3. — I gave, instead of a sermon, an exposition 
 this afternoon. I became conscious of difficulties and 
 faults peculiar to this form of discourse. In an ex- 
 position I see care must be taken to prevent its 
 becoming fragmentary. The way in which the para- 
 graphs, or the consideration of the successive partic- 
 ulars, are connected must be attended to. The 
 repetition of the same connecting phrases must be 
 avoided. Oneness of purpose in all that is said, from 
 the difficulty of securing it in an exposition, ought to 
 be kept in view as an especial aim. 
 
 3Iay 10. — I made very little use of my MS. this 
 morning. It was almost useless, plainly because I 
 had not attained to sufficiently clear ideas upon my 
 subject at the time I wrote the MS. This shows that 
 to write in haste — almost, as is sometimes done, 
 against time, — it is not only to waste your labor, but 
 it is something still worse; for it is doing what it is 
 probable may confuse you, when you attempt to 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 69 
 
 preach what you wrote without a proper mastery of 
 your subject, or at inauspicious moments. 
 
 Ma7/ 17. — The Minister of the Word must remem- 
 ber that to speak persuasively is an important part of 
 his work. To have a large and attentive congregation 
 is not a bad proof, though of course not a conclusive 
 one, that he has attained to this power. 
 
 Mai/ 31. — I found this morning that I could not 
 interest myself in my work, or exert myself; conse- 
 quently I preached in a slovenly and perfunctory 
 manner. I was rather going over so much ground, 
 than endeavoring to implant certain ideas and awaken 
 certain feelings in the minds of the people before me. 
 
 JuIt/ 5. — To look the congregation in the face is 
 often both a stimulus to the speaker and a guide to 
 him in the treatment of his subject. It tells him 
 whether he is understood, and whether he should 
 drop, or continue to dwell a little longer on what he 
 is speaking about. 
 
 Aug. 30. — I felt to-day that I had more complete 
 command of my faculties than usual. I traced this 
 plainly to the mentally invigorating effects of having 
 been travelling about for the preceding month. The 
 great variety of minds, just like the variety of natural 
 scenes and objects one meets with in travelling, re- 
 freshes and strengthens. 
 
 Oct. 18. — One of the great advantages a speaker 
 has over a reader, is, that he has grasped his whole 
 
YO EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 subject, and sets it before his mind's eye; he is there- 
 fore able, as he goes on, to give its proper breadth 
 and color to each part. He works up to and makes 
 his points. The reader must confine himself to what 
 he has before him, and so cannot do these things. 
 
 Nov. 8. — I felt something to-day of the hearts and 
 minds of the people I was addressing. I was con- 
 scious that their thought and feeling were aroused. I 
 seemed to myself to be giving expression to their 
 thought and feeling. This ra-pport between the 
 speaker and his hearers is necessary. Their thoughts 
 and feelings are partly to be read in their faces, and 
 partly to be divined. To keep oneself in this way in 
 sympathy with one's hearers, is utterly to repudiate 
 the pestilential idea of oratorical display. It is the 
 substitution of the thought of one's audience for the 
 thought of oneself. 
 
 Nov. 15. — The preacher should begin by planting 
 his subject in the minds of the congregation. He 
 should do this in such a way as, if possible, to interest 
 them, and set them thinking upon it. They will then 
 go along with the speaker, and be more disposed to 
 adopt his thoughts and feelings. If they are them- 
 selves thinking on the subject, he will appear to be 
 giving utterance to their thoughts and feelings. 
 
 Dec. 25. Christmas Day. — I heard a young Extem- 
 porary Preacher in Ipswich this afternoon. I wished 
 I could have got hold of him, and made him under- 
 
EXTEMPORAllY PREACHING. 71 
 
 stand that wliat he wanted was some years of hard 
 study, both thought and reading, to enable him to 
 have something to say that would be worth hearing. 
 He is evidently not aware of the vast difference be- 
 tween saying something, and having something to 
 say. His efforts were not directed to any definite 
 purpose. He made no points. His sermon, if it 
 could be so called, was one dead level of religious 
 common-places. 
 
 Dec. 27. — ^While preaching, my mind now is never 
 occupied about the language I am using, further than 
 to avoid words which would be unintelligible to the 
 rural poor. As one's object is to be understood, to 
 move, and to persuade, one ought to be careful to say 
 nothing but what may be readily followed and taken 
 in by the present congregation. And having ceased 
 to be occupied with the language I use, I can attend 
 more closely to reasoning out and illustrating the 
 point before me. 
 
 I have now completed the fourth year of practice ^^• 
 in Extemporary Preaching. Whatever else might 
 have been done with this long period of my working 
 life, I am not dissatisfied with having devoted it to 
 this object. I say this as a Minister of the Word; 
 though possibly I could not, under any circumstances, 
 have employed the time to better purpose. It would, 
 however, have been far better had I begun to prac- 
 tise speaking in public twenty years earlier. 
 
72 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 Throughout this year there arc no entries of dis- 
 content at slowness of progress, but there are some of 
 an opposite character. 
 
 I find in this year the following entries without 
 date : — 
 
 There are three kinds of material for Extemporary 
 Speaking — Reasoning, Feeling, and Imagination. 
 The first care of the Extemporary Preacher must be 
 to have each of these at command. In the next place, 
 he must be able to clothe in appropriate language 
 what each supplies. Lastly, he must have judgment 
 to know when to use and how much to use of each. 
 These three materials of speaking must be used as 
 different colored threads would be used in a cloth of 
 fair design. Each must always be in hand for use, 
 ready to be taken up and laid down as required. 
 Sometimes the three will be used in the same para- 
 graph. Sometimes, Keasoning, Feeling, or Imagi- 
 nation will be indicated in the use of a single word. 
 
 One of the great advantages of Extemporary 
 Preaching is that it obliges the preacher to under- 
 stand to some extent what he is speaking about. 
 "What he understands, there is some prospect of his 
 being able to make intelligible to his congregation. 
 
 The matter of what a man says cannot be better 
 than his knowledge and his logic. This is why the 
 ordinary run of popular preachers have no weight at 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 73 
 
 all in the world. They must improve their logic, 
 and increase their knowledge. 
 
 1858. Jan. 10. — I was very much dissatisfied 12. 
 with myself tliis afternoon. I did badly because I had 
 not clearly made out to myself beforehand a part of 
 my argument. 
 
 Feb. 14. — Lately I have found myself so entirely 
 absorbed by my subject as to forget the presence of 
 my hearers. This is a mistake and must be guarded 
 against. The speaker ought never to lose sight of 
 the way in which his audience is regarding his sub- 
 ject, and what he is saying of it. 
 
 Ajyril 18. — For the first time I used a MS. from 
 which I had already preached. It was one that had 
 been written and used at the beginning of 1854. I 
 find that I have very much advanced beyond what I 
 was then capable of doing. The old MS. proved 
 almost useless. I recast the whole of it. Nothing 
 of the kind would have been done under the system 
 of reading. I should not have outgrown a MS. in 
 four years ; or, if I had, I should hardly have 
 noticed it, when nothing was to be done but read 
 what was already prepared. The having to master, 
 and construct in the mind what was to be said, 
 showed that something better could now be done than 
 had been done in 185-4. 
 
 Mai/ 9. — I still have nearly one hundred unused 
 MSS., but used to-day, instead of taking two of 
 
74 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 these, two that I had written and used four years 
 ago. This is good practice, to discover faults, and 
 correct them; and, in consequence of having in- 
 creased and more digested one's knowledge and 
 enlarged one's experience of what is required in 
 preaching, to remodel an old MS. This accustoms 
 one never to use one's materials without thought and 
 understanding. 
 
 July 18. — I find that in preaching there is always 
 a great difference hetween my way of treating the 
 beginning and my way of treating the latter part of 
 a sermon. At first I am always more diffuse than I 
 am towards the close. This difference probably arises 
 from a difference in the matter. The beginning of a 
 sermon is generally explanatory; and explanations 
 admit of and almost invite diffuseness. The latter 
 part, however, consists generally of application and 
 exhortation. Diffuseness here would mean dilution 
 and weakness. I also find that diffuseness is far 
 easier than conciseness. Diffuseness does not con- 
 fuse the speaker, though it may the hearer. The at- 
 tempt at conciseness has a tendency to confuse the 
 speaker. A well-executed conciseness is a great 
 help, and very pleasing to the hearer. 
 
 Sept. 12. — I preached this morning for the first 
 time from a sketch drawn out on one side of half a 
 sheet of note-paper. I had sufficiently studied the 
 subject in my mind. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 75 
 
 Oct. 10. — I did badly this morning, because I had 
 not made out my subject distinctly to myself. De- 
 fective power of speaking, and insufficient study of 
 what one is to speak about, are two very diiferent 
 things. 
 
 Oct. 24. — My powers of extemporary thought are 
 much enlarged. At first, my memory was chiefly 
 exercised. Then, language occupied me much while 
 speaking. Now, neither memory nor language occupy 
 me much. My mind is chiefly occupied with seeking 
 for arguments and illustrations, and arranging what 
 I have to say. My practice in Extemporary Preach- 
 ing has convinced me of the duality of the mind — or 
 rather that the mind is capable of doing two things at 
 the same moment. While I am speaking, — which is 
 one operation, for it is the clothing of thought in lan- 
 guage, — I am always thinking of what is coming, 
 sometimes very intently ; or of the congregation, of 
 how they will understand and receive what I am 
 saying. Whether these two operations are performed 
 simultaneously by the same organ, or by two distinct 
 yet connected organs, like the two eyes, or the two 
 ears, is a question which I suppose admits of dis- 
 cussion. If the two organs are distinct, they may be 
 so in the fashion of the two hands or the two feet, 
 which are capable of acting simultaneously either for 
 a conjoint purpose, or each for a separate purpose of 
 
76 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 its own. Or the rapidity of thought may be so great 
 as to dispense apparently Avith time, and thus to pre- 
 clude the thinker from distinguishing between the 
 laying down of one subject and the taking up of 
 another. The attention given to the two subjects may 
 in reality be not simultaneous, but consecutive ; we 
 may, however, be incapable of observing the consecu- 
 tiveness of the second act of attention to the first. 
 I would illustrate this supposition by the familiar in- 
 stance of a long and eventful dream being comprised 
 in the instantaneous act of waking, when a noise or a 
 word has been the cause of the sleeper's having been 
 aroused, and his whole dream was suggested by the 
 very noise or word that awoke him. 
 
 Dec. 26. — I have frequently of late preached with- 
 out any written study, except a few headings set down 
 in a few lines. 
 
 I close this year with the entry, that 1 believe I 
 have during the year improved in preaching, but that 
 I can hardly say that I have made any approaches 
 towards my ideal of a preacher. My imaginative 
 powers generally appear to me to be paralyzed when 
 I am in the pulpit. My reasoning powers are not af- 
 fected in this way. 
 
 13. 1859. — 1 had now entirely ceased to write sermons 
 in extenso. Seven years have since passed, and during 
 that time I have never had occasion to do more than 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 77 
 
 set down a few short notes, that I might be able to 
 judge of the plan of what I was about to say; and 
 that no part of it, — as must sometimes be the case if 
 no memoranda arc made, — might slip out of my mind, 
 and be lost. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 SOME REMARKS OX THE COMPOSITION OF SERMONS. 
 
 1. Com- 
 position of 
 sermons — 
 their eflfec- 
 tiveness 
 depends 
 upon it. 
 
 1 NOW proceed to say something on a 
 subject to which passing references have 
 frequently been made in the foregoing 
 pages — that of the Composition of Ser- 
 mons. Upon this depends not only the 
 effectiveness of sermons, but also the very power of 
 preaching them effectively. This is true of them even 
 when addressed to the ignorant and uncultivated, who 
 are more impressed by what they hear, understand it 
 more readily, and are able to carry more of it away 
 when the plain natural rules of composition are 
 observed. 
 
 2. They 
 must, first 
 of all. be 
 vertebrate 
 composi- 
 tions. 
 
 The first and most essential principle 
 
 is, that a sermon must be a vertebrate 
 
 composition. It must have a vertebral 
 
 column — a back-bone. When this has 
 
 been secured, other things may be attended to; and 
 
 just as the higher vertebrate animals have appendages 
 
 in the shape of limbs, so may this vertebrate composi- 
 
 78 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACniNQ. 79 
 
 tiou — a sermon — be the better for an appendage or 
 two. You may depart occasionally from the direct 
 line of the column of construction to append here what 
 may serve as a leg, to give the body of the discourse 
 as it were a little movement, and here what may serve 
 as an arm, to smite the wrong-doer, or to raise the 
 distressed in mind, body, or estate. But these must 
 grow naturally from it, and their use must be obvious. 
 They will give to what is being said motion and action ; 
 but the vertebral column itself is the body and sub- 
 stance of the sermon: these additions are the means 
 it uses for effecting its immediate objects. 
 
 Sometimes we hear of a speaker having lost the 
 thread of his discourse; sometimes also we hear an 
 Extemporary Preacher accused of having repeated 
 himself. Here we have an accident and a fault, both 
 of which may be avoided by the observance of the rule 
 I have just laid down; for if his sermon be so com- 
 posed, the preacher must begin at the beginning and 
 go on to the end. "What he has to say will then not 
 admit of his doubling back. He will always know 
 just where he is, what he has said, and what he has 
 still to say. 
 
 But speakinor in this way of the compo- ^- To be 
 
 regarded as 
 
 sition of sermons, suggests the objection works of 
 that it w^ould give them an artificial cha- high order 
 racter. AYe must distinguish between 
 what has an artificial character and what is a work of 
 
80 EXTEMPORARY PREACHI.XG. 
 
 art, which every sermon ought to be, in the sense in 
 which the building itself in v>'hich the sermon is de- 
 livered is, or a statue, or a picture. Indeed, there 
 is a sense in which the vforks of nature, as for instance, 
 the terrestrial landscape, the starry firmament, a flower, 
 a leaf, a tree, an animal, the human face, the human 
 figure, .are, just like the works of man, works of art, 
 although the terms are commonly used in opposition 
 to each other. The diiterence between them is, that 
 the latter are the works of a human, and the former 
 of a Divine Artist. What brings any thing under 
 this category, is, that it is conceived and executed 
 with reference to certain principles of proportion, 
 contrast, form, color, and greater or less prominence 
 of certain parts. Conformity in each instance to the 
 principles which that particular kind of work requires, 
 makes the thing done suitable for its purpose, and also 
 makes it a work of art. All this applies strictly to 
 sermons, which, as they are addressed to the under- 
 standing and feelings, do in truth occupy a very high 
 place among works of art. 
 4. Must But I proceed with the remarks I have 
 
 have unity 
 
 of purpose, to make on their composition. No great 
 effect can be produced on the mind and feelings by 
 what is confused and indistinct, and wanting in 
 directness and intelligibility. A man who is un- 
 acquainted with, or careless about what are the rules 
 of art belonging to this subject, will sometimes begin 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 81 
 
 an argument and then interrupt himself with some 
 irrelevant considerations. An incomplete argument, 
 or an argument thus broken into pieces, cannot have 
 so much force as it would have had if it had been 
 managed in a more workmanlike manner. An anal- 
 ogous fault, equally or even more inartistic, is to in- 
 troduce any thing that will produce a different effect 
 from that at which the preacher is or should be 
 aiming, either as the object of his whole sermon or of 
 that particular part of it where the discordant thought 
 or feeling is suggested. He ought not to use so much 
 as a word which would divert the attention of his con- 
 gregation from his object, by suggesting an irrelevant 
 or superfluous idea. All the powers of thought and 
 feeling both in himself and in his audience, should be 
 made to converge on the present object. This is what 
 we do in conversation. A preacher who understands 
 how his purpose is to be effected will do the same in 
 the pulpit. Matter and words that are irrelevant or 
 superfluous are objectionable in a sermon for the same 
 reasons for which any thing of the same description 
 would be objectionable in a poem, statue, picture, or 
 any other work of art. The difference is, that in such 
 a work as a picture or statue, the whole being taken 
 in by the eye at a glance, if there be any thing irrele- 
 vant or superfluous, it is detected instantly ; but a 
 sermon, before judgment can be passed on it, requires 
 half an hour's attention and a knowledge of what is 
 
82 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 really beside its purpose and aim. This implies in 
 the hearer an amount of knowledge which many per- 
 sons do not possess, and an amount of attention which 
 few persons are disposed to give. Such people will 
 generally allow to pass unnoticed much that may be 
 at discord with and destructive of the effect the ser- 
 mon should have been intended to produce. Still, 
 even in their cases, the effectiveness of a sermon 
 would be very much increased by a diminution of 
 these faults. 
 5. What Another objection, besides that which 
 
 better in '^ 
 
 sermons mistakes conformity to the rules of art 
 
 than na- •/. • i -i 
 
 tural elo- for an artificial character, may be made 
 quence. ^^ ^l^^ more measured and reasoned kind 
 
 of speaking which may be expected from the adoption 
 of my recommendations as to regular study and careful 
 composition previous to delivery : it may be said this 
 cannot produce any thing at all resembling true 
 natural eloquence. But may it not produce some- 
 thing much better, and much more suited to the pul- 
 pit ? We can imagine what would be the effect on 
 the mind, of hearing twice every Sunday, for half an 
 hour at a time, bursts of true natural eloquence. It 
 would become tedious, perhaps insufferable. Ac- 
 curacy and variety of knowledge, and thoughtfulness 
 in the man one has to hear so frequently, are better 
 than what is meant by true natural eloquence, which 
 is generally accompanied with more or less of ignc- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 83 
 
 rancc, with 'svant of balance, want of breadth of view 
 and of profundity, and of connectedness and of dis- 
 tinctness of object. These are excellences which can 
 be attained only by patient thought and study. 
 In sermon-writino; and preachinc; a ques- 6. Re- 
 
 , ^ ° ^ spective 
 
 tion sometimes arises, as to the most ap- claims of or- 
 
 * • • 1 dinary 
 
 propriate language. As it is the somewhat phraseology 
 
 T . 1 X r* .r 1 f and that of 
 
 archaic character oi the language ot our ^^^^ English 
 Enghsh Bible and of our Book of Common ^^^^^• 
 Prayer which gives rise to this question, it is evident 
 that whatever difficulties it contains are peculiar among 
 public speakers to the preacher. Some would solve 
 the question by cutting the knot. They say, "Archaic 
 language is unfit for the purposes of the preacher, as 
 it would be for the purposes of any other speaker. 
 Speakers, of whatever kind they may be, should use 
 the language of the day — it must be the language 
 which is most readily understood; and to be readily 
 understood is the object of all speakers." These per- 
 sons mean that they would have the language of our 
 English Bible and Book of Common Prayer dropped 
 in the pulpit, and the language of the literature of the 
 day adopted in its place. This solution, however, of 
 the question is dictated rather by an exaggeration of 
 the common-sense view of the matter, than by consi- 
 derations of good taste, or of what would produce the 
 best effect on the minds of the congregation. An 
 instance will perhaps show this better than an argu- 
 
84 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ment. A preacher who some years ago was of some 
 note in a country town where he held a benefice, but 
 was afterwards the minister of a more critical congre- 
 gation elsewhere, agreed with those whose opinion I 
 have just quoted; and once gave (it was his ordinary 
 style of language) the following illustration of the 
 practice of using modern phraseology in sermons. 
 His subject was, "The Children of Light," and his 
 object at the moment was to convey the idea that they 
 are the recipients of light. With this in view he said, 
 " Brethren, to use a philosophic " (he meant a scientific) 
 "term, you are photogenic." The word was taken 
 from the walls of a lucifer-match manufactory in Mile 
 End, which is seen from the Great Eastern Railway ; 
 where, however, whether correctly or not, it means 
 exactly the reverse of what the preacher supposed, 
 being applied there to the production, not the reception 
 of light. It is obvious that the use in the pulpit of 
 such fire-new, and would-be scientific, terms as the 
 above, even when applied with perfect correctness, can 
 only be justified by necessity. They jar too much on 
 the ears of educated hearers. If the object be to con- 
 nect the pulpit as closely as possible with the facts and 
 thoughts of the present day, the object is a most proper 
 one; and the means for doing this which language 
 supplies are not to be neglected; but excess is possi- 
 ble in the use of these means, as in most other things, 
 and ought to be guarded against. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 85 
 
 The opposite extreme, that of the preacher con- 7. 
 fining himself exclusively to the language of our English 
 Bible, is also to be avoided. The effect of this is to 
 take the hearer out of the living realities of tlie actual 
 world, and to transport him to a region of shadows ; 
 for such are words and phrases which are no longer in 
 common use: life has departed from them. The dis- 
 crepancy between ordinary language and that of the 
 Authorized Version is rapidly increasing; the time 
 therefore cannot be very distant when the bad effect 
 of preaching in the language of the latter will be gen- 
 erally obvious. In the mean time, judgment, good 
 taste, and a common-sense view of the requirements 
 of what we have to speak about, must determine for 
 the preacher in what way he can most effectively ex- 
 press his meaning. Some when wishing to inculcate 
 the practice of "every virtue" would urge the hearer 
 in Biblical phrase " to fulfil all righteousness." Some- 
 thing may be objected to either phrase — at all events 
 it may be said of the latter that the idea it calls up is 
 faint, and not precisely what the preacher wishes to 
 convey. One might hesitate between the Holy Spirit 
 and Holy Ghost, feeling that the latter name is be^ 
 coming obsolete, and that the former awakens more 
 thought, because to our ears more instinct with mean- 
 ing. Trespasses and transgressions are words which 
 have almost ceased to appeal to the conscience. 
 8 
 
86 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 Naughtiness is no longer applied to the delinquencies 
 of grown-up persons. 
 
 8. But that multitudes of Biblical words and 
 phrases are thus more or less obsolete is not all ; there 
 is also the fact that a great deal of what the preacher 
 has to say cannot be expressed at all, or only very im- 
 perfectly, in Biblical phraseology. One almost shrinks 
 from mentioning in the pulpit any place — as, for 
 instance, Paris or New York — the name of which does 
 not occur in the Bible : but this is false taste, and is 
 wrong. 
 
 9- Our rule then should be to say whatever ought 
 to be said, on every subject that comes before us in the 
 Ministry of the Word, in the most distinct, direct, and 
 intelligible way; not fearing to use modern phrase- 
 ology, if it will bring our meaning more forcibly home 
 to the understandings of our congregations than 
 Biblical phraseology would. But at the same time we 
 need not avoid, I would rather say we ought to prefer. 
 Biblical phraseology wherever it can be used without 
 detriment to the effectiveness of what we are desirous 
 of saying. Its use will have this advantage, that it 
 will contribute to invest our discourse with something 
 of a sacred character by connecting it with the source 
 from whence it derives its inspiration. While, however, 
 we do this, we must be careful not to do it to such an 
 extent as to invest our discourse with an unreal and 
 conventional character, as if it were all about matters 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 87 
 
 that men had ceased to think or to talk about; for if 
 we do not speak in the language in which men think, 
 what we say will not come home to their understand- 
 ings or their feelings. 
 
 The two most important, and at the ^^- Open- 
 ings of ser- 
 same time the most difficult, sentences in mons will 
 
 r\n generally 
 
 a sermon are the first and the last. Of becom- 
 these the last is the more difficult of the ^^^^ 
 two. The first will frequently supply the key-note to 
 all that is to follow; while it suggests the object of 
 the discourse, or brings at once into prominency some 
 fact or thought which is material to the Preacher's 
 purpose, and which he therefore desires that the con- 
 gregation should bear in mind. The sentence that is 
 to do this in the most appropriate manner for the 
 whole of what is to follow, can seldom be hit upon 
 when one first sits down to write a sermon ; but it will 
 always readily present itself to the mind when the 
 whole subject has been completely grasped, and not 
 only its aim, but the way in which each part contributes 
 to that aim, distinctly made out. "When all this stands 
 clearly and palpably before the mind's eye, the point 
 from which the preacher is to start will suggest itself. 
 This is so certainly the spontaneous result of knowing 
 what one is about, and has to do, that in Extemporary 
 Preaching the beginning of a sermon may generally be 
 left to the moment of delivery. In actual composition, 
 therefore, the first paragraph will generally be most 
 
OO EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 to the purpose if written last, because it is properlj 
 
 the result of Vv'hat all the rest happens to be. The 
 
 preacher will know the precise point from which he is 
 
 to set out when he knows the exact point he is to make 
 
 for, and the ground he is to go over. 
 
 11. Further Acrain, it is by no means an invariable 
 remarks on *^ 
 
 the opening rule that the preacher should begin bj 
 
 sentence. 
 
 stating his subject, because if the subject 
 be of such a nature that the congregation will not 
 readily understand or accept it, it is obvious that it may 
 be better to introduce the announcement of it with 
 some argument, or statement, or illustration, that will 
 lead on to it, and dispose the congregation to accept it. 
 12. Con- The conclusion, however, of a sermon is 
 
 eluding sen- 
 tence diffi- perhaps of greater importance and of 
 cult, and of i-m i -r ■, 
 
 different greater difliculty. its purpose may be 
 
 kinds. '.1 J. • • 
 
 either to sum up m an impressive manner 
 what has gone before, which must be done by recalling 
 as much of it as can be recalled in a few short sen- 
 tences; or to state forcibly the conclusion of the 
 whole ; or to bring all that has been said to bear on 
 the reason and conscience of the hearer. It might 
 appear that it must be easy enough to conclude, be- 
 cause when a speaker has said all that he has to say 
 upon a subject, then he has arrived at the natural end 
 of the matter. It is not so, however, with a sermon. 
 If one were writing a disquisition, or an essay, that 
 would generally be sufficient; but the preacher has 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 89 
 
 furthermore to make the treatment of his subject im- 
 pressive ; he has to put it in such a way that it shall 
 not only convince the reason, but also interest the 
 feelings of the congregation. He has to leave 
 an impression — to interest — to move — to persuade. 
 Hence arises the difficulty of concluding in a satis- 
 factory manner, for it is no easy thing that has to be 
 done, and it has to be done in a few words ; and the 
 feeling will often be left on the preacher's mind that 
 the effect of his sermon was short of what it might 
 have been had there been more concentration and 
 power in his conclusion. 
 
 Several of Bishop Butler's celebrated fifteen l^- 
 sermons conclude with some Scripture which more or 
 less embodies his general aim, or recalls his argument. 
 This method has great advantages. It is as it were a 
 summary of one's own sermon in the authoritative 
 language of the Word of God. The mind receives it 
 as a strongly corroborative argument, which produces 
 this effect without its having been directly used, or 
 stated as an argument. 
 
 Many of our Lord's parables conclude with in- I-*- 
 stances of the most wonderful condensation combined 
 with exhortation — for example, those of the Good 
 Samaritan, the Pharisee and publican, the unjust 
 steward, the unforgiving servant, the wise and foolish 
 virgins, kc. It will not often perhaps happen that 
 such terminations as these would be suitable to our 
 
90 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 sermons, still it -would be of use to the preacher to 
 regard them as perfect models which may occasionally 
 be imitated. 
 
 15. What [But -whatever be the form of conclusion 
 
 to be avoid- 
 ed in con- whicli a sermon may require, nothing can 
 
 elusions. /» . . T 11 . 1^ rr 
 
 be more irigid and destructive or eiiect 
 than the announcement so frequently heard, that it is 
 the conclusion. The "In conclusion," or "Now to 
 conclude," or "Finally," appears generally to bring a 
 feeling of relief both to the Minister and to the con- 
 gregation ; although they are sometimes put in such a 
 way as to imply that it is time alone which is obliging 
 the preacher to end his discourse. The effect of this 
 is very bad. 
 
 16. Uni- In his commencements and terminations, 
 
 formity of 
 
 plan to be and the whole construction of his sermons, 
 avoided. • i r» it 
 
 How. the preacher must caret ully avoid falling 
 
 ment of ' ^^*^ *^^® habitual use of any single plan. 
 
 bl^ivoTd'ed" ^^^^T Sunday, and this for year after 
 
 year, he has to preach two sermons; how 
 
 insufferably tedious then will it prove to his auditors, 
 
 if all his sermons should be constructed alike. This 
 
 cannot be the case if his plan is always taken from his 
 
 subject. If this be done, the requisite amount of 
 
 variety in treatment will be secured. • The caution 
 
 now being given is by no means unnecessary, for one 
 
 form of the fault is, at all events, very common, that 
 
 of dividing the subject. Many preachers seem to 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 91 
 
 think that in a sermon this is a necessity; accordingly 
 every sermon they preach is divided. You will hear 
 again and again in sermon after sermon — "This text 
 has three," or, it may be, "half-a-dozen points." 
 Then they are enunciated and numbered. This is 
 followed by the separate treatment of each. The 
 irksomeness of composing and preaching such sermons 
 must be very great, though as they are the preacher's 
 own work he may be somewhat blind to their dulness ; 
 but he ought to consider what must be the effect of 
 two sermons of this kind every Sunday year after year 
 on the minds of educated, and even of uneducated, 
 people. It will often be the case that a text contains 
 two or three statements or particulars, and it may be 
 necessary for the preacher to bear this in mind in 
 treating his subject, and to take them separately; and 
 when he has done with the consideration of the first, 
 to mark the transition to the next in some way, as for 
 instance by saying, "We now pass to the considera- 
 tion of another point our text contains," or something 
 of this kind, and so on with the rest: but it can very 
 rarely happen that there is any necessity at the com- 
 mencement of an address of half an hour's duration to 
 enunciate the divisions of the subject. They may, 
 without the preacher's doing this, be marked distinctly 
 enough, if requisite, in the treatment of the subject. 
 The first moments of your address, when you are 
 always listened to attentively, may be much belter 
 
92 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 employed. The old joke against this style of preach- 
 ing, that there is in it a great deal of carving, but 
 very little meat, is far from being all that can be said 
 against it. Its sameness, its departure from the na- 
 tural method of treating a subject, the inevitable 
 unmeaningness of many divisions of this kind, present 
 a combination of faults that is quite insufferable. 
 17. Repe- A fault that is very common, but not so 
 
 tition of . • 1 f> 1. 
 
 ideas to be obvious as it IS common, is that oi the 
 repetition of ideas. One who sits down 
 to write without knowing distinctly what he is going 
 to aim at, or the path by which he is to reach his aim, 
 is constantly liable to fall into the fault of reproducing 
 the same thoughts in different words. Sermons of this 
 kind are very wearisome, without the hearer being 
 always able to point out the cause, for it generally 
 happens that one requires, in order to discover what is 
 amiss in such sermons, more than is possessed by most 
 men of the power of analyzing and arranging ideas. 
 This kind of repetition, from its very nature, is more 
 likely to be found in written than in Extemporary Ser- 
 mons, for in the latter a proper grasp of the subject 
 must be taken, and therefore in its treatment an ad- 
 vance will be made by distinct steps to a distinct end. 
 There are some whose sermons are rather an array of 
 Texts connected in some way or other with their sub- 
 ject, than a discourse upon or a proper treatment of 
 their subject. Their practice is a very simple one. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 93 
 
 It is to collect these Texts, and then to enlarge upon 
 them seriatim. This is what South tells us the Puri- 
 tans of his day called "a saving way of Preaching." 
 His OAvn comment on this description of their style 
 being, '' that he knew nothing it saved, except the 
 time and thought of the Preacher." In this method 
 repetition of ideas is unavoidable. 
 
 Exhortation is a necessary part of a l^- Exhor- 
 tation ne- 
 sermon, because the object of preaching cessary— in 
 
 . 1 Ti A 11 what it 
 
 is to mnuence the will. Arguments and de- consists. 
 monstrations only affect the reason and the understand- 
 ing. And though the reason may be thoroughly con- 
 vinced, the preacher's work is only done in part. He 
 aims at convincing the reason with the ulterior view 
 of regarding such convictions as levers by which he 
 hopes to move the will. He has then to consider how 
 this leverage is to be brought to bear. It can only be 
 done by showing that what has been proved and 
 established is advantageous or disadvantageous to the 
 hearer. And this can only be done by addressing the 
 feelings and sentiments of the congregation ; that is, 
 by appealing to their moral sense, to their religious 
 sentiments, to enlightened self-love, to their approval 
 of what is just, and true, and noble, and lovable, to 
 their hopes and fears, to their desires and affections. 
 The attempt in these ways to awaken emotion in the 
 congregation, and so to lead it to accept or reject what 
 reasoning has demonstrated, is properly exhortation. 
 
9i EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 It is an appeal to their feelings on the subject before 
 them. It is absurd to object to these appeals to the 
 feelings, for if they are not to be made, then there 
 can be no such thing as exhortation ; and then there 
 can be no such thing as influencing the will: for 
 reasoning, as a general rule, cannot do it. The will 
 is reached, as nature seems to have intended, through 
 the feelings. The demonstration of one of Euclid's 
 problems convinces the understanding, but, as this is 
 not a subject about which the feelings can be inter- 
 ested, the matter ends when the proof is understood: 
 the will can be in no way aflfected by that proof. So 
 you may demonstrate the statements that Jesus Christ 
 is the Light of the world, and the Saviour of the 
 world, but you will have done little, as a preacher, 
 till by making men feel that it is for their advantage 
 to receive Him in these capacities, you shall have 
 brouo^ht them to wish so to receive Him. To do this 
 you must appeal to their sense of sin, to their desire 
 to be at peace with God, to their gratitude, to their 
 natural approval of all that is pure and holy, and to 
 any other feelings by which you may hope to draw 
 them to desire what you have proved. These appeals 
 are exhortations. 
 
 19. Light The preacher who attends to what he 
 
 and shade 
 
 necessary. is about will often be reminaed by his own 
 preaching, as well as by what he hears from others, 
 that a sermon requires both light and shade. It is a 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 95 
 
 great fault when every thing from first to last is kept 
 at one uniform level. This, indeed, goes some way 
 towards making what is said unintelligible, except to 
 those who can separate its sense from the form and 
 manner in which it is put. The points towards which 
 one has been working, and the appeals made to the 
 feelings and Christian consciousness of the congrega- 
 tion, and other main parts of the discourse, ought to 
 stand out distinctly from the general level, so that the 
 congregation shall at once understand their impor- 
 tance, and their relation to the other parts. We 
 often, however, hear the same exalted style and the 
 same impressive delivery continued throughout, or the 
 same sobriety of language and calmness of feeling. 
 Both obscure the preacher's meaning by putting the 
 comparatively unimportant parts on the same level as 
 the most important. The Extemporary Preacher is 
 more likely to escape this defect, and it is a very con- 
 siderable one, than the reader of written sermons, 
 because whatever the former says, he says with a 
 clear conception of its bearing on the rest of his dis- 
 course; he w^ill therefore in preaching, just as he 
 would in conversation, emphasize and bring out what 
 he knows ought to be so dealt with : in his case every 
 thing comes fresh from his thoughts and feelings. 
 Invariable rules can hardly be given on this subject. 
 The sense and object in view must in each case point 
 out what ought to be made prominent. Sometimes, 
 
96 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 though this will not often be the case, the first ^Yords 
 of the sermon, as the Quo usque tandem of Cicero's 
 first oration against Catiline, will be of this char- 
 acter; and sometimes it will be requisite that the con- 
 cluding paragraph should be calm and unimpassioned. 
 Any invariable rules on this point are not only im- 
 possible, but would be prejudicial if possible, because 
 they would lead to uniformity of treatment, which 
 ought carefully to be avoided in preaching, so often to 
 the same hearers. It would be very tedious and 
 wearisome to the congregation to find the preacher 
 twice every Sunday emphatic by rule in the same 
 parts of his discourse. What he has to attend to is 
 to be emphatic, impressive, or solemn whenever the 
 sense requires it of him. This implies that he must 
 also bear in mind the converse of what has just been 
 said, I mean the necessity of shade as well as of light, 
 of calmness as well as of energy, of deliberateness as 
 well as of rapidity of delivery. And it may not be 
 out of place here to remark, that all this applies not 
 more to the manner in which God's Word is expounded 
 and enforced, than it does to the manner in which it 
 is read, and the Word read occupies a large part in 
 our Liturgy. 
 20. Cor- I -^yiu \iQTCQ add a word or two on the 
 
 rect Empha- 
 sis comes subject of Emphasis. In reading the 
 naturallj t* t 
 
 in speaking. Prayers little or no emphasis is required. 
 readin<^. ^^J remarks are intended only for Preach- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 97 
 
 ing ; but still even with this restriction, I cannot make 
 them without some misgivings, knowing that one can 
 hardlj make a wrong emphasis, who fully understands 
 and feels what he is saying, and that one who does 
 not, but yet thinks he ought to emphasize the important 
 words, can only be right by accident ; and that, there- 
 fore, the emphases in which he will happen to be cor- 
 rect will be far outnumbered by those in which he v/ill 
 be mistaken; and often in such a way as to cause a 
 smile. But I overrule my misgivings by the considera- 
 tion that in Preaching no emphasis is a fault, and 
 wrong emphasis a very great fault ; and that in this, 
 as in all other particulars of delivery, we ought to 
 know what is a fault, and avoid it; and what is correct, 
 and endeavor to attain to it. Points of this kind are 
 best explained by examples. The late Archbishop 
 Whately used to make the remark that Clergymen in 
 reading the Ten Commandments, generally emphasize 
 the "not" in the second, the third, the sixth, and the 
 four following Commandments. This he considered 
 wrong, on the ground that the question is not, whether 
 the subject-matter of these commandments respectively 
 is forbidden, or enjoined. There is no question on 
 that point. They are all obviously and necessarily pro- 
 hibitions. The question is, what is the thing forbidden ? 
 That is what the mind is listening for; and so that is 
 what in each case ought to be made clear and unmis-. 
 takable by being emphasized. For instance, *^ making 
 9 
 
98 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 graven images," *' taking God's name in vain," 
 ''murder," "committing adultery," ''stealing,'' &c. 
 The "nots" are not to be slurred over, but they are 
 not the emphatic words. I think one has only to read 
 the 18th verse of the xix. ch. of St. Matthew's Gospel 
 to be convinced of the justice of this comment. I 
 lately heard an elderly Clergyman reading this part 
 of the Ante-Communion Service, and throughout he 
 emphasized the "Thou" of each Commandment in a 
 manner the eifect of which, as it went on accumulating, 
 might, in some of the congregation, have disturbed 
 the reverential feeling proper to the occasion. This 
 mistake could not have been made designedly, for if 
 so, it would have implied that the reader was of opinion 
 that all mankind, with the exception of those to whom 
 the Decalogue had been given, were at liberty to 
 blaspheme, murder, steal, etc. The occurrence of such 
 mistakes in the reading of the Ten Commandments, 
 intimates that it is no easy thing for the reader to 
 emphasize correctly. My object is to show the im- 
 portance of right emphasis. I make no attempt to 
 give rules, because correctness in this matter can only 
 be secured when the reader is able to realize to his 
 mind, at the instant of uttering the words, all their 
 meaning, purpose, and connection. This is often 
 difficult in itself, and the difficulty is greatly increased 
 in the case of the reader, by the fact that what he has 
 to do is a direct inversion of the natural order of 
 
^^ 1 
 
 EXTExMPORARY PREACIIIXa. 99 
 
 things ill this matter. The natural order is to have 
 the feeling and the meaning in the mind first, and then 
 to seek for words by which utterance may be given 
 them ; whereas the reader has the words presented to 
 him first, and then has to find what they mean. 
 
 I would give from the Te Deuni the short 21 
 sentence " We believe that Thou shalt come to be our 
 Judge," as an instance of the great facility with 
 which false emphases may be made, and of the Protean 
 eSfects, upon what we are reading, of such mistakes. 
 We have here, if we omit the conjunction "that," and 
 regard "to be" as a single word, a sentence of eight 
 words, susceptible of eight distinct meanings; each of 
 these eight meanings being brought out solely and 
 entirely by the position of the emphasis; for in every 
 case the words used would be the same. It may be 
 worth while to spend a few moments in observing this 
 instance of the transforming effect of emphasis. If 
 the first word, "we," be emphasized, it implies that 
 the meaning of the declaration is, that others do not 
 believe this proposition, but we do. The whole sen- 
 tence then becomes an answer to the question, who 
 believes it? We do. If "believe" be emphasized, it 
 implies that our state of mind with respect to the 
 statement made, is not that of inquiry, or of acqui- 
 escence, or of affirmation, etc., but of belief, and the 
 sentence becomes a reply to the question. What is our 
 state of mind with respect to this proposition? If 
 
100 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ^'Thou" be emphasized, its meaning becomes that we 
 believe Jesus Christ to be the coming Judge; and it is 
 a reply to the question, Who is to be the coming 
 Judge? If ''shalt," its meaning is that what we 
 affirm is irrevocably fixed, and it becomes a reply to 
 the question, Whether we are absolutely certain on 
 this point? If "come," it means that Jesus Christ is 
 not here now in a visible bodily form, but that He will 
 reappear in that form, and it is a reply to the question, 
 Will Jesus Christ ever leave heaven, and return again 
 to earth? If "to be," its meaning is that His being 
 our Judge will not be an accidental, or undesigned re- 
 sult of His coming, but its very intended purpose. 
 If "our," its meaning is that whoever may be the 
 judge of Turks, infidels, and heretics, Jesus Christ is 
 He by whom we shall be judged. If "Judge," its 
 meaning is that at His second coming, His character 
 will be that of a Judge. Now here are eight meanings, 
 any one of which, if brought out by emphasis, will 
 occupy the mind, and so hinder the perception of the 
 other seven. The inference I would draw from this in 
 connection with my present subject, is, that it must be 
 very difficult indeed for one who reads his sermons 
 to make correct emphases. It generally happens, 
 which is just what might be expected, that the reader 
 of sermons makes little or no use of emphasis; and 
 this may be one cause of the complaint of the dulness 
 of sermons delivered in this manner. The least inat- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACIIINQ. 191 
 
 tention to Avhat is being read, or the preoccupation of 
 the reader's attention by his MS., which is virtually in- 
 attention to his subject, must result in a great many 
 neglected, and a great many wrong emphases. In 
 conversation, the most illiterate clown is not guilty of 
 these faults, because his words are the expression of 
 his present thought and feeling. The same remark, 
 though not quite to the same extent, may be made of 
 the Extemporary Preacher. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SOME EEMARKS ON THE AUIS AND SUBJECTS OF SERMONS. 
 
 1. Sub- I NOW come to another part of my 
 
 jects and 
 aims of undertaking, that of the subjects and aims 
 
 Preaching. of the modern preacher. He will do well 
 
 epoclifin ^0 Consider, that though ultimately, and 
 
 ^^f^h^^^^^"^ in their simplest expression, the subjects 
 
 Churcli. and aims of the preacher must always be 
 
 Each has ^ , *^ 
 
 its own dis- the same, yet that they bear such a re- 
 
 tinctive . . . i i t i 
 
 character. lation to the times that he wno does not 
 take that relation into account will in a great measure 
 in his preaching beat the air. The Christian Church 
 has advanced through several epochs, each character- 
 ized by very distinct features of its own. We find the 
 first age marked by great freedom and variety, as well 
 as freshness and depth of feeling and thought. Then 
 comes an age of hard doctrinal controversy. In the 
 Mediaeval Church we find an honest formalism and 
 religious submission to authority. At the time of the 
 Reformation men are debating eagerly the question of 
 the grounds of acceptance, whether the individual is 
 102 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHIXQ. 103 
 
 to depend on the authority of the Church, or on the 
 simple Word, and the action of the Divine Spirit on 
 his own heart. At the present day the characteristics 
 of all former epochs appear to be in conflict. And 
 out of this conflict there appears to be rising, coming 
 as well from the side of the laity as of the Clergy, a 
 scn.'tc of the necessity of insisting on our right to use 
 "the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free," 
 which prompts men to look every where for what is 
 good and true, and to approve it wherever found ; and 
 which is disposed to make the main feature of religion 
 the imitation of Christ; and the main feature of that 
 imitation the effort, in accordance with His example, 
 to do good; and which sets above all precepts that 
 one which bids us "be perfect, even as our Father in 
 heaven is perfect," that is, to be true, and just, and 
 holy, and loving. And so it was with the Old Dis- 
 pensation. As its history advanced, new epochs 
 opened upon it. Prayer and thanksgiving became a 
 higher service than that of sacrifices. The moral law 
 was clearly distinguished from and elevated above the 
 ceremonial. The value of contrition and repentance 
 was revealed. Messianic anticipations became dis- 
 tinctly a refuge from the distresses and perplexities of 
 the present. It is evident then that the preacher 
 ought to address himself to the feelings, the vrants, the 
 mental movem.ents of his time, not because they are 
 necessarily right in every particular, but because there 
 
104 EXTExMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 must be reason for their existence ; and it is his 
 
 business not to ignore or to denounce that reason, but 
 
 to consider it, and to find how much truth there is in 
 
 Tvhat is acting widely and deeply on the feelings and 
 
 minds of men. To do otherwise, — to live in a bygone 
 
 world, or in a world of his own, — is to render his 
 
 ministry of the Word useless. 
 
 2- The The remark readily su52:2;ests itself, that 
 
 character of J oo ' 
 
 the age this attention to the spirit and wants of 
 
 must be at- . o p • 
 
 tended to. the times may be carried too lar; lor m- 
 
 The safe- , . o . 
 
 guard pro- Stance, in an age oi controversy one may 
 ^^^Inst car- ^^ occupied too much with controversies, 
 
 ryingthis ^^^^ acquire too controversial a spirit, 
 to an ex- 
 treme. But in an age of controversies, contro- 
 versy must be attended to: it is the work of the age. 
 Or again, in an age when religious formalism and 
 submission to authority are in the main alone possible, 
 one may exaggerate what are the necessities of the 
 age; but if these are the necessities of the age, the 
 preacher ought to understand their necessity and 
 uphold them. I am supposing a man of good judg- 
 ment, and of such an amount of knowledge as may 
 be expected in a Minister of the Word, for without 
 them he will be liable in any question he may have 
 to consider to be carried to faulty extremes. The 
 preacher, however, has a safeguard which will never 
 fail him, and that safeguard is, that he must ever 
 speak in accordance with the Spirit of Christ, remera- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 105 
 
 bering that, as the Minister of Christ, he stands in 
 Christ's place. 
 
 We can see a good reason why the 3. Ilow 
 
 ^ '' Christ is all 
 
 Word, although it had embraced the whole in all in the 
 history of the Jewish Church, should end must be so 
 where it does, and should not go on to in- preacher, 
 elude the history of the Christian Church subsequent 
 to the Apostles' times, notwithstanding its importance. 
 As what is contained in the Word was to form the 
 subject of the study of God's people, and the subject 
 of the preaching of the Ministers of the Word, it was 
 necessary to confine it to the history of Him who is 
 the Author and Finisher of our Faith, — the Way, 
 the Truth, and the Life. The Messiaruc anticipations 
 of the Old Testament, in which that Dispensation 
 issues, prepare the way for Him. We then have the 
 picture of His life, and the account of what He 
 taught. Then how He was preached by the Apostles, 
 and His kingdom established. He therefore is the 
 subject of the entire Word. It is not merely that 
 His figure stands forth from it, but that He is the 
 centre to which every thing it contains more or less 
 directly converges. This could not have been so 
 much the case had the Word been made to include the 
 subsequent history of the Church. In that subse- 
 quent history, man, with his passions, and follies, and 
 mistakes, is generally more prominent than God. But 
 now the preacher of the Word can hardly misunder- 
 
106 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 stand his subject ; or, if lie strays from it, he must do 
 
 so wittingly. 
 
 4- It ^g tiie Word, then, now stands, pre- 
 
 would be 
 mischiev- senting to the preacher's view Jesus 
 
 were pos- Christ and Him only, he must, like the 
 
 ml")lp to T'P- 
 
 vive'aijj- Apostle Paul, be determined in a certain 
 
 gone epoch. ^^^^^^ ^^ j^^^^^ jj.^^ ^^^1^^ ^^^ ^1^^^,^ ^^^-^^ 
 
 be some among both preachers and hearers who will 
 see the great central truths of religion through the 
 light of subsequent portions of the Church's history; 
 for the great epochs of its history do not appear to 
 come utterly to an end, but as it were to live on in the 
 minds and hearts of some here and some there, 
 almost as if all that had taken place since had 
 taught them nothing : for them subsequent history 
 appears to have no existence. So it is in an especial 
 manner with the Mediaeval epoch, which in many 
 leading particulars teaches lessons very different from 
 those taught us by the first ages of the Church. Still 
 though the lessons taught by these two ages were so 
 widely different as to be almost contradictory of each 
 other, yet the ideas and practices of each were rela- 
 tively to their own times equally wise and equally 
 true. Each presents to us truths which after-times 
 ought not to lose sight of, and which may be profitably 
 made use of in other times as occasions may arise, 
 but which it must be futile and mischievous to attempt 
 to reproduce again in their complete form ; for having 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 107 
 
 once been displaced by the growth of religious ideas 
 and practices, they can never again possess the whole 
 field: nor is it desirable that they should. For in- 
 stance, how suited to the times, and therefore how 
 powerful an instrument for subduing and keeping in 
 subjection men's minds, was the imposing ritual of 
 the Mediaeval Church, aided by the ministering arts 
 of Architecture, Sculpture, Painting, and Music. How 
 invaluable also for those times was the principle of 
 submission to ecclesiastical authority. And of what 
 great advantage was it that the Church was able to 
 organize society for the work of society wherever the 
 motive or aim of the work was religious, as in founding 
 and maintaining asylums to which in those rough and 
 troublous times the weak, and those weary of the 
 world might retire; and in being the great almoner 
 of society ; and in providing a sufficient number of 
 churches and Clergy for the comforting and instruction 
 of the people. The Mediaeval Church teaches us that 
 these things were of great value in those times, and 
 so suggests the probability of their being of value, 
 with certain qualifications and adaptations, under the 
 changed circumstances of other times. But while we 
 admit this, we must not forget that the Primitive 
 Church grew and prospered under far more arduous 
 circumstances, without a settled ritual ; without the 
 ministering aid of Art; without the subjection of 
 society to ecclesiastical J^uthority; and without the 
 
108 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 power of organizing society for religious purposes. 
 It worked with other and very different instruments; 
 and of these the same may be said as of the instru- 
 ments used by the Mediaeval Church, that they were 
 the best adapted to their own times; and that with 
 those qualifications, which are necessary if they are 
 applied usefully to altered circumstances, they have 
 a value for all times. And so we might go on through 
 all the epochs of the Church's history. Absolutely 
 then those preachers are wrong who hold up the prac- 
 tices and ideas of any bygone epoch as if they ought 
 to rule the present. Relatively, however, such 
 preachers may be doing a good work, for they are the 
 counterpoise to those who ignore, or misunderstand, 
 or ignorantly decry, the practices and ideas of the 
 past. He alone in this respect will be doing his work 
 properly who shall claim for the Church of to-day the 
 same liberty of action which the Church has used in 
 all anterior epochs; and which, however strenuously 
 resisted, must in every epoch be established eventually ; 
 and who, because he understands the spirit of the an- 
 terior epochs of the Church's history, and their neces- 
 sary connection, will, instead of vainly endeavoring 
 to recall men to what has passed away, together with 
 the reason of its existence, confine himself to the ad- 
 vocacy only of what may still be of use in the 
 ideas and practices of the past. To contend for what 
 has become obsolete, because unsuitable to the wants 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 109 
 
 and circumstances of the times, cannot be a means for 
 
 conveying to men's minds a knowledge of Christ, or 
 
 of extending His kingdom : it can only obscure the 
 
 former and limit the latter. It makes men conscious 
 
 that there is an oppugnance between Him as He is 
 
 preached to them and what they know, and feel, and 
 
 desire. Where this is the case, the fault probably is 
 
 in the preacher. Christ is for all times, as much for 
 
 the modern as for the Mediaeval or the ancient world. 
 
 Indeed, the modern preacher has an advantage over 
 
 those of previous ages, inasmuch as he has a more ex- 
 
 tensiv^e armory of means to choose from ; only let him 
 
 not endeavor to make use of weapons unsuited to the 
 
 existing condition of the fight. 
 
 A mistake to which attention may now 5. Ser- 
 mons must 
 be directed is that into which preachers not be re- 
 
 . gar (led as 
 
 fall when they make their sermons too Confessions 
 theological. There are some whose dis- 
 courses consist of dogmatic statements, and again of 
 dogmatic statements perpetually reiterated. Chris- 
 tian doctrine is not to be lost sight of in the pulpit, 
 and on many occasions it must be the direct object of 
 the preacher to enunciate and establish it; but speak- 
 ing generally this is not his object. His object is 
 precisely that of the prophets of old, and of the Great 
 Master Himself. Let him take the Bible for his 
 guide. His object is to exhort, to warn, to comfort, 
 to instruct, and to do all these on Christian grounds. 
 10 
 
110 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 We sometimes hear it affirmed, that a sermon ought 
 not to be regarded as the address of a Christian 
 preacher to a Christian congregation unless the doc- 
 trine of the Trinity, and also the work of the Second 
 and Third Person of the Trinity in the redemption of 
 man, can be readily collected from its statements. 
 Such opinions as these indicate very little knowledge 
 either of the principles of composition or of the hu- 
 man mind. The principles of composition require 
 that each sermon should have its own subject, and 
 that that subject should be set forth distinctly. It 
 should stand out to the mind, as a well-grown tree 
 does to the eye, clearly defined, with its own stem and 
 its own system of branches ; but these people would 
 smother all their trees, as nature sometimes docs in 
 the tropical forest, with the same set of overwhelming 
 creepers. We must remember that what the congre- 
 gation have to judge of is not a single sermon, but a 
 long series of sermons, — to be precise, two sermons 
 preached each Sunday by the same person through 
 many years ; and we must consider what would be the 
 effect of the distinctive doctrines of our religion being 
 made a more or less prominent feature in every one of 
 these hundreds of sermons. There is no one but can 
 tell what the effect of it would be upon his own mind. 
 It would be neither attractive nor edifying. Let the 
 preacher, then, recollect, that Confessions of Faith are 
 one thing, and that sermons are another. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. IH 
 
 But, however, on the other hand, the ^>- Nor, on 
 
 llic other 
 
 preacher must take care lest, while avoid- hand, as 
 ing the mistake of being too doctrinal, he Bridgcwatcr 
 fall into the opposite mistake. Sermons ^-,0^0,1'^'^^' °^ 
 cease to be sermons as soon as they lose assays. 
 sight of the Faith. Nothing can be more frigid and 
 soulless, or produce a more disagreeable sense of dis- 
 cord, than the discourses of those who adopt the 
 moral essay and Bridgewater Treatise style of preach- 
 ing. The preacher must preach the Gospel of Jesus 
 Christ ; not only because there is no other subject so 
 deeply and enduringly interesting to man, but because 
 there is no other subject on which he is commissioned 
 to speak. Pulpits are not, and could not be, main- 
 tained for any other purpose. When Napoleon I. was 
 told that it was proposed, in arranging the adminis- 
 tration of the Neapolitan kingdom, to retain, though 
 on a greatly reduced scale, a Church establishment, 
 on the ground of its utility to literature, he replied, 
 with the sagacity which characterized all his legisla- 
 tive ideas, that that was not a ground upon which any 
 Church establishment, however small, could be main- 
 tained; that there was but one ground upon which it 
 could be maintained, which was its utility as an in- 
 strument of religious consolation and instruction. 
 The preacher will have to consider what 7. Ilow 
 
 . the prcach- 
 
 position he will take up in reference to er must re- 
 the increased scientific knowledge, and creased^sci-' 
 
112 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 entific the more profound Biblical and historical 
 
 knowledge 
 
 and the his- criticism of the present day. Many ig- 
 
 Bibiicai nore these matters altogether. This may 
 
 the^pre^nt^ be done in some rural parishes without any 
 day. great hurt to the congregation, though 
 
 never without some damage to the mind of the 
 preacher himself; for these are matters with which 
 he ought to be acquainted, and upon which he ought 
 to have arrived at the best conclusions his opportuni- 
 ties admit of. The question, however, is full of diffi- 
 culty. Neither scientific nor critical knowledge is 
 within every body's reach. Speaking for myself, I 
 have no fear that the modern advances of science, and 
 the wider spread of scientific knowledge, will weaken 
 men's faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There was 
 a time when it was supposed, and perhaps even with 
 more reason than at present, that the then recent dis- 
 covery of the laws which regulate the solar system, 
 and the revelations made by the telescope, must have 
 this effect. It was demonstrated that this earth was 
 not the centre either of the sidereal or of the solar 
 system ; and it appeared no longer possible to localize 
 either the heaven above or the hell beneath the earth. 
 But I am not aware that any one now finds that his 
 astronomical knowledge indisposes him to Christian 
 belief. With respect to the historical and Biblical 
 criticism of the present day, the result probably will 
 be that it will give us more distinct ideas than we now 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 113 
 
 possess with respect to the religious history and pro- 
 gress of mankind, which is a very different thing from 
 overthrowing religion. Its concern with the Sacred 
 Text is to ascertain its meaning, and to offer us an 
 interpretation of it in harmony with the existing state 
 of knowledge. These interpretations can hardly be 
 hostile to that progressive revelation of Himself which 
 God has ever been making, through patriarchs and 
 prophets ; and then through Jesus Christ ; and with 
 the enlargement of our knowledge may expand, but 
 cannot diminish. At all events, however, there are 
 two remarks which may be made on this subject with 
 which every body will agree, and which cover some 
 portion of the ground which the question opens up to 
 us. One of these remarks is, that it will very much 
 weaken the influence of the pulpit if it be found to 
 have placed itself in unreasoning antagonism to the 
 science and the criticism of the day ; and the other is 
 a warning against the opposite course, that of being 
 over eager to accept as ascertained and established 
 facts matters which have not yet advanced beyond the 
 stage of scientific or critical conjecture. 
 8. He The modern preacher will do well to 
 
 must con- 
 sider the consider how greatly the relation of the 
 change in . . 
 the relation intelligence of congregations to that of 
 
 telligence preachers differs at the present day from 
 of the con- ^^g^^ jj. ^j^g jj^ former times. In some 
 
 gregation to 
 
 that of the cases this difference is so jrreat that it 
 
 preacher. ^ 
 
 10* 
 
114 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 amounts to a partial inversion. There were times 
 when the Clergy alone were educated. Of those 
 times they were the natural and undisputed intel- 
 lectual leaders. But now all the upper classes are 
 similarly and equally educated; and, indeed, education 
 has been extended even to the lowest classes of 
 society. And moreover, as the Clergy must devote a 
 large portion of their time to parochial work, there 
 are many of the laity who are able to follow up in- 
 tellectual pursuits far more thoroughly than is possible 
 for the Clergy. 
 
 9. Also Simultaneously also with this great 
 
 the enlarge- ° 
 
 ment of the alteration in the intellectual position of 
 
 means of , , i i /-i 
 
 instruction, the laity towards the Clergy, there has 
 been brought about an equally great dif- 
 ference between the relation which the modern pulpit 
 bears to the now existing means of instruction, and 
 that which the Mediseval pulpit bore to what were the 
 means of those days. It almost might be said, that in 
 those times the pulpit stood alone as the only means 
 of instruction; but in these days the press has become 
 far more widely used, and far more powerful than the 
 pulpit. These are facts which are most material to 
 any profitable consideration on the subject of 
 preaching. 
 
 10. These ^t all events, they at once oblige us to 
 changes *' ° 
 
 suggest the acknowledge that there may be some 
 
 justice of 
 
 some of the justice in the reiterated complaints we 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 115 
 
 hear from the more hidily-cultivated por- common 
 
 ° '' -^ complaints 
 
 tion of the laity of the dulness and un- against 
 
 sermons. 
 
 profitableness of the generality of modern 
 sermons. Their attainments in knowledge, and the 
 thought they have bestowed on that knowledge, are in 
 advance of the knowledge and thought which perhaps 
 the majority of modern sermons exhibit. If this be 
 so, and few I believe are disposed to dispute it, there 
 can be but one way of meeting the complaint, and 
 that is by our paying more attention to preaching ; by 
 which I mean, that we must endeavor to attain to 
 fuller and wider knowledge of the subjects upon which 
 we have to speak, and to a more efi'ective and better 
 way of saying what we have to say. In other words, 
 what we have to do is, I think, what it is the ob- 
 ject of this little work to recommend. The know- 
 ledge and practice I am speaking of as requisite, can- 
 not, I know, be secured without many years of study; 
 but this is not more than men give in every profession 
 and callinac to what is to be the Avork of their lives. 
 It may be useful to take another view ^•^J* ^^°^^ 
 
 •^ of different 
 
 of the objects and aims of preaching, kinds of 
 
 preachers. 
 
 that in which they will present themselves Those who 
 
 , .11 1 • ^in^ fit 
 
 when we consider them as they appear in strictly 
 the work of different kinds of preachers. Ill'^'^^fj-on. 
 
 For instance, some aim distinctly and pri- Those who 
 
 '' ^ take wider 
 
 marily at instruction. This instruction views. 
 may be of two kinds. It may be confined to theology 
 
116 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 simply, or it may embrace also history and moral 
 science, and indeed almost all kinds of knowledge, 
 regarding theology as a kind of summa philosophia, 
 •which harmonizes and gives its proper place and 
 highest aim to all we know. Those who aim chiefly 
 at what is generally understood by strictly theological 
 instruction, undertake a very difficult task, for they 
 are speaking upon what all the congregation, in its 
 leading facts and mother-ideas, are already acquainted 
 with, and which cannot be spoken upon well and in- 
 terestingly, and so as really to instruct, without a 
 complete knowledge of the subject and much logical 
 acumen. "What we find however to be the fact is, that 
 very many of those who aim in their sermons at 
 merely doctrinal instruction seldom go beyond the 
 quotation of texts, which is a very dry way of dealing 
 with the subjects they handle, and, as Jeremy Taylor 
 observes, a very inconclusive way. Those who take 
 the other and wider view of the instruction sermons 
 may be made to convey, propose to themselves a very 
 high aim indeed, but one which is certain to be 
 attended with lamentable and ludicrous failures, unless 
 the preacher be provided with very extensive learning 
 and with very sound judgment. 
 12. Those ^ second description of preachers make 
 
 who aim at 
 
 awakening it their object to awaken and feed reli- 
 
 religious t • i • 
 
 emotion. gious omotion. It IS obvious that very 
 
 little knowledge is required for this purpose. A man 
 
EXTEMPORAHY PREACHING. 117 
 
 "who is very ignorant of books may still, if he feels 
 those emotions himself, be able to communicate them 
 to others. This is the aim of a large proportion 
 of those whom we call popular preachers. These 
 preachers are very serviceable to large classes of the 
 community. For it has always hitherto been the case 
 (and we may suppose that it will continue to be so), 
 that the great majority of mankind, being engaged 
 throughout their lives in daily business and daily toil, 
 have been so unlearned that more could be effected 
 by awakening their religious feelings than by endeav- 
 oring to convey to them religious instruction. But 
 the very qualification which makes these preachers 
 useful, the fact of their preaching being chiefly emo- 
 tional, is the reason why we so rarely find them pos- 
 sessing much weight in the world of intellect. It is a 
 rare thing to find those who are able to teach well, 
 able also to move the feelings well; and so, too, vice 
 versh : in the Ministry, however, of the Word there is 
 a place for each. 
 
 A third class, that was very numerous i^- Those 
 
 who regard 
 
 in the last generation, but is now very sermons as 
 
 ... a depart- 
 
 much on the wane, make it their aim to ment of the 
 1 J. -i.- 1 I, xi Belles Let- 
 
 give pleasure to critical ears by the pro- ^,.^^. 
 priety of their ideas, language, and style. They 
 hardly regard a sermon as any thing more than a lit- 
 erary composition. Sermons with them are a depart- 
 ment of the Belles Lettres. Bishop Porteus's sermons 
 
118 EXTEMPORAKY PREACHmG. 
 
 and a large portion of Bishop Heber's were of this 
 kind. But nothing more need be said of this class of 
 preachers, as the growing earnestness of religious feel- 
 ing is rapidly extinguishing them. 
 14. Those A fourth class aim at producinsj a kind 
 
 who dis- _ . 
 
 parage ser- of quietism — I had almost said, no effect 
 mons. 
 
 at all — by their preaching. They find the 
 
 other parts of the ritual more productive than the ser- 
 mon of those emotions they themselves delight in; and 
 some of the members of their conc^resjations are soon 
 brought to the same way of thinking and feeling ; they 
 therefore discountenance and disparage any kind of 
 preaching that is accompanied with excitement, or al- 
 most with interest. We sometimes hear them even 
 objecting to preaching altogether. It would not be 
 correct to say that they regard the sermon from the 
 ritualist's point of view, because the sermon is a part 
 of the ritual; nor would it be right to say that they 
 are altogether in the wrong, for many sermons pro- 
 duce what cannot be considered as a religious effect 
 upon the minds of those who hear them: many con- 
 troversial sermons, and many that are not controver- 
 sial, are of this kind. The deep and calm feelings too 
 which these preachers aim at cultivating, though not 
 all adapted to, or attainable by the mass of mankind, 
 are true and beautiful, and ought to be exhibited to 
 the world, but the inert, the ignorant, and the con- 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 119 
 
 tentedly sinful, will never be awakened by a refined 
 quietism. 
 
 These are the different kinds of preach- l^- Those 
 
 who regard 
 
 ers who by their energy and talents are sermons as 
 brought into prominence. There are, the service, 
 however, two other classes, each of which re<^arcUhera 
 is probably more numerous than all the ^^ ^ P^^'J ^^ 
 preceding four combined. First, those 
 who have no definite aim in their preaching, merely 
 regarding the sermon as a part of the service they 
 have to perform; and, secondly, those who without 
 any great amount of learning, or the possession of 
 any popular talent, endeavor to set the Gospel before 
 the souls which have been entrusted to their spiritual 
 oversight. They feel their responsibility, and endea- 
 vor to discharge their duty faithfully. It is the at- 
 tention of this class, particularly of the younger por- 
 tion of it, that I am desirous of obtaining for the sug- 
 gestions of these pages. I wish them to consider 
 whether it is not within their reach to make their 
 preaching a far more effective instrument for good 
 than they have hitherto found it, by devoting to it 
 that amount of time, study, and labor, without which 
 nothing very great, or very good, can be attained in 
 any department of human exertion. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 SOME EEMAEKS OX THE PLACE ASSIGNED TO PREACHING IN" 
 THE WOED OF GOD, AND IN OUR SERVICE. 
 
 1. The I xow propose to consider the way in 
 
 place as- 
 signed to which the Word itself speaks of this in- 
 preaching /. . . • 
 in the Word, strument for its own propagation, exposi- 
 
 OldDis- *^'^i^? enforcement and adaptation to the 
 
 pensation. varying circumstances of the times. Un- 
 der the Old Dispensation the prophetical office, that 
 now held by the properly-qualified Minister of the 
 Word, was, we may almost say, the only means used 
 for maintaining and advancing the knowledge of God. 
 In times as rude and unsettled as those were, the reli- 
 gious and moral forces of society are always likely to 
 organize themselves for the protection of society. At 
 such epochs this organization will stand forth more 
 prominently than at others. It was so again in the 
 Middle Ages. And it will also happen that whatever 
 is done by the organization of these forces of society 
 will seem to those who, like ourselves, regard the his- 
 tory from a distance, and with the aid of only very brief 
 120 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 121 
 
 and imperfect records, very much as if it were the 
 work of the leaders only. Bat it is obvious that, to 
 have enabled them to carry out the bold and difficult 
 tasks in which v/e frequently find them engaged, the 
 sympathy and support of considerable numbers were 
 requisite. And as respects their teaching, it must be 
 equally obvious that unless the truths and sentiments 
 they enunciated had been previously more or less dis- 
 tinctly apprehended by others, what they might have 
 said would have fallen to the ground. The position 
 therefore in which the Hebrew prophet stood towards 
 his own times, was not that of complete difference 
 from, or opposition to the religious thought and feeling 
 of those around him, but that he saw more clearly, 
 and was able to enunciate more forcibly than others 
 what was at work in many minds besides his own. 
 The Spirit of God, which guides to a knowledge of 
 the truth, and supplies the boldness to say and to do 
 what is required for its maintenance, was in him in 
 greater measure than in others. Because he saw 
 distinctly truths which others had seen, but seen less 
 distinctly, or perhaps which others were only prepared 
 to see, he became to them the messenger of God to 
 proclaim these truths to them. Had it been other- 
 wise, what he enounced would have fared as good 
 seed fares when it falls upon dry and naked rock. Be 
 this, however, as it may, just what we are told of 
 David, as a prophet, that " the Holy Ghost spake by 
 11 
 
122 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 his mouth," the father of the Baptist declares was 
 true of ''all the prophets which had been since the 
 world began." They were raised up in long succession, 
 through God's providence, to proclaim by preaching 
 each advance to a purer and higher morality, and to a 
 more spiritual religion, and to awaken and keep alive 
 the assurance of the ultimate triumph of good over 
 evil, of right, of mercy, and of truth. Each pro- 
 gressive revelation of God's Holy Spirit, and every 
 application of previously secured truths and principles 
 to the wants of the times, was made through this in- 
 strumentality. We have no intimation of any other 
 way in which these things were or could have been 
 done. 
 
 _ 2. Then But to pass from the old Dispensation 
 
 m the New. 
 
 to the New. Here it is that we behold 
 the prophetical office exalted to its highest dignity, 
 and exercised on the widest scale. The Son of Man 
 has now taken that office on Himself. The Word has 
 become flesh, and is shining as the Light of the world ; 
 and preaching, we find, is the only instrument He 
 uses for disseminating the Light. The preacher and 
 the prophet in Him are synonymous. "He went 
 through every village and city preaching the glad 
 tidings of the kingdom of God." All His parables, 
 and discourses, and teaching of every kind, were de- 
 livered as spoken words, that is to say, were preached. 
 It had been in this way that he who was ''the prophet 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 123 
 
 of the Highest" had prepared the way for Him: ^'In 
 those days came John the Baptist preaching." And 
 after a time we find the Great Preacher sending forth 
 the twelve to preach the kingdom of God. And then 
 He appoints other seventy also, and sends them two 
 and two before His face into every city and place 
 whither He Himself would come, to preach. The 
 miracles He empowered them to do were to support 
 their preaching. And after the Ascension of their 
 Divine Instructor, His disciples go forth to preach 
 His Gospel in all the world, as they had been com- 
 manded; miracles again being made subsidiary to 
 preaching; for ''they went forth and preached every 
 where, the Lord working with them, and confirming 
 the word with signs following." The object rf the 
 great miracle on the day of Pentecost, as described 
 in anticipation by the Lord Himself; and as shown 
 by the nature of the powers it conferred, for it gave 
 knowledge and words ; and as seen by its efi'ects ; was 
 to enable those who were acted on by it to preach: 
 and so it happened, not accidentally, that the first 
 propagation of the Gospel was the direct and imme- 
 diate result of preaching. And this was the instru- 
 ment, as I have already had occasion to notice, by 
 which Paul and his brother-Apostles established the 
 Gospel in the world. '' God," he says, "was pleased 
 by the foolishness of preaching to save them that 
 believe." Again he says, in writing to Titus, ''God 
 
124 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 in due time manifested His Word through preaching." 
 And in speaking of himself to Timothy he says not 
 only that he had been appointed "an Apostle and a 
 teacher of the Gentiles," but also, and he puts it 
 first, as being foremost in his thoughts, "a preacher" 
 of the Gospel, though indeed each of the three titles 
 to a great extent implies the other two. In his Epis- 
 tle to the Romans he greatly magnifies and insists on 
 the necessity of the oflice: " How shall they call on 
 Him on whom they have not believed? and how shall 
 they believe on Him of whom they have not heard ? 
 and how shall they hear without a preacher ?" sup- 
 porting what he says by a reference to the prophet 
 Isaiah : " How beautiful are the feet of those who 
 preach the Gospel of peace, and bring the glad tidings 
 of good things !" So was the Gospel established in 
 the world by preaching. And by this same means 
 was it, as I have shown elsewhere, maintained and 
 extended. And whenever the love men had for it was 
 languishing and dying away, this was the instrument 
 used for its revival. Every Minister of the Word 
 should consider the exhortation which the great 
 preacher Paul urged upon his brother-preacher 
 Timothy : I charge thee therefore before God and 
 the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the quick and 
 dead at His appearing in His kingdom ; preach 
 the Word ; be instant in season and out of season ; 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 125 
 
 reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and 
 doctrine. 
 
 Such is the way in which preaching is set before us 
 in the Word of God. 
 
 In the preceding parao-raphs I have been 3- Preach- 
 using the words Preacher and Prophet, and synony- 
 
 . mous with 
 
 Preaching and Prophesying, as nearly prophet, 
 synonymous. And so for our present purpose they 
 may be regarded. The prophets were preachers of 
 the Word of the Lord; God spake by their mouths. 
 In this sense the Apostles were prophets, and Jesus 
 Christ is the Head of the prophetic order. And so 
 in His Church every preacher who speaks in con- 
 formity to the will of God, and who advances, or even 
 maintains among men the knowledge of God, which 
 includes the duty of man, belongs to the same order 
 as the prophets of old. '-For the prophecy came not 
 in old time by the will of man ; but holy men of God 
 spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 
 
 The remark is obvious, that probably 4. The 
 
 ' , ^ ; want of 
 
 the proportion of the community that is preachers 
 
 ... still, and 
 
 able to read is greater now than it was m always will 
 
 the days when the Apostle to the Gentiles ®' ^^^^ * 
 went forth to preach the Gospel to the nations on the 
 northern shores of the Mediterranean. But no great 
 weight need be attached to this remark, although we 
 add to it that the facilities for reading have increased 
 since the Apostle's time in a still greater degree even 
 11* 
 
126 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 than the proportion of readers; because amongst our- 
 selves the absolute number of those who require the 
 aid of the preacher is so great that we are unable to 
 supply the want. The want is great and pressing in 
 every part of the country. In respect of this matter 
 we cannot talk of some towns or some neighborhoods 
 beins: more enlicrhtened than others, for the difference 
 between the most and the least enlightened is so in- 
 considerable as to make scarcely any practical differ- 
 ence. Can we put our finger on any place, and say, 
 ^'The preacher is not needed here; his labors may be 
 transferred elsewhere?" Indeed the probability seems 
 to be that the preacher will always be needed even by 
 the most cultivated classes, for wherever religious 
 feeling exists the preacher satisfies a desire which is 
 felt by most of us. Religion has been regarded by 
 statesmen and historians as the strongest of all bonds 
 of union. And so it is; it binds nations, and races, 
 and sects together in a manner which nothing else can. 
 And it has this effect because the religious sentiment, 
 being in its highest form and expression Christian 
 love, in whatever degree it may exist, in the same de- 
 gree will it crave for sympathy, for union and com- 
 munion of feeling ; and for a large assembly to be 
 consciously moved in common by the thoughts and 
 feelings of one who preaches the Word of God with 
 truth and power, is a profitable as well as a delightful 
 way of satisfying this longing of the spirit. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHIXa. 127 
 
 With the facts and thoughts to which ^- Answer 
 
 to the dis- 
 
 attention has just been directed, I woukl pai-aging 
 
 , . i ^ xi xi. i. 1 remark, that 
 
 place in contrast the attempts now made people do 
 so frequently to disparage Preaching. "hufdiVo 
 Sometimes this is done by the remark ^^^^^ ^^J~ 
 
 "^ mons, but to 
 
 " That people come to church to pray, pray, 
 and not to hear sermons." The answer to this is, 
 "That it is not true: people come to church both to 
 pray and to hear sermons." Sometimes, however, 
 the objection does not go further than an insinuation 
 of an inferiority in Preaching to Praying. There is 
 an ambiguity in this way of putting the objection, and 
 it will be almost an answer to it to state it in such a 
 manner as to remove the ambiguity. There cannot 
 properly be any comparison between Preaching and 
 Praying, because they are not the acts, which the ob- 
 jection would require them to be, of the same person. 
 The one is the act of the Minister, and the other the 
 act of the congregation. The comparison then must 
 be between the advantage of listening to sermons and 
 the advantage of praying. The method of the argu- 
 ment is to affirm that the benefits of the latter greatly 
 preponderate over the benefits of the former, and to 
 put this statement in such a way as to insinuate that 
 it is safe and profound to sneer at and depreciate 
 preaching as a matter of little consequence. There 
 is no weight at all in this argument. First, benefit is 
 a word of relative significance. There may be some 
 
128 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 to whom, for satisfactory or for unsatisfactory rea- 
 sons, that may be of little benefit which will be of 
 much benefit to many. Far the greater part of the 
 population of this country, some even perhaps of the 
 educated classes, may still be in need of being taught 
 not only how to pray aright, but to pray at all in the 
 proper sense of the word praying. As yet, to them 
 the benefit of the opportunity of praying, of which 
 they cannot or do not avail themselves, is not of so 
 much value as the opportunity of hearing sermons, 
 which may lead them to prayer. It is also a sufficient 
 reply to the objection to point out the fact that there 
 are two kinds of sermons, good sermons, by which all 
 may be benefited, and bad sermons, from which very 
 little good can result to any one ; the carelessness, 
 ignorance, and tediousness of which really often do 
 much harm. The objection includes both kinds, 
 whereas it cannot apply to the former, that is to say, 
 to what all sermons ought more or less to be. 
 
 G. And Another and somewhat similar way of 
 
 that hear- ^ -^ 
 
 ing ser- attempting to depreciate preaching is to 
 
 mons is n- i i • . . ^ . 
 
 inferior to afhrm that hearing sermons is inferior to 
 ^' praying, because preaching is a means 
 
 used for bringing men to praying ; and that the end 
 must be greater than the means. The weight, how- 
 ever, of this objection is not greater than the weight 
 of the one we have just disposed of. It is possible 
 that that which is the means for attaining several 
 
EXTEMPORARY rREACIIINQ. 129 
 
 great ends may, in regarding a whole system, be as 
 important a part of that system as any one of those 
 ends taken separately. Preaching has ever been the 
 chief means for bringing men to a knowledge of God 
 and of duty, and for maintaining and advancing reli- 
 gious culture. It cannot therefore be depreciated by 
 the fact that in a certain sense it stands to prayer in 
 the relation of a means to an end. This is not a com- 
 plete account, it is a very partial one indeed, of what 
 preaching is. The objector (though what has just 
 been said is a sufficient answer) may also be taken on 
 his own ground. Why should the fact that preaching 
 is, among its other uses, a means to prayer, be a rea- 
 son for thinking lightly of preaching, any more than 
 the fact that preaching is a means to holiness be re- 
 garded as a reason for thinking lightly of praying? 
 He cannot depreciate preaching in this way in favor 
 of praying, because we have only to advance a single 
 step, and then by parity of reason prayer itself may 
 be depreciated. The effect, however, ought to be the 
 very opposite ; for having discovered that prayer is 
 a means to holiness, our conclusion ought to be not 
 to neglect prayer, but to be instant in prayer. In 
 proportion to the greatness and importance of the end 
 is the value of the proper means for attaining that 
 end ; and preaching, we must remember, is much 
 more than a means for bringing men to pray. 
 
130 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 7. A cause The truth is that these objections, just 
 
 for these 
 
 objections. like every thing else in the ^Yorld, have a 
 cause ; and with some that cause is, that the degree 
 of freedom and of mental stir which accompanies 
 preaching does not suit the ecclesiastical system and 
 aims, or the sentiments of the objectors; while with 
 others it is incompatible with that decent conforming 
 worldliness which in so many results from the en- 
 deavor to serve botli God and Mammon. These two 
 classes of men dislike earnest preaching. It is too much 
 of an appeal to the heart and intellect. It is too direct 
 a challenge to thought and inquiry. It awakens. It 
 disturbs. It individualizes both the hearer and the 
 preacher, by calling into activity religious consciousness 
 and the sense of duty in each. Those worldly-minded 
 persons whose religion consists very much in outward 
 reverence find it disagreeable to be addressed in this 
 way. Such preaching and the eifects it produces are also 
 at variance with the feelings of those who discharge 
 among us the necessary, or at all events, the useful part 
 of maintaining the importance of the Church's ritual — 
 notwithstanding the fact that the sermon they depre- 
 ciate is a part of the ritual. I am speaking of what we 
 find is the general feeling among such persons on this 
 subject. They care little about preaching. They 
 seem to care more even for the mere accessories of the 
 service, such as the splendor and decorations of the 
 sacred building, and the excellency of the music. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 131 
 
 There is notliing annoying or condemnatory intended 
 
 by those observations, for so long as a powerful party 
 
 in the Church neglect the ritual, and give too much 
 
 prominency to the sermon in the service, the position 
 
 such objectors take up is useful, though very liable to 
 
 be carried in themselves to a faulty extreme. 
 
 And here I take the opportunity for 8. Proper 
 ^ ^ *^ length of 
 
 offering the suggestion that the character sermons. 
 
 Btid effects 
 and structure of our Liturgy, as now of making 
 
 used, seem to indicate the propriety of Jq^.^^ ^°° 
 not allowing our remarks to exceed over the half-hour 
 the general practice of the Clergy, and the general 
 opinion of the Laity on the subject assigned to them. 
 In the Morning Service about this space of time is 
 occupied by the Prayers, and as much more by the 
 reading of the Word. In the Evening Service the 
 time occupied by each of these is somewhat less. To 
 preach, therefore, for an hour, or three quarters of an 
 hour, appears to be both a Psychological and a Litur- 
 gical mistake. Because even if any considerable 
 portion of the congregation had the power of attention 
 requisite for so long a sermon — which however they 
 have not — still so long an effort of attention given to 
 the sermon, would, by comparison dwarf the effect of 
 the previous reading of the Word, and of the Prayers. 
 Much of the effect of the Word read and of the 
 Prayers must be obliterated by the great strain laid 
 on the mind by a sermon of an hour's length. We 
 
132 EXTEMPORARY PREACHINa. 
 
 ought to take care that neither the devotional, nor 
 the instructional part of the Service should detract 
 from the effect of the other, but that each should as 
 far as possible aid the other; and one way of providing 
 for this is to give to each about the same space of 
 time. In considering the point before us we may 
 regard the reading of the Word as participating in 
 both the above-mentioned characters, for it both 
 conveys instruction, and excites devotion. Another 
 concomitant of long sermons is that somehow or other, 
 either from the accumulating effects of the fact just 
 noticed, or because the Preacher of long sermons 
 appears himself to take more interest in his sermons 
 than in the other parts of the service, or from these 
 reasons combined, the congregation, that is, those who 
 are brought to like the practice, and the tone of mind 
 created by it, come to think more of the sermon than 
 of the other parts of the service, although those other 
 parts be Prayer and Praise, and the hearing of God's 
 Word read. Among such congregations a want of 
 right understanding of what is meant by Public Wor- 
 ship is often betrayed by such questions as, '^ Who 
 are we to hear to-day" and "Who preaches at such 
 or such a Church?" The vulgar expression of 
 "sitting under such or such a Minister" is doubly 
 offensive, because it implies the same state of mind on 
 this point — the feeling not that Preaching is a great 
 thing, but that it is the great thing ; and that every other 
 part of the service is of very subordinate interest. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 133 
 
 It oiiglit to be a very leading object ^ p- Modern 
 
 ° ^ o cf failure in 
 
 with us all to make the Church attractive; making the 
 
 Church 
 
 so attractive, if possible, as that "all attractive. 
 people should flow to it." Of late we have seen 
 great efforts made in different quarters with this view. 
 One party in the Church evidently rests its main hopes 
 on Preaching. Another party of very opposite sen- 
 timents, while to a great extent discouraging preach- 
 ing, makes much of the devotional part of the ser- 
 vice ; some among them carrying this principle to so 
 unreasonable an extreme that they appear to be 
 thinking more even of the material accessories to de- 
 votion than of the service itself. Earnestness, how- 
 ever, of any kind will always be attractive to many 
 minds, and there are truths earnestly held by each of 
 these parties that have in themselves ever been 
 attractive ; but it cannot be said of either of them, 
 that they have rendered the Church as attractive to 
 the great body of the people, either among the edu- 
 cated or uneducated classes, as those desire who wish 
 well to the cause of religion. 
 
 We may take it for o-ranted that the l^- The 
 •^ ^ /= ^ ^ fault not in 
 
 reason of this failure is not in Christ- human na- 
 ture, which, 
 ianity; nor, notwithstandmg what many as all history 
 , ^ 1 1 r 1 M 1 shows, has 
 
 preachers and would-be philosophers may ^^ strong 
 say, in human nature. The fault is not ^°'^;^f ^^^ 
 
 •^ ' united wor- 
 
 in the latter, because there is no senti- ship. 
 
 12 
 
134 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ment of our common human nature so general as, I 
 will not say the religious sentiment, but I will speak 
 of a very definite manifestation of that sentiment, and 
 which bears directly on the point now before us, I 
 mean that particular manifestation of it which exhib- 
 its itself in the manner in which in all ages, and 
 among all races of men, and under all forms of civili- 
 zation and of religion, we find men dedicating certain 
 places and buildings to religious services, and uniting 
 together for the purpose of public worship. Wherever 
 we may go over the surface of the earth, if we are 
 among men who are able to raise such structures, we 
 find temples thronged with worshippers drawn toge- 
 ther by the desire of gratifying their religious senti- 
 ments. There is really no feeling or practice about 
 which there is so striking a concurrence, so general 
 a unanimity. It would be a mistake to suppose that 
 our churches are a result, or a characteristic of our 
 Christianity. There has scarcely ever been a city in 
 the world in which the grandest, costliest, and most 
 conspicuous structures were not dedicated to the ser- 
 vice of religion. It has been so in every quarter of 
 the globe. Approach any city in India, in Turkey, 
 or in China, and that which will first attract your eye, 
 soaring above and appearing to dominate over all the 
 other works of men's hands, will be, just as in the case 
 of this Christian land, the sacred buildings of the 
 place — temples, mosques, pagodas. And when some 
 
EXTExMPORARY PREACHING. 135 
 
 old form of civilization has passed away, all that ap- 
 pears to remain of it standing before our eyes, as a 
 visible memorial of what has been, are the massive re- 
 mains of its temples. Here and there you may find 
 the mouldering fragments of some secular building, 
 but what you find every where, as if kept up by an 
 invisible hand, for the purpose of witnessing to us of 
 the religious sentiments of past generation of men, 
 are the temples. It is so with the wonderful rock 
 temples of India, with the massive structures raised 
 by the myriad-handed devotion of the Egypt of the 
 Pharaohs, with the glorious remains that still rise 
 above the sandy wastes of the Syrian desert, the rock 
 of Athens, and the deserted fields of Paestum, and 
 even with the rudely grand monuments of ancient 
 Mexico, and of our own Stonehenge. A sentiment 
 then which has ever and every where acted with such 
 surprising uniformity, and produced such great re- 
 sults, and for the gratification of which men have al- 
 ways been so lavish of thought and labor, can have 
 nothing unreal or artificial about it. It cannot be 
 due to any accidental causes. It acts with the force 
 of a never-failing instinct implanted in the very 
 depths of our nature by the hand of our Creator. 
 However false, foolish, corrupt, and corrupting, 
 creeds may have been, this sentiment has never died 
 out : indeed, it has scarcely ever been weakened. God 
 never left us without this witness of Himself, and 
 
136 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 of our relation to Him. It is under the influence of 
 this sentiment that Christian churches have been 
 built, and that Christian congregations assemble in 
 them. We do these things in obedience to the desire 
 our Maker has implanted in our common human na- 
 ture to meet Him unitedly, to praise Him unitedly, 
 to supplicate Him unitedly, and unitedly to have our 
 thoughts guided to true and lofty conceptions of Him 
 in a place and house (in order that all these things 
 may be felt more deeply and with less of distraction) 
 disconnected from worldly uses, and dedicated espe- 
 cially to Him. This is a natural, universal, inde- 
 structible sentiment, as much so as the approval of 
 what is right, or the affection of a parent for a child. 
 If then our churches are neglected by any large pro- 
 portion of our people, this must be done not so much 
 from any fault in human nature, as at the cost of off- 
 ering violence to a strong natural sentiment. 
 
 11. Nor ill -^QY is it from any fault in Christianity 
 tianity. That religion which, by its own intrinsic 
 
 power and complete adaptation to the spiritual wants 
 of civilized man, overthrew all the religions of Eu- 
 rope, and of those parts of Asia and Africa at that 
 time in connection with Europe, cannot for a moment 
 be considered to be deficient in the power of attract- 
 ing all hearts and minds to itself. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 137 
 
 If the fault, then, is neither in our 12. Those 
 
 who are re- 
 
 nature nor in our religion, where is it to pelied, say 
 be looked for? What is it? In what cause what 
 does it consist? Where does it reside? Jo them ?s^ 
 I would rather confine myself to our own "^^^61^8?^^^ 
 Church, but it will help us in obtaining as a form. 
 an answer to the question before us, to observe that 
 this loss of attractive power has spread much more 
 widely in the Church of Rome than in any other 
 Christian body. We may almost ask what has become 
 of the religion of Italy, of Spain, of France, and of 
 Germany. The Pope tells us in his recent allocution 
 that the fault is to be found in the philosophical and 
 political speculations of the day, and in the corrup- 
 tions of human nature. And many of our own reli- 
 gious leaders give very similar replies. These cannot 
 be the reasons. If they were, Christianity could never 
 have existed in the world. The true reasons must be 
 very different from any thing of this kind. It may be 
 as well to hear what these people say themselves, and 
 to see whether it agrees with what those amongst our- 
 selves say, both of the educated and uneducated 
 classes, w^ho have any complaints to make upon this 
 subject. It cannot be that they are devoid of the re- 
 ligious sentiment. That is impossible. It may be so 
 with an individual here and there, but it can never be 
 the case with classes, still less with nations. They 
 themselves do not allege any thing of this kind. It is 
 
138 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 evident that even the infidelity of the present day is 
 not irreligious. It is puerile and false to affirm that 
 it is. Nor is it that men have imagined any thing 
 that they conceive to be higher or purer than the life 
 and teaching of Jesus Christ. They frequently affirm 
 the contrary. What they tell us is, that religion is 
 now taught as a theology, as a system of dry dogmas, 
 with ecclesiastical rather than human aims; and not 
 as a religion, that is, as certain divine principles pos- 
 sessing a power to elevate man's nature and to guide 
 his feelings aright, as something possessing the power 
 of binding men to God and to one another. They say 
 that theology, dry dogmas, are what the Churches are 
 fighting about ; are what they see inscribed on the stand- 
 ards which the Churches raise, and under which they 
 urge their members to fight ; whereas, what men crave 
 for is light, love, trustfulness; what is true, what is 
 of good report, what is lovable; what may give 
 strength when strength is needed, and what may give 
 rest where rest is possible; faith in God and man; 
 hope, justice, charity. 
 13. This This is the account which those who 
 
 intelligible 
 
 and not withdraw themselves from the Ministers 
 
 able or ir- and ministrations of religion give of their 
 religious. conduct. And can we, who are the Min- 
 isters of the Word, and who in this respect stand to 
 our brethren in Christ's place, regard the account 
 they give of their conduct as altogether irrational, and 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 139 
 
 in every sense irreligious ? Rather is there not some- 
 thing religious in the feelings and thoughts which they 
 thus describe to us? Would a theology and a system 
 of dogmas have converted the Roman Empire and es- 
 tablished Christianity in the world? Very few, I 
 think, would be of opinion that they could have pro- 
 duced such effects. And as moral no less than political 
 empire is maintained by the same means by which it 
 is acquired, I do not think that Christianity can be 
 upheld by this method of preaching it and presenting 
 it to men's minds. Does the artisan class, the one 
 amongst us which has broken to the greatest extent 
 with the Church, do the men of science, and do the 
 wretched in any way (and in these days the forms of 
 mental as well as of other kinds of distress are very 
 numerous), feel that what they are in need of is a the- 
 ology and dogmas? When therefore we offer these to 
 them in the first place as spiritual food and light, we 
 can understand what they say when they tell us that 
 they are repelled ; that they felt that they were ask- 
 ing for the bread of life, and we offered them a stone, — 
 something very cold and hard. 
 
 What then are we to do? Are we to 14. Chris- 
 
 tianity, as 
 
 give up our theology and our dogmatic presented 
 
 o -Tf 11- ^y Jgsus 
 
 teaching? If we were to do this, we Christ and 
 
 could hardly be regarded any more as a to Uie^Gen- 
 
 Church. But what we must do, if it can p^wer^to 
 
 be done, is to find out what men really convert the 
 
 ' *^ world. 
 
 want, and to supply their wants, remem- 
 
140 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 bering tliat the Gospel when first preached to the 
 world exactly met the wants of those spiritually dis- 
 tressed times. The fact that the world accepted 
 Christianity without the application, in spite even of 
 the use on the other side, of force, voluntarily, and 
 often at great cost, proves that it supplied a deeply- 
 felt want. It also proves that men are not irrational 
 in this matter, and that they are not irreligious ; for 
 the very thing they require is, that their reason and 
 their religious wants should be really and truly satis- 
 fied. This has been done once, and so may be done 
 again, if attempted in the same way in which it was 
 originally done. What Christ did, and felt, and 
 taught, and what Paul did, and felt, and taught, was 
 what converted the world. Here then is what we who 
 are Ministers of the Word must endeavor to do, and 
 to feel, and to teach, setting before all that to do and 
 to feel in this way will be emancipation and happi- 
 ness. 
 
 15. The If "we could rekindle the feeling de- 
 
 satisfying ^ _ 
 
 plenteous- scribed in the thirty-sixth Psalm, we might 
 ness of 1 1 • 
 
 God's house, then DC sure that our work was bemg 
 
 ded^y the"" "^^^^ done ; if making the Church attractive 
 Psalmist. ^^^ -^Q regarded as a proof of our doing 
 our work well. " The children of men shall be satisfied 
 with the plentcousness of Thy house ; and Thou shalt 
 give them to drink of Thy pleasures as out of a river. 
 For with Thee is the well of life, and in thy light 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 141 
 
 shall wc see light." God is the well of life, and God 
 is the light that we desire ; and in the act of united 
 worship in His house, may not men attain to large 
 measures of that light and that life, and so become 
 satisfied with the plenteousness of His house ? 
 Our own form of public worship appears l^. The 
 
 excellence 
 
 to supply us with every thing that is re- of our form 
 
 ..(,,. T 1 • of public 
 
 quisite tor this purpose, in this respect worship, as 
 it is quite unequalled. We must regard it as ^^^i^ifthose 
 aiminor at satisfyinor the wants both of the ^^^^^^^ , 
 
 o ^^ o v/hich make 
 
 heart and of the understanding ; for re- ^^o much of 
 
 preaching. 
 
 ligion is the offspring not of one of these 
 only, but of both, that is of our whole moral nature ; 
 and regarding our Liturgy in this way, we shall find, I 
 think, that it provides with more than human wisdom 
 and insight for every thing that a religious service or 
 public worship can require. Some Christian bodies 
 err in maintaining services which aim almost exclu- 
 sively at imparting instruction. This is evident from 
 the fact that with them the sermon is the main feature 
 of the service. Every thing else is subordinated to 
 it. This is a very serious mistake, because it is a 
 misconception of the main object of a religious ser- 
 vice. It sends away those who should have been wor- 
 shippers without their having had presented to them 
 any proper opportunity for worship. Many of the 
 religious emotions which belong to worship have by 
 such services not been gratified, or even awakened. 
 
142 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 No food is provided for them: they are starved 
 Services of this kind have a chilling and hardening 
 effect. They minister to a spirit of controversy, and 
 to arrogancy. 
 17. And It ig possible, as we all know, for a 
 
 with those ^ 
 
 which dis- Churcli to err in the opposite direction, 
 parage it. i t i • i 
 
 It may attach so little importance to the 
 
 sermon, or may have a repugnance to the liberty of 
 prophesying, as in most of its services to dispense en- 
 tirely with the exposition of the Word of God. This 
 is to depreciate the Word of God, or to be afraid of it. 
 The main, almost the whole, effort that is made, is to 
 awaken religious emotion, to sway the heart. Every 
 means has been resorted to for bringing this about ; 
 incense, vestments, pomp, processions, ceremonies, 
 symbolisms, music, painting, sculpture, architecture. 
 Every thing that has power to stir emotion, as distinct 
 from thought, has been attended to. The understand- 
 ing alone is not appealed to, just as if there were 
 something to be dreaded, or even something unholy in 
 the understanding; or as if, at all events, it had 
 nothing to do with religion. It is well that the reli- 
 gious emotions should be cultivated, but ill that this 
 should be done without the aid of the understanding; 
 the consequences of which we see are indistinctness 
 and ignorance in matters of religion, that is to say, the 
 substitution of superstition for religion. 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 143 
 
 Our admirable Liturrj^y avoids what is 18. How 
 
 ^•^ , the dif- 
 
 faulty in these two extremes, and combines ferent 
 
 . -. . . ,. factors of a 
 
 what is good in each. It neither allows religious 
 the exposition of the Word of God to re- V)riam?ed^ia 
 duce the rest of the service to insisini- ^^^^ l^^- 
 
 ° turgy, 
 
 ficance, nor does it regard it as a matter 
 of small account. Just so too with the devotional 
 part of the service. It does not allow that to over- 
 power the instructional part, or to be overpowered by 
 it. Each is duly considered and adequately provided 
 for. The provision made for religious instruction is, 
 that the whole of the Word of God should be read 
 through in the course of the year, the Psalms twelve 
 times, and the New Testament, with the exception of 
 the Book of the Revelation of St. John, three times, 
 with the addition of certain portions of the Gospels 
 and Epistles being selected for a fourth repetition; 
 and that, furthermore, on every occasion of public 
 service, a part, or some point of God's Word should 
 be expounded. The provision made for pure devotion 
 supplies means and opportunities for the expression 
 of every kind of religious emotion, — confession, hu- 
 miliation, supplication, the making known our wants 
 to God, the thanking and praising Him for all His 
 goodness, the sense of pardon, reconciliation, and ac- 
 ceptance. Nothing that can call forth religious emo- 
 tion, or to which religious emotion can desire to give 
 utterance, has been omitted. 
 
144 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 19. The We may then, I think, infer, that 
 
 eflFeci of this "^ 
 
 admirable wherever SO admirable a service fails to 
 
 be weakened clraw men to the house of God, having 
 
 faultsin become incapable of satisfying the natural 
 
 faults in 
 those wl 
 conduct it. 
 
 those who instinct for united public worship, there 
 
 must be something elsewhere than in the 
 service itself very wrong. Whatever circumstances 
 of the day there may be that bear upon and affect the 
 conclusions and feelings of certain classes among us, 
 I pass by, because their direct consideration does not 
 belong to my subject. There may, of course, be faults 
 in certain individuals and in certain classes, and some 
 of the circumstances of the times may be adverse to a 
 right appreciation of our service ; but there may also 
 be faults in the Minister who conducts the service. 
 This last particular is all that my subject now requires 
 me to advert to. He may be wanting in devotion, or 
 in learning, or in some qualification needed for en- 
 abling him to conduct the service in such a manner as 
 shall satisfy the religious feelings of the congregation. 
 20, The The fore<]^oing pages aim at indicating 
 
 high and o ± o 
 
 responsible what in some cases may be the remedy 
 
 duty of the f i r» •! • • i 
 
 Minister of when the cause oi the lailure is m the 
 thfs maUen Minister. The service, even if absolutely 
 perfect in itself, cannot do every thing. 
 Much will still depend on the way in which it is con- 
 ducted, that is, on the Minister. In this, after all, 
 lies his chief duty as a Minister of the Word. Those 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 145 
 
 committed to liis charge are assembled before him. 
 He is leading their intercourse with God. lie is 
 delivering to them God's Word, and speaking to them 
 all, collected for this purpose, of the things belonging 
 to their salvation. If it is important that he should 
 be able to speak to them individually on this subject, 
 as occasions present themselves, how much more im- 
 portant is it that he should be able to speak to them 
 all collectively. Many of them he never sees at any 
 other times. How solemn and imperative then is the 
 duty of the Clergy to take care, by the way in which 
 they perform their part of the service, that its effect is 
 not weakened, and no discredit brought upon it ! In 
 this matter a heavy, a very heavy responsibility, de- 
 volves upon them. They have to take care that the 
 instructional parts do really convey instruction, and 
 that the devotional parts are led in such a manner as 
 really to awaken and sustain devotion. To do these 
 things as they ought to be done requires very high 
 attainments, and is an offering to God worthy of the 
 mind and of the heart He has given to man. The 
 Minister of the Word is bound by the most sacred 
 considerations not to aim at any thing less. The man 
 who attains to this high aim makes a Avorthier contri- 
 bution to the service of God, and does more to elevate 
 its character, than he would have done had he built a 
 cathedral of marble, decorated with gold and precious 
 stones, for the service to be performed in ; for the 
 13 
 
146 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 service is greater than the temple ; and the mind and 
 heart, to which the service gives expression, are more 
 precious than rubies and fine gold, and all the things 
 we can desire for ourselves or dedicate to God are not 
 to be compared to them. 
 
SERMONS 
 
 The remainder of the volume will contain notes of 
 six sermons I preached while occupied on this work, 
 followed by six studies for sermons. In each case 
 the notes were written after preaching, from recollec- 
 tion of what had been said, aided by the few brief 
 memoranda that had been made at the time of the 
 study of the subject, and which were made in order 
 that the plan and arrangement which had then been 
 thought out might not be forgotten. The reader will 
 readily see that the sermons are not finished compo- 
 sitions, such as would admit of being read from the 
 pulpit, but merely what they profess to be, notes of 
 what was said. 
 
 I propose to append to each sermon a few observa- 
 tions. These will be of two kinds; for I wish to 
 comment both on their matter and on their structure 
 and composition ; that is to say, both on what is said, 
 and upon the way in which it is said. Indeed, my 
 object in giving the sermons will be contained in the 
 
 147 
 
148 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 observations which will follow them, for it is my- wish 
 to use them as illustrations of the rules and advice I 
 have given in the preceding part of this work. 
 
 It may appear an unusual proceeding for a writer 
 to comment on his own work ; and so I inust explain 
 why I am about to do this. I do it because I am 
 obliged to do it; for it would not be allowable for me 
 to reprint half-a-dozen sermons from other people's 
 works. I must therefore give sermons of my own. 
 And as to commenting upon them, I shall be able to 
 do this with much more freedom and ease when my 
 own compositions are the subject of the comment, for 
 I shall know why I said one thing and not another; 
 and what is the meaning and purpose of each sermon, 
 and of each part of each sermon. 
 
 The reader, too, when he finds that the sermons are 
 the work of the writer who has undertaken to give 
 him advice on the very subject of the composition of 
 sermons, will be more disposed to make his own re- 
 marks and to form his own judgment upon them than 
 he would be were they taken from other people's 
 works. 
 
 I have throughout the foregoing pages insisted on 
 the principle that the preaching of the Minister of 
 the Word can rest only on the Word itself. And I 
 have endeavored to make it clear that I mean by this 
 that his preaching must exhibit not an ignorant fami- 
 liarity, but what in the opinion of competent judges 
 
EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 149 
 
 is well-informed and intelligent acquaintance "with the 
 Word; that is to saj it must include a knowledge of 
 all that in these days contributes to a full and right 
 understanding of it. An address that does not show 
 this is not an exposition of the Word of God, is not a 
 sermon, but the speech of an ignorant man that will 
 repel all who are not as ignorant as the speaker him- 
 self. For the Word of God is the truth on all matters 
 of duty and religion as far as God has permitted it to 
 be revealed to the existing generation ; and the pro- 
 phet, or preacher, is the man who having attained to 
 a knowledge of this truth delivers it effectually to 
 those who have not attained, and who indeed never 
 will be able to attain to it, without his aid. 
 
 A sermon must also be felt to be the address of a 
 Christian to Christians; of one who does himself feel 
 the truth, the force, and the value of what he is set- 
 ting before others. The convictions and the expe- 
 riences he is speaking about are his own. He has 
 suflfered from what he describes as evil. What he 
 commends as good and profitable he has found good 
 and profitable to himself. The words of an exponent 
 of Theology are one thing, and the words of a Chris- 
 tian Minister are quite another thing. The flavor and 
 eff'ect of the two are very unlike. The faculties even 
 to which they are addressed are not the same ; for the 
 former are submitted to the critical, and the latter to 
 
 the moral faculties. 
 
 13* 
 
150 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 One word more : all worship is communion with 
 God. Without this communion of man's spirit with 
 God's Spirit there can be no religion. It is therefore 
 not only useless, but a positive and direct injury to 
 the cause of religion that a man, whose daily life and 
 bearing are inconsistent with the idea of habitual 
 communion with God, should stand up before the 
 Lord's congregation, as Jesus did in the Synagogue 
 of Nazareth, to speak about the things of the king- 
 dom of God. "What the Preacher may have to say 
 must be gathered from many sources, some old, some 
 new; but every thing he says ought, and that mani- 
 festly, to have been sifted, harmonized, and sanctified 
 by communion with God, by prayer. 
 
SERMON I. 
 
 Isaiah xxviii. 10. 
 "Here a little, and there a little." 
 
 It can result only from a narrow and mistaken view 
 of religion to suppose that any of the conclusions of 
 observation or experience which may contribute 
 towards enabling us to form a correct estimate of 
 human life, and to act wisely under the circumstances 
 in which we are placed here, can be unimportant. It 
 is possible that a statement may contain nothing dis- 
 tinctively Christian, and yet, by its truth and wisdom, 
 may be very serviceable to one desirous of doing good 
 Christian work. 
 
 Consider what the words ^'here a little, there a lit- 
 tle," suggest. Certainly nothing religious or Christian 
 in the ordinary acceptation of those words. They 
 convey nothing doctrinal. Nevertheless they are full 
 of true practical wisdom, which it would be folly to 
 regard as something separate from religion. The idea 
 
 151 
 
152 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 contained in them is, that we are not to expect to be 
 always engaged in what we may consider important 
 undertakings, or to be always making what we may 
 consider rapid progress. We must at times be content 
 with work that appears to us very humble, and with 
 progress that appears to us very slow ; with only a 
 little here, and a little there. 
 
 This is just one of the most necessary lessons for 
 the enthusiastic, the zealous, and the half-informed. 
 They are always looking for what they regard as great 
 things. They are always impatient of delay. But if 
 they would add knowledge, and wisdom, the fruit of 
 knowledge, to their zeal, they would learn that there 
 is "a day of small things" as well as a day of great 
 things. Resistance of one kind or another, from one 
 quarter or another, is always springing up to hinder 
 our undertakings; and so seldom indeed would it be 
 good even for a good cause to have every thing its 
 own way, that the days of small things are to the days 
 of great things as thousands to one. The man who is 
 wise in knoAving this, while he sets before himself what, 
 according to the light that is in him, he conceives to 
 be the highest and best objects, and lives for them, 
 will not be discouraged because he finds that he can 
 seldom do more than ''a little here, and a little 
 there." 
 
 In nature, as we are beginning to understand, all 
 great changes are effected very gradually and very 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 153 
 
 slowly. Continents are not built up, mountain ranges 
 are not elevated, oceans are not excavated by sudden 
 efforts. These grand operations are carried through 
 so gradually, that the rate of progress is quite inap- 
 preciable to man, even when by the aid of letters his 
 memory, or rather his view of the past, is enabled to 
 reach back for three or four thousand years. These 
 things have been done over the whole of our earth, so 
 as to make every part of its surface what it now is; 
 the same causes, producing similar results, are every 
 where in operation at this moment; but the rate at 
 which the progress has been, and is still being carried 
 on, is inconceivably slow. 
 
 Add another remark: this slow rate of- progress in 
 nature is God's work. It comes from His mind. It 
 is His doing. He it is who is so many thousands of 
 years in excavating the bed of an ocean, and in con- 
 structing a continent. And the agents He employs 
 for doing His work are either themselves so small, or 
 must work so slowly, that any rapid progress is 
 simply impossible. Perhaps large districts of future 
 continents are being formed from fragments of micro- 
 scopic animalcules; while the now existing continents 
 are being worn away by the gradual erosion of rains, 
 and rivers, and tides, and waves, and winds, and frost. 
 In these things God does every thing very gradually, 
 ^'a little here, and a little there." 
 
 Now it is probable that the Being who thinks it 
 
154 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 best to act in this way with respect to the material 
 world in which He has placed man, will act in a sim- 
 ilar way with respect to man himself; man and the 
 world in which he is placed being the correlated parts 
 of one plan. The same mind underlies and regulates 
 the progress of both. When we come to the facts of 
 the case, we find that they support the supposition. 
 The greatest event that has taken place in the history 
 of the world was the development and establishment 
 of our religion ; and how instructive is the review of 
 the gradual way in which it was brought about ! Take 
 the particulars as they are recorded in the Holy 
 Scriptures. Sin entered into the world when the first 
 man transgressed. But how many thousand years 
 elapsed before the appearance on the scene of Him 
 who was to overcome sin, and to be our guide into the 
 perfect way of righteousness! The steps by which 
 God prepared the world for His coming were slow and 
 gradual, almost beyond any thing we can imagine. 
 The patriarchs, the chosen people, the law given 
 through Moses, the prophets, were only a few of the 
 later steps in the long line of events, which issued at 
 last, when the fulness of time was come, in the state 
 of necessary preparation. In other parts of the world 
 other lines of events had to be carried through, and 
 other equally necessary results matured. Millennium 
 after millennium was required for this purpose, and 
 was passed in this way. 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 155 
 
 Then, when all things were at last made ready, 
 consider how gradually the actual establishment of 
 the Gospel was brought about. It was not done by a 
 sudden decree, or by an instantaneous exercise of 
 omnipotence. The Saviour appeared as an infant, 
 and grew to man's estate just like any other child of 
 man. He then delivered the Gospel by the slow pro- 
 cess of preaching it — a process necessarily of some 
 years. He was then content to leave this earth 
 without having effected its establishment. Were 
 there half-a-dozen persons in all who understood His 
 Gospel and believed on Him at the time when He 
 gave up the ghost on the Cross? Certainly there 
 were not. And so the Apostles were commissioned, 
 and instructed by the Spirit, and sent forth to continue 
 the preaching the Lord had commenced. In this 
 gradual way the Gospel of man's redemption was 
 begun to be spread and established in the world. The 
 rule observed was that of working gradually, ^'a little 
 here, and a little there." 
 
 Nearly two thousand years have passed since that 
 time ; and in what way and at what rate has the 
 Gospel been advancing over the world? Only very 
 gradually. Many countries it has not yet reached. 
 In some it has receded. This is one of those eras in 
 which visible progress is being made ; but still it is 
 not being made in the way in which zeal would have 
 anticipated, but through events which it took who can 
 
156 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 tell how many thousands of years to arrive at ? The 
 chief cause of its present spread is, that at length, 
 through the progress of science, and from political 
 and economical causes, some of the nations that have 
 received Christianity, and above all others our ov/n 
 countrymen, are now able to penetrate to and establish 
 themselves in the wide waste places of the earth. 
 
 I have still to show what practical bearing these 
 remarks have upon ourselves, upon our thoughts, our 
 feelings, and our conduct. The lesson which stands 
 out upon the surface of what we have been considering 
 is, that what we are called to is to work, and still to 
 work on, and to faint not. And we must not judge 
 of the value of our work by the success which has 
 attended it, or by the rapidity of its progress. The 
 questions we must ask ourselves are such as whether 
 our work is precious in the sight of God, who judges 
 not as men judge, by immediate, tangible, ponderable 
 results ? And are its effects good upon our own char- 
 acters? These are quite distinct questions from what 
 is the amount of. effect it has had upon others and 
 upon the world. We are too much disposed, in 
 forming our estimates, only to regard the latter con- 
 sideration. This is a mistaken and unfortunate 
 way of judging. If the Omnipotent and All-wise is 
 content to work slowly, why should we be impatient? 
 The motto of him who in this respect has learnt of 
 God, and who has in himself the mind that was in 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 157 
 
 Christ Jesus our Lord, will be, Rest not, Haste not. 
 Trust in God. 
 
 I say that one way of estimating our work is to 
 consider in what way God will estimate it. Remem- 
 ber, God does not require one man to do every thing, 
 nay, not even to do much ; any more than He requires 
 one generation of men to do every thing, or even to 
 do much. What He requires of a man is that he 
 should do what He has set him to do, and what He 
 has set him to do is that he should with all his heart 
 do and bear whatever it is evident to conscience with 
 common sense for its assessor he is called upon to do 
 and to bear. Lazarus was called to suffering ; to bless 
 God under the deprivation of all that is pleasant to 
 flesh and blood ; and furthermore, in the midst of 
 much that is most distressing. Here the busy philan- 
 thropist or the eager controversialist might say was a 
 form of life in which no one particle of work could 
 be done. How could he who was so circumstanced be 
 useful to any one? But God does not think in this 
 way, otherwise He would at once ordain that there 
 should be no more Lazaruses upon earth. Nay, 
 rather looking upon this poor sufferer as occupying a 
 place in a great plan ordained by God, we must come 
 to the conclusion that his life was one of great use- 
 fulness, issuing in great reward. Considered in this 
 light we can understand that his abject condition, his 
 penury of every thing that makes life desirable to the 
 14 
 
158 EXTEMPORARY PREACIimG. 
 
 multitude, his having none but God to help him, his 
 pain-racked, corruption-eaten body, were to a large 
 portion of the inhabitants of a self-willed, and self- 
 seeking capital, a very intelligible call to think of 
 God and of a day to come ; a call to feel for the dis- 
 tressed ; and, as stewards of God's bounties for this 
 very purpose, to succor them ; a call to consider the 
 conditions God has imposed on human life, as for 
 instance the frail tenure by which they themselves 
 held their good things, their health, their wealth, and 
 all their temporal advantages. Who could tell how 
 soon he might not himself be made in some respect or 
 other no better than this poor beggar ? The daily 
 sight of so abject a sufferer possibly was a more ef- 
 fectual sermon to the inhabitants of Jerusalem than 
 all the preaching of all who then sat in Moses' seat. 
 He who could do nothing may have done more, with- 
 out opening his mouth, than they all with all their learn- 
 ing, position, and influence. And we are told how 
 highly God estimated his work, for He took him to 
 Himself. If a man is honest and enduring, if he is 
 resigned and self-denying, if he is pure and true, is 
 he not doing God's work ? And is not the light that 
 shines from him that which God approves ? Is this 
 work that God will think lightly of ? We must bring 
 this home to ourselves. What is required of us is not 
 great results as men count greatness ; if it were, few 
 men would ever have done God's work in the world. 
 
159 
 
 Rather let us feel that there never lived a man who 
 loved and trusted God, who believed in His justness 
 and goodness, who walked as in His presence, but did 
 His work abundantly and acceptably. 
 
 I just now mentioned another way of estimating our 
 work — that of considering the effect it has upon our 
 own character. We are told that there are men who 
 will say at the judgment, " Lord, Lord, have we not 
 cast out devils in Thy name ? and in Thy name done 
 many marvellous things?" to whom the Lord will say, 
 ''Depart from me, for I never knew you, ye workers 
 of iniquity." These were they who were called to 
 great position and opportunities, who had power, 
 wealth, authority, influence, learning, . culture, intel- 
 lectual capacity ; and who, merely because it was their 
 place to do it, did something, a thousand-fold be it, 
 more than the humbly placed could appear to do ; but 
 the love of what is good and true and gentle, that is 
 the love of God, the one source of all excellence, was 
 not in them ; and so what they did had no good effect 
 upon their hearts. They did not become better men, 
 more loving, more self-denying, more patient, more 
 gentle. Estimate then the work you have done, and 
 are doing, in this way: not by attempting to measure 
 its effects upon others, but by measuring its effects 
 upon yourself. Estimated by this standard, many a 
 man whose life-long, daily, lowly, monotonous occupa- 
 tion has been in the workshop or at the plough, has 
 
160 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 worked to better purpose in the eyes of the great 
 Task-master, has become more purified, better in- 
 structed, more sanctified, brought nearer to God by 
 his work, than some of those who in the world's esti- 
 mation have occupied a high place among its benefac- 
 tors. 
 
 These considerations throw some light upon those 
 graces which are more especially Christian, enabling 
 us to see what they are in themselves, and what they 
 are good for. For instance, they help us to compre- 
 hend the meaning of Humility. If the opportunities, 
 and means, and endowments God has vouchsafed to 
 us are but small, if He allows us to do but little, and 
 to advance in doing that little but slowly, when we 
 have learnt of G-od the lesson before us to-day we shall 
 acquiesce. We shall feel and understand that His 
 mind is in the matter; that it is in this way that He 
 has thought it best to deal with us. Yv^e shall be con- 
 tented, thankful, hopeful, trustful. AYe shall not 
 complain because He has not allowed us a wider field, 
 or called us to greater things. Such is the spirit of 
 Christian Humility. 
 
 Again, the facts and the thoughts that have been 
 before us show how necessary a part of the Christian 
 character is Perseverance, that patient continuance 
 in well-doing of which we read. We must not be dis- 
 couraged at finding that we have nothing of impor- 
 tance to do as the world measures importance ; or that 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 161 
 
 our efforts have been attended with little success, as 
 the world understands success. Our business is to 
 persevere unto the end : the rest belongs to God. 
 
 "With Faith also the connection of all this is very 
 close, and well worthy of notice. It is of the essence 
 of Faith to trust God in all that He does, and under 
 all circumstances. As soon as we shall have learnt 
 that slow progress in every thing good is a law God 
 has imposed upon the course of this dispensation ; that 
 His plan here, certainly in things moral and spiritual 
 is not to perfect any thing, but to allow of gradual 
 advances towards perfection, for that belongs to, and 
 will be consummated in a better world than this; then 
 one hindrance to Faith, to childlike trustful Faith, 
 will be at once removed. Men are not dissatisfied with 
 what they have come to understand has been ordained 
 of God. Failures, disappointments, repulses will not 
 then disquiet. We shall go on, knowing that to Avork 
 under these conditions belongs to this life, but that it 
 will not always be so. We shall then travel along the 
 paths of Christian duty, upon which God has placed 
 us severally, assured that the man who is faithful in a 
 little, will be accepted as though he had been faithful 
 in much ; and that he who gives the cup of cold water, 
 if that is all his opportunities permit him to do, shall 
 receive a disciple's reward. 
 
 14* 
 
162 EXTEMPORARY PREACHIXG. 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon. 
 
 With respect to the foregoing sermon, I would beg 
 permission from my younger brethren to point out to 
 them, that its object is not merely to call attention to 
 a truth that is of much practical value, though it is 
 very much overlooked; but to do it in such a manner 
 as to remind the hearers of a still more important 
 truth, and one it is which we are only just now be- 
 ginning to understand — that what our religion is de- 
 pends on what our knowledge is. 
 
 It has no bearing on this statement to reply that 
 among ourselves the ignorant classes are as susceptible 
 of deep religious impressions as the most instructed, 
 because those classes must always accept the religion 
 of the age in which they live, whatever it may be. 
 They must accept it because they have no knowledge, 
 and cannot acquire any. The religion of the age, 
 however, will be what the knowledge of the age 
 makes it. 
 
 The idea of this discourse is to make the knowledge 
 of a few simple facts belonging to the domain of one 
 of the physical sciences, and a few analogous facts of 
 Christian history, a ground for the cultivation of cer- 
 tain Christian graces. How melancholy a reflection 
 is it that there are many amongst us who would look 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 163 
 
 upon a Christian exhortation founded on such grounds 
 as incongruous, and more likely to hinder than to ad- 
 vance the cause of religion. Let us consider what 
 this implies. It shows that they regard religious 
 truth as incompatible with scientific and historical 
 truth ; though scientific truth is simply the apprehen- 
 sion of the ideas which were in the mind of God 
 before He embodied them in nature, and which ideas, 
 at the time He set nature before us, He gave us the 
 capacity and the desire to master ; and though historical 
 truth is simply the ascertaining the events, with their 
 sequence and connection, which God foreordained and 
 brought about in human afiairs. Is it conceivable 
 that the knowledge of either of these should in any 
 way be opposed to religion? It is impossible that 
 such knowledge can take us further from God. It 
 must bring us nearer to Him. The more we appre- 
 hend of the principles on which God acts, so much 
 the more of His mind will be in us. Or if any object 
 to the repeated statements of Scripture that God's 
 works manifest to us His mind, we may put it differ- 
 ently, and say — so much the more shall we form 
 within ourselves of that mental and moral state God 
 intended this knowledge to produce. At all events, to 
 confine ourselves to the particulars I have mentioned 
 in the foregoing discourse ; we are told in Holy Scrip- 
 ture that God requires man to be humble and perse- 
 vering, and to have Faith; and I think it must be 
 
164 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 plain enough that the few facts of science and history 
 referred to in the sermon agree with Holy Scripture 
 in commending to us these graces. 
 
 It is a distinct and especial part of the duty of the 
 Minister of the Word, as compared with other 
 teachers, to set forth the connection and correlation of 
 all knowledge. Hitherto religious teachers, whether 
 lay or clerical, have too generally assumed that their 
 duty was directly the opposite of this. It seems to 
 have been a main object with them to make it appear 
 that religious knowledge is irreconcilably hostile to 
 other kinds of knowledge, and they to it. How false 
 and mischievous is this position ! 
 
 The students of any department of human history, 
 or of any of the natural sciences, are students of 
 special branches. They carry on their inquiries 
 within certain restricted and defined limits. But 
 Divinity is truly, and essentially, and alone, the 
 scientia scientiarum. If it is not this, it is nothing 
 at all. Its subject-matter is all knowledge. The 
 factors of the religious ideas of any age are all that 
 is known at that time of nature and of man ; that is, 
 wdiat is known of the ways in which God has mani- 
 fested Himself in nature, and of the ways in which 
 He has constituted and dealt with ourselves, which in- 
 cludes our moral being, our past history, and our pre- 
 sent condition. The most important source of this 
 latter department of knowledge is the Holy Scriptures. 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 165 
 
 But thej are very far indeed from containing or pro- 
 fessing to contain all that it is necessary we should 
 know about ourselves. 
 
 If we look out over the world, we still find people 
 among whom religion is only in its germ : a state of 
 which history supplies us with other instances. This 
 germ of religion is Fetishism ; in other words, it is the 
 religion of almost complete ignorance. The worshipper 
 of a Fetish has no conception of man's history, of him- 
 self indeed he can scarcely form any conception as a 
 moral being ; and as to nature, all he knows of it is 
 that certain objects have certain properties, but his 
 knowledge does not go so far as to enable him to de- 
 fine what those properties really are, or to connect 
 the properties of which he has a dim conception with 
 the objects to which they rightly belong. And so he 
 worships a feather, or a tooth. As knowledge widens 
 and deepens, so does religion purify itself. There is 
 no denying this, unless one would deny the teachings 
 both of observation and of history. Every religion 
 that now exists, or that we know of as ever having ex- 
 isted in the world, has been in strict correlation to the 
 knowledge of those who made it their rule of life. As 
 knowledge advances, religion advances 2^«r« passu. 
 Religion is the knowledge men possess of God and of 
 themselves used as a means for supplying them with a 
 rule of life. 
 
 Again then : how unfortunate is the opposition in 
 
1G6 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 wbich some endeavor to place religion to science and 
 history. It is most unfortunate for themselves : for 
 those they lead, or rather mislead; and for a time, 
 but only for a time, for the cause of religion itself. 
 As the difference between the religion of Fetishism 
 and our own is simply a difference of knowledge, we 
 ought to hail every accession to our knowledge, be- 
 cause it must purify, elevate, and strengthen our 
 religion. The discoveries of Astronomers, Geologists, 
 Botanists, Zoologists, and Chemists, have enlarged 
 and rendered more impressive some of our ideas of 
 God. So with those who extend our knowledge of the 
 history and of the nature of man. We need not then 
 have any dread of the extension of knowledge. If its 
 extension be, from a religious point of view, an evil, 
 how much have we now to dread, for it is certainly 
 now being extended with a rapidity wholly unknown 
 in former times. But what ground can there be for 
 believing that we have reached, or ever shall reach a 
 point at which the laws of mind will be so far reversed, 
 as that knowledge which has hitherto built up shall 
 thenceforth overthrow religion? From a date long an- 
 terior to the time of Galileo, there has existed a most 
 pernicious misunderstanding between religion and 
 knowledge. They have feared, hated, reviled each 
 other. Under the Old Dispensation we see no trace 
 of this feeling. There religion is distinctly based on 
 knowledge. And now, again, there are symptoms of 
 
HERE A LITTLE, THERE A LITTLE. 167 
 
 their true relation to each other being better under- 
 stood. We may say this when "we see many Ministers 
 of Religion cultivating, welcoming, and dissemina- 
 ting knowledge; and this with a clear perception of 
 the extent to which religion is dependent upon it ; and 
 when, on the other hand, we see men of science no 
 longer denouncing religion, but regarding their sciences 
 as contributory to it. 
 
SERMON II. 
 
 "WHAT AVE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 
 
 2 Corinthians xi. 2i 
 
 "In labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons 
 more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I 
 forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I 
 stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been 
 in the deep; in journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of 
 robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the hea- 
 then, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in 
 the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and pain- 
 fulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastinga 
 often, in cold and nakedness." 
 
 This is a description of the life the Apostle Paul 
 had been passing for several years. It was a life of 
 ceaseless toil, peril, suffering, unjust treatment, and 
 insult. Many must be struck with the thought that 
 he who had to bear all this must have been a very 
 wretched man. Indeed, all who mif^ht regard the 
 Apostle's manner of life from the ordinary point of 
 view, that is, from the point of view from which most 
 168 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 169 
 
 of US regard our own lives, -would have abundant 
 reason for coming to such a conclusion. " Here," 
 they would think, "is not one of the circumstances 
 which render life agreeable; no leisure, no home, no 
 display, no pleasures; and instead of these every thing 
 which flesh and blood most shrink from. What a 
 miserable life! What a miserable man!" I cannot, 
 I suppose, be w^rong in taking it for granted that this 
 is the light in which many of those who are now here 
 present regard the description just given of the 
 Apostle's life. 
 
 There is, however, quite another way of looking at 
 it, and quite an opposite conclusion to be arrived at 
 respecting it. I mean the Apostle's way of looking 
 at it, and his conclusion respecting it. Mark, the 
 way of looking at it, and the conclusion respecting it 
 of the man who was himself bearing it all. In men- 
 tioning his labors, dangers, and sufferings, he does not 
 do it with the slightest thought of lamenting himself, 
 or in any way making himself an object of pity. He 
 does not at all say, "See what a sufferer, what an 
 unhappy man I am." On the contrary, he speaks of 
 these things as if he somehow or other had satisfaction 
 in thinking of them. The expression drops from him 
 that "he glories in them." The remembrance of 
 them is no more accompanied with any feeling of hu- 
 miliation, than with any desire to complain. And in 
 the following chapter we find him going so far as to 
 15 
 
170 EXTEMPORAPtY PREACHING. 
 
 say that ^'he takes pleasure in infirmities, reproaches, 
 necessities, persecutions, and distresses." Nor has 
 he a thought that fear of such treatment as he had 
 himself received would deter men from accepting the 
 Gospel. 
 
 It may add some weight to the judgment and ex- 
 ample of the Apostle to remember that no one could 
 have obliged him to submit to these miseries. Had he 
 been so minded, he might have escaped them all. 
 He might have stayed quietly at home, and to use 
 our way of speaking on the subject, have enjoyed life. 
 But this was not what he preferred. With his eyes 
 open, seeing clearly that all these miseries would be 
 brought upon him, of his own choice, and gladly too, 
 he went forth and incurred them all. His address to 
 the elders of Miletum is very moving: "And now, 
 behold, I go bound in the spirit unto Jerusalem, not 
 knowing the things that shall befall me there: save 
 that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city, saying 
 that bonds and afflictions abide me. But none of 
 these things move me, neither count I my life dear 
 unto myself, so that I miglit finish my course with 
 joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the 
 Lord Jesus." He says this of himself in the year in 
 which he gives the account of his life we have in the 
 text. Shortly after his making this statement to the 
 elders of Miletum of the sufferings he expected in 
 every city, we find the disciples at Caesarea entreating 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 171 
 
 him to have some regard for his own safety, and not 
 to go up to Jerusalem; to this entreaty he replies, 
 "What mean ye to weep and to hreak my heart? for 
 I am ready not to be bound onl}^, but also to die for 
 the name of the Lord Jesus." 
 
 And furthermore he had now had five-and-twenty 
 years' experience in this kind of life. He knew the 
 hardness and the sharpness of all these things. For 
 so many years had they been his daily lot. But long 
 experience had not worked in him any desire to shrink 
 from them, or escape from them. And in this same 
 mind he persevered until the end came, which was 
 only a few years later. He continued to fight the 
 good fight, not reckoning his life dear unto himself, 
 till at length the violent and painful death he had so 
 long foreseen was inflicted on him. " Not tribulation, 
 or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or 
 peril, or the sword, could separate him from the love 
 of God which was in Christ Jesus our Lord. Nay, in 
 all these things he was more than a conqueror through 
 Him that loved him." 
 
 The reciprocal exclamations which closed the scene 
 between the Roman Governor Festus and King 
 Agrippa on the one side, and the prisoner Paul on 
 the other, place in the strongest light the contrast 
 between the two aspects of the Apostle's life. The 
 Roman Governor, taking the worldly view, considers 
 the Apostle mad-. "Paul," he exclaims, "thou art 
 
172 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 beside thyself." To his mind it was quite irrational 
 to expose one's self to dangers and inconveniences 
 for spiritual or speculative objects. And just so it is 
 among ourselves. How many think and talk in the 
 same way of similar earnestness and self-devotion. 
 Paul's fervid wish addressed to King Agrippa rests 
 upon just the opposite ground: "I would to God, that 
 not only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were 
 almost, and altogether such as I am, except these 
 bonds." He, the poor prisoner as they thought, 
 brought into trouble by his ridiculous hallucinations, 
 was so satisfied with, and so happy in his own condi- 
 tion, that he could have no more exalted wish for 
 them, king and governor though they were, than that 
 they should be as he was, with the exception of his 
 bonds. Prisoner though he was, he was in his own 
 estimation a happier man than any governor or king. 
 He would not have changed his life, taking the inner 
 life with the outer, for the life of any other man. He 
 had nothing better to wish for them than that they 
 should be as he was. 
 
 So was it with the Apostle — him, who after the 
 Author and Finisher of our Faith, was its great foun- 
 der. But how is it in these matters with ourselves ? 
 How far are we like-minded with him ? What are we 
 seeking? What are the ideas of happiness which are 
 shaping our lives ? These are questions which men 
 answer in most diverse ways. And probably, we 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IX LIFE. 173 
 
 sliould see, if we were capable of taking all things 
 into our consideration, that it is best that it should he 
 so. But Avhat each has to consider for himself is, 
 whether his own ways are wise ? Whether it would 
 be better for him to take that view of life upon which 
 the Apostle acted, or that on which the world acts ? 
 Are ease, pomp, show, wealth, pleasure, self-indul- 
 gence, the best objects we can set before ourselves, 
 and what .we ought to be seeking ? The Apostle did 
 not think that these things constituted the happiness 
 of this life. Or if he did, then he thought that there 
 was something more worthy of his pursuit than the 
 happiness of this life. He took little thought about 
 these things how they befell. What he gave himself 
 up to was the practice in himself, and the extension 
 among his fellow-men, of what he had come to know 
 was true, and right, and good for man, being the will 
 and the truths of God ; and therefore beyond measure 
 more desirable for man than any thing else. He 
 would do this good ; and he would purchase the satis- 
 faction of having done it, at all personal risk and sa- 
 crifice. If happiness means ease and pleasure, his 
 life proclaims to us that it ought not to be made the 
 end and aim of our existence. Or if we must seek 
 happiness, it must be a happiness of a different kind, 
 a happiness which arises from our knowing that we 
 are living for objects out of ourselves — what I just 
 mentioned, for right, for truth, for God; that we are 
 15^^ 
 
174 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 seeking the kingdom of God and His rigliteousness, 
 and are on God's side. These are matters into which 
 a man ought to look. A man ought to be able to give 
 a reason for the conclusions on which he has staked 
 all he has, nay all he is. What else can concern him 
 so much? 
 
 And here the practice and the instincts of the dis- 
 ciples of the world appear to be better than what they 
 avow as their principles. They talk as if ease and 
 pleasure were happiness, and as if they were what 
 men ought to seek. But are their lives always con- 
 sistent Avith these ideas? Do we not see multitudes 
 of worldly persons, I mean persons who clearly are 
 not under the influence of religion, in their practice 
 quite abandoning all this talk about ease and pleasure 
 and happiness ? Do we not see them taking most 
 laboriously some to one pursuit and some to another? 
 This is one of those points in which the children of 
 this world are in their generation wiser than the 
 children of light. One will devote all his powers to 
 the attempt to advance in some branch of knowledge, 
 or to perfect himself in some branch of art. Another 
 will rise early, and late take rest, and eat the bread 
 of carefulness, that he may die a rich man. Another 
 will pass laborious days and sleepless nights, that he 
 may stand high in reputation among men. Now these 
 persons, though professing to believe in the world, and 
 to have little religion, have thrown to the winds all 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 175 
 
 that the world says about case and pleasure, and are 
 striving for their particular objects, though not in the 
 same spirit, yet quite as devotedly as the Apostle 
 strove for his. When then I see multitudes of the 
 disciples of the world agreeing with the true disciples 
 of the heavenly wisdom in devoting themselves, with- 
 out regarding labors and inconveniences, to their sev- 
 eral objects of pursuit, I must come to the conclusion 
 that God has so made men as that they shall not be 
 satisfied with ease and pleasure; that whether they be 
 worldly or religious, they shall see plainly, almost, I 
 may say, in proportion to the intelligence God has 
 given them, that such a kind of life is low and con- 
 temptible, and that self-devotion to some pursuit is far 
 more desirable. 
 
 There are probably not many who deliberately give 
 themselves up to ease and pleasure; and of those who 
 do, but a very small proportion appear to be satisfied 
 with themselves; that is to say, are at peace with their 
 own consciences. How frequently do we see such 
 men restless and discontented. Their ease and plea- 
 sure do not appear so much like ease and pleasure as 
 like uneasiness and unhappiness. 
 
 I should feel no hesitation in leaving the decision 
 of this question to any audience, and least of all to 
 one composed of those whom circumstances oblige to 
 pass a life of toil and drudger3^ But let us put it to 
 ourselves. Which of the two lives is most in accord- 
 
176 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ance -^vith the i;iculties and purposes of our nature ; 
 the life of the Apostle y>ho took pleasure in re- 
 proaches, in necessities, in persecutions, and distres- 
 ses for Christ's sake and the Gospel's sake, or his 
 -who said, " Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for 
 many years. Eat, drink, and take thine ease?" You 
 feel that the Apostle respects himself and his work, 
 and is to be honored, loved, imitated, while the other 
 man respects nothing, and is simply contemptible. 
 If the choice were offered to you, I think you would 
 say, let me be the Apostle, with all his infirmities, re- 
 proaches, necessities, persecutions, and distresses, and 
 not the poor wretch whose aspirations could not get 
 beyond eating and drinking and taking his ease. 
 
 It seems then to come up from the very depths of 
 man's heart and mind, the thought having been im- 
 planted in him by his Creator, that it is not good for 
 him to have his portion in this life; that he is not 
 here for ease and pleasure. We ought then to take 
 counsel of this instinctive sentiment, and to consider 
 how we can live conformably to it. It would be very 
 serviceable to bring this distinctly before our thoughts, 
 and, if possible, to obtain our assent to it as regards 
 ourselves. Let us therefore put it to ourselves, each 
 to himself: "I am not here to take my ease and plea- 
 sure, but to follow what is true and right; to do 
 whatever God calls me to do, and to bear whatever 
 He lays upon me." Let us say this to ourselves, and 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 177 
 
 see whether we are dismayed at what it means. Let 
 us consider whether we accept or reject it; whether 
 it sounds to us proper and reasonable, or otherwise. 
 
 But how shall we carry out in action these senti- 
 ments ? We have the account of the way in which 
 the Apostle Paul and his fellow- Apostles, and of the 
 way in which the Author and Finisher of our faith 
 acted upon them. Enough was said in the first part 
 of my discourse about the Apostle. Now look at the 
 man Christ Jesus, in whom dwelt the fulness of the 
 Godhead bodily. Even lie pleased not Himself, but 
 was made perfect by suffering, by labors, by self- 
 denial — by what we call working. For the joy that 
 was set before Ilim, the joy of revealing and of propa- 
 gating the truth, and of doing good, He endured the 
 Cross, despising the shame. In this way it was that 
 He widened and relaid the foundations of the regene- 
 ration of the world. Consider how He labored and 
 how He suffered ; and remember that His sufferings 
 came upon Him as a part of the work He had under- 
 taken. And with respect to those sufferings, we are 
 sure that sorrow was not the only feeling with which 
 He was acquainted. We know that he thanked His 
 Father in heaven at the view of the work in which 
 He was engaged. And it cannot but have been, that 
 in His holy and self-devoted life, the joy of which the 
 Apostle speaks, was deeper and more soul-sustaining 
 
178 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 than was ever felt by any other of all who have been 
 on earth in human form. 
 
 You see then, brethren, the vocation to which we 
 are called. We must go and do likewise. God gives 
 the opportunities and the powers for doin«g so. We 
 must put God, and the truth, and goodness before every 
 thing. One good, holy, right, and godlike action, 
 however much self-denial it may need, and in this 
 world of sin, such actions will always imply self- 
 denial, one such action is worth more than whole ages 
 of ease and pleasure. We cannot imagine ourselves 
 having been endowed with our moral and intellectual 
 faculties, having been enabled to carry our thoughts 
 beyond the limits of this world, and to acquaint our- 
 selves with God, merely that we might labor and rest, 
 eat and drink, grow and decay, and die. The ideas 
 are incongruous. No; the kind of actions and the 
 kind of life I have been setting before you are far 
 better and more desirable than any thing self-indul- 
 gence can dream of. Am I, then, rich or poor ? 
 Young or old ? A child or a parent ? A husband 
 or a wife ? A master or a servant ? One exercising 
 authority or one subject to it? Am I a neighbor to 
 others ? Am I a Christian ? Each of these relations 
 indicates much that I am called to do ; and which I 
 may find a satisfaction in doing hardly of this earth, 
 because it is a satisfaction such as the world can 
 neither give nor take away. Each of these relations 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 179 
 
 is proof enough that ease and pleasure arc not my 
 first aim Iiere; for each of them implies that there is 
 somethinfT for me to do, the oblio-ation to do which I 
 cannot get rid of, because it inheres to the relation, 
 and has upon me, as long as the relation exists, prior 
 claims to any thing else. 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon. 
 
 I have two observations to make on this sermon. 
 The first is, that it supplies an instance of a difficulty 
 which often, as in this case, becomes a fault in the 
 composition of sermons. It is the difficulty of avoid- 
 ing the unpardonable offence of dulness in the state- 
 ment of such an argument as that set forth in the 
 first part of the discourse before us. The object of 
 the argument is, by calling attention to several par- 
 ticulars of St. Paul's life in succession, to accumulate 
 their whole weight in favor of that view of life which 
 supposes that there is something better worth seeking 
 than ease and self-indulgence. In order that this 
 efi'ect may be produced, it is necessary to dwell for a 
 few moments on each of these particulars. This is 
 necessary ; but the impression it produces on the mind 
 of the hearers is bad. The impression left is : this is 
 all very true, but it does not matter much to me. In 
 
180 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 fact, there is nothing in it to interest the thought, or 
 awaken the feelings of ordinary hearers. 
 
 Now this difficulty may be met in two ways. First, 
 by delivery. In society it is not uncommon to find 
 persons who have an admirable style of talking. 
 Their opinions are not wiser or truer than the 
 opinions of multitudes of other men, but they are very 
 much better put. Every thing is worded so neatly 
 and clearly, and said in so gentle and yet so decided 
 a manner, and in such pleasing tones, that one is 
 never inattentive. This is not rare among conversers, 
 but it is rare among speakers. A speaker, however, 
 of this kind mio-ht deliver himself of a statement as 
 dull as the one before us without its dulness being ob- 
 served. He has the power of commanding attention. 
 
 The other way in which such a statement may be 
 deprived of its dulness would be by presenting every 
 particular of it picturesquely. This would be done 
 by going into details, by strong coloring, and gene- 
 rally by calling in the aid of the imagination. This 
 is the unvarying practice of many preachers whose 
 names are well known. It is, however, the last 
 method a man of good taste and good judgment 
 would have recourse to. Such statements ought to 
 be made with precision of thought and in quiet lan- 
 guage; if therefore they are decked out with the 
 flowers of rhetoric, then wrong emphasis of particu- 
 lars, disproportion, and exaggeration must result. 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 181 
 
 In this case the speaker is not preaching or arguing, 
 but is merely delivering himself of so much decorated 
 rhodomontade. This is what cannot be done by a 
 Minister of the Word who respects his subject, his 
 hearers, or himself. 
 
 "What then is to be done? Each must decide for 
 himself, whether he will risk wearying his audience by 
 such statements, or whether he will compress them 
 into half-a-dozen lines, or drop them altogether, and 
 set before his hearers the point under discussion only 
 in the light of their own experience, or in some such 
 way as will bring them to take a personal interest in 
 it. 
 
 The other observation I have to make upon the 
 foregoing sermon is, that it calls our attention to the 
 very important question of how the Gospel is to be 
 preached with reference to those circumstances of the 
 present day which are the reverse of the circumstan- 
 ces of the times when it was first preached by Jesus 
 Christ and His Apostles. It is impossible to shut our 
 ears to the tone which the New Testament emits. 
 The gloomiest view is taken of human life. Nor was 
 it possible that it could have been otherwise. Con- 
 sider for how many centuries, with how short inter- 
 vals, the unhappy people to whom it was addressed 
 had been trodden under foot of the heathen^ Syrians, 
 Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans. 
 It is almost impossible for persons living in these 
 16 
 
182 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 times to form an adequate conception of the wretch- 
 edness, the mental and moral degradation that this 
 had made the normal condition of the people. Pro- 
 bably no people except the Jews could have possessed 
 sufficient vitality to have survived it. And it is very 
 possible that the schooling of these long grievous cen- 
 turies may have given to the race the power which it 
 has since shown of bearing up under oppression. We 
 may suppose, that for generation after generation 
 those who had not this power would have a tendency 
 to die out; and so this power might become a charac- 
 teristic of the race. We can understand what so 
 great and so long-continued suffering must have made 
 the traditions of the time when the Gospel was first 
 preached. And the facts of the times were in keep- 
 ing with the traditions: suffering, degradation, sad- 
 ness every where, and no prospect of any improve- 
 ment. There was no gleam of hope in any direction. 
 The iron had entered into their souls. Who could 
 ever hope to see the world-wide, the omnipresent, and 
 almighty despotism of Rome broken from off their 
 necks? They dreamt of a deliverer, but hardly be- 
 lieved in one. And when Jesus came (Himself a man 
 of sorrows and acquainted with grief), He could hold 
 out no hope of any relief from this dreadful lot. They 
 must go on suffering; and even worse things were in 
 store for them. In the world they must have tribu- 
 lation. This must continue, and the climax of 
 
WHAT WE ARE TO SEEK IN LIFE. 183 
 
 wretchedness would be reached in the indescribable 
 horrors that would attend the destruction of their 
 holy city. And then would begin the endless and 
 numberless miseries of the state in which they would 
 neither have a place nor nation. This will quite ex- 
 plain the sadness that pervaded the first preaching of 
 the Gospel, and which has been expressed by saying 
 that it is the religion of sorrow and of the sorrowful. 
 
 The conditions of life however amongst ourselves at 
 the present day are, in the respects I have been re- 
 ferring to, the very reverse of what they were in 
 those times amongst the Jewish people. Every Eng- 
 lishman has for many generations and centuries stood 
 with an unabashed face before the world and towards 
 his fellow-countrymen. Our material prosperity is 
 such as the world has never before witnessed. All 
 the causes of distress that pressed upon the Jew and 
 bore him down to the ground have been removed from 
 us. They are unknown amongst us, and in their stead 
 we have, in overflowing abundance, all that in these 
 respects the heart of man can desire. 
 
 The question then arises, is that Christianity which 
 was addressed to a suffering and unhappy world ap- 
 plicable, and if so how, to a world that is steeped in 
 prosperity and happiness? When patience, and re- 
 signation, and submission are preached to us, it almost 
 produces the feeling that we are in a position where 
 these graces are not needed in the sense in which they 
 
184 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 were needed bj those who heard the words of Christ 
 and His Apostles. Thankfulness, moderation, and a 
 right use of opportunities appear the more appropri- 
 ate topics for exhortation to us. And this, I think, 
 makes us feel the importance of the subject of the 
 foregoing sermon, that is, of the example of the 
 Apostle. If the people who occupy our streets of 
 palaces and our country houses are not called to suffer 
 as the Apostle and his countrymen were, they are 
 assuredly called by the very circumstances in which 
 God has placed them to work as the Apostle did. And 
 they can work under far more easy and encouraging 
 circumstances. There is a wide field every where 
 open before them. By working, I mean honestly en- 
 deavoring at the sacrifice of personal ease, and at pe- 
 cuniary cost, according to their opportunities and abil- 
 ities, to do good. And what happiness can be greater 
 than that the man is entitled to who knows that he 
 has made others wiser, or better, or happier than they 
 would have been without him ; and who feels, as he is 
 leaving the world, that it is in these respects his 
 debtor ? 
 
SERMON III. 
 
 THE RETURN OF THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 
 
 Luke xi. 24-26. 
 
 "Wlien the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh 
 through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I 
 will return unto my house whence I came out. And when he 
 Cometh, he findeth it swept and garnished. Then goeth he, and 
 taketh to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and 
 they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is 
 worse than the first." 
 
 Several of our Lord's parables, as for instance 
 those of the laborers hired at different hours, and of 
 the man who built a vineyard and let it out to hus- 
 bandmen, have very evidently two applications : one 
 to a particular passage in the history of the Jewish 
 nation ; the other to individuals in all ages. So it is 
 with the parable before us. Its primary application 
 is to the chosen people. At the preaching of the 
 Baptist and of Jesus they were much moved. They 
 showed some desire for a closer walk with God. But 
 
 IG* 185 
 
186 EXTEMPORARY PREACHIjS'G. 
 
 they eventually fell back into a worse state than they 
 had ever been before ; for they rejected and crucified 
 Jesus. 
 
 This makes clear what its meaning is when it is ad- 
 dressed to the cases of individuals. It presents to us 
 a series of pictures in the progress of the man who 
 dies in his sins. In the first we behold him as a man 
 possessed with an unclean spirit. This picture inti- 
 mates nothing of the earlier stages of his course. We 
 are told nothing of the steps which brought him to 
 this state. Neither are we told any thing of the form 
 and character of the wickedness with which he is 
 possessed. The forms of wickedness are infinitely 
 various. The particular feature of sin that is indi- 
 cated in the picture, and which is true of all kinds of 
 sin, is that it is working in the man like madness. 
 The madman is the victim of a will which is not the 
 offspring of reason, but is opposed to reason; and 
 which is not in conformity to, but opposed to self- 
 interest. And yet it so masters the man that he 
 makes no effort to resist it. If the voice of reason 
 could command, it would be against sin. .If the heart 
 that has had experience of the miseries of sin could 
 choose, it too would be against sin. But in the 
 habitual sinner both the reason and the heart are in 
 bondage. The unclean, the mad, the senseless spirit 
 has got possession of them and rules over them. It 
 urges the man on to his detriment, to his misery, to 
 
THE RETURN OF THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 187 
 
 his ruin. You cannot in any other way account for 
 his actions. He is possessed. He is not in his right 
 mind. 
 
 And now we pass to the next picture. There are 
 cases in which the cloud does not rest uninterruptedly 
 on the mind of the lunatic. It is drifted away for a 
 season : there is again an interval of light. Just so 
 is it with the sinner. Something occurs that for a 
 time shakes and appears to overthrow the power of 
 his tyrant sin. God in his inexhaustible mercy is ever 
 bringing this about in many wa3^s. He recalls to the 
 thoughts and feelings of the sinner the impressions 
 and lessons he received in early youth from a wise and 
 good father, or from an affectionate and religious 
 mother. Or He overtakes him with some deserved 
 chastisement : or He surprises him with some unde- 
 served mercy; or He brings it about that he should 
 witness some appalling occurrence. God is ever 
 working by some dispensation or other on the heart 
 and the mind of the sinner : and with apparent suc- 
 cess in the case before us. The unclean spirit has 
 gone out of the man. He endeavors to walk before 
 God in his right mind. Was he profligate or a 
 drunkard? He loathes his former profligate and 
 drunken companions. Was he a Sabbath-breaker ? 
 He now has delight in being on God's day in God's 
 house. Was he revengeful and malicious? He now 
 has a pleasure in seeking to be at peace with those 
 
188 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 whom he had formerly hated. Was he unfair and 
 dishonest ? He is now endeavoring to make restitu- 
 tion to those he had wronged. The misleading irra- 
 tional will has been overcome within him. The sight 
 is full of promise. 
 
 But as we look on the picture that follows, the hope 
 that had been formed within us is shaken. AVe behold 
 the unclean spirit that had gone out of the man, 
 which we had looked to see transformed into a right 
 spirit, and able to lead the man on to a good and 
 peaceful life, leading him "through dry places;" so 
 that though rest is sought, none is found. ^ This in- 
 cident is described with local propriety. In that hot 
 and dry climate there can be no coolness, no re- 
 freshing air unless water be present. These things 
 can onl}^ be found in the valley, by the streamlet's 
 side. There the turf is green, the flowers sweet and 
 
 ' It is obvious to remark that we do not express ourselves on 
 this subject in the fashion of the parable, which of course was 
 the fashion of expression used by those to whom the pax-able was 
 addressed. They regarded "the unclean spirit" as having a sep- 
 arate existence from that of the man. It comes and goes at its 
 own will. It returns eventually, because it is dissatisfied with the 
 separation; and the man becomes its helpless and unresisting 
 victim. With us *' the unclean spirit" is a condition of the man's 
 own spirit. He has powers within his reach sufficient for altering 
 this spirit. According therefore to our form of expression, it is 
 the man himself who expels the unclean spirit, and who, having 
 done so, wanders through dry places seeking rest and finding 
 none; and eventually relapses into his former state. 
 
THE RETURN OF THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 189 
 
 gay; the trees give sliade ; the air revives. But the 
 half-recovered lunatic wanders in dry places, and 
 therefore cannot but miss the cool refreshment, and 
 the rest he is in search of. He is still exposed to the 
 distressing glare, and the withering heat. 
 
 It often happens that the sinner who is beginning 
 to fight against sin places himself in similar circum- 
 stances. He is entering on the most difficult work 
 that can be undertaken by man in this world. The 
 stream of his life having for many years flow^cd on in 
 a wrong direction, he is now endeavoring to make it 
 flow in an opposite course. He has to change the 
 Ethiopian's skin, and the leopard's spots. The war 
 in his mind has commenced. The good of his nature 
 that had been subdued, has now risen up against the 
 evil that had subdued it. But the strong man within, 
 well equipped and armed, is holding his ground at 
 many points. If then the would-be soldier of Christ 
 is to come off victorious, he must be brave, and per- 
 severing, and wise. 
 
 Some there are w^ho think the grace of God is to do 
 every thing, and to do it in a moment. No such 
 thing. If God's almighty power -were all His nature 
 He might do so. But having other attributes He 
 does not do so. He looks on, and beholds the con- 
 flict. He approves, and is a fellow-worker with the 
 man. But the man must do much himself. And one 
 thing that he must do is that he must act wisely; and 
 
190 EXTEMPORARY rREACIIING. 
 
 lie will be doing very unwisely, for he will be bring- 
 ing (liscouragcnient on himself, if he seeks for rest 
 "in dry places." 
 
 Pcrliapa lie has no conception of any feeling 
 towards God excepting that of fear. lie never rises 
 to the idea that God is his Father in heaven, and that 
 he is God's child. He does not see that God is love, 
 and that what he is called to is himself to love. If a 
 man see this, though he may not have attained to it, 
 he will be encouraged by the knowledge of it. lie 
 will feel that this high state is open to him. But 
 those whose conceptions do not go beyond fear, are in 
 "a dry place," where they can find no rest for their 
 souls. 
 
 Or he may be devoting himself to worldly pursuits 
 or worldly enjoyments. I know that neither the pur- 
 suits nor the enjoyments of this world are absolutely 
 and in themselves wrong. What is wrong is to devote 
 one's self to them, to give them the best of our 
 thoughts and of our aifections; whereas there are 
 higher things, the things of the soul, and of God, 
 things whereby others may be benefited and ourselves 
 lifted into a higher region of thought and feeling, 
 which ought to be sought first. To invert the com- 
 parative value of the two, to put first what ought to 
 be second, is again to seek rest in "a dry place," 
 where it cannot be found. 
 
 But the driest of all dry places in which to seek 
 
THE RETURN OF THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 191 
 
 it, is the retention of some sin. An unclean spirit 
 is cast out in order to pacify the conscience, and to 
 obtain peace from God. But it is impossible that 
 these objects can be attained if a place in tlic heart 
 be still allowed to another unclean spirit. And yet 
 we see this being done every day. Violence of tem- 
 per, or an uncharitable way of thinking of others, or 
 arrogance, or covctousness, or envy, is retained while 
 something else is given up. IIoav unmerciful would 
 God be, if He allowed these persons to find rest unto 
 their souls ! 
 
 The picture again changes; but we were almost 
 prepared for what we now behold. lie — the parable 
 says the unclean spirit, but it will be more intelli- 
 gible for us to say the man — returns to his house 
 whence he had come out. This was not a sudden 
 thought, but the result of a deliberation consequent 
 on his finding no rest. lie looks in again at his old 
 haunts. lie there finds everything ready to receive 
 him, and very inviting — empty, swept, and garnished. 
 Something seems to say to him, "Enter again, and as 
 of old every thing you desire sliall be ministered to 
 you." He docs not resist. He enters. All the 
 progress he had made is lost. The relapse is com- 
 plete. Every one of us must in some matter or other 
 have exhibited in himself such a picture as this. Re- 
 member that two reasons are suggested — that he found 
 no rest in his new ways of life, and that ho allowed 
 
192 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 his thoughts to go back to his old ways. He set his 
 hand to the plough, but finding the work distasteful 
 he looked back again to his former state of idleness ; 
 and then he gave over work. He expected an impos- 
 sibility ; that the new way would be immediately easy 
 and pleasant. As well might you expect to learn any 
 art or trade by wishing for a knowledge of it ; or to 
 find an oak-tree the growth of anight. Perseverance 
 and prayer were the means by which the old man was 
 to be exorcised, and the new man formed within him. 
 
 But the history is not yet all told ; one more scene 
 is presented to us, and that is the final one. No 
 further struggle is made. The surrender is complete. 
 The returning unclean spirit goes and takes to him- 
 self seven others, more wicked than himself; and 
 they are all allowed to enter into the man's heart and 
 dwell there. His last state is worse than his first ; 
 and so he ends. An army that has been thoroughly 
 beaten and routed cannot renew the conflict. It has 
 been demoralized and weakened by the defeat, and 
 the enemy has become relatively much stronger. 
 
 The case resembles those of whom we are told 
 " that it is impossible for them who were once en- 
 lightened ; and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and 
 were made partakers of the Holy Ghost; and have 
 tasted the good word of God ; and the powers of the 
 world to come ; if they shall fall away, to renew them 
 again to repentance ; seeing they crucify the Son of 
 
THE RETURN OP THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 193 
 
 God afresh, and put Ilim to an open shame." And 
 again : " If wc sin wilfully after that we have received 
 the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more 
 sacrifice for sin, but a certain looking for of judgment, 
 and of fiery indignation." And so says St. Peter: 
 " For it had been better for them not to have known 
 the way of righteousness, than, after having known 
 it to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto 
 them. But it happened to them according to the true 
 proverb ; The dog is turned to his own vomit again, 
 and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the 
 mire." 
 
 What can be more appalling! But I cannot leave 
 the subject in this position. As a minister of the 
 Word of God I must say that that Word contains 
 statements that counteract the sense of dead hope- 
 lessness, and of blank despair which what has just 
 been said would leave on the mind. How much, for 
 instance, is there in the parable of the prodigal son to 
 tell us of the inexhaustible, the infinite mercy, nay, 
 love of God. And does not the idea pervade all 
 Scripture, that our Father in heaven is not willing 
 that any of His children should perish, but that all 
 should come to Him, and that all should be saved ? 
 And we are told that the time will come when the Son 
 shall have given up every thing to the Father; and 
 so this dispensation shall have come to an end. And 
 if it shall have come to an end, then we cannot believe 
 17 
 
194 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 that suffering and sin mil remain as a residuum of it ; 
 for we need not believe that they existed before it, 
 and independently of it. At all events, we are told 
 that "God will be all in all." And if He shall be all 
 in all, then there can be no more sin oT suffering; or 
 any thing to oppose itself to His will. 
 
 The distress of mind which arises at considering the 
 Scripture that has been before us, must have been in- 
 tended to arise. As this is its legitimate effect, it 
 must have been intended. But neither may we forget 
 the opposite conclusions which several particular 
 statements of God's Word were equally intended to 
 leave on the mind. And if any find a difficulty in 
 reconciling these opposite, though I think not contra- 
 dictory, truths, they must hold them both. When 
 they think of themselves, they may dwell on the first. 
 When they think of God they must dwell on the last. 
 We know little now. We shall be able to reconcile 
 them when we know all things even as we are now 
 known of God. 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon. 
 
 It is a difficult task to give in a sermon a continu- 
 ous comment on a narrative used as text; especially 
 when, as is generally the case with our Lord's parables, 
 it is impossible to add any thing either to the clearness 
 
THE RETURN OF THE UNCLEAN SPIRIT. 195 
 
 or forciblencss of the original. The reader must de- 
 cide whether to his mind any thing has been gained 
 in the case of the one before us by dividing the story 
 into what may be compared to the acts of a drama, 
 and endeavoring to connect each with the personal 
 experience of the hearers. 
 
 I endeavor in the latter part of the sermon to avoid 
 a mistake which many sermon-writers and commenta- 
 tors are apt to fall into ; the mistake of supposing that 
 their work is done when they have explained the 
 meaning of the text and founded some exhortation 
 upon it. It often happens that a very important part 
 of their work still remains to be done, that of showing 
 the relation in which the meaning of their text stands 
 to other parts of Scripture which have a bearing 
 upon it. 
 
SERMON IV. 
 
 THE CENTURIOX OF CESAREA. 
 
 Acts x. 1,2, 
 "There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a cen- 
 turion of the band called the Italian band, a devout man, and one 
 that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the 
 people, and prayed to God alway." 
 
 This is the cliaracter given of the man who was the 
 first to leave heathenism, and enter the Church of 
 Christ. Some of us, as we heard it read, may have 
 thought that it was the description of an ordinarily 
 good and religious man ; and of what might have been 
 expected to be the conduct of such a one. And I 
 shall endeavor to show why it is so ; and that there is 
 nothing accidental about any one of the particulars of 
 his character, or of his conduct. We shall understand 
 the man when v/e have made out the reasons that ex- 
 isted for what we are told of him, and seen the con- 
 nection of the several statements. 
 
 We have just heard,^ as the chapter from which our 
 
 » This sermon was preached on Dec. 10, 1865, on which day 
 Acts X. is read as the Second Lesson for the Morning Service. 
 
 196 
 
THE CENTURION OF C.ESAREA. 197 
 
 text is taken was read, that this first Gentile convert 
 was admitted to the Christian Church bj the Apostle 
 Peter; and we saw that he would have been so un- 
 willing to have done this that a miraculous interposi- 
 tion was needed to persuade him. And even after he 
 had been commanded bj a vision to undertake the 
 work, he speaks in an apologetic tone of what he had 
 come to do. Eight years had passed since his Lord 
 had sent him forth to establish His kingdom, but Peter 
 tells us he still rigidly observed the ceremonial law of 
 Moses — he had never eaten any thing which according 
 to that law was common or unclean. lie asserts that 
 it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep 
 company with, or to come unto one of another nation ; 
 and he enters into explanations to justify himself for 
 being engaged in receiving a Gentile into the Christian 
 Church. Compare this with the way in which his 
 fellow-Apostle Paul speaks of the same occurrence in 
 the Scripture you have just heard read as the Epistle 
 for the day.^ He is all eagerness to justify the ad- 
 mission of the Gentiles; and to show from the Scrip- 
 tures of the Old Dispensation that their admission had 
 been originally, and all along intended. How hesita- 
 tingly does St. Peter make up his mind to receive 
 Cornelius ; how gladly would St. Paul have welcomed 
 him ! Whence this difference ? Some perhaps may 
 
 2 Rom. XV. 4. The Epistlo for tlic Second Sunday in AdvenU - 
 17* 
 
198 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 be in the habit of suj^posing that in matters of this 
 kind there neither was, nor could have been any dif- 
 ference between two Apostles. But what is thus in 
 the Scriptures for this present service forced on our 
 attention will correct us in this mistake. "We may 
 feel a little surprise at the discovery, and even a 
 slinfht reluctance to acknowledsfe it; but as the sur- 
 prise and reluctance were the result of a mistake, the 
 discovery and acknowledgment of the mistake will be 
 of advantage to us. We shall then see, what will im- 
 part a far more life-like interest to what we read in 
 God's Word, that a man's having been called to become 
 an Apostle did not obliterate his natural character; 
 but that he became an Apostle, retaining the char- 
 acter he had previously possessed. See the character 
 respectively of St. Peter and of St. Paul as reflected 
 by their conduct in reference to the admission of the 
 Gentiles. St. Peter evidently was a man who was 
 capable of receiving new ideas, for he had received 
 the Gospel of Jesus Christ ; but he was at the same 
 time a man who was incapable of giving up old ideas, 
 for he could not abandon the ceremonial law in Avhicli 
 he had been brought up, although the purpose of that 
 law had now been served in brin2;in"j him to Christ. 
 St. Paul, on the other hand, was a man who felt so 
 strongly whatever he accepted, that he rejected what- 
 ever was opposed to it, however dearly he might pre- 
 viously have cherished it. When his faith was that of 
 
THE CENTURION OF C^SAREA. 199 
 
 a Jew he would have destroyed all belief in Christ. 
 No sooner was he converted to Christ than he gave 
 himself up wholly to preaching the faith he for- 
 merly had persecuted. The observances of the law 
 had no longer any attraction for him. There was no 
 reservation in his feelings. What he felt he felt with 
 all his heart. What he did he did with all his might. 
 He would straightway have the old typical and cere- 
 monial observances abolished utterly ; and the Gospel, 
 pure and simple, preached to every creature. To 
 suppose that all the instruments we find employed by 
 God in the establishment of the Gospel were brought 
 precisely to the same state of mind, renders it impos- 
 sible for us to understand much that is recorded in 
 the sacred page itself; and also deprives us of one 
 fertile source of interest in reading it — that which 
 arises from the contemplation of the varieties of human 
 character and feelings as they exhibit themselves in 
 the working out of the great purpose. 
 
 But what I have now to speak to you about is the 
 description given of Cornelius, and how that came to 
 be the character of the man who was selected as the 
 first-fruits to Christ of all the Gentile world. 
 
 We are told first of all that he was "a devout 
 man." The thought probably that is called up in the 
 minds of many as they hear this said is that of devoutr 
 ness as we see it around us, and feel it in ourselves, 
 that is to say, we think of a man being devout as a 
 
200 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 Christian. "VVe think of Christian devoutness. To 
 some it may even sound strange and novel to have 
 any other kind suggested to them. But devoutness, 
 or a sense of the existence of God, and of the relation 
 in which man stands towards Him, is one of the con- 
 stituent elements of the common mental or spiritual 
 nature of man. In some it is stronger, and more en- 
 lightened than in others — that is all the difference: 
 It exists in all men, to speak generally. In all times 
 it has existed. It has been found, and is still to be 
 found, among all races of men. It is an instinct of 
 the heart and of the reason of man. As the Apostle 
 reminds us, God revealed Himself to men's under- 
 standings by His works and His dispensations. Of 
 the heathen especially he says this. The fruitful 
 seasons God sent appealed to their feelings of grati- 
 tude and of dependence. And long before the Apos- 
 tle's time it had been noted that there was a voice in 
 the starry firmament which had gone out into all 
 lands, and had been heard by all people ; and which 
 they had understood as speaking to them of God. 
 Into whatever heathen land you may go, in every 
 city you will find costly temples raised to express the 
 devoutness of its inhabitants. So was it of old time. 
 And now well-nigh all that meets the eye of bygone 
 empires and states of civilization are the remains of 
 their magnificent temples. These arc standing wit- 
 nesses, and witnesses that cannot deceive, of the de- 
 
THE CENTURION OF C^SAREA. 201 
 
 Youtness of all races of men in all times and places. 
 We know the mind of Cornelius's countrymen, and we 
 know that devoutness was a very large element in the 
 constitution of their inner nature. 
 
 But we may go further than the contemplation 
 of the outward manifestations of this universal senti- 
 ment. True, it is not religion as we understand re- 
 ligion, but it is the foundation of religion, so much so 
 that religion could not exist w^ithout it any more than 
 a temple could be raised without a foundation, or a 
 tree grow and be kept alive without its roots. The 
 sense we have of God, and of the relation in which 
 we stand towards Him, is the foundation, the root of 
 religion. Take it away and there is nothing to work 
 upon, nothing to rest upon. Or we may look at it in 
 another way, as the seed, the germ out of which, 
 under the favoring and progressive circumstances God 
 ordains, religion, even that of the Gospel of Jesus 
 Christ, is in fulness of time developed ; for God or- 
 dains suitable circumstances for the growth of reli- 
 gion just as He does for the growth of a plant. 
 
 You will not then understand the nature of man, 
 or the history of religion, or the character of this 
 man, and both of the former throw light upon the 
 latter, unless you understand that devoutness is an at- 
 tribute of man, and belongs to the heathen as well as 
 to Christians. Now Cornelius had been devout as a 
 heathen : indeed it was this disposition, while ho was 
 
202 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 still in heathenism, that brought him to entertain the 
 consideration of a purer and higher form of religion 
 than that of his o'\Yn country in which he had been 
 brought up. You must separate in him the idea of 
 devoutness from the idea of the approximations he 
 made to the highest and purest religion. The former 
 existed before the latter in his mind, just as it had 
 done in the -world. It was the former that brought 
 him to the latter. And having done this great work 
 for him, it did not leave him, or die out of his mind. 
 On the contrary; it became purified and exalted, and 
 a still more vivifying and active principle. His faith 
 in Christ would without its continuance have been but 
 ineffective and dead ; while with it that faith lived, 
 and moved, and had being. But again I say the two 
 things are quite distinct. Devoutness is one of the 
 ingredients of man's nature that is common to all ; it 
 is not only a necessary Christian quality, but it is also 
 a good heathen quality. The first Gentile convert to 
 Christ while still in heathenism had been a devout 
 man. 
 
 And now we pass to another stage in the formation 
 of his religious character. "He gave much alms to 
 the people." This was not a heathen, assuredly not 
 a Roman practice. Heathenism, and especially Ro- 
 man heathenism, was intensely selfish. It was the 
 character of the Government and of the people. They 
 respected power and wealth ; they had no commisera- 
 
THE CENTURION OF C^SAREA. 203 
 
 tion for tlic suffering and the abject. Woe was with 
 them the lot of the fallen. Man need not trouble 
 himself to pity those whom God had forsaken. The 
 Roman never founded institutions for the relief of the 
 distressed in mind, body, or estate. With reference 
 to this particular compare the past with the present. 
 Perhaps in no city of the world of the same size as 
 modern Christian Rome, and in no other country in 
 the world with a population equal to that of modern 
 Christian Italy, are there so many who live by alms. 
 In this we have an abuse of one of the great principles 
 of Christianity^; but in heathen Rome it was most 
 markedly the very reverse of this. In that hard- 
 hearted city the beggar was little known in the time 
 of Cornelius. The word so seldom occurs in the lit- 
 erature of that age that the character itself must have 
 been very rare. This could not have been because 
 there were none in a state of destitution, no abjects 
 (they must have abounded in such a city), but because 
 it would have been useless for the abject and the des- 
 titute to have appealed to feelings that did not exist. 
 How then came this Roman captain to have acquired 
 the habit of giving much alms ? 
 
 There is no difficulty in answering the question, 
 It was from his acquaintance with that religion which 
 through Moses, David, and the prophets God had 
 given to the people among whom Cornelius had been 
 for some time residing. "He was a just man who 
 
204 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 feared God," that is now, the God of Israel, "and 
 was of good report among all the nation of the Jews." 
 It is the Master who tells us, and we find it laid down 
 in the law itself, that the highest regard we can prac- 
 tically feel for others, is just the very principle of the 
 law ; for it is in the Book of Leviticus that we first 
 meet with the great saying, which Jesus recalls in 
 His conversation with the lawyer, ''that thou should' 
 est love thy neighbor as thyself." Cornelius was now 
 well acquainted with this law and its principles. He 
 had received it as a revelation of God, and from God. 
 He had formed his religion from it. The Jewish law, 
 in a way in which no heathen law over had done, 
 charged itself with the care of the orphan and the 
 widow, of those who had none to help them, of the 
 poor, the maimed, the destitute, and the stranger. 
 We see this every where in the Law, the Psalms, and 
 the Prophets. Cornelius's idea therefore of the duty 
 of man towards his fellow-man, regarded as a matter 
 of religion, was, in conformity with this teaching, to 
 love his fellow-man, and gladly to do for those who 
 needed his assistance, all that love can suggest. This 
 is the principle which fulfils the Law. 
 
 That this was the principle of the Jewish Law well- 
 nigh alone proves its divine origin. You must recol- 
 lect that that Law was promulgated in a rude and vio- 
 lent age, and intended for a rude and unmanageable 
 people, insomuch that many of its enactments were 
 
THE CENTURION OF C.ESAREA. 205 
 
 adapted to such a state of things. IIow marvellous 
 then that this principle of love, so widely at variance 
 with the tone and \yith the circumstances of the times, 
 and so immeasurably in advance of the legislation and 
 of the feeling of the most polished nations of the 
 heathen world, should have been made its governing 
 idea. And now this principle coming to Cornelius 
 through the channel of the Jewish Law, commended 
 itself to him as the rule of his feelings towards, and 
 of his dealings with, his fellow-men. The very word 
 I last used contained an idea absolutely new to him. 
 He had not been brought up to regard men, consid- 
 ered as men, in the light of his fellows. He, a 
 Roman, had not thought the inhabitants of subject 
 nations, or that part of the population that was in 
 slavery, or the poor of his own country, as in any 
 sense his fellows, as having claims upon him, and as 
 entitled to be treated by him with consideration and 
 respect. But now the hard selfish arrogance of the 
 Roman was abandoned, and his feelings and practice 
 had risen to the level of the Jewish Law. To be mer- 
 ciful, to be compassionate, to give, he felt to be his 
 duty to man as required by God. "He gave much 
 alms to the poor. 
 
 His devoutness, then, and his alms-giving mark two 
 
 stages in his religious progress : his devoutness the 
 
 stage when he was religious as a good heathen might 
 
 be; his alms-giving when he had superadded to the de- 
 
 18" 
 
206 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 voutness of a good heathen the religious sense of 
 duty to others which the Jewish Law prescribed. 
 
 To each of these stages is appended a single illus- 
 tration which we must notice as we pass along in the 
 consideration of this good man's character. He was 
 a devout man, "who feared God with all his house;" 
 and the subsequent parts of the history show more 
 than this, for we have indications of others beside those 
 of his own house having been influenced by his devout- 
 ness. "The devout soldier," who we know was 
 among those who waited on him continually, and 
 whom he sent with his two servants to Joppa to sum- 
 mon Peter, may have been intended to be included 
 among "those of his house." But to meet Peter he 
 invites his kinsfolk and acquaintance, who he knows 
 are in the same state of mind, and who, we cannot 
 but think, must have been brought into it by his in- 
 fluence. Real devoutness, since we all of us have al- 
 ready some amount of it in our nature, is very infec- 
 tious. Not only does it pass from one mind to other 
 minds, because those other minds are predisposed by 
 what they have of their own to admit it, but it con- 
 sciously makes the effort thus to spread and propagate 
 itself. And this is an indication of true devoutness, 
 that this effort is made, and that it is made success- 
 fully. A devout man will generally have, as Corne- 
 lius had; a devout household, and devout kinsfolk and 
 acquaintance. 
 
THE CENTURION OF CiESAREA. 207 
 
 The illustration -which is appended to the descrip- 
 tion of the second stage of his religious progress, is 
 that he prayed to God ahvays. This is inseparably 
 connected with his giving much alms. For, remark, 
 it is not merely that he prayed — he had done that in 
 his state of devout heathenism — but that he prayed to 
 God ; the one true God, by whom he had been taught 
 to love his neighbor as himself. His desire was to 
 commune with that Being from whom he had learnt 
 this most blessed principle, and so to drink more 
 largely of His Spirit. Each implies the other. If 
 he gave much alms, he would pray to God always; 
 and if he prayed to God always, he would give much 
 alms. 
 
 But to proceed to the third and last stage of his 
 character. This devout man who had brought others 
 to fear God, — this man who gave much alms and 
 prayed to God always, — had still one step to take. 
 But it may be said what more could he have needed? 
 Is there not enough of religion in what has been 
 already said of him ? Is he not already all that a re- 
 ligious man can desire to be? Does any reasonable 
 want still remain unsatisfied ? Yes : the greatest need, 
 the most pressing want of all that religion is con- 
 cerned with, has still to be supplied. What he wants 
 is precisely that which all religions, more or less dimly, 
 or more or less distinctly, aim at. He wants that 
 which all the altars, all the temples, and all the ser- 
 
208 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 vices throughout the world were designed as instru- 
 ments for attaining, but which none, not even the sa- 
 crifices and services of the Jewish Temple, could com- 
 pletely supply. He wants something that will meet 
 and remove the sense of sin, of unworthiness before 
 God, of alienation from Him, even of contradiction to 
 Him. He wants a sense of pardon, of acceptance, of 
 reconciliation. This can be obtained only through 
 what Peter has to communicate to him ; the Gospel of 
 our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, "through whom 
 alone we obtain remission of our sins;" Christ, the 
 Saviour, was what Peter preached to him. We have 
 the narrative of Avhat passed on the occasion; we 
 know what Peter said. He spoke of Christ, and of 
 Christ only, as the Great Deliverer that had been ex 
 pected. And we know in what way Cornelius received 
 what Peter said of Christ. 
 
 Here then was a third and distinct state in the 
 religious progress of this first Gentile convert. There 
 was now superadded to the two conditions of mind he 
 had previously arrived at, that at which they had 
 aimed, and that for v/hich in the religious progress of 
 the human race they had been the preparation — a 
 sense of forgiveness and acceptance, accompanied 
 with, nay almost arising out of, a clear perception of 
 the goodness and loving-kindness of our Father in 
 heaven; a far clearer perception than was possible 
 under the old dispensation, where God was revealed 
 
THE CENTURION OF C^ESAKEA. 209 
 
 chiefly as the Lawgiv^er and Judge of a rude and stub- 
 born people. And consequently there was now made 
 a fuller and more direct appeal than was formerly pos- 
 sible to the good and loving qualities God has im- 
 planted in the heart ; and the faith that works by 
 love, not obedience extorted from fear, became the 
 principle of the spiritual life. This was the wisdom 
 that came down from above. It brought into the fore- 
 ground a gentler and more heavenly view of duty, 
 one element of which was that sense of universal 
 brotherhood in which we see even the Apostle Peter 
 had been so deficient. This was what Cornelius, and 
 after him the civilized world, gained by rising to a 
 belief in Christ the Light and the Saviour of the 
 world, for He cannot be our Saviour any more than 
 He can be our Light, without our knowing and feeling 
 it, and being assured of it. 
 
 And what I have been endeavoring to set before 
 you is, my good friends, not merely an interesting 
 picture of a bygone state of things. What passed so 
 many hundred years ago in the mind and heart of 
 this Centurion of the Italian band, is a picture of 
 what passes just as distinctly in our own minds and 
 hearts. Every one of us who is in the habit of 
 coming here to God's House is more or less devout. 
 That it is that impels us to come. Some of us give 
 large alms to the poor. Some also have arrived at 
 that full assurance of faith, which gives them "hope, 
 18^ 
 
210 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 and peace, and joy in believing." But some stop at 
 the first state. It seems to them like religion. 
 They fear and respect God. But, my friends, you 
 who have gone no further than this state are not yet 
 Christians. You have advanced no further than the 
 good heathen had. This you may think a hard 
 saying. But look at the history of Cornelius's re- 
 ligion, and you will understand what is meant. If you 
 are pained at the statement, it will not have been said 
 unprofitably. There are others again, and these are 
 a very numerous class, who go no further than the 
 second stage. Here they feel sure is practical re- 
 ligion. Here is palpable proof of their having sub- 
 mitted themselves to the teaching of God. They are 
 keeping the Law of Love even as expounded and en- 
 larged by Jesus Christ. They are doing good. They 
 are diminishing the misery that is around them. They 
 visit the fatherless and the widow in their distress. 
 They feed the hungry ; they clothe the naked. This 
 is practical religion. But, my friends, this is only the 
 stage which Cornelius had reached when his knowledge 
 did not go beyond an acquaintance with the Law of 
 the first Dispensation. If this be enough, then was it 
 superfluous that Jesus Christ should have come, and 
 taught, and suffered. You must go up higher. There 
 is a third, the last and crowning stage. You must go 
 to Christ. You must learn of Him. You must cast 
 your burden upon Him. So shall you find rest unto 
 
THE CENTURION OF CiESAREA. 211 
 
 your soul. That will be a state in which your love 
 for Ilim who so loved you as to give Himself for you, 
 will have cast out fear. You will be conscious of 
 God's love for you ; and you will no longer be con- 
 scious of the existence of any bar to your loving 
 Ilim. This I trust is the state of some among us. 
 We cannot say who are Christ's in this sense. Nor 
 can we say who among us are resting on the heathen, 
 and who on the Judaical form of religiousness. Each 
 must try and examine himself as in the sight of God 
 who knows the heart. 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon, 
 
 I wrote the foregoing sermon for this work on the 
 Monday after I preached it. I had previously to 
 preaching it made only a mental study of what I was 
 to say. I have put it on paper for the purpose of 
 showing, if possible, how analysis, and its opposite, 
 comprehensiveness of view, and how, too, historical 
 matter, may be used in order to give interest and 
 distinctiveness to a familiar subject ; and this to such 
 a degree as to enable the preacher to bring home his 
 discourse in an intelligible and forcible manner to the 
 understandings and consciences of the congregation. 
 By analysis; I here mean the distinction drawn be- 
 
212 EXTExMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 tween the three states of the religious heathen, the 
 religious Jew, and the Christian ; by comprehensiveness 
 of view, the reference made to the manner in which 
 the religious sentiment shows itself in all ages and 
 nations ; by historical matter, the reference made to 
 the Jewish law and to Roman history. 
 
 I have also another motive for giving it just as I 
 preached it. I had intended to say something about 
 the proof my subject gives us, fortified by that of the 
 other Centurion, whose faith was greater than that 
 which Jesus had found in any in Israel, that even the 
 profession of a Roman soldier in the tributary province 
 of Judea, those whom John advised to be content with 
 their pay, and not to accuse any falsely, might be 
 sanctified by religion unto a discipline for the practice 
 of duty both to God and man. This was what I had 
 intended. But being struck by the indications which 
 the Scriptures read in the Service supplied of the 
 difi'erence in feeling between the Apostles Peter and 
 Paul on the very subject I was about to speak upon, 
 the admission of the Gentiles to the Church, I thought 
 it better not to lose the opportunity presented for 
 pointing out this difterence. It was the 10th of De- 
 cember, and the second Sunday in Advent ; and the 
 difi'erence in feeling between St. Peter in the second 
 lesson, the 10th of the Acts of the Apostles, and St. 
 Paul in the Epistle, from the 15th of his Epistle to 
 the Romans, was most obvious. I thought it better 
 
THE CENTURION OF CJESAREA. 215 
 
 to drop something I had intended to say, and instead 
 to call the attention to this point, not merely because 
 it was closely connected with the fact I was about to 
 speak upon, but because at the same time it presented 
 an excellent opportunity for saying a few words on a 
 subject which throws some light upon the nature of 
 Inspiration; and which besides gives a more life-like 
 interest to what we read in God's Word. 
 
 Now it is plain that I could have made no use of 
 this opportunity, which 'rt'as of much value both exc- 
 getically, and because it connected the sermon very 
 closely with the foregoing parts of the Service, if I had 
 been a reader of written sermons. 
 
 But as my object is to give my younger brethren 
 hints for the proper composition of sermons, I will 
 further remark that my having done this injured the 
 proper effect of the sermon, because it introduced 
 what was in reality irrelevant matter ; that is, matter 
 which was only connected with my subject, and not 
 necessary for its elucidation ; and so far it was de- 
 structive of that oneness of purpose which ought to 
 pervade all that is said in a sermon. The advantage 
 however of saying it outweighed this disadvantage, 
 and so I introduced it. And remark that it was out 
 of place not only because it was unnecessary for the 
 elucidation of the subject, but also because, b^ing in 
 itself a point of much interest, it impressed itself too 
 
214 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 much on the mind at the expense of the real subject 
 of the discourse. 
 
 With respect to the references to history which 
 this sermon contains, I would observe that nothing of 
 that kind is of any value in what is addressed to un- 
 educated persons. As they cannot understand such 
 matters, they are only confused and wearied by the 
 mention of them. 
 
 In writing this sermon the day after I had preached 
 it, I was struck with the difficulty, I almost found it 
 the impossibility, of maintaining that continuity of 
 thought which comes spontaneously in speaking. 
 The length of time required to write a sentence, and 
 the attention requisite for the work of the pen, are 
 constantly breaking the direct stream of thought, and 
 diverting it into side channels. This is worthy of 
 being noticed as a disadvantage of writing in com- 
 parison with speaking. One's style dlso in speaking 
 is more homogeneous. 
 
 In the foregoing sermon it was necessary to point 
 out that the germ of the religious character of the 
 Centurion was his devoutness; but the word is re- 
 peated too often, and too much is made of the fact. 
 I leave this uncorrected, that it may illustrate a 
 fault. 
 
SERMON Y. 
 
 THE CEXTUmON OF CAPERXAUM. 
 
 Matthew viii. 10. 13. 
 
 •'When Jesus heard it, He marvelled, and said to them that 
 followed, Verily, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel. 
 And Jesus said unto the Centurion, Go thy way; and as thou hast 
 believed, so be it done unto thee." 
 
 There are four Centurions of whom in the Gospels 
 and Acts of the Apostles very honorable mention is 
 made. First comes this Centurion of Capernaum, 
 ■whose faith was greater than that of any in Israel. 
 He is followed by the Centurion who, being a spec- 
 tator of the Crucifixion, declared his belief that He 
 who had just expired on the Cross was truly the Son 
 of God; a conviction which certainly at that moment 
 does not appear to have existed in the mind of any 
 one of the disciples. The next was the Centurion 
 who was the first of all the Gentile world to be ad- 
 mitted to the Church of Christ. Again, it was a 
 Centurioii who saved the Apostle Paul from being 
 thrown out the ship into the sea in the storm off Mel- 
 
 215 
 
21G EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 ita; an act, the eflfect of Avliicli will for ever be felt in 
 the Church to the extent in -vvhicli it contributed to 
 strengthen the Pauline element in the setting forth of 
 the Gospel. 
 
 What is told us of these Centurions reminds us, by 
 the way, how illiberal and unjust it is to condemn a 
 man on account of the profession to which he belongs. 
 There are men, in these days even, who speak dispar- 
 agingly of those who belong to the profession of, 
 arms. With how much more reason might this have 
 been done of the officers of the Roman army, which 
 was very notorious, particularly in subject countries 
 such as Juda\a then was, for rapacity, arrogance, and 
 cruelty ; and yet here arc four officers of that army 
 conspicuous for piety, for openness to conviction, and 
 for a proper sense of duty and humanity, at a time 
 when well-nigh every one around them was over- 
 powered by superstitious terrors, or had abandoned 
 himself to disbelief of all relis2;ion. The same re- 
 mark must be made of class prejudices. The rich 
 think disparagingly of, and distrust the poor; and just 
 in the same way do the poor regard the rich. This is 
 narrow-minded and sinful. The religiously wise, and 
 the w^orldly wise too, will estimate a man not by con- 
 sidering the demerits of others, but by endeavoring to 
 ascertain what is the character, but more particularly 
 what arc the merits of the man himself. It is a mis- 
 take to suppose that it shows like wide experience to 
 
Tlir: CENTURION OF CAPERNAUM. 217 
 
 condemn whole professions and classes. Wide expe- 
 rience that has been profited by teaches that there arc 
 no two persons alike; and that even in those whoso 
 faults are very [)rominent there is still good to be 
 found by all who have the eyes to see it. 
 
 But to come to our Centurion. lie had been 
 brought up in all the abominations and wickednesses 
 of heathenism; but he has now built a synagogue for 
 the promotion of the knowledge of the true God. 
 From Avhat darkness had he passed into what marvel- 
 lous light! We can hardly imagine the conflicts that 
 must have taken place in his thoughts and feelings, 
 while he was breaking away from the immemorial re- 
 ligion of his country, under which it had grown from 
 a small city into the mistress of the world; and while 
 he was being brought to know God through the sacred 
 books of one of the most despised and hated of all 
 the subject nations of the empire. But just as the 
 wise man will recognize moral worth whatever be tho 
 calling or class of its possessor, so also will he be dis- 
 posed to recognize truth whatever may be the means 
 through which it may be presented to him ; and he 
 will hold his mind in readiness to abandon falsehood, 
 however strongly it may be able to commend itself to 
 his feelings, his interests, or his habits of thought. 
 The struggle may involve the very tearing out of his 
 hcart-stringSj but in proportion to the nobility of his 
 
 19 
 
218 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 nature will be the singleness of his desire that the 
 truth only should triumph within him. 
 
 But the struggle was now over; and we have to 
 see in what it had issued. First look at his liberality. 
 To those among whom he was then residing he had 
 given a synagogue. This, recent investigations show, 
 was a costly act. There are several motives which 
 may prompt us to give; I need only notice two 
 here. A man may regard giving as a substitute for 
 religion ; or genuine religion may impel him to give. 
 It is often said depreciatingly. Giving is not religion. 
 The reply is, No ; but there can be no religion without 
 it. The religion of Christ would have men ready to 
 give, wherever an occasion presents itself, their 
 money, their time, their thought, even their own 
 selves. Take the mere giving of money; he that is 
 of the spirit of Christ will always find happiness in 
 giving, because the promotion of a good object will be 
 dearer to him than his money. How many are there 
 in these days amongst ourselves who have exactly fol- 
 lowed in the steps of this good man's liberality. They 
 have assisted in restoring or building some house of 
 God, or have carried through the wdiole work at their 
 own sole cost. The thing done gave them greater 
 pleasure than the retention of what it cost would have 
 given them. 
 
 And now notice this Centurion's piety. It showed 
 itself in every way in which it could have been possi- 
 
THE CENTURION OF CAPERNAUM. 219 
 
 blc for lilm to make it operative on the minds and 
 hearts of others ; that is, in his life and conversation, 
 in all that he said and did. But here I confine my 
 observations to the one particular just mentioned: he 
 had built a synagogue for the Jews of Capernaum. 
 Piety, if genuine, must endeavor to propagate itself 
 as diffusively as possible. How this was to be done 
 by himself must have been the question which above 
 all others occupied his mind. Of course it is to be 
 propagated most widely through the instrumentality 
 of letters. The man for instance who writes a book 
 such as that of Thomas u Kempis, On the Imitation 
 of Christ; or that of Jeremy Taylor on Holy Living 
 and Dying, kindles and feeds the flame of piety in a 
 manner which can be effected by no other means. 
 He works without being subject to the restrictions of 
 time or place. This is the mighty prerogative of the 
 highest form of intellectual work. It is unapproach- 
 able by any other means. It was not given to this 
 Roman Centurion, it is not given to one of a million, 
 perhaps not to one in a whole generation of the hu- 
 man race to work in this way. But he did what was 
 in his power, and what, though at a long interval, 
 came next in effectiveness ; he built a house of God, 
 a place where the Word of God might week after 
 week, year after year, and generation after generation 
 be set forth by reading, by exposition, by exhortation. 
 He could establish a. centre where religious thought 
 
220 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 and feeling might be cultivated for that neighborhood 
 ■while he was there, and after he was gone: and that 
 was what he did, and what he meant to do when he 
 built the people of Capernaum a synagogue. 
 
 Observe next the kindliness and considerateness of 
 his character. It was this that brought him before 
 Jesus, and gave him a place in the records of the Gospel 
 history. lie is very solicitous for the recovery or 
 the relief of a poor grievously palsied slave. In what 
 strong contrast does this stand with the feelings that 
 were usual among his countrymen on such subjects ! 
 About their aged or worn-out slaves they were notori- 
 ously careless and hard-hearted. They called them 
 and treated them as cattle. But this man begs 
 the chief people of the city to go to Jesus and 
 beseech Him to restore to health the poor creature. 
 His feelings are an anticipation of Christian charity. 
 
 Another particular which the history brings out is 
 his humility. He deems himself unworthy either of 
 going to Jesus, or of having Jesus come to him. 
 Here again we shall fall short of a proper view of the 
 character and merits of the man if we content our- 
 selves with the thought that he possessed those feel- 
 ings which we understand by the word humility. As 
 in the former particular, we must contrast what he 
 had become with the ideas in which he had been 
 brought up. His arrogant countrymen had no con- 
 ception of this grace. They had no word in their 
 
THE CENTURION OF CAPERNAUM. 221 
 
 language for it, regarded as an adornment and excel- 
 lence of character. With them it was a vice of the 
 mind and heart ; something mean and contemptible. 
 The fact is, that it can only exist in those who have 
 some knowledge of God, and of themselves, and of 
 what God requires of them. What now so much be- 
 comes him is just what he would formerly have 
 shrunk from as un-Roman and despicable. 
 
 And consider too how what in him, because he had 
 been brought up in heathenism, and was a Roman 
 soldier, had been positive vices were now changed into 
 negative excellences. I pass by the probability that 
 he had been a man who would have borne malice, and 
 would have deceived, but that it was impossible now 
 that he could do either. There are other points on 
 which we may speak with more certainty. V/hat we 
 call debauchery and profligacy were of the very rou- 
 tine of heathen life. We know how frequently the 
 Apostle Paul refers to this source of the corruption 
 of heathenism. But the life of this good man could 
 not any longer have been tainted with this kind of 
 impurity. Again, we recollect what the Baptist's 
 advice was to the soldiers who came to ask him what 
 they should do. " They were not to accuse any 
 falsely, and they were to be content with their wages." 
 This implies how much they had it in their power to 
 oppress the subject population, and how frequently 
 
 19* 
 
222 EXTEMPOEAEY PREACHING. 
 
 they availed themselves of their opportunities of this 
 kind. But this man did not extort and oppress. 
 
 Great then were his negative merits as well as his 
 positive virtues. We naturally ask if it is possible to 
 trace them up to any adequate cause ? Yes, the cause 
 was what Christ particularizes and speaks so highly 
 of: He had not found so great faith ; no, not in Israel. 
 It is so among ourselves. A man's character, — and 
 if his character, then of course his conduct, — is the 
 result of what he believes. It is not only, as it was 
 in his case, and as it will be in the case of every one 
 of us, ^'as thou hast believed, so be it done unto 
 thee," but also, as thou hast believed, so wilt thou 
 do. 
 
 This faith is needed by all, even the most learned; 
 and is possible to all, even the most unlearned. 
 Those most learned need it because it does not con- 
 sist in learning, but in a sense of our relation to (rod. 
 And because it does not consist in learning, but in 
 what God has placed within the reach of every one 
 He has made accountable for his conduct, it is attain- 
 able by the unlearned. 
 
 Christ's comparison of the faith of the Centurion 
 with that of the chosen and highly-favored people, 
 and the way in which He marked his approval by 
 granting what the man asked for, convey to us the 
 lesson that is it not our gifts and opportunities that 
 will ultimately be of advantage to us; our having 
 
THE CENTURION OF CAPERNAUM. 223 
 
 possessed tliem may even increase our condemnation ; 
 ■what will benefit and save us is the use we shall have 
 made of them. On this subject two questions must 
 be asked. First, What is the talent the Lord of all 
 has entrusted to me? and then, Am I using it so as 
 to promote His glory, to benefit others, and to im- 
 prove myself? 
 
 I have one more thought to set before you. Com- 
 pare this Centurion in his life, and in the end of his 
 life, with the other Centurions at that time in the 
 Roman army. We can imagine what they were. 
 The great majority, of course, were as the great 
 majority always have been. They gave themselves 
 little trouble about themselves. As they had been 
 brought up, so they lived, and so they died. Some, 
 however, made use of their opportunities to enrich 
 themselves dishonestly and cruelly, at the cost of the 
 provincials. Some by attention to their professional 
 duties rose to high military appointments. Some may 
 have returned to Rome, and by endeavoring to serve 
 the state at home became great in civil capacities. 
 This man loved those among whom he resided, and 
 was loved by them in return. He was liberal. He 
 was intelligently religious. He was considerate and 
 kind to his poor slave. He thought humbly of him- 
 self. He had faith in God. He believed in Jesus 
 Christ. I do not say that the lines which were 
 adopted by his brother- Centurions were without any 
 
224 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 reward in this world ; but I affirm that the happiness 
 conferred on him by the line he adopted was well 
 worth having. There is One who has told us that it 
 will be rewarded in this world an hundredfold, and 
 will lead to life everlasting in the world to come. 
 Each must consider, and choose for himself, what 
 he thinks best. May God help us in making our 
 choice. 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon, 
 
 I began this sermon with the mention of the four 
 Centurions, because what we have to say of them is 
 of so much interest that it must at once engage the 
 attention of the hearers. 
 
 This mention of them gives an opportunity, which 
 is made use of in the second paragraph, for awaken- 
 ing in the minds of the congregation a sense of the 
 injustice of the common fault of condemning whole 
 classes and professions, a fault that is as unchristian 
 as it is common. This practice pretends to be the 
 result of experience, whereas experience of mankind, 
 in those who are able to understand its lessons, is just 
 what will most effectually save us from it. In the 
 Sacred History we have good Pharisees and good 
 Publicans, as well as good Roman soldiers. Jesus 
 came from Nazareth. A good opportunity for making 
 
THE CENTURION OF CAPERNAUM. 225 
 
 people feel the foolishness and ■wickedness of this 
 practice ought not to be lost, although it is not a mat- 
 ter that belongs to a sermon on the character of this 
 Centurion. But it springs naturally from the joint 
 mention of the four Centurions, which was the point 
 from which I started. 
 
 The graces which are manifested in this T^enturion's 
 character ought not merely to be catalogued. To 
 bring them out distinctively, and to unite them into a 
 portrait of the man, must be the aim of the sermon 
 of which he is the subject. Each should be so pre- 
 sented as not only to make its nature apparent, but 
 also to awaken interest, and to engender in the hearer 
 the feeling that it is worth having and seeking. The 
 more connectedly they are all presented, the more 
 distinctness and life will it give to the Centurion's 
 character. 
 
 The comparison of the works of Thomas k Kempis 
 and Jeremy Tayloi* with the building of a synagogue 
 would revive flagging attention ; and would induce 
 the congregation to make an estimate, and, too, a 
 deservedly high one, of the Centurion's gift to the 
 people of Capernaum, as a means for promoting piety. 
 Without some stimulus or assistance of this kind the 
 minds of the hearers would not be disposed to make 
 any estimate of its value at all. 
 
 What the Centurion had escaped in abandoning 
 heathenism, and what he had gained in coming to 
 
226 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 God through the Law and through Christ, must he in- 
 dicated, for without this we can form no real con- 
 ception of the man ; but it must not be dwelt on at 
 any length, because the character of the man, and not 
 the difference between heathenism and the knowledge 
 of God, is the subject of the sermon. 
 
 The exht)rtation is contained indirectly in the last 
 paragraph. This is a case where an indirect way of 
 submitting a consideration is more forcible than the 
 direct way would have been. The direct way of 
 putting the exhortation would have been to say : " You 
 see what this man was. You see what he gained. 
 Become like him. Secure what he secured." This 
 would have been very common-place and feeble. But 
 by giving a comparative view of the aims and princi- 
 ples, of the modes of life and probable success in life 
 of this man and his brother-Centurions, the hearers 
 are enabled to see distinctly what is the object of the 
 sermon, without being directly told; and they will 
 feel that their approval of the man's character, and 
 their desire that their last end should be like his, are 
 results of their own judgment. 
 
SERMON VI. 
 
 THE SENSE OF SIN AND THE SENSE OF DUTY LEAD 
 TO FAITH. 
 
 Luke iii. 10-14. 
 
 "And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then? 
 He answereth and saith unto them, He that hath two coats, let 
 him impart to him that hath none ; and he that hath meat let him 
 do likewise. Then came also publicans to be baptized, and said 
 unto him. Master, what shall we do ? And he said unto them, 
 Exact no more than that which is appointed you. And the sol- 
 diers likewise demanded of him, saying, And what shall we do ? 
 And he said unto them. Do violence to no man, neither accuse any 
 falsely ; and be content with your wages," 
 
 The endeavor to do our duty stands in two rela- 
 tions towards faith. In that which is most frequently 
 insisted on it springs from faith and is its conse- 
 quence. In the other the position of the two is just 
 reversed, and the endeavor to do our duty appears as 
 the cause of faith. This is the relation between them 
 supposed in the Scripture of which my text forms a 
 part, and which I now propose to bring before you. 
 
 227 
 
228 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 In order that this may be seen, we must recall the 
 circumstances under which the questions contained in 
 our text were asked and answered. Jesus had not 
 yet entered on His ministry. John, His appointed 
 forerunner, was preparing the minds of the people for 
 believing on Him. The burden of his preaching was, 
 "Prepare ye the way of the Lord." Mark then how 
 he endeavors to prepare them for believing on Christ, 
 when Christ should Himself come forward and pro- 
 claim His divine mission. He does it by awakening 
 within them the sense of sin and the sense of duty. 
 His preaching is described in one word when we are 
 told that he called upon them "to repent." Cease to 
 do evil, learn to do well ; otherwise you will be incapa- 
 ble of believing on the Great and Holy One who is 
 shortly about to appear before you. 
 
 What followed is interesting as well as instructive. 
 It was what is contained in our text. His appeals to 
 the sense of duty and the sense of sin had come home 
 to the conscience of his hearers. It was not the 
 camel's-hair garments and the leathern girdle he wore, 
 nor the locusts and wild honey he ate, nor his dwell- 
 ing in the wilderness that moved them. These things 
 were in the eyes of John's hearers just what the 
 clerical dress is amongst ourselves. They merely in- 
 dicated that he had undertaken the office of a teacher 
 of religion. Eastern ideas have always required in 
 such persons some such austerities. What moved 
 
THE SENSE OP SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 229 
 
 them was not what met the eye, but what had through 
 their ears passed to their hearts and consciences. 
 God has made every man more or less capable of being 
 wrought up to a desire for what is pure land holy, and 
 to a dislike of what is sinful. And John having ex- 
 cited these feelings among his audience, just in the 
 manner in which they might be excited amongst our- 
 selves, they severally inquire of him, '^ What they shall 
 do." His object in exciting these feelings, and in 
 the replies he made to their questions, was to bring 
 them to Christ. This we must bear in mind while we 
 review the scene. 
 
 First the general multitude ask him, " What shall 
 we do?" Mark, he could not say as Paul said to the 
 jailer at Philippi, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 and thou shalt be saved;" for the Lord Jesus Christ 
 had not yet manifested Himself to the world. John 
 was at that very moment preparing them for receiving 
 Him. With this then in view, what is the advice he 
 gives them? He singles out the one commandment 
 which is of universal application, and tells them to be 
 considerate and helpful to one another. And to make 
 his meaning as palpable as possible, and to prevent its 
 being lost in vague generalities, he puts his reply in 
 the form of two instances : "Let him," he says, "who 
 has two coats, impart to him who has none ; and let 
 him who has meat, do likewise." To the mixed mul- 
 titude then he recommends, as a preparation for belief 
 20 
 
230 EXTEMPOKAEY PHEACIIING. 
 
 in Christ, the most general of all duties. And as this 
 duty does not rest merely on the fact that it is en- 
 joined by religion, but is enjoined by religion because 
 a foundation for it had all along been laid in the higher 
 and better sentiments of our nature, his recommenda- 
 tion would find an echo in the hearts of all those his 
 preaching had already awakened in some degree to a 
 sense of sin and a sense of duty. If he could induce 
 them to act on these feelings by putting in practice 
 his recommendation, he knew that he would thus be 
 leading them to Christ. 
 
 And when the farmers of the taxes saw that he 
 was ready to give advice to those who sought it they 
 also asked him, "And what shall we do?" Again 
 see, bearing in mind what he was aiming at, how he 
 endeavors to attain his aim. How apposite, too, and 
 how full of good sense, is his advice. There is nothing 
 vague, sentimental, or fanatical about it. Now he 
 has to deal with a particular class ; and he bids them 
 guard against that particular sin, for the commission 
 of which their particular calling presented especial 
 opportunities and temptations. He says, '^ Exact no 
 more than that which is appointed you." It was fre- 
 quently in their power to practise these unjust exac- 
 tions. Things of this kind were not looked into very 
 closely; so long as the Government received the rent 
 at which they had let out the taxes, and so long as 
 there were no public disturbances, all was right. In 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 231 
 
 collecting these taxes there were seen behind the farm- 
 ers the armed force and the tribunals of the Romans. 
 This gave these men great facilities for exacting more 
 than was appointed. The victims of their cruel and 
 dishonest impositions would be indisposed and afraid 
 to go into the courts of their foreign oppressors, 
 which they could hardly hope would be courts of jus- 
 tice to them in such cases. — We know that it was the 
 general practice of the farmers of the taxes in Judaea 
 to sin in this way. Having awakened then in these 
 persons the sense of sin and the sense of duty, he 
 dexterously turns these feelings upon the point where 
 in their case reform was most needed, and with respect 
 to which their requickening consciences would be most 
 sensitive, trusting that, if he could induce them to 
 undertake what he recommended, he would in that 
 way bring them to Christ. 
 
 Let us go on with this instructive scene. When he 
 had answered the publicans, the soldiers came forward 
 with a similar request. Again in framing his reply 
 he had in view the same object as before, that of 
 bringing the inquirers to Christ ; and he takes the same 
 ground, that of the temptations which most beset 
 them. "My advice," he says, " to you soldiers is, that 
 you do violence to no man, neither accuse any 
 falsely; and that you be content with your wages." 
 This would not be suitable advice to the soldiers of 
 our own army ; but it was the most appropriate that 
 
232 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 could have been given to the soldiers who were then 
 standing before John, and whose consciences had just 
 been touched by his exhortations. They were pro- 
 bably heathen soldiers in a conquered country, and so 
 were not likely to be very strictly amenable to law. 
 It would frequently happen that they would plunder, 
 and practise various kinds of oppression towards the 
 subject population, which they hated and despised, 
 especially by threats of false accusations of hostility 
 to the Government, and of the breach of various reg- 
 ulations that had been imposed on them by their con- 
 querors. "You have become conscious," he says, 
 " of having committed these particulars kinds of 
 wickedness. Endeavor from this moment to avoid 
 them." 
 
 Such then was the Baptist's method of preparing 
 in these people's hearts the way of the Lord. It 
 consisted in persuading them to give up their common 
 besetting sins, and to undertake their common every- 
 day duties. 
 
 And now to bring this home to ourselves. Pos- 
 sibly there may be some here present who have 
 scarcely any more distinct faith in Jesus Christ than 
 John's hearers had. How shall I, Christ's Minister 
 among them, endeavor to put them wpon a way by 
 which they may attain to this faith? This, as a Min- 
 ister of God's Word, must be my great aim, my par- 
 amount object. Some might say, "Recommend 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 233 
 
 prayer." But I know that men cannot pray who 
 have not faith. Others might say, " Speak of the 
 wrath of God against sin, and of the grace of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ." But, again, what is needed is 
 to bring men to believe in these things. I am reduced 
 then to that which the Scripture before us suggests — 
 the effort to awaken men to a sense of duty, and a de- 
 sire to perform it, and to a consciousness of their be- 
 setting sins, such as may give rise to the desire to es- 
 cape from them. 
 
 You have, then, some belief in a connection between 
 your present life and a life to come. To some extent 
 you believe that the purpose of your existence is 
 moral and spiritual, and not merely material. You 
 have some apprehension of your having a Great Un- 
 seen Master, whose eye is ever upon you, and who is 
 requiring of you certain dispositions and a certain 
 mode of life. You do not feel these thoughts now for 
 the first time stirring within you; you know that you 
 are concerned in the matters to which they refer. 
 But let us go more into particulars. You are a pa- 
 rent or a child, a husband or a wife, a master or a 
 servant, a neighbor, or, to take the instances of the 
 text, one of the multitude, a man among men, or a 
 soldier, or a public functionary of some kind or other. 
 Consider Avhat belongs to and what grows out of your 
 position; its calls, its opportunities, its temptations. 
 You do not think that your position has no duties; 
 
 20* 
 
234 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 you do not think that it is a matter of indifference to 
 your conscience how those duties are performed, or 
 "whether they are performed or not. Now imagine 
 yourself endeavoring earnestly to do your duty as a 
 parent, or master, or servant, or merely as a man 
 among men, and cannot you see that this endeavor, 
 as the herald of the Saviour saw, will lead you on to 
 faith in that Saviour ? Without Christian faith you 
 feel and acknowledge that you have duties. The only 
 logical inference is that you should endeavor to prac- 
 tise those duties. That attempt will probably issue in 
 Christian faith. 
 
 See why it is so. It is an attempt which, as soon 
 as a man begins to make it, he finds beset with diffi- 
 culties. One want, which the hundredth, perhaps, as 
 well as the ninety and nine will immediately feel, will 
 be that of distinct and infallible authority for the kind 
 of life he is entering on ; and he will feel that it must 
 be some authority external to himself. This is a very 
 material point. There is a craving for certainty 
 which is not to be found in one's self. Whence then 
 is it to be gbtained? The more a man looks into him- 
 self, the less confidence will he have in himself; the 
 more distinctly will he perceive that he is misled by 
 what he desires, by self-love, by prejudices, by his 
 natural biasses, and also by his ignorance. The edu- 
 cated classes may think that they are more or less 
 raised above these influences, these disturbing causes, 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 235 
 
 or, rather, each may think so of himself; but docs he 
 think so of his friends and neighbors, as well in- 
 structed as himself? As respects, however, these 
 subjects, who are we to consider as the educated 
 classes? Even in those parts of the world which are 
 intellectually the most advanced, they form a very 
 small proportion of the whole. And if we extend 
 our view to mankind generally, they become so small 
 a proportion that they need hardly be taken into ac- 
 count. What we want all the while is something by 
 which the great mass of mankind may be guided. 
 Take any one from the passing crowd : this is what he 
 needs. Look at the human race : this is what it 
 needs. The impulses of the sense of duty, whether 
 awakened from without or by a conscious effort, re- 
 quire sanction, and support, and guidance. These 
 must be external. There must be something that 
 speaks as it were with the Voice of law — something 
 authoritative. 
 
 Who then is there that can speak to us with this 
 necessary authority, and with a voice that will be to 
 us as the voice of law? Not the Scribes and Phari- 
 sees — they who sit in Moses' seat; not you, nor I, nor 
 any other man. What any man may say on these 
 subjects (subjects which do not admit of demonstra- 
 tion) must be more or less colored by the peculiarities 
 of the individual, of the age in which he lives, and of 
 the people to whom he belongs. Men can only see 
 
236 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 these tilings with imperfect vision through distorting 
 media. The conclusion any individual may come toon 
 these subjects is only what he thinks; it is his opinion, 
 and must partake more or less of the nature of a con- 
 jecture or a guess. All the while what is wanted is 
 certainty; for what is wanted is a rule that a man 
 may live and die by. The philosophies of the ancients 
 failed among other reasons from this, that they were 
 not possessed of the requisite authority. One was ar- 
 rayed against another; and all wore the aspect of 
 guesses; whereas what was wanted was certainty. 
 Whence then, and how, shall we obtain it? In this 
 matter little or nothing can be done without it. The 
 history of the human race shows that it can be ob- 
 tained only from one source, that is, from Him who 
 alone can speak with authority, to Whom alone in 
 this matter authority and certainty belong, God Him- 
 self, the author of the moral law. It was this feeling 
 that brought Christendom, and will naturally bring 
 every one of us who shall have become desirous of dis- 
 charging his duty, to the Word of God, that is, to the 
 Incarnate Word — the Lord Jesus Christ, whom God 
 sent to be in this particular the Light of the world, to 
 give light to every man who desires light. He alone 
 speaks not as men speak, but with authority and cer- 
 tainty. 
 
 As soon as this want is felt, we see that recourse 
 is had to the Word of God, and to those who have 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 237 
 
 made the Word of God their study. This is an ever- 
 acting motive which generation after generation fills 
 the house of God ; which from the Apostles ' days to 
 our own has brought together so many Christian con- 
 gregations — the desire to be told, albeit through a 
 human channel, what God would have them to do. 
 Nothing of the kind would ever have taken place if 
 preachers spoke with no other authority than their 
 own. 
 
 And if we pass from the sense of duty to that with 
 which it is very closely connected, the sense of the re- 
 lation that exists between man and the author of the 
 moral law, we find precisely the same want felt, that 
 of distinct and certain knowledge, derived from an 
 authoritative source. Many put themselves forward 
 as teachers in these times, as many have done in all 
 times. But of all these could we accept one. Revela- 
 tion entirely set aside, as capable of being the instruc- 
 tor of his brethren on this subject? Can the people 
 of this country be each to himself a light upon this 
 subject, or can the people of any country? It is 
 clear, that as soon as the religious sentiment is 
 awakened it needs guidance and enlightenment, that is, 
 it needs a revelation; and no other revelation has been 
 given but that through Jesus Christ. This sentiment, 
 therefore, just as the sense of duty does, leads to faith 
 in Him. If it does not lead to Him, then there is an 
 
238 EXTEMPORARY PREACHmG. 
 
 instinct without an object, or without the means of 
 attaining to its object. 
 
 But not only did we find the Baptist setting before 
 his hearers what thej ought to do, but also calling 
 them to repentance. That is to say, as I have been 
 putting it throughout this discourse, not only en- 
 deavoring to awaken within them the sense of duty, 
 but also the sense of sin. The two are so closely 
 connected that they may almost be regarded as two 
 aspects of the same feeling. Regarding them how- 
 ever for this occasion separately, let us see how the 
 latter also would lead to the object he had in view. 
 A sense of our having done wrong, of our having 
 wronged our Maker, wronged the nature He gave us 
 akin to His own, fallen short of the opportunities He 
 has presented to us, and wronged our fellow-men, can 
 have but one issue, and that is the desire for atone- 
 ment. If the uneasiness felt does not lead to this, it 
 is purposeless. This seeking for atonement in a man 
 who has become conscious of having done wrong is as 
 natural as the effort to obtain food when one is hun- 
 gry. All the penances and mortifications the natural^ 
 man imposes on himself, all the altars that have been 
 raised, and all the sacrifices that have been offered on 
 every part of the earth's surface, are unanswerable 
 witnesses to this fact. Man has felt universally the 
 necessity of atonement. Man believes in God, and in 
 a day of account. It cannot therefore be, he feels 
 
TUE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 239 
 
 that it cannot be, a matter without issue that he has 
 been a wrong-doer. How were the sins of that mul- 
 titude that stood before John to be atoned for? He 
 knew but of one Avay, the deliverance to be effected 
 by Him to whom he pointed when he said, ^'Behold 
 the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the 
 world." And as there is no other name given under 
 heaven whereby this may be effected, the sense of sin, 
 accompanied, as it must be, by the craving for atone- 
 ment and reconciliation, must lead to faith in Christ. 
 Every one, then, can and must judge for himself 
 whether the ground I have been taking to-day is 
 strong or weak. Each is, as far as he himself is con- 
 cerned, the only possible judge of the matter. I 
 appeal to what I suppose is in your hearts and minds, 
 to what you must know about yourselves. But I have 
 no fear that you will attempt to refute me from your 
 own experience, for I have been speaking of the com- 
 mon principles and the common necessities of ev^ry 
 man's nature. All languages show that men have in 
 all times, and in all places, had an instinctive sense 
 of duty. It matters nothing whether it results from 
 the exercise of a congenital faculty, or from necessary 
 development, as the flower and the fruit do from the 
 seed. Certain actions and certain dispositions, vary- 
 ing from the necessity of circumstances within certain 
 limits, but still always, however, varying, presenting 
 the same characteristics, have always been approved 
 
240 EXTEMPORAKY PREACHING. 
 
 of, well spoken of and regarded as becoming. To 
 these men have considered themselves as under obliga- 
 tion. The sense, too, of man's standing in certain re- 
 lations to God has been equally universal. The same 
 is true of the sense of sin. Men are every where ac- 
 quainted with its demerits, and have a more or less 
 definite desire to be rid of what they anticipate as its 
 consequences. Upon these principles of our common 
 nature I take my stand. If you are conscious within 
 yourselves of these feelings, there is but one legitimate 
 conclusion to which you can come, that is, thankful 
 and trustful faith in the Gospel of our Lord and Sa- 
 viour Jesus Christ. It alone can give light accom- 
 panied with authority where we need them. It alone 
 can supply those wants which conscience forces on our 
 attention. Not only then is it the unspeakable gift of 
 God, and emphatically the good tidings, but it is the 
 necessary complement of our nature and of the con- 
 ditions of our earthly existence. It is no by-thought 
 or after-thought breaking in unexpectedly in the mid- 
 dle course of this present dispensation, but it is the 
 completion and the crowning fact of the one great 
 harmonious plan. Without it the moral and spiritual 
 creation would be confusion, darkness, and despair. 
 With it we obtain all that our spiritual and moral, and 
 much that our intellectual nature requires — a sense 
 of certainty, a sense of peace and reconciliation, and 
 a sense that we arc progressing towards a higher, and 
 as we are allowed to hope, even a perfect state. 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 241 
 
 Observations on the foregoing Sermon. 
 
 We insist frequently upon the statement that the 
 virtues are all of them fruits of faith. It therefore 
 becomes necessary for the Minister who is desirous of 
 fully instructing his hearers in the Word, to call their 
 attention to the opposite view of the relation in which 
 the two may be standing to each other ; the relation 
 in which that which is usually regarded as the cause 
 appears as the effect, and the effect as the cause. 
 And this will have the advantage of showing a scrip- 
 tural, and I believe the readiest and most certain, 
 because the natural method of producing faith in 
 men's minds. To point out this method, and, while 
 pointing it out, to use it for its proper purpose, as far 
 as that can be done, is the object of the sermon. 
 
 It is surprising that the ideas of so many Christians 
 as to what the religion of Christ requires of them 
 should be so different from what we find Christ Him- 
 self telling us in His announcements of His kingdom 
 and Gospel. He makes it consist in right conduct 
 resulting from right dispositions. But if we listen 
 now to those who put themselves most prominently 
 before us as teachers of religion, and religious guides, 
 we shall hear most of them affirming above all things 
 
 21 
 
242 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 the necessity of some detached doctrine, or the per- 
 version of some doctrine, or some only partially true 
 opinion. Such a text then as the one that has been 
 before us is useful as bringing us back to a scriptural, 
 and a plain and intelligible conception of Christianity. 
 Here is the forerunner of Christ, -whose work it was to 
 prepare men for Christ, telling them what they must 
 do ; and what he tells them is that they must practise 
 the several duties of their respective stations and cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 There are some who in reading this sermon would 
 remark that it is unmanly, and that it shows a dis- 
 trust in the power of Christ, not to speak at once and 
 in the first instance of Christ. It may not be so. He 
 who on finding the surface of the ground unfit for sup- 
 porting the structure he is desirous of erecting, goes 
 down deeper for a foundation, is not to be accounted 
 an unwise builder. At all events, such objectors are 
 at issue with the Baptist in his method of bringing 
 men to Christ. 
 
 I have just used, not undesignedly, the expression 
 of going deeper for a foundation, because in these 
 matters there is something anterior to, and more an- 
 cient than the Gospel; which is not yet two thousand 
 years old; something more universal, for the Gospel 
 has not yet spread over the world ; something, in short, 
 upon which the Gospel is founded, and to which it ap- 
 peals — the sense of sin and the sense of duty, and the 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN AND DUTY LEADS TO FAITH. 243 
 
 sense of our standing in certain relations to God. 
 We may also regard these sentiments as the citadel. 
 If the citadel be secured, the city may be lost, and 
 again recovered. But if the citadel itself be lost, 
 nothing more can be done. That which it was de- 
 signed to protect has fallen with it, and all is lost. 
 
STUDIES FOR SERMONS. 
 
 I WILL now give six short studies for sermons. I 
 take tliem from a selection of as many hundreds. To 
 make them intelligible to others, I am obliged to ex- 
 pand them very much beyond the length at which they 
 were set down originally, when intended only for my 
 own eye. I find studies of this kind of great use, 
 because they enable one to take in at a glance all the 
 ground that is to be passed over in preaching, and to 
 judge in a few seconds of the quality and arrange- 
 ment of one's materials. 
 
 It would be of advantage to very many also of those 
 who read written discourses, if they were to make 
 short abstracts of this kind of every sermon they 
 write. It would oblige them to ascertain what is the 
 real meaning of every paragraph; and to see what 
 is the nature of its connection with what precedes and 
 with what follows it. It would help them very much 
 in forming a correct judgment ; at all events it would 
 necessitate their forming some kind of judgment of 
 the sermon they were about to preach, both as a whole, 
 
 and of each part of it. 
 244 
 
STUDY I. 
 
 GOD HAS IMPOETAXT WORK FOR THE LEAST AMONG US. 
 
 Deutebonomt vii. 6, 7. 
 
 "The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people 
 unto Himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth. 
 Tho Lord did not set His love upon you, nor choose you, because 
 ye were more in number than any people ; for ye were the fewest 
 of all people." 
 
 I. — 1. The gifts God bestows upon us, and the 
 work He calls us to do, are not in proportion to our 
 seeming importance in the world. Consider the his- 
 tory before us. He passes over the Egyptians, and 
 chooses their wretched bondmen. 
 
 2. This may be further illustrated by the call of 
 Abraham. 
 
 3. This is in accordance with what God does in the 
 kingdoms of nature. The huge elephant is of very 
 little use in the world, while the smallest animalcules 
 have built up large districts of existing continents, 
 and are building up what will be large districts of 
 
 21* 245 
 
246 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 future ones. The little bee gives men honey and 
 light. Another insignificant insect contributes largely 
 to the clothing of the human race. And so it is in 
 the vegetable kingdom. The humble grass we tread 
 on unnoticed has a more important place in the 
 economy of nature than the stateliest trees of the 
 forest. 
 
 II. — 1. Just so, God has great work for little 
 people to do. Consider what the world owes to the 
 people described in the text as ''the fewest of all 
 people." Without them what would the religion of 
 the leading races of mankind now be ? 
 
 (2. It is instructive to observe, by the way, that 
 though they did not comprehend their high calling, 
 still God's purpose was worked out through them.) 
 
 III. — 1. The moral of these observations is for each 
 of us, that he cannot be so small but that God has 
 some great work for him to do. 
 
 2. The humblest in circumstances should recollect, 
 that it was not by the great, the powerful, the noble, 
 that the Gospel was first received and exhibited to the 
 world. The same glorious part is open to the 
 humblest in all ages. It is so at this day. 
 
 3. God has something for the poor beggar to do, 
 as a poor beggar, which he could not do were he a 
 prince. 
 
 4. He who came in the form of a servant, not 
 having where to lay His head, has shown by His 
 
GOD HAS IMPORTANT WORK FOR TUE LEAST. 247 
 
 example, that a holy spirit will under the lowliest cir- 
 cumstances make its possessor a blessing to his fellow- 
 men, and enable him to live to the glory of God. 
 
 lY. Nothing can so lift us above worldly cares 
 and circumstances as the knowledge that, whatever 
 our position at present, still that we have a part to 
 act in the great plan, not unimportant, for assigned 
 us by God Himself. We, even if we be the lowliest 
 of all may do the work and live the life of God as 
 thoroughly, may be as much His instruments, and 
 represent Him as truly to our brethren, as the most 
 exalted of all. 
 
STUDY II. 
 
 SOME LIMITATIONS TO SELF-WILL. 
 
 Deuteronomy xii. 8. 
 
 "Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, 
 every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes." 
 
 I. — Self-will is a natural impulse in all. It is 
 not desirable, nor would it be possible that it should 
 be carried out. 
 
 II. — 1. Moses, in giving the Law which was to 
 transform a multitude into a nation, announces the 
 limitation it would set to their self-will. Without 
 this limitation national existence would be impossible. 
 
 2. Look at the summary of the Law, the Decalogue, 
 and see how its injunctions and prohibitions check and 
 guide us at every step. 
 
 3. This is why we are told in the New Testament 
 to be subject to magistrates ; and that they are or- 
 dained of God. 
 
 4. The whole framework of human societies con- 
 sists of so many checks on self-will. The same may 
 
 248 
 
SOME LIMITATIONS TO SELF-WILL. 249 
 
 be said of our daily and hourly intercourse with each 
 other. 
 
 5. Take what we are most familiar with, our own 
 homes, and you will see that home becomes impossible 
 if self-will is to be the rule of its member's conduct. 
 
 III. — But law is very imperfect. Religion, which 
 substitutes the love of others for the love of self, is 
 the only complete and ever-acting check. It trans- 
 forms our worst fault into our highest grace. 
 
 IV. — The means by which we may be brought to 
 this new birth, this regenerate state, are — (1) a know- 
 ledge of God; (2) thoughtful and serious habits of 
 mind; (3) experience of the fact that self-will is not 
 conducive to happiness ; (4) early training ; (5) an ac- 
 quaintance with the character and with the work of 
 Christ ; (6) communion with God, i. e., prayer. 
 
 Y. — The result will be, that a spirit — the opposite 
 of self-will, originally external to ourselves, and no 
 part of what we were by nature — God's Spirit will 
 come and dwell with us, and make us one with God 
 and one with Christ. 
 
STUDY III. 
 
 WE TEMPT GOD BY OUR DESIRES. 
 
 Psalm cvi. 14, 15. 
 
 " They tempted God in the desert. And He gave them their 
 desire; and sent leanness withal into their souls." 
 
 I. — 1. Then our having obtained our desires is no 
 proof either that it was right to have entertained such 
 desires, or that now they are fulfilled there will result 
 to us from them any kind of blessing. 
 
 2. The text is a comment on the history recorded 
 in the eleventh chapter of Numbers. While God, we 
 are told, was bringing up the Israelites from the bon- 
 dage of Egypt to the land He had promised them, He 
 fed them in the desert with manna from heaven. This 
 was to teach them their dependence on Him, and that 
 they might trust Him. They desire meat instead. 
 This, under ordinary circumstances, would have been 
 a matter of indifi'erence. Under the particular cir- 
 cumstances of the case it was tempting God, It was 
 250 
 
WE TEMPT GOD BY OUR DESIRES. 251 
 
 calling upon Him to do in one way what He had for 
 sufficient reasons decided would best be done in a dif- 
 ferent way. Their desire, however, is. complied with ; 
 but its fulfilment is made the instrument of their pun- 
 ishment. 
 
 II. — 1. It is then a sin to tempt God ; and we 
 tempt Him when we would do in one way what He 
 has ordained should be done in another way. Jesus 
 Christ would have tempted God if He had thrown 
 Himself down from the pinnacle of the Temple, be- 
 cause reason (which God has given us for this among 
 other purposes) teaches that those who act in this 
 way, God does not protect. 
 
 2. God has ordained that man shall eat bread by 
 the sweat of his brow. Those who make haste to get 
 rich, and there are many such in these days, tempt 
 God. 
 
 3. God has ordained that parents should train up 
 their children by encouraging them in doing right, 
 and by restraining them when they do wrong. Those 
 who neglect these things tempt God. 
 
 4. God has ordained that we should hear the Lord 
 Jesus Christ. Those who in this matter are in their 
 own conceit wiser than God, are tempting God. 
 
 III.— 1. But the text speaks of our desires as the 
 means wherewith we may tempt God. Our desires 
 may be in themselves all that is most excellent, as was 
 the desire of Judas to be the companion of Jesus. 
 
252 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 But desires the most excellent may, as in his case, be 
 cherished for purposes the most vile. 
 
 2. Or our desires may be in themselves most 
 wicked; as when the Israelites wished to worship 
 idols or to be told smooth false things. So it may be 
 with us when we desire opportunities for lust, revenge, 
 deceit, &c. 
 
 3. Or they may be indifferent, as when we desire 
 wealth; which maybe desired and used either for 
 good and godly purposes, or for bad and godless 
 ones. 
 
 lY. — God, by the reason, the conscience, the powers 
 of observation, the experience of life He has given 
 us, and by the instruction and the Spirit He conveys 
 to us through His Word, enables us to regulate our 
 desires wisely. But at the same time, if we will have 
 it so. He allows us opportunities for doing wrong, for 
 wreaking our vengeance, for living unchastely, for de- 
 ceiving, for self-indulgence, and for godlessness. How 
 appalling is this thought! Let each then consider 
 vv'hat is the nature of his desires, and why he wishes 
 for such or such things. Let us look into our hearts. 
 Self-knowledge is the most difficult, as it is the most 
 useful of all knowledge. We must try to see our- 
 selves as others see us, or rather as God sees us. 
 
STUDY IV. 
 
 WHAT IS TRUTH? 
 
 John xviii. 88. 
 ' What is truth ?" 
 
 I. — 1. Pilate asked this question jeeringlj, and 
 did not wait for an answer. He was an educated 
 Roman, and a man of the world. He must have had 
 some acquaintance with the different schools of Greek 
 philosophy. Probably he ridiculed them all for their 
 disagreement as to what was the truth ; and because 
 each propounded as a rule of life what had no author- 
 ity beyond that which resulted from its being the 
 guess of the philosopher who had founded the 
 school. 
 
 2. Pilate would perhaps have been a happier and a 
 better man had he possessed the spirit of any one of 
 the philosophers whose efforts to attain the truth he 
 derided. But under the circumstances he was not to 
 be blamed. And that he, an educated Roman, high in 
 the service of the State, was not to be blamed for 
 22 253 
 
254 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 speaking derisively of the truth, shows the necessity 
 there was for the religion Christ came to establish. 
 
 II. — 1. If Pilate could revisit this earth, how sur- 
 prised would he be at the changes which have taken 
 place in the world since he spoke the words before us ! 
 But perhaps neither the desolation of Judaea, nor the 
 disappearance of the world-wide empire among the ad- 
 ministrators of which he had held so high a place, 
 would surprise him so much as that the Galilean pea- 
 sant whose words he had derided had established a 
 moral and spiritual empire in the world far wider than 
 that of Imperial Rome, and was worshipped as God. 
 
 2. And how had this been effected ? By the very 
 truth he thought it so ridiculous that the Galilean 
 peasant should make any pretensions of possessing. 
 
 III. — 1. And in attaining to this dominion that 
 truth was unaided by any kind of worldly power or 
 inducement. The influence and authority of Govern- 
 ment were opposed to it. The sword was drawn, not 
 for it, but against it. And it had, besides, to combat 
 both the wisdom and the vices of mankind. It tri- 
 umphed entirely by its own intrinsic power, because 
 it was the truth. It commended itself to the hearts 
 and to the understandings of all men, because it was 
 the truth. 
 
 2. Nations and races of men very unlike in many 
 things have alike received this truth. 
 
WHAT IS TRUTH? 255 
 
 3. Nor have any diversities of condition or circum- 
 stances hindered men from embracing it. 
 
 IV. — 1. And what is the substance of this truth ? 
 It consists, in its simplest expression, of two propo- 
 sitions. The first is what mankind had every where 
 dimly apprehended, — that man is a sinner in the sight 
 of God ; and the second is what mankind had every 
 where been seeking for, — that a way for reconciliation 
 with God is now opened. 
 
 2. Texts on the latter point, 1 Timothy i. 15. John 
 iii. 15. Matthew xi. 28. 
 
 3. This is what every thoughtful soul would regard 
 as the gladdest of tidings, and what every dying soul 
 sees is the main substance of the truth. 
 
 4. No philosophy can teach us any thing higher, 
 and yet the most unlearned man can distinctly appre- 
 hend it. 
 
 V. — This truth' has power to raise the beggar from 
 the dunghill and to give him a place among princes, 
 and to which many princes shall not attain. It makes 
 those who receive it like Christ, and qualifies them for 
 sitting with Him in heavenly places. It gives a man 
 dominion over himself. It gives him the happiness 
 of the world that now is, and of that which is to come. 
 It harmonizes things temporal with things eternal. 
 It reconciles man to God, and God to man. 
 
STUDY V. 
 
 THE OFFENDER IN ONE POINT. 
 
 James ii. 10. 
 
 ''Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one 
 point, is guilty of all." 
 
 I. — 1. The seeming hardness of this saying arises 
 in a great measure from our translation. The word 
 "point" suggests to us some small matter, but this 
 word is not in the original. The literal translation 
 would be "offend in one law;" i. e., the man who 
 should keep nine of the commandments but break the 
 tenth. This is a very different statement. 
 
 2. "Guilty of all" means that he has defied the 
 authority upon which all the ten equally rest. So if 
 he were tempted to break any other one, he would not 
 be held back from doing it by the consideration that 
 he would be breaking God's law. 
 
 II. — Another reason why we are offended at it is, 
 that, as no one is without sin, in admitting it we con- 
 demn ourselves. 
 
 256 At 
 
THE OFFENDER IN ONE POINT. 257 
 
 III. — 1. We must endeavor to bring ourselves to 
 acknowledge its force. Consider some of the figures 
 used to express the relation in which we stand to God. 
 We are called '• the children of God." Can that 
 child be regarded as aflfectionate, obedient, or dutiful 
 towards his earthly father, who sets some one of his 
 commandments at defiance? 
 
 2. We are "the servants of God." Suppose we 
 had contracted to serve an earthly master, should not 
 we break the contract and forfeit the stipulated com- 
 pensation if we declined to do the whole of the work 
 required of us ? 
 
 3. We are '' subjects of God's kingdom upon earth." 
 It is no defence for the subject of an earthly kingdom, 
 when charged with breaking any one of its laws, to 
 allege that he has kept any number of its other laws. 
 The forger cannot defend himself by saying, I am not 
 a murderer or an adulterer. 
 
 4. This is the principle in accordance with w^hich 
 we judge others. We must so judge ourselves in 
 respect of God's law. 
 
 IV. — 1. This principle is not now announced here 
 by St. James for the first time. It is as old as the 
 Law itself, as quoted by St. Paul, " Cursed is every 
 one that continueth not in all things which are written 
 in the book of the law to do them."^ 
 
 ' Gal. iii. 10. 
 
 22* 
 
258 EXTEMPORARY PREACHING. 
 
 2. The Great Master also tells us, " Whosoever 
 shall break one of these least commandments, and 
 shall teach men so, he shall be called least in the king- 
 dom of heaven."* 
 
 V. — 1. The Herod who committed incest and be- 
 headed John the Baptist is an instance of the insuffi- 
 ciency even of going so far as to hear gladly the most 
 stirring preaching of the Word, and of doing much in 
 conformity to it. 
 
 2. Judas supplies a case still more in point. It 
 was the breach of the tenth commandment which 
 literally made him guilty of others in so aggravated 
 a form, that we see there was nothing to hold him 
 back from the breach of any one, or of every one of 
 them. 
 
 VI. — 1. Another way of putting it. What is 
 meant is the persistent breach of some commandment, 
 any kind of sin practised habitually. 
 
 2. It is not said of those who, as Peter did, under 
 some extraordinary circumstances bend before the 
 storm ; they soon recover their erect position. 
 
 3. Nor of those who have truly repented them of 
 their former sins. It is the glad tidings of the Gos- 
 pel, that they are freed from them, and are no longer 
 under condemnation. 
 
 VII. — We must endeavor to picture to ourselves 
 
 2 Matt. V, 19. 
 
THE OFFENDER IN ONE POINT. 259 
 
 the mind, the character, the work of Christ. "VVe 
 must endeavor in every way we can to acquaint our- 
 selves with God. So may we hope to be redeemed 
 from every thing that is degrading, that is hateful, 
 that is sinful. 
 
STUDY YI. 
 
 GOD IS EEVEALED TO US BY OUR HEARTS. 
 
 1 JoHx iv. 8. 
 " He that loveth not, knoweth not God." 
 
 I. — The highest place is assigned in Holy Scripture 
 to love, as a principle of conduct. It is the fulfilment 
 of the whole Law. This seems to embrace every 
 thing. 
 
 II. — 1. This statement, however, of the Apostle 
 John exalts love still higher. Love it is, he says, that 
 reveals to us God. 
 
 2. This is the highest, and most precious, and most 
 influential of all knowledge. No other knowledge so 
 changes and so regenerates. Nothing so distinguishes 
 man from the brute, or so lifts a man in thought and 
 feeling above those in other respects his fellows. 
 
 III. — It is not, then, so much by reason that God 
 is apprehended as by the heart. And this is a fact 
 which our own experience confirms. Many a culti- 
 260 
 
GOD IS REVEALED TO US BY OUR HEARTS. 261 
 
 vated mind sees not, knows not God; but He is known 
 bj those who have loving hearts. 
 
 IV. — This justifies that dispensation of God which 
 confines opportunities for mental culture to a few ; for 
 goodness of heart is placed within the reach of every 
 one. 
 
 V. — 1. It explains the coldness of the worldly and 
 the recklessness of the sinner. Their hearts are 
 hardened and corrupted, and so cannot reveal God to 
 them. 
 
 2. The teaching, therefore, of the Ministers of the 
 Word should not be denunciatory, but should aim at 
 awakening a sense of gratitude and love. 
 
 3. There is much in every heart to which such teach- 
 ing can appeal. In no one, probably, does God allow 
 this witness to Himself to be completely silenced. He 
 created the heart with a yearning for something to lean 
 against, something to love. In the relations of home 
 and of society, and even in the creatures and objects 
 with which He surrounds us, He is ever endeavoring to 
 call into exercise our good and loving feelings. Eut 
 in connection with all these objects of love there arises 
 a sense of imperfection and of perishableness, of in- 
 security and of uncertainty. No earthly friend can 
 be worthy of the entire devotion of the heart. 
 Nothing earthly can be secured to us but from day to 
 day. Are we then to love those whom God has made 
 near and dear to us less than vre do at present ? Nay, 
 
262 EXTEMPORARY PREACHINQ. 
 
 with these words of the Apostle before us, we will 
 strive to love them more ; knowing that this will ever 
 be more and more distinctly revealing to us God, the 
 one perfect and abiding object of love. " Grod is love ;" 
 and "he that loveth not, knoweth not God." 
 
 THE END. 
 
CHAS. SCRIBNER & CO.'S 
 
 LIST OF 
 TO BE PUBLISHED DURING THE 
 
 Autumn of 1867. 
 
 Will Appear 
 
 IN SEPTEMBER. 
 
 n^IMOTHY TITCOMB'S NEW BOOK. Kathrina, her Life and 
 •^ Mine; in a Poem. One vol. i2mo. Price, $i 50; full gilt, $2 50. 
 The aim of this poem is to illustrate the power of a true woman to ennoble and to elevate 
 man ; to reveal to him the true end of life, and to lead him to press after it with the same 
 earnestness and determination which have marked his struggles to realize his dreams of 
 ambition. Although mainly narrative in form, parts of the work are dramatic and lyrical, 
 and, scattered tlirough the poem, are passages unsurpassed for their exquisite and pathetic 
 tenderness. 
 
 "pAULDING'S (J. K.) WORKS. The Bulls and the Jonathans 
 •*■ (uniform with the Literary Life of Paulding). One volume, crown 8vo. 
 Price, $2 50. 
 
 T^AY, Prof. Henry N. The Art of English Composition. One 
 •*-^ vol. i2mo. (Uniform with Day's Logic.) Price, . . $1 50. 
 
 The Art of Discourse. A system of Rhetoric adapted for use in 
 
 Colleges and Academies, and also for private study. One vol. i2mo. 
 (Uniform with Day's Logic.) Price, $i 50. 
 
 GUIZOT'S MEDITATIONS ON THE ACTUAL STATE OF 
 CHRISTIANITY and on the attacks which are now being 
 made upon it. (Second series.) One vol. i2mo. Price, . $1 75. 
 
 IN OCTOBER. 
 "DEECHER'S (Henry Ward) PRAYERS— Pulpit, Occasional, and 
 
 •^ Social. One vol. i2mo. Price, 5i 75. 
 
 All who have ever enjoyed Mr. Beecher's ministrations have been impressed with the 
 fact that his prayers are the most earnest, effective, and forcible part of his public exercises. 
 The spirit of deep devotion, of filial affection and childlike trust which breathes through those 
 comprised in tliis volume, will find a response in thousands of hearts. 
 
 QUEENS OF AMERICAN SOCIETY (The). By Mrs. Ellet. Witn 
 thirteen original steel engravings by Ritchie, Hall and others. One 
 
 vol. crown 8vo. Price, $2 50. 
 
 In this volume Mrs. Ellet gives us sketches of prominent belles and leaders of fashion, 
 from the early days of the Republic to the present time, and full space is also assigned to the 
 ladies of our own day who have been and are most conspicuous in our first social circles. 
 
 ^\ This volume is adorned with original and exquisite steel engravings of portraits of the 
 most distinguished leaders of "the too" iu New York, Boston, Philadelphia, &c 
 
Charles Scribner & Co.'s New Books, 
 
 READY IN OCTOBER (Continued). 
 T ANGUAGE AND THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE. By William 
 -*-' DwiGHT Whitney, Professor of Sanscrit and Instructor in Modern 
 Languages in Yale College. One volume, crown Svo. Price, . $2 50. 
 Prof. Whitney's aim in these lectures is to place in a clearly comprehensible form, before 
 the English reader and student, all the principal facts regarding language— its nature and 
 origin , its growth, its classifications, its ethnological bearing, its value to man. Technical and 
 metaphysical phraseology is avoided as much as possible and the progress of the argument is 
 always from that which is well known, or obvious, to that which is more obscure or difficult. 
 i t is believed that the work will be widely adopted as a text-book for instruction. 
 
 ■pROUDE (J. A.) SHORT STUDIES ON GREAT SUBJECTS. One 
 "^ vol. crown Svo. (Uniform with the History of England.) Price, $3. 
 The essays collected in this volume comprise all Mr. Froude's contributions to current 
 periodical liteiature during the last few years. They are marked by that gieat originality 
 and independence of thought, joined with stirring eloquence of expression which have 
 secured him such wide and enduring reputation as an historian. 
 
 /^LD ROMAN WORLD (The). The Grandeur and Failure of its Civil- 
 ^-^ ization. By John Lord, LL.D. One vol. crown Svo. Price, $3 00. 
 In this work Dr. Lord describes, in his peculiarly graphic and nervous style, " the 
 greatness and misery of the old Roman world." The volume will be found entertaining 
 instrTctive and profitable in the highest degree, while it will be specially useful as a text-book 
 for higher schools and colleges. 
 
 pAULDING'S WORKS. TALES OF THE GOOD WOMAN. 
 -^ One vol. crov»'n Svo. (Uniform edition.) Price, . . $2 50. 
 
 IN NOVEMBER. 
 
 TTISTORY OF THE CHURCH OF GOD during the period of 
 ^-^ Revelation. By Charles Colcock Jones, D. D. First Period. 
 
 One volume, Svo. Price, $3 50. 
 
 T K MARVEL. MY FARM AT EDGE WOOD. With 10 Photographic 
 -*■ Illustrations by Rockwood, and a fine Portrait. In one vol. 4to. $10. 
 
 T7XTEMPORARY PREACHING. By F. Barham Zincke, Vicar of 
 •^-^ Wherstead, and Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen. {Published by 
 ■irrajigciueiit with the author.) To be uniform with Baulain's Art of Extem- 
 [)urary Speaking. One vol. i2mo. Price, $1 75- 
 
 T ANGE'S COMMENTARY. "Genesis." "Corinthians." Each 
 •^ one volume, royal Svo. Price, per volume, ... $5 00. 
 
 ^HANKSGIVING; Memories of the Day, and Helps to the Habit. 
 -■■ By William Adams, D. D. One volume, i2mo. Price, ^2 00. 
 
 IN DECEMBER. 
 T ANGE'S COMMENTARY. "Thessalonians." "Timothy." 
 •*-^ " Titus." " Hebrews." One volume, royal Svo. Price, . $5 oa. 
 
 , pAULDING'S (J. K.) WORKS. DUTCHMAN'S 'FIRESIDE. One 
 vol. crown Svo. Price, .... . . $2 50. 
 
DATE DUE 
 
 " 1 ) - 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 GAYLORD #3523PI Printed in USA