{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_23113/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_23113","id":"gutenberg_23113","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23113","summary":null,"tags":["Category: How To ...","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Pastoral theology"],"text":"E-text prepared by Colin Bell, Thomas Strong,\nand the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Note:\n\n 1. Obvious misspellings and printing errors have been corrected.\n\n 2. Archaic word spellings have been retained.\n\n 3. The list of books by the same author has been moved from the\n beginning to the end of the book.\n\n 4. Footnotes have been placed immediately following the paragraphs\n in which they are noted.\n\n 5. Notation for Footnote 4, which is missing in the original, has\n been supplied.\n\n 6. A word that is missing at the beginning of Footnote 8 has been\n supplied as (I).\n\n 7. Capitalized headings within chapters are running page headers.\n\n 8. Running page headers which are designated by * reflect subject\n matter that occurs within paragraphs in the original and are\n broken into paragraphs for the purpose of better readability in\n this document.\n\n 9. Scripture references (e.g., Mal. 2.1; Acts xx. 19; 2 Tim. 1.12;\n etc.) which appear as sidenotes in the original are placed within\n [ ] and immediately follow the quoted scripture or statement\n pertaining to scripture to which they refer.\n\n10. Redundant book heading and redundant chapter headings have been\n omitted.\n\n\n\n\n\nTO MY YOUNGER BRETHREN\n\nChapters on Pastoral Life and Work\n\nby\n\nTHE RIGHT REV. HANDLEY C.G. MOULE, D.D.\nLord Bishop of Durham\n\nFourth Edition\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nLondon\nHodder and Stoughton\n27, Paternoster Row\n1902\n\nPrinted by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury.\n\n\n\n\n TO\n\n MY DEAR BROTHER AND VICAR,\n\n THE REV. JOHN BARTON, M.A.,\n\n INCUMBENT OF TRINITY CHURCH, CAMBRIDGE,\n\n AND RURAL DEAN,\n\n AND TO MY DEAR BROTHERS AND FRIENDS,\n\n THE PRESENT AND PAST STUDENTS\n\n OF RIDLEY HALL, CAMBRIDGE,\n\n THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.\n\n H.C.G.M.\n\n\n \"_Give those who teach pure hearts and wise,\n Faith, hope, and love, all warm'd by prayer;\n Themselves first training for the skies\n They best will raise their people there._\"\n\n ARMSTRONG.\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nThe following pages do not appear to need any extended preface; their\ntopic is set forth in the first lines of the first chapter. With what\nsuccess it has been handled is another matter.\n\nBut as a writer reviews his own words, it is inevitable that some sort\nof _envoi_ should present itself to his mind. In this case the _envoi_\nseems to me to be the vital necessity of personal holiness in the\nChristian Minister, in order to the right working of the Christian\nMinistry; a personal holiness which shall be no mere form moulded from\nwithout but a life developed into manifestation and action from within.\n\nNever did the Church of Christ more need to remember this than at the\npresent day. The strongest surface currents of the age are against it;\nalike that of unregulated, hurrying, indiscriminate enterprize, and that\nof an exaggerated ecclesiasticism. In the one case the worker's\ncommunion with God tends to be sacrificed to the work, the fountain\nchoked for the sake of the stream. In the other case there is a serious\nrisk that \"the Church\" may come to be regarded as an almost substitute\nfor the Lord in matters affecting the life and growth of the Christian\nman, and of course of the Christian Minister. Sacred are the claims of\norder and cohesion, but more sacred and more vital still is the call to\nthe individual constituent of the community to come to the living\nPersonal Christ, \"nothing between,\" and to abide in innermost\nintercourse with Him, and to draw every hour by faith on His great\ngrace.\n\nIf these simple pages may at all, in His most merciful hands, promote\nthe holy cause of such a hidden life and its fruitful issues, it will\nindeed be happiness to the writer. In these days of stifling\nmaterialism in philosophy, and withering naturalism in theology, but in\nwhich also the Holy Spirit, far and wide, is breathing upon us in\nspecial mercy from above, there is no duty more pressing on the\nChristian than to seek, in the world of work, after that life which is\n\"lived in the flesh by faith in the Son of God,\" and which is manifested\nin the strong and patient \"meekness of wisdom.\"\n\nRIDLEY HALL, CAMBRIDGE,\n_April 22nd, 1892_.\n\n\n\n\n \"_Servant of God, be fill'd\n With Jesu's love alone;\n Upon a sure foundation build,\n On Christ the corner-stone;\n By faith in Him abide,\n Rejoicing with His saints;\n To Him with confidence, when tried,\n Make known all thy complaints._\"\n\n MORAVIAN HYMN-BOOK.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\n CHAPTER I.\n\n _THE SECRET WALK WITH GOD_ (i.).\n PAGE\n\n Need of watching and prayer over three departments of\n a Minister's life--The secret department--Temptations\n in it from work--From solitude--Secret Devotion--The\n Morning Watch--Physical precautions--Evening\n hours--A Minister's prayers must sometimes\n forget the Ministry--This will be to the advantage of\n the Ministry--\"_Tell Him all_\" 1\n\n\n CHAPTER II.\n\n _THE SECRET WALK WITH GOD_ (ii.).\n\n Secret intercourse with God the life of a Minister's life--The\n Example of Jesus Christ--Testimony of von\n Machtholf--Special need of divine communion at\n the present day--The cry for effort and enterprize--Secularizing\n theories of religion and the\n Ministry--A call to young English Clergymen--A\n caution from Laodicea--Study of the Holy Scriptures--\"The\n New Testament about twice a week\"--What\n says the Ordinal?--M. Henri Lasserre on\n Devotional Literature and the Gospels--Study the\n Bible unprofessionally--Bridges' quotation from\n Witsius--Ridley in the Orchard 21\n\n\n CHAPTER III.\n\n _SECRET STUDY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES._\n\n A fragmentary chapter--Higher Criticism--A technical and innocent\n term--Actual assertions of certain critics--\"Do not follow this\n Book; follow Christ\"--Weigh facts before theories--Testimony of\n Nature and History to Scripture--The Duke of Argyll in the\n _Nineteenth Century_--Prediction--Problem of the Human Knowledge\n of Jesus Christ--Current fulfilments of Prophecy--Methods of Bible\n Study--The plough--The spade--Specimen of spade-husbandry, in a\n Church Congress Study of the Epistle to the Philippians 45\n\n\n CHAPTER IV.\n\n _THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (i.).\n\n Secret Communion with God must _accompany_ everything\n else--We are watched--Self-respect--Consistency largely means\n Considerateness--\"A consistent gentleman\"--The Tongue--St\n Augustine's couplet for the dinner-table--The Clergy-House, its\n opportunities and risks--The duty of Example--Is it remembered as\n it used to be?--\"For their sakes I sanctify Myself\"--\"Others\" and\n their claims on us--Manner--Temper--Simeon's patience--The Secret\n of the Presence 79\n\n\n CHAPTER V.\n\n _THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (ii.).\n\n \"Take heed unto thyself\"--Relations with Woman--Christian\n chivalry--And Christian caution--Special difficulties--\"Know\n thyself\"--Celibacy--The Clergyman's Wife--The problem of\n means--The Clergyman and money--Pecuniary intemperance--Accurate\n accounts--Investment circulars--\"Lay not up for yourselves\" 101\n\n\n CHAPTER VI.\n\n _THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (iii.).\n\n Curate and Incumbent--A Chancellor on Curates--The ideal\n Incumbent--No Incumbent perfect--And no parish perfectly\n content--Loyal watchfulness needed accordingly--The Curate's\n Party--\"The lost grace, humility\"--Subordination--Take sides\n against yourself--A letter to _The Record_ on Curates'\n grievances. 123\n\n\n CHAPTER VII.\n\n _PASTOR IN PARISH_ (i.).\n\n A boundless subject--Visiting--All-important--Prepare for\n the round with prayer--Method--Brevity but not hurry--An\n example--Courtesy--It must be impartial--Visitation of the\n sick--Its special demands--Punctuality always a duty--Use of\n the Bible--The advantage of coming as \"the Clergyman\"--Mistaken\n for the undertaker--Come to the point--Lying in wait for the\n occasion--Happy rebukes to timid reticence 147\n\n\n CHAPTER VIII.\n\n _PASTOR IN PARISH_ (ii.).\n\n Teach as you go--Urgent need of teaching--About Christ--And\n the Holy Spirit--And Sacraments--Common mistakes about the\n teaching of the Church--Sin--Evidences--Recollections of a\n visiting round--The retired tradesman--The sceptical\n blacksmith--The invalid artizan--The civil-servant--The\n consumptive--The dying printer--The cripple--Aged poor\n saints--Saddening visits--Humbling memories--A bright\n conversion at eighty-two 173\n\n\n CHAPTER IX.\n\n _THE CLERGYMAN AND THE PRAYER BOOK._\n\n \"As bad as inspired\"--Imperfections in the Book--Yet it is\n priceless--Spirituality of the Prayer Book--What it takes for\n granted in the worshipper--A remarkable reason for secession--The\n Prayer Book as a weapon--Its Scripturality--Its compilers jealous\n for the Word of God--Ministerial use of the Prayer Book--Put\n yourself into it--We are not to preach the prayers--Yet we are to\n pray them--Reading of the Lessons--Baptism--Marriage--Burial--The\n Holy Communion--Reverence--Of what sort--Instruction-addresses\n on the Prayer Book--\"Less worship\" 201\n\n\n CHAPTER X.\n\n _PREACHING_ (i.).\n\n The Pulpit a central point in the Ministry--Mutual influence of\n \"parish-work\" and preaching--\"Truth through personality\"--Let us\n \"labour in the Word\"--\"Litho Sermons\"--Addison's village-parson\n and his sermons--_Attractive_ preaching--Is a duty--Audibility--Of\n the right sort--Good English--Why to be cultivated--Mr Spurgeon's\n style--French hearers of an English preacher--Good effects on his\n style--\"Written or extempore?\"--Length--Action 225\n\n\n CHAPTER XI.\n\n _PREACHING_ (ii.).\n\n Further remarks on Attractiveness--And, in passing, on\n Ministerial Considerateness--This is to be practised in\n preaching--As well as in other functions--Attractiveness to be\n guarded by Faithfulness--Requisites to attractiveness--\"Preach\n the Gospel earnestly, interestingly, fully\"--Jesus Christ is\n _the Gospel_--Personal conviction the essence of\n _Earnestness_--\"Matter-of-Fact\"--_Interest_ sustained by anecdote\n and illustration--But still more by intelligibility and\n practicality--Expository sermons--_Fulness_ in the message--Jesus\n Christ for us--And in us--The Holy Spirit must work with the Word 249\n\n\n CHAPTER XII.\n\n _PREACHING_ (iii.).\n\n Notes from a Sermon-Lecture--On diction, arrangement, fidelity\n to the text, proportion of parts, accuracy--On statements about\n revelation, justification, faith, grace--A paper in _The Churchman_\n on Old Sermons--Be a preacher indeed, whatever be the fashion of\n the time--The Directory of 1645--Its instructions on \"the\n Preaching of the Word\"--Spiritual Power in Preaching--How sought\n and received--Farewell 273\n\n _Fordington Pulpit_ 301\n\n\n\n\n _\"What contradictions meet\n In Ministers' employ!\n It is a bitter sweet,\n A sorrow full of joy;\n No other post affords a place\n For equal honour or disgrace\"_\n\n OLNEY HYMNS.\n\n\n \"_The Interpreter had Christian into a private Room, and bid\n his Man open a Door; the which when he had done, Christian saw\n a Picture of a very grave Person hang up against the Wall, and\n this was the fashion of it: It had eyes lift up to Heaven, the\n best of Books was in its hand, the Law of Truth was written\n upon its lips, the World was behind his back; it stood as if it\n Pleaded with Men, and a Crown of gold did hang over its head._\"\n\n PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\n_THE SECRET WALK WITH GOD_ (i.).\n\n\n _Pastor, for the round of toil\n See the toiling soul is fed;\n Shut the chamber, light the oil,\n Break and eat the Spirit's bread;\n Life to others would'st thou bring?\n Live thyself upon thy King._\n\n\nLet me explain in this first sentence that when in these pages I address\n\"my Younger Brethren,\" I mean brethren in the Christian Ministry in the\nChurch of England. Let me limit my reference still further, by premising\nthat very much of what I say will be said as to brethren who have lately\ntaken holy Orders, and are engaged in the work of assistant Curacies.\n\nAIM OF THE BOOK.\n\nDay by day, for many years past, my life has lain among men preparing\nthemselves for just that work. As a matter of course my thoughts have\nrun incessantly in that direction. Many a lecture in the library where\nwe work together, and many a conversation in dining-hall, or by study\nfire, or in college garden, or on country road, has given point to those\nthoughts and enabled me, I trust, better to understand my younger\nBrethren, and with more sympathy to make myself, as an elder brother,\nunderstood by them. What I here seek to do, with the gracious aid of our\nblessed Master, is somewhat to extend the range of such talks, and to\nask a friendly hearing from younger Brethren in the holy Ministry with\nwhom I have never had the opportunity of speaking personally.\n\nI have not the least intention of writing a treatise on the Christian\nPastorate. To talk to young Christian Ministers about some important\ndetails of pastoral life and work, but above all of life, inward and\noutward--this is my simple purpose.\n\n * * * * *\n\nTHREE LINES OF PRAYER.\n\nOne day in each week, at Ridley Hall, we unite in special prayer,\nwithout liturgical form, for those members of the Hall who have gone out\ninto actual ministry. As I lead my dear younger Brethren in that\nsupplication, the heart feels itself full of many, very many,\nwell-remembered faces, characters, lives. It seems to see those many old\nfriends scattered abroad in the Lord's work-field; and it sees, of\ncourse, a very large variety among them, in the way of both character\nand circumstances. But, with all this consciousness of differences, my\nthoughts and my petitions always, by a deep necessity, run for all alike\nalong three main paths. The first prayer is for the young Clergyman's\ninner and secret Life and Walk with God. The second is for his daily and\nhourly general Intercourse with Men. The third is for his official\nMinistrations of the Word and Ordinances of the Gospel. And in all these\ndirections, after all, one desire, one prayer, has to be offered, the\nprayer that everywhere and always, from the inmost recesses of life to\nits largest and most public circumference, the Lord and Master may take,\nand keep, full possession of the servant. I pray that in secret\ndevotion, and in secret habits, Jesus Christ may be intensely present\nwith the man; and that in common intercourse, in all its parts, He may\nbe the constant and all-influencing Companion, to stimulate, to control,\nto chasten, to gladden, to empower; and that in the preaching of the\nWord the servant may really and manifestly speak from, and for, and in,\nhis Lord; and that in ministration of the sacramental and other\nOrdinances he may truly and unmistakably walk before Him in holy\nsimplicity, holy reverence, and full spiritual reality, \"serving the\nLord,\" and serving the flock, \"with all humility of mind.\" [Acts xx.\n19.]\n\nMy present talks on paper will take very much the lines of these\nprayers. Secret walk with God, common and general walk with men, special\nministrations--I desire to say a little on each and all of these points,\nand more or less in this order, though without attempting too rigid an\narrangement, where one subject must often run over into another.\n\n * * * * *\n\nSECRET WALK WITH GOD.\n\nLet me take up the first great topic of the three for a few preliminary\nwords in this chapter: THE SECRET WALK WITH GOD of the young Pastor of\nChrist's flock.\n\nHINDRANCES: WORK.\n\nMy brotherly reader will not need any long explanation or careful\napology from me here. He knows as well as I do, on the one hand, that a\nclose secret walk with God is unspeakably important in pastoral life,\nand, on the other hand, that pastoral life, and not least in its early\ndays, is often allowed to hinder or minimize the real, diligent work\n(for it is a work indeed in its way) of that close secret walk. He finds\nall too many possible interferences with the inner working on the part\nof the outer. Such interferences come from very different quarters. The\nnew Curacy, the new duties and opportunities, if the man has his heart\nin his ministry, will prove intensely interesting, and at first, very\npossibly, encouragement and acceptance may predominate over experiences\nof difficulty and trial. Services, sermons, visits to homes and to\nschools, with all the miscellanies that attend an active and\nwell-ordered parochial organization--these things are sure to have a\nspecial and exciting interest for most young men who have taken Orders\nin earnest. And it will be almost inevitable that the Curate, under even\nthe most wise, considerate, and unselfish of Incumbents, should find\n\"work\" threatening rapidly to absorb so much, not of time only but\nthought and heart, that the temptation is to abridge and relax very\nseriously indeed secret devotion, secret study of Scripture, and\ngenerally secret discipline of habits, that all-important thing.\n\n*HINDRANCES: SOLITUDE.\n\nThen, on the other hand, there is a risk and trial from a region quite\nopposite. The Curate comes to his new work, and takes up his abode in\nlodgings--alone. Only a few months ago, perhaps only a few weeks ago, he\nwas in rooms at College, amidst all the social as well as mental\ninterests of University life, and (so it is, thank God, for many\nUniversity men now) feeling on every side the help of Christian\nfriendship and fellowship of the warmest and truest sort. And now,\nsocially and as to fellowship in Christ, he is, to speak comparatively,\nalone. I say, _comparatively_. Very likely he has found in his Incumbent\na friend and elder brother, perhaps a friend and loving father, in the\nLord. And most probably he will find among his people, and that very\nsoon if he is on the watch, friends in Christ, gentle or simple. He may\nbe associated with a brother Curate or Curates; and if so, the inmost\naim of both or all ought to be, and in most cases will be, not only to\nwork in the same parish but to work heart to heart as \"in Him.\"\nNevertheless, the Vicar or Rector, though a friend, is a very busy\nfriend; and so is the brother Curate; and the Christian friend in the\nparish is after all only one of the many souls to whom the man has to\nminister, and he must not forget those who perhaps need him most just\nbecause they are least congenial to him.\n\n*ITS DANGERS.\n\nSo the sense of change, of solitude, in such part of his life as is\nspent indoors, may be, and, as I know, very often is, real and deep, sad\nand sorrowful, and in itself not wholesome, to the young Minister of\nChrist. Possibly my reader knows nothing of all this; but I think it\nmore likely that at least he knows something of it. And it needs his\nprompt and watchful dealing if it is not to hurt him greatly. Solitude\nwill not _by itself_, if I judge rightly, help him to secret intercourse\nwith God. A feeling of solitude, under most circumstances, much more\ntends, by itself, to drive a man unhealthily inward, in unprofitable\nquestionings and broodings, or in still less happy exercises of thought.\nOr it drives him unhealthily outward, quickening the wish for mere\nstimulants and excitements of mind and interest. Aye, let me not shrink\nfrom saying it, it sometimes quickens a wish for \"stimulants\" in the\nmost literal sense of the word. Exhausting and multifarious parochial\nwork, and the lonely bachelor quarters at the day's end, have brought to\nmany a young man sore temptations of that sort, and sometimes they have\nwon the battle, to the wreck and ruin of the work and of the worker.\n\nHINDRANCES ARE OCCASIONS.\n\nWell, all these facts or possibilities are just so many reminders that\nthe new Curate's life will not, of itself, greatly help him to maintain\nand quicken his Secret Walk with God, that vital necessity for his work.\nIt certainly will _not_ do so directly; it will, directly, be a problem,\nnot an aid. But on that very account, dear Brother and reader, your new\nconditions of life may prove indirectly a most powerful aid, by being a\nconstant and urgent _occasion_. As you are a Minister of Christ, your\nlife and work will, in the Lord's sight, be a failure, yes, I repeat it,\na failure, be the outside and the reputation what they may, if you do\nnot walk with God in secret. But therefore your life and work are a\ndaily and hourly occasion for the positive resolve, in His Name, that\nwalk with Him you will. Recognize the risks, right and left, the risks\nbrought by pastoral activities and interests, and those brought by\npastoral loneliness and uncheerfulness. Remember the vital necessity\namidst those risks. And then you will the more deliberately purpose and\nplan how to guard your secret devotions, and how to order your secret\nhours even when devotion is not your direct duty, so that your Lord\nshall be indeed there, at the centre, \"a living, bright Reality\" to you.\n\nSECRET DEVOTION.\n\nLet me plunge into the midst at once, with a few simple suggestions on\nSECRET DEVOTION.\n\nLET IT BE DELIBERATE.\n\nI ask my younger Brother, then, to keep sacred, with all his heart and\nwill, an unhurried time alone with the Lord, night and morning at the\nleast. I do not intrusively prescribe a length of time. But I do most\nearnestly say that the time, shorter or longer, must be _deliberately\nspent_; and even ten minutes can be spent deliberately, while\nmismanagement may give a feeling of haste to a much longer season. Do\nnot, I beseech you, minimize the minutes; seek for such a fulness of\n\"the Spirit of grace and of supplications,\" [Zech. xii. 10.] as shall\ndraw you quite the other way. But if the time, any given night or\nmorning, _must_ be short, let it nevertheless be a time of quiet,\nreverent, collected worship and confession and petition. One thing\nassuredly you can do: you can, if you will, secure a real \"Morning\nWatch\" before your day's work begins. I do not say it is easy. Young men\nvery commonly sleep sounder and longer than we seniors do; they are not\nalways easy to rouse in a moment. But they can direct some of their\nenergy to contrive against themselves, or rather _for_ themselves, how\nto secure a regular early rising to meet their Lord. Most ingenious, not\nto say amusing, are some of the devices which friends of mine have\nconfided to me; schemes and stratagems to get themselves well awake in\ngood time. But after all, in most lodging-houses surely it must be\npossible to be called early, and to instruct the caller to show no mercy\nat the chamber door. Anyhow, I do say that the fresh first interview\nwith the all-blessed Master must at all costs be secured. Do not be\nbeguiled into thinking it can be arranged by a half-slumbering prayer in\nbed. Rise up--if but in loving deference to Him. Appear in the presence\nchamber as the servant should who is now ready for the day's bondservice\nin all things but in this, that he has yet to take the day's oath of\nobedience, and to ask the day's \"grace sufficient,\" and to read the\nday's promises and commands, at the Master's holy feet.\n\nA PRACTICAL SUGGESTION.\n\nI do not recommend an unpractical physical mortification as the rule for\nsuch early hours with God. Fully believing that there is a place for\ndefinite \"abstinence\" in the Christian (and certainly in the\nministerial) life, I do not think that that place is, as a rule, the\nearly morning hour. Very many men only procure a bad headache for the\nday by beginning any sort of earnest mental effort without food. Such\nmen should take care accordingly to eat a _chotee h\u00b7zaree_ (as old\nIndians say), \"a little breakfast,\" however little, before they pray and\nread. There are appliances, simple and inexpensive, by which the man in\nlodgings can, without giving any one trouble, provide himself with his\ncup of cocoa or coffee as soon as he is up; and he will be wise to do\nsomething of this sort, if he is a man whose work by day is heavy for\nboth body and spirit, and who is thus specially apt to find the truth of\nwhat doctors tell us, that \"sleep is, in itself, an exhausting process.\"\n\nBut at any cost, my dear friend and Brother in the Ministry, we must\nhave our Morning Watch with God, in prayer and in His Word, before all\nthe day's action. Not even the earliest possible Church service can\nrightly take the place of that.\n\nGOOD HOURS AT NIGHT.\n\nIt is obvious to add that punctuality and early hours in the morning\nwill bring into your life another rule; that of punctuality and\nreasonably good hours at night. No temptation is greater, sometimes, for\nthe man alone than to ignore or break such a rule. And no doubt the\nexigencies of pastoral life, sometimes, but surely not often, make it\nhard to keep it. But it is extremely important, for the man who would\nwalk closely and humbly with his God, to end the day deliberately at His\nfeet. And here accordingly is another occasion for watchfulness, and for\nmethod, and for will. Do not _drift into the night_. Have a settled hour\nwhen, as a habit, you lay interests and intercourse of other sorts\ndown, and turn unhurried to the holy interview, spreading open your\nBible by the lamp, the Bible marked and scored with signs of past\nresearch, and then kneeling, or standing, or _pacing_, for your\nprayer--your prayer which is to be the very simplest (while most\nreverent) speech with the Lord.\n\nPRAY AS A PRIVATE CHRISTIAN.\n\nIn such acts of worship, morning and night, thought for others, for dear\nones, for parishioners, for colleagues, will have its full place of\ncourse. Let it be so, with an ever-growing sense of the preciousness of\nthe work of intercession. But I do meanwhile say to my Brother in\nChrist, take care that no pre-occupation with things pastoral allows you\nto forget the supreme need of drawing out of Christ's fulness, and out\nof the treasures of His Word, for _your own_ soul and life, as if that\nwere the one and solitary soul and life in existence. We Clergy are in\ndanger of becoming too official, too clerical, even in our prayers. We\n_are_ the Lord's Ministers; we have a cure and charge of souls as the\nunordained Christian has not; and let us daily remember it, humbly and\nreverently. But also we are, all the while, sheep of the flock,\nabsolutely dependent on the Shepherd, men who for their own souls'\nacceptance, and holiness, and heaven, must for themselves \"live at the\nFountain.\" We have to serve others, and \"lay ourselves out\" for them,\ndaily and hourly. But on that very account, that \"our selves\" may be, if\nI may say so, worth the laying out, we must see that \"our selves\" are,\nin their own innermost life and experience, filled with the Spirit of\nGod, filled with the presence of an indwelling Lord Jesus Christ by the\nSpirit. And so we must worship Him, and draw on Him, and abide in Him,\nand acquaint ourselves with Him, just as if there were no flock at all,\nthat we may the better be of use to the flock.\n\nLIVE BEHIND YOUR MINISTRY.\n\nI am sure that this is an important point for the thought and practice\nof the young Clergyman. While never really forgetting his ordained\ncharacter, let him, for the very purposes of his ordained work,\ncontinually \"live behind\" not only the work but the character; living in\nthe presence, in the love, in the life, of his Lord and Head, simply in\nthe character of the redeemed sinner, the personal believer, the glad\nyounger Brother of the glorious Firstborn, the living Christian with the\nliving Christ; \"knowing whom he has believed,\" [2 Tim. i. 12.] and\nwalking by faith in Him.\n\nFOR THE MINISTRY'S SAKE.\n\nDo you so live, by His grace and mercy? Is the sitting-room and the\nbedroom of your curacy-lodging the place where you habitually hold\nintercourse in this holy simplicity with Him who has loved you and given\nHimself for you? Then I venture to say that all the more for this, by\nthat same grace and mercy, you shall be enabled to \"lay yourself out\"\nfor others, in your pastoral charge. You shall understand other men\nbetter, by thus securing for your own soul a deeper understanding of the\nLord Jesus and a fuller sympathy (if the word is reverent) with Him. I\nhardly care to analyze how, but somehow, you shall more readily and\nclosely \"get at\" men through this direct, simple, unofficial, unclerical\ndrawing very near indeed to God in Christ. The more you know Him thus at\n_first-hand_ the more shall you understand alike the needs of the human\nheart (of which all individual hearts are but various instances), and\nthe supplies that are laid up for all its needs in Him. And so you\nshall go out among your people armed, equipped, with a truly\nheaven-given sympathy and tact. True personal intercourse with the Lord,\nthe very closest and deepest, is the very thing to open the whole man\nout for others, and to teach him how, with a loving intuition, to look\ninto them and \"upon their things.\" [Phil. ii. 4.]\n\nA HYMN.\n\nIn the next Chapter I shall speak a little more about the young\nClergyman's secret devotion, and secret study of the heavenly Word. But\nenough for the present. And let me close with the quotation of a\nhymn,[1] a new friend of mine, but already a very dear one, and\nthankfully added to the treasures of memory. It puts in the simplest\nform possible, while in a form most beautiful, the vital truth that\n\"intercourse with God is the power for holy service.\" Happy the young\nClergyman whose secret daily life, from its beginning in the \"Morning\nWatch,\" on through the intercourse and energies of the day, up to the\nevening hour of weariness and repose, is a translation into experience\nof that blessed hymn.\n\n[1] By G.M. TAYLOR: _Hymns of Consecration and Faith_ (Second Edition),\nNo. 349.\n\n\n\"TELL HIM ALL.\"\n\n \"When thou wakest in the morning,\n Ere thou tread the untried way\n Of the lot that lies before thee\n Through the coming busy day;\n Whether sunbeams promise brightness,\n Whether dim forebodings fall,\n Be thy dawning glad or gloomy,\n Go to Jesus--tell Him all!\n\n \"In the calm of sweet communion\n Let thy daily work be done;\n In the peace of soul out-pouring\n Care be banish'd, patience won\n And if earth with its enchantments\n Seek thy spirit to enthral,\n Ere thou listen, ere thou answer--\n Turn to Jesus--tell Him all!\n\n \"Then, as hour by hour glides by thee,\n Thou wilt blessed guidance know;\n Thine own burthens being lighten'd,\n Thou canst bear another's woe;\n Thou canst help the weak ones onward;\n Thou canst raise up those that fall;\n But, remember, while thou servest,\n Still tell Jesus--tell Him all!\n\n \"And if weariness creep o'er thee\n As the day wears to its close,\n Or if sudden fierce temptation\n Bring thee face to face with foes--\n In thy weakness, in thy peril,\n Raise to heaven a truthful call;\n STRENGTH AND CALM FOR EVERY CRISIS\n COME--IN TELLING JESUS ALL.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\n_THE SECRET WALK WITH GOD_ (ii).\n\n\n _He that would to others give\n Let him take from Jesus still;\n They who deepest in Him live\n Flow furthest at His will._\n\n\nI resume the rich subject of Secret Devotion, Secret Communion with God.\nNot that I wish to enter in detail on either the theory or the practice\nof prayer in secret; as I have attempted to do already in a little book\nwhich I may venture here to mention, _Secret Prayer_. My aim at present,\nas I talk to my younger Brethren in the Ministry, is far rather to lay\nall possible stress on the vital importance of the habit, however it may\nprove best in individual experience to order it in practice. \"As a man\nthinketh in his heart, so is he\" [Prov. xxiii. 7.]; and as a life\nworketh in its heart, so is it. And the heart of a Christian Minister's\nlife is the man's Secret Communion with God.\n\nLet us Clergymen take as one of our mottoes that deeply suggestive word\nof the Lord by Malachi, where the ideal Levi is depicted: \"_He walked\nwith Me_ in peace and equity, and did turn many away from iniquity.\"\n[Mal. ii. 6.]\n\nTHE LORD'S EXAMPLE.\n\nRemember with what a heavenly brightness that principle was glorified in\nthe recorded life on earth of \"the great Shepherd of the sheep,\" [SN:\nHeb. xiii. 20.] who in this also \"left us an example, that we should\nfollow His steps.\" [1 Pet. ii. 22.] Never did man walk more genuinely\nwith men than the Son of Man, whether it was among the needy and wistful\ncrowds in streets or on hill-sides, or at the dinner-table of the\nPharisee, or in the homes of Nazareth, Cana, and Bethany. No Christian\nwas ever so \"practical\" as Jesus Christ. No disciple ever so directly\nand sympathetically \"served his own generation by the will of God\" [Acts\nxiii. 36.] as did the blessed Master. But all the while \"His soul dwelt\napart\" in the Father's presence, and there continually rested and was\nrefreshed, [John iv. 32, 34.] and there found the \"meat\" in the strength\nof which He travelled that great pilgrimage by way of the Cross to the\nThrone. Jesus Christ, our Exemplar as well as our Life, did indeed live\nbehind His work, behind His ministry, behind His ministerial character,\nin the region of a Filial Communion in which His Father was His all in\nall for peace and joy, His law of action and His eternal secret of life.\nAnd observe, this habitual communion in the midst of active service did\nnot at all supersede in His blessed experience the stated and definite\nwork of worship and petition before and after the busy hours of service.\n\"He was alone, praying\" [John vi. 57.]; \"He continued all night in\nprayer to God\"; and at last, \"He was withdrawn from them about a stone's\ncast, and kneeled down and prayed.\" [Luke ix. 18; vi. 12; xxii. 41.]\n\nAll this is not only matter for wondering notice, as we read our New\nTestament. It is example, it is model. The Head is thus showing His\nmembers the way, the only way, to maintain a life among men and for men\nwhich shall be full of good for them, because itself ever filled with\nthe life and presence of God.\n\nTESTIMONY OF LUCIUS VON MACHTHOLF.\n\nFrom a leaflet which came long ago into my hands, I quote the experience\nof a German Christian, eminently successful in spiritual work; a\npassage which will illustrate and bring home my appeal in this whole\nmatter:--\n\n\"When Lucius von Machtholf was asked how he carried on religious\nintercourse with individuals, he wrote:--'I know no other tactics than\n_first of all to be heartily satisfied with my God_, even if He should\nfavour me with no sensible visible blessing in my vocation. Also to\nremember that preaching and conversation are not so much _my_ work as\nthe outcome of the love and joy of the Holy Ghost in my heart, and,\nafterwards, on my lips. Further, that I must never depend upon any\nprevious fervour or prayers of mine, but upon God's mercy and Christ's\ndearly-purchased rights and holy intercession; and cherishing a burning\nlove to Christ and to souls, I must constantly seek for wisdom and\ngentleness.... Finally, I would guard myself from imagining that I know\nbeforehand what I should say, but go to Christ for every good word I\nhave to speak, even to a child, and submit myself to the Holy Spirit, as\nthe Searcher of hearts, who, knowing the individuals I have to do with,\nwill guide and teach me when, where, and how to speak.\n\n\"'Be always following, never going before. It were better to be sick in\na tent under a burning sun, and Jesus sitting at the tent door, than to\nbe enchanting a thousand listeners where Jesus was not. Be as a\nday-labourer only in God's harvest-field, ready to be first among the\nreapers in the tall corn, or just to sit and sharpen another's sickle.\nHave an eye to God's honour, and have no honour of your own to have an\neye to. Lay it in the dust and leave it there. Never let your inner life\nget low in your search for the lives of others.'\"\n\nI dare to say that this quotation contains no mere \"counsels of\nperfection,\" but principles which are indispensable for the Minister of\nJesus Christ who would be not only reputable, popular, and in the\nsuperficial sense of the word successful, but--what his dear Master\nwould have him be for His work. And the blessed spirit it suggests and\nexemplifies is a thing which cometh not in \"but by prayer\" and by at\nleast such fasting as takes the shape of a most watchful secret\nself-discipline. When von Machtholf speaks of \"never depending on\nprevious prayers\" it is obvious what he means; not that prayer should\nnot precede work, but that nothing should satisfy the worker short of a\nliving and present trust in a living and present Lord. But that trust is\nthe very thing which is developed, and prepared, and matured, in the\nlife of genuine secret intercourse, in which the Lord is dealt with as\nman dealeth with his friend, and gazed upon and (I may reverently say)\nstudied in His revealed Character, till the disciple does indeed \"know\n_whom_ he has believed,\" \"who He is that he should believe on Him.\" \"My\nsoul shall be satisfied ... when I remember Thee, when I meditate on\nThee, in the night watches,\" [2 Tim. i. 12; John ix. 36; Ps. lxiii. 5,\n6.] aye, and in the Morning Watch also.\n\nURGENT PRESENT NEED TO MAINTAIN SECRET DEVOTION.\n\nI know not how to get away from this subject; not only because of its\nintense connexion with the most blissful experiences of the believing\nsoul, but because of its unspeakably important bearing on the work of\nthe Ministry, the Ministry of our own time and of my reader's own\ngeneration. Never was there a period when the cry for enterprize and\npractical energy was louder; and God knows there is occasion enough for\nthe cry, and for the answering resolve. But never was there a time when\nthe need was greater to distinguish true from false secrets of energy,\nand to be content with nothing short of the deepest and most divine as\nour ultimate secret. Do you not well know what I mean? Is there not far\nand wide in the \"Christian world\"--I do not speak now of the exterior\nregions of avowed scepticism or indifference--a tendency to merge the\nwhole idea of religion in that of philanthropic benevolence, and thereby\nto draw inevitably the idea of philanthropy downward in the end into its\nleast noble manifestations? Is it not a fashionable thing to regard the\nChristian Ministry, for example, as a useful and ready mechanism with\nwhich to work out the social and sanitary amelioration of the lives of\nthe multitude, and so to take him to be the best qualified Clergyman who\nis, perhaps, the most \"muscular\" of Christians, or the cleverest at the\ninvention or superintendence of recreations on a large scale, or the\nquickest student and exponent of the principles or theories of political\neconomy, or possibly of socialistic enterprize? But all this may leave\nentirely out the very life-blood of what the New Testament means by the\nGospel of the grace of God; and in many, many cases it does entirely\nleave it out.\n\n*\"NATURALISM\" IN CHRISTIAN WORK.\n\nA conception of \"Church work\" is widely entertained, and thought to be\nadequate, out of which is practically dropped all the mystery, and all\nthe mercy; above all, the work and message of the atoning Cross and the\ndying Lamb; and the need of the sovereign grace of the Holy Ghost to\nbegin and carry out the Regeneration of the soul; and the depth of our\nFall; and the offered greatness and splendour of our New Creation; and\n\"that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of the great God and our\nSaviour Jesus Christ.\" [Tit. ii. 13.] It is just one wave of the great\nanti-supernatural tide of our time. Christian work is viewed as much as\npossible as man's work for man in this present world, under the example,\ndoubtless, of the beneficent life of our Lord, but not under the shadow\nof Calvary, nor in the light of Pentecost, nor in the definite prospect\nof an immortality of holy glory.\n\nHOW TO COUNTERACT IT.\n\nTo counteract this tendency, and to do so _in the right way_, is one of\nthe very noblest tasks set before the younger Clergy of the English\nChurch in our time. It is for them, under God, in a pre-eminent degree,\nto find out the secret, and then to live it out, how to be at once the\nperfectly genuine _man_, devoted to the service of men, carrying what he\nis and what he believes into the actual surroundings of modern life, not\nallowing illusions and poetic day-dreams to come between him and facts;\nand also the convinced, unwavering, spiritual _Christian_, conversant\nwith his own soul, and with his living Lord and Saviour, and with that\nsacred, unalterable written Word which that Saviour put into His\npeople's hands, never to be taken out of them. Nothing is more wanted at\npresent in the sphere of \"Church life and work,\" unless I am greatly\nmistaken, than a generation of young Clergymen (soon to be seniors) who\nshall conspicuously combine the best forms of practicality with an\nunmistakable chastened personal spirituality which is seen to be \"the\npulse of\" their busy \"machine.\" And if the spirituality is to be indeed\ngenuine (away with it if it is anything but genuine to the centre), if\nit is to be quite different on the one hand from a thing of artificial\nphrases, and on the other from merely formulated and regulated\ndevoutness, I am deeply sure that its only secret and preservative is a\nfully-maintained secret walk with God.\n\n\"GOD, I THANK THEE.\"\n\n\"I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing.\" [SN:\nRev. iii. 17.] Such was the thought and word of the Laodicean long ago.\nIs it not in effect the thought, if not the word, of not a few hard\nworkers and energetic enterprizers now? \"What do I want with the dialect\nof 'Christian experience'? What have I, with all these irons in the\nfire, and a strong hammer and a strong hand with which to strike them,\nwhat have I to do with 'old-world faiths' about sin and salvation, about\ngrace and conversion, about pardon and justification? What have I so\npressingly to do with much prayer, save in the form of much work? God, I\nthank Thee that I am a worker; let it be for others to dive into\nspiritual secrets, if it is good for them to do so.\"\n\n\"THOU KNOWEST NOT.\"\n\nI would not overdraw the picture. And the words I have put into a\npossible mouth are words which, if I heard, I hope I should hear with\nevery wish to judge them fairly and to see where any truth lay in them.\nBut none the less I am sure that those words not unjustly represent a\ntype of thought widely prevalent among even ministerial workers, and\nthat it is a type of thought pregnant with disaster for Christian work.\n\"Thou knowest not that thou art poor\"; \"I counsel thee, to buy of Me\";\n\"I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear My voice and open the\ndoor I will come in to him and sup with him, and he with Me.\" [Rev. iii.\n17, 18, 20.] So said Jesus Christ to the Laodicean. And though it may\nseem paradoxical to compare a man involved in the rush of modern \"Church\nwork\" with the Laodicean, the comparison may not be always far astray,\nnor the words of the Lord in Rev. iii. 18 out of place accordingly. To\nbe \"neither cold nor hot\" towards _Him_ is all too possible for us,\nalas, even when \"the irons in the fire\" are most numerous, and even when\nthey are being most briskly hammered.\n\nTO KNOW CHRIST IS INDISPENSABLE.\n\nSo let us listen, making a pause to do so. Perhaps just now the knock\nmay be audible, and certain articulate sounds may come from outside,\nsaying that a PERSON waits for readmission to HIS place in our busy,\nmultifarious life, and that HE can be content with nothing short of\nheart-intimacy with us, and that we, if we would not forsake our own\nmercy, must be content with nothing short of heart-intimacy with HIM.\n\n\"I counsel thee to _buy_ of Me.\" Let us do it; let us pay over, at His\nfeet, our poor fancied wealth of self's energies and undertakings (as\nregards our own good opinion of them), receiving from Him the heavenly\n\"gold\" of His own glorious grace and peace, and the \"white robe\" of a\nliving and loving conformity to His likeness, and the \"eye-salve\" of His\nillumination, in which we see things as He sees them. It is better, as\nvon Machtholf says it is, to have Him within the heart's chamber, at\nonce as Guest and as Host, in that blessed inter-communion, than to be\napparently the most successful of organizers or of toilers, strong in\nourselves, but without the secret of the Presence of the Lord.\n\nIt is scarcely needful, I trust, to explain what I do _not_ mean. My\nvery last intention is to speak slightingly of devoted work and\nself-sacrificing endeavours, whether or no they take the line which most\napproves itself to me. A _fain\u00c8ant_ in the English Ministry to-day is\nsomething worse than even a cumberer of the ground; he is, I dare to\nsay, like a upas upon it, blighting where he throws his shadow, so\nconspicuous and so deadly must be the example of such a life in the\nMinister of such a Gospel. But what I mean, again and again, is this,\nthat the days demand, along with a thoroughgoing while prudent\npracticality, more and more also of a profound reality of spiritual\nknowledge of the Lord in those who labour in His Name. With the growing\nstress of our time we _must_ have not less but more of this, in those\nwho are called to meet that stress. This is vital, if we would not be\nstifled and succumb as Christians altogether.\n\nSo this is my plea, dear Brother in the Ministry, now making your first\nessays in some great city parish, or wherever it may be: cultivate, as\nfor your life, secret intercourse with God.\n\nBIBLE STUDY.\n\nAnd with this view, I now say specially, cultivate such intercourse\n_laying His holy Word open before you_. I spoke in the previous Chapter\nof the Bible spread open by the evening lamp, the Bible marked with\nsigns of diligent search. With all my heart I mean to press that\nthought. It will be best to reserve for another Chapter certain\nsuggestions on methods of Bible study. But I may, and I will at once,\noffer a few words on the subject in general. It is a subject which lies\nnear my heart, and of the urgent importance of which I am very sure.\n\nTHE ORDINATION CHARGE.\n\nAbove all then I would entreat you to be a Bible student _at whatever\ncost of other religious reading_. It is a very common thing to\nsubstitute, practically, for the Bible a little library of _livres de\npi\u00c8t\u00c8_, as the French would call them, small \"good books.\" Not very long\nago, in the course of an ordination examination, I came across an\ninstructive instance. In answer to a question in a \"Pastoral Paper\" for\ncandidates for Priest's Orders, a thoughtful young Clergyman stated\nincidentally that he used every day with great profit certain devotional\nbooks, and that about twice a week he took for definite meditation and\nprayer a passage from the Gospels. It struck me that here was a strange\nand sad inversion of the right order of proportion; devotional books\ndaily, and the New Testament (in any sense of earnest meditative study)\nabout twice a week! Very different, I thought, is the view and teaching\nof the Church of England in this matter of the spiritual reading of her\nMinisters. What does the Church say, through the Bishop, when the Deacon\nis ordained Presbyter? \"Seeing that you cannot by any other means\ncompass the doing of so weighty a work, pertaining to the salvation of\nman, but with doctrine and exhortation taken out of the Holy Scriptures,\nand with a life agreeable to the same; consider how studious ye ought to\nbe in reading and learning the Scriptures.... We have good hope that you\nwill continually pray to God the Father, by the mediation of our only\nSaviour Jesus Christ, for the heavenly assistance of the Holy Ghost;\nthat, by daily reading and weighing of the Scriptures, ye may wax riper\nand stronger in your Ministry.\"\n\nAnd I need not go about to prove that the Church does not mean such\ndaily \"reading and weighing\" to wait till the young man is actually\nordained Priest. We should scarcely have had the First Homily of the\nFirst Book written, if such had been her mind. Have you ever read over\nthat \"Voice of the Church\"?\n\nM. HENRI LASSERRE ON DEVOTIONAL READING.\n\nA remarkable confirmation of my present contention comes to us from an\nunexpected quarter. I refer to the Preface prefixed by that ardent Roman\nCatholic, M. Henri Lasserre, to his remarkable French translation of the\nFour Gospels, the book which, December 4, 1886, received the cordial\nbenediction of Leo XIII., but within a twelvemonth, such is \"the power\nbehind the Pope,\" was placed on the _Index Expurgatorius_. Probably such\npassages as the following had much to do with this strange and sudden\nself-reversal of the judgment of the Vatican.\n\n\"A timid school,\" after the crisis of the Reformation, which finds, of\ncourse, little favour with M. Lasserre, and on which, very unjustly, he\nlays much of the blame of the practical prohibition of the Bible within\n\"the Catholic Church,\" \"a timid school tended thenceforth to strike from\nthe hands of believers the divine Book which makes the foundation of\nour faith, and laboured to substitute for it by degrees a pious\nliterature, intended to furnish hearts and minds with a nourishment\nsuited to their weakness, a diet without danger. Some of these books, we\nown without hesitation, are excellent in themselves, and have\ncontributed to the sanctification of many souls. However, this is the\nexception. In the majority of these works, where, alas, the sugar of\ndevotion takes the place of the salt of wisdom, the eternal truths and\nthe genuine teachings of the Gospel were soon diluted, and, as it were,\nlost in strange waters.... One and all, the better specimens and the\ndeplorable (_les lamentables_) alike, they are another thing altogether,\nyes, absolutely another thing, than the Gospel, whose apostolic mission\nthey have noiselessly usurped by an invasion insensible, I had almost\ncalled it clandestine.... The general ignorance of the Gospels has been\nthe one cause in France, these twenty years, of the success of the\nscandalous romance which appeared under the title of _La Vie de J\u00c8sus_.\nAmong a people moderately familiar with the narratives of St Matthew,\nSt Mark, St Luke, and St John ... there would have been no need to\nrefute it. Every one would have seen, without assistance, its flagrant\nfalsifications, its gross sophisms, its absolute emptiness. This\ndeep-seated and complex evil, this enervation of the Christian spirit,\nthis _an\u00camia_ (_cette an\u00c8mie_) of so many among us, are an object of\nsorrowful anxiety (_pr\u00c8occupation_) for the Catholic thinker\" (pp. x,\nxxv).\n\nCURRENT NEGLECT OF SCRIPTURE.\n\nFor the Protestant thinker too, within a Church which has now for\ncenturies, in every possible official way, pressed home the reading of\nthe Bible upon her every member, and of course upon her every Minister,\nthere is material for similar anxieties, _mutatis mutandis_. Bible\nstudy, such as our Lord and the Apostles enjoined and encouraged, is not\non the increase amongst us, to say the least of it; certainly the\nignorance of the blessed Book even among candidates for holy Orders is\nsometimes, is not seldom, very great indeed. Nay more, there is\nsometimes, however rarely as yet, an ominous disposition even in\nclerical circles to shelve the Bible. Quite lately I heard, on excellent\nauthority, that a certain large Clerical Society, revising its rules,\ndeliberately decided that the meetings shall _not_ in future be begun\nwith the reading of Scripture. My friend and Brother, do not swim even\non the edges of such a current. Swim with all your might, in your\nMaster's might, against it.\n\nREAD IT FOR YOUR OWN NEEDS.\n\nThen lastly I put in my plea, as I sought to do when we were considering\nthe matter of secret prayer, for such a secret study of the Word of God\nas shall be _unprofessional, unclerical, and simply Christian_. Resolve\nto \"read, mark, and inwardly digest\" so that not now the flock but the\nshepherd, that is to say you, \"may embrace and ever hold fast the\nblessed hope of everlasting life.\" It will be all the better for the\nflock. Forget sometimes, in the name of Jesus Christ, the pulpit, the\nmission-room, the Bible-class; open the Bible as simply as if you were\non Crusoe's island, and were destined to live and die there, alone with\nGod. You will be all the fresher, all the more sympathetic and to the\npoint, when you do come to speak to the listening people about the Book.\nThe discoveries which we make in it for our own souls are just the\nthings which we cannot help reporting so as to interest and attract our\nbrethren; as least, that is the sure tendency of things.\n\nBRIDGES AND WITSIUS ON BIBLE STUDY.\n\nLet me write out a slightly abbreviated extract from a golden book,\nunhappily no longer in print, _The Christian Ministry_, by that diligent\nstudent, loving and laborious Pastor, and heavenly-minded man, the\nremembrance of whom shines on me like a ray reflected from the Chief\nShepherd's face, the late Rev. Charles Bridges.[2]\n\n[2] He died at Hinton Martell, in Dorset, 1869.\n\n\"The maxim, _Bonus textuarius est bonus theologus_, marks a grand\nministerial qualification--'mighty in the Scriptures.' The importance of\nthis is beautifully expressed by Witsius: 'Let the theologian ascend\nfrom the lower school of natural study to the higher department of\nScripture, and sitting at the feet of God as his teacher, learn from His\nmouth the hidden mysteries of salvation, _which eye hath not seen nor\near heard, which none of the princes of this world knew_; which the most\naccurate reason cannot search out; which the heavenly chorus of angels,\nthough always beholding the face of God, _desire to look into_. In the\nhidden book of Scripture, and nowhere else, are opened the secrets of\nthe most sacred wisdom. Let the theologian delight in these sacred\nOracles; let him exercise himself in them day and night; let him\nmeditate in them; let him live in them; let him draw all his wisdom from\nthem; let him compare all his thoughts with them; let him embrace\nnothing in religion which he does not find there. The attentive study of\nthe Scriptures has a sort of constraining power. It fills the mind with\nthe most splendid form of heavenly truth. It soothes the mind with an\ninexpressible sweetness; it satisfies the sacred hunger and thirst for\nknowledge; ... it imprints its own testimony so firmly on the mind, that\nthe believing soul rests on it with the same security as if it had been\ncarried up into the third heaven and heard it from God's own mouth; it\ntouches all the affections, and breathes the sweetest fragrance of\nholiness upon the pious reader, even though he may not perhaps\ncomprehend the full extent of his reading.... We ought to draw our views\nof divine truths immediately from the Scriptures themselves, and to\nmake no other use of human writings than as indices marking those chief\npoints of theology from which we may be instructed in the mind of the\nLord'\" (pp. 79, 80, ed. 1830).\n\n * * * * *\n\nRIDLEY IN THE ORCHARD.\n\n\"In thy Orchard, Pembroke Hall,\" wrote Nicholas Ridley within a few days\nof his fiery martyrdom, \"(the wals, buts, and trees, if they could\nspeake, would beare me witnes), I learned without booke almost all\nPaules epistles, yea, and I weene all the Canonicall epistles, save only\nthe Apocalyps. Of which study, although in time a great part did depart\nfrom me, yet the sweete smell thereof I trust I shall cary with me into\nheaven; for the profite thereof I thinke I have felt in all my lyfe tyme\never after.\"\n\nAnd so shall it be with us also, if we go and do likewise in our \"lyfe\ntyme,\" our period, not at present of martyrdom but, God knoweth it, of\nneed.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\n_SECRET STUDY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES._\n\n\n _Like those Emmaus travellers we go\n Forth from the city-gate of things below;\n Christ at our side, His Scripture for our light,\n Here burning hearts and there the beatific sight._\n\n\nAlready I have broken ground to some extent in the all-important subject\nof private Bible Study. Let me now put before my reader and Brother a\nfew more detailed remarks and suggestions on that subject. Such is the\nholy Book, and such is the variety of possible modes of study, that all\nI can dream of doing is to touch some parts and sides of the matter\nwhich present themselves with special impressiveness to my own mind, or\nwhich experience of the needs of friends has suggested to me somewhat\nparticularly.\n\nHIGHER CRITICISM.\n\nTo discuss the sacred problems of Scripture Inspiration is not my\npurpose here. Elsewhere[3] I have attempted to deal with some of them.\nAll I would do here is, in view of what is truly a \"present necessity,\"\nto ask my Brethren, very deliberately, not to be in haste to take up\nwith the last and boldest word of what is called the Higher Criticism (I\nspeak particularly now of its application to the Old Testament), as if\nits \"advances\" were always towards light and fact. I have no complaint\nagainst the term Higher Criticism, which has a recognized place in\nliterary technical language, denoting that familiar and lawful process,\nthe study of books not for their grammar and style only, but in order to\ninfer from their whole phenomena what their age is, and their structure,\nand their character. The Higher Criticism is a term pointing not to\nmethods and results transcending ordinary intelligence, but to a study\nwhich aims \"higher\" than grammatical and textual questions considered as\nfinal. And thus of course the most earnest defender of the supernatural\ncharacter of the Scriptures may be, and very often is, as diligent a\n\"higher critic\" as the extremest anti-supernaturalist.\n\n[3] _Veni Creator_, ch. iii\n\nA PLEA FOR CAUTION.\n\nIt is not its definition in the abstract but its actual work and spirit,\nas seen in many leading instances, which constrain me to enter an\nearnest protest against a too easy confidence in this criticism of,\nparticularly, the Old Testament Scriptures. It is \"a thing to give us\npause\" when we are asked to accept it as proved, or at least as\nextremely probable, that righteous Abel is a myth; that there was\nlittle, if any, monotheism before Abraham; no theophany at Sinai; no\nWilderness-Tabernacle; no record of the conquest of Canaan written till\nlong generations after the event; not much written record at all till\nSamuel; few, if any, Psalms before the age of the Captivity, if not\nbefore the age of the Maccabees; certainly two if not more Isaiahs, and\nprobably hardly one Daniel; at least, that the book bearing his name\ndates from the second century before Christ, and is in fact a\nPalestinian story-book which has not, perhaps, even a nucleus of history\nwithin it. It ought to make us stop and think when we are told that\nIsaiah did not predict coming events; indeed (for the drift of this\nteaching goes very strongly in that direction), that predictive prophecy\nis hardly to be recognized anywhere; that it is better out of our\nthoughts; that it is but \"soothsaying\" after all, and that the true work\nof the prophet was not to fore-tell but to \"_forth_-tell,\" to proclaim\npresent and eternal principles, which again were not revealed to him\nfrom above but arrived at by intuitions and meditations within his own\nconsciousness. It is a grave thing to be asked to believe, as many would\nhave us do, that such was the lack of feeling for veracity in ancient\nJudah that Hilkiah, Jeremiah, and Huldah could arrange for the\n\"discovery\" of a fabricated Deuteronomy, and then (_see the narrative_\nin the Second Book of Kings) [xxii. 8-20.] get the prophetess to follow\nup the fabrication with awful denunciations--all fulfilled--in the name\nof THE LORD Himself. Such theories we are asked to hold in face of our\nMaster Christ's deliberate, persistent, manifold testimony to the\nsupernatural character and _authority_ of the Old Testament; to the\nsolidity of its records of fact, to the reality of its predictive\nelement--on which He stayed His sacred soul in Gethsemane, and on the\nCross itself. It is no longer a question of details, an inquiry whether\nthe numerals are invariably authentic and accurate; whether the minute\nparticulars of a king's death as told in Chronicles tally with the\naccount in Kings. It is a question whether the Old Testament at large is\nnot a singularly and flagrantly untrustworthy record. It is a question\nwhether its literature as a whole is not to be explained, practically,\nby \"natural causes\"; including a causation by deliberate, elaborate, and\ninterested untruth.\n\nA GRAVE ALTERNATIVE.\n\nIs it too much to say that the alternative has come to be this: Was our\nLord Himself right or very gravely wrong about the nature of Scripture?\nDid the Spirit of Pentecost guide the Apostles into all truth, or leave\nthem under a vast illusion in this central matter of their witness? \"Do\nnot follow this Book, young men; follow Christ\": so said a speaker of\nhigh Christian reputation, holding up a Bible, before a great gathering\nin America, not long ago. But what does this mean? Christ carries the\nBook in His hand; if you follow Him you must follow it. If you decline\nto follow the Book, your following Him is a following--so far as at\npresent you agree with Him, and not further.\n\nWITNESSES FOR SCRIPTURE.\n\nMeantime, what are some facts of the case, facts not nearly so well\nremembered now as they should be? One comprehensive fact is that the\ntestimony of nature and of history goes, as a whole, to affirm the\nveracity of the Scripture records, and to do so more and more pointedly\nas research advances. In a remarkable recent essay by the Duke of Argyll\n(_Nineteenth Century_, January, 1891), the growing accumulation of\ngeological evidence for a Great Flood, affecting at least the northern\nhemisphere, and falling within the human period, is forcibly set out by\na master hand. In the same paper is indicated the fast-gathering\nevidence, now digging up month by month from the soil of Palestine, to\nthe accuracy of the picture of Canaan drawn in the Pentateuch and\nJoshua. The Ordnance Survey of Sinai has amply shown that the geology of\nthe peninsula confirms down to minute details the record in Exodus.[4]\nAnd now the Oxford Arabic Professor is making it, at the least,\nextremely likely that the Hebrew written two centuries before Christ was\nmore modern by many generations than that presented by the Book of\nDaniel.[5]\n\n[4] See Sir J. DAWSON: _Modern Science in Bible Lands_, \"The Topography\nof the Exodus.\"\n\n[5] _See_ MARGOLIOUTH: _The Place of Ecclesiasticus in Semitic\nLiterature_.\n\nI am only indicating and suggesting. Remembering the curiously similar\nhistory of New Testament criticism during the recent past, some of its\nstages running out their course within my own memory, I cannot but\nthink, looking from the merely literary view-point, that the days are\nnot far off when the now powerful theories of revolutionary criticism\nwill seem improbable. And so I ask my younger Brethren at least _to\npause_ before going with the strong, deep stream.\n\nTHE DUKE OF ARGYLL QUOTED.\n\nLet me quote a few sentences from the Duke of Argyll's paper:--\n\nTHE WORK OF THE SPADE.\n\n\"The assumption ... that precision in research is undermining the credit\nof the Hebrew Scriptures, is a presumption almost comically at variance\nwith fact. There is, in particular, one 'weapon of precision' which has\nof late been working wonders in precisely the opposite direction. That\nweapon is the spade. And what has it been unearthing? Everywhere over\nthat narrow strip of our planet on which its human interests have been\nmost impressive and profound--everywhere from Tyre and Sidon, from\nCarmel and Lebanon, on the west, to Babylon and Nineveh and the boundary\nmountains of Assyria on the east--the spade has been disentombing\ncontinuous and triumphant proof of the genuine antiquity and historical\ncharacter of the Jewish books.... Only the other day Mr Flinders Petrie\nhas told us how the spade has uncovered those impregnable walls of the\nAmorite cities which were reported to invading Israel by the spies of\nMoses....\n\n\"I may be permitted to express a very strong opinion that in recent\nyears Christian writers have been far too shy and timid in defending one\nof the oldest and strongest outworks of Christian theology. I mean the\nelement of true prediction in Hebrew prophecy. It may be true that in a\nformer generation too exclusive attention had been paid to it.... But\nthe reaction has been excessive and irrational. A great mass of\nconnected facts, and of continuous evidence, remains--which cannot be\ngainsaid. Even if the greater prophets can be brought down to the very\nlatest date which the very latest fancies can assign to them, they\ndepict and predict overthrows and vast revolutions in the East which did\nnot take place for centuries\" (pp. 28, 30).[6]\n\n[6] \"Professor Huxley speaks of the hopeless position of Christian\ndivines 'raked by the fatal weapons of precision with which the _enfants\nperdus_ of the advancing forces of science are armed.'... Perhaps he\nmeans the small arms of the modern critical school. If he does, then\nprecision is the very last characteristic which belongs to it. Its\nmethods are largely subjective. Here and there it may have a clearly\nascertained fact to rest upon. Here and there it may have arrived at\nsome tolerably secure results. But in the main its methods are\nmetaphysical, resting on nothing but individual preconceptions, applying\ntests and private canons of interpretation which are purely arbitrary\"\n(_Ibid._, p. 28).\n\n * * * * *\n\nPREDICTION.\n\nThe analysis of prophetic _consciousness_ may be, and in a great measure\nis, impossible. But the facts of prediction remain. It remains that our\nLord Himself predicted. He foretold minutely His own death, and the end\nof the City and the Temple, and the circumstances of the close of this\n\u00caon. Was He \"soothsaying\"? It remains that He perpetually and most\nemphatically claimed to be the exact Fulfilment of predictions which,\non any hypothesis, were then ages old. Was He mistaken in their\ncharacter and quality?\n\nCHRIST'S WITNESS TO THE BIBLE.\n\nIn those last words I step, as I well know, upon a field of the most\nurgent controversy. What is the weight to be assigned to our ever\nblessed Lord's verdict upon the Old Testament as history and prophecy?\nIt is now asserted, and by Christian men, that that verdict is not\nfinal; that He in the days of His flesh so submitted to human\nlimitations that He was liable to mistakes of fact just as His best\ncontemporaries were; that we adore Christ, and rely absolutely on Him,\nbut it is on Christ not as He was but as He is, the glorified Christ.\nHere is an unspeakably overawing subject. I would not treat of it as if\nthe question could be swept away in a sentence. But I do, as in our\nliving Master's presence, venture to say that His witness to the nature\nand character of the Old Scriptures claims definitely to be _ex\ncathedr\u201a_. True, He doubtless spoke in this matter, as elsewhere, not in\nwhat may be called the technical style; not every reference of His to\n\"Moses\" need necessarily mean to assert precisely that Moses wrote\nevery clause of the Pentateuch. But the present question goes, as we\nhave remembered, much deeper. It asks whether or no the Lord Jesus was\naltogether and in principle mistaken. He treated the Law, Prophets, and\nPsalms as a solid structure of historic fact and supernatural promise,\ndivinely planned all through, divinely carried out and up from the\nfoundation, and leading straight up to Himself. Was it all the time true\nthat large parts of them were no more historical than the False\nDecretals on which the high Papal claims were built?[7]\n\n[7] I may remind the reader that about the middle of the ninth century\nthere were published, by one Isidore, a collection of decisions and\ndecrees, purporting to be by the earliest Bishops of Rome, all\nsupporting the Papal claims as known in the Middle Ages. The collection\nwas afterwards increased, and in the middle of the twelfth century\nengrafted into Gratian's _Decretum_, on which is based the Canon Law of\nthe Roman Church. These documents are undoubtedly fabrications long\nafter date.\n\nIf we revise the opinion of our Redeemer on this conspicuous point of\nHis teaching, where shall we securely pause? Certainly we cannot\n_securely_ trust, as oracular and final, His own predictions of things\nstill future, at least in their details.\n\nHE HAS AFFIRMED IT FROM ABOVE.\n\nOne great utterance is often quoted as a confession that His conscious\nknowledge had limits; Mark xiii. 32. Quite true; but what sort of\nconfession is it? It indicates in its very terms the vastness of His\nsupernatural knowledge; asserting His cognizance of the fact that _the\nangels in heaven did not know_ that day and hour. Such an avowal of\nnescience is an implicit assertion of an immeasurable insight.\n\nAnd has He not, _as the glorified Christ_, thrown a light of affirmation\non the \"opinions\" of the days of His flesh? The glorified Christ sent\ndown the Paraclete. And the first and abiding work of the Paraclete was\nto illuminate the Apostles with a new understanding of the truth and\nglory of the Old Scriptures, altogether in the lines of their crucified\nMaster's teaching about them. Unless indeed Resurrection, and Ascension,\nand Pentecost are themselves to melt into the haze of myth! The New\nTestament is as full of the supernatural as the Old.\n\nReverently and humbly, and with full recognition of a large place and\nlawful work for a true higher criticism in the literature of the Old\nTestament, and of the New, I yet decline to think that our Lord's\nestimate of the nature of the Bible is not to be final for me, and that\nHis reasonings from it are to be revised, while yet I adore Him as my\nLight, my Life, and my God. And I ask my Brethren to pause many times,\nand on their knees, before they think otherwise.\n\nPRESENT FULFILMENTS OF PROPHECY.\n\nAs regards prediction, let them look around them. Two great fulfilments\nof Old Testament prediction are going forward at this moment. One is,\nthe vast work of missions, whose whole aim is to make known \"to the ends\nof the earth\" the Name of Messiah, Son of David, Son of Abraham, Son of\nGod. The other is, the dispersion and yet permanence of the Jewish race,\nand (may I not add, in view of the facts of the last few years?) the\nbeginnings of a re-population of Palestine by the Jews. Credible\nstatistics assure us that they are now returning to their old land at\nthe rate of many thousands in a year. True, no \"miracle\" brings them\nback. But no thoughtful student has ever said that the miracle of\nprediction demands miracle in the circumstances of the fulfilment.\n\nBIBLE READING IS THE BEST DEFENCE OF THE BIBLE.\n\nI have gone beyond my intended length in these observations.[8] The\npresent urgency of the subject, which encounters us everywhere, is my\napology. But now, all the more gladly for the delay, I hasten to a few\nsimple words of suggestion on that practical duty of Secret Bible\nReading which is, after all, the best and surest antidote and\npreservative against scepticism about the Bible, if it is carried on at\nonce thoroughly, intelligently, and as before the Lord. Vain without it,\nworse than vain, will be the most diligent and successful study of the\napologetics of the Bible. For the Bible was given to be, not a\nbattle-field, but a field of wheat, and pasturage, and flowers, and a\ngold-field also all the while.\n\n[8] (I) have elsewhere called attention to the following among works\nhelpful at present in the controversy about Scripture: Lord Hatherley's\n_Continuity of Scripture_, Dr Waller's _Authoritative Inspiration_, Dr\nCave's _Inspiration of the Old Testament_. Let me add four able popular\ntractates: Cave's _Battle of the Standpoints_ (Queen's Printers),\nEckersley's _Historical Value of the Old Testament_ (Society for\nPromoting Christian Knowledge), G. Carlyle's _Moses and the Prophets_\nand Seaver's _Authority of Christ_ (Elliot Stock). Dr Liddon's memorable\nsermon, _The Worth of the Old Testament_, is full of helpful\nsuggestions. See too Professor Leathes' _Witness of the Old Testament to\nChrist_, Sir J.W. Dawson's _Modern Science in Bible Lands_, and Bishop\nHarold Browne's _Messiah Foretold_. I specially call attention to Canon\nR. Girdlestone's recent book, the work of a master, _The Foundations of\nthe Bible_, most temperate, judicial, solid, and establishing; and to\nthis must be added now (1892) Bishop Ellicott's excellent Charge,\npublished by the S.P.C.K. under the title _Christus Comprobator_.\n\nHow then shall I read my Bible so as at once spiritually and mentally to\nknow it, or rather, to be always getting to know it? The answer must\nbe--\"at sundry times and in divers manners.\" I must make time to read\noften, however brief each time may be. And I must use methods of study,\nmore than one, in parallel lines.\n\nAs a sort of ground-work to all other methods I venture first to say, be\nalways reading the Bible _through_, however slowly, or rapidly. For\ncertain purposes, for instance in order to grasp the scope of a book, as\nperhaps an Epistle, or the Revelation, or St John's Gospel, or the\nlatter half of Isaiah, or the Book of Genesis,[9] rapid reading may be\nquite reverently done. In any case, get as soon as you may, and as\noften as is practicable and practical, over _the whole surface_. Lord\nHatherley, amidst the heavy occupations of a barrister's and judge's\nlife, used to read the whole Book through carefully every year, and this\nfor more than thirty years. I cannot say that I do the same. But I aim\nto read the Bible over carefully within every few years.\n\n[9] To touch on a very small point I write here \"the Book of Genesis,\"\nnot \"the Book Genesis.\" English literature, if I do not mistake, is as\nunfamiliar with the latter phrase as it is with \"the city London.\"\n\nPLOUGH-HUSBANDRY.\n\nThen, practise what I would call the _plough-husbandry_ of the Book.\n\"Make long furrows.\" Investigate what the Scriptures have to say by\ntopics, by doctrines, by leading words, over great breadths of their\nsurface; keeping _that_ subject, _that_ word, all along in view. Bring\nall your mind to work that way, in the light of the Presence sought by\nprayer. An occasional special form of such study may be illustrated by\nthat admirable book, written long ago, but full of life still, the late\nProfessor Blunt's _Undesigned Coincidences_. I was thankful in my first\ndays of ministry to be led to put in practice its examples and\nsuggestions by ploughing in the field of the New Testament for the\ncoincidences between the Gospel narrative and the allusions to our\nblessed Lord's life scattered over the Epistles.\n\nSPADE-HUSBANDRY.\n\nThen, practise also a diligent _spade-husbandry_ in your Bible study.\nDig as well as plough. In each narrow plot of the great field there are\ntreasures hid. Dig a verse sometimes, using perhaps the spade of\nparallel references. Dig a paragraph at other times; a chapter; a short\nbook. You are quite sure, under the blessing of the Master of the Field,\nto bring up rich results, more or less.\n\nI will close my talk upon the Bible by offering a specimen of such\nspade-husbandry. A few years ago, at the Church Congress at Wakefield, I\nread a paper on Bible-reading. It mainly took the line of recommending\nearnestly the use of the Biblical student's \"spade,\" and then it\nillustrated the recommendation by the following \"spade-study\" of the\nEpistle of St Paul to the Philippians; given here just as it was read.\n\n * * * * *\n\nA CHURCH CONGRESS PAPER ON BIBLE STUDY.\n\n\"It has been laid on me to say a few words on the devotional study of\nthe Holy Scriptures, taking some one Book of Scripture, and in some\nsort exemplifying such study from it. I accept the theme, with a deep\nsense both of its opportuneness in our busy period, so full of\ntemptations to the Christian Minister to postpone his Bible-study to\nother things, and of its sacred, paramount, vital importance. May our\ndivine and sovereign Master be pleased to use my simple suggestions to\ncall once more the attention especially of His ordained servants to the\nurgency of our need to be personal Bible-students before Him, and to the\nstrength and joy that lies in such study, really pursued. He, in the\ndays of His flesh, was the supreme Believer in the Bible, the supreme\nLover, Student, Expositor, and Employer of the Bible. With the letter of\nthe Bible He sustained Himself and quelled the Enemy in the Temptation,\nand the quotations He then selected suggest the minuteness of His study.\nUpon the written Word He spent the whole Easter afternoon. Accepted\nSacrifice for Sin, Conqueror of Death, Lord and Head of Life, He had\ncome that morning from the grave; and He came as it were holding the\nScriptures in His hands.\n\n\"He found around Him in those earthly days a mass of religious popular\nopinions, and He spoke His holy mind freely against the false among\nthem. But there was one opinion which He noticed only to sanction, to\nsanctify, to glorify. It was the opinion that the Scriptures were\ndivine, were charged with the authority of God.\n\n\"I pray to Him, and trust Him, my Master and Lord, to hold me now humbly\nfirm to the end, after many a struggle, in His opinion of the Holy\nScriptures. I would enter into, as He abode in, their rest; therefore I\naccept, as He accepted, their yoke. I would feel what He felt, that\nliving incitement to their study which is indissolubly bound up, if I\nmistake not, with the firm persuasion of their supernatural character\nand authority. I would read them, as He read them, above all things to\nact upon them in the life which we, His followers, have in Him; that\nlife whose exercise and outcome means our whole walk here as well as\nhereafter. I would regard them, as it is apparent that He regarded them,\nas being (in a sacred sense) self-sufficient; not, indeed, to the\nself-sufficient reader, but to the reader who prays in reverent\nsimplicity that the Holy Spirit may dispel every moral mist, every\nhindrance of heart and will, from between him and the meaning of the\nwritten Word; and who intends in truthful sincerity to consent to, to\nobey, the discovered meaning; and who is taking pains over the Book.\n\n\"It is a great joy to know how entirely this was the view of the matter\nheld, and loved, and taught in the ancient Church. Is there anything\nabout which there is a larger consent of the Fathers? St Athanasius\nloves to dilate on the [Greek: autarkeia], the self-sufficingness, of\n'the divine Scriptures.' St Cyril of Jerusalem entreats his hearers to\nguide and fix their belief by the reading of the Canonical books. St\nChrysostom boldly accounts for all mischiefs by the lack of personal\nacquaintance with the Scriptures.\n\n\"We are in the nineteenth century, almost in the twentieth, and perhaps\nwe therefore need, even more than our elder brethren of the fourth, to\nrenew our energies in Scripture-study by prayerful, painstaking\nrecollection of what the Book is. We need an ever fresh realization of\nwhat it is immortally, unalterably; the divinely trustworthy, and\ntherefore authoritative, account of God's mind, and specially and above\nall of God's mind concerning Jesus Christ and our relations to Him, our\nlife by Him, our peace, and power, and hope, in Him. And it is a few\nwords about this aspect of Scripture, and the search of Scripture, that\nI now lay before you, with humility and simplicity of purpose, in the\nway of a description and example of a sort of study that has been a\ngreat blessing to myself.\n\n\"Take one of the holy Books, or a section of one of them; and for this\npurpose shorter is better. By a certain exercise of imagination suppose\nyourself to be reading a _newly-discovered_ fragment of the apostolic\nage. Treat it somewhat as many of us have recently sought to treat\nBryennius' discovery, _The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles_. What\nmicroscopic attention has been brought to bear upon that little book,\njust because good evidence gives it a place in the first century, and\nbecause it speaks of Christ, and of Christians; of faith, worship,\nministry, and life, in a part of the primeval Church! Now I attempt from\ntime to time, reverently but very simply, to treat some inspired Epistle\nsomewhat in the same way. I place myself before it as much as possible\nas if it were new to me and others. I seek, with something of the\ncuriosity which such conditions would create, to collect and arrange its\ntheology and its ethics. And then I bring in upon the results of my\nstudy the fact that it is God's Word, the Word which I am to embrace,\nand live upon, and act upon, to-day.\n\n\"For example and suggestion, let us turn to the EPISTLE TO THE\nPHILIPPIANS; few but golden pages, precious product of those two years\nof St Paul's physical imprisonment but blissful spiritual liberty. To\nstimulate our consciousness of what the Epistle contains to reward\nsearch, and search alone, let us try to place it before us as what it is\nnot now, but once was, a newly-given oracle of God. It was once read for\nthe first time, perhaps in the house of Lydia. Let it be to us, so far\nas thought can make it so, what it was then. And let us remember all\nthe while that it is really even now new, for it is immortal with the\nbreath of the Spirit of God. It not only 'abideth,' but 'liveth,' for\never.\n\n\"Let us take two titles under which to classify the results of our\ninspection of this primitive Document. First, its doctrine of Christ;\nthen, its doctrine of Christian Life. As a subordinate third title we\nmay collect what it indicates of Christian life as exemplified in the\nWriter's allusions to his own experience.\n\n\"I.--The Christology of the Epistle.\n\n\"(1) We trace hints of the _human history_ of Christ. He was man, in\nreality and in seeming; He died a death of suffering, the death of the\nCross [ii. 7, 8; iii. 10.]; He rose again, for there is a power of His\nResurrection; [iii. 10.] and, apparently, He so left this earth that it\nwas known that an immeasurable exaltation attended His going, so that\nthe heavens are now His seat [ii. 9.], from which He is definitely\nexpected to return. [iii. 20.]\n\n\"(2) Going back to antecedent and prehistoric matters of faith about\nHim, we find here that before He became man He subsisted in possession,\nlawful and natural, of the manifested reality [Greek: morph\u00cd] of\nGodhead, equal to God [ii. 6.]. His appearance as man was the sequel of\nHis own action of will in that eternal state [ii. 7.]. It was a novel\nand voluntary assumption of the condition of the Bondservant, the\n[Greek: Doulos], of God. Antecedently possessing the [Greek: morph\u00cd] of\nGod, He now _de novo_ 'took' the [Greek: morph\u00cd] of a bondservant. What\ncreated beings in general are of course, God's bondservants, He had not\nbeen but now became; a fact as astonishing in its region as the fact of\nHis possession of the Supreme Nature is in its region. He assumed this\n[Greek: douleia], we find, because His essential work was to obey, to\n'become obeying,' yes, to the extent of death [ii. 8.]; which death was\nthus in Him altogether voluntary, part of a free undertaking to be not\nHis own. The immediate result for Himself, it next appears, was an\nexaltation by God to supreme majesty under all these conditions. As\nbeing all this, possessor of Deity and accepter of bondservice, He was\nnow _de novo_ proclaimed as [Greek: Kyrios], as Lord, in a sense\ninterpreted by the adoration of the universe; to the glory of God His\nFather. For it repeatedly appears in the Epistle that God is His Father;\nHe is the Son of God [ii. 11.]. Further, all 'the riches of God in\nglory' [i. 2; ii. 11.] are 'in Him.' [iv. 19.] It appears that in His\nexaltation He is embodied still, for it is to likeness to the body of\nHis glory that the body of our humiliation is to be changed at His\nexpected return. He is Almighty 'to subdue all things,' and the\nsubjugation is 'to Himself.' [iii. 21.]\n\n\"(3) As regards His relation to His followers, such is it that their\nwhole life and every exercise of it is mysteriously but emphatically\nsaid to be IN HIM. He, the supreme Bondservant, is to them (we\ncontinually read) absolute Lord. His grace animates their spirit. The\ndivine Spirit ministered to them is His [i. 2; iv. 23.]. Their 'fruit of\nrighteousness' is generated and produced 'through' Him [i. 19.]. He is\nevermore and profoundly near to them. Their heart-emotions are 'in His\nheart.' [i. 11; iv. 5.] To believe in Him is their essential\ncharacteristic [i. 8.]. To suffer for Him is a special boon to them [i.\n29.]. They live in expectation of His return, His day. [i. 6, 10; ii.\n16; iii. 20.]\n\n\"II.--The Epistle's account of Christian Life, inward and outward.\n\n\"We gather that the disciples are saints, [Greek: hagioi], separated\nfrom self and sin to God; brethren to one another; the true Israel,\ncitizens of the City above [i. 1, 14; iii. 3, 20; iv. 21.]. Their being\nand life are so united to Christ, that they as Christians (and it is\nevidently assumed that this covers _everything_ for them) exist, and are\nto act, 'in Him.' In Him, we find, they are 'saints' and 'brethren' [i.\n1, 14; iv. 1, 2; ii. 29.]; in Him they are to 'stand fast'; to be 'of\none mind'; to 'receive one another'; to possess comfort, consolation; to\nglory; to rejoice [ii. 1; iii. 1, 3; iv. 4.]. It is solemnly guaranteed,\nunder certain most holy and happy conditions, that 'the peace of God\nHimself shall'--the promise is positive--'keep safe their hearts and\nthoughts in Him' [iv. 7.]; wonderful words, but perfectly distinct. In\nthem God 'has begun a good work, to be carried for its completion up to\nthe day of Christ'; and God is now 'working in them to will and to do\nfor the sake of' His plan and purpose [i. 6; ii. 13.]. It is laid upon\nthem accordingly, in the profound inner rest of such union, such\npossession, such submission, to 'work out their salvation,' to live out\ntheir life as the saved, with the 'fear and trembling' of sacred\nreverence [ii. 12.]. They are 'to look each not on his own things,' but\non the things of others, in their Lord's manner [ii. 4.]; to hold\ntogether in loving and courageous union for the Gospel, standing fast in\n'one soul,' under the 'one Spirit's' power; to keep their place in the\nmidst of evil surroundings as the 'children of God' [i. 28.] and the\n'light-bearers' of 'the message of life.' [ii. 16.] They are to abstain\ntotally, in the power of their life in Christ, from all sin, to 'do\nnothing' (I take all possible note of these '_alls_' and '_nothings_' as\nI study and classify) 'for strife or vainglory' [ii. 3.]; to be 'anxious\nabout nothing, but in everything' to tell God their desires; to 'do all\nthings without murmurings and disputings' [iv. 6; ii. 14.]; to be\n'unblamable, unhurtful, unblemished, God's children,' not in a\ndreamland, but in the realities of Philippian life; to bear fruit,\n'fruit of righteousness, which is through Jesus Christ,' [ii. 15.] and\nso to bear it that at last it shall turn out, in the day of the Lord,\nthat they are 'filled' with it [i. 11.]; every branch is laden. They\nare to let their 'moderation,' that is to say their yieldingness, their\nself-lessness, come out in common life, 'known to all men,' in the power\nof a 'Lord at hand' [iv. 5.]; to fill their thoughts with all that is\ngood, straightforward, chastened, pure [iv. 8.]; to 'mind' the things in\nheaven [iii. 20; ii.]; to have 'the mind of Christ'; to grow in\nspiritual perception, along with the growth of love [i. 9.]; to live the\nlife expressed in that profound summary, 'worshipping God in the Spirit\n(or, by the Spirit of God); exulting in Christ Jesus; having no\nconfidence in the flesh.' [iii. 3.]\n\n\"III.--The Life in Christ exemplified in the Writer.\n\n\"Here let us forget the Apostle, for he speaks wholly as the Christian,\nand in a way manifestly meant to be an instruction to all Christians. He\nappears, then, in our document, as one whom Christ has 'seized,' has\n'grasped' [iii. 12.]; as one who has discovered in Christ, and in Christ\nalone, the supreme Gain, the supreme Object of knowledge, the supreme\nSpiritual Power as the Risen One, [iii. 10.] the supreme Interest and\nReason of life [i. 20; iii. 7-14], the one possible supply of the\nunspeakable need of a valid Righteousness before the Judgment Seat. Yes,\nhe must be 'found in Him, having the righteousness which is from God on\nterms of faith,' [iii. 9.] the faith which enters into Christ. 'In\nChrist,' we discover, the Writer is, everywhere and always. His 'bonds'\nare 'in Christ'; his 'glory' is 'in Christ' [i. 13, 26.]; his hopes\nand trusts about the common events of life are 'in Christ'; in Christ he\nhas 'found the secret' how to do all, all he has to do, in peace [iv.\n19, 24.]. Christ fills his present life [iv. 13.]; when he dies, he will\nbe so 'with Christ' that it will be 'far better' than this present life,\nthough it is full of Christ [i. 21, 23.]. He is the willing but most\nreal bondservant of Christ [i. 1.]. His relations with Christ so fill\nhim with peace and the power of peace, that extremely irritating rivalry\nand opposition at Rome does not irritate him, but occasions holy joy,\nand the suspense about life and death in which Nero keeps him is\npowerless, wholly because of Christ [i. 12, etc.], to evoke anything\nbut a statement of the dilemma of blessings which life and death in the\nLord are to him [i. 21, etc.]. On the other hand, as the whole Epistle\nindicates, every pure human sensibility circulates naturally in this\nsupernatural atmosphere [_E.g._ ii. 27, 28; iv. 10.]. And meanwhile,\nthough 'perfect,' in respect of reality of union and communication with\nhis Lord, he is not yet 'perfected' in respect of application and\nresults; the goal, the prize, is yet to come. [iii. 12, 14.]\n\n\"And so I shut my Epistle to the Philippians, leaving very much more in\nit for the next occasion. Such a study has not demanded long hours. It\nhas asked only interest, purpose, and painstaking, a few such fragments\nof daily time as we must, yes, _must_, make and take for the Bible, if\nwe are not to starve our people and ourselves. Suffer me to repeat it\nwith deep earnestness; we must, we absolutely must, not merely\ndevotionally read but devotionally search and penetrate this divine\nBook. And what shall come of the effort? By the grace of God, sought in\nthe deep joy of a profound submission, it shall come that we shall each\none realize, with a vernal newness and delight, that Christ is mine;\nthat the springs and secrets of this life in Him are mine, for the\nrealities of my home, my parish, my study, my soul. I go (it is for each\none of us to say it) with renewed thirst and certainty to Him the\neternal Fountain; I live, I live, yet not I; and therefore I can work.\nIt will be 'with fear and trembling,' as I know myself to be indeed in\nthe eternal Presence; yet it will be also in the power-giving 'peace\nthat passeth understanding, keeping the heart and thoughts, in Christ\nJesus,' a keeping that is not meant to vanish outside holy places and\nholy hours, but to do its strongest and serenest work in the midst of\ncrookedness and perverseness, under the stress of toils and burthens, as\ntruly for me to-day as for the Philippians and their Teacher then.\"\n\n\n \"_The Spirit breathes upon the Word\n And brings the truth to sight;\n Precepts and promises afford\n A sanctifying light._\n\n \"_My soul rejoices to pursue\n The steps of Him I love,\n Till glory breaks upon my view\n In brighter worlds above._\"\n\n COWPER.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\n_THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (i.).\n\n\n _When the watcher in the dark\n Turns his lenses to the skies,\n Suddenly the starry spark\n Grows a world upon his eyes:\n Be my life a lens, that I\n So my Lord may magnify_\n\n\nWe come from the secrecies of the young Clergyman's life, from his walk\nalone with God in prayer and over His Word, to the subject of his common\ndaily intercourse. Let us think together of some of the duties,\nopportunities, risks, and safeguards of the ordinary day's experience.\n\nA WALK WITH GOD ALL DAY.\n\nA word presents itself to be said at once, about the connexion between\nthe secret and the common walk of the servant of God. The former is\nnever to _give way to_ the latter; it is to _run into_ it, underground.\n\"To walk with God _all day_\" is to be our distinct and practical\npurpose, and not merely a sweet sentiment and holy aspiration of the\nhymn-book. The man who prays in secret is to be the man who knows how\nto pray secretly in public. The man who pores over the Word all alone is\nto be the man who, out in the open field of life, \"sins not\" because he\nhas \"hid that Word in his heart\" [Ps. cxix. 11.]; and who, being called\nupon by circumstances, however casually, to show himself actually a true\n\"man of the Book,\" is internally ready to do so. Nothing short of \"a\nlife with Christ behind our work,\" always and everywhere, is to content\nus Pastors. To live that life is from one point of view our wonderful\n_privilege_, in our living union with our blessed Head. From another\npoint of view it is our truest and deepest _work_, as we watch and pray\nover our privilege, and draw upon our Head in the holy diligence of\nfaith.\n\nI have spoken already of this vital connexion between the walk with God\nin secret and the secret walk with God in public. But it bears\nreiteration. It is something gained if we only remind one another, with\nthe emphasis of repetition, that such a life is our bounden duty and our\nblissful possibility:--\n\n \"You may always be abiding, if you will, at Jesu's side;\n In the secret of His Presence you may every moment hide.\"[10]\n\n[10] I quote from a beautiful hymn, beginning, \"In the secret of His\nPresence.\" It is given in part in several recent hymn-books, but for its\ncomplete form see _From India's Coral Strand_, (_Home Words_ Office,\nPaternoster Buildings,) a collection of the poems of its gifted writer,\na Hindoo Christian lady, Miss E.L. Goreh.\n\nBut now, what will be the surface and expression of such a hidden life,\nas the young Clergyman passes through his busy common day?\n\nLIFE IN LODGINGS.\n\nLet me speak first of his life indoors, that is to say, probably, in his\nlodgings. There the day at least begins and ends; and, in more ways than\nhe is aware of till he sets himself to consider, he may--or may\nnot--glorify his Master _there_. He is quite certain to be watched,\nwhether the eyes are friendly or unfriendly to himself and to his\nmessage and ministry. He will be watched of course not only as a man but\nas a Minister. And the results of the observation may be most important,\nfor good or for evil, to the immediate observers; and they are pretty\nsure to reach many other people through them. \"What shall the harvest\nbe?\"\n\nSELF-RESPECT.\n\nLet one result be, a clear impression in the house that you, the new\nCurate, are a man of SELF-RESPECT. Perhaps that _word_ will not be used,\nany more than its Greek equivalent, [Greek: aid\u00d9s], that noble\npre-Christian ethical term which lay ready and waiting to be glorified\nby the Gospel. But let Self-respect be your principle and your practice,\nand it will leave its impression, by whatever word the impression may be\ndescribed. Let the man be seen by those who are about him, and who in\none way or another wait on him, to be _quite simple while quite refined_\nin ways and habits; to be active and wholesome in the hours he keeps; to\nhold self-indulgence under a strong bridle (shall I say, not least the\nself-indulgence which cannot do without the stimulant and without _the\npipe_?); and he will be in a fair way to commend his message indoors.\nLet him be seen, without the least affectation, but unmistakably, to\nfind his main interests, within doors as well as without, in his Lord\nand His cause and work; to be the avowed Christian at all hours; and he\nwill be doing hourly work for Christ. With it all, let him be seen to be\n\"gentle to others\" while \"to himself severe\"; let him, while always\nself-respectful, be always watchfully CONSIDERATE; and his light will\nshine; he will be an OEcolampadius, a _House-light_, indeed.\n\nCONSIDERATENESS.\n\nOn that last point I must dilate a little; on the point of\nConsiderateness. I remember a conversation a few years ago with one of\nour college servants, an excellent Christian woman, truly exemplary in\nevery duty. She was speaking of one of my dear student friends now\nlabouring for the Lord in a distant and difficult mission-field, and\ngiving him--after his departure from us--a tribute of most disinterested\npraise: \"Ah, Sir, he _was_ a consistent gentleman!\" And then she\ninstanced some of my friend's consistencies; and I observed that they\nall reduced themselves to one word--Considerateness. He was always\ntaking trouble, and always saving trouble. He was always finding out how\na little thought for others can save them much needless labour. The\nthings in question were not heroic. The thoughtfulness for others\nconcerned only such matters as the bath, and the shoes, and the clothes,\nand some small details of hospitality. But they meant a very great deal\nfor the hard-worked caretaker, and they were to her a means of quite\ndistinct \"edification,\" upbuilding, in the assurance that Christ and the\nGospel are indeed practical realities. I break no confidence when I add,\nby the way, that my friend had not always been thus \"a consistent\ngentleman.\" But the Lord had found him, and he had found the Lord, in\nthe midst of his University life; and he had learnt most deeply and\neffectually, at the feet of Jesus, the consistency of Considerateness.\n\nI do press this aspect of our daily walk with all earnestness on my\nyounger Brethren. I press it on them at least _to think about it_ with\npainstaking attention. No Christian man, as such, means for one moment\nto be selfish. But lack of attention does in very many cases indeed\nallow the real Christian to contract, or to continue, selfish habits.\nMany good men quite fail to realize how selfish, practically, it is to\nbe unpunctual. You have your understood mealtimes in your lodging. It\nmay not be always possible to keep strictly to them; the exigencies of\nwork may make it honestly necessary now and again to be out of time. But\nlet nothing less than duty do so for you. The breakfast kept standing\nbecause you are not up when you should be may very likely mean much\nneedless trouble and much domestic disarrangement. Guests often brought\nin without any notice may mean the same.\n\nSIMPLICITY AT TABLE.\n\nPerhaps I need not say, yet I will say it, that the consistent servant\nof God, whether at his own table or at his neighbour's, will \"take heed\nunto himself\" not even to _seem_ fastidious. There are some men about\nwhom, if you know them, you feel sure that they will _not_ choose the\nbest dish at the table; and there are others, I am afraid, about whom\nyou feel pretty sure that they will. One man will not think, or at least\nwill not seem to think, whether the meat is hot or cold; and another\nwill rather decidedly avoid the latter. Pardon the details; they have\nsomething very real to do with our Consistency.\n\nUSE OF THE TONGUE.\n\nAnd indeed we have need to ponder Consistency when we come to \"the\nunruly member.\" It is not often, perhaps, that the risks of the tongue\nare specially present in a bachelor's life in lodgings. But they are not\nabsent there. Friends come in, and we will suppose that you and they are\nwaited upon at your meal. What does the servant hear? Much talk about\nother and absent persons? Unkind or flippant criticisms? Idle, frivolous\nwords? Very likely not, thank God; for we do want to remember our Lord.\nBut let us take heed. Nothing is more conspicuously inconsistent in the\nChristian than needless, unloving discussion of the characters and lives\nof others; nothing is more keenly noticed when overheard; nothing more\nbreaks the spell of influence for God.\n\n \"_Quisquis amat dictis absentum rodere vitam,\n Hanc mensam vetitam noverit esse sibi._\"[11]\n\n[11] POSSIDONIUS: _De Vit\u201a Augustini_, c. 22.\n\nSuch was the memento which St Augustine had inscribed upon his\ndining-table. He found it necessary to remind the Bishops (_co\u00cepiscopi_)\nwhom he entertained not to misuse their ordained tongues. And the\nPastors of the nineteenth century need it still, quite as much as it was\nneeded in the fifth.\n\n\"SET A WATCH.\"\n\nIt is impossible, of course, to lay down exhaustive rules for the\nChristian guidance of conversation in detail. It is quite certain that\nthe Gospel does not prescribe, or intend, that we should never speak\nexcept about things spiritual, or even except about our special duties\nin the Ministry. But it is quite certain too that the Gospel does\nprescribe inexorably the utmost watchfulness and self-discipline in the\nmatter of the tongue, for all who name the Name of Christ. \"For every\nidle word that men shall speak they shall give account\" [Matt. xii.\n36.]; \"Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but such\nas is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the\nhearers\" [Eph. iv. 29.]; \"If any man among you seem to be devout\n([Greek: thr\u00cdskos]), and bridleth not his tongue, that man's devoutness\n([Greek: thr\u00cdkeia]) is vain\" [Jas. i. 26.]; \"Set a watch, O Lord, before\nmy lips.\" [Ps. cxli. 3.]\n\nLIFE IN A CLERGY-HOUSE.\n\nI may say a few words in this connexion about the peculiar call for care\nand consistency where a group of young Clergymen live together in a\n\"clergy-house.\"\n\n*ITS OPPORTUNITIES AND NEEDS.\n\nIt seems to me that such groups must in the nature of the case be\n_either_ means of the greatest good in the mutual intercourse of their\nmembers, _or_ just the opposite. As sure as _corruptio optimi est\npessima_, so sure it is that the young Clergyman who is not consistent\nin temper, word, and habit, is the most unhelpful specimen of the young\nman; just because of the discord between his ministerial character and\nhis personal. And if, say, three or four young servants of God (by\nprofession) domicile together and are _not_ consistent, I am afraid they\nwill positively and actively draw one another, without in the least\nmeaning to do so, away from the mind of Christ and the walk with God. Do\nthey allow themselves to engage in trivial foolish, unkind talk? Do they\nso valiantly determine \"not to be goody-goody\" as tacitly to avoid all\nopen-hearted, loving, reverent conversation about their Lord and His\ntruth? Are they much fonder of endless argument than of the Word of God\nand prayer? Do their united devotions tend to be formal and perfunctory?\nDo they (I come back to that point again) \"bridle not their tongues\"\nabout the absent, about those over them, about those who differ from\nthem? Then they are doing each other harm, at a rapid rate, by their\ncollocation. On the other hand, are they each for himself living close\nto their Master and Friend in the secret chamber and in the inner heart?\nAre they walking humbly and gladly with their God, much in prayer, and\nhaving the Scriptures often open? And are they considering one another,\nto provoke unto love and to good works? Are they remembering generally\nand habitually the sacredness of the duty of mutual influence and\nexample, in personal habits, and otherwise? Are they determined each for\nhimself to help his brethren in all things pure, and just, and lovable,\nand of good report, and to strengthen them to endure hardness, and not\nto be ashamed of the blessed Name? Then they are blessing one another in\nChrist, as few men otherwise can do. But personal, individual\nconsistency is the absolute requisite to this; each man must follow the\nLord _for himself_ in faith and fear.\n\nTHE DUTY OF EXAMPLE.\n\nI spoke just above of the sacredness of the duty of example. It is a\ntheme on which I entreat my younger Brethren very often to reflect,\nwith self-scrutiny before their Master: I may be wrong, but I cannot\nhelp thinking that here is a duty which is decidedly less remembered\nnow, among young Christian men, than it was in other days. With\nexceptions many and bright, I yet fear that there is a decline in this\nmatter as a rule. That unhappy _individualism_ which is the bane of our\nday, and which is the fatal enemy of all true and healthy\n_individuality_, breathes its malaria through even earnest Christian\ncircles. In the formation or allowance of personal habits, in\nparticular, it is sadly common to see young Christian men practically\nquite forgetful of the power and responsibility of example. I do not\nthink that this was quite so common twenty or thirty years ago. Not that\nI wish to take up the futile part of a mere _laudator temporis acti_; I\nbelieve that the phenomenon has its reasons, its law so to speak, in the\npeculiar conditions of our day. But then the Christian man is never to\nbe the slave of the conditions of his day, while he _is_ to \"serve his\nown generation by the will of God.\" [Acts xiii. 36.] So I appeal most\nurgently to my reader, if he should chance to need the friendly call, to\nawake to a renewed attention to the responsibility of example, and to\nwatch accordingly over consistency in everything.\n\n\"FOR THEIR SAKES.\"\n\nWith the humblest reverence may I quote in this connexion the words of\nour blessed Lord in the High Priestly Prayer? \"_For their sakes I\nsanctify Myself._\" So said JESUS CHRIST. [John xvii. 19.] Perfectly holy\npersonally, He was yet always deliberately hallowing Himself, separating\nHimself, to the Father's will and work, \"for their sakes\"; because of\nHis relations with His disciples. Shall not we sinners, at whatever\ninterval, yet really, \"follow His steps\" in this also? \"For their\nsakes,\" for the sake of our brethren in the Ministry, for the sake of\nour servants, for the sake of our neighbour of all sorts and kinds, let\nus \"sanctify ourselves\" in a daily, willing separation from the way of\nself to the will of God, diligently seeking the expression of that will\nin His holy Word. It is the duty of every Christian. It is _par\nexcellence_ the duty of every Christian Minister, from the oldest\nArchbishop to the youngest Deacon. To take Orders is to renounce all\nideas of a selfishly _private_ life. Our whole life henceforth is \"for\ntheir sakes\"; even in those parts of it which must, from another point\nof view, be most jealously protected from officialism, and lived as if\nfor the time no one existed but the man and his God. We are emphatically\nnow \"their bondmen for Jesus' sake.\" [2 Cor. iv. 5.] \"Others\" have now\nan indefeasible right not only to our ministry of Ordinances, and to our\npreaching, and our visiting, but to the example of our habits, of our\nlives.\n\nMANNER.\n\nFollowing up the same line of remark, let me say a word about our duty\nto others in the matter of _manner_. It is sometimes, surely, forgotten\nby Christian men that they have no right to be careless of their manner.\nMany an excellent and otherwise consistent Clergyman seems to assume\nthat, whether with his brethren or with his parish neighbours, his\nmanner may take care of itself, if he only \"does not mean it.\" But\nwell-meaning is a poor substitute for well-doing; especially that otiose\nsort of well-meaning which only means not meaning ill.\n\n*\"NOBLESSE OBLIGE.\"\n\nChristians have no business with so poor and thin a phantom of virtue.\nThey are not at liberty not to think about a kindly courtesy of address,\nand a manly deference towards elders, and watchful \"honour\" given to\nwoman [1 Pet. iii. 7.], and a _manifested_ (as well as felt) sympathy of\nheart with all who ask it. They are forbidden by the whole will and\nrights of their Master to be loud and \"casual\" in intercourse; to be\nmoody and uncertain; to be difficult to please, easy to offend; to think\nit a small thing to speak the word to others which may wound, even\nlightly, with any wound but the really \"faithful\" one of a loving\ncaution or reproof in Christ. No one is to be so independent in one\naspect as the Christian man, and particularly the Christian Minister.\nFew men have so strong a vantage-ground for independence as the\nClergyman of the English national Church. But it is the sort of\nindependence which carries also the deepest obligation, the strongest\nsort of _noblesse oblige_. It is \"for their sakes.\" And so the same man\nis bound to be also the most accessible, the most attentive, the most\ncourteous and sympathetic. Avoiding carefully, of course, all\naffectation and unreality, he is to take care that a Christian reality\nwithin does show itself in a Christian manner without. \"Let your\nmoderation, your oblivion of self, be _known unto all men_.\" [Phil. iv.\n5.] Let it be seen and felt, in your rooms, in your parish, in your\nchurch.\n\nTEMPER.\n\nObviously this takes for granted the Clergyman's recognition of the call\nto \"rule his spirit.\" [Prov. xvi. 32.] The temptation not to do so is\nvery different for different men. One man finds temper and patience\nsorely tried by things which do not even attract the attention of\nanother. But very few men indeed, in the actual experiences of pastoral\nlife, whether in town or country, quite escape for long together the\nstings which irritate and inflame. But they _must_ learn how to meet\nthem in peace and patience, unless they would take one of the most\ncertain ways to dishonour their Master and discredit their message. The\nworld has some very true instincts about the power of the Gospel, as it\nought to be, as it claims to be. And one of them is that a Christian as\nsuch is a man who ought always to keep his temper. The Christian\nClergyman is most certainly, at least in an ironical sense, \"expected\"\nnever to be _personally_ vexed and hot. Will it be so? Will he take\nignorant rudeness pleasantly, should it cross his way? Will he meet\nopposition patiently, however firmly? Will he show that he remembers the\ntext, \"The bondservant of the Lord must not strive\"? [2 Tim. ii. 24.]\n\nTHE REV. C. SIMEON.\n\nThat text was the watchword of a great man of God, the Rev. Charles\nSimeon, in the early and exquisitely trying experiences of his long\nministry (1782-1836) at Trinity Church, Cambridge. The parishioners shut\ntheir house-doors in his face, and locked their pew-doors against those\nwho came to hear him. Every form of irritating parochial obstruction was\nemployed. And the young Clergyman had by nature a very short temper, and\na very fearless spirit. But he had found peace through the blood of the\nCross a few years before, and the interests of his Saviour were become\nall in all to him. So his first thought was, what would best commend\nJesus Christ to the angry people? And the words seemed to sound\nconstantly in his soul, by way of answer, \"The servant of the Lord must\nnot strive.\" Never was tried patience more beautifully made perfect. He\nwas always giving way, and always going on. He carefully ascertained\nthat it was illegal to lock the pew-doors; but he _did not take the law_\nof those who locked them. His soul was kept in peace; and by degrees, as\nmight be expected, a calmness which clearly was not cowardice but\nconsistency won a victory whose effects are felt to this day through the\nwhole Church of England in the results of Simeon's mighty influence.[12]\n\n[12] I may be permitted to refer to my brief sketch of Mr Simeon's Life:\n_Charles Simeon_ (Methuen, 1892), ch. iv.\n\nTHE SECRET OF PEACE.\n\nHow shall we, in our measure, whenever called to it, \"not strive,\" but\n\"let our oblivion of self be known unto all men\"--in the cottage, in the\nvilla, in the vestry? There is only one way. It is by abiding in the\nSecret of the Presence, in the \"pavilion\" where \"the strife of tongues\"\nmay be heard indeed, but cannot, _no, cannot_, set the hearer on fire.\nWe must claim on our knees, very often, our Master's power to keep the\nsoul which He has made, and which longs to manifest Him\n\n \"In faith, in meekness, love,\n In every beauteous grace,\n From glory thus to glory changed\n As we behold His face.\"\n\nPOWER OF A CONSISTENT LIFE.\n\nI have inevitably touched only some parts of the great subject of\npersonal ministerial Consistency. More will be said later. But the\ntreatment on paper, at almost any length, must be incomplete at the\nbest; many an important side of the subject will need to be omitted. My\naim has been, and will be, to speak of those sides most, if not only,\nwhich are in special danger of neglect at the present day; and this\nmeans of course the passing by of some large topics.\n\nPAINS AND MEANS.\n\nBut contributions, however fragmentary, to the study of Consistency will\nnot be in vain. \"A Minister's life is the life of his ministry,\" says\nsome one of other days with pithy force. \"Happy those labourers of the\nChurch,\" says blessed Quesnel, the Jansenist (on Mark vi. 33), \"the\nsweet odour of whose lives draws the people to Jesus Christ.\" We all\nrecognize the beauty and truth of such sayings. We all admit the\nfitness and duty of Consistency. But we must also recollect that in\norder to our consistency there is needed more than an abstract\napprobation; we must attend, we must reflect, we must examine ourselves,\nwe must discipline ourselves, as those who aim at an object at once\nlovely and necessary. Above all, we must \"order our steps in our Lord's\nWord,\" [Ps. cxix. 133.] and we must maintain a living communion of\nspirit with our Lord Himself, who is not only our Exemplar, our Law, and\nour King, but also our Secret, our Strength, our Life.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\n_THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (ii.).\n\n\n _If Jesus Christ thou serve, take heed,\n Whate'er the hour may be;\n His brethren are obliged indeed\n By their nobility._\n\n\nIn the present chapter I follow the general principles of the last into\nsome further details. And I place before me as a sort of motto those\ntwice-repeated words of the Apostle, TAKE HEED UNTO THYSELF.\n\nThese words, it will be remembered, are addressed in both places to the\nChristian Minister. [Acts xx. 28; 1 Tim. iv. 6.] At Miletus St Paul\ngathers round him the Presbyters of Ephesus, and implores them to take\nheed to themselves, and to the flock. A few years later he writes to\nTimothy, commissioned (whether permanently or not) to be Pastor of\nPastors in that same Ephesus, and lays it on his soul to take heed to\nhimself, and to the doctrine. In each case the appeal to attend to\n\"self\" comes first, as the vital preliminary to the other. And in each\ncase it takes the form of a solemn warning; not only \"remember\" but\n\"TAKE HEED.\"\n\nTAKE HEED UNTO THYSELF.\n\nI have already tried to emphasize the duty of \"heed-taking,\" in several\ndirections. But I come in this chapter to some important matters which\nseem specially to fall under such a heading; matters in which the lack\nof prayerful heed may, and often does, work great and even fatal\nmischief in the lives of Clergymen.\n\nRELATIONS WITH WOMAN.\n\ni. Let me first say a little, in brotherly confidence and candour, about\nthe young Clergyman's _relations with Woman_ in ordinary intercourse.\n\nIt would be waste of words to talk about the delicacy of the subject; it\nis self-evident. And it is obvious also that in a book like this the\nsubject can be treated only in the way of general suggestion; no vain\nattempt shall I make to state and discuss possible exceptional cases of\nsocial difficulty. But it is quite necessary to say something on this\nmatter, for it is indeed a pressing and important thing in ministerial\nlife.\n\nI will begin, then, with the assumption that the young Clergyman\nrecognizes, and seeks to practise, the great Gospel principle of a\nsanctified chivalry. \"To the feminine vessel, as to the weaker, give\nhonour,\" writes St Peter [1 Pet iii. 7.]; words which must be cut large\nand deep into our ministerial hearts if we are to live as true Ministers\nand true men. They have a particular reference to married life, I know;\nbut their full scope is far wider. And they are among the most wonderful\nutterances of the apostolic Gospel, when we read them in the light, or\nrather under the contrasted darkness, of the contemporary\n_anti_-chivalry of the Rabbinic teaching about woman. They are the\nutterance of Peter, the married man, after his discipleship in the\nSpirit at the feet of Jesus, the Mother's Son. \"_Giving honour_;\" do not\nforget the phrase. It lifts us into a higher and far healthier region\nthan that of either mere fondness or mere admiration. Indeed, it is\nall-important to remember what a deep gulph lies between two things\nwhich at first sight may be mistaken for one another--Admiration for\nWomen, Reverence for Woman.\n\nSo let apostolic chivalry, unaffected, but watchful and practical,\ngovern your life, by the grace of God. Let it be quite impartial as a\nprinciple. You may possibly have to speak with a princess; you are sure\nto have to speak and deal with very poor and ignorant women. But each\nand all they are WOMAN, and you must remember the Apostle's word.\nCourtesy and consideration are due to them all, as you are a man, a\nChristian, a Minister of God. The expression may vary, and within limits\nit must, but the principle must be always there. To the poorest woman\ngive the wall in the street, offer the best seat in the train.\n\nWE ARE TRUSTED.\n\nI must here so far anticipate a future chapter as to point out how\nconstantly this call to \"give honour\" must be remembered in pastoral\nvisitation. We Clergy are _trusted_ to an extraordinary degree in\npersonal intercourse with female parishioners. How often a pastoral call\nis paid, whether at mansion or cottage, when no man is at home! \"Take\nheed unto thyself\" _then_. The call under those circumstances should be\nas brief as possible. And the whole interview should be ruled by a\nheedful while unobtrusive respect and self-respect. Do not think a\nstrong word of caution in this matter out of place and out of scale.\nCarelessness of even appearances here may wreck a life; it may certainly\nblight an influence.\n\nWHEN AND HOW TO TAKE HEED.\n\nBut I do not forget that we are not yet concerned directly with pastoral\nvisitation as such; we are thinking of incidental social intercourse.\nThe young Clergyman will sometimes, however seldom, find himself\nvisiting in not exactly the pastoral sense of the word. Courteous\nhospitality will be shown him by neighbours; and while he will very\noften decline these calls, because his Master's work in other and more\nobvious forms claims him, sometimes he will accept them, as his Master\ndid. Or his needful holiday has come, and he is staying at a friend's\nhouse, or is thrown into new intercourse at some health-resort. And we\nwill suppose that he is a bachelor, and not engaged. In what particular\ndirections shall he take heed?\n\n\"KNOW THYSELF.\"\n\nBelow and above all details, he will take heed to remember his always\npresent Lord and Friend, and to live and talk as knowing that \"HE is the\nunseen Listener to every conversation\"; a recollection which ought to\nbanish from our talk, whether we talk with man or woman, alike\nfrivolity, unkindness, untruthfulness, and dulness. Then, to come to a\nfew details under that great principle--the man will need to watch and\nbe heedful in one or more quite different directions, according to his\ncharacter. And God grant us all such honesty and simplicity before Him\nas shall teach us to know at least something of our own characters,\nespecially in their weak points. There ought to be no surer prescription\nfor a true [Greek: gn\u00d9thi seauton] than to \"walk in the light\" [1 John\ni. 7.] of the presence of Him who sees everything just as it is, and in\nthat light to look at ourselves, and the world, and His Word; aiming\nevery day, not to be thought \"nice,\" or to be thought remarkable, but to\nlet Him shine out of our lives.\n\nTHE DUTY OF RESERVE.\n\nOne man, then, will need more than another to cultivate a quiet reserve\nand restraint of manner in social intercourse with young ladies. It is\nthe way of some men, without thinking about it, to be too\ndemonstratively attentive. It is the way of others to forget that they\nare not everywhere at home, and to be far too familiarly friendly. \"I\nlook on every girl I meet as if she were my sister;\" so said one young\nClergyman, a very fine fellow indeed, but certainly in this sentiment\nvery much and very dangerously mistaken. Attentions and confidences may\nbe meant as honestly as possible. But if they go beyond a certain line\n(soon reached) they may most naturally be thought to mean something\nmore; to be a preliminary, however distant, to an offer. And just\npossibly such a thought may not be unwelcome to the other person\nconcerned. And if so, and if all the while nothing but courtesy was\nmeant, you, my friend and Brother, without knowing it, perhaps without\never knowing it, may _spoil the life_ of one who cannot possibly, as a\nwoman, express herself to you. I have known such a case in clerical\nlife. The man was a true man, but he allowed himself, for the\npleasantness of it, to be very agreeable where he meant no more than\nfriendship. Great, while silent, was the sorrow that resulted. Take heed\nunto thyself.\n\nSPECIAL RISKS.\n\nThere are some parochial circumstances where even unusual caution is\nneeded in this direction; for reasons which I allude to with pain. It\nis a fact, I fear, that in some parishes the Curate is in danger of\nbeing rather actively pursued, by here and there a parent, as a possibly\ndesirable son-in-law. I have even heard of a certain Incumbent who was\ngiven not indistinctly to understand that the coming Curate would be\nless welcome if he was a man already married. Such a state of things is\nof course one of exceptional social risk and difficulty for a Curate,\nand for a young single Rector or Vicar still more so. Nothing will do\nbut a very real \"heed-taking,\" beginning always in secret with God, and\nthen quietly carried out with sanctified common-sense. Fatal mistakes,\nreally fatal to future usefulness in the Ministry, may very easily be\nmade otherwise.\n\nBut then there is an opposite side to the question. Some young men, not\nall certainly but a good many, are in great danger of a rather\nexaggerated estimate of their own attractions and importance. There are\nsome junior Clergymen who are, if I do not mistake, prone to think that\nmost young ladies whom they meet are fascinated by them, or are at least\nin imminent peril. Such delusions meet sometimes with not very gentle\ncorrections. But it is better to be forearmed against the delusion--as\nit most probably _is_ a delusion in the given case. And the best\nprophylactic is the old one; a secret walk with God \"in the light,\" and\na recollection of the constant need of self-knowledge exactly where such\nknowledge is least pleasant. I repeat it; may the Lord grant us each and\nevery one His true [Greek: gn\u00d9thi seauton]. By a blessed paradox it is\nsure to prove the secret of a true self-oblivion; for it means for\ncertain, among other things, a truer and fuller sight of HIM.\n\nMATRIMONY OR CELIBACY?\n\nThe subject thus before us is a very large one. It connects itself with\nthe whole question whether marriage or celibacy is the will of God in\nthe man's ministerial life. Happily I have no need, in the Church of\nEngland, to defend \"the holy estate of matrimony\" as if it were in the\nslightest measure incompatible with the fullest sanctification of life\nand of ministry. Personally my belief is that, in the immense majority\nof cases, the married Clergyman is the more useful Clergyman _if_ (an\n\"if\" of extreme importance) his wife is _altogether one with him in the\nLord_. But I distinctly think that there are very many exceptions to the\nmatrimonial rule. There are branches of ministerial work, particularly\nin parts of the sacred _missionary_ field, where the single man seems to\nmake the better Minister. And no true servant of God will allow himself\nto think first of an opening for marriage and then of an opening for\nministry.\n\n\"ONE IN THE LORD.\"\n\nHere I pause to say what it lies much on my heart to say somewhere. Let\nthe true man, who is at present free in respect of marriage-engagements,\nresolve that in the whole question of seeking or not seeking a wife he\nwill consider first, midst, and last his Master's work, his Master's\nMinistry. Better a thousand times be the most solitary of human beings\nthan choose with your eyes open a married life in which you will not\nfind positive help (not merely no positive hindrance) in your work for\nthe Lord Jesus Christ. Beware of the temptation to seek the mere pretty\nface, or the mere fortune large or small, or mere accomplishments, or\nindeed anything short of the truly converted believing heart and\ndedicated will.\n\n*MARRIED LIFE AS IT SHOULD BE.\n\nThe Clergyman and his Wife are sacredly bound to live their united life\nwholly for Christ. They are to help one another on in Him, to stimulate\none another in work for others in Him, to give each other always mutual\naid towards a constant growth in faith, hope, and love; towards an ever\nbetter use of means, and time, and tongue, and everything. If their Lord\ngives them children to train for Him, those children are to see their\nparents so living, not only individually but together, as to glorify and\ncommend the Gospel _to them_, from the very first. And the wider family\nof the parish, sure to be observant, is to see the same sight in\nmeasure. Happy the married Pastor whose home and its life respond to\nsuch a description. Alas for the man whose passion, blindness, hurry,\nself-will, or whatever else it is, has betrayed him into a condition of\nthings which cannot be so described.\n\nI may be writing for some readers to whom such a \"take heed unto\nthyself\" may be in point even as they read. If so, let me seize the\noccasion. With not a few very sorrowful illustrations in my mind I lay\nall emphasis on this earnest word of affectionate warning. And let me\nadd to it another word, as in duty bound, and with the utmost solemnity,\nknowing that the thing is vitally important. I appeal to you not lightly\nto seek marriage, not lightly to make engagement, even where you have\ngood assurance that all would be spiritually well, if there is a real\nprobability of a married life _clogged with pecuniary perplexities_.\n\nYou observe that I do not speak absolutely on this point; I dare not. I\ndo not say, Do not do it; I say, Do not _lightly_ do it. Faith is one\nthing; \"light-heartedness\" is another. And sometimes light-heartedness\nmeans nothing better than a vague expectation that \"something will turn\nup.\" Perhaps what does turn up is a weary and distracting struggle with\ndebt, and a gradual habituation to a not very creditable life upon the\nmeans of others, who very likely can spare only with difficulty what\ncomes at length to be taken without gratitude. I beseech my Brother to\n\"suffer the word of exhortation.\"\n\nRISKS OF DEBT.\n\nii. I touch thus already on the second point about which I would fain\ncry, Take heed unto thyself. That matter is _Money_. A few words here\nwill sufficiently convey my appeal, but those few must be pressing. I\nappeal to my younger Brethren to be watchful day by day in the matter of\nmoney. At this moment there rises in my memory the face and name of a\nClergyman with whom, long years ago, I became acquainted about the time\nof his ordination. He was unquestionably in earnest; I believe that he\ntruly knew his Lord and Master, and was truly desirous to serve Him in\nHis flock. But I am perfectly sure that he must have forgotten, almost\nfrom the first, to take heed unto himself in the matter of money. [SN:\nPECUNIARY INTEMPERANCE.] Perhaps he had brought with him from the\nUniversity that fatal habit of _pecuniary intemperance_ which sometimes\ngets a hold upon a man second in its grasp only to that of intemperance\ncommonly so called. Unhappily the ways of modern college life too easily\ngenerate such a habit, as University men are led more and more by their\nsurroundings into a dread of appearing to be poor, and are almost\nexpected to cost their fathers more for the academical year of eight or\nnine months than they will earn in the clerical year of twelve. But\nhowever it was, my poor dear friend _had_ about him the tendency to\ndebt. And not all his earnestness and his devoutness could maintain his\ninfluence when that tendency began to tell. One post of duty had to be\nsoon quitted for another, and so again and again, under this\never-recurring failure. Let us take heed unto ourselves.\n\nPUBLIC AND PRIVATE MONEY.\n\nIn dealing with money which in any sense is public, no care can be too\ngreat. In a case well known to me, a Clergyman imperilled his whole\ninfluence, to the verge of ruin, by the simple but effectual process of\nallowing money collected for a church-object to be mixed and \"muddled\"\nwith his private funds. He was not business-like, and he was not at all\nwell off. And somehow, when the time of reckoning came, the money had\nmelted, he knew not whither. Strenuous exertions on the part of friends\nreplaced privately the missing collection; but it was only just in time.\nI have often heard our Indian Missionaries say how great and frequent is\nthe difficulty raised by the apparent incapacity of some otherwise\nexcellent native Pastors to keep public and private money apart. They\nmean all that is honourable; but a friend comes in begging for a loan,\nand there is the church fund at hand, and of course the sum taken shall\nbe soon repaid, and of course it is _not_ repaid. But such difficulties\nare not confined to India. The native Pastors of England have great need\nto take heed unto themselves.\n\nTHE ACCOUNTS IN GOOD ORDER.\n\nIf possible, let us make our lay parochial friends our secretaries, and\nabove all our treasurers. But if it must be otherwise, and often it must\nbe, let us take heed, at any cost of pains. To do so may be overruled to\nwin a positive influence for the Clergyman. I well remember a dear\nfriend of mine telling me, with loyal pleasure, of his holy and devoted\nVicar's care in this direction, and its power over the keen-sighted and\nnot always friendly members of the school-committee in his great parish.\nEvery item of the books was accurate; every halfpenny of receipts\naccounted for. Men could find no fault in that Clergyman save concerning\nthe Law--and the Gospel--of his God.\n\nINVESTMENT-CIRCULARS.\n\nPerhaps I need only allude in passing to that crude sort of temptation\nput so freely before us Clergy, the circular advertisement of the mine\nwhich is to pay twenty per cent., or of the company just formed (I have\nsuch a circular in my possession, and keep it sacredly,) to promote the\nconstruction of a new projectile which shall make war more horrible than\never; one condition to the success of the Clergyman's investment being,\nof course, that war, thus made more horrible than ever, shall also be as\nfrequent and continuous as possible. But the schemes announced in these\ncirculars are very various in character; good, indifferent, and bad.\nNeed I say that, as a very safe rule, they must all be viewed as bad\nfrom the point of view of the young Clergyman's (or indeed of the\nClergyman's) purse? It is a truism to remark that high interest means\nlow security; but even a truism can bear occasional repetition when it\nhas to do with a good man's whole life and work, and when the oblivion\nmay mean acute or chronic misery. Such investments are for us a form of\ngambling, almost as much so as the shameless circulars which we\nsometimes receive from foreign cities, announcing the possibility of\nclearing a fortune at one stroke by a turn of the lottery machine. Does\nthe sending of such missives to the English Clergy mean that English\nClergymen sometimes answer them? If so, I say that it is strictly\nimpossible that the man who so answers, whether he loses or wins, can\nalso be walking with God, and so working that the Lord works with him.\nSo far as such acts go, he is acting an awfully untrue part, and his\nMaster knows it. Let us take heed unto ourselves.\n\nOTHER MONEY-PERILS.\n\nIn conclusion, I turn another way. The whole question of the increase\nand investment of money is a very solemn and searching one for the\nChristian, clerical or lay. There are holy men who say that we ought in\nno degree to \"lay up.\" While I reverence their meaning, I do not agree\nwith them. Yet I do most deeply feel that their warnings raise a\ndanger-signal in a direction opposite to that which we have been\nviewing, but equally important. Some of my younger Brethren have already\na private competency; others may be expecting one.\n\n*\"WHEN RICHES INCREASE.\"\n\nTo others, gifted in one way or another for marked acceptance in the\nChurch, posts are, or will be, offered which even in these days bring a\ngood income, perhaps a growing one. Take heed unto thyself. It is with\ndeep significance that the Word of God bids us not set our heart upon\nriches _when they increase_. [Ps. lxii. 10.] It is often observed, I\nfear, that a man's readiness to give diminishes in proportion to his\npower for giving. There is a subtle fascination for many minds, and\namong them for minds generous at first, in an access of possessions; the\nthirst for more sets in, however imperceptibly, and perhaps the\nChristian, perhaps the Pastor, has become--before he knows it--covetous;\ncaring a good deal for money. Let us take heed unto ourselves.[13]\n\n[13] I cannot help relating a pathetically amusing remark I once heard\nin a Dorsetshire cottage. I had looked in on the good housewife in the\ncourse of a long walk, and she was telling me about the needs and\nstraits of a recent time of illness. The aged Vicar of the large and\nthinly-peopled parish was a well-to-do man, and not at all unkind in\nmeaning and manner. But he never gave alms, or indeed material help of\nany kind. \"Poor Mr ----,\" said the cottager, with the kindliest\n_na\u00d4vet\u00c8_, \"he never _do_ give away anything. There, _I suppose it be\nhis affliction_.\"\n\n\"LAY NOT UP FOR YOURSELVES.\"\n\nI am sure that the Gospel has no censure for modest comforts and for\nsimple refinements. I am sure that it bids the Christian, whether Pastor\nor not, \"_provide_,\" look beforehand, with a view to save needless\nanxiety and disadvantage both for himself and yet more \"for them of his\nown house.\" [1 Tim. v. 8.] But I am equally sure that it commands us\neven more emphatically not to lay up treasure upon earth; not to make\nthe sad mistake of thinking that the work of life is to get. Rather may\nours be the spirit of a noble-hearted friend of mine, now at rest for\never, early called away from heroic Missionary work. He had found\nhimself rapidly getting richer in a successful school-enterprize; and\nrecognized _in this_ a summons to give it up, and volunteer for the\nforeign field.\n\nBut I say no more. Probably to the great majority of my readers these\nlast paragraphs seem little to the purpose, at least at present. But\nthere are few lives in which, sooner _or later_, such reflections may\nnot find a corner for application.\n\nTHE MOTIVE.\n\nMeanwhile, whether our call is to avoid debt or to avoid gathering, we\nwill look up for new motive power into our Master's face. Him we love;\nHim we long to commend; and to Him we belong with all we have. In His\nName, and for His sake, we will take heed unto ourselves.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\n_THE DAILY WALK WITH OTHERS_ (iii.).\n\n\n _Thrice happy they who at Thy side,\n Thou Child of Nazareth,\n Have learnt to give their struggling pride\n Into Thy hands to death:\n If thus indeed we lay us low,\n Thou wilt exalt us o'er the foe;\n And let the exaltation be\n That we are lost in Thee._\n\n\nLet me say a little on a subject which, like the last, is one of some\ndelicacy and difficulty, though its problems are of a very different\nkind. It is, the relation between the Curate and his Incumbent; or more\nparticularly, the Curate's position and conduct with regard to the\nIncumbent.\n\nA LECTURE ON CURATES.\n\nI need not explain that the legal aspect of this important matter is not\nin my view. Not long ago I listened, in the library of Ridley Hall, to\nan instructive lecture, by a diocesan Chancellor, on the law of Curates;\none of a series on Church Law delivered under the sanction of the\nUniversity. The Lecturer informed the audience, certainly he informed\nme, of many points of practical moment not clearly known to us before.\nHe gave a sketch of the history of the licensed Curate as an\ninstitution, and made us aware that he is a modern institution,\ncomparatively speaking. Before the Reformation the numerous host of\n\"chantry-priests\" was largely used to supplement the offices of the\nparochial Clergy. After the Reformation, for a very long while, the\npastoral arrangements did not include a special institution of\nAssistants. Then, as the unhappy system of pluralities grew large and\ncommon, such as it was all through the eighteenth century and beyond it,\n\"the Curate\" meant not the active assistant of the resident Pastor but\nthe substitute for the non-resident--the Curate-in-Charge. It was not\ntill well within these last hundred years that men were commonly to be\nfound doing what we now understand so well as Assistant-Curates' work.\nThe presence in the Church of us Assistant-Curates (I hold a licence\nmyself, and am therefore one of the company) is at once an effect and a\nsign both of the great increase of population and of the concurrent\nincrease throughout the Church of England of the desire for fuller and\nmore laborious ministrations.\n\nA CHANCELLOR'S SUGGESTIONS.\n\nSo our able Lecturer led us through our own history; and then he\nproceeded to instruct us in some main elements of our legal\nqualifications, and duties, and rights: how to get into a Curacy, and\nhow to get out of it; what are the Bishop's rights over the Curate, and\nhow the Archbishop may interpose if the Curate pleads a grievance\nagainst the Bishop. But I trust that this and other Lectures of the same\ncourse may see the light some day in a better form than a rough and\npassing report of mine. My purpose in referring to them now is that I\nmay call attention to one point on which the Lecturer laid no little\nstress. It was, that it is the wisdom of the Curate, when he has once\ndeliberately accepted a Curacy, to be thoroughly loyal all along; to\nconsider himself as \"at the Vicar's beck and call\"; to serve him\nheartily and unreservedly. If tempted to do otherwise, particularly if\ntempted to complain of the Vicar to the Bishop, let him resist that\ntemptation to the utmost of his power. \"There may be sad exceptions, and\nnecessity knows no law; but _as a rule_,\" said my honoured friend, \"I\nmay assure you, from a large experience, that the Curate who complains\nof his Incumbent to his Bishop injures not the Incumbent but himself.\"\n\nLOYALTY.\n\nOur Lecturer avowedly spoke not as a spiritual but as a legal\ncounsellor. I would now take up his words, and from the point of view of\nthe friend and Brother in the Lord say a little to my younger Brethren,\nengaged or about to be engaged in assistant Curacies, concerning the\nChristian rightness and Christian wisdom of taking the sort of line\nwhich the diocesan Chancellor recommended.\n\nTHE IDEAL INCUMBENT.\n\nAs I come to the subject, let me say on the threshold that I am sure to\nbe writing for many readers who little need the discourse, at least at\npresent. You are working under a Vicar or a Rector whose example and\nalso whose friendship is one of the greatest blessings of your life. You\nsee in him a man perhaps much older than yourself, perhaps nearly your\ncoeval, but however a leader, who is also, in the Lord Jesus Christ,\nyour brother, and your most considerate while stimulating friend. He\nconsults you, without forgetting his responsibility of ultimate\ndirection. He gladly and fully recognizes and honours your work done\nunder his organization. He has not the slightest wish to come between\nyou and the affections of his parishioners among whom you move. He\ncultivates, in his busy life, Christian fellowship with you in private;\nyou pray together, and talk together, not only about the parish but\nabout the Lord, and the Word, and your own souls. He lets you find in\nhim, as he is glad to find in you, just a man, a friend, a Christian,\nwith trials and blessings of inner experience on which it is sometimes\ngood to speak to one another; a living soul, companionable and human,\nwhile in it Christ dwells by faith. You have experienced with happy\nuniformity your Incumbent's patience, sympathy, fairness,\ntrustworthiness. You have seen in him one who is himself always at work,\nalways watching for the flock; who does not put on you this duty or that\nmerely because it is irksome to himself, but whose whole purposes are in\nthe cause of God, and who distributes labour in any and every interest\nbut his own.\n\nAnd perhaps you see this man honoured and loved by all around you, as\nthey too see and know him to be what he is. You move about in the\nparish, and you are quite sure to hear allusions to the Vicar. And as a\nrule, perhaps, they are all friendly, all loyal, all grateful. You find\nyourself, in short, under no appreciable present temptation, being (as\nof course you are) a true man yourself, to do anything but identify\nyourself very gladly with him.\n\nYET EVEN HE IS NOT PERFECT.\n\nBut then, even in this bright supposed case--a case of which the Church\nof England contains hundreds of practical examples, thank\nGod--appreciable temptations in the other direction, the wrong, unhappy,\nfatal direction, may very conceivably creep upon you with time. Your\nadmirable Incumbent is all the while a mortal man, and as such, most\ncertainly (he himself above all men knows and owns it), he is not\nperfect, not quite equal to himself in every way. Perhaps he has come to\nbe not perfect in physical health, and thus he is obliged, to his own\ngrief, to do less in this or that branch of activity than some of his\npeople think he ought to do; and then you are tolerably sure to hear\nsome not very just and generous complaints in the parish. Perhaps\ndomestic sorrow, or domestic straits and care, may have come in to\nbecloud his spirit and to make his energies for a season flag. Perhaps\namong his many gifts you may find some gift a little lacking; he may be\nmanifestly less strong in the committee, or in the labours of\narrangement generally, than in the pulpit or the class; or it may be\njust the other way. And you, my dear friend, may be (or may think\nyourself to be) somewhat strong where he is somewhat weak; an\nopportunity for many subtle temptations. The days and weeks go on; and\nif you let \"the little rift\" of criticism widen, and do not continually\ntake it to your Lord to be examined and mended, other feelings--not born\nfrom above--may steal in between you and this good man, your elder and\nleader in Christ. Petty dislikes and impatience may rise in your heart\nabout some trifling point of manner, some momentary failure of sympathy,\nsome oblivion of arrangement or engagement due to a sore stress of\nwork, some very small matter of Church order, or Christian dialect; or\nwho can tell what?\n\nGRAVE POSSIBLE TEMPTATIONS TO DISLOYALTY.\n\nBut also it is just possible that I am writing for some reader who finds\nhimself in more grave and pressing difficulties than these. My most\nhonoured brethren the Incumbents, if any of them should cast their eyes\nover these chapters, written by a Curate mainly for Curates, will not\nblame me for saying that there are cases, sad and sorrowful, where the\nCurate cannot honestly think with perfect happiness of his leader's work\nand influence. Perhaps that Incumbent has \"run well,\" nobly well, but\n(as it was of old with some primitive saints) something or someone\n\"hindered him.\" [Gal. v. 7.] Perhaps he has lost first love and\nzeal, and sunk, he knows not how, into an indolent clericalism, or\nanticlericalism, of thought and habit. Perhaps he has suffered care,\ndisappointment, parochial conflicts, to sour his spirit, or at least to\ntake his heart away from his people. Perhaps he has felt the sad\ninfluence of controversial battles, and the love and richness of the old\nGospel has somewhat faded out of his life, and conversation, and\nsermons; I do not refer to faithful care over distinctive and\nworld-offending truth, but to the controversial _spirit_, which is\naltogether another thing. Perhaps he has somewhat lost command over\ntemper; perhaps he has not yet found in our Lord's great fulness the\nopen secret by which He supplies patience to His servants, even when\nthey are sorely vexed by man. And just possibly difficulty between\nCurate and Vicar threatens to arise from some side-quarter; from those\nwho stand around the Vicar, who inevitably see him often and intimately,\nwho are active and important under-workers in his field, and who may\nthemselves be not quite fully \"governed by the Spirit and Word of God.\"\n\nBEWARE OF THE GROWTH OF A CURATE'S PARTY.\n\nI have put a good many supposed cases. How much I should rejoice if I\ncould know that not one reader of this page could find any of my\n\"peradventures\" the least in point within his experience. But I must\nemphasize one of them which is hardly a peradventure at all; namely that\nthe Curate is practically certain, sooner or later, to find temptations\npresented to his loyalty by the conversation of parishioners. There is\nnot one parish in all England where everybody is pleased with the\nIncumbent; pleased always and about everything. And if the given Vicar\nor Rector employs a Curate, and if that Curate is you, it will be a\nmoral miracle if you never hear of such discontents. You will hear of\nthem, very probably, in ways which will offer you, however faintly, an\nopportunity of acting towards your chief a little as Absalom acted\ntowards David when he expressed certain pious wishes that _he_ were made\njudge in the land in his father's place. [2 Sam. xv. 1-6.] I do not for\na moment mean that you are, or ever will be, a man of treacherous\n_purposes_; the Lord forbid. But if you do not watch, and are not in\nsome measure forewarned, you may easily be betrayed unawares, quite\nunawares, into speech or into action which will practically be\ntreacherous to the man who is over you in Christ, and so toward Christ's\nwork and cause in the parish where you serve. Do you not know the\npossibilities to which I refer? Have they not crossed either your own\npath or that of some Curate-friend of yours? Is there no such thing as\nan intimacy formed by the Curate in some house where the Incumbent is\nnot liked, and is that intimacy never used by the Curate _not_ for the\nnoblest ends? Is there no weak listening to parochial gossip on the\nCurate's part? Is there never any allowance by the younger man of a\ngrowth around him, in ways which he could stop summarily, if he tried,\nof a certain unwholesome sort of preference and popularity? Is it not\nsometimes known that a Curate condescends so low as to concur with\ncriticisms or sarcasms on his chief, or even to volunteer them? Alas for\nthe parish where there is a \"Curate's party,\" small or more extensive.\nHappy the parish where no chance is given in that direction by either\nIncumbent or Curate. Happy the Curate who is so truly loyal and dutiful,\nit may be even under difficulties, that he makes it quite unmistakable\nthat, if a party is to gather, it must gather around some one else.\n\nHOW TO REPRESS IT.\n\nSome cases happily in point are present to my own mind. I once knew of a\nparish in which the truly devoted Vicar was, however, not popular; he\nhad sadly felt the weight of depression and disappointment, and this had\nhad a weakening reflex influence on his ministry. He was joined by a\nCurate, a man in the prime of youth and vigour, well qualified to\nattract confidence and affection, and particularly gifted as a preacher.\nVery soon many parishioners showed a preference for the young man's\nministrations in public, and for his company in private; it was a golden\nopportunity for the almost spontaneous formation of a Curate's party. By\nthe grace of God, the young Clergyman was enabled both to see the\nposition at once and, by most decisive and manly speech and act, in the\nright quarters, to show, without a chance of mistake, that he considered\nhis work as altogether identical with his Vicar's, never to be carried\non for an hour outside a faithful subordination. Another instance may be\ngiven. Some years ago it was my duty to explain at a meeting the objects\nand work of the Divinity Hall with which I am connected. Quite\nincidentally, while describing our course of teaching, I mentioned my\nearnest desire always to caution my student-friends against giving the\nslightest encouragement to the rise of Curates' parties.\n\n*AN EXAMPLE.\n\nAt the close of the occasion, a Clergyman rose at the back of the\nparish-room where we met, and said a few words, as gladdening as they\nwere unexpected. He had come to the meeting-place with no knowledge of\nthe meeting; merely to keep an appointment. But he happened to be the\nVicar of a large town parish, and there to have had a friend of mine as\nhis Curate; and he told us how this same Curate had come to him at a\ntime when the parish, under circumstances inherited from past years, was\nripe and ready for partizanship and division. Nothing would have been\nneeded but the Curate's passive allowance of such tendencies to\nembarrass and spoil the difficult work of the Vicar. But my dear young\nfriend was \"found in Christ\"; he knew his Lord's will in the matter, and\nhe strove to do it. By active discouragement he precluded the mischief\ncompletely, and thus greatly strengthened his leader's hands for the\nwork of God before him.\n\n\"THE LOST GRACE, HUMILITY.\"\n\nSurely few Christian men have wider and nobler opportunity than Curates\nhave for the practice of \"that lost grace, humility,\" in its form of\nunselfish dutifulness, \"good fidelity in all things.\" [Tit. ii. 10.] My\nBrethren know the sort of humility I mean; no artificial mannerism,\nnothing in the least degree unworthy of the \"adult in Christ.\" What I do\nmean is that thing so scarce in our days, the noble opposite to that\nindividualistic spirit than which nothing is more narrow, more low, more\nhostile to all true, genial development and greatness. I mean the\ngenerous modesty which delights to recognize the claims of an elder, of\na leader; which loves the idea of trustworthy service, taking as its\nmotto a more than princely _Ich Dien_. I mean the temper of mind which\nsees the happiness of siding against ourselves, of judging not others\nbut ourselves; the spirit which is much more anxious to vindicate a\nsuperior's reputation than our own, more alert to ward criticism off\nfrom him than to shield our own head from its arrow. I mean the life\nwhich shows that so far from being ashamed of the idea of subjection,\nthe man has learnt at the feet of Jesus to think true service the\ntruest freedom.\n\nAnother day, very probably, the Curate will find himself an Incumbent,\nand will have his own helping brother at his side. It will be a happy\nthing then for both parties if he has thoroughly learnt that great\nqualification for command, the experience of obedience; and has\ncultivated the exercise of sympathy with his subordinate by having first\nstriven in honest loyalty to take his chief's part against himself.\n\nTAKE PART AGAINST YOURSELF.\n\nFew, very few, are the cases where a man who has accepted a Curacy _with\nhis eyes reasonably open_ finds that such is the friction of the\nposition that his first duty is to seek a release. There are such cases,\nI am afraid. But, I say it again, they are very few; and in every case\nwhich looks as if it were one of them, the Curate should _first_\nexercise the severest scrutiny upon himself, trying honestly to find, in\nsome magnifying mirror, \"the beam in his own eye.\" [Matt. vii. 3.] And\neven where such scrutiny still leaves it plain, after consultation not\nonly with sensible friends (if necessary) but of course with the Lord\nHimself, that it is best to seek a change, let it be remembered that, up\nto the very last day of connexion, the Curate is still the Curate, bound\nto all possible loyalty and good faith.\n\n\"SUFFER THE WORD.\"\n\nIt is with some misgivings of feeling that I have dwelt thus at length\non difficulties and anxieties incident to the relationship of Curate and\nIncumbent. But I do not think after all that I shall be misunderstood.\nIn the nature of the case, the bright sides of the matter have hardly\nneeded comment. The Curate who finds himself the favoured and advantaged\nhelper of some true-hearted leader needs little counsel from me, unless\nit be in face of the fact, on which we have touched, that the noblest\nleaders in the Lord in the whole English Church are not above parochial\ncriticism, or even parochial slander. But I do know that there are\nCurates whose circumstances are less favourable; and I long to impress\nit upon them that few Christians have a larger and more fruitful field\nthan they for the cultivation of some of the crowning graces of the\nGospel. It is for them to make no common proof of the power of the\nIndwelling Lord to subdue the iniquities of His people, to hallow their\ninmost spirits, to set before their lips the watch and ward of His\nblessed Presence, to drive utterly away from their pastoral souls the\nwretched spirit of sarcasm, to enable them for an unselfish faithfulness\nwhen no eye but the unseen Master's oversees.\n\nINDEPENDENCE AND LOYALTY.\n\nIt is no part of the system of the Church of England, as it is of that\nof the Church of Rome, to put a man (or a woman) under the \"spiritual\ndirection\" of a fellow-sinner, who is to be, for the \"directed,\" the\norgan and representative of the will of God. For such a method is no\npart of the apostolic Gospel, which never for a moment bids us\nsurrender conscience into the keeping of another. \"Who art thou that\njudgest _Another's_ servant? To his _own Master_ he standeth or\nfalleth\" [Rom. xiv. 4.]; words which deeply and decisively contradict\nthe root-ideas of spiritual despotism, for they teach us to think of\nour fellow-Christians, as if--for purposes of the conscience--He who\nis their Master and ours was, for them, _another_ Master than\nours.[14] Yet the ideas of spiritual despotism are only the distortion\nor parody of ideas which are as true and sacred as the Gospel can make\nthem; the ideas of self-abnegation for the good of others, and of\nresolute denial of the miserable spirit which prefers self to others\nand talks about rights when we should be intent on duties. The\nChristian man, and _\u2021 fortiori_ the Minister of Christ, is called (as\nwe have seen in earlier pages) to nothing less than a life in which,\nwhile conscience is inviolable, self is surrendered to Christ, in that\npractical sense of the words which means surrender, for His sake, _to\nothers_, in all things which concern not right and wrong but our\nself-will.\n\n[14] I owe this remark to my friend the Rev. H.E. Brooke.\n\n\"CLOTHED WITH HUMILITY.\"\n\n\"Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder.\" [1 Pet. v. 5.]\nI never forget how the Apostle finishes the passage; \"Yea, _all of you_,\nbe subject one to another, and be clothed with humility,\" [Greek:\negkoub\u00d9sasthe t\u00cdn tapeinophosyn\u00cdn], \"tie humility round you\" as the\nservant ties on his apron. Most characteristic of the Bible is the\nimpartiality of the precept, so given; the Elders in the Church of God\nwill not forget it on their side. But nevertheless the stress of the\nprecept bears upon the younger man. He, in the Lord's order, is\nespecially to recollect the sacred duty of a willing, loyal, and\nopen-eyed humility.\n\nA NOBLE SUBORDINATION.\n\nAll the instincts of our time are against this. But for the true\ndisciple of Jesus Christ there is something stronger than any spirit of\nthe age; it is the Spirit of God, dwelling in the inmost soul. By that\nwonderful power the Christian Curate, who walks with the Lord in secret,\nand finds in Him his way of purity and consistency in the more general\naspects of his \"walk with others,\" will daily be enabled for a bright\nand glad consistency in the path of ministerial subordination. He will\nnot cease to be a man, who must observe and think; nor will he\nnecessarily hold it his duty never, in all loyalty and respect, to\nexpress to his Vicar a differing wish or opinion. But his bias will be\nagainst himself, and for his chief, if he indeed lets the Spirit of God\nlead him, and rule him, and fill him. For the Lord's sake, [Greek: dia\ntou Kyrion], and by the Lord's power, [Greek: dia tou Kyriou], he will\ncarry the principle of a watchful \"submission\" not only into greater\nthings, but even into the smaller preferences of his elder and leader,\nif they in the least degree affect the duties of the parish and the\nchurch.\n\nA LETTER ON CURATES' GRIEVANCES.\n\nI close this chapter with a quotation. It is a letter written to the\nEditor of the _Record_, in the spring of 1885, after the perusal of a\ncorrespondence in that paper in which some \"grievances of Evangelical\nCurates\" had been set forth, and in which it had been implied that such\ngrievances might give some sufferers occasion to transfer their\nsympathies to another \"school.\"\n\n\"After reading the recent correspondence, I cannot forbear a few words\nexpressive of the sad impression left upon my mind. Far be it from me to\nsay that Incumbents have no lessons to learn from this correspondence.\nAll Incumbents who have, by grace, 'the mind that was in Christ Jesus'\nwill surely embrace every suggestion, however painful in form, which can\nstimulate them to larger manifestations of holy and self-forgetting\nsympathy, perfectly compatible with the firm attitude (which is also\ntheir duty) of responsible direction. But this thought leaves unaltered\nthe mournful impression taken from the tone of the letters of my\naggrieved Brethren. In one form or another one thought seemed to breathe\nin all;--the thought of _my_ rights, _my_ position, _my_ gifts and\nopportunities, and what was due from others in regard of them; the\ncomplaint that others were not humble, when the Christian's first\nconcern with humility is to derive it for himself from his Lord. Such a\nspirit is not easily compatible with a true secret hourly walk with God\nand abiding in Christ, the _sine qu\u201a non_ of fruit-bearing. And\nfruit-bearing is the supreme inner aim of the true pastoral life,\nfruit-bearing in the devoted doing of the Master's present will.\n\n\"In one letter I read with pain that 'it is no marvel' if men who cannot\nsecure justice and happiness in one party should transfer their\nallegiance to another. Is it indeed 'no marvel'? Is it to be expected,\nthen, in the holy Ministry, that convictions about divine truth should\nbe modified by the personal claims and comfort of the holder, if the\nword 'hold' may be used without severe irony in such a connexion? Can a\nsaint and servant of God, young or old, Vicar or Curate, walk closely\nwith Him all day, truly given to Him, wholly submissive to His word and\nwill, and yet find it possible to deal with convictions so? What are\npersonal rights and exterior happiness weighed against the claims of\nwhat we have really grasped as truth in the presence of the Lord? It is\nwell for us that martyrs and confessors, and their worthy successors,\nour Evangelical ancestors of a century ago, knew how to answer that\nquestion.\n\nCONVICTION SACRED, SELF NOWHERE.\n\n\"I aim to speak with all humility and sympathy. But I cannot but thus\nearnestly express the unalterable conviction that the only ministerial\nlife which can be 'sanctified and meet for the Master's use' is the life\nin which conviction is sacred, in which Christ is all, and in which self\nis nowhere.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\n_PASTOR IN PARISH_ (i.).\n\n\n _Master, to the flock I speed,\n In Thy presence, in Thy name;\n Show me how to guide, to feed,\n How aright to cheer and blame;\n With me knock at every door;\n Enter with me, I implore._\n\n\nWe have talked together about the young Clergyman's secret life, and\nprivate life, and his life in (so to speak) non-clerical intercourse\nwith others, and now lastly of his life as it stands related to his\nimmediate leader in the Ministry. In this latter topic we have already\ntouched the great matter which comes now at once before us, the man's\nwork amongst his neighbours as he approaches them in his proper\ncharacter, as a Pastor.\n\n\"THE PULSE OF THE MACHINE.\"\n\nHow shall I speak of \"parish-work\"? It would be a boundless subject if\ntreated in detail and in the style of a directory of methods. But such a\ntreatment is far from my purpose. To undertake it, I should not only\nneed to be a widely experienced Pastor, which I cannot claim to be, for\nmy life for many years has been mainly devoted to academic teaching; I\nshould need to be several widely experienced Pastors bound up into one\nliving volume. So let no one expect to find here a prescription for the\nright plans and right practice of the many departments of the rural\npastorate, or of the urban, or suburban; directions how to organize\nwork, and how to develop it; how to deal with the Sunday School, or the\nDay School, or the Institute, or the Guild, or the Visitors' Meeting, or\nthe Missionary Association. My hope is rather to get behind all these\nthings to the pulse of the busy machinery; to offer a few hints to my\nyounger Brethren \"how to do it,\" from the point of view of their\npersonal and inner preparedness for the multifold work, and to state\nsome plain general principles which may run through all the doing.\n\nVISITING.\n\nI set before me then the Curate, and the Parish, with its demands for\npastoral labour, and particularly for _Visitation_. Well do I know how\nimmense the differences are between place and place in this same matter\nof visitation; how the parish of a few hundreds, or even of two or\nthree thousand, is one thing, and the parish of ten, or eighteen, or\ntwenty thousand is another. I know that there are parishes, in London\nfor example, where all the efforts of a staff of devoted Clergy seem to\nfail to do more than touch the edges of the work of domestic visitation.\nYet surely even in such cases that work must not, and will not, be quite\ngiven up as hopeless. A little, where only a little is possible, is\nvastly better than none; even if it be only the visitation of the sick,\nand of those who immediately surround them, and with whom the sick-visit\ngives the Clergyman an opportunity. Such efforts, where nothing more of\nthe kind is possible, if only done in an unmistakable spirit of love and\nself-sacrifice, must carry good to the people. And do not forget that\nthey must, quite as necessarily, carry good to the Clergyman. For they\nare a means, for which nothing else can be quite the substitute, of\nbringing him into contact with the people's thoughts and lives in ways\nwhich will tell usefully (as we have seen in an earlier page) upon his\nwhole ministry, particularly upon his work in the pulpit, and at the\nmission-room desk, and in the open air.\n\nBut, to be as practical as possible, I will assume that the Curacy is of\na more normal kind than that just supposed. The parish, whether in\ncountry or in town, is not so large as to make visitation from house to\nhouse impossible. And the Curate has had his work of this kind assigned\nhim, and is setting out upon it. A good portion of every day (though I\nhope it is possible to give a part of one day each week to some sort of\nwisely managed holiday) is devoted to \"the district\"; now for a steady\nround of calls, door by door; now, in an irregularity not without\nmethod, for visits to special cases of sickness, or sorrow, or other\nneed.\n\nPREPARE FOR VISITATION WITH PRAYER.\n\nWhat shall be my first suggestion? It shall point to the Throne of\nGrace. Preface the pastoral round with special secret prayer. Sermons\nare usually (I wish it were always so now) prefaced with prayer in the\npulpit that the heavenly blessing may rest upon the ordinance. Is it\nless fitting, less necessary, to prepare for the afternoon's or\nevening's visitation with a secret petition in your own room that the\napostolic ordinance of domestic visitation [Acts xx. 20, 21.], to be\nadministered now by you, may have the special grace of God in it? Pray\nfor yourself, my younger Brother.\n\n*PRAY FOR SPIRITUAL READINESS AND SPIRITUAL FULNESS.\n\nAsk that you may go out well furnished with the peace, and patience, and\nwisdom laid up for you in your Lord; that you may have \"by the Holy\nSpirit a right judgment in all things\"; that you may have \"the tongue of\nthe taught,[15] to speak a word in season to them that are weary\";\nwhatever sort of weariness it is. Pray for that secret skill of\ndiscernment which can see the difference of spiritual states, and allot\nwarning or comfort not at random but \"in due season.\" Pray for that\nreadiness for the unexpected which is best secured and best maintained\nin a close and conscious intimacy with your Saviour. The man \"found in\nHim\" will be found ready _in spirit_ (and that is after all the\nessential in spiritual work) for the sudden question, whether anxious or\ncaptious, for the sudden rudeness of ignorance or opposition, and again\nfor the chronic and so to speak passive difficulty of indifference. \"The\ntongue of the taught,\" while the \"taught\" man is found in Christ, will\never be sweet, wise, and truthful, as the owner of it goes his round.\nBut we must seek for it; \"He will be enquired of for this thing.\" [SN:\nEzek. xxxvi. 37.]\n\n[15] Isai. l. 4. Obviously the word \"learned\" in our Version is there\nused in its old English sense, \"instructed, taught.\" No slight on\n\"book-learning\" is ever conveyed in the Scriptures. But the man in view\nhere is not the highly-educated person, but the believer who has\nlistened with _the ear_ \"of the taught\" (see the end of the verse), as a\ndisciple at the Master's feet; and so goes forth to speak with \"_the\ntongue_ of the taught,\" as a messenger who has learned sympathy,\ninsight, holy tact and truthfulness, from the Master's heart. The whole\npassage is full of the blessed Messiah Himself, I know. But it has its\nreflected reference for all His true followers, and above all for all\nHis true Ministers. May He give us, in His mercy, for every act of our\nmessenger-work, both the ear and the tongue of His \"taught\" ones.\n\nThen, as you pray for yourself, you will pray also for the people you\nare about to visit. Perhaps they are as yet strange to you, and you can\nask for them only in general. But if you know anything at all about them\nit will be worth while to individualize your prayer, however briefly.\nSpecial, detailed prayer _is_ a power with God. And it is a power with\nman too. To be dealing with one for whom you know you have prayed is\nalready to have a foothold there. Perhaps you may have an opportunity to\n_say_, quite naturally, that you have been praying for him; and this may\nvery possibly be a direct vehicle of blessing.\n\nYou will go out then, as directly as possible, from the secret place of\nheavenly intercourse. That is a bracing atmosphere:\n\n \"Fresh airs and heavenly odours breathe around\n The throne of grace;\"\n\nand those airs can quicken the young Pastor's spirit for the heaviest\nhours of a sultry afternoon or evening, till he comes back weary to his\nrooms, \"tired in the Lord's work, but not tired of it,\" as dying\nWhitefield said.\n\nSo you go forth with real prayer. It is your wonderful privilege, thus\ngoing to carry nothing less than the blessed \"Fulness of the Holy Ghost\"\nfor your inmost equipment. I say deliberately, nothing less than the\nheavenly Fulness--a far different thing from a mere stir and lift of the\nemotions. That most divine gift is a \"calm excess\" of tranquil power,\nreceived humbly by the prayer of faith. It is not meant to be a rare\nluxury; it is a daily and hourly offer, a provided _viaticum_ for every\nstage of walk and duty. Can we work aright for God while any corner of\nour being has no room for God, and is not possessed by Him?\n\nMETHOD.\n\nThen, for true prayer and true practicality are the closest and most\nharmonious friends, you will of course aim with forethought and\npersistency at _method_ in the pastoral work. The visits will be\narranged as far as possible with economy of _space_; no difficult task\nin most town parishes, while in the country, of course, the matter is\noften much less easy. And you will study also economy of _time_. Your\nround is a work of sacred _business_. The minutes, the quarters of an\nhour, are never to run loose and unobserved. Who that has ever visited\nin a parish does not know the need of remembering that point, so easily\nforgotten? Here we visit a pleasant, welcoming neighbour, and it is all\ntoo easy to stay on, perhaps to little real purpose, with the secret\nsatisfaction of knowing that the next and much less attractive call must\nbe shortened in proportion. Here, less willingly, we are detained by\none of those ingenious tongues which make it so difficult to get in a\nword, or to stop the unprofitable continuity of topics. All these cases,\nand endless kindred ones, need a little foresight and firmness, and a\nlittle of the skill which is soon learnt by open heart and open eyes.\n\nECONOMY OF TIME.\n\nObviously this line of caution is more needed by some men than by\nothers. But it is needed by not a few; particularly in respect of the\ntemptation to lengthen out unduly the visits that are pleasant to the\nvisitor. One young Clergyman known to me, an indefatigable and devoted\nvisitor, needed a strong reminder in this direction in the early days of\nhis ministry. He would visit a sick person, who proved more or less\nresponsive to his efforts, and would allow himself to _over_-visit, to\nan unwise extent, going often more than once a day, and long after the\nstate of the invalid made such attentions urgent. And other work of\ncourse suffered in proportion. Wesley's precept to his workers needs our\nremembrance often; \"Go not where you are wanted, but where you are\nwanted most.\"\n\nBUT AVOID HURRY.\n\nBut a risk on the other hand must be remembered. Economy of time must\nnever mean hurry of manner, a thing which is nearly if not quite fatal\nto the usefulness of a visit. It is perfectly possible to combine\npromptitude with quiet; to come manifestly on business, and yet not in a\nbustle. We Clergymen may learn many valuable lessons in this, as in some\nother parts of our work, from our medical friends. Observe how a wise\nand kindly doctor visits _his_ parishioners. He knows exactly why he\ncomes; he knows that other patients are wanting him, in long succession;\nhe knows that he must observe and advise as promptly and as much to the\npoint as possible; and he knows that all must be done with a quiet,\nstrong, untroubled manner, if it is to be done aright.\n\nI spoke in a previous chapter about the sacred duty of watching and\nregulating manner. This is to be done at all times of intercourse, but\nabove all in pastoral visits. To speak only of this point of hurry or\ncalm of manner; it is most important. The right manner will make a visit\nof five minutes practically longer than a twenty minutes' visit which\ngives all through it the impression that the Clergyman must be off. One\nof the most admirable Pastors I have ever known, the late Rev. Charles\nClayton, of Cambridge,[16] did much of his work by five-minute visits.\nBut they were always visits in which the whole thought was given to the\ncase before him, and the word in season came from full knowledge of his\nflock and from an unmistakably pastoral heart.\n\n[16] Afterwards Rector of Stanhope and Canon of Ripon.\n\nIMPARTIAL COURTESY.\n\nA duty which you will carefully remember throughout your round is that\nof quiet Christian courtesy; impartially shown to rich, to middling, and\nto poor. I say impartially, with a view to _both_ ends of the scale.\nSome men (perhaps not many, but some) seem to think that ministerial\ncourage and fidelity in dealing with well-to-do parishioners demand a\ncertain dropping of the courtesies of life; a very great mistake. Many\nmore men are tempted to forget that their visits to the poorest should\nbe, in the essence of the matter, as courteous as when they go to the\nportal which carries a brass knocker. At the door of the dingiest\ncottage, or dingier lodging, never forget that you _ask_ for entrance;\nit is your neighbour's castle-door; and you are not a sanitary\ninspector. If you happen to come in at the meal-time of the roughest and\ndirtiest, apologize as naturally and honestly as you would if you\nintruded on the wealthy churchwarden's well-set luncheon. Among the very\nlowest, do all you can to honour parents before their children (I know\nit is nearly impossible in some sad cases); and always honour old age.\n\nBE NATURAL.\n\nSurely one good maxim on manner with our poorer neighbours is to aim to\naddress them very much as we would address our neighbours of our own\nclass. A patronizing manner is most certainly a very great pity, and\nalmost sure to be resented. But so, too, is the ostentatious\n\"hail-and-well-met\" manner which is sometimes assumed; an over-drawn\nimitation, perhaps, of the workman's manner with his fellows. This is a\nmistake, because it is almost always unnatural. Few gentlemen get better\nat others by ceasing to act and speak as gentlemen. Let us talk quite\nquietly and pleasantly, as just what we are, and as those who most\nunaffectedly \"honour all men,\" [1 Pet. ii. 17.] and we shall not go far\nastray; always supposing that the matter of our talk is sensible, true,\nand to the purpose.\n\nTHE SICK-ROOM.\n\nTo turn aside for a moment to the special and sacred work of Visitation\nof the Sick. It is not to be lightly done, as if it were an easy part of\nour duty, quite obvious in its aims and methods. The greatest judgment\nis often needed in the sick-room. We need quickness to perceive how much\nconversation the invalid can bear, if the case is one of great pain, or\n(what often makes undue length even more irksome) great weakness. We\nneed an insight into the best side of approach to conscience, or to\nwill. We need the skill which knows how to question enough, but not too\nmuch, not as the inquisitor but as the helper. Many another matter will\ncall for sanctified common-sense in the sick-room; a restful _voice_,\neasy, quiet _movements_, and the like. And let me say that where you are\nvisiting a chronic case, and need to call again and again, if a day and\nhour for the next visit is mentioned it should be _kept to_ with\njealous punctuality. Nothing is more trying to the suffering and weary\nthan uncertainty and suspense. I have known of much harm done to good\nmen's influence by their neglect of punctuality with sick people.\n\nPUNCTUALITY.\n\nOf punctuality generally I can (and surely need) speak only in passing.\nIt is a primary duty of the busy but patient work of the pastorate. To\nbe neglectful of it is to set up and keep up a needless and mischievous\nfriction in our intercourse with others, and indefinitely to injure our\ninfluence in many ways. \"No man ever waited five minutes for me in my\nlife, unless for reasons quite beyond my power;\" such was a remark of\nCharles Simeon's in his last days. _We_ may be for ever unable to say\nthis of our own past. But if so, shall it not be true for us also _from\nthis day forward_?\n\nUSE OF THE BIBLE IN VISITING.\n\nThus prepared by secret and special intercourse with God, and\nrecollecting some simple maxims about practical points, you go out into\nthe parish. But no; let me suggest one other preliminary, which, before\nmost rounds of pastoral visiting, cannot be out of place. You will take\nin your pocket _two books_, if not more; one, your visiting register and\ndiary, the other--your Bible. Of the use to be made of the note-book I\nneed not speak. About that to be made of the Book of God let me say a\nvery few words.\n\nI do not mean at all that you will make the reading of the Holy\nScriptures a matter of form or routine; a thing which _must_ be done, as\nan _opus operandum_, wherever there is a chance. But I do mean that you\nshould have the Book always ready for use, and be prompt to sow the\n\"incorruptible seed\" [1 Pet. i. 23.] from house to house as God gives\nopportunity. Remember, it is a Book sadly little known by the very large\nmajority of your people; so that every natural and naturally-taken\noccasion to \"let it speak,\" in private as well as in public, is a\ncontribution to that urgent need of our modern world, Bible-knowledge.\nRemember again that, despite all the wretched unsettlements of belief\namongst us, the Bible is still the Bible, for untold multitudes; it is\nowned by them, whether or no it is used, as the Oracle of God. Let us\nlet the Book speak at the open ear of such a conviction, however dimly\nthe conviction is entertained. And then remember that the Bible,\nwhatever be the state of current opinion about it, _is_ as a fact the\nOracle of God, and its immortal and life-conveying words have a\nmysterious fitness all their own to be the vehicle of the Spirit's voice\nto the human heart. Offer it, as often as you can, to be that vehicle.\n\nCHOOSE A PASSAGE BEFOREHAND.\n\nTwo simple expedients for effective use of the Scriptures in a parish\nround are presented to me by my own past experience, gathered from\nseveral years of regular parochial work. One is, the choice of some\nshort pregnant passage which shall be, for that round, _the_ passage to\nbe read not once only but in house after house, unless, of course, there\nis special reason to the contrary. Such a reiteration, so I have often\nfound, is a great help to the visitor, who probably feels on each new\noccasion that a new power and point appear in the passage, and that it\nseems each time easier to speak from it, however briefly, to the soul.\nThe other expedient which my experience recommends is to be prepared,\nwhenever a hopeful opportunity occurs, to leave a Scripture message\nvisibly behind you as you go. I used to carry with me a little sheaf of\nslips of paper, on each of which was printed the request, _Please read\nthis passage, and think about it_. A short message from the heavenly\nWord would be written on the slip in pencil as I was about to go; and\nthis visible and personal invitation to \"read and think\" proved often a\nreal remembrance from the Lord.\n\nTHE VISITING PASTOR AT WORK.\n\nBut now you are actively engaged from door to door. If you are a\nnew-comer, and particularly if it is also a district (in the great City\nperhaps) where visitation has been an unwonted thing, you must be\nprepared of course for very various sorts of reception. But assuredly in\nmost districts by far, and at most doors, the man who exercises common\ntact and courtesy, and is plainly trying to do his duty in a loving and\nearnest spirit, and is known already, or now introduces himself, as the\nClergyman, will be civilly and often gladly met.\n\n*OUR ADVANTAGE AS MINISTERS OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH.\n\nLet me pause for a moment to remind you of one great and valuable\nadvantage which is ours as the Ministers of the National Church and the\nservants of the parochial system. All honour to devoted servants of God\nin the Ministry of other denominations; in numberless instances they\nhave done in the past, and are doing now, work which the National Church\nhas either neglected, or has been unable to overtake; and the power of\nthe Lord has been and is present with them to bless. But nevertheless I\nfor one thank God for a National Church, and recognize in that Church's\nhistorical and practical position a unique opportunity and an immense\nadvantage, so it be used faithfully and in loyalty to the Lord and His\nWord. And one feature of that position of opportunity is this, that it\nis the popularly (and rightly) recognized _duty_ of the Church of\nEngland Clergyman to ask admission at every door, so far as he can go to\nevery door, within his portion of the national vineyard. To a large\ndegree this is understood to be our duty, our business, as it is not\nunderstood to be that of other Ministers of religion; and this is a fact\nwhich for the man who will use it with good sense and unobtrusive\ndiligence is an invaluable introduction. A \"younger Brother\" of my own,\nwhose work began in a Liverpool Curacy, told me of his experience in\nthis matter. His district contained a very miscellaneous population;\nalmost all the great dissenting Churches were represented, and there\nwere many Roman Catholics, and not a few Jews. But the Curate went to\nevery door, as in duty bound; as a friend, a neighbour, a Christian, but\ndistinctly as one of the Clergy of the parish. And with one solitary\nexception, an instance in which a Jew repulsed him, he was not only\nadmitted but welcomed everywhere in his character as the Clergyman.\n\nOf course there are, as I have said just above, streets and lanes where\nit is not quite so. Another friend of mine, labouring in East London,\nfound that his black coat and white tie suggested to some of the people\nonly the guess that he was--the undertaker; so strange to them was the\npresence of a Clergyman, or the idea of his duty. The same friend, by\nthe way, found that there was one sure prescription for securing a\nwelcome on a second visit--to make the people _laugh_ before the first\nvisit was over. He was no careless Pastor, who forgot that he was in\nquest of souls, and that the message of the Lord is no jest. But his\nexperience was that in that strange \"lapsed\" population the _rapport_\nbetween man and man set up by an honest laugh was important as the first\nstep to something very different which was to follow.\n\nCOME TO THE POINT.\n\nIn the ordinary pastoral round no such ingenious merriment will be\nnecessary; though you will of course aim not only to be but to be seen\nto be _happy_ in your work, and in your Master; _bright_ with a light\nwhich is as natural in its influence as it is divine in its origin. In\nthe ordinary round one great principle to be remembered, if I am right,\nis that you should _come to the point_ as soon as possible. Some earnest\nmen greatly shrink from this, and aim at the souls of their people by\nvery circuitous routes. As a rule, I am sure, there is little need to do\nso; we are \"expected\" to be about our Master's business, and to deliver\nHis messages without needless delay. I would not counsel the general\nverbal adoption of one good country Parson's salutation, who always\nopened the cottage door with, \"_How are you? How is your soul?_\" But I\nhave no doubt it was a good greeting for many a parishioner of his; and\nthe _principle_ of it is good for almost every pastoral visit. Yes, we\nshall do well to take people very much for granted, coming before them\nas we do (unless we quite forget our true character) as the Lord Jesus\nChrist's messengers and delegates, whatever else we are.\n\nKEEP IT ALWAYS IN VIEW.\n\nMost certainly and obviously the Pastor will often allude to common\nhuman interests, and should indeed know something and have something to\nsay and do about temporal problems, things of body and estate. But then\nI do hold that he should \"draw all things this\" supremely important\n\"way.\" All his pastoral intercourse should bear somehow upon the\nquestion of the state before God of the person or persons visited; upon\nconviction of sin, or comfort in grace, or Christian conduct; upon\nChrist and the soul, upon holiness and immortality, as the Gospel\n\"brings them out into the light.\" [2 Tim. i. 10.]\n\nA DIFFICULT CASE WELL MET.\n\nThere are cases most certainly where this has to be done with peculiar\ntact and caution unless quite obvious mischief is to be done instead of\ngood. But let the man be always _lying in wait_, and he will very seldom\ndo so quite in vain. An instance occurs to me, in the work of a most\nhonoured veteran in the Ministry. He called on a new parishioner, a lady\nof his own class, and soon found out that she was politely but\nresolutely arranging to keep Jesus Christ out of the conversation; so\ncleverly that he fairly failed to break the fence. Just as he was\nleaving, for he could not go without one mention of his Master, he said,\nas the last word of his courteous farewell, \"_The Lord bless you_.\" That\nwas all; but it was enough to carry in it the Spirit's message. The\nutterance stayed in the parishioner's soul, sounding solemnly on. It was\nimpossible to be offended; it was impossible not to think. And the issue\nwas, in God's time, a real and deep conversion.\n\nA HAPPY REBUKE TO COWARDICE.\n\nBut, I repeat it, such difficulties in \"the daily round\" need not be\nvery frequent, if we do not create them for ourselves. How often the\nvery persons to whom we think it wiser not to speak openly about the\nLord Jesus Christ (remember, it is about HIM, even more than about\nthemselves, we are to speak) are longing to hear us do so! In the early\ndays of my ordination I remember visiting an invalid gentleman, who had\nknown me (for it was my Father's parish) all my life; and I was very\ncowardly in his case about coming to the point of Christ and the soul.\nSeveral visits, let me confess it with shame, were paid before I found\nmyself able to propose that we should open the Bible together, and then\npray. I was moved to the inmost heart by the actual tears of delight\nwith which the proposal was welcomed.\n\nAnd not seldom, if we do not come to the point, our people will bring us\nto it. A very dear friend of mine, a few years ago, was going his first\ncircuits in a large London parish, and paid one among many first visits.\nHe allowed it to be a mere visit of introductory civilities; but he need\nnot have been so cautious. As he rose to go the good woman on whom he\nhad called said to him, \"You will have a word of prayer with me, will\nyou not? The Vicar always does.\"\n\n\n \"_Go, labour on, spend and be spent;\n Thy joy to do the Father's will;\n It is the way the Master went;\n Should not the servant tread it still?_\n\n \"_Go, labour on while it is day,\n The world's dark night is hastening on;\n Speed, speed thy work, cast sloth away;\n It is not thus that souls are won._\"\n\n BONAR.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n_PASTOR IN PARISH_ (ii.).\n\n\n _Work on in hope; the plough, the sickle wield;\n Thy Master is the harvest's Master too;\n He gives the golden seed, He owns the field,\n And does Himself what His true servants do._\n\n\nI take up again the all-important subject of Pastoral Visitation, for\nthe same sort of informal and fragmentary treatment as that attempted in\nthe last chapter, and with the same feeling that the subject is\npractically inexhaustible.\n\nLET THE VISITOR BE A TEACHER, WATCHING FOR OPPORTUNITIES.\n\nOne object which the visitor will do well to keep steadily before him\nis, to be a _teacher_ as he goes. I have said something of this already,\nin recommending my Brethren to seize every good occasion for bringing in\nthe Bible, and words about the Bible. But the whole work of instruction\nneeds remembrance in our private intercourse with parishioners. Of\ncourse we shall avoid with watchful and willing care the magisterial\nmanner, the too didactic tone. And only when obvious occasions present\nthemselves shall we even seem to _set ourselves_ to teach; as when we\nare distinctly asked what is the meaning of this doctrine, or that\npassage of Scripture, or that phrase of the Prayer Book, or how to meet\nthat difficulty of belief. Such moments do come; in some pastoral lives\nthey come frequently; and whether the inquiry is made in a friendly\nspirit, with a real wish for information, or whether, as sometimes, it\nis the question of a critic or a caviller, it is an opportunity for\nwhich, in the Lord's grace, we should stand quite ready. To be sure we\nmay have sometimes to remember that sensible precept of the Rabbis,\n\"_Teach thy tongue to say, I do not know_\"; the answer, often, of the\ntruest and deepest-sighted wisdom. But even when answering so,\ninstruction may be given, as we state the reasons for the answer. And we\nshall at least have the opportunity while so doing to bring in that\nother maxim, which we owe, I think, to the late Archbishop Whately,\n\"_Never allow what you do know to be disturbed by what you do not\nknow_\"; a principle of very wide application.\n\nBut I am thinking now rather of the every-day sort of pastoral call and\nconversation, in which perhaps the parishioner visited may be anything\nbut a caviller, and anything but even a questioner; much too ready,\nperhaps, to take everything about Christian truths for granted, which,\nalas, means too often to take them as understood, to take them as\nbelieved, when there is little understanding of the matter, or even\nthought about it. Now it is a great thing when a pastoral visitor has\nthe art (which needs to be considered, and to be acquired) of putting\nhere and there into a quiet and friendly talk, best of all towards the\nclose, some sentence which sets out a great truth clearly, strongly, and\nin a shape which may wake attention and help remembrance. That is the\nkind of didactic work which I earnestly recommend.\n\n*THE PASTORAL TEACHER'S TOPICS.\n\nIf possible, let no visit close without some such utterance, if only\none. It may be about the very foundations of all Christian truth; about\nthe certainty of Christian facts, the Resurrection above all; about the\nPerson of the Lord Jesus; about His finished work of Atonement; about\nfaith, and our acceptance as believers in Him, and our victory and\ndeliverance in temptation by the power of the Holy Ghost through faith;\nabout sin, its true nature, its guilt, its end. Or it may be about the\nholy practicalities of Christian conduct; about the Lord's call to us to\nbreak with everything that is against His will; about that deep,\nfar-reaching truth of the Gospel that, while the sinner is saved by\nfaith only, he is saved on purpose that he may serve, on purpose that he\nmay \"walk and please God,\" [1 Thess. iv. 1.] and that he may do this\nabove all in \"the duty that lies near,\" in the plain things of the home,\nthe business, the handicraft, the social circle. Or it may be about the\nmighty claims of the Missionary cause, about the strangely forgotten\nfact that the Christian Church exists mainly in order to evangelize the\nnon-Christian world. Or it may be about the principles and duties of\nChurch membership and Christian ordinances; the true nature of worship;\nthe sacred duty of united worship; the call to hallow the Lord's Day;\nthe precious benefits of the Sacraments of Christ, explained with the\nholy reverence and equally holy simplicity and moderation of the\nCatechism and the Articles.\n\nNEED FOR SUCH WORK.\n\nI need not fill my pages with numberless details. For my plea is that we\nshould rather hold ourselves ready for the natural rise of such or such\ntopics, and for a clear instructive word in season upon them, than that\nwe should propose a theme and deliver a discourse. But I cannot too\nearnestly remind my Brethren how great _the need_ of instruction is\namong many of our kindly neighbours, even among our neighbours who go\nregularly to Church and are constantly to be seen at the Table of the\nLord.\n\nCHRIST \"A BLESSED ANGEL.\"\n\nLet me take one pre-eminent subject as my illustration: the\nfoundation-truth of the Godhead of our Blessed Redeemer. Are you at all\naware how widely spread is ignorance and error on that subject, far\nbeyond the limits of the \"Unitarian\"[17] community? I remember a\npastoral visit long ago to a slowly dying parishioner, a labouring man\nsomewhat stricken in years, who had been a church-goer, though not a\ncommunicant. I soon fell into a conversation with my friend which took a\nsort of catechetical shape; my aim was to see where the soul's hopes for\neternity really rested. Who and What was JESUS, whose name I know he\nhumbly reverenced? Was He a good Man? Yes. But anything more? There was\na long hesitation, and then the dear man expressed a faltering\npersuasion that the Lord could not be less than \"a blessed angel.\" That\ncase, I am well convinced, is very much more representative than some of\nus may think. At a recent Church Congress I heard some remarks in just\nthis direction from Bishop Walsham How, who speaks from a large pastoral\nexperience; his anxiety about the immense extent of popular ignorance or\nmisbelief about the Saviour's Person was at least as great as mine.\n\n[17] A term which I use under protest. If a Unitarian means a believer\nin the Unity of the Godhead, every orthodox Christian is a true\nUnitarian. Only, he is a Trinitarian also, from another side. I may\nventure to refer on this subject to a small book of my own, _Outlines of\nChristian Doctrine_, p. 20.\n\n\"ALL MY SUFFERMENT HERE.\"\n\nAnd so too is ignorance and misbelief about the work of His Cross, and\nof His Holy Spirit. \"I hope I shall have all my sufferment here,\" said\none poor invalid to me in old days, speaking indeed from a very\ncomfortless bed, in the slow pains of a dire disease. She had been long\nwithin sound of clear, bright Christian teaching. But deep in the soul,\nunmoved and ah, so difficult to dislodge, lay that notion of an atoning\nvalue in our own pains which is a radical contradiction to the glorious\nparadox of the perfect and unique work of Calvary:--\n\n \"Thy pains, not mine, O Christ,\n Upon the shameful tree\n Have paid the law's full price,\n And purchased peace for me.\n\n \"Thy Cross, not mine, O Christ,\n Has borne the awful load\n Of sins that none in heaven\n Or earth could bear but God.\"[18]\n\n[18] Bonar, _Hymns of Faith and Hope_ (First Series).\n\nTHE TRUTH OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.\n\nAs regards the Person and the Work of the blessed Spirit, great and\ngeneral is the oblivion, and manifold are the mistakes. I fear that even\nin the best instructed congregations, under the clearest public\nteaching, there are all too many who, practically, \"have not so much as\nheard whether there be any Holy Ghost.\" [Acts xix. 2.] The belief in His\nglorious Personality is faint and vague. The confusion of His Presence\nand Power with our \"better feelings\" is very, very common. The solemn\nquestions which the Scripture bids us put to ourselves, [Rom. viii.\n9.] whether _or not_ we \"have the Spirit of Christ\"--not merely \"a\nChristian spirit\" in the sense of tone and temper, but the Holy Ghost,\nproceeding from the Son, and uniting the true believer to Him--are\nlittle understood, and rarely used upon the man by himself. And the very\nthought of such a presence and such a power of the Lord the Life-Giver\nas shall \"_fill us with_ the Spirit\" [Eph. v. 18.] is not yet existent,\nI fear, in the minds of many even earnest Christians.\n\nHere are fields, large and fruitful, for the teaching visitor's\ncultivation. And so are the other possible subjects indicated above;\nsuch as the claims of the Lord upon our personal consistency in little\nthings; His solemn call to all His people to be, directly or indirectly,\nthe evangelists of the world; and the nature of His blessed sacramental\nInstitutions.\n\nTHE TRUTH OF THE SACRAMENTS.\n\nOn that last subject it is not my intention to enter at any length. But\na few words I may take this occasion to say, and I will assume that I\nam speaking to a younger Brother who in the main agrees with me in what\nare commonly called Evangelical Church principles. Let me first then\ncounsel you to take care that no one shall be able, lawfully, to charge\nyou with making light of the Sacraments,[19] or with leaving uncertain\nyour belief as to their divine purpose and function. A ministry which is\nsilent about them, and indistinct in its teaching on them, cannot in\nthis respect be fully true to either the Prayer Book or the Bible. Let\nyour instructions on this great subject, in public and in private, be\ndefinite, reverent, and full of thankfulness and praise for those great\ngifts of God. Then on the other hand, do not, if I may speak freely,\nwhile with all respect, think to honour the Sacraments by exaggeration,\nby speaking more of them than of that far greater thing, the blessed\nGrace of God in Christ, of which they are the \"sure _witnesses_ and\neffectual _signs_.\"[20] If I do not mistake, one of the most prevalent\ntendencies of current thought in the Church now is the tendency to\ninvert, in a certain way, the relations between Sacrament and Grace; to\ndevelop a doctrine of the Sacrament such that the doctrine of Grace can\nbe seen only, as it were, through it. And the result is, very often, so\nat least it seems to me to be, a very poor and attenuated presentation\nof the glorious things said in Scripture about \"the grace of God which\nbringeth salvation,\" [Tit. ii. 11.] and about the work of pure and\nsimple, but mysteriously mighty, faith in our appropriation of Christ's\nmerits and our reception of Christ's living power by the Holy Ghost. Let\nno such inversion mark your teaching. And if I may give one further\nsuggestion, I would say, remind yourself frequently of the very words of\nthe Prayer Book (including the Catechism) and the Articles on these\ngreat subjects. And inform yourself to some extent, at first hand, of\nthe views of the men who cast our Services and our Articles into their\npractically present shape; the views of Cranmer, of Ridley, of Jewell,\nand, just after them, of Hooker; not forgetting one great foreign\ntheologian, Henry Bullinger, who exercised a special influence on the\nEnglish divines of Edward and Elizabeth's time in the matter of\nsacramental doctrine.[21] You will find in him a full measure of holy\nreverence, and at the same time a luminous clearness and definiteness of\nexposition. The central idea of his teaching is the idea of the Covenant\nSeal, the \"instrument\" of solemn, valid, legal \"conveyance.\"\n\n[19] I mean of course Baptism and the Supper of the Lord, which _alone_\nthe Church of England recognizes as Christian Sacraments, _Sacramenta\nEvangelica_, \"Sacraments of the Gospel\" (see Art. xxv., par. 2).\n\n[20] _Certa testimonia, efficacia signa_ (Art. xxv.). It is worth the\nwhile to point out that a \"_sign_\" is \"_effectual_\" when it _effectually\ndoes the work of a sign_, not some quite different work. A seal is an\neffectual seal, not because, conceivably, its matter could be used as a\npowerful medicine, but because, _attached to its document_, it\neffectually seals the document's validity. A seal is in this respect a\nspecial sort of \"effectual sign.\" And so are the Sacraments.\n\n[21] See the Parker Society's collection of authors for Bullinger's\n_Decades_, or Doctrinal Sermons; officially recognized as a body of\ndivinity by the Church of England in Elizabeth's reign.\n\nMISTAKES ABOUT CHURCH DOCTRINE.\n\nWhile on the subject of Church Doctrine, I may go a little further, and\nremind you how very likely you are to discover in your rounds many\nmistakes about both the doctrine and the government of the Church of\nEngland. I have had considerable experience of such questions in the way\nof private pastoral ministry; I have found pious dissenters, or\nchurch-people whom they had influenced, fully persuaded that the Church\nof England teaches unconditional regeneration in the hour of Baptism,\nthat she teaches at least a near approach to Transubstantiation, that\nshe entrusts to her priests the power of conferring or withholding the\ndivine forgiveness, and that, officially and in set terms, she\n\"unchurches\" all communities not episcopally organized.[22] It is well\nto be quite sure that these beliefs about the Church are mistakes,\nprovably such, in the light of the Prayer Book and Articles, and of\nhistory. It has been my happiness to bring some such questioners as I\nhave described to \"sincere and conscientious communion with\" the Church\nof England, in a loyalty which leaves ample room for loving sympathy\nwith all true Christians. And the chief means has been the production of\nproof that the Church herself, as distinguished from particular teachers\nand leaders in the Church, does not teach the tenets alleged.\n\n[22] As regards the Scottish and Continental Protestant Churches it is\nnot too much to say that, with the very rarest exceptions, English\nChurch writers _of all schools_ regarded them as \"Sister Churches of the\nReformation\"--_till about 1830_.\n\nDEFECTIVE VIEWS OF SIN.\n\nBut to come back to matters more primary than even these; I must remind\nmy younger Brother that there is, all around him, in the average circles\nof even church-going people, a sorrowfully faint insight into the\nsinfulness of SIN; into the terrible realities of its _guilt_ before God\n(a point too often absent from even earnest modern teaching), and of its\n_power_; yes, and into its true _nature_, as it comes out, not in\noutbursts of word or deed, or in practices which public opinion\ncondemns, but in imagination, in desire, in tone. It may surprise us\n(when we think how very elementary are the spiritual principles\ninvolved), but I fear it is a fact, that sin is regarded by vast numbers\nof church-people (I am not thinking at all of \"the lapsed masses\" now)\nas a matter of little importance if it does not come out in some very\npositive form. Multitudes among us are quite insensible to the spiritual\npenetration of the law of God, and have never given a thought to the\nquestion of a heart-surrender to His will in everything, and the sin of\nmerely withholding that surrender.\n\nThen, to take another primary subject of a different class; there is a\nwide and general ignorance of the great lines of Christian Evidence, and\na large open door accordingly for the active attacks of shallow, or\nsubtle, unbelief. Few have ever been taught in any definite way the\nsupreme significance in this respect of the fact of the Lord's\nResurrection, and its mighty walls of proof; and the reasons for our\nbelief that the Bible is indeed not of man but of God; the witness of\nhistory to prophecy; and so on.\n\nLET US DROP SEEDS OF TEACHING.\n\nI owe an almost apology for this long talk about subjects of doctrine,\nand practice, and evidence. But I have kept all along the purpose of\nthis chapter in view. I wish to remind my Brethren how very much they\nmay do, in the course of visitation, to _drop seeds_ of fact, of truth,\nof principle, in careful, thoughtful words, the product of private\nreading and reflection, called out by some natural occasion.\nUndoubtedly, the subjects I have outlined are themes for the pulpit, and\nfor the Bible class, as well as for the visit. But my feeling is that\nthe visit gives opportunities quite of its own for didactic work. We\nought to be \"natural\" everywhere; but we are sometimes suspected, or\nimagined, to be less so in public than in private; and besides, in\nprivate we give and take; we are open to question and answer; and this\nmay give quite special advantage to the word spoken, quietly and\npleasantly, but pointedly, in the pastoral interview.\n\n\"PURCHASE THE OPPORTUNITY.\"\n\n\"The priest's lips should keep knowledge.\" [Mal. ii. 7.] The Clergyman\nshould be ready everywhere to be the teacher on the great subjects which\nhe is supposed to make his own. He will never intrude instruction, or\nparade it; but he will everywhere be on the watch for the occasion for\nit, [Greek: exagorazomenos ton kairon], \"purchasing the opportunity,\"\n[Eph. v. 10.] at the cost of care.\n\nVISITATION OF THE SICK.\n\nAnd here I may come again to that important branch of visitation, the\nvisitation of the sick. The Church, as we well know, provides a Form of\nVisitation; most helpful and suggestive in its principles and outline\nfor all. But it is, as you are aware, _imposed_ by the Canon (lxvii.)\nonly on such Clergymen (very scarce personages) as have no licence to\npreach. As a fact, we Presbyters are left to our own discretion in this\nsacred part of our work; and that discretion we should seek prayerfully\nto cultivate. How different are the circumstances in each one of an\naverage series of sick-visits! As I write the words, such a series from\nmy own past days rises up before me; and I transcribe a few\nrecollections from the book of memory.\n\nA SERIES OF VISITS.\n\nW.S. is a retired tradesman, a thoughtful and rather reticent man;\nbrought up a Socinian, and professedly such still. I am trying to lay\nsiege to him, not without merciful tokens of hope from the Lord. And the\nsimple plan is, not to open the controversy between Socinus and\nScripture, but to arrange that each visit shall have its short Scripture\nreading, its friendly talk, and its prayer, all bearing mainly on the\ndeadliness of sin and the wonder and glory of salvation. I happen to\nknow that the married daughter of W.S., a very intelligent woman, was\nbrought from heresy to a divine Saviour's feet by means of a sermon, not\non Christ's Godhead, but on the sinfulness of sin.\n\nT.H. is a sturdy old blacksmith, old enough to have been bred in the\ninfidel school of Carlile (quite another person than Carlyle), and\nsteeped in old-fashioned Chartism. He always has the newspaper on his\nnow helpless knees, never the Bible; but he almost always has some Bible\ndifficulty ready for me. It is pleasant to be able this afternoon to\nshow him, holding the page up before his eyes, that his last\nstumbling-block is one of his own (or his friends') bold invention. He\nmeets civility always civilly, and never resents a natural transition\nfrom the last bit of politics to the Gospel. But it is a hard, sad case.\nThe Lord only knows how the apparently motionless conscience fares.\n\nT.G. is a fine, manly artizan, a coach-painter, scarcely yet in middle\nlife; lately the somewhat bitter and very self-satisfied critic of his\ngood and devoted wife's simple faith. I have had rather discouraging\ntalks with T.G. before to-day; but now he is very ill, and a few Sunday\nafternoons ago he sent across the road for the Curate, who to his own\nsolemn joy found him broken down in unmistakable conviction of sin,\nasking what he must do to be saved. It is a blessed thing to visit him\nnow, for already the rays of the eternal sun are shining between the\nclouds of a deeply genuine repentance; and the visitor's task is\nplain,--\n\n \"To teach him all the mercy, while he shows him all the sin.\"\n\nSoon it will be my happiness, I hope, to administer to him, as a\npenitent believer, with his now happy wife and a faithful friend, the\nprecious Communion; and I look forward to see him depart in due time in\nthe peace of God, to be with Christ, for whom already he has learnt to\ntestify.\n\nThen comes another visit, to one of our \"bettermost\" neighbours; this\ndoor bears, or ought to bear, the proverbial brass knocker. But be the\ndoor what it may be, there is great need and great mercy inside it. The\ndear man, W.T., lately in active professional life in the home\ncivil-service, is sinking under the most agonizing of human maladies,\nand it is very near the close; this is the second visit to-day, in his\nurgent need. But, blessed be God, grace, once absent, has found its way\nthrough the terrible obstacle of pain, and his scarcely articulate\nutterance--intelligible to his visitor only because now so\nfamiliar--speaks of the joy and rest of the Lord Jesus Christ, and of\nthe sufferer's longing for the salvation of another soul, a soul very\ndear to him.[23]\n\n[23] Wonderful to say (it is to me very wonderful), I have known more\nthan one bright conversion take place amidst the untold pangs of such an\nillness.\n\nSuch visits tell upon the heart, and upon the head, and perhaps the\nround among the suffering has been long enough to-day. To-morrow we will\ntry to get a quiet half-hour with W.R., a shopkeeper, sinking in\nconsumption; a man of no common natural refinement and thoughtfulness,\nbut long troubled with that sort of scepticism which is generated (who\nknows in how many cases?) by the mysteries, not of God's revelation, but\nof His providence. For him, too, the visitor's business is to lay a\ngentle siege, \"here a little, and there a little,\" trying never to lose\npatience with objections and difficulties, but rather to sympathize with\nthem _as to their pains_, and then to suggest the answer in Jesus\nChrist. And oh joy, the Lord is finding the way in, through His Word,\nand the clouds are passing away from the man's mind, and soul, and\nforehead, as he is getting to \"know WHOM he believes.\"[24]\n\n[24] I possess a beautiful little Bible given me by dear W.R., who has\nnow been many years with Christ. Such a gift is a very sacred treasure\nto a Pastor.\n\nThen we can walk round the corner--how the beloved streets and lanes\nrise up in memory before me as I write!--to see J.F., a young printer,\ndying in the brightest joy and peace, won from carelessness to a solid\nfaith by the work and witness of earnest dissenting Christians, but glad\nand thankful to receive the Communion of the Lord from his dear Vicar,\nor his Vicar's son. And then five minutes' walk takes us to a tiny alley\nin the denser part of the widespread parish, where a poor life-long\ncripple, W.G., lies day and year upon his _little_ bed--little, because\nthough the head is full-sized, and the brain within it is an adult\nbrain, the body has never grown since childhood. Here is a case for\nsteady sympathy, and also for gentle and steady aiming at instruction as\nwell as comfort. And then, not far off, we will take the privilege of a\nquiet visit to an aged Christian woman, J.N. In long past years loving\nsaints found her pining in extreme poverty, and sunk in a dull,\ndespairing indifference. Now it is a great spiritual help to sit in her\nlittle attic beside her, and draw her on to speak (she is no loquacious\nperson by nature, and needs drawing on) about the needs of the soul, and\nthe glorious fulness of the Son of God. She is no common Christian; not\nonly in life but in thought this appears. At the time of her conversion,\nshe could not read a letter. Since then, she has repeatedly read with\ngreat spiritual insight and enjoyment Archbishop Leighton's Commentary\non St Peter. Here is a room in which the visitor learns quite as much as\nhe teaches. And so he does in a still smaller and much darker room,\nthree minutes' distant from J.N.'s. There lies blind R.W., in his strong\ndays the head-servant of an old farmer of our village, and to all\nappearance as little capable of spiritual interests as the animals he\nfed. But on his sick-bed, the comfortless couch of many declining years,\na loving visitor, a devoted lady-worker, has found him out, and the Lord\nhas found him out through her. He never knew A from B in his life, and\nnever will. But do you want proof of the power of grace to quicken mind,\nas well as to convert soul? Come with me up the stairs into dear old\nR.W.'s darksome room, and in the course of our talk you shall hear his\nquavering voice saying things, quite humbly and naturally, about the\nglory of his Saviour, and the way of salvation, and the joy and peace of\nhis heart in God, which are not only loving ascriptions but clear and\nsound divinity. It is good to be with him.\n\nI have spoken mainly, though not only, of cases of warm interest and\nencouragement. Of course there are sorrowful and heart-trying visits to\nthe sick. One such, to poor old T.H., I have described. And we might see\nthe much older A.C., a woman of near ninety years, who seems\nimpenetrable to the true light, though grateful and kindly towards the\nvisitor; and B.F., older still, ninety-six, so vain of her age that it\nis difficult to get her off the beloved theme; and J.G., a steady,\nself-righteous man; and C.W., clever, and disposed to scoff; and T.B.,\nknown to be leading a very evil life, civil, but immovable.\n\nRESOLVE TO BE A VISITOR.\n\nThe work is very various, very interesting, and full of the call for\n\"long patience,\" while full, too, of blessed encouragements and\nsurprises. But \"the time would fail me.\" Ah, let me not close without\nsaying to my younger Brother how deeply humbling to me are the memories\nof those pastoral days, and humbling above all as I look back and wish\nnow, in vain for ever, that I had _visited more_, among both the sick\nand the whole. \"Enter not into judgment with Thy servant, O Lord\"; \"To\nThee only it appertaineth to forgive sins.\"\n\nMy dear younger Brother, resolve that by the grace of God you will be a\nvisitor, whatever else you are, or are not. And be a visitor who\nrespects his neighbours, who feels with them, whose heart lives with\nthem, and who on the other hand watches over his call to instruct them,\nto clear up and deepen their thoughts of self, and God, and life, and\ndeath, and salvation, and duty, and eternity.\n\nA CONVERSION AT EIGHTY-SIX.\n\n\"Go, labour on; spend and be spent.\" There is a sure reward, seen or not\nseen as yet; and often the most unlikely quarter shall prove the quarter\nof blessing, and the last shall be first. One recollection, drawn out\nof my earliest childhood, shall close this wandering talk. It is of dear\nold Mrs E., then aged quite eighty-six. She must have been born under\nthe rule of King George the Second. A farmer's widow, she had been\nabsolutely and perfectly respectable all her life, and was entirely\nsatisfied with her state and her prospects for the next world. My dear\nFather, and his devoted Curate of those days, the Rev. W.D., not seldom\nsaw her, but without leaving any apparent impression on her conscience.\nAt last that conscience woke. The Curate read a chapter, in her hearing,\nto her pious invalid daughter, who had sought her mother's conversion\nfor years in prayer, and had _lived_ true Christianity all the while in\nher mother's home. And on a sudden, something in that chapter (it was\nthe third of Romans) said to the old lady, \"You have lived eighty years\nin the world, and never done a single thing for the love of God.\" The\nconviction was tremendous in its depth and quality, and it lasted long.\nBut a very bright light followed, and shone with holy fulness through\nwhat proved to be several remaining years of beautiful old age. She\nrejoiced in her adorable Saviour with joy unspeakable, a joy meanwhile\nperfectly sober and full of the good fruits of loving righteousness. She\ndied at last, singing, or rather musically murmuring, _Rock of\nAges_.[25] And my recollection, across seven-and-forty years, is of that\ndear old lady of the past, sitting upright in her parlour, as my Mother\nled me in to see her, and wearing a look upon her face which I can only\nnow describe as a remembered ray of light.\n\n[25] My dear Father, many years ago, published a full narrative of Mrs\nE.'s last days, in a little volume of pastoral recollections, _Pardon\nand Peace_.\n\n\n \"_I love, I love my Master;\n I will not go out free;\n For He is my Redeemer,\n He paid the price for me._\n\n \"_I would not leave His service,\n It is so sweet and blest,\n And in the weariest moments\n He gives the truest rest._\"\n\n MISS F.R. HAVERGAL.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\n_THE CLERGYMAN AND THE PRAYER BOOK._\n\n\n _Dear pages of ancestral prayer,\n Illumined all with Scripture gold,\n In you we seem the faith to share\n Of saints and seers of old.\n\n Whene'er in worship's blissful hour\n The Pastor lends your heart a voice,\n Let his own spirit feel your power,\n And answer, and rejoice._\n\n\nIn the present chapter I deal a little with the spirit and work of the\nClergyman in his ministration of the ordered Services of the Church,\nreserving the work of the Pulpit for later treatment.\n\nTHE PRAYER BOOK NOT PERFECT BUT INESTIMABLE.\n\nLet me begin by a brief reminder of the greatness of the spiritual\ntreasure which we possess in the Book by which we minister. How shall I\nspeak of it as I would? \"The Prayer Book isn't inspired, I know,\" said\nan old coast-guardsman some years ago to a friend of mine, \"but, sure\nand certain, _'tis as bad as inspired_!\" \"I find the Liturgy,\" said\nanother veteran, Charles Simeon, \"as superior to all modern compositions\nas the work of a philosopher on any deep subject is to that of a\nschoolboy who understands scarcely anything about it.\" \"All that the\nChurch of England needs to make her the glory of all Churches,\" said\nSimeon's friend, the late Rev. William Marsh, \"is the spirit of her own\nservices.\"\n\nI am not so blind as to maintain that our Book is ideally perfect, and\nthat its every sentence is infallible. It is not quite literally \"as bad\nas inspired.\" After using it in ministration for nearly five-and-twenty\nyears I own to the wish that here and there the wording, or the\narrangement, or the rubrical direction, had been otherwise in some\ndetail, perhaps in some important detail. I do certainly wish very\nearnestly indeed that the Revisers of 1661-2 had expressed themselves\nmore happily in that Rubric about \"Ornaments\" which within recent years\nhas proved--little as they expected it, or intended it, to do so--such a\nfertile field of discord. But for all this, my five-and-twenty years'\nministerial use of the Prayer Book has only deepened my sense of its\ninestimable general value and greatness.\n\nIf a temperate and equitable revision were possible at the present time\nI should welcome the prospect on most accounts. But it seems to me\nplain that it is _not_ at present possible. And meanwhile I thank God\nfrom my inmost heart for the actual Prayer Book as a whole.\n\nLet me point out a very few of the claims of the Book on our love and\ngratitude; and now specially in view of what we may sometimes hear said\nabout it by Christians not of our own Church.\n\ni. Observe its profound and searching _spirituality_. It is quite true\nthat in a certain sense the Book takes all who use it for granted; it\nassumes them to be worshippers in spirit and in truth; it does not pray\nfor them, or lead them in public worship to pray for themselves, as for\nthose who do not know and love God, who have not come to Christ. But\nthen what form of public, common prayer can well do this? And meantime\nthe Book does, especially in the service of the Communion, and\nparticularly in that too often omitted part of it, the \"longer\nExhortation,\" beginning _Dearly beloved in the Lord_, throw the\nworshipper back upon himself for self-examination. This is just the\nmethod of St Paul in his addresses to the Christian community. He\nwrites to all as \"saints,\" \"faithful,\" \"elect,\" \"sanctified.\" What does\nhe mean? Does he mean that those glorious terms are satisfied by the\nfact that all have been baptized, or even that all are communicants at\nthe sacred Table? Not at all. He takes all for granted as being what\nthey profess to be, when he greets the community. [Rom. viii. 9; 1 Cor.\nxvi. 22; 2 Cor. xiii. 5; Gal. v. 6.] But he says also, \"If any man have\nnot the Spirit of Christ he is none of His\"; \"If any man love not the\nLord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema\"; \"Examine yourselves, whether ye\nbe in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not that Jesus Christ is\nin you--except ye be [Greek: adokimoi], counterfeits?\" \"In Jesus Christ\nneither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith\nwhich worketh by love.\" Such sentences throw a flood of holy and\nsearching light on the sense in which St Paul \"took them all for\ngranted.\" And the Prayer Book is in true harmony with both parts of the\nApostle's method.\n\nWHAT IT TAKES FOR GRANTED IN THE WORSHIPPER.\n\nAnd then, think what the Book _does_ thus searchingly and helpfully\n\"take for granted.\" It assumes a deep sense of sin, such a sense as is\nindeed \"grievous unto us.\" It takes for granted our deep desire both for\npardon and for spiritual victory. It assumes our desire to be \"kept this\nday without sin\"; to \"follow the only God with pure hearts and minds\";\nto \"be continually given to all good works\"; to \"be enabled by the Lord\nto live according to His will\"; to have \"all our doings ordered by His\ngovernance\"; to have \"such love to Him poured into our hearts that we\nmay love Him above all things.\" It assumes our desire to \"read, mark,\nlearn, and inwardly digest all the Holy Scriptures.\" It assumes our\nreadiness to \"suffer on earth for the testimony of the truth, looking up\nsteadfastly to heaven, and by faith beholding the glory that shall be\nrevealed.\" It assumes our adoring devotion to our Lord Jesus Christ, and\nthat we present \"ourselves, our souls and bodies, a reasonable, holy,\nand living sacrifice,\" to our God.\n\nI heard a few years ago of a remarkable case of secession from the\nChurch of England. A thoughtful and conscientious man left us because,\nas he said, he could no longer seem to concur in such words of intense\nspiritual reality and surrender _while he did not fully mean them_. On\nhis principles, I fear there ought to be a large exodus from our Church.\nBut that is not the fault of the Church, or of the Church's Book. It is\nthe fault of the worshippers, and it is a solemn call to us not so much\nto criticize the Liturgy as to \"examine _ourselves_.\"\n\nTHE PRAYER BOOK AS A WEAPON.\n\nIn this connexion I am reminded of a characteristic saying of an\nhonoured friend of mine, now at rest with the Lord after a long and\nfaithful ministry. He was one of those men who instinctively speak\nstrongly, perhaps sometimes roughly; but such roughness is often useful.\n\"The Prayer Book,\" said he, \"is always handy to throw at people's\nheads\"; figuratively, of course, not literally. He slung it out in\nvigorous quotations from his pulpit, point blank at the unreality, and\nformalism, and pharisaism, and love of this present evil world, which\ntoo often underlies the most precise \"churchmanship\" and the most\npunctual church-going.\n\nMy old friend's strong word may carry a suggestion to some of my younger\nBrethren; though I would advise their deferring a _projectile_ use of\nthe Book till they are seniors in the Church. But the youngest Minister\nof Christ, in all loving modesty, may reach many a conscience (beginning\nwith his own) by well-timed words from the Prayer Book, showing what the\nBook takes for granted in the worshipper.\n\nSCRIPTURALITY OF THE BOOK.\n\nii. Next I point to the abundant and loyal _Scripturality_ of the Prayer\nBook. I venture to say that no Service Book in the world is quite like\nours in this. This characteristic lies on the surface; in the wealth of\nScripture poured out in every service before the people; Psalms,\nLessons, Canticles, Epistle, Gospel, Introductory Sentences, Decalogue,\nComfortable Words. At the Font, in the Marriage Ordinance, at the Grave,\nit is still the same; Scripture, in our mother tongue, full and free,\nruns everywhere. And below the surface it is the same. Take almost any\nset of responses, or any single prayer, and see the strong warp of the\nBible in it all.\n\n*\"THE PREFACE\" ON THE BIBLE.\n\nAnd then go for a moment from the Services to the Preface of the Book,\nand see what the Fathers of our English Liturgy thought and intended\nabout the place of the Holy Scriptures in worship. I hope my Brethren\nhave all read that \"Preface\" with care; I mean, of course, the whole\nlength of introductory matter which precedes the Tables of Lessons;\nnothing of it later than 1662, most of it (indeed all but the first\nsection, written by Sanderson) dating in substance from 1549.[26] I hope\nit has all been read by you; but I am not quite certain of it, so little\nattention is at present called to those important and authoritative\nstatements of principle. But however well you may already know them,\nthey will repay another reading; and so you will be reminded again that\nthe really first thought in the minds of the men who gave us our Prayer\nBook in English was to let \"_the Word of God_ have free course and be\nglorified\" in all the worship of the people. [2 Thess. iii. 1.] Those\nmen were learned in the past, and they reverenced history and\ncontinuity. But they reverenced still more the heavenly Word, and where\nthey found the ample reading and hearing of it impeded by even\nimmemorial usage, the usage had to give way, without reserve, to the\nBible.\n\n[26] I do not forget that some modifications in detail, as to the\nLectionary, are quite recent.\n\nYes, the Prayer Book is, whatever else it is, searchingly, overflowingly\nScriptural; full of the Bible, full of Christ. Let us drink its\nprinciples and its manner in, that they may come out in our life and our\npreaching.\n\nAnd now for a few simple practical suggestions on our ministerial use of\nthe Book.\n\nUSE THE BOOK WITH DILIGENCE.\n\ni. First, I would entreat my younger Brother to resolve in the Lord's\nname that his own use of the Prayer Book in his ministration be to him a\nthing of sacred importance and personal reality. We _need_ to form such\na resolve deliberately, and to watch and pray over it. Do we not know\nwhat strong temptations lie in the other direction? We have to use these\nforms over and over again; before many years are over perhaps we could\n\"take\" a whole service, except the appointed Scriptures, without looking\nat the book: is it not too easy under such conditions to read as those\nwho read not, and to pray as those who pray not? And all too often the\nClergyman, younger or older, allows himself almost consciously, almost\non principle, to form an inadequate estimate of his Prayer-Book work.\nPerhaps he regards the prayers as in such a sense \"the voice of the\nChurch\" that he is willing to be little more than a machine through\nwhich the Church offers them. Or perhaps on the other hand he lets\nhimself forget their immense importance, under a strong, and just, sense\nof the sacred importance of the Sermon. He is alive and awake in the\npulpit, and seeks his Lord's presence there, and realizes it as sought;\nbut in the desk--he goes by himself, and much of his precious time there\nis spent in thought which wanders to the ends of the earth while his\nvoice does its decent but somnambulatory part alone.\n\n*USE IT WITH LIVING REALITY.\n\nI can only appeal with all my heart to my younger Brother not to let it\nbe thus with him. And the only effective recipe against the trouble is\nfaith, exercised in prayer and watching, with a full recollection of the\nurgent importance of the matter. For indeed it _is_ all-important that\nthe servant of God should be \"given wholly to\" his work, at the reading\ndesk, at the lectern, at the Table, at the Font.\n\nPRAY THE PRAYERS.\n\nIt is easy to say, as it is often said, that we \"must not preach the\nprayers,\" must not obtrude our personality in leading the devotions of\nthe congregation; that our part is to be regular and audible, and\notherwise to \"efface ourselves.\" Most certainly we ought not to _preach_\nthe prayers, in public any more than in private. But then, we ought to\n_pray_ them. Most certainly we ought not to obtrude our personality upon\nthe thought of the worshippers. But then, we ought to serve them with\nour personality, and we can best do this, surely, by a spirit and a\nmanner which is unmistakably that of the fellow-worshipper, who feels\n_himself_ to be in the presence of the King, and knows that the\npetitions and the promises are for him at least a holy reality. I am\nperfectly well aware that it is not _easy_ to steer between a more or\nless mechanical manner and a demonstrative one, and that perhaps of two\nevils the former is the less. But I am sure it is _possible_ to steer\nthe right line, by using sanctified common-sense, and asking for a\nlittle candid counsel from those who hear us, and above all by being\nwhat we seek to seem--true worshippers, spiritually awake and humbly\nreverent.\n\nAs long as man is man, so long will the law of sympathy hold good. And\nby that law it is certain that the way to promote, so far as we can, a\nspirit and tone of true worship in our people is to possess--and to\nshow--that spirit ourselves, as we lead, and also join, their worship.\nNever declaim the prayers, but always pray them, from the soul and with\nthe voice.\n\n\"GIVE ATTENDANCE TO THE READING\" OF THE LESSONS.\n\nii. I spoke just now of what we should do at the lectern. Let me\nearnestly press upon my Brethren the great duty of rightly reading the\nLessons. Do you want to carry out the will and purpose of the Church of\nEngland? As we have seen, that purpose is above everything to glorify\nthe Word of God. See then that the Lesson, as read by you, is as\naudible, as intelligible, as impressive as you can make it. Take care\nbeforehand that you understand its points, its arguments, its emphasis.\nTake counsel with yourself, and perhaps with others, about ways and\nmeans for bringing these things out in your public reading. Remember\nthat for very many of your people (I fear I am right in saying so) the\nChurch Lessons are the most solid pieces of Scripture they ever hear,\nor ever read. Many years ago it was not uncommonly said that in \"these\ndays of universal reading\" we might perhaps abbreviate our Church\nLessons. But since that time it has been more fully and sadly realized,\nby very many of us at least, that universal reading does not mean\nuniversal Bible reading by any means, but much rather universal\nnewspaper and novel reading. The heavenly Book is _terribly unfamiliar_\nto multitudes of churchgoers, as you will find, if you ask, when you go\nabout your parish; of this we have already thought. Therefore, make all\nyou can of the reading of the Lessons in public worship. [Greek:\nProseche t\u00cd anagn\u00d9sei], says the Apostle to Timothy, \"Give attention to\nthe reading\" [1 Tim. iv. 13.]; does he not mean, be diligent in reading\nthe Scripture to the people? The precept is as much as ever in point in\nour day.\n\nOPPORTUNITIES OFFERED BY THE OCCASIONAL SERVICES.\n\niii. As regards the occasional services, Public and Private Baptism,\nMarriage, Burial, I would earnestly counsel my Brother to put\npersonality into his reading in them all, in the moderate sense\nindicated above. The fact that such occasions are necessarily more or\nless _special_ in their interest for some at least of those present\nshould never be forgotten; bring the power of a sympathetic interest and\nearnestness to bear upon it. In administering Public Baptism I have\noften realized this to a very peculiar degree. Who can feel the least\nfondness for little children, and have the slightest insight into a\nparent's heart, and not do so? Our service is undoubtedly long; very\nlong indeed when accompanied by a chorus of perhaps several little\ncrying voices. But let the servant of God \"be in it,\" and he will find\nhimself much more touched than troubled by the babies' lamentations as\nhe speaks to the sponsors about the young helpless souls, and turns to\nthe Lord of all grace to dedicate them to Him and to invoke His blessing\non them for time and eternity, and then applies the watery Seal of all\nthe promises to their small foreheads. I have always found it very hard\nto get through that service with a perfectly steady voice; and after\nall, why should we be so careful to do so?\n\n_Private_ Baptism is indeed a special occasion. There are reasons, no\ndoubt, why it must not be too readily administered; in some parishes\nparents, for one reason or another, too often try to secure \"a\nchristening\" in private, on insufficient grounds, with no intention of a\npublic dedication afterwards. But when the case is clear, and you are at\nthe little suffering one's side, perhaps with a distressed mother close\nbeside it and you, see to it that you so minister the rite, so read the\nfew precious words, as both to sympathize and to teach. Let me add that\nPrivate Baptism often brings the Clergyman into a house where religion\nis utterly neglected; and the opportunity may be a priceless one, if the\npower of love and spiritual reality is with you in the work.\n\nAnd when you officiate at a Wedding, different as the conditions are\nfrom those just remembered, still do not forget that for at least some\nthere present the hour is a deeply moving one. And is not the Marriage\nService a noble one to read, to interpret, with its peculiar mingling of\nimmemorial and archaic simplicity with a searching depth of scriptural\nexhortation, and a bright wealth of divine benedictions? Throw the\npower of a true man's solemnized sympathy into your reading of that\nservice.\n\nPROBLEMS CONNECTED WITH THE USE OF THE BURIAL SERVICE.\n\nOf the ritual of the Grave I hardly need to speak. I know only too well\nthat there are funerals and funerals. There are occasions of unrelieved\nsadness. There are occasions when the Minister's heart is chilled by a\nmanifest and utter indifference. But the saddest, dreariest of burials\nis an opportunity for the Lord. Whether or no you see your way to give\nan address, let it be seen that you are dealing with God in the prayers,\nand read the Lessons \"as one that pleadeth with men.\"\n\nA brief word in passing on the problem raised by some of the phrases of\nour Burial Service. Let me call attention to the studied generality of\nthe words, _In sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal\nlife_. Before 1662 this ran \"in sure ... hope _of resurrection_, etc.,\"\nwhich, as you will observe, expressly applied the \"hope\" to _that_ case\nof burial; the change was evidently made on purpose to relieve\nconscience in the matter. Then remember that the whole service is\nconstructed, like all our services, for the member of the Christian\ncommunity taken on his profession; and that assumption, unless flagrant\nfacts withstand it, is to be made, in public ordinance, as much at the\ngrave as elsewhere. And do not forget that _hope_, be it ever so\n\"trembling,\" is _never_ forbidden at a grave-side. I am no advocate of\nwhat is called \"the larger hope\"; I dare not be. But I am deeply\nconvinced that mercies of the Lord, in cases quite beyond our possible\nknowledge, are experienced in the very act of departure.\n\n \"Betwixt the stirrup and the ground\n Mercy I sought, mercy I found.\"\n\nThat instance has many parallels; and God only knows their limits. Never\nshould we say, whatever we may awfully fear, that such and such a soul\nis _to our knowledge_ lost.\n\nAs regards the practical management of extreme cases, the young\nClergyman will of course act altogether under his Incumbent. And the\nyoung Incumbent will remember that he can have recourse to his Bishop\nfor counsel.\n\nTHE HOLY COMMUNION.\n\niv. Let me say one special word on our administration of the precious\nritual of the Table of the Lord. I am not attempting here any\ndiscussion of its doctrinal aspects in detail. For myself, as I have\nsaid elsewhere, I make no secret of long-settled \"Evangelical\"\nconvictions. I regard the Holy Eucharist as above all things else the\nLord's way of sealing to His true Israel the unutterable benefits of the\nNew and Everlasting Covenant, rather than an occasion on which He\ninfuses into them His glorified Manhood. His sacred Body and Blood are,\nfor me, the Body and the Blood _as they were_, once for all, at Calvary,\nand as they are not therefore literally now; and my participation in\nthem is accordingly my participation in the virtues of the Atoning\nSacrifice, there once and for ever wrought and offered. But this is by\nthe way. I speak now of our spirit and manner in the administration, in\nrespect of some principles which are little if at all affected, it seems\nto me, by even grave differences of doctrinal theory. Alas, at the\npresent day it is too often the case that the communicant is fairly\nbewildered by the varieties of Communion ritual, or by the complications\nof it. Ought this to be so, on _any_ theory of the Eucharist? Did I for\none believe our adorable and beloved LORD to be locally present (I use\nthe words not technically but practically) on the Holy Table as nowhere\nelse here on earth, I think that all my instinct would go towards a\nreverence whose depth was manifested not by an elaborate ceremonial but\nby the most solemn possible simplicity of act. A ritual whose details\nmust be matter of careful practice, and which suggests almost the need\nof a Spanish master-of-the-ceremonies--ought _that_ to be the natural\neffect of an, as it were, invisible Presence?\n\nSIMPLICITY AND REVERENCE.\n\nBut probably I write for readers whose inclinations or risks lie little\nin that direction. And for them I say, let your administration of the\nblessed Communion always combine a manifest reverence and a restful\nsimplicity. The Lord _is_ there, the Master of His own Table, the Prince\nof His own Covenant, ready to give His people His royal Seal by your\nhands. And His people are there, to have their sacred interview with\nHim. Do not obstruct their view, their colloquy; humbly aid it. Be their\nservant, as in HIS presence; obtrude yourself as little as you possibly\ncan.\n\nADDRESSES ON THE PRAYER BOOK.\n\nAs I draw the chapter to a close, I make one practical recommendation to\nmy younger Brethren. It is, to do what they can to interest their people\nin the Prayer Book, and to promote its intelligent use, by taking what\nopportunities they can to talk to them about it. Many a private occasion\nfor this will no doubt present itself. But if now and then a simple\nlecture on the history of the Prayer Book can be given, and if possible\nwell illustrated, it will be very useful; and so will be a series of\nweek-night devotional addresses on the teaching of the Prayer Book. And\nlet not the need of plain matter-of-fact explanation of obsolete terms\nand technical phrases be forgotten on such occasions. Of course the\nCurate will carefully consult his Incumbent on the whole matter. But few\nof my elder Brethren will not feel with me that such \"talks upon the\nPrayer Book,\" carefully considered and conducted, whether by Incumbent\nor by Curate, may be of the greatest use, under our Master's blessing.\n\n\"MORE CEREMONIAL, LESS WORSHIP.\"\n\nOne last word, and I have done with these suggestions. An English Bishop\nonce told me that he had lately met a gentleman who, after ten years'\nresidence abroad, returned to England, and to his place as a worshipper\nin our Churches. \"Do you remark particularly any change or advance in\nwhat you see there?\" \"I observe on the one hand much more ceremonial, on\nthe other hand, apparently, much less worship. Fewer kneel, fewer\nrespond, fewer around me seem devoutly attentive.\" Less worship! Is it\nso indeed? Let the very opposite be the case, so far as our influence\nand teaching can have effect, with our fathers' Prayer Book in our\nhands, and in our hearts.\n\n\n \"_Lo, God is here; Him day and night\n Th' united quires of angels sing;\n To Him, enthron'd above all height,\n Heaven's hosts their noblest praises bring;\n Disdain not, Lord, our meaner song,\n Who praise Thee with a stammering tongue.\n\n \"Being of beings, may our praise\n Thy courts with grateful fragrance fill;\n Still may we stand before Thy face,\n Still hear and do Thy sovereign will;\n To Thee may all our thoughts arise,\n Ceaseless, accepted sacrifice._\"\n\n J. WESLEY, from TERSTEEGEN\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\n_PREACHING_ (i.).\n\n\n _Earthen vessels, frail and slight,\n Yet the golden Lamp we bear;\n Master, break us, that the light\n So may fire the murky air;\n Skill and wisdom none we claim,\n Only seek to lift Thy Name._\n\n\nI have on purpose reserved the subject of Preaching for our closing\npages. Preaching is, from many points of view, the goal and summing up\nof all other parts and works of the Ministry. What we have said already\nabout the Clergyman's life and labour, in secret, in society, in the\nparish; what we have said about his study and use of the Book of Common\nPrayer; all, so far as it has been true, ought to contribute its\nsuggestions as we approach this great theme.\n\nTHE PULPIT THE CENTRAL POINT.\n\nFor, indeed, \"the Pulpit\" (I use the word in its widest application,\nwide enough to cover the mission-room desk, or the preaching place in\nthe open air) is no mere isolated item in the midst of other matters\nwhich call for a Clergyman's attention. If the man is working, and\nordering his work, aright, the Pulpit will not be a something which has\nto be taken by the way, a link in a long chain in which committees,\nclubs, and social gatherings, and the like, are other and co-ordinate\nlinks. It will be a sacred central point, the living heart of the busy\nlife, to which everything will bear relation. To the Pulpit everything\nwill somehow converge, and from the Pulpit everything will be\ninfluenced. As the Pastor moves about amongst his people, he will be\ngathering incessantly, from all parochial places and seasons, material\nwhich will tell upon his sermons; he will be getting to know his\npeople's minds and lives with an intimacy which will give his preaching\nto them a point which otherwise it could not have. And when he stands in\nthe Pulpit, this continually accumulating knowledge will come out, not\nindeed in the way of diluting or distorting his Gospel, but so as to\ngive its eternal and holy message a point and closeness of application\nwhich will ensure its \"coming home,\" as God gives the blessing.\n\nTEMPTATIONS TO FORGET THIS.\n\nIt needs thought and care to keep the parish and the sermon thus _en\nrapport_. But such thought and care is infinitely well worth taking.\nThe Clergyman who longs to be useful for his Lord in the highest degree\nhe can be, cannot possibly think lightly of his sermons. Yet he may be\ntempted, half unconsciously, to treat them too lightly in practices,\nparticularly if he is beset with a consciousness that he is not \"a born\npreacher,\" or if he stands in the opposite danger of having a \"fatal\"\nfacility of speech. Let the Clergyman only remember that his sermon, his\npublic delivery of instruction, of exhortation, in the Lord's name, is\nnot to be an exhibition of his own powers of thought or utterance, but a\nfaithful message-bearing to his own flock, in the light of what he knows\nof Christ and the Word on the one side, and of the needs of the flock on\nthe other, and he will find a most useful encouragement, or a most\nuseful corrective, as the need may be. \"O my Lord, I am not eloquent,\"\n[Exod. iv. 10.] will be no disheartening thought, as he carries to the\npulpit the ever-growing weight of pastoral experience, all giving point\nand freshness to the unalterable message. And the secret temptation to\nthink the sermon a light thing because mere words come easy, will be\npowerfully counteracted in the other case not only by contact with the\nrealities of life in the daily work, but by remembering that the sermon\nwill have to do with not an abstract audience but _these particular_\nsouls and lives thus laid on the man's conscience and affections.\n\nTHE PASTOR PREACHES TO THOSE PARTICULAR HEARERS.\n\nLet me repeat it as earnestly as I can. The sermon, if it is to be what\nit should be, should be affected at every point by the facts of the\npreacher's own inner life, and by those of his intercourse with his\npeople. Those facts must, of course, be thoughtfully weighed and\nhandled. The tact which is so important in a Pastor, and which is best\nlearned and developed in the school of Christ's love, will see\ninstinctively how to apply in preaching the experience gained in prayer,\nin conversation, in every branch of ministering life. We shall remember\nthat indefinite harm, not good, may be done when a man, particularly a\nyoung man, unwisely preaches what may fairly seem to be personalities; I\nhave known some sad instances in point here. But taking that for\ngranted, assuming the good sense and sympathy of the preacher, I am\nquite sure that the most eloquent sermon, adapted to _any_ audience, is\nfar less likely to be blessed and used by our Lord than the sermon which\nis penetrated with the Pastor's personal intimacy with _that particular_\naudience, and which goes therefore straight from him to them.\n\nIt has been well said that preaching may be described as \"truth through\npersonality\"; not merely the presentation somehow of so many facts and\nthoughts, but the presentation of them through the medium of a living\nman, who brings into the pulpit his heart, his character, his\nexperience, and so gives out his message. We may add to this suggestive\ndictum that the true pastoral sermon is also \"truth _to_ personalities\";\nthe living man's delivery of the message to living men and women whose\nlife, more or less, he knows. And so it presupposes some real amount of\npastoral intercourse, intelligently brought to bear on pulpit work.\n\nPREPARE SERMON IN THE PARISH.\n\nI linger a little over these thoughts, though they are little more than\nintroductory. For experience tells me how easily, in these days, the\nClergyman is tempted to dislocate his \"parish work\" from his sermons, to\nthe great loss of one or both parts of his duty. And if once he begins\nto think of his sermons as a thing really apart, which must be got\nthrough somehow, but rather as a mere duty than as a vital ministerial\nfunction, the results will be sad for the sermons. So I lay stress on\nthe thought that the sermon-preparation ought to go on not only in the\nstudy, over the Word, but in the parish, over the hearers of it. The\nmore constantly this is recollected, and put in practice, the less fear\nwill there be that the sermon will be a weariness either to people or to\npreacher.\n\n\"LABOUR IN THE WORD.\"\n\nBut let me, however, entreat my younger Brother, by any and every means,\nto watch and pray against a slack or low view of his function as a\npreacher. From very many quarters at the present day we are invited to\nslight our sermon-labour. Sometimes it is \"work,\" organization,\ncommittees, which is set against the sermon; sometimes it is the\nreading-desk and the Communion Table--the liturgical functions of the\nMinistry. Let pastoral activities and holy rites alike have ample place\nin our thoughts and work; but for Christ's sake, my Brother in the\nministry of the Word and Sacraments, do not forget the Word. A Christian\nChurch where preaching sinks to a low ebb, where the labour of public\nteaching and exhortation is neglected, in favour either of machinery or\nritual, cannot possibly--I dare to say it deliberately--be in a truly\nhealthy state now, and most assuredly is not laying up health and\nstrength for years to come. For the very life of our flocks, and of our\nChurch, and for the dear glory of our Master, let us \"labour in the Word\nand teaching.\" [1 Tim. v. 17.]\n\n\"LITHO SERMONS.\"\n\nIs it necessary, in the case of any reader of these pages, that I should\nnot only appeal thus in general, but add one special entreaty--always to\npreach _your own_ sermons? Probably it is not necessary; but it may be\n\"safe\" [Phil. iii. 2.] nevertheless. Not long ago I was distressed to\nread, in the advertisement columns of an excellent Church newspaper, a\nconspicuous announcement of a series of \"_litho sermons_,\" that is, I\nsuppose, sermons so printed as to look like manuscript. If such\nliterature has a sale, it is a miserable fact. Can these discourses\npossibly be either written by a \"man of the Spirit,\" or used by such a\nman? I say, No. The production of them (in order to be lithographed),\nand the use of them in their \"litho\" state, are untruthful acts,\nuntruthful in the very sanctuary of truth. The Lord pardon--and the Lord\nforbid!\n\nBetter the most stammering and incoherent utterances of a man who loves\nthe Lord, and the Word, and the flock, and who in Christ's Name does his\nbest, than the unhallowed, and usually, I think, vapid glibness of such\nacted as well as spoken falsehoods.[27] And surely, the more the\nClergyman keeps his pulpit and his parish in living relation, the less\nwill he be tempted, be it ever so remotely, by any exigencies, to dream\nof expedients such as these.\n\n[27] I am far from saying that the preacher should never get help from\nother men's sermons. This may be done honestly and usefully, in many\nways. But to let another man's sermon pass as one's own is a sin.\n\n\"DR SOUTH IN THE AFTERNOON.\"\n\nQuite conceivably, there may be rare occasions when another man's sermon\nmay be rightly used by you. But then, of course, you will do it\nhonestly and above-board, telling your people whose it is. In Addison's\n_Sir Roger de Coverley_ there is a pleasant scene, where the venerable\nKnight asks the Parson who the preacher for next Sunday is to be. \"The\nBishop of St Asaph in the morning,\" replies the good man, \"and Dr South\nin the afternoon.\"[28] That is, he was about to read, openly and\nhonestly, a sermon of Beveridge's, and then a sermon of South's;\nneither, certainly, in lithograph. I do not say he did the best for his\npeople in so doing; most certainly he could not \"speak home\" to the\ndetails of their village life, and its temptations, if he spoke only in\nthe phrase of the two classical pulpit-masters. That _rapport_ of parish\nand pulpit of which I have spoken could not have been much felt, at\nleast on that coming Sunday. But the good Parson was honest, however.\nThe practice of which I speak is not honest.\n\n[28] \"He then shewed us his list of preachers for the whole year, where\nI saw with a great deal of pleasure Archbishop Tillotson, Bishop\nSanderson, Dr Barrow, Dr Calamy, with several living authors.\"\n(_Spectator_, No. 106, July 2nd, 1711.) Calamy by the way was a\nPresbyterian, made one of the King's chaplains at the Restoration.\n\nWE MUST PREACH ATTRACTIVELY.\n\nLet me come now to a closer view of the preacher's work, and I will be\nas practical as possible. I have besought my Brother to let nothing\ntempt him to push his preaching into a neglectful corner. Let me now\nbeseech him to remember that he must not only be a diligent preacher,\nbut do his very best to commend his preaching to his people,--to be, in\na right sense, _attractive_.\n\nI deliberately say, attractive. That word, of course, suggests some very\nundesirable applications. It is only too possible to aim at\nattractiveness by bad methods. We may tone down the Gospel-message,\nleaving out unpopular and man-humbling truths, and try to \"attract\"\npeople so. We may strive to \"attract\" them to hear us by doubtful\nexternal accessories (of very different kinds), which, after all, will\nrather attract attention--for a season--to themselves, than to the\nmessage, and the Lord. But none the less it is every Clergyman's plain\nduty to make his preaching, so far as he can, lawfully attractive. It is\nhis duty to see that he preaches Christ Crucified; and \"the offence of\nthe Cross\" [Gal. v. 11.] will always occur, sooner or later, in such\npreaching; but it is his duty to see that there is no other \"offence\" in\nit, so far as he can help it. If he so speaks of sin, and righteousness,\nand judgment, that the unregenerate heart does not like it, though the\npreacher has spoken wisely and in love, that is not the preacher's\nfault. If he has so magnified Christ, and the glory and fulness of His\nsalvation, that it sounds like exaggeration to the unspiritual hearer,\nthough the words have been said in all reverent reality, that is not the\npreacher's fault. But it _is_ his fault if he has repelled his hearers\nfrom his message by what is not the message, but his own setting of it;\nhis spirit, manner, his delivery, his neglect of some plain precautions\nagainst prejudice and weariness. Of a few such precautions I come now to\nspeak; and first, of what I may call the most external amongst them.\n\nNEEDFUL AND NEEDLESS OFFENCES.\n\nBeginning, then, with physical precautions against needless \"offences,\"\n[Greek: skandala], in our preaching I say first, let us do our best to\nbe _audible_.\n\nAUDIBILITY: MEANS TO IT.\n\nThe word sounds almost amusingly commonplace. But it must be said. Many\nmore of us Clergymen than know it, or think about it, are not audible.\nThe lack of training for the bodily work of the pulpit, in our Church,\nis serious; far more is done in this way among our Nonconformist\nbrethren.[29] And accordingly there are numbers of young English\nClergymen who read and speak without a thought of methodical audibility.\nThey do not articulate distinctly. They do not remember that the _pace_\nand _force_ of utterance, fit for a private room, are quite unfit for a\nlarge building. They do not know, perhaps, how extremely important is\nthe articulation of consonants, and of final syllables of words, and of\nclosing words in a sentence. They do not know that a certain equability\n(not monotony) of voice is necessary, if the utterance is to \"carry\" to\nthe end of a long church, or a church of many pillars.\n\n[29] Let me cordially commend the Rev. J.P. Sandlands' book, _The Voice\nand Public Speaking_. Mr Sandlands has done, and is doing, admirable\nwork as an oral teacher of clerical elocution, in the intervals of his\nparochial labours.\n\nPLEASANT AUDIBILITY.\n\nOr again, they do not know, or do not remember, that audibility is not\nsecured by mere loudness and bigness of voice, nor again by raising the\nvoice to a high pitch. \"People tell you to speak up,\" said that\nexcellent elocutionist, Mr Simeon; \"but I say, speak down,\" down as\nregards the musical scale. Again, the larger the building the more\naccentuated must be the articulation, and the more limited the variation\nof pitch; but too often this is not thought of by the preacher.\n\nFurther, it has to be remembered, but it is frequently forgotten, that\nthe audibility we should aim at is a pleasant and attractive audibility.\nIt is a great thing to be easily heard; which of us does not know the\ncombined physical and mental labour of listening to a sermon, or a\nspeech, which only reaches us indistinctly? But it is a greater thing to\nbe pleasantly heard; heard so that the listener finds nothing to tire\nand repel in the utterance. Here, of course, different voices give very\ndifferent advantages; but there are some common secrets, so to speak,\nwhich all--who will make a sacred business of it--may profitably and\neffectively use. Above all, there is the secret of quiet naturalness;\nthe watchful avoidance (do not forget this) of tricks and mannerisms in\ndelivery;[30] the watchful cultivation of the sort of utterance which we\nshould use in an earnest conversation on grave subjects, with only such\ndifferences as are suggested by _the size_ of the place in which we\nspeak. Of some other \"common secrets\" I shall speak when I come to the\nquestion of style and phrase.\n\n[30] I have known a sermon which in matter and style were really\nexcellent made, to some hearers at least, almost unendurable by the\naccident that the preacher had got the habit of (needlessly) _clearing\nhis throat_ at the end of almost every sentence.\n\nFIND A CANDID FRIEND.\n\nHow shall we best work upon such hints? Very largely, by the use of the\nplainest common-sense and every-day observation on our own part. But\nlargely also by trying to find some friend, equally kind and candid, who\nwill help us \"to hear ourselves as others hear us.\" For myself, after\ntwenty-five years, I welcome more and more gratefully every such\ncriticism as the occasion presents itself. Let the Curate ask his Vicar\nto tell him without mercy if his utterance, his articulation, is clear;\nif his manner is natural; if his preaching is or is not easy to listen\nto in these respects. And let friend ask friend; let pastor ask\nparishioner; let husband ask wife!\n\nGOOD ENGLISH.\n\nThere are other directions in which we must cultivate attractiveness.\nThere is English style. Here, again, gifts differ widely in detail, yet\nthere are common secrets open to common use. It is open to every one to\navoid, on the one hand, an ambitious, long-worded style; on the other, a\nstyle which many young men of our time are in more danger of\npatronizing--the slovenly, shapeless style, in which the Queen's English\nis very \"freely handled,\" and into which the broken English of an\never-growing _slang_ not seldom makes its way. These defects have only\nto be recognized, surely, to be avoided, by keeping our eyes open as we\nread and our ears as we hear, and by remembering that the sacred message\nof the King, while it is too great to be tricked out with false\nrhetoric, is also too great to be slighted, not to say insulted, by a\nreally careless phraseology.\n\nA GOOD STYLE IS A PRACTICAL POWER.\n\nPains will be needed, of course, as we pursue the object of a good\nstyle. We must watch and think. We must read and observe good models,\nthe written words of men who have proved themselves powerful preachers\nto the people, and indeed of men generally who are known masters of\nEnglish. We shall have, again, to consult candid friends. But my point\nis, that all this is abundantly worth our while. A neat, straight,\nwell-worded sentence is not a mere literary luxury. It is a practical\npower. It is far easier to listen to than a careless, formless sentence\nis, and it is far easier to remember. The truth which it conveys is much\nmore likely, therefore, to find its way securely into the mind, and to\nlie there ready for the vivifying touch of the Spirit of God.\n\nI emphasize this matter of style, for in many quarters it is much\nneglected, and some of my younger Brethren do, if I mistake not,\nentertain the thought that the simplicity of the Gospel is best set\nforth, and God most honoured, where plans and methods of language are\nneglected. To speak about \"a good style\" to those who think so, may seem\nperhaps little else than a recommendation to bid for human applause in\nthe line of literature. But my intention is far enough from this. Mere\nliterary ambition, the quest of the glory of self in this as in every\nother line, is a forbidden thing to the true bondservant of the Lord.\nBut it is by no means forbidden him, for his Lord's sake, to aim at\nclearness, point, force of expression, that the message may be the\nbetter taken in. God is as little glorified by a bad style as by a bad\nvoice, or bad handwriting, or bad reasoning. And by a good style I mean\nnot a style polished and elaborated to please fastidious tastes (the\nbest taste, by the way, is best pleased with correct simplicity), but a\nstyle which shall be both pure and plain in word and phrase,\n\"understandable of the people\" yet such as not to vex those who care for\ntheir native tongue, and just enough formed and pointed to make\nattention pleasant to the ear. For average audiences, I know no style\nmore perfectly answering my idea than that of Mr Spurgeon,[31] in his\nprinted sermons of recent years. And I happen to know that Mr Spurgeon\nhas always taken great and systematic pains with his English.\n\n[31] Since these words were written this great Christian and preacher\nhas passed away to his Master's presence.\n\nFRENCH HEARERS OF ENGLISH.\n\nSome preachers need much more than others a hint to keep their sentences\n_straight_, and to avoid the tangle of parentheses, long or short. Here,\nagain, Mr Spurgeon gives me an admirable illustration. His sentences,\nnever thin or weak in matter, are always straight. If any of my younger\nBrethren are tempted, as I confess I am, in the digressive direction, I\nwould recommend them (if they usually preach without writing) to _write_\na sermon now and then, and rigorously to exclude, or re-write, all\nsentences which transgress. It occurred to me recently, when acting as a\nsummer chaplain in Switzerland, to find the benefit of a different\ncorrective. On one particular Sunday I had among my hearers in the\nmorning a French Presbyterian, in the afternoon a French Roman Catholic,\neach understanding a little English; and in each case I had special\nreasons for hope and longing that the sermon might bring some spiritual\nhelp. Instinctively, I avoided every expression which could in the least\ncomplicate my English and thus obscure the message to my foreign\nfriends. And so thankful was I for the pruning of periods that resulted,\nthat I am much disposed, in all future preaching, to put mentally\nbefore me those same two hearers.\n\n\"WRITTEN OR EXTEMPORE?\"\n\nOn that great question, Shall I preach from writing, or not? I say very\nlittle. Speaking quite generally, and thinking now only of the regular\nchurch congregation, not of the mission-room or open air, I would advise\nmy younger Brethren to write for some while, but usually with an\nultimate view to speech without writing. No hard rule can be laid down.\nOne man is so gifted that from the first he can express himself\ncorrectly and well without any manuscript before him. Another finds, all\nhis life through, that he speaks best, and his people listen best, when\nhe reads (vividly and naturally) from his prayerfully-prepared\nmanuscript. But on the whole, I repeat it, writing is the best\ndiscipline for a man in his early days of Ministry, while beyond doubt\nthe freely-spoken sermon, like the freely-spoken speech, (carefully\nenough prepared as to matter and order,) is usually best to listen to,\nand therefore should be the preacher's goal. Some men write their\nsermons and then learn them by heart for delivery. For myself, I own\nthis would be a severe ordeal to nerve; and in very few cases, if I am\nright, does it produce a perfectly natural effect. Not long ago, if not\nnow, it was a frequent custom in Scotland; and one amusing story comes\nto my mind. A good minister, known to a near relative of mine, always\nthus \"mandated\" his sermon, and punctually delivered it word for word.\nOne day a tremendous hailstorm assailed the church windows, and not only\ndid his parishioners fail to hear him, but literally he lost the sound\nof his own voice. Yet he _dared not stop_, lest memory should play him\nfalse; and when the storm ceased, \"I found myself,\" he said, \"with some\nsurprise, in a quite distant part of the sermon.\"\n\nORDER AND DIVISION.\n\nAnother important aid to attractiveness is order and division, simply\nand sensibly managed. Nothing is much more repellent, at least to modern\nhearers, than an excess of arrangement; headings and subdivisions\noverdone. But nothing is more helpful to attention than a simple,\nnatural, luminous division, present in the preacher's mind, announced to\nthe audience, and faithfully carried out. Remember this, among many\nother things, in the choosing of the text; _ceteris paribus_, that text\nis best which best lends itself to natural division.\n\nPAINS AND FAITH.\n\nThere are many other points, more or less of the exterior kind, so to\nspeak, which concern the attractiveness of our preaching. There is the\nquestion of length, which can only be settled by careful and prayerful\nconsideration of special circumstances, with recollection of the general\nprinciples that the morning sermon should be short compared with that of\nthe evening, and that he who would reach the hearts of the poor must not\ngive them \"sermonettes,\" but sermons. There is the question of action, a\nlarge subject. All that I can say is, that _some_ action is almost\nalways a help to attention, but that it proves the very opposite as soon\nas it seems uneasy, or a mannerism.\n\nI have yet to deal with some thoughts about the preacher's message, and\nthe inmost secrets of his power. Meanwhile, may our Lord and Master\nenable us so to \"labour in the Word\" that we shall think no means too\nhumble which will really help us to make His message plain, and no\ndependence on Him too absolute for the longed-for spiritual results.\n\n \"_Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul,\n Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own,\n Paul should himself direct me. I would trace\n His master-strokes, and draw from his design.\n I would express him simple, grave, sincere,\n In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain,\n And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste,\n And natural in gesture; much impress'd\n Himself, as conscious of his awful charge,\n And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds\n May feel it too; affectionate in look,\n And tender in address, as well becomes\n A messenger of grace to guilty men._\"\n\n COWPER.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\n_PREACHING_ (ii.).\n\n\n _For Thy sake, beloved Lord,\n I will labour in Thy Word;\n On the knees, in patient prayer;\n At the desk, with studious care;\n In the pulpit, seeking still\n There to utter all Thy will._\n\n\nI pursue the subject of attractive preaching, taking still the word\nattractive in its worthiest sense, and again laying stress on the\n_necessity_ of attractiveness of the right sort. We have looked a little\nalready at some of the external requisites to this end; now let us\napproach some which have to do with matter more than manner.\n\nCONSIDERATENESS.\n\nOn the way, I pause to say a word in general on one of the reasons why\nwe should do our best to speak so that our hearers shall care to hear.\nThe supreme reason is manifest; it is the glory of our Master and the\ngood of souls. For His sake, and for the flock's sake, we long and must\nstrive to speak so as to draw their attention to His message and to\nHimself. But subordinate to this great motive, and in fullest harmony\nwith it, there is another; and this is a motive which, once clearly\napprehended, will affect not our preaching only, but all parts of our\nministry--our conduct of public worship, our pastoral visitation, our\nwhole intercourse with our neighbours. I mean, the simple motive of a\nloyal and faithful _considerateness for others_, as we are on the one\nhand Christian men and English gentlemen, and on the other hand\nservants, not masters, of the Church and parish. Possibly this aspect of\nthe Pastor's public and official ministry may not have presented itself\ndistinctively as yet to my younger Brother; but it cannot be recognized\nand acted upon too early. Some things in our clerical position and\nfunctions tend in their own nature to make us forget it, if we are not\ndefinitely awake to it beforehand. In some respects the Clergyman, even\nthe youngest Curate, has dangerous opportunities for _in_ considerate\npublic action. Take the management of divine Service in illustration. In\nhis manner of reading, his tone, his pace, the Clergyman may allow\nhimself, only too easily, to think of himself alone. In the\nreading-desk, or at the Table of the Lord, he may consult only his own\nlikes and dislikes in attitude, gesture, and air. But if so, he is\ngreatly failing in the homely duty of loyal considerateness. What will\nbe most for the happiness and edification of the congregation? What will\nleast disturb and most assist true devotion? How shall the Minister best\nsecure that the worshippers shall remember the Master and not be\nuncomfortably conscious of the servant? The answers to such questions\nwill of course vary considerably under varying conditions; but it is\n_the principle_ of the questions which I press home. Our office, and the\ncommon consent and usage of the Christian people, give us a position of\nindependence in such matters which has its advantages, but also its very\ngreat risks; and it is for us accordingly to handle that independence\nwith the utmost possible _considerateness_.\n\nThis thought was much upon my own mind lately during the interesting\nexperiences of a Continental summer chaplaincy, to which I referred in\nthe last chapter. As usual in a health resort abroad, the English\nresidents represented many different shades of Church opinion and\npractice. By the convictions of many long years, I am an Evangelical\nChurchman, in the well-understood sense of the term; and of those\nconvictions I am not at all ashamed. My manner of conducting public\nworship, especially in the Communion Office, would probably make it\nplain at once to most worshippers where I stand as a Churchman. But that\ndoes not mean, I trust, that I am to allow myself to be inconsiderate of\nthe feelings of others in the matter; and on the occasions referred to\nit was my earnest and anxious aim to remember this with regard to\nworshippers, and particularly communicants, whose beliefs, or however\nwhose sympathies, were what is called \"higher\" than my own. On their\naccount I sought to make it plain that no rubrical direction was\nneglectfully treated by me, and that reverence of manner and action was\na sacred thing in my eyes--a reverence not elaborated, but attentive. I\nhope I should have been reverently careful whatever the composition of\nthe congregation was; but under the circumstances the duty of this\nobvious sort of ministerial _considerateness_ was laid on my heart with\nspecial weight. That duty bears in many directions. It is, I venture to\nsay, inconsiderate, on the one hand, when the Clergyman conducts the\nservices of the Church with a disturbing artificiality of performance.\nIt is inconsiderate, on the other hand, when he conducts them with any,\neven the least, real slovenliness and inattention.\n\nTEMPTATIONS TO FORGET IT.\n\nBut if all this is true of the desk and of the blessed Table, it is true\nalso, and in a high degree, of the pulpit. Singularly independent, up to\na certain point, is the position of the preacher. He chooses his own\ntext; he assigns himself (at least in theory) his own length of\ndiscourse; he is entitled, under the \u00cagis of the law of the land, to\nspeak on to the end without interruption; he is bound, within the limits\nof a sanctified common-sense, to speak with the authority of his\ncommission. Here are powerful temptations to an inconsiderate man,\nperhaps especially to an inconsiderate young man, to show much\ninconsideration. And therefore, here is a pre-eminent occasion for the\ntrue Pastor, who thinks, prays, loves, and is humble, to practise the\nbeautiful opposite. Shall you and I seek grace to do so?\n\nRESPECT ELDER HEARERS.\n\nPut yourself often, my dear Brother, while I do the same, into the\nposition--which we once occupied always, and often do still--of the\nhearer. You, the Curate, or the young Incumbent, have recently come into\nthe parish, and you are full of a young man's energy and enterprize, and\na little infected perhaps with a common and natural belief of your time\nof life, but a belief not quite true to facts, that the world is made\nfor young men. And among your hearers, week by week, as you preach from\nthat pulpit, sit men and women who were working, and thinking, and\nperhaps believing, literally long before you were born. Put yourself in\ntheir place. Into many of their experiences, and their sympathies born\nof experience, you cannot possibly enter personally. You cannot _feel\npersonally_ how this or that innovation of language or manner, this or\nthat too crude statement of your message, this or that baldly new and\nperhaps by no means true theory, aired as if it were all obvious and of\ncourse, must look and sound to them. You cannot _feel_ it all; but you\ncan think about it. Perhaps these are educated and refined people, and\naccustomed all their lives to value clear thought and pure diction, in\nany case accustomed to carefulness in the matter and manner of the\nsermon. You cannot enter into all their mental habits in your own mental\nworkings; but you can take account of them, and in a loyal and\nthoughtful _considerateness_ you can remember them in practice, and\nhonestly aim so to prepare and to preach as to conciliate the thoughtful\nand the elders.\n\nSuch considerateness will not mean the stifling of prayerful conviction,\nor the failure to be faithful as the messenger of the Lord. But it will\nmean a severity upon yourself as regards the tone and spirit of your\nthoughts, and also as the manner of your utterance. You will take pains,\neven at a heavy cost to self (and such costs are always gains in the\nend), so to minister as to attract the attention of the flock, not to\nyourself, but to your blessed Master and His Word; preaching \"not\nyourself, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and _yourself their servant_ for\nJesus' sake.\" [2 Cor. iv. 5.]\n\nWith this aim of Attractiveness, then, in our minds, and with this\nmotive of Considerateness beside it, let us come to some thoughts in\ndetail about the matter of preaching.\n\nAnd here first I must bring in another word to meet the word\n\"attractive.\" That word is \"faithful.\"\n\nWRONG KINDS OF ATTRACTIVENESS.\n\nAs a matter of most obvious fact (we noticed it in the previous\nchapter), there is a false and useless attractiveness, as well as a\ntrue. There is the poor and miserable attractiveness--it draws a certain\nclass of modern hearers--of mere brevity; the \"ten-minute sermon.\" There\nare no doubt exceptional occasions when ten minutes, or even five, may\nbe the right limit to our utterance; but there is something wrong with\nboth sermon and audience if in the regular ministration of God's holy\nWord the preacher must at once begin to stop. There is again the\nspecious and spurious attractiveness of excitement and froth of manner,\nor of a merely emotional appeal to perhaps not the deepest emotions, an\nattraction which has little in it of that divine magnet which draws the\nwill and lifts the soul in regenerate faith and surrender. There is the\nattraction, tempting, but futile for the true purposes of the pulpit,\nof the sermon which is after all only a lecture, or a leading article;\nfull of the topics of the day, of the hour; full perhaps of some\ncelebrated name just immortalized by death[32]; but not full of the\neternal message for which the pulpit exists. Most certainly there is no\ndivine rule which excludes from the sermon all allusions to politics, to\nsociety, to science, to great men; but there _is_ a divine rule, running\nthrough the whole precept and example of the New Testament, which keeps\nsuch things always subordinate to the supreme work of preaching Jesus\nChrist.\n\n[32] \"I went longing to hear about Christ, and it was only Newman from\nbeginning to end.\" This was the actual lament of an anxious soul, one\nSunday in 1890.\n\nFAITHFULNESS.\n\nAcross all our thoughts how to secure attractiveness, as a co-ordinate\nline which fixes attention to the true point, runs the word\n\"Faithfulness.\" The preacher is to be attractive while faithful,\nfaithful while attractive. And he is to be attractive not for the sake\nof so being, but in order that he may win an entrance for the words of\nfaithfulness, to his Master's praise.\n\nWE ARE MESSENGERS.\n\nYes, this is what we are to be as preachers. We are to seek \"mercy of\nthe Lord to be faithful.\" [1 Cor. vii. 25.] We are not popular leaders,\nlooking for a cry, or passing one on. We are not speculative thinkers,\nfeeling out a philosophy, communicating our guesses at truth to a\ncompany of friends who happen to be interested in the investigation. We\nare \"messengers, watchmen, and stewards of the Lord.\" We are in\ncommissioned charge of a divine, authentic, and unalterable message. We\nare the expounders of a \"Word which liveth and abideth for ever,\" [1\nPet. i. 23.] a Word which man is always trying to judge and to\ndisparage, but which will judge man at the last day. [Joh. xii. 48.] We\nare the bondservants of an absolute Master, who is at once our Sender\nand our Message, and who overhears our every word in its delivery.\n\nIt is a grave mistake, as we saw in our last chapter, to think that\nfaithfulness means a repellent utterance of \"the faithful Word.\" [Tit.\ni. 9.] But it is at least an equal mistake to think that attractiveness\nmeans a modification of that Word, which to the end of our world's day\nwill still be a \"folly\" and a \"stumbling-block,\" [1 Cor. i. 23.] in\nsome respects, to the unconverted soul, and will always have its\nsearching point and edge for the converted soul also.\n\nBut this consideration here is only by the way. I return from it to the\nmatter of a right and faithful attractiveness and some of its higher\nconditions.\n\nSECRETS FOR TRUE ATTRACTIVENESS.\n\n\"_Preach the Gospel--earnestly, interestingly, fully._\" Such, I believe,\nis the prescription given, by the great preacher whom I cited in the\nlast chapter, to the Pastor who would fill his church, and keep it full.\nIn the first instance, no doubt, Mr Spurgeon gives it as a prescription\nto the Nonconformist Pastor; but it is quite as much to the purpose for\nthe Conformist, so far as he is a Minister of the Word.[33] What I have\nto say in these present pages shall run on the lines of that sentence of\ngood counsel.\n\n[33] And let it never be forgotten that this is his _primary_ function\nin the mind of the Church of England. See the Priest's Ordination,\nparticularly its Exhortations, its Commission, and its final Collect.\n\n\"PREACH THE GOSPEL.\"\n\ni. \"_Preach the Gospel_,\" that is to say Jesus Christ, in His Person,\nHis Work, His Offices, His Teaching, all applied to the souls and lives\nof men. Would you truly and permanently attract, with an attraction\nwhich God will bless? Let that be your first condition. I do not dilate\nupon it here, but with all the earnestness possible I lay it upon my\nyounger Brother's heart as we pass on. Preach the Gospel, that is to say\nthe Lord, in all He is for man as man is a sinner, a mortal, a mourner,\na worker. Do not let Christ be one subject among others. As little can\nthe sun be one among the planets. He is _the_ Subject; all others get\ntheir reality and importance for us preachers by their relation to Him.\nIn particular I venture to say, do not let occasional, temporal, local\ntopics, even very important ones, dislodge Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ\nof the whole Bible, from His royal place in your preaching; and do not\nforget continually (though not monotonously) to keep to the front the\nfact that He is _the sinner's Saviour_. More will be said later about\nthat point of view, but I state it at once. Speak indeed of Christ as\nExemplar, Ideal, Friend, Man of Men; but do not let your brethren forget\nthat, \"_first of all, Christ died for our sins_, according to the\nScriptures,\" [1 Cor. xv. 3.] and that His primary practical relation to\nus is always that of Saviour to sinner. That truth is not altogether in\nfashion now. But it is eternal; it is deep as the human soul, and as the\nLaw of God, and as such it is a mighty condition to attractiveness,\nwisely and truly handled. It corresponds to the inmost facts of the\nhearers' being, whether they are aware of it yet or not; and is there\nnot here the most powerful of magnets, at least _in posse_?\n\n\"PREACH IT EARNESTLY.\"\n\nii. \"Preach the Gospel _earnestly_.\" This does not mean necessarily\nwith vehemence, or even with fervour, of manner. Some men's delivery is\nfervent, or even vehement, in the most natural way possible; and let\nsuch men preach so, if they will do it thoughtfully and to the purpose.\nBut the slightest artificial cultivation of such qualities, or of the\nsemblance of them, is a great practical mistake. And earnestness is at\nonce a wider and a simpler matter all the while. The man who preaches\nearnestly is the man who is altogether in earnest, and speaks out his\nconviction and his purpose.\n\n*PREACH IT AS A WITNESS.\n\nHe is the man who has the Lord's message deep in his own soul, and is\nconscious of its vast importance for the souls of others. He is the man\nwho does not merely discuss, or explain, or even expound, however\nsoundly and luminously, but whose words--well chosen, well weighed, well\nordered--are _also_ the living words of one who \"testifieth that he hath\nseen.\" [Joh. iii. 11.] Yes, the essence of the right sort of earnestness\nis the witness-character of the preacher. What is a witness? One who has\npersonal knowledge of the matter of his words [2 Tim. i. 12.]--\"_I know\nwhom I have believed._\" Is there not a great need at this time, in our\ndear Church, of more such witness-preaching? I do not mean preaching\nthat advertises the preacher as a remarkable Christian, certainly not\npreaching that puts for one moment our \"testimony\" on a level with the\ninfallible Word once written. But I do mean the preaching which, by one\nof the surest laws of our nature, attracts attention to that Word in a\nliving way by the preacher's manifest confession that its message is a\nmighty reality and certainty to himself.\n\nSome years ago I heard an account of the peculiarly impressive preaching\nof a young Mission-clergyman. It was described to me as remarkable not\nfor energy of manner, or warmth of diction, but for the impression left\non all hearers that the truths handled by the man were for himself\nabsolute and present facts. He stated them with a directness and\nquietness which was emphatically matter-_of-fact_. This sort of\npreaching is earnest indeed.\n\n\"PREACH IT INTERESTINGLY.\"\n\niii. \"Preach the Gospel _interestingly_.\" How shall we secure this? Some\nrecipes for interest are familiar. There is the method of illustration;\nthere is the method of anecdote: both excellent, and almost\nindispensable. Only, they are methods which have their risks, and must\nbe used with care. Illustrations are apt to overwhelm the thing\nillustrated, the moment much detail is allowed; and they are apt to go\non three feet, or even upon one, instead of upon four; and they may be\ndrawn from quarters too remote to strike the hearers with effect.\nAnecdotes have the same risks; and, besides, they need, if they are to\nbe used aright, to be carefully sifted and verified. I say this not to\ndisparage what in some preachers' hands is a most powerful and also a\nmost delicate weapon; yet the caution is certainly needed, especially by\nyounger men.\n\nINTEREST OF EXPLANATION.\n\nBut the surest secrets of interesting preaching lie deeper than anecdote\nand illustration. One of them, a very simple one to state, is clearness\nof thought, and of the expression and explanation of thought. I entreat\nmy Brother to be an _explanatory_ preacher, by which I mean, not that he\nshould treat his _brethren_ as if they were his _children_ (unless\nindeed it is a children's sermon), but that he should handle familiar\nreligious terms with the resolve to make them _live and speak_ to the\nordinary hearer. Nothing is more opiate-like than a sentence which is\nunreal to the hearer because it is mere phraseology. Nothing can be made\nmore interesting than familiar phraseology (supposing it to be true and\nimportant) so treated as to speak its meaning out fresh and living in\nmodern ears.\n\nINTEREST OF EXPOSITION.\n\nAnother deep and unfailing secret of interest, so that it be used\nintelligently and prayerfully, is close akin to this last. It lies in\nthe right sort of _expository_ preaching. I have in my mind such\nexposition as will be found in Dr Vaughan's sermons on the Philippian\nEpistle. The charm and power of those sermons lie, I know, very much in\nthe extraordinary excellence, the _curiosa simplicitas_, of their\nliterary style, so unpretentious and so masterly. But it lies also in\nthe fact that the preacher takes us over a familiar Scripture passage,\nverse by verse, phrase by phrase, and translates it into the dialect of\npresent circumstances. Let me heartily commend this sort of preaching\nfrom my own parochial experience in past days. In a congregation\nconsisting chiefly of the poor, I found that the most intelligent and\nsustained interest was excited by a series of Sunday evening sermons on\na selected chapter or paragraph, in which the aim was first to\nparaphrase the sacred phrases, as it were, into modern shapes, and then\nat the close to enforce some main message of the portion. The method is\nas old as the Homilies of Chrysostom, and older.\n\nINTEREST OF PRACTICALITY.\n\nAnother secret of interest, permanent and effectual, is _practicality_\nin preaching. I protest, whenever I can, and I hope to do so to the\nlast, against the common but unhappy fallacy of an outcry against\ndoctrine: \"_Give us not a creed, but a life_.\" The whole New Testament,\nthe whole Bible, protests against such a sentence. There, a divine creed\nis always seen as necessary for a divine life. Supernatural facts,\nlivingly apprehended, are necessary for supernatural peace and power in\nthis formidable natural world. But then, on the other side, it is a\nfallacy almost as fatal to preach the supernatural fact and truth\nwithout a constant and practical application of them to the crude and\nstern realities of life. A young pastoral preacher was once, in my\nhearing, warmly and lovingly thanked for his pulpit-work, on the eve of\nhis quitting his Curacy; and the point on which his humble friends dwelt\nwas that he had always preached Christ, _and_ always showed them how to\nmake use of His presence and power in the actual circumstances of their\nlives. Eloquent words, aye and true words, spoken _in vacuo_, will be\ndull to most hearers; eternal truths laid alongside the weekday work and\ntemptation will always be interesting.\n\n\"PREACH THE GOSPEL FULLY.\"\n\niv. \"Preach the Gospel _fully_.\" Here is our great Nonconformist's last\nadverb, in his recipe for attractive preaching. Its point is not so\nobvious perhaps as that of the other words, but it is nobly true. \"The\nGospel\" is, as I have said, and as we know, nothing less than Jesus\nChrist the Lord, in His whole harmonious glory of Person, Work, and\nWord. It is deeply true that in that mighty and manifold theme there are\npoints which must be always prominent and ruling; and most surely the\nman-humbling and soul-blessing truths of the Atoning Sacrifice are such\npoints. \"First of all\" (we have recalled that all-significant sentence\nalready), \"first of all, Christ died for our sins.\" [1 Cor. xv. 3.] Alas\nfor the Church, for the congregation, for the pulpit, where that is\nforgotten, obscured, or put into a secondary, or perhaps a tertiary\nplace! One thing is certain; that pulpit cannot be bearing its right\nwitness meanwhile to the \"exceeding sinfulness\" of sin--not merely the\ndeformity of sin, but the awful evil and condemnable guilt of sin. [SN:\nRom. vii. 13.] But then it is a thing to be regretted (and corrected)\nwhen the Pastor's preaching is _always and only_ concerned with the\nurgent need, and wonderful provision, for the pardon and acceptance of\nthe believing sinner. I dare to say it is impossible that such preaching\nshould be permanently, or even long, interesting and attractive, and\nthis because of the nature of the case.\n\n*PREACH PARDON, BUT MORE ALSO.\n\nMan's fallen and sinful soul needs pardon unspeakably, and always, but\nit needs it as a means to an end; and that end is nearness to God,\nconformity to Him, power to do His blessed will as His servant for ever.\nFor this same great end the soul needs, even in the range of truths\nwhich are of the order of means, to learn more than the glorious\n_rudiments_ of forgiveness. It needs to know something of the heavenly\nOffices of the once Crucified One: His Mediation, Suretyship, and\nIntercession; His Priesthood; His Royalty; His Headship. In Him lie\nstored the divine treasures with which our _whole_ extent of need is to\nbe met. And the preacher who would permanently attract his people, by\nbringing out of his storehouse things eternally old and new, must seek\nand pray to preach Christ fully.\n\nCHRIST FOR US AND IN US.\n\nTo some devoted men it seems impossible not to be always preaching the\nglory of \"Christ _for_ us\"; others can never leave the precious theme of\n\"Christ _in_ us.\" But if they are not missioners, but pastors, they will\nassuredly find that a _permanent_ attraction can only be secured by\ndoing what the Word of God does--setting forth _both_ glorious sets of\ntruths in fulness, in harmony, and in application to the realities of\nsin and of life.\n\nSo we have thought awhile about attractive preaching. Need I say again\nwhat the sort of attractiveness is which I have in view? It is indeed,\non the surface, attraction to the church, attraction to the sermon; but\nits whole inner purpose is an attraction which neither church nor sermon\ncan in the least degree cause, but which the Eternal Spirit, sovereign\nand loving, can cause through them--an attraction to Jesus Christ, in\ntrue repentance, living faith, genuine surrender, and patient, happy\nservice.\n\n\n \"_Ye servants of God, your Master proclaim,\n And publish abroad His wonderful Name;\n The Name all victorious of Jesus extol,\n His kingdom is glorious and rules over all._\n\n \"_Then let us adore and give Him His right,\n All glory and power, all wisdom and might,\n All honour and blessing with angels above,\n And thanks never ceasing, and infinite love._\"\n\n C. WESLEY.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\n_PREACHING_ (iii.).\n\n\n _Eternal Fulness, overflow to me\n Till I, Thy vessel, overflow for Thee;\n For sure the streams that make Thy garden grow\n Are never fed but by an overflow:\n Not till Thy prophets with Thyself run o'er\n Are Israel's watercourses full once more._\n\n\nAgain I treat of the sermon. We have looked, my younger Brother and I,\nat some main secrets and prescriptions for attractive preaching. What\nshall I more say on the subject of the pulpit? In the first place I will\noffer a few miscellaneous suggestions, and then come in closing to the\ndeepest theme of the whole matter--Spiritual Power in Preaching.\n\nNOTES FOR A SERMON-LECTURE.\n\nI address myself to write, soon after delivering to my students, in the\nlibrary adjoining my study, a lecture on Preaching. Let me call it\nrather, a talk on Sermons, which is a term less grandiose and much more\ntrue; for in fact the discourse has been a most informal series of\nremarks and suggestions on topics suggested by a collection of sermons\nwritten for me, and which I now came to give back, annotated, to their\nwriters. It occurs to me to offer my kind reader a written version of\nsome of these remarks just made _viv\u201a voce_ to my friends. They happen\nto touch on a variety of points which are not unimportant in themselves\nand also typical of very many more.\n\nFor the purposes of the lecture, they have been divided between matters\nof form and matters of substance; and I report them, or rather some of\nthem, in that order.\n\nI. _Remarks on Diction, Style, etc._\n\n(_a_) Take care to \"pull the sentences together,\" to avoid loose and\nredundant phrases and words. Why write \"_grief and sorrow_,\" \"_fatigued\nand tired out_,\" \"_attacks and assaults_\"? A subtle intellect may see\ndistinctions here, but it is too much for me, and, I am sure, for most\nplain people in church.\n\n(_b_) Respect the Queen's English. \"_The one_ who lives a Christian\nlife\" is scarcely English; say \"the man,\" not \"the one.\" \"_Like_ Adam\nand Eve walked in Paradise\"! This is a serious, though common, piece of\nbad grammar. Say, \"_Like Adam_, when he walked,\" but \"_As_ Adam\n_walked_.\"\n\n(_c_) Remember that the genius of English eschews a large use of\n_connecting words_, particularly in spoken discourse. Not often is a\nsentence the better for an \"_and_\" at the beginning. Many a\n\"_therefore_\" and \"_because_\" are well away, if you would speak with\nfreedom and vigour.\n\nAVOID RHETORICAL DICTION.\n\n(_d_) Avoid altogether such touches of expression as characterise verse,\nor rhetorical prose. I find in one sermon the sentence, \"_Think you_ St\nPaul trembled at the prospect?\" Please re-write this, and say, \"_Do you\nthink_ St Paul was afraid?\" For you certainly would not say, speaking\nhowever gravely, to your friend, \"Think you that we shall have a fine\nday to-morrow?\" Rhetorical phrases rarely give an impression of\npractical reality.\n\n(_e_) Do not speak in the pulpit as if you were writing notes for an\nedition of the Epistles. What does the labourer (and what do many\nhearers more highly educated than he) think when you say, on Rom. v. 1,\nthat \"_weighty manuscript authority gives another reading_\"? And what\ndoes he think you mean when you talk about \"_She\u00d9l_\"? By the way, when\nyou quote Scripture in the pulpit, passingly, to a general\ncongregation, I would advise you to quote not the Revised Version, but\nthe Authorized, which will surely be \"_the_ English Bible\" for many long\ndays yet. Unless you have before you some special difference between the\ntwo Versions, on which you can _stop to speak explicitly_, quote the\nfamiliar (and inimitable) diction of 1611.\n\nPREACH WHAT CAN BE REPORTED.\n\n(_f_) Prepare your sermon, and preach it, so that it shall be _easy to\nreport_. One sermon here before me would be as hard as possible to\nretail at home. It is on Rom. v. 1, and it says some excellent things\nupon it. But it brings in holiness of heart where the text speaks only\nof acceptance of person, and it mingles the two topics so ingeniously\ntogether that the impression is seriously complicated. Think of the\npious daughter yonder in church, going home to her infirm old mother,\nand trying to answer the question, \"What did the gentleman preach about\nto-night?\" Let us do our best to preach sermons which are not only\nsound, but portable.\n\n(_g_) Take care to keep the sermon in _tune with the text_. Here is a\nmanuscript on Psal. v. 12, a verse of exultant joy; but the last\npassage of the sermon, the passage which ought to concentrate the whole\nmessage, is full of solemn _warning_. Warn by all means; do not forget\nto sound the watchman's trumpet. [Ezek. xxxiii.] But sound it in the\nright place.\n\nCUT THE PREFACE SHORT.\n\n(_h_) Here is a sermon sadly spoiled by a _long introduction_. It tells\nus much about the circumstances of the inspired writer, but so as to\nthrow little light on the message of the text. Here is another, on the\nwonderfully definite hope of blessedness after death given us in Phil.\ni. 21. This also is ruined by its introduction, which truly begins _ab\novo_, discussing the genesis of man's belief in immortality! That\npreface would leave, in the actual delivery of the sermon, about five\nminutes for the handling of the precious words, \"To depart and to be\nwith Christ, which is far better.\" Generally, be shy of much\nintroduction and preface in the pulpit. I do not mean that we are never\nto elucidate connexions and contexts. But, remember limits. Your minutes\nare few, ah, so few, for such a Message,--Christ Jesus in His fulness,\nfor man's need in its depth. Pass quickly through the porch into that\nChurch.\n\nBE ACCURATE IN STATEMENT.\n\n(_i_) When you refer to _Scripture facts_, be accurate; a slip-shod\nhabit there may fatally prejudice a not quite friendly hearer who knows\nsomething of the Bible; and it will certainly do no good to _any_\nhearer. Here is a sermon on Phil. i. 21, and it speaks of St Paul as\nwriting to Philippi from his \"_dark cell_.\" But St Luke says that he was\n\"in his own hired house,\" [Acts xxviii. 30.] or at worst, \"his own hired\nrooms.\" Here again I read of David as returning to \"Jerusalem, _the city\nof his fathers_.\" But his fathers had lived and died at Bethlehem; and\nJerusalem was in heathen hands till David himself took it!\n\n2. _Remarks on Points in the Substance of the Sermons._\n\n(_a_) Are you quite sure that the Patriarchs had no anticipation of a\nlife eternal? Many lecturers, and many editors, now say so. But the\nEpistle to the Hebrews says that \"they desired a better country, that is\nan heavenly\" [Heb. xi. 16.]; and that is better evidence for this\npurpose than any inferences (or beliefs) of modern \"scholarship.\" True,\nthe old saints say little explicitly about their hope. But many things\nlie deep in a man's faith, and in his experience too, about which, for\nvarious reasons, he may say very little.\n\nREVELATION WAS NOT INTUITION.\n\n(_b_) I do not like this sentence, which says that the later Prophets\nhad a \"_fuller perception_ of\" the eternal future than their\npredecessors. Not that I blame the phrase in itself; but I dislike its\nassociations. There runs a strong drift in modern theology, as we all\nknow, towards the explanation of Scripture by \"perception\" rather than\nby revelation. \"The Lord appeared unto me\"; \"The Lord spake unto me\";\nsay the Prophets, and they appeal occasionally to supernatural\nattestation of their assertions. But the modern expository savant, wiser\nto be sure than the Prophet, assures us that they arrived at their\nmessages by observation, by meditation, by development of thought and\ncharacter, and practically by nothing different from these things.\nAccordingly, their \"inspiration\" was strictly speaking the same in kind\nas that of a Chrysostom, or a Luther, or a Shakespeare. Do not you say\nso, or imply that it is so. Do not go for mere company's sake with the\ncurrent of naturalistic thought. Sure I am that you are most unlikely,\nif you do, to be the instrument of _super_natural _effects_ in your\npreaching.\n\n\"WHAT IS JUSTIFICATION?\"\n\n(_c_) \"What is Justification? It is, _the making man just_.\" Is it\nindeed? I should read that sentence with alarm, if I did not know the\nwriter! Its sentiment is practically Roman Catholic. Moreover, it puts a\nmeaning on the word in question, contradicted by the common usages of\nlanguage; an important consideration when we study a Scriptural\ntheological term. When I \"justify my opinion\" I do not _make it right_,\nbut vindicate it as already right. When the Hebrew judge \"justified the\nrighteous,\" [Deut. xxv. 1] he did not improve him, but pronounced him\nsatisfactory to the law. And when God, for Christ's sake, justifies you\nwho believe in Jesus, He does not in that act make you good; He\npronounces you, for His Son's sake, to be satisfactory to His Law, for\npurposes of your personal acceptance.\n\n\"WHY DOES FAITH JUSTIFY?\"\n\n(_d_) \"Why has faith such power to justify? Because, _carried out to its\nfullest extent, it implies assimilation_ to its Object.\" Here again I\nshould be alarmed, if I did not know the writer's general convictions,\nwhich are sound enough. But this particular sentence again is in full\nharmony with Romanist doctrine. And, as a fact, with the Bible open, and\nwith usages of common language before us, it can easily be exposed as a\nconfusion of words and thought. Faith, carried out ever so fully, is\njust faith still; personal reliance, personal confidence on God in His\nWord. That reliance is His appointed (and divinely natural) way for our\nreception of Jesus Christ. For our Justification, it receives Christ in\nHis merits; it does _that_, and that only, and always. For our\nSanctification, it receives Christ in His inward power, by the Holy\nGhost. But faith is just faith, to the end.\n\n(_e_) \"We are not _forced_ to receive salvation.\" Most true. \"He\nenforceth not the will.\" But do not forget on the other hand to magnify\nthe necessity of grace, \"preventing grace,\" [Act. x.] that is to say,\nGod Himself \"working in us _to will_\" to receive our salvation. The two\nsides of truth are both divine. [Phil. ii. 13.] Do not neglect either,\nwhether you can harmonize them or not here below.\n\n * * * * *\n\nEND OF THE LECTURE.\n\nSuch are some specimens of a Saturday morning's talk in our library.\nThey are taken, just as they come, from notes constructed after the\nstudy of a set of some twenty sermons, written, and then commented upon,\nwithout the slightest thought that any public or permanent use would be\nmade of the materials thus given. But perhaps the remarks may be in\npoint to some of my readers all the more because of the unstudied nature\nof the materials.\n\nLet me say, before I quite leave this part of my subject, that adverse\ncriticism was by no means my only work this morning in the lecture-room.\nIt was my happiness, on the other hand, to commend thankfully many a\nclear setting of living truth, and many a sentence of forcible point and\nof true beauty, happy omens for future years, in which, if it please\nGod, \"the torch shall be carried on,\" bright and clear, when we elders\nshall be heard no more.[34]\n\n[34] Ungracious as it may seem, I must betray one less pleasant\nconfidence of such occasions. Sometimes I have had to note in sermon\nMSS. a strange neglect of punctuation, and, here and there, a little\naberration from received usages of spelling! No Clergyman ought to think\nsuch matters beneath his notice. His people, some, if not many of them,\nwill from time to time receive letters or other written messages from\nhim; these ought to be unmistakably the writing of the educated\ngentleman. Is it too much to say also that _the handwriting_ ought to be\nclear and easy? It is distressing, certainly to one who has many letters\nto read daily, to see how _rare_ such handwriting is now.\n\n\"MY CASES OF OLD SERMONS.\"\n\nBut now let me return from this discursive report of a sermon-lecture to\nsome more central thoughts about the Preaching of the Word. Sacred,\nsolemn theme! I was made to realize its character in a peculiar way\nquite lately, when reading a heart-searching and most instructive essay,\nby the Rev. R. Glover, Vicar of St Luke's, West Holloway, entitled, _My\nCases of Old Sermons_.[35] The essay was simply an experienced\npreacher's review of many years of pulpit labour, in the light of the\ncollected and ordered manuscripts which silently represented it. The\nwriter had much to say, to my great profit, about his methods of\npreparation and delivery, and about the pains taken to distribute the\nchoice of texts widely and impartially over the field of Scripture.\nThen he went on to speak of the ascertained spiritual history of some of\nthose many sermons; the messages to souls which in this or that instance\nthey had carried; the savour of life unto life, or perhaps, alas, of\ndeath unto death, which had to his knowledge breathed from them. The\nimpressions left on my mind were, above all others, two; first, the call\nto thorough diligence in preparation, if the preacher is to give his\naccount with joy; and then, the indescribable solemnity and greatness of\nthe work of a true pastor-preacher.\n\n[35] In _The Churchman_ of August, 1891.\n\n*BE A PREACHER INDEED.\n\nI may seem to reiterate too much, but I _must_ say again, with new\nemphasis, to my younger Brother, resolve to be a preacher indeed, by the\ngrace of God. Do not let secondary things, however good, distort your\nattention from that supremely sacred commission, \"Preach the Word; be\ninstant, in season, out of season[36] [2 Tim. iv. 2.]; reprove, rebuke,\nexhort, with all long-suffering and doctrine. _For_,\" the Apostle\nsignificantly proceeds, \"the time will come when they will not endure\nsound doctrine.\" Therefore, an age impatient of thorough Scriptural\npreaching is the very age in which to seek, in wisdom and courage, to\nmake much of it. Do not let organization spoil your preaching-work. Do\nnot let current events spoil it. Do not let elaboration of ritual spoil\nit. Do not let organist and choir rule over you, and claim for music the\nprecious moments called for by the Word.\n\n[36] That is, irrespective of _your own_ convenience.\n\n * * * * *\n\n\"THE DIRECTORY.\"\n\nLet me present to my reader, in this last chapter, an extract from an\nold book which however may be new to him. The book is not one which as a\nwhole I greatly love; how could I? It is that sternly-imposed substitute\nfor the Book of Common Prayer, commonly known as the Parliamentary\nDirectory of 1645; the exact title is, _A Directory for the Publique\nWorship of God in the Three Kingdomes_.[37] Its associations are\naltogether with an unhappy time, in which it was a seriously penal\noffence, at least in theory, to use the Prayer Book even at a sick\nfriend's bedside. Yet great men of God had a hand in the making of the\nDirectory; and their words are well worth the reading. In particular, I\nfind in the volume one passage, full of golden wisdom, a precious\nmessage to all Christian preachers. It is the section which I now quote\nexactly as it first appeared, and which is entitled\n\n[37] It is printed in W.K. Clay's _Book of Common Prayer Illustrated_.\nParker, 1841.\n\n\"OF THE PREACHING OF THE WORD.\n\n*THE DIRECTORY ON PREACHING.\n\n\"Preaching of the Word, being the power of God unto Salvation, and one\nof the greatest and most excellent Works belonging to the Ministry of\nthe Gospell, should bee so performed, that the Workman need not bee\nashamed, but may save himself, and those that heare him.\n\n\"It is presupposed (according to the Rules for Ordination) that the\nMinister of Christ is in some good measure gifted for so weighty a\nservice, by his skill in the Originall Languages, and in such Arts and\nSciences as are handmaids unto Divinity, by his knowledge in the whole\nBody of Theology, but most of all in the holy Scriptures, having his\nsenses and heart exercised in them above the common sort of Beleevers;\nand by the illumination of Gods Spirit, and other gifts of edification,\nwhich (together with reading and studying of the Word) he ought still to\nseek by Prayer, and an humble heart, resolving to admit and receive any\ntruth not yet attained, when ever God shall make it known unto him. All\nwhich hee is to make use of, and improve, in his private preparations,\nbefore hee deliver in publike what he hath provided.\n\nCHOICE OF THE TEXT.\n\n\"Ordinarily, the subject of his Sermon is to be some Text of Scripture,\nholding forth some principle or head of Religion; or suitable to some\nspeciall occasion emergent; or hee may goe on in some Chapter, Psalme,\nor Booke of the holy Scripture, as hee shall see fit.\n\n\"Let the Introduction to his Text be brief and perspicuous, drawn from\nthe Text itself, or context, or some parallel place, or generall\nsentence of Scripture.\n\n\"If the Text be long (as in Histories and Parables it sometimes must be)\nlet him give a briefe summe of it; if short, a Paraphrase thereof, if\nneed be: In both, looking diligently to the scope of the Text, and\npointing at the chief heads and grounds of Doctrine, which he is to\nraise from it.\n\nHOW THE TEXT IS TO BE HANDLED.\n\n\"In Analysing and dividing his Text, he is to regard more the order of\nmatter, then of words; and neither to burden the memory of the hearers\nin the beginning with too many members of Division, nor to trouble their\nminds with obscure terms of Art.\n\n\"In raising Doctrines from the Text, his care ought to bee, First, that\nthe matter be the truth of God. Secondly, that it be a truth contained\nin or grounded on that Text, that the hearers may discern how God\nteacheth it from thence. Thirdly, that he chiefly insist upon those\nDoctrines which are principally intended, and make most for the\nedification of the hearers.\n\n\"The Doctrine is to be expressed in plaine termes; or if any thing in it\nneed explication, is to bee opened, and the consequence also from the\nText cleared. The parallel places of Scripture confirming the Doctrine\nare rather to bee plaine and pertinent, then many, and (if need bee)\nsomewhat insisted upon, and applyed to the purpose in hand.\n\n\"The Arguments or Reasons are to bee solid; and, as much as may bee,\nconvincing. The illustrations, of what kind soever, ought to bee full of\nlight, and such as may convey the truth into the Hearers heart with\nspirituall delight.\n\n\"If any doubt, obvious from Scripture, Reason, or Prejudice of the\nHearers, seem to arise, it is very requisite to remove it, by\nreconciling the seeming differences, answering the reasons, and\ndiscovering and taking away the causes of prejudice and mistake.\nOtherwise, it is not fit to detain the hearers with propounding or\nanswering vaine or wicked Cavils, which as they are endlesse, so the\npropounding and answering of them doth more hinder than promote\nedification.\n\n\"Hee is not to rest in generall Doctrine, although never so much cleared\nand confirmed, but to bring it home to speciall use, by application to\nhis hearers: Which albeit it prove a worke of great difficulty to\nhimselfe, requiring much prudence, zeale, and meditation, and to the\nnaturall and corrupt man will bee very unpleasant; yet hee is to\nendeavour to perform it in such a manner that his auditors may feele\nthe Word of God to be quick and powerfull, and a discerner of the\nthoughts and intents of the heart; and that if any unbeleever or\nignorant person bee present, hee may have the secrets of his heart made\nmanifest, and give glory to God.\n\nHOW THE MESSAGE IS TO BE APPLIED.\n\n\"In the Use of Instruction or information in the knowledge of some\ntruth, which is a consequence from his Doctrine, he may (when\nconvenient) confirm it by a few firm arguments from the Text in hand,\nand other places in Scripture, or from the nature of that Common place\nin Divinity, whereof that truth is a branch.\n\n\"In Confutation of false Doctrines, he is neither to raise an old\nHeresie from the grave, nor to mention a blasphemous opinion\nunnecessarily; but if the people be in danger of an errour, he is to\nconfute it soundly, and endeavour to satisfie their judgements and\nconsciences against all objections.\n\n\"In exhorting to Duties, he is, as he seeth cause, to teach also the\nmeanes that help to the performance of them.\n\n\"In Dehortation, Reprehension, and publique Admonition (which require\nspeciall wisdome) let him, as there shall be cause, not only discover\nthe nature and greatnesse of the sin, with the misery attending it, but\nalso shew the danger his hearers are in to be overtaken and surprised by\nit, together with the remedies and best way to avoyd it.\n\n\"In applying Comfort, whether generall against all tentations, or\nparticular against some speciall troubles or terrours, he is carefully\nto answer such objections, as a troubled heart and afflicted spirit may\nsuggest to the contrary.\n\n\"It is also sometimes requisite to give some Notes of tryal (which is\nvery profitable, especially when performed by able and experienced\nMinisters, with circumspection and prudence, and the Signes cleerely\ngrounded on the Holy Scripture) whereby the Hearers may be able to\nexamine themselves, whether they have attained those Graces, and\nperformed those duties to which he Exhorteth, or be guilty of the sin\nReprehended, and in danger of the judgments Threatened, or are such to\nwhom the Consolations propounded doe belong; that accordingly they may\nbe quickened and excited to Duty, humbled for their Wants and Sins,\naffected with their Danger, and strengthened with Comfort, as their\ncondition upon examination shall require.\n\n\"And, as he needeth not alwayes to prosecute every Doctrine which lies\nin his Text, so is he wisely to make choice of such Uses, as by his\nresidence and conversing with his flocke, he findeth most needfull and\nseasonable: and, amongst these, such as may most draw their soules to\nChrist, the Fountaine of light, holinesse and comfort.\n\n\"This method is not prescribed as necessary for every man, or upon every\nText; but only recommended, as being found by experience to be very much\nblessed of God, and very helpful for the people's understandings and\nmemories.\n\nIN WHAT SPIRIT THE PREACHER IS TO WORK.\n\n\"But the Servant of Christ, whatever his Method be, is to perform his\nwhole Ministery;\n\n\"1. _Painfully_, not doing the work of the Lord negligently.\n\n\"2. _Plainly_, that the meanest may understand, delivering the truth,\nnot in the entising words of mans wisdome, but in demonstration of the\nSpirit and of power, least the Crosse of Christ should be made of none\neffect: abstaining also from an unprofitable use of unknown Tongues,\nstrange phrases, and cadences of sounds and words, sparingly citing\nsentences of Ecclesiasticall, or other humane Writers, ancient or\nmoderne, be they never so elegant.\n\n\"3. _Faithfully_, looking at the honour of Christ, the conversion,\nedification and salvation of the people, not at his own gains or glory:\nkeeping nothing back which may promote those holy ends, giving to every\none his own portion, and bearing indifferent respect unto all, without\nneglecting the meanest, or sparing the greatest in their sins.\n\n\"4. _Wisely_, framing all his Doctrines, Exhortations, and especially\nhis Reproofs, in such a manner as may be most likely to prevaile,\nshewing all due respect to each mans person and place, and not mixing\nhis own passion or bitternesse.\n\n\"5. _Gravely_, as becometh the Word of God, shunning all such gesture,\nvoice and expressions as may occasion the corruptions of men to despise\nhim and his Ministry.\n\n\"6. _With loving affection_, that the people may see all coming from his\nGodly zeale, and hearty desire to doe them good. And\n\nDOCTRINE AND LIFE.\n\n\"7. _As taught of God_, and perswaded in his own heart, that all that he\nteacheth, is the truth of Christ; and walking before his flock as an\nexample to them in it; earnestly, both in private and publique,\nrecommending his labours to the blessing of God, and watchfully looking\nto himselfe and the flock whereof the Lord hath made him overseer. So\nshall the Doctrine of truth be preserved uncorrupt, many soules\nconverted, and built up, and himselfe receive manifold comforts of his\nlabours even in this life, and afterward the Crown of Glory laid up for\nhim in the world to come.\n\n\"Where there are more Ministers in a Congregation than one, and they of\ndifferent guifts, each may more especially apply himselfe to Doctrine or\nExhortation, according to the guift wherein he most excelleth, and as\nthey agree between themselves.\"\n\nSPIRITUAL POWER IN PREACHING.\n\nI have little to say after the recitation of this passage of pregnant\nand solemn counsel. That little shall be given to a supreme aspect of\nthe whole subject; I mean, Spiritual Power in Preaching. Who that knows\nthe Lord, and contemplates the preacher's work, does not long for\nSpiritual Power? By that longing he means no ambitious wish to be\nremarkable, nor any unwholesome craving to be a leader in scenes of\nreligious excitement. He means the deep desire to be an effectual\nmessenger of his Master; to be the living channel of the Holy Spirit's\nenergy in His converting, sanctifying, strengthening, perfecting work.\nHe knows that it is possible to be truly orthodox, and yet not to be\nthis; to be eloquent, to be impressive, to be impassioned, and yet not\nto be this; to be unimpeachably truthful, reasonable, intellectually\nconvincing, and yet all the while not to be this. How shall he be a\nvehicle of spiritual power?\n\nTHE OPEN SECRET.\n\nThe Scriptural answer is very simple, but it goes deep. If a man would\nhave spiritual power with men, and prevail, he must be real with his\nLord. What he says, he must first know, he must first live. As regards\nHIM who is at once his Master and his Gospel, he must indeed \"_know_\nwhom he has believed,\" [2 Tim. i. 10.] and, in calm but entire\nsimplicity, \"_submit himself_ under His hands.\" Granted a true creed,\nand a humble faith in its Subject, he must, in quiet reality, \"yield\nhimself unto God,\" if he would be used by Him. Observe the Apostle's\nphrase; \"Yield yourselves,\" [Greek: parast\u00cdsate heautous]: not, \"yield\nto God\" (though that is implied), but, \"yield _yourselves_, hand\nyourselves over, to God,\" as you would hand over a tool, a weapon [Rom.\nvi. 13.]. And another aspect of the same thing appears in the same\nApostle's later words: \"_If a man_ _purge himself_ of these, he _shall\nbe a vessel_ unto honour, sanctified (to), and meet for, the Master's\nuse,\" [Greek: h\u00cdgiasmenon euchr\u00cdston t\u00d9 Despot\u00cd]. [2 Tim. ii. 21.]\n\nThe deepest secret of spiritual power, in God's sense of the phrase,\nlies there. Let the man be watchful over his Scriptural creed, and let\nhim discipline his life, and let him toil in his study, and among his\npeople. None of these things can be spared; they are all vital. But the\ncentral secret, which they as it were enclose and protect, lies in the\nwords _Surrender in faith_. And the Christian man's heart must be its\nown inquisitor, before God, in the inquiry after the point, or points,\nwhere you, where I, need to make that surrender for ourselves.\n\nIn the void thus left, in the chasm thus cut deep into our ambitions,\ninto our self-love, the mighty Spirit in His tranquil fulness will\nspring up. And then, whether we know it or not, we Ministers of the Word\nshall assuredly be vehicles of spiritual power, to our Lord's praise.\n\n * * * * *\n\nFAREWELL.\n\nSo let me close these fragmentary words spoken \"to my younger Brethren.\"\nMay God's mercy be upon the writer. Upon the readers, whom he loves in\nthe Lord, may grace and peace come every hour and day, in secret, in\nsociety, in holy ministration of Word and Ordinance. And in due time,\nwhen they are no longer juniors but, if the Lord will, veterans and\nleaders in the work, may they in turn pass on the message to those who\nfollow, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.\n\n\n \"CHRISTIANITY is so great and surprising in its nature that, in\n preaching it to others, I have no encouragement but in the\n belief of a continued divine operation. It is no difficult\n thing to change a man's opinions. It is no difficult thing to\n attach a man to my person and notions. It is no difficult thing\n to convert a proud man to spiritual pride, or a passionate man\n to passionate zeal for some religious party. But to bring a man\n to love God, to love the law of God while it condemns him, to\n loathe himself before God, to tread the earth under his feet,\n to hunger and thirst after God in Christ, and after the mind\n that was in Christ, this is impossible. But God has said it\n shall be done; and bids me go forth and preach, that by me, as\n His instrument, He may effect these great ends; and therefore I\n go.\"\n\n CECIL.\n\n\n\n\nFORDINGTON PULPIT:\n\nA PREACHER'S WEEKDAY THOUGHTS,\n\n_Written, in 1878, in the Church of the Author's Baptism, and where he\nfirst Ministered as his Father's Curate._\n\n\n Many voices yester-even\n Made these walls and arches ring\n With their high-sung hopes of Heaven,\n And the glories of its King;\n Now my footfall sounds alone\n On the aisle's long path of stone,\n Save that yonder from the loft,\n With a solemn tone and soft,\n Beating on with muffled shock,\n Conscience-waking, speaks the clock.\n Holy scene, and dear as holy,\n Let me ponder thee this hour,\n Not in aimless melancholy,\n But in quest of Heaven-given power;\n Seeking here to win anew\n Contrite love and purpose true;\n Near the Font whose dew-drops cold\n Fell upon my brow of old,\n Near the well-remember'd seat\n Set beside my Mother's feet;\n Near the Table where I bent\n At that earliest Sacrament.\n Let me, through this narrow door,\n Climb the Pulpit's steps once more.\n Blessed place! the Master's Word,\n Child and man, I hence have heard;\n Awful place! for hence, in turn,\n I have taught, so slow to learn.\n To the silence now to hearken\n Here I mount and stand alone,\n While the spaces round me darken\n And the Church is all my own;\n While the sun's last glories fall\n From the window of the tower,\n Tracing slow their parting hour\n On the stones of floor and wall.\n Seems a secret Voice to thrill\n All the dusky air so still;\n Turns a soul-compelling gaze\n On me from the sunset haze:\n Sure the eternal Shepherd's hand\n Beckons me awhile apart,\n Bids me in His presence stand\n While He looks me through the heart.\n Sinful preacher, ask again\n In this nearness of thy Lord,\n How to HIM has rung thy strain,\n When it seem'd to speak His Word.\n 'Midst thy brethren's listening numbers\n Hast thou felt, with heart sincere,\n How, in thought that never slumbers,\n This great Listener stood more near?--\n Listening to His own high Name\n Spoken by His creature's breath;\n How from out the Heavens He came,\n How He pour'd His soul in death,\n How He triumph'd o'er the grave,\n How He lives on high to save,\n How He yet again shall come,\n Lord of glory and of doom.\n Has He found thy message true?\n Truth, and truly spoken too?\n Utter'd with a purpose whole,\n From a self-forgetful soul,\n Bent on nothing save the fame\n Of the dear redeeming Name,\n And the pardon, life, and bliss\n Of the souls He bought for His?\n Think!--But ah, from thoughts like these\n Hasten, sinner, to thy knees.\n\n_Printed by Hazell, Watson & Viney, La., London and Aylesbury._\n\n\n * * * * *\n\n\n_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._\n\n THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 7s. 6d.\n\n COLOSSIAN STUDIES. Crown 8vo., cloth, 5s.\n\n TO MY YOUNGER BRETHREN ON PASTORAL LIFE AND WORK. 5s.\n\n OUTLINES OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. 2s. 6d. (In the _Theological\n Educator_ Series.)\n\n VENI CREATOR: THOUGHTS ON THE HOLY SPIRIT OF PROMISE. Third\n Edition. Crown 8vo, 5s., cloth.\n\n LIFE IN CHRIST AND FOR CHRIST. 32mo, 1s., cloth.\n\n \"NEED AND FULNESS.\" 1s., cloth.\n\n \"PATIENCE AND COMFORT.\" 1s., cloth.\n\n THOUGHTS ON CHRISTIAN SANCTITY. 1s., cloth. 30th Thousand.\n\n THOUGHTS ON UNION WITH CHRIST. 1s., cloth. 22nd Thousand.\n\n THOUGHTS ON THE SPIRITUAL LIFE. 1s., cloth. 12th Thousand.\n\n SECRET PRAYER. 1s., cloth, 11th Thousand.\n\n \"AT THE HOLY COMMUNION.\" Thoughts for Preparation and\n Communion. 1s., cloth.\n\n \"THE PLEDGE OF HIS LOVE.\" Thoughts on the Lord's Supper, 1s.,\n cloth.\n\n THE NEW BIRTH. A Brief Enquiry and Statement. 2d.\n\n THE CLEANSING BLOOD. A Study of 1 John i. 7. 2d.\n\n JUSTIFYING RIGHTEOUSNESS. 4d.\n\n THE CHRISTIAN AND THE WORLD. 2d.\n\n THE NET AND THE DELIVERANCE. 1d.\n\n A MORNING ACT OF FAITH. 3d. per dozen.\n\n THE CHRISTIAN'S OWN CALENDAR OF PERSONAL AND FAMILY EVENTS.\n 1s. 6d. With an Introduction by Rev. H.C.G. MOULE.\n\n PRAYERS FOR THE HOME. 2s. 6d.\n\n THE CHRISTIAN'S VICTORY OVER SIN. 2d.\n\n \"GRACE AND GODLINESS.\" Chapters on Ephesians. 2s. 6d.\n\n \"CHRIST IS ALL.\" Sermons. 2s. 6d.\n\n COMMENTARIES ON THE ROMANS (3s. 6d.); EPHESIANS (2s. 6d.);\n PHILIPPIANS (2s. 6d.); COLOSSIANS (2s. 6d.) in the\n _Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges_; and on the\n PHILIPPIANS in the _Cambridge Greek Testament_. Also on the\n ROMANS in the _Expositor's Bible_ (7s. 6d.).\n\n \"BETWEEN MY LORD AND ME.\" A Card containing Morning and\n Evening Acts of Faith and Devotion. 2d.\n\n CHARLES SIMEON. (In _English Leaders of Religion_.) 2s. 6d.\n\n BISHOP RIDLEY ON THE LORD'S SUPPER. A Reprint from the\n Original Edition, with Life of Ridley, Notes, Appendices, etc.,\n and Illustrations. 5s.\n\n \"IN THE HOUSE OF THE PILGRIMAGE.\" Hymns and Sacred Songs, 2s.\n 6d.","title":"To My Younger Brethren: Chapters on Pastoral Life and Work","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":55905}