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And as to preaching, what ground have I to think that mine is of any particular importance? Not that I mean to affect any humility which I do not feel. I profess that I have quite a good opinion of myself as a preacher. Oh! if I could add, a full sense of the divineness of the thing, I should say all.
It was here I had the humiliating experience of sitting in a union Thanksgiving service where the preacher called the Pilgrim Fathers religious fanatics, and spoke of words writers of the Pentateuch put into the mouth of Moses to give them influence with the people. Yet I never saw a sign of disapproval in the audience or heard a word of criticism.
"It has been a pleasure to instruct Will," said the preacher. "For one thing he has a wonderfully retentive memory. Of course it is useless to pretend that I should not have been better pleased if he had remained a member of 'the old body'; but, wherever he is, I shall be very grateful if the small seeds I have sown are allowed to bear the blossom and fruit of a useful Christian life."
There were a dozen, I dare say, that very evening, and as many more the next evening. They are common enough, I am sure. And he didn't say anything personal, nor anything very bad, anyhow. They all take that position have to, I suppose; it's a part of their business. I don't like them any the less for it. I wouldn't listen to a preacher who played whist." Mrs.
The preacher is expected to speak in a different voice and wear a different expression in the "sacred desk" from his voice and expression in other places. In some churches he is expected to read the Bible in a strange, archaic sort of way, pronouncing the words which appear upon its pages with a pronunciation never employed under any other circumstances.
Some kept to their seats, and listened to the words of the preacher, interrupting him occasionally by fervent ejaculations; others sang and shouted, sometimes standing up, clapping their hands and stamping their feet; while a large proportion of the able-bodied members left their seats, and pushed their way forward to the wide, open space which surrounded the preacher's desk, and prepared to engage in the exhilarating ceremony of the "Jerusalem Jump."
This vocal organ was in itself a rich endowment, insomuch that a listener, comprehending nothing of the language in which the preacher spoke, might still have been swayed to and fro by the mere tone and cadence. Like all other music, it breathed passion and pathos, and emotions high or tender, in a tongue native to the human heart, wherever educated.
Isaac laid a hand upon his shoulder and smiled at him benevolently. "How do, Brothah Hayward," he said, "you been sittin' unner de drippin's of de gospel, too?" "Yes, I has been listenin' to de wo'ds of my fellow-laborah in de vineya'd of de Lawd," replied the preacher with some dignity, for he saw vanishing the vision of his own glory in a revivified sermon on predestination.
May every pastor emulate the virtues of that village preacher of whom it was written that: Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway, And fools who came to scoff, remained to pray. A man he was to all the country dear, And passing rich with forty pounds a year.
Profiting by the growing fear, which the approach of the Cholera then inspired, the preacher struck with terror these weak and credulous imaginations by pointing to M. Hardy's factory as a centre of corruption and damnation, capable of drawing down the vengeance of Heaven, and bringing the fatal scourge upon the country.
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