He urged the same view by another example, still better adapted to popular apprehension : "Look yonder," said the impassioned orator, pointing a motionless finger towards the lofty ceiling, as if it were the sky. "See that wrathful thunder-cloud-the fiery bed of the lightnings and hissing hail-the cradle of tempests and floods! -What can be more dark, more dreary, more dreadful? Say, scoffing skeptic, is it capable of any beauty? You pronounce, 'no.' Well, very well; but behold, while the sneering denial curls your proud lips, the sun with its sword of light shears through the sea of vapors in the west, and laughs in your incredulous face with his fine golden eye. Now, look again at the thunder-cloud! See! where it was blackest and fullest of gloom, the sunbeams have kissed its hideous cheek; and where the kiss fell there is now a blush, brighter than ever mantled on the brow of mortal maiden-the rich blush of crimson and gold, of purple and vermilion-a pictured blush, fit for the gaze of angels-the flower-work of pencils of fire and light, wrought at a dash by one stroke of the right hand of God! Ay, the ugly cloud hath given birth to the rainbow, that perfection and symbol of unspeakable beauty!" THE LORD BISHOP. The following incident is said to have occurred in the parish church of Bradford, England, during a special service, on the occasion of a visit from the bishop of the diocese :— The clerk, before the sermon, gave out the psalm in broad Wiltshire dialect, namely:-"Let us zing to the praayze an' glawry o' God, three varsses o' the hundred and vourteen zaam -a varsion 'specially 'dapted to the 'caasion,-by meself:" Why hop ye zo, ye little hills, An' what var de'e skip? Why skip ye zo, ye little hills, Is it 'cas to preach to we Is com'd the Lard Bishop? Eese; he is com'd to preach to we: An' zing a glawrious zong of praayze, THE PREACHERS OF CROMWELL'S TIME. Dr. Echard says of the preachers who lived in the time of Cromwell, Coiners of new phrases, drawers-out of long godly words, thick pourers-out of texts of Scripture, mimical squeakers and bellowers, vain-glorious admirers only of themselves, and those of their own fashioned face and gesture; such as these shall be followed, shall have their bushels of China oranges, shall be solaced with all manner of cordial essences, and shall be rubbed down with Holland of ten shillings an ell." One of the singular fashions that prevailed among the preachers of those days was that of coughing or hemming in the middle of a sentence, as an ornament of speech; and when their sermons were printed, the place where the preacher coughed or hemmed was always noted in the margin. This practice was not confined to England, for Olivier Maillard, a Cordelier, and famous preacher, printed a sermon at Brussels in the year 1500, and marked in the margin where the preacher hemmed once or twice, or coughed. ORIGIN OF TEXTS. The custom of taking a text as the basis of a sermon originated with Ezra, who, we are told, accompanied by several Levites in a public congregation of men and women, ascended a pulpit, opened the book of the law, and after addressing a prayer to the Deity, to which the people said Amen, “read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading." (Nehemiah viii. 8.) Previous to the time of Ezra, the Patriarchs delivered, in public assemblies, either prophecies or moral instructions for the edification of the people; and it was not until the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity, during which time they had almost lost the language in which the Pentateuch was written, that it became necessary to explain, as well as to read, the Scriptures to them. In later times, the book of Moses was thus read in the synagogues every Sabbath day. (Acts xv. 21.) To this custom our Saviour conformed: in the synagogue at Nazareth he read a passage from the prophet Isaiah, then closing. the book, returned it to the priest, and preached from the text. CLERICAL BLUNDERS. In an old book of Sermons by a divine named Milsom, we are told that it is one among many proofs of the wisdom and benevolence of Providence that the world was not created in the midst of winter, when Adam and Eve could have found nothing to eat, but in harvest-time, when there was fruit on every tree and shrub to tempt the willing hand. Another commentator praises Divine Goodness for always making the largest rivers flow close by the most populous towns. St. Austin undertook to prove that the ten plagues of Egypt were punishments adapted to the breach of the ten commandments,-forgetting that the law was given to the Jews, and that the plagues were inflicted on the Egyptians, and also that the law was not given in the form of commandments until nearly three months after the plagues had been sent. PROVING AN ALIBI. A clergyman at Cambridge preached a sermon which one of his auditors commended. 66 'Yes," said a gentleman to whom it was mentioned, "it was a good sermon, but he stole it." This was told to the preacher. He resented it, and called on the gentleman to retract what he had said. "I am not," replied the aggressor, "very apt to retract my words, but in this instance I will. I said, you had stolen the sermon; I find I was wrong; for on returning home, and referring to the book whence I thought it was taken, I found it there." WHITEFIELD AND THE SAILORS. Mr. Whitefield, whose gestures and play of features were so full of dramatic power, once preached before the seamen at New York, and, in the course of his sermon, introduced the following bold apostrophe:— "Well, my boys, we have a clear sky, and are making fine headway over a smooth sea before a light breeze, and we shall soon lose sight of land. But what means this sudden lowering of the heavens, and that dark cloud arising from the western horizon? Hark! Don't you hear the distant thunder? Don't you see those flashes of lightning? There is a storm gathering! Every man to his duty. How the waves rise and dash against the ship! The air is dark! The tempest rages! Our masts are gone. The ship is on her beam ends! What next?" The unsuspecting tars, reminded of former perils on the deep, as if struck by the power of magic, arose and exclaimed, "Take to the long boat." PROTESTANT EXCOMMUNICATION. John Knox, in his Liturgy for Scotch Presbyterians, sets forth the following form for the exercise of such an attribute of ecclesiastical authority in Protestant communities as excommunication: "O Lord Jesus Christ, thy expressed word is our assurance, and therefore, in boldness of the same, here in thy name, and at the commandment of this thy present congregation, we cut off, seclude, and excommunicate from thy body, and from our society, N. as a pround contemner, and slanderous person, and a member for the present altogether corrupted, and pernicious to the body. And this his sin (albeit with sorrow of our hearts) by virtue of our ministry, we bind and pronounce the same to be bound in heaven and earth. We further give over, into the hands and power of the devil, the said N. to the destruction of his flesh; straitly charging all that profess the Lord Jesus, to whose knowledge this our sentence shall come, to repute and hold the said N. accursed and unworthy of the familiar society of Christians; declaring unto all men that such as hereafter (before his repentance) shall haunt, or familiarly accompany him, are partakers of his impiety, and subject to the like condemnation. "This our sentence, O Lord Jesus, pronounced in thy name, and at thy commandment, we humbly beseech thee to ratify even according to thy promise." Puritan Peculiarities. BAPTISMÁL NAMES. A PURITAN maiden, who was asked for her baptismal name, replied, "Through-much-tribulation-we-enter-the-kingdom-ofHeaven,' but for short they call me 'Tribby."" The following names will be found in Lower's English Sirnames, and in the Lansdowne Collection. Most of them are taken from a jury-list of Sussex County, 1658. The favorite female baptismal names among the Puritans were Mercy, Faith, Fortune, Honor, Virtue; but there were among them those who preferred such high-flown names as Alethe, Prothesa, Euphrosyne, Kezia, Keturah, Malvina, Melinda, Sabrina, Alpina, Oriana. The-gift-of-God Stringer, Repentant Hazel, Zealous King, Be-thankful Playnard, Live-in-peace Hillary, The-work-of-God Farmer, More-tryal Goodwin, Faithful Long, Joy-from-above Brown, Thunder Goldsmith. |