SECTION SECOND.

INSTRUCTION.

CHAPTER I.

PREACHING.

1. Importance of Preaching among the Functions of the

Ministry.

WHAT is preaching? It is the explication of the word of God, the exposition of Christian truths, and the application of those truths to our flock; all this, in the presence of our assembled flock-I might say, in public; since the Church, in the view of the multitude or mass, is regarded as a great school, open to every comer.

We have first spoken of worship, and then of preaching as included in worship, and to be considered as making a part of worship, although worship speaks to God, and preaching speaks of him; but it is only in elevating his soul to God that one speaks worthily of him; preaching which is not of the nature of worship is not true preaching. Things which, in a lower region, are separated, in a higher one are reunited and blended.*

But let us leave this, and see what place God himself has given to preaching in Christianity. It is a place greater than preaching has in any other religion, greater than it had even in the Jewish religion. Christianity is a religion made

* On the relative importance of preaching in the pastoral office, see HARMS.

for thought, and, consequently, for speech; it represents itself, it substantively manifests itself by speech, it propagates itself by speech. The Gospel is a word. Christ himself is the Word, or the Reason. The term is of no importance; for the word is reason expressed, and the reason is the interior word. The Church itself is truth thought in common, spoken in common. In insisting, a while ago, on synthesis in worship, we did not condemn speech; religion, it is true, appears in a complex state in worship, in the soul and in the life; but there is no just sentiment, no strong affection, which does not connect itself with a distinct idea of which the reason can give account, or which is not founded on a relation, the terms of which are well known and well appreciated; and this characteristic should, above all, belong to the true religion, nay, to this religion alone. This alone can say, I know in whom I have believed. In a word, it is a religion of faith or of persuasion, consequently a religion which employs speech.

Hence arises the importance of preaching. Our preaching, it is true, is second hand, a preaching on a preaching, a word on a word; but this matters not, preaching is necessary; for this are we sent; worship, simply, might be celebrated by any Christian whatever; for this no call is necessary; it is sufficient if the person has no reason to doubt the conformity of his faith with this act. If we should interrogate ourselves as to a call, if it is necessary we should be called, it is as stewards of the mysteries of God, as heralds or messengers of justice, as preachers.

To speak the truth, the whole ministry is preaching. Instead of saying that preaching makes a part of worship, we might say that worship makes a part of preaching, that rite is a form of instruction. What we here present, then, as a species, is, in a certain sense, a genus; but still we may so present it, since the word preaching, in common language, means a part, and not the whole, of the exercise of the ministry

Not only should pastors preach, but we think, with Fenelon, under our own explanation, that it belongs to them only to preach. True political eloquence belongs only to the statesman; true sacred eloquence, only to the statesman in religion or religious affairs, that is to say, the pastor; who alternately passes from generalities to details, and from details to generalities; from theory to practice, and from practice to theory; who has been in contact with individuals, and is familiar with their ways. If certain men without a parish are successful in preaching, it is because they are pas tors after another manner and at large.

It is true that the primitive Church divided ministerial functions. They had κυβερνήταίt and διδάσκαλοι Are all apostles? are all teachers?"-1 Cor., xii., 29. But without saying that gifts are here referred to, and without speaking of what the necessity of the times might require, we may hold that the office of some was absolutely foreign to others. At a period when each Christian was a minister-when an Aquila and a Priscilla, simple artisans, became instructors of an Apollos, how can we suppose that the teacher was not a pastor? We may well think that there were elders (πρεσbúrepot) who did not preach, but not preachers who were strangers to every other pastoral duty except preaching. Paul preached and governed: Timothy preached and gov

erned.

The pastorate, then, is necessary to preaching; but it is yet more evident that preaching is essential to the pastorate,

* "We must commonly leave preaching to pastors. Thus shall we give to the pulpit the simplicity and authority which belong to it. For pastors, who to experience in the work and in the conduct of souls unite the knowledge of the Scriptures, can speak in the manner best suited to the wants of their hearers; whereas preachers, who are merely speculative, enter less into the difficulties, and can scarcely adapt themselves to the minds of their hearers, and speak in a more vague manner."-FENELON, Dialogues sur l'Eloquence (Dialogue III.). + Governors or directors.-Edit. + Teachers.

and that we can not conceive of a pastor who does not preach; we would say, who does not preach in public (for, as respects preaching out of season, who can doubt this ?); since, apart from preaching, to the minister there remains nothing of the feeder and of the pastor. But public preaching is essential to the pastorate, which, without this, can not reach all souls, and can not present truth under the most regular and most general form. It is the glory of our Reformation that it restored public preaching to the Church, I say even to the Catholic Church. How noble was it to advance the priest from the mere celebration of rites (which had become a species of magic) to science, to thought, to the word, to conflict?

§ 2. Principles or Maxims which should be maintained as to Preaching.

On the subject of preaching, we must adopt certain principles, or acknowledge certain commanding truths.

The first is, that preaching is an action, a real word, not the imitation of a word, and that eloquence is a virtue. Abstracting art, preaching is a work of love, a good work, a good office, a part of the service of God. But this is only the first step here is the second.

Preaching is a mystery. A mystery, I mean, as to its action and its effects, a mystery of reprobation and salvation ;* for the word of God (which we assume to be in the preacher's mouth) does not return to him without some effect; something of truth, whether for gain or for loss, always connects itself, and remains with him who has heard it. It is truly mysterious that on the voice of one man the soul and the eternity of another should depend. Mysterious truly a mode of action so peculiar, so inexplicable, the effect of which so far outreaches our calculations, and so often disappoints * St. Cyran calls it an almost sacrament, and more awful than that of the altar. (See in the Appendix, note B.)

our foresight: How often do we see the greatest effects con nected with the smallest causes, as the smallest also with the greatest; power becoming feeble, and impotence powerful; one succeeding by another's shipwreck, and vice versa: Laws there are, no doubt, but no constancy; and all rules are subordinated to the liberty of the Spirit, which "bloweth as it listeth."

All this is awful, overwhelming, but suited to empty us of ourselves. It is evident that we carry this treasure in earthen vessels, and that all which depends on us (if any thing does depend on us) is that the vessel has no leak through which the living water may escape, and no impurity by which it may be corrupted. The rest belongs not to us; and so much the less does it belong to us, the more we imagine that it does. In respect to preaching, then, as well as in respect to the whole work of the ministry, we have cause to rejoice with trembling.

The sovereignty of God in this matter (the first point to be recognized) does not exclude human responsibility. Preaching is an action, but an action of the soul, and its effects are connected with the preacher's spiritual state. It is not so much by what he says as by what he is that the preacher may flatter himself that he does not beat the air. Before every thing, he is concerned to "hold the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience."-1 Tim., iii., 9. This pure conscience (that is to say, uprightness of intention) is the true force of preaching. A discourse is powerful from the motive of him who pronounces it, whatever may be the mode in which that motive expresses itself. A discourse is so much the better, the more it resembles an act of contrition, of submission, of prayer, of martyrdom. The preacher should regard himself as "a channel for what ought to be conveyed by him into the heart of his hearers." The ministry of the word," We must pray,

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says Fenelon, "is wholly founded on faith.

* Praktische Bemerkungen, etc., p. 49.