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MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATION S
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> v ^ MMMH Some Observations on the Sermons of Missionaries . Translated Jrom the Spanish of JP . Feyjoo , a Monk and Public IVriter to the King of Spain , in the last Century . { Translated and Communicated by a Lady , S . E . P . ]
Friend akd Sir , RECEIVED your letter of the I 4 th of November , which I perused with singular p leasure , as in it you express an inclination to employ that portion of . your time usefully , which being exempted From the duties of your profession is at your own disposal , and cannot be better employed than by
continuing ' the sacred ministry of preaching in the neighbouring towns in the manner of a missionary . On this subject you tell * me you not only hope for my approbation , but likewise that I would impart any particular observations which may occur to me on this topic , to render the employment more beneficial .
To this I answer , that in regard to my approbation there can be no doubt , when the thing proposed is such as demands from the most indifferent not merely acquiescence but applause . I assure you if I had been endowed with necessary talents for preaching , when the king granted me an exemption from the service of the cathedral , I
should in some measure have devoted myself to this ministry , alternately with that of public writer , an occupation in which 1 was already engaged ; and in all probability my health would have
been benefited by some bodily exercise being mixed with the inevitably sedentary employment of writing : however 1 wanted the two indispensable
qualifications for missionary labours , virtue and strength of lungs , or , in other words , neither soul nor body allowed my undertaking the office of a preacher . With » speet to virtue even in an exemplary degree , I know I might have acquired it , my free will
co-operating with the aid of divine grace ; but weakness of chest was incurable , being constitutional , and a defect I have suffered from even in my earliest years . As to the observations you desire me to make , ^ v hat cau I say that you have
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— ** not already anticipated ? But as I have for a long time remarked certain i nconveniences which result from the discourses of particular preachers , owi ™
to the vehemence of their zeal to correct vice , though otherwise discreet and learned men , I shall offer two reflections to your consideration on those inconveniences and their cause .
First , I have observed that in the sermons of missionaries , it frequently happens that the preacher becomes heated by exaggerating the mischief occasioned by some one particular vice to the souls of his auditors : I repeat , it is very common to magnify much
beyond its real extent the prevalence of this vice amongst the inhabitants of the town where he preaches . This is highly reprehensible , and , for from conducing to reformation , tends to increase the general corruption . 1 will explain my position . The diseases of the soul
are not less con tag \ o us than those of the body ; they are even more so . It is only some particular species of bodily sicknesses that are infectious , but every malady of . the soul ( all moral vices ) may be communicated . Two circumstances must concur to render a
distemper contagious , a transmission of the breath of the sick person and a previous disposition to the disorder in the receiver . When an epidemic disease rages in any town , all the inhabitants are not affected , either because the morbid exhalations from the
sufferers do not extend to all those in health , or because there is not a disposition in every constitution to imbibe that kind of contagion . Now for the application of . this theory . The maladies o £ the soul transfuse or communicate their malignant influence by being known : while they are concealed they only injure the heart that engenders them , but when they are . published , their noxious vapours form an atmosphere more or less extended , according to the degree of publicity
sometimes reaching to a la ^ ge town , sometimes to a whole p rovince ; a . within this sphere their baleful influence is felt by every individua l in the least disposed to inhale the poison , in short , on all whose rulrng pa **" inclines them to the vice thw j ><*! r lished . ^ . , ,.
Miscellaneous Communication S
MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATION S
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( 636 )
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1816, page 636, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2458/page/8/
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