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lijs powers of happy illustration and forcible reasoning , this rare advantage belonged to his delivery , that it was exactly suited to the nature and the manner of his compositions . It was correct , grave , distinct , and expressive on fit occasions , of genuine emotion ; while it never diverted the attention of the audience from the subject and the argument to the speaker . His elo ~ quence therefore was the eloquence of thought and feeling ; admitting no tinsel and glare , and no artificial pomp . Whatever topics he selected for his public addresses , he treated with his characteristic luminousness and talentaffording large stores of information within a narrow compass—and if , of late , the tenor of his preaching was more critical and controversial than might have suited every hearer , the peculiarity , we must remember , arose from the nature of his situation , and the direction of his studies : nor did he lose sight of the devotional and practical uses , to which his themes of discourse might be applied . "—Pp . 18 , 19 .
If the concluding words of this extract be meant not merely to describe the construction of Mr . Belsham's sermons , but to characterize their spirit and tendency , they fall short , in our apprehension , of rendering full justice , which certainly could rot be the intention of their excellent and able author . There can be no occasion to tell him that the practical inferences at the end of a discourse are do measure of its moral power . But it may not be amiss to offer a word or two in vindication of Mr . Belsham ' s claim to an appellation which many were disposed to withhold from him , we mean that of a Practical Preacher . It is only as that title is sometimes applied , or rather misapplied , that his ri ght to it must be relinquished . There are few things more useless than the dull essays on trite topics which are often termed , exclusively , practical preaching ; which state what every body knows , affirm what nobody denies , and recommend what all approve ; which impart no instruction and leave no impression ; whose character is a negation , whose effect is slumber , and whose destiny is oblivion . In Mr . Belsham's youth there was plenty of this ; and some yet hold it in lingering regard . It never has been , nor can be , influential . The ordinary duties of ordinary life , on which this class of preachers was accustomed to dilate , are pretty well known even to the least instructed frequenters of our places of worship . What they need , what all need , is motive . The path is plain enough before them , and what the preacher has to do is to find and apply the power to impel them therein . And what can he have recourse to , for this purpose , but Christian doctrine ? His office is to teach ; to make his hearers wise unto salvation . His chief business with ethics is to enlighten them as to the
nature of moral obligation , to trace its bearings , and on proper occasions to insist at large on those duties to which the prejudices of society particularly oppose themselves . A dry detail of the common duties and decencies of life can scarcely ever be more than a mere waste of time . The hearer admits it all , for he knew it all before ; but it does not make him think , and it does not make him feel , and therefore it cannot make him act . The real
practical preaching is not that which is so called for no better reason than that it relates to the practice of our duty , but that which tends to promote the practice of our duty . This tendency may exist , and ought to exist , in every sermon which is preached and it may often be found in the highest degree in discourses which have no formal application , and which make no distinct mention of any particular duty whatever . Whatever renders a man ' s faith more firm , more clear , more pure ; whatever increases the sublimity and loveliness of his conceptions of the Deity , and deepens the sense of his presence ; whatever stimulates his intellect to the honest and active pursuit of truth , the truth by which the heart is sanctified ; whatever occu-
Untitled Article
168 On the Character and Writings of the Rev . T . Beishum .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1830, page 168, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2582/page/24/
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