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    humanity , the humanity of a good home and humble life , would furnish in aid of his holy cause . I do not hence infer that we should neglect the mind , but that we should educate the heart . Opportunities of social intercourse should be deemed an essential requisite in locating an establishment for the education of ministers , and wherever such an establishment exists , occasions SolIlBl ^ fou ^^

    the students to keep alive the play of human affections . Every system of education for the pulpit must be regarded as seriously defective , which does not comprise exercises having a direct bearing , not only on the pastoral , but on the pulpit duties . And where accessible , good models , in which the rules of science are realized , modified , and consummated in practice , are of a value that cannot be easily overrated . But of preeminent consequence among these preparatory exercises , is the practice of preaching itself .

    At least one third of the time occupied in collegiate studies should be improved by the practice of occasional preaching ; and if the time of going to college were delayed , no objection could arise to this from the youth and inexperience of students . By what pos * sible arguments can the propriety of preaching during the latter part of a theological education be impeached ? Is preaching of all things the only one that requires no preparation and practice . to

    secure acceptance and success ? - How can even mediocrity be attained without previous labour ? In this nature , indeed , is the best master ; but nature , even under the most favourable circumstances , is weak and deficient apart from art and practice . Yet it sometimes happens , that a young man has to preach perhaps for the first or second time in public , when the question is whether or not he shall be chosen by Christians to lead their devotions and instruct their minds . How absurd , that when excellence is

    wanted , he should take the first lesson in one of his most important duties . Besides , what so efficient to keep alive the flame of piety in ja student , to keep his attention from being engrossed by secular studies , and fixed on the grea ^ object of his life , to improve the character , to support energies that otherwise might flag , to increase the ardour of pursuit after knowledge , and especially

    after that which has most directly a bearing on ministerial duties , to give some knowledge of men and manners , of the wants , hopes , and fears of Christians , to give a reality and a practicality to sentiments and feelings derived from books—what so efficient for these valuable ends , as the occasional preparation of discourses , as the delivery of them to Christian congregations , as the mingling with society which such a practice would occasion ?

    In this important matter there is much neglect . 1 abhor , indeed , the prepared and studied arts of the pulpit declaimer . Simplicity in the pulpit is before all things necessary . But there is an ease , a self-possession , not to say a grace * which are as needful to allow the workings of the soul full play , as they are to

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    168 ^ THE TRUTH TELiER .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 1, 1833, page 168, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2615/page/8/