A CHARGE, DELIVERED TO THE CLERGY OF THE DIOCESE OF CARLISLE.
THE USE AND PROPRIETY OF LOCAL AND OCCASIONAL PREACHING:
A CHARGE, DELIVERED TO THE CLERGY OF THE DIOCESE OF CARLISLE, IN THE YEAR 1790, BY WILLIAM PALEY, M. A. CHANCELLOR AND ARCHDEACON OF THAT DIOCESE.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR R. FAULDER, NEW BOND STREET. M DCC XC.
THE USE AND PROPRIETY OF LOCAL AND OCCASIONAL PREACHING:
A CHARGE, &c.
REVEREND BRETHREN,
THE late Archbishop Secker, whose memory is entitled to public respect, as on many accounts, so especially for the judgement with which he described, and the affecting seriousness with which he recommended, the duties of his profession, in one of his charges to the clergy of his diocese
Archbishop of Canterbury's Third Charge to his Clergy. Abp. Secker's Works, vol. iv.
, exhorts them "to make their sermons local." I have always considered this advice as founded in a knowledge of human life, but as requiring, in its application, a more than ordinary exercise of christian prudence. Whilst I repeat therefore the rule itself, with great veneration for the authority by which it was delivered, I think it no unfit employment of the present opportunity, to enlarge so far upon its use and meaning, as to point out some of the instances in which it may be adopted, with the probability of making salutary impressions upon the minds of our hearers.
But, before I proceed, I would warn you, and that with all the solemnity that can belong to any admonition of mine, against rendering your discourses
so local,
as to be pointed and levelled at particular persons in your congregation. This species of address may produce in the party, for whom it is intended, confusion perhaps and shame, but not with their proper fruits of penitence and humility. Instead of which, these sensations will be accompanied with bitter resentment against the preacher, and a kind of obstinate and determined opposition to his reproof. He will impute your officiousness to personal enmity, to party spirit, to the pleasure of triumphing over an adversary without interruption or reply, to insult assuming the form of advice, or to any motive rather than a conscientious solicitude for the amendment and salvation of your slock. And as the person himself seldom profits by admonitions conveyed in this way, so are they equally useless or perhaps noxious to the rest of the assembly; for the moment the congregation discover to whom the chastisement is directed, from that moment they cease to apply any part of it to themselves. They are not edified, they are not affected, on the contrary they are diverted, by descriptions of which they see the design, and by invectives of which they think they comprehend the aim. Some who would feel strongly the impropriety of gross and evident personalities, may yet hope to hit their mark by covert and oblique allusions. Now of this scheme, even when conducted with the greatest skill, it may be observed, that the allusions must either be perceived, or not. If they be not perceived, they fail of the effect intended by them; if they be, they are open to the objections which lie against more explicit and undissembled attacks. Whenever we are conscious, in the composition of our discourses, of a view to particular characters in our congregation or parish, we ought to take for granted that our view will be understood. Those applications therefore, which, if they were direct, would produce more bad emotions than good ones, it is better to discard intirely from our sermons; that is to say, it is better to lay aside the design altogether, than to attempt to disguise it by a management which is generally detected, and which, if not seen through, defeats its purpose by its obscurity. The crimes then of individuals let us reserve for opportunities of private and seasonable expostulation. Happy is the clergyman who has the faculty of communicating advice and remonstrance with persuasion and effect, and the virtue to seize and improve every proper occasion of doing it; but in the pulpit let private characters be no otherwise adverted to, than as they fall in with the delineations of sins and duties which our discourses must necessarily contain, and which, whilst they avoid personalities, can never be too close or circumstantial. For the same reason that I think personal allusions reprehensible, I should condemn any, even the remotest, reference to party or political transactions and disputes. These are at all times unfit subjects not only of discussion in the pulpit, but of hints and surmises. The Christian preacher has no other province than that of religion and morality. He is seldom led out of his way by honourable motives, and, I think, never with a beneficial effect.
Having premised this necessary caution, I return to the rule itself. By "local" sermons I would understand, what the reverend prelate who used the expression seems principally to have meant by it, sermons adapted to the particular state of thought and opinion, which we perceive to prevail in our congregation. A careful attention to this circumstance, is of the utmost importance, because as
it
varies, the same sermon may do a great deal of good, none at all, or much harm. So that it is not the truth of what we are about to offer which alone we ought to consider, but whether the argument itself be likely to correct or to promote the turn and bias of opinion, to which we already perceive too strong a tendency and inclination. Without this circumspection we may be found to have imitated the folly of the architect, who placed his buttress on the wrong side. The more the column pressed, the more firm was its construction, and the deeper its foundation, the more certainly it hastened the ruin of the fabric. I do not mean that we should, upon any emergency, advance what is not true; but that, out of many truths, we should select those, the consideration of which seems best suited to rectify the dispositions of thought, that were previously declining into error or extravagancy. For this model of preaching we may allege the highest of all possible authorities, the example of our blessed Saviour himself. He always had in view the posture of mind of the persons whom he addressed. He did not entertain the Pharisees with invectives against the open impiety of their Sadducean rivals; nor, on the other hand, did he sooth the Sadducee's ear with descriptions of pharisaical pomp and folly. In the presence of the Pharisee he preached against hypocrisy: to the Sadducee he proved the resurrection of the dead. In like manner, of that known enmity which subsisted between the Jews and Samaritans this saithful teacher took no undue advantage, to make friends or proselytes of either. Upon the Jews he inculcated a more comprehensive benevolence: with the Samaritan he defended the orthodoxy of the Jewish creed.
But I apprehend that I shall render my advice more intelligible, by exemplifying it in two or three instances, drawn from what appears to be the predominant disposition and religious character of this country and of the present times.
In many former ages of religion, the strong propensity of men's minds was to over-value positive duties: which temper, when carried to excess, not only multiplied unauthorised rites and observances, not only laid an unwarrantable stress upon those which were prescribed; but, what was worst of all, led men to expect, that, by a punctual attention to the ordinances of religion, they could compound for a relaxation of its weighty and difficult duties of personal purity and relative justice. This was the depraved state of religion amongst the Jews when our Saviour appeared: and it was the degeneracy, against which some of the most forcible of his admonitions, and the severest of his reproofs, were directed. Yet notwithstanding that Christ's own preaching, as well as the plan and spirit of his religion, were as adverse as possible to the exalting or over-valuing of positive institutions, the error, which had corrupted the old dispensation, revived under the new; and revived with double force, insomuch as to transform Christianity into a service more prolix and burthensome than the Jewish, and to ascribe an efficacy to certain religious performances, which, in a great measure, superseded the obligations of substantial virtue. That age however with us is long since past. I fear there is room to apprehend that we are falling into mistakes of a contrary kind. Sadducees are more common amongst us than Pharisees. We seem disposed, not only to cast off the decent offices, which the temperate piety of our church hath enjoined, as aids of devotion, calls to repentance, or instruments of improvement, but to contemn and neglect, under the name of forms and ceremonies, even those rites, which, forasmuch as they were ordained by the divine founder of our religion, or by his inspired messengers, and ordained with a view of their continuing in force through future generations, are entitled to be accounted parts of Christianity itself. In this situation of religion, and of men's thoughts with respect to it, he makes a bad choice of his subject, who discourses upon the futility of rites and ordinances, upon their insignificancy when taken by themselves, or even who insists too frequently, and in terms too strong, upon their inferiority to moral precepts. We are rather called upon to sustain the authority of those institutions which proceed from Christ or his Apostles, and the reasonableness and credit of those which claim no higher original than public appointment. We are called upon to contend with respect to the first, that they cannot be omitted with safety any more than other duties; that the will of God once ascertained is the immediate foundation of every duty; that, when this will is known, it makes little difference to us what is the subject of it, still less by what denomination the precept is called, under what class or division the duty is arranged. If it be commanded, and we have sufficient reason to believe that it is so, it matters nothing whether the obligation be moral, or natural, or positive, or instituted. He who places before him the will of God as the rule of his life, will not refine, or even dwell much, upon these distinctions. The ordinances of Christianity, it is true, are all of them significant. Their meaning, and even their use, is not obscure. But were it otherwise; was the design of any positive institution inexplicable; did it appear to have been proposed only as an exercise of obedience, it was not for us to hesitate in our compliance. Even to enquire, with too much curiosity and impatience, into the cause and reason of a religious command, is no evidence of an humble and submissive disposition; of a disposition, I mean, humble under the Deity's government of his creation, and submissive to his will however signisied.
It may be seasonable also to maintain, what I am convinced is true, that the principle of general utility which upholds moral obligation itself, may in various instances be applied to evince the duty of attending upon positive institutions; in other words, that the difference between natural and positive duties is often more in the name than in the thing. The precepts of natural justice are therefore only binding upon the conscience, because the observation of them is necessary or conducive to the prosperity and happiness of social life. If there be, as there certainly are, religious institutions which contribute greatly to form and support impressions upon the mind, that render men better members of civilized community; if these institutions can only be preserved in their reputation and influence by the general respect which is paid to them; there is the same reason to each of us for bearing our part in these observances, that there is for discharging the most acknowledged duties of natural religion. When I say "the reason is the same," I mean that it is the same in
kind.
The
degree
of strength and cogency which this reason possesses in any particular case, must always depend upon the value and importance of the particular duty: which admits of great variety. But moral and positive duties do not in this respect differ more than moral duties differ from one another. So that when men accustom themselves to look upon positive duties as universally and necessarily inferior to moral ones, as of a subordinate species, as placed upon a different foundation, or deduced from a different original; and consequently to regard them as unworthy of being made a part of their plan of life, or of entering into their sense of obligation, they appear to be egregiously misled by names. It is our business, not to aid, but to correct, the deception. Still nevertheless is it as true as ever it was, that, "except we exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven;" "that the sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath;" "that the weightier matters of the law are faith, justice, and mercy:" but to insist strenuously, and, as some do, almost exclusively, upon these points at present, tends to diminish the respect for religious ordinances, which is already too little; and, whilst it guards against dangers that have ceased to exist, augments those which are really formidable.
Again: Upon the first reformation from Popery, a method very much prevailed in the succeeding churches of resolving the whole of religion into faith;
good works,
as they were called, or the practice of virtue, holding not only a secondary but even distant place in value and esteem, being represented indeed as possessing no share or efficacy in the attainment of human salvation. This doctrine we have seen revived in our own times, and carried to still greater lengths. And it is a theory, or rather perhaps a language, which required whilst it lasted very serious animad version; not only because it disposed men to rest in an unproductive faith, without endeavours to render themselves useful by exertion and activity; not only because it was naturally capable of being converted to the encouragement of licentiousness; but because it misrepresented Christianity, as a moral institution, by making it place little stress upon the distinction of virtue and vice, and by making it require the practice of external duties, if it required them at all, only as casual, neglected, and almost unthought of consequences of that faith which it extolled, instead of directing men's attention to them, as to those things which alone compose an unquestionable and effective obedience to the divine will. So long as this turn of mind prevailed, we could not be too industrious, in bringing together and exhibiting to our hearers, those many and positive declarations of scripture, which enforce, and insist upon, practical religion; which divide mankind into those who do good and those who do evil; which hold out, to the one favour and happiness, to the other repulse and condemnation. The danger however from this quarter is nearly overpast. We are on the contrary setting up a kind of philosophical morality, detached from religion and independent of its influence, which may be cultivated, it is said, as well without Christianity as with it; and which, if cultivated, renders religion and religious institutions superfluous. A mode of thought, so contrary to truth, and so derogatory from the value of revelation, cannot escape the vigilance of a Christian ministry. We are entitled to ask upon what foundation this morality rests. If it refer to the divine will (and, without that, where will it find its sanctions, or how support its authority?), there cannot be a conduct of the understanding more irrational, than to appeal to those intimations of the Deity's character which the light and order of nature afford, as to the rule and measure of our duty, yet to disregard, and affect to overlook, the declarations of his pleasure which Christianity communicates. It is impossible to distinguish between the authority of natural and revealed religion. We are bound to receive the precepts of revelation for the same reason that we comply with the dictates of nature. He who despises a command which proceeds from his Maker, no matter by what means, or through what medium, instead of advancing, as he pretends to do, the dominion of reason and the authority of natural religion, disobeys the first injunction of both. Although it be true, what the apostle affirms—that, "when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, they are a law unto themselves," that is, they will be accepted together with those who are instructed in the law and obey it, yet is this truth not applicable to such, as having a law contemn it, and with the means of access to the word of God, keep themselves at a voluntary distance from it. This temper, whilst it continues, makes it necessary for us to assert the superiority of a religious principle, above every other by which human conduct can be regulated: more especially above that fashionable system, which recommends virtue only as a true and refined policy, which policy in effect is, and in the end commonly proves itself to be, nothing else than a more exquisite cunning, which by a specious behaviour in the easy and visible concerns of life collects a fund of reputation, in order either to cherish more securely concealed vices, or to reserve itself for some great stroke of selfishness, perfidy, and injustice, in a pressing conjuncture of fortunes. Nor less justly may we superinduce the guidance of Christianity to the direction of sentiment; which depends so much upon constitution, upon early impressions, upon habit and imitation, that unless it be compared with, and adjusted by, some safer rule, it can in no wise be trusted. Least of all ought we to yield the authority of religion to the law of honour, a law (if it deserve that name), which, beside its continual mutability, is at best but a system of manners suited to the intercourse and accommodation of higher life; and which consequently neglects every duty, and permits every vice, that has no relation to these purposes. Amongst the rules which contend with religion for the government of life, the law of the land also has not a few, who think it very sufficient to act up to its direction, and to keep within the limits which it prescribes: and this sort of character is common in our congregations.—We are not to omit, therefore, to apprize those who make the statutes of the realm the standard of their duty, that they propose to themselves a measure of conduct totally inadequate to the purpose. The boundaries which nature has assigned to human authority and controll, the partial ends to which every legislator is obliged to consine his views, prevent human laws, even were they, what they never are, as perfect as they might be made, from becoming competent rules of life to any one, who advances his hopes to the attainment of God Almighty's favor. In contradistinction then to these several systems which divide a great portion of mankind amongst them, we preach "faith which worketh by love," that principle of action and restraint which is found in a Christian alone. It possesses qualities to which none of
them
can make pretensions. It operates where they fail: is present upon all occasions, firm upon the greatest; pure as under the inspection of a vigilant omniscience; innocent where guilt could not be discovered; just, exact, and upright without a witness to its proceedings; uniform amidst the caprices of fashion, unchanged by the vicissitudes of popular opinion; often applauded, not seldom misunderstood, it holds on its straight and equal course, through "good report and evil report," through encouragement and neglect, approbation and disgrace. If the philosopher or the politician can point out to us any influence, but that of Christianity, which has these properties, I had almost said which does not want them all, we will listen with reverence to his instruction. But until this be done, we may be permitted to resist every plan which would place virtue upon any other foundation, or seek final happiness through any other medium, than faith in Jesus Christ. At least whilst an inclination to these rival systems remains, no good end I am apt to think is attained by decrying faith under any form, by stating the competition between faith and good works, or by pointing out, with too much anxiety, even the abuses and extravagancies, into which the doctrine of salvation by faith alone has sometimes been carried. The truth is, that, in the two subjects which I have considered, we are in such haste to fly from enthusiasm and superstition, that we are approaching towards an insensibility to all religious influence. I certainly do not mean to advise you to endeavour to bring men back to enthusiasm and superstition, but to retard, if you can, their progress towards an opposite and a worse extreme; and both in these, and in all other instances, to regulate the choice of your subjects, by the particular bias and tendency of opinion which you perceive already to prevail amongst your hearers, and by a consideration, not of the truth only, of what you deliver, which however must always be an indispensable condition, but of its effects, and those not the effects which it would produce upon sound, enlightened, and impartial judgments, but what are likely to take place in the weak and preoccupied understandings with which we have to do.
Having thus considered the rule as it applies to the argument of our discourses, in which its principal importance consists, I proceed to illustrate its use as it relates to another object—the means of exciting attention. The transition from local to occasional sermons is so easy, and the reason for both is so much the same, that what I have further to add will include the one as well as the other. And though nothing more be proposed in the few directions which I am about to offer, than to move and awaken the attention of our audience, yet is this a purpose of no inconsiderable magnitude. We have great reason to complain of listlessness in our congregations. Whether this be their fault or ours, the fault of neither or of both, it is much to be desired that it could by any means be removed. Our sermons are in general more informing, as well as more correct and chastised both in matter and composition, than those of any denomination of dissenting teachers. I wish it were in our power to render them as impressive as some of theirs seem to be. Now I think we may observe that we are heard with somewhat more than ordinary advertency, whenever our discourses are recommended by any occasional propriety. The more therefore of these proprieties we contrive to weave into our preaching, the better. One which is very obvious, and which should never be neglected, is that of making our sermons as suitable as we can to the service of the day. On the principal fasts and festivals of the church, the subjects which they are designed to commemorate, ought invariably to be made the subjects of our discourses. Indeed the best sermon, if it do not treat of the argument which the congregation come prepared to hear, is received with coldness, and with a sense of disappointment. This respect to the order of public worship almost every one pays. But the adaptation I apprehend may be carried much farther. Whenever any thing like an unity of subject is pursued throughout the collect, epistle, and gospel of the day, that subject is with great advantage revived in the pulpit. It is perhaps to be wished that this unity had been more consulted in the compilation of this part of the liturgy than it has been. When from the want of it a subject is not distinctly presented to us, there may however be some portion of the service more striking than the rest, some instructive parable, some interesting narration, some concise but forcible precept, some pregnant sentence, which may be recalled to the hearers attention with peculiar effect. I think it no contemptible advantage if we even draw our text from the epistle or gospel, or the psalms or lessons. Our congregation will be more likely to retain what they hear from us, when it, in any manner, falls in with what they have been reading in their prayer books, or when they are afterwards reminded of it by reading the psalms and lessons at home. But there is another species of accommodation of more importance, and that is the choice of such disquisitions, as may either meet the difficulties, or assist the reflections which are suggested by the portions of scripture that are delivered from the reading desk. Thus, whilst the wars of Joshua and the Judges are related in the course of the lessons which occupy some of the first Sundays after Trinity, it will be very seasonable to explain the reasons upon which that dispensation was founded, the moral and beneficial purposes which are declared to have been designed, and which were probably accomplished, by its execution, because such an explanation will obviate the doubts concerning either the divine goodness or the credibility of the narrative, which may arise in the mind of a hearer, who is not instructed to regard the transaction, as a method of inflicting an exemplary, just, and necessary punishment. In like manner, whilst the history of the delivery of the law from Mount Sinai, or rather the recapitulation of that history by Moses, in the book of Deuteronomy, is carried on in the Sunday lessons which are read between Easter and Whitsunday, we shall be well engaged in discourses upon the
commandments
which stand at the head of that institution, in shewing from the history their high original and authority, and in explaining their reasonableness, application, and extent. Whilst the history of Joseph is successively presented to the congregation during the Sundays in Lent, we shall be very negligent of the opportunity, if we do not take occasion to point out to our hearers, those observations upon the benevolent but secret direction, the wise though circuitous measures, of Providence, of which this beautiful passage of scripture supplies a train of apposite examples. There are, I doubt not, other series of subjects dictated by the service as edifying as these; but these I propose as illustrations of the rule.
Next to the service of the church the season of the year may be made to suggest useful and appropriate topics of meditation. The beginning of a new year has belonging to it a train of very solemn reflections. In the devotional pieces of the late Dr. Johnson this occasion was never passed by. We may learn from these writings the proper use to be made of it; and by the example of that excellent person, how much a pious mind is wont to be affected by this memorial of the lapse of life. There are also certain proprieties which correspond with the different parts of the year. For example, the wisdom of God in the work of the creation is a theme which ought to be reserved for the return of the spring, when nature renews, as it were, her activity; when every animal is chearful and busy, and seems to feel the influence of its Maker's kindness; when our senses and spirits, the objects and enjoyments that surround us, accord and harmonize with those sentiments of delight and gratitude, which this subject, above all others, is calculated to inspire. There is no devotion so genuine as that which flows from these meditations, because it is unforced and self-excited. There is no frame of mind more desireable, and consequently, no preaching more useful, than that which leads the thought to this exercise. It is laying a foundation for Christianity itself. If it be not to sow the seed, it is at least to prepare the soil. The evidence of revelation arrives with much greater ease at an understanding, which is already possessed by the persuasion, that an unseen intelligence framed and conducts the universe; and which is accustomed to refer the order and operations of nature to the agency of a supreme will. The influence also of religion is almost always in proportion to the degree and strength of this conviction. It is moreover a species of instruction of which our hearers are more capable than we may at first sight suppose. It is not necessary to be a philosopher, or to be skilled in the names and distinctions of natural history, in order to perceive marks of contrivance and design in the creation. It is only to turn our observation to them. Now beside that this requires neither more ability nor leisure than every man can command, there are many things in the life of a country parishioner which will dispose his thoughts to the employment. In his fields, amidst his flocks, in the progress of vegetation, the structure, faculties, and manners of domestic animals, he has constant occasion to remark proofs of intention and of consummate wisdom. The minister of a country parish is never therefore better engaged, than when he is assisting this turn of contemplation. Nor will he ever do it with so much effect, as when the appearance and face of external nature conspire with the sentiments which he wishes to excite.
Again; if we would enlarge upon the various bounty of Providence, in furnishing a regular supply for animal, and especially for human subsistence, not by one, but by numerous and diversified species of food and cloathing, we shall be best heard in the time and amidst the occupations of harvest, when our hearers are reaping the effects of those contrivances for their support, and of that care for their preservation, which their Father which is in Heaven hath exercised for them. If the year has been favourable, we rejoice with them in the plenty which fills their granaries, covers their tables, and feeds their families. If otherwise, or less so, we have still to remark, how through all the husbandman's disappointments, through the dangers and inclemencies of precarious seasons, a competent proportion of the fruits of the earth is conducted to its destined purpose. We may observe also to the repining farmer, that the value, if not the existence, of his own occupation, depends upon the very uncertainty of which he complains. It is found to be almost universally true, that the partition of the profits between the owner and the occupier of the soil, is in favor of the latter, in proportion to the risk which he incurs by the disadvantage of the climate. This is a very just reflection, and particularly intelligible to a rural audience. We may add when the occasion requires it that scarcity itself hath its use. By acting as a stimulus to new exertions and to farther improvements, it often produces, through a temporary distress, a permanent benefit.
Lastly; sudden, violent, or untimely deaths, or death accompanied by any circumstances of surprise or singularity, usually leave an impression upon a whole neighbourhood. A Christian teacher is wanting in attention to opportunities who does not avail himself of this impression. The uncertainty of life requires no proof. But the power and influence which this consideration shall obtain over the decisions of the mind, will depend greatly upon the circumstances under which it is presented to the imagination. Discourses upon the subject come with tenfold force, when they are directed to a heart, already touched by some near, recent, and affecting example of human mortality. I do not lament that funeral sermons are discontinued amongst us. They generally contained so much of unseasonable, and oftentimes undeserved panegyric, that the hearers came away from them, rather with remarks in their mouths upon what was said of the deceased, than with any internal reflections upon the solemnity which they had left, or how nearly it related to their own condition. But by decent allusions in the stated course of our preaching to events of this sort, or by, what is better, such a well-timed choice of our subject, as may lead our audience to make the allusion for themselves, it is possible, I think, to retain much of the good effect of funeral discourses, without their adulation and without exciting vain curiosity.
If other occurrences have arisen within our neighbourhood, which serve to exemplify the progress and fate of vice, the solid advantages and ultimate success of virtue, the providential discovery of guilt or protection of innocence, the folly of avarice, the disappointments of ambition, the vanity of worldly schemes, the fallaciousness of human foresight; in a word, which may remind us, "what shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue," and thereby induce us to collect our views and endeavours to one point, the attainment of final salvation, such occurrences may be made to introduce topics of serious and useful meditation. I have heard popular preachers amongst the methodists avail themselves of these occasions with very powerful effect. It must be acknowledged that they frequently transgress the limits of decorum and propriety, and that these transgressions wound the modesty of a cultivated ear. But the method itself is not to be blamed. Under the correction of a sounder judgement it might be rendered very beneficial. Perhaps, as hath been already intimated, the safest way is not to refer to these incidents by any direct allusion, but merely to discourse at the time upon subjects, which are allied to, and connected with them.
The sum of what I have been recommending amounts to this, that we consider diligently the probable effects of our discourses, upon the particular characters and dispositions of those who are to hear them; but that we apply this consideration solely to the choice of truths, by no means to the admission of falsehood or insincerity
This distinction fixes the limits of
exoteric
doctrine, as far as any thing called by that name is allowable to a Christian teacher.
: Secondly that we endeavour to profit by circumstances, that is, to assist, not the reasoning, but the efficacy of our discourses, by an opportune and skilful use of the service of the church, the season of the year, and of all such occurrences and situations as are capable of receiving a religious turn, and such as, being yet recent in the memory of our hearers, may dispose their minds for the admission and influence of salutary reflections.
MY REVEREND BRETHREN, I am sensible that the discourse with which I have now detained you, is not of that kind which is usually delivered at a Chancellor's visitation. But since (by the favor of that excellent prelate, who by me must long be remembered with gratitude and affection) I hold another public station in the Diocese, I embrace the only opportunity afforded me of submitting to you that species of council and exhortation, which with more propriety perhaps you would have received from me in the character of your Archdeacon, if the functions of that office had remained entire.
THE END.