The Apostle's Preaching.
By Bishop South
"I SPEAK the words of soberness," said St. Paul, "and I preach the Gospel not with the enticing words of man's wisdom." This was the way of the Apostle's discoursing of things sacred. Nothing here of the "fringes of the north star;" nothing of "nature's becoming unnatural;" nothing of the "down of angels' wings," or of the "beautiful looks of cherubims;" no starched similitudes introduced with a "Thus have I seen a cloud rolling in its airy mansion," and the like. No, these were sublimities above the rise of the Apostolic spirit. For the Apostles, poor mortals, were content to take lower steps, and to tell the world in plain terms, that he who believed should be saved, and that he who believed not should be damned. And this was the dialect which pierced the conscience, and made the hearers cry out, Men and brethren, what shall we do? It tickled not the ear, but sunk into the heart; and when men came from such sermons, they never commended the preacher for his taking voice or gesture; for the fineness of such a simile, or the quaintness of such a sentence; but they spoke like men conquered with the overpowering force and evidence of the most concerning truths; much in the words of the two disciples going to Emmaus—"Did not our hearts burn within us while he opened to us the Scriptures?" In a word, the Apostles' preaching was therefore mighty and successful, because plain, natural, and familiar, and by no means above the capacity of their hearers; nothing being more preposterous, than for those who were professedly aiming at men's hearts, to miss the mark by shooting over their heads."—Bishop South.