not only everything to save the
soul, there was everything to charm the ear!

From this divine example, if from no other consideration, let us set
ourselves to preach attractively; and let us begin by resolving to
preach _naturally_. The best preaching is talk at its best in subject
and in style, and provides exercise for every talent of preacher and
hearer alike. "Right here," as the Americans say, let us remember that
talk is always spoken and never read. For the production of the effect
of dulness; for the sure spoiling of good thought nobly conceived and
nobly phrased, commend us to a manuscript slavishly read to an audience
assembled to be _spoken to_ by a man who was appointed to _speak_.
There may be churches which, through long suffering, have become so
used to being read to that they have learned to endure it, perhaps even
to fancy they like it. But watch the congregation in such a church.
Note when for a moment the preacher lifts his head and ventures a brief
excursion from the sheets before him, how obviously their interest
quickens and their eyes brighten. Even _they_, in the depths of their
hearts, would rather be spoken to, though such a practice might mean,
now and then, a little looseness in expression, a little breakdown in
the preacher's grammar. More than this may be said:--It has seemed to
us, as the result of attending many churches, that in such sanctuaries
as we have referred to reading is going out of fashion. We have
listened of late months to many well-known preachers of various
denominations and not one of them "read." On the other hand, we have
heard it asserted that while the method of reading becomes less common
in these churches, it tends to become more usual in Methodism. Alas!
for Methodist preaching if this startling assertion be really true.
Methodism does _not want_ the read sermon--is not likely, unless it
ceases to be Methodism, to learn to want it--will only endure it when
it cannot help itself, or when, for other reasons, it has great
reverence and affection for the man who weakly offers it; or again,
when the preacher is old and has outlived his intellectual nimbleness,
in which case sympathy may so plead his cause as to secure him a
reluctant hearing. Methodism grew to greatness under the preaching of
men who _spoke_, and that method is traditional to her pulpit; some day
she will crystallise her tradition into a law that the _speaker_ alone
shall stand in her high pl