discourse,
saying, "Well, it is a very old story, young gentleman, and it is
mighty difficult to find anything new to say about it!"

The bibliomaniacal doctor, however, seems to have pleased me better
out of the pulpit than in it, for I find that "he called in the
afternoon and chatted amusingly for an hour. He fell tooth and nail
upon the Oxford Tracts men, and told us of a Mr. Wackerbarth, a curate
in Essex, a Cambridge man, who, he says, elevates the host, crosses
himself, and advocates burning of heretics. It seems to me, however,"
continues this censorious young diarist, "that those who object to the
persecution, even to extermination of heretics, admit the uncertainty
and dubiousness of all theological doctrine and belief. For if it be
_certain_ that God will punish disbelief in doctrines essential to
salvation, and _certain_ that any Church possesses the knowledge what
those doctrines are, does it not follow that a man who goes about
persuading people to reject those doctrines should be treated as we
treat a mad dog loose in the streets of a city?" Thus fools, when they
are young enough, rush in where wise men fear to tread!

I had entirely forgotten, but find from my diary that it was our
pleasant friend but indifferent preacher, Dr. Dibdin, who on the 11th
of February, 1839, married my sister, Cecilia, to Mr., now Sir John,
Tilley.

It appears that I was not incapable of appreciating a good sermon
when I heard one, for I read of the impression produced upon me by an
"admirable sermon preached by Mr. Smith" (it must have been Sydney, I
take it) in the Temple Church. The preacher quoted largely from Jeremy
Taylor, "giving the passages with an excellence of enunciation and
expression which impressed them on my mind in a manner which will not
allow me to forget them." Alack! I _have_ forgotten every word of
them!

I remember, however, perfectly well, without any reference to my
diary, hearing--it must have been much about the same time--Sydney
Smith preach a sermon at St. Paul's, which much impressed me. He took
for his text, "Knowledge and wisdom shall be the stability of thy
times" (I write from memory--the memory of half a century ago--but I
think the words ran thus). Of course the gist of his discourse may be
readily imagined. But the manner of the preacher remains more vividly
present to my mind than his words. He spoke with extreme rapidity, and
had the special gift of combining extreme rapidity of utt