The following brief notes by Mr. Simeon furnish some further hints of importance on the foregoing subject.

"I. What is to be guarded against?

Monotony and Isochrony:

A continuous solemnity.

It should be as music; and

not like a funeral procession. Guard against speaking

in an unnatural and artificial manner.

At the same time levity is even worse.

The point for

you to notice is this: see how all persons, when in earnest, converse: mark their intonations, their measure (sometimes slow, and sometimes rapid, eren in the same sentence), their pauses. But especially mark these in good speakers. Delivery, whether of written or extemporaneous discourses, should accord with this, so far as a diversity of subjects will admit of it.

Too great a familiarity does not become the pulpit; but a monotonous, isochronous solemnity is still worse. The former will at least engage the attention; but the latter will put every one to sleep.

II. What is to be done?

1. In the forming the voice:

Not in the throat, or roof of the mouth; but with the lips and teeth. Try this in these different ways consecutively.

Seek particularly to speak always in your natural voice. If you have to address two thousand people you should not rise to a different key, but still preserve your customary pitch. You are generally told to speak up; I say rather, Speak down. The only difference you are to make is, from the piano to the forte of the same It is by the strength, and not by the elevation of your voice, that you are to be heard. You will remember that a whole discourse is to be delivered; and if you get into an unnatural key, you will both injure yourself, and weary your audience.

note.

2. In the utterance:

Read first; then address the same without reading. Let every periphrasis, which stands in the place of an adjective, be read as a single word; e. g. 'God, that comforteth all them that are cast down:' read it not, God, who comforteth-all them-that are cast down: but as though it were,-God, who is merciful.

Further, be not content to express the sense, but convey

the spirit of the passage. Be the thing that you speak— tender or impassioned-be cast as it were into the mould of your sentiment, so as to express in your intonation and action what you mean to convey by your words.

3. In the delivery:

As to the mode of delivering your Sermons, speak exactly as you would if you were conversing with an aged and pious superior. This will keep you from undue formality on the one hand, and from improper familiarity on the other.

And then as to the proper mode of conducting the

devotional part of the Service, do not read the prayers, but pray them; utter them precisely as you would if you were addressing the Almighty in the same language in your secret chamber; only, of course, you must strengthen your tones, as in the former case. But the whole state of your own soul before God must be the first point to be considered; for if you yourself are not in a truly spiritual state of mind, and actually living upon the truths which you preach or read to others, you will officiate to very little purpose."

CHAPTER XXX.

LETTERS-TO J. J. GURNEY ON MR. IRVING AND HIS DOCTRINES———— NARRATIVE BY CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH-TO MISS MARY ELLIOTT ON THE OBSERVANCE of the lord'S DAY-TO THE BISHOP OF CALCUTTA ON HIS RELIGIOUS VIEWS-TO REV. J. SARGENT ON THE CHARACTER OF MR. THOMASON-TO REV. J. H. MICHELL ON PRINTING HIS ENTIRE WORKS-KIND REMARKS OF DR. GOODALL TO REV. J. WRIGHT ABOUT THE PROGRESS OF HIS WORKMEMORANDUM ABOUT HIS JUBILEE-LETTER FROM MR. WILBERFORCE ON HIS COMPLETING THE FIFTIETH YEAR OF HIS MINISTRY -EXTRACTS FROM HIS DIARY ON THE OCCASION TO REV. J. H. MICHELL DESCRIBING THE EVENT-AND HIS RELIGIOUS VIEWS.

1832.

CORRESPONDENCE, ETC.

To J. J. GURNEY, Esq.

"K. C., Jan. 26, 1832.

"My beloved friend and Brother,

"I thank you for your kind letter, and am glad that my Sermons on the Holy Spirit's Of fices meet upon the whole with your approbation. And I think it due to you to explain why I have acted in a way so different from what I so highly admired and so cordially applauded in you.

66

You, my beloved Friend, have treated those, whose sentiments you controvert, with admirable tenderness and lenity. I, on the contrary, have treated some with severity as you justly observe: To be sure thou dost not use the pseudo-gifted ones of the present day very ceremoniously.' This is true: and it becomes me to assign to you my reasons.

"1. I am not controverting their sentimentsI do not hold them worthy of controversy.

"2. It was necessary to shew my abhorrence both of their principles and proceedings, that my sentiments might gain the freer access to the minds of my audience, and that it might be known, that whilst I maintain and advocate the deepest truths of our holy religion, I do not countenance the one or the other. (I have received letters inquiring whether Daniel Wilson and myself are not, as has been reported, converts to their opinions.)

"3. They are doing great harm in the Church; and it was desirable that I should do what I could to stem the torrent, at least as far as by a few words I might do so.

"4. The Apostle Paul was ruder far, and rougher than I, towards persons meaning well perhaps, but doing great injury to the Church of God. Beware of dogs, beware of evil-workers, beware of the concision.' Many are the passages where he guards us against 'doting about questions and strifes of words, and profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called;' yea, and even against 'strivings about the law,' because their word will eat as doth a canker:' but that which appears to me most ‘unceremonious' is in Col. ii. 18, where, speaking of persons who in profession inculcated only humility and devotion, he speaks of their motives and principles, and says they were 'vainly puffed up by their fleshly mind.' THEIR mode of promoting humility and devotion originated in vanity, pride, and carnality. Now if you will go to Mr. Irving's chapel, perhaps you may have a practical comment on these words. I touch not on their motives, but only on their habits; which

L. S.

Y y

I trace to a want of true Christian sobriety;— brainsick enthusiasts*.' If I say the truth, I think it charity to account for Mr. Irving's sentiments and conduct by tracing them to an aberration of mind.

"I should not have thought it needful to trouble you with this, but from the admiration I have both felt and expressed of your sweet delicacy towards those whom you oppose. Those whom you deal with prefer arguments; and arguments should be duly and candidly weighed. The persons whom I push aside (not encounter) are known by their actions, which savour more of St. Luke's Hospital than St. Luke's Gospel. What God may do, I presume not to say; but I think that whatever He does will be in accordance with what He has done both in its manner and end; and that to a humble spectator, desirous of knowing and doing His will, it will commend itself as His work; and I think it will rather be a turning of a Gadarene dæmoniac into a meek follower of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind, than an inversion of this order. I long greatly to visit you once more. You must not wonder if such a desire be once more carried into effect by

"Your most truly affectionate friend and Brother,

"C. S."

Mr. Simeon's strong feelings respecting Mr. Irving and his fearful doctrines are characteristically exhibited in the following narrative by Charlotte Elizabeth.'

"Once more I saw and spoke to Mr. Simeon. He recognized me in a Meeting, not very large, held in a room

*The expression used by Mr. Simeon respecting them in his Sermons before the University.