which a preacher's individuality, his acquaintance with his people, even his idiosyncrasies, are most strongly marked. No conviction. that he is justified in availing himself of other people's labours should hinder him from spending what time and trouble he can in preparation for the pulpit. Both for his own sake and that of his audience, it must be a bad plan to depend exclusively, even generally, upon extraneous aid. He should be left free, in my opinion, to consult the best interests of his congregation in his own way: but such freedom should be accompanied by a grave sense of responsibility, and an accurate knowledge, if possible, of the strong and the weak points in his personal qualifications.

Mrs. C. And surely he ought to be stopped from preaching the same sermon more than once.

B. Why? How few of us remember a sermon a year or two after it has been delivered! How few of us would even be aware that it has been preached before, if it were not

for some register of texts!

A clergyman

writes a sermon let us say on the gospel for the day. He takes great pains with it, and brings out what he conceives to be the true teaching of the passage as clearly and incisively as he knows how. Three or four years afterwards the same Sunday comes round. He may not improbably have had other sermons. to prepare, or his parochial duties may have interfered with his hours of study. Is there any intelligent reason why he should not deliver that exposition of the gospel for the day a second time? Its recognition, even by a small number, would be a presumptive proof of its exceptional excellence. You have hinted at clerical indolence. Pray, madam, have you any idea how long it takes to write a sermon ?

Mrs. C. I can't say I have: perhaps an

hour or so.

B. I should recommend you, some time or other, to get a book of sermons, and to copy one out, just in order to ascertain the

extent of the mere manual work, quite irrespective of composition.

Mrs. C. Then our clergy should save themselves labour by preaching extempore, which we should all like so much better.

B. I think it would be found that so-called extempore sermons, if they are worth much, take more time in preparation, and certainly more wear and tear of brain, than others. We are so accustomed to have sermons pro- . duced for us, that we have very little notion of the toil they indicate. We assume that they spring into existence by some easy and spontaneous process, and that they are attended by no particular effort on the part of their authors. It so happens that, having clerical relatives, I have been a good deal behind the scenes. I know the heavy burden of two sermons a week, sometimes more, upon hard-worked men. In my humble opinion, neither of the propositions which incited me to take part in this little discussion can be rationally maintained.

213

COLLOQUY THE EIGHTEENTH.

HODGE AND HIS WIFE.

SCENE: Through the Meadows, on the way from Church.

H. That wor a main good sarmin.

W. It wor. He did stand up to it straight. H. I'll tell yer what, old 'ooman: if that there mon allays preached, I'd never go to meetin'.

W. Then I wish he did allays preach. You know you never didn't ought to go to meetin'. Parsons is parsons: but what them is as preaches at meetin', who can say ?

H. My opinion is that parsons is as parsons does. I don't understand nowt of what they calls nordination and that, but I knows a good sarmin when I hears un.

W. But our rector says we don't go to church so much to hear sarmins as to worship God.

H. That's all roight, no doubt, but he do preach sarmins, rector do, and they baint fustrate. Not but what they may suit the squoire and the doctor, and may be the farmers, but bless yer, they don't suit me.

W. A noice judge o' sarmins you be. There's niver a better mon in the parish to shear a sheep, or to keep a plough straight, but what do yer know of sarmins?

H. I knows when they does me good. That there mon this arternoon has put thoughts into my yed as'll stick there all the week, when I be's in the lanes or on the lond.

W. But do yer mane to say that them preachers at meetin' is up to that gemmon we've been a hearing on this arternoon?

H. Noa, wife, I don't say that he's a cut above 'em, he is; and as I tell'd yer, if I could allays hear him at church, it's uncommon little they'd see of me at meetin'. But, heart