INSTRUCTIONS

TO THE

CLERGY

OF THE DIOCESE OF TUAM.

BY JOSIAH HORT,

LATE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF TUAM,

AT HIS

PRIMARY VISITATION

Held there on WEDNESDAY, July 8, MDCCXLII.

INSTRUCTIONS

TO THE

CLERGY

OF THE DIOCESE OF TUAM, &c.

My Reverend Brethren,

THE providence of God having called me to the government of this diocefe, I have judged it not improper for me to communicate my thoughts to you with regard to the execution of your ministerial office, in order to the edification and falvation of the fouls refpectively committed to your charge.

To this end I fhall reduce what I have to fay to you under two general heads.

The first relates to your conduct in the actual performance of divine offices in the house of God.

The fecond relates to your behaviour at large towards your parishioners.

In fpeaking to the former, I fhall confine myself to these four branches of your office, namely, Preaching, Praying, Catechifing, and expounding the holy Scriptures.

I fhall begin with Preaching, which is one of those means appointed by our Saviour, for the enlightening the minds, awakening the confciences, and reforming the manners of your hearers. In order to answer these great ends, fome degree of skill and addrefs, as well as of pains and ftudy, will be requifite: and I fhall, for the fake chiefly of fuch of you as have not been long in holy Orders, communicate my fentiments with regard to the fubject, the composition, the style, and the pronunciation of a fermon.

The fubject of a fermon ought to be fome point of doctrine that is neceffary for a Chriftian to know; or fome duty that is neceffary for him to practise, in order to his falvation. I fpeak this in oppofition to fubtile questions and curious fpeculations, that are above the common level

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of the auditory, and which have often no other effect, than to difquiet the minds and confciences of those who do not rightly understand them; and if they please curious and itching ears, yet will edify no man in faith and a good life.

Upon this occafion I would recommend it to young preachers especially, to compofe a set of fermons upon the chief articles of the Chriftian religion, according to their natural order and dependence. By this means they will improve their own knowledge at the fame time that they are teaching their hearers: but this fhould be done in the plaineft and eafieft manner, laying afide metaphyfical niceties and the jargon of the schools, and especially avoiding to explain myfteries; for this is generally giving words and terms without meaning; and no man has ever fucceeded in the attempt.

When a useful fubject is chofen, the next care of the preacher is to find out fome proper and pertinent text, that will naturally lead him to pursue his fubject, and that will yield him those doctrines and practical deductions which he had in his view, without force and torture. For want of this, the whole operation will be laborious, obfcure, and perplexed to the compofer; and the difcourfe will be void of that perfpicuity, which is neceffary to engage the attention of the hearers. And I am sure there is no want of fuch texts upon all fubjects in the Bible.

It has given me difguft to obferve in fome preachers a certain affectation of choofing fuch texts as appear remote and foreign to their fubject, that by this means they may have opportunity of fhewing their wit and ingenuity in fetching that out of a text, which nobody imagined could be in it. They would do fomething miraculous, like bringing water out of a dry rock in the wilderness, in order to furprise their auditory: but this will ever give diftafte to good judges, and there is no occafion for putting one text upon the rack, to make it speak that which would naturally and eafily arife out of another, that might as well have been chofen in the room of it.

When a useful fubject and a pertinent text are chofen, the next work is compofition, or the ranging of fuch thoughts as naturally arife upon the fubject, into a convenient order and method: this will be the plan of his difcourfe; and the composer will reap no small advantages from this practice.

First, As it will help him to enter all his loofe. and detached thoughts in their proper places, for want of

which fome of them may escape him when he comes to the finishing part.

Secondly, It will lead him to break his fermon into heads, which is abfolutely neceffary for giving ftrength and clearness to the whole, and for engaging the attention of the audience; which will be foon blunted and tired with hearing an harangue where all the parts are run into one general mafs, and nothing diftinctly and specially offered to the understanding.

Thirdly, The memory of the hearers will be greatly relieved; for a fermon thus broken into particular heads will be better imprinted, and more eafily recollected, by reafon of the dependence and connection of the parts, where one draws another after it like the links of a chain.

And lastly, It will give the preacher an opportunity of interfperfing apt texts of holy Scripture for the support or illuftration of every particular head.

There may indeed be a faulty extreme on this hand; for I have heard a fermon that has been fo overloaded with texts of Scripture, that the thread of the reasoning was in a manner loft, and the whole looked like a piece of rich patchwork, without any ground appearing at the bottom. But the other extreme, of a penury of facred texts, prevails too much in our modern and refined compofitions; which, for that reason, may rather be called orations than sermons.

A due medium therefore ought to be observed in this cafe; but of the two, the latter extreme is most blameable; for a fermon will appear lean and unfatisfying to a religious palate, when it is not fufficiently larded with Scripture, but the whole is made to reft on the reasonings of the preacher, unfupported by the authority of God's Word.

By this means likewife he will become an expert textuary, which is the firft excellency of a Christian Divine; and the people will occafionally be made acquainted with the holy Scriptures.

Now this is what I call a fermon, in contradiftinction to an oration, which by one uniform flow of eloquence, without proper breaks and divifions, glides like a fmooth ftream. over the foul, leaving no traces behind it. The word thus delicately fown may, like a concert of mufic, delight the ear while it lafts, but dies with the found, and the hearer will carry little home, befides a remembrance that he was fweetly entertained.

The effect of this will, where there are any kind of

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talents