orthograghy, and the joining of words; and when we ourfelves learnt the catechifm? Is it agreeable to a father, fays St. Austin, to ftammer out half words with his fon, in order to teach him to speak? Yet this gives him great pleasure. Does not a mother take more delight in putting aliment into her infant's mouth fuitable to its weak and tender condition, than to take the nourishment proper for herself? We muft perpetually call to mind the tenderness of a hen who covers her young ones with her extended wings; and hearing their feeble cries, calls them with a faltering voice, in order to fhelter them from the bird of prey, who unrelentingly fnatches away fuch as do not fly for fafety to their mother's wings. The love and cha rity of Chrift, who vouchfafed to apply this comparifon to himself, has been infinitely more extensive, and it was in imitation of him, that St. Paul made himfelf weak with the weak, in order to gain the weak; and bad, for all the faithful, the gentleness and tenderness of a nurse and a mother. Σ This, fays St. Austin, is what we must represent to ourselves, when we are tired or difgufted; when we are weary of defcending to the puerility and weaknefs of children; and to repeat inceffantly to them the moft trite things, and run them over a hundred times. It often happens, continues the fame father, that we take a fingular pleasure, in fhewing friends newly arrived at the city we live in, whatever is beautiful, uncommon or curious; and the sweetness of friend * Num delectat, nifi amor invitet, decurtata & mutilata verba immurmurare? Et tamen optant homines habere infantes quibus id exhibeant: & fuavius eft matri minuta manfa infpuere parvulo filio, quàm ipfam mandere ac devorare grandiora. Non ergo recedat de pectore etiam cogitatio gallina ilJius, quæ languidulis pennis reneros, foerus operit, & fufurrantes pullos confracta voce advocat: cujus blaudas alas refugientes fuperbi, pada fiunt alitibus. De catechif. y Matt. xxiii. 37. b Si ufitata, & parvulis congru entia fæpe repetere faftidimus.. fi ad infirmitatem difcentium piget defcendere. .... cogitemus quid nobis prærogatum fit ab illo.... qui, cum in forma Dei effet, femet ipfum exinanivit, formam fervi ac cipiens. Ibid. cap. 10. C fhip diffufes a fecret charm over things which would otherwise appear exceeding tirefom; and gives them, as to ourselves, all the graces of novelty. Why should not charity produce the fame effects in us that friendship does, especially when the thing propofed tends towards making God himself known to men, who ought to be the end of all our knowledge, and of all our ftudies? I thought it my duty to enlarge a little upon the manner of framing catechifms, which is not foreign to the end I propose to myself in this article, viz. of inftructing youth in what relates to the eloquence of the pulpit. It is now time to proceed to the fecond duty of preachers. II. DUTY OF A PREACHER. To pleafe, and for that end, to speak in a florid and polite manner. St. Auftin recommends to the preacher, to endeavour first, and above all things, to be clear and perfpicuous, but he does not pretend he muft confine himfelf to that only. He would not have truth divefted of the ornaments of speech, which it alone has a right to employ. He would have human eloquence fubfervient to the word of God; but not the word of God made the flave of human eloquence. It often happens, that we cannot reach the heart but through the understanding, and that in order to affect the one, we must please the other. e It is an extraordinary quality, in his opinion, to love and to fearch in the words only the things themselves, and not the words: but he owns at the fame time, that this qua lity is very uncommon; that in cafe truth is reprefented without ornaments, it will affect very few. That speech, like food, muft be palatable in order to make it agreeable; and that in both, we muft pay a regard to the delicacy of mankind, and gratify their tafte in fome measure. It was for the fame reafon that the fathers of the Church were far from forbidding those who were called to the miniftry of the word, the reading of ancient authors and profane learning. St. Auftin declares, that all the truths found in heathen authors are our own, and confequently, we have a right to claim them as our property, by taking them out of the hands of thofe unjuft poffeffors, in order to employ them to a better use. b He would have us leave to heathen writers their profane words and fuperftitious fictions, which every good Chriftian ought to abominate, after the example of the Ifraelites, who by the command of God himself plundered Egypt of her gold and moft precious garments, without touching their idols; and that we should take from the heathen authors, thofe truths we find in them, and which are, as it were, the filver, the gold, and ornaments of difcourfe; and clothe our ideas with them, in order to make the one and the other fubfervient to the preaching of the Gospel. He cites a great number of fathers who made this use of them, in imitation of Mo f Sed quoniam inter fe habent nonnullam fimilitudinem vefcentes atque difcentes, propter faftidia plurimorum etiam ipfa, fine quibus vivi non poteft, alimenta condienda furt. Ibid. ..... De doctr. chrift. 1. 2. n. 6. Sc do&trinæ omnes gentilium, non folùm fimulata & fuperftitiofa figmenta.... quæ unufquifque noftrum duce Chrifto de focietate gentilium exiens debet abominari atque devitare: fed etiam liberales difciplinas ufui veritatis aptiores, & quædam morum præcepta utilis fima continent. ... quæ tanquam aurum & argentum debet ab eis auferre chriftianus ad usum justum prædicandi evangelii. Vefem quoque illorum accipere atque habere licuerit in ufum convertenda chriftianum. De doct. chrift. 1.2. n. 60. i Nonne afpicimus quanto auro & argento & vette fuffurcinatus exierit de Egypto Cyprianus doctor fuaviffimus, & martyr beatiffimus? Ib. n. 61, Vir eloquentia pollens & martyrio. S. Hieron. fes fes himself, who was carefully inftructed in all the wifdom of the Ægyptians. St. Jerom treats the fame topic more at large, in a fine letter ky where he juftifies himself from the reproaches of his adverfaries, who imputed it as a crime in him, that he had employed profane learning in his writings. After pointing out feveral places in the fcriptures, where heathen authors are cited, he makes a long enumeration of the ecclefiaftical writers, who alfo made ufe of their teftimonies, in defence of the Chriftian religion. Among the holy writers, he had named St. Paul, who quotes feveral paffages from the Greek poets. "And indeed, fays he, he had learnt "from the true David the way of forcing the enemy's weapon out of his own hand, in order to fight "him; and to cut off the head of the proud Goliah "with his own sword." It were therefore much to be wished, that thofe who are defigned for the pulpit fhould begin by imbibing eloquence at its fource, that is, from the Greek and Latin authors, who have been always looked upon as mafters in the art of fpeaking, m The facred orator should have learnt from them the diftribution of the feveral ornaments of discourse, and this not barely to please the auditor, much less to gain a reputation, (motives which even heathen rhetoric thought unwor thy its orator.) But in order to make truth more amiable to men, by rendering her more lovely; and to engage them by this kind of innocent allurement, * Quæris cur in opufculis noftris fecularium litterarum interdum po namus exempla, & candorem Ecclefiæ Ethnicorum fordibus polluamus. S. Hieron. Epift. ad Magnum. Didicerat à vero David extorquere de manibus hoftium gladium, & Golia fuperbiffimi caput proprio mucrone truncare. Ibid. TM Illud, quod agitur genere temperato, id eft ut eloquentia ipfa delectet, non eft propter feipfum ufurpandum, fed ut rebus quæ uti→ liter honefteque dicuntur .... aliquanto prompt ùs & delectatione ipfa elocutionis accedat, vel tenaciùs ad hærefcat affenfus.... Ita fit ut etiam temperati generis ornatu non jactanter, fed prudenter uta❤ mur, non ejus fine contenti, quo tantùmmedo delectatur auditor: fed hoc potiùs agentes, ut etiam ipfo ad bonum, quod perfuadere volu mus, adjuvetur. S. Aug. de doct. chr. 1. 4. n. 55. to relish her holy fweetness, and to practise her falutary lessons with greater diligence and fincerity. It is well known that St. Ambrofe's eloquence had this effect on St. Auftin, though he was ftill charmed with the beauties of profane eloquence. n That great bishop preached the word of God to his people with fo many charms and graces, that all his auditors were tranfported with a kind of divine enthufiafm. St. Auftin fought only in the fermons of that preacher the flowers of language, and not the folidity of fenfe ; but it was not in his power to feparate them. He thought to have opened his understanding and heart to the beauties of diction only; but truth entered at the fame time, and foon gained an abfolute fovereignty over them. He himself made the fame ufe of eloquence afterwards. We find the people were fo ravifhed with his fermons, that they beftowed the utmoft applaufes on them. He was, however, very far either from seeking or affecting those applauses; for his humility was fo great, that they really afflicted him, and made him fear the secret and subtile contagion of that poisoned vapour. P But whence fhould fuch frequent acclamations arife, but from this, viz. that truth, thus illuftrated and placed in her utmost splendor by a truly eloquent man, charms and transports the mind of man? I cannot here avoid exhorting my readers to peruse M. Arnaud's little treatise, entitled, Reflections on the Eloquence of Preachers. He there refutes part of the preface which M. du Bois his friend had prefixed to his tranflation of St. Auftin's fermons, in which he pre Veni ad Ambrofium Epifcopum... cujus tunc eloquia ftrenuè miniftrabat adirem frumenti tui... & fobriam vini ebrietatem populo tuo. Confeff. 1. 5. c. 13. • Cum non fatagerem difcere quæ dicebat, fed tantum quemadmodum dicebat audire.... veniebant in animum meum fimul cum verbis quæ diligebam, res etiam quas negligebam: neque enim ea dirimere poteram. Et dum cor aperirem ad excipiendum quàm difertè diceret, pariter intrabat & qua verè diceret. Ibid. c. 14. P Unde autem crebrò & multum acclamatur ita dicentibus, nifi quia veritas fic demonftrata, fic defenfa, fic invicta, delectat? De doctr chr. 1.4. n. 56. tended |