Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1883 edition. Excerpt: ... And, in truth, it is difficult to understand how there can be found men of learning and taste, who are-willing to sacrifice sense to mere words and phrases. When I can employ a phrase understood by everyone, why should I, instead, make use of a phrase which may not be understood by one half of my audience? Instead of addressing my flock in plain, homely words, which they will all understand, why should I select words which will have no meaning for them, and will be intelligible only to scholars?1 A misdirected admiration for classic writers, an extravagant love of elegance and purity of language, sometimes blinds even the most sensible men, and they wish to employ in the church, where most of the audience are ignorant or but poorly educated, language which would be suited to the halls of a University. 3. Of The Affability Which Should Accompany Preaching. When in ordinary conversation we wish to convince a person of any truth, or to induce him to perform some good action, we are accustomed to do so in the most gracious manner possible, in order to conciliate him, and win over his sympathies. Now the self-same method must be adopted when addressing the public, and especially by a Parish Priest, who must speak to them as a father, and consequently with the affection which a father entertains towards his children. 1 Preachers who affect the style which the Author here so justly condemns, do so iu the hope of gaining a reputation for eloquence; and yet they only prove thereby that they are utterly ignorant of what constitutes true eloquence. "No man," says Blair, "can be called eloquent who speaks to an assembly on subjects, or in a strain, which none or few of them comprehend. The unmeaning applause which the ignorant give to what is..."
