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Show THE OLD TIME PULPIT. flit) Preacher Tiilkcil Plainly and BUI IUuiIp Known Ttu-lr KfiitliDeiitft. The people did not come Bimply to be taught, ih.-y came to be interested, to be moved, to hear evildoers, even if in high places denounced unsparingly. With the gradual awakening of men's minds which came with tho Sixteenth century, the power of the pulpit Increa-ed Increa-ed amazingly Tho iration was divided into two schools of thought; the exponents expo-nents of each side endeavored to persuade per-suade by means of tho pulpit, whliothey coerced by means of tho stake and the prison "Have at them. Muster Uitimer. have at them! cried tho people who lilled St Paul's church yard to the preacher, as they made a passage for liini to reach the cross They had no idea of being listeners only "passive buckets to te poured Into" they intended in-tended to show which way their sympathies sym-pathies went in tho great question then agitating Hug land, to mark approval or disapproval of sentiments delivered. Thus, when shortly afterward Bishop Homier was preaching from the same Bpot. some one iu the crowd threw a dagger at him us emphatic mark of ilia-! ilia-! approbation It is easy lo note in the ! language of the sermons of that tfm ; how unrestrained the preachur whs Latimer, when he wns pleaching, scut-tered scut-tered denunciations, epithets, invectivo. and sarcasm about him in a wuy which u modern audience would not appreciate appre-ciate lie attacks the judges for unfairness, unfair-ness, for taking of bribes; the citizens ' of Loudon for their selfishness, their greedy extravagance, "their brother," ! he cries, "shall die iu the streets of cold, he shall lie sick at their door, and perish for hunger! The ladies before him are reproved for tlair vanity, "laying out their hair in tussocks and tufls:" and for the general people he bus such epithets i us "you velvet coats, you upskipa, you ! hodipoles. you doddypecks,'' I The preachers of that time could, more i over employ that dangerous weapon, ! humor, which u modern preacher had I best avoid Tlie (teople then were used i to humor and understood it Laiioier ' was preaching once on the want of In lerost shown in church services, nnd blaming the clergy for it, he said: "A neighbor met a gentlewoman of London, and snid "Mistress, whither goest thou? Marry, said she, T am going to St. Tliom::s ol Acres, to the sermon. 1 could not si -i p lust nighl, nnd I am going now thither. I never failed of good sleep there..'" Sonn-limes his humor is holder still Prciic.iing one day ol LI ias slopping slop-ping I ho rain, be suddenly slopied and said: "1 think there lie some Kliaa ulsan at thi; time which stuppeth the ruin. havo not had ram a good while,' Temple Tem-ple liar |
