ABOUT LONG SERMONS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 149, 26 June 1877, Page 2

ABOUT LONG SERMONS.

To the Editor op the 'Evening Mail.' Sir-In yesterday morning's Times there was published a letter signed •« Churchman,'** in which "F." is alluded to half a dozen times or more. lam not one "who shrinks from a discussion, particularly when I have been the means of Introducing it, and therefore I desire to say a. few words iu reply. But, first of all, I must state that I am not prepared to allow that a preference for short sermons of necessity implies a want of reverence and respect for religious subjects, any more than I am willing' to admit that a liking for a long discourse is a proof of their existence in those who take the opposite view to myself. I claim to be actuated by quite as high and laudable motives as those which have induced "Looker On" and " Churchman "to appear in print. I am attacked with, I think, more virulence than the occasion requires—but that is a matter of taste—for advocating a curtailment of the sermons preached in our churches every* Suuday, but I entirely repudiate the charge that this advocacy ia due to irreverence or to want of respect for the priesthood. It is rather owing to my observation of the effect of long sermons, the result of which after a regular attendance at church for many years is the conviction that they produce restlessness, inattention, and adisposition to levity in the congregations to which theyare preached. On the other hand I have noticed that where the sermon is brief, and well considered, and thoroughly digested by the preacher before delivery, the effect produced is manifest in fche church, and is perceptible outside ifc. In the one case the congregation leaves with a sensation of relief that the end has been reached, and frequently with an unmistakeable expression of weariness t in the other with an equally strongly expressed feeling of interest iu the subject they have heard discussed, aud of satisfaction with the preacher who without tiring them has given them something to think over on their return to their homes. lam not attempting to lay down so absurd a cast-iron rule as that because a sermon is long ic must he uninteresting and wearisome, and because it is short it is necessarily the reverse, but I am speaking of the ordinary sermon, such as we are all in the habit of hearing, and of the efiect which I have observed that ifc produces. If lam wrong ia the estimate I have formed of the ! wishes of our church goers in this respect, then my standpoint is removed altogether, and I have made an egregious error in the deductions I have drawn from the symptoms I have seen displayed. But I do not admit that I am wrong, and I assert that, all other things being equal, an average, congregation, be they assembled in a church of any denomination whatsoever—hut more especially of the Church of England where the service in itself is of considerable length --will prefer the short to the long sermon. Believing this, as I most firmly do, and feel-

ing fully convinced that a-reform in this matter would lead,to a, large increase in the numberof attendants }at our churches, and** to a greater amount of good being effected by the utterances c-f the: preachers, have I laid myselfj open tojsuch an amount of blame as that imputed, to me for introducing a subject oh whijjh r*-£eel„quife ;as warmly, an&7 just as earnestly as do those who differ from me? I have been accused of flipoancy, of grotesque indecency, and of irreverence. I fail to see wherein I have laid myself open to either charge, and if any words of mine appear, to justify it, I can only express my sincere regret that a meaning; which they,; were.hever intended to bear, has been at-* tached to them. The grandest sermon on record is that which was delivered on the Mount, which, while it contains so.much, is a. masterpiece of brevity and condensation. In this respect it might b.e accepted, as a model by the clergy. Arid there are some* of its" precepts which, it seems to me, have been entirely ignored by those who have assailed me with so much rancour. I am, &c, "_\"