The National Register.
London, England, 1809-01-15 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL REGISTER.

46

POPULA.R PR EACIIER.
lyot xxip.
•
Let me board with care.
With frugal gunning, with the niggard's art?
A. few fix'd principles, in early life,
Ere lad )lence impede the search, explored;
Then, like old Latimer, when age impairs
My judgment's eye, w ben quibbling schools attack
Illy grounded hope, or subtler wits deride,
Wilt I not blush to shun the vain debate :
And this mine answer—' Tdns,'tw•as thus, I tbought,
My mind yet vigorous, and my soul entire ;
Thus will I tbiuk, a,erse to listen more
To intricate discussion prone 19 stray !' SaENSTONE,
REV- RICTIARD YATES, B.D. F.S.A.
ALTERN4IE rßgAcarit

TO THE PHIL4NTHROPIC CH/PEE.

I HAVE lately seen, not without surprise, attempts to I
Depreciate the character of the popular preacher. One of these
adversaries of popular preachers presents himself where such
species of opposition ought to have been least expected.—" A
ikneficed clergyman in the county.," says the Anti-Jacobin
Review, page iB, for December last, " should not pass one
lialfof the year in frequenting places of fashionable resort, or
ID great towns; and a good parish priest is a mach more re-
spectable character than any popular preacher."
Without demanding for what purpose an invidious distinction
Is here drawn between the popular preacher and the parish
priest; why, it may be asked, cannot the same man be at once
*good parish priest and a respectable popular preacher? Be-
cause he possesses qualities and qnalifications w hick enable hid.
to command the pulpit, is he, therefore, unfitted to discharge the
parochial duties of the priest ? Does not religious faith ordina-
rily come by bearing, and attentive hearing by acceptable
smashing Is it not, indeed, to the paucity of the number of
esteemed preachers, that we are to attribute the desertion of too
Many of oar churches ; and, are the closet exhortations of any
divine likely to be less efficacious, because his public discourses
ore numerously attended, and perfectly appreciated, by his coil-
gregation ? There is no insuperable bar, no impassable gulf,
Netween the honourable elevation of the popular preacher and
sloe dignified humility of the parish priest.
What is a popular preacher ?—lle is one who is disinterested-
Tot distinguished, who has honestly acquired the suffrages of the
people. He ~naiad no surreptiiious superiority. lie is great, ,
assavell as good; and, while he most conscientiously discharges
tl:e unostentatious avocations of the priest, he also confers lustre
i his sublime station as a preacher. He is both t!se clew of the.'
4.sseutiow and the manna of the dcsart.
It is mistaking, if it be not designedly misrepresenting, the
popular preacher, when he is described as actuated only by the
trvt of fame; as one who conceives !iimseil pricik•ged to ts pass
arte half of the year in frequenting places of fashionable resort,
4r in great towns." He will, if he knows and. feels his duty,
samtent himself with parochial popularity. He will, if provi-
iikaitially appointed " a beneficed clergyman in the country,"
srside and labour, except in cases of excusable absence from
eisera, among the people committed to his charge; and, by his
talents and conduct, eminently conduce to their edification, his
own credit, and the honour and stability of the church of which
bit is a minister. It is thus that we must conceive of the justly
prspular preacher.
Let the respectable writer in the Antic-Jacobin Review, how-
eser, heassured that he is not likely to find me really dissenting
ftoin him respecting the momentous subject of clerical residence
'nerally. Far enough am I frost conceding to ooe of the cri-

JAN. 15.

tics in the twenty-fifth part of the Edinhargh Review, that,
"at present, the torrent sets " too strongly against non.residence
'tor can I see him, whom I almost suspect to be " a beneficed
tergyman in the country," declare he should not be surprised
to find the clergy " absenting themselves from their beoefices by
kind of day-rule," without myself feeling sentiments of the
,roost serious indignation ! If this critic be a cleric, which I now
'ore than suspect, it seems no violation of mental charity to
believe that he is one of those beneficed clergymen who " pass
ode half of the year in frequenting places of fashionable resort, or
in great towns." He, and such as him, do not, ofeourse, belong to
iy definition of a popular preacher. Pulpiteers are not preachers.
ilighly serviceable and nsefully eminent, still let us cordially air
low to the popular preacher,notwithstanding thoseabuses incident
to cleri,cal popularity, the aseendaocy to which he seems 'post hes!
nourably entitled. Since spiritual shepherds are not wholly
exempted even from the very benefit' influence of envy, but are
men of like passions with the weakest of their flocks, it may
become those of them, who habitually condemn popular preach-
ing, to canvass their hearts ae to the causes of such disapptobal
tion; and to ascertain, with the precision of real piety? bow
far their own inablility to obtain popularity, does, thirties .
knowingly on their part, incite then) todeery the merit of popes
laxity in other preachers? If what we tall popularity is sot
the object—it can never be the end !—of any plows preacher. is
he to abase himself, or endure the persecution of others, became
he happens to have honestly acquired the highest estimation
among his contemporaries? Christianity does nor enjoin this
kind of penance, and humanity does not exact it.
Circumstances appeared to me to require some explanation of
my own sentiments respecting popular preaching. Having so
far explained, let me trust not unsatisfactorily, my tbonghts on
that subject, I proceed with the immediate business of thia
paper.

It is the honour of the present preacher, the Rev. RICHARD
YATES, that he owes his respectability to those causes
by which the individual becomes estimable to society; that
whatever eminence he has obtained, either ecclesiastical or lite-
rary, is the result of ability, ofesertioe, and of integrity. He
is of Jesus College, in the University of Cambridge. He has
been many years Chaplain to his Majesty's Royal Hospital, at
Chelsea,—a painful and arduous preferment, the very active
duties of which he fulfils most exemplarily. Ile is also Rector
of Eve, alias Ashen; and, what brings him directly under my
cognizance in this place, he is now Alternate Preacher, in eon.
eert with the Rev, Isaac Jacktuan, to the Philanthropic Sod.
et v. lie is unmarried.

Air. Yates appears advantageously in the pulpit. His person
tall, and hat. much of gentlemanly dignity ; his deportment is
grave, without the remotest approximation to pompousness;
and his manner, which is uniformly interesting, is often ani-
mated, and, sometimes, deeply affecting. His countenance is
highly expressive of his intelligence and sincerity us a preacher.
If he would still more disembarrass himself from the trammels
of manuscript, to which, from his apparent solicitude as to
correctness, he pays ton much attention, he would rise greatly
in the effect of his public delivery.
His discourses are plain, and, generally, practical. With•
out being loaded with ornament, his language is not deficient
either in elegance or eloquence. I have observed, however, that
his sentences are sometimes so run out, as to become rather in•
volved; and, that they abound too much in parentheses.

It is on subjects of humanity nr benevolence, n here the heart
communicates its warm►h to the imagination, that this preaelsof
most iudisputably excels. Whether the occasion be private or
public, on which his abilities are called forth,—wbetber It hp
to animate the social sympathies to the practice of the•
tive duties, or to rouse individual kindness is aid of diffusive
charity,-.-it is on these occalioas that Mr. Yates, to adopt