The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1872-03-12
Fewer Sermons aud More Service.

There is no man living engaged in lit.
erary work, who does not know that a
minister who writes, or in any way thor.
oughly prepares, two sermons a week, ca q
have no time for any other work whatso.
ever Pastoral duty is out of the qucs-
ton with any man who performs this
task month after month ~ man wh }
faithfully executes this amount Of ltera.
~ labor and then, on Sunday, breaches
his two sermons and performs the other
services which are connected with public
worship, does all that the strongest con-
stitution can endure. When it is under
taken to add to this work universal pas.
toral visitation, attendance at funerals
weddings, and all sorts of meetings dur.
ing the week, and the care of personal
and family affairs, case of cruelty is es.
tablished great many times worse than
any that engage the sympathies and de.
mands the interference Of the humane Mr.
Bergh. To do all this work without a
fatal breakdown before middle age, re.
quircs an amount Of vitality and strength
of constitution which few men in any
calling possesses, and which youth de-
voted to study is pretty certain to dam
age or destroy.
Now if such work as this were neces-
sary, or cvon extraordinarily useful, there
would be some apology for it, and some
justification of it but it is neither. II
it is impossible for the average minister
to prepare ccmpetently two sermons a
week, it is just as impossible for the av-
crage parishoner to receive and remem-
Der and appropriate two sermons in day.
No man of ordinary observation and ex.
perience-no man who has carefully ob.
served his own mental processes in the
reception and appropriation of truth
has failed to notice that the digestive
powers Of his mind are limited. The man
who hears and appropriates a good ser.
mon in the morning has no room in him
for another sermon in the afternoon or
evening. To hear three sermons in day
is always to confuse and often to destroy
the impression left by each. Every dis
course that man hears after his frs,
strong impression and his first hungry re-
cepton is disturbing, distracting, an
depressing force. The second sermon Or
single Sabbath makes every man poor
or who heard and was interested in tn
first, and not richer while both sermon.
were damaged in their quality by the sim
pie fact that the time devoted to botl
should have been bestowed on one alone
And now let US state our conclusions
for this article, which VIC intended should
be brief, is opening into long discourse
1st. There is no way to improve the
character and quality of our preaching
except by reducing the quantity. The
advancing intellectual activity and capac.
ity of the people demand better sermon
than the fathers were in the habit OF
preaching-such sermon as eur preach
ers cannot possibly produce with the
present demand for two sermons on n
Sunday.
I'd. For all practical purposes and
results, one sermon on Sunday is BET
ter thau two 1t is all that the averaee
preacher can produce, doing his best, an
all that the average hearer can receive
and "inwardly digest"
Sd. One sermon each Sunday give
the whole church half day in which ia
engage in Suuday-school and missionary
work, and Sunday evening at home
an evening of rest and family commun-
ion.
OF course We shall be met by the ster-
eotypcd questions "Will not our people
60 somewhere else to hear preaching il
they cannot get the two sermons at our
church ?" "Wil not young people 60 to
worse places on Sunday night if the
churches should be shut" The answer
to the first question is, that no one will
leave "our church" who is worth any.
thing in and to it; and to the second
that whether the young will 60 to worse
places will depend something upon the
attractiveness of Christian homes, which
arc now rather lonely and checress plac-
cs on a Sunday, we confess. Still, il
places of worship must be open for them
it is easy to have union services, dividing
the work among the pastors. There are
are thousand ways to meet special ex.
igencies like this, for which We shall find
our means amply sufficient when th'
broad reform moves through the land, for
the reform must come, aud the sooner tn,
better.-Dr. J. G. Holland in Scribner'.
for March.