The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1876-04-26
MR.. MOODYS METHOD.

THE SECRET OF HIS SUCCESS.
AN ANALYTICAL EXAMINATION INTO HIS
oRAToRY-HIs KNOWLEDGE OF .NEN-THE
PENALTY OF sUCCEss-eRAMMATICAL ER-
RoRs AND UNIQUE EPRoNoUNCIATzoN.
The New York Evening Post publishes
the following apprecistive and careful in
quiry into the great lay preachers extrsor-
dinsry success: Let US inspect Mr.. Moody.
In the drst place, and most OBVIOUSLY, he
is, apparently at least, sincere. He seems
to speak what he believes, ard because he
believes 1t. Then he is an orator; that is
to say, he knows how to persuade. Next,
be Is earnest, and bis magnificent physique.
his rugged health, his bodily strength,
enable hirn constantly to show it. He is
simple, natural, unaffected, unconven-
tioDsl, unreserved, direct, business-like.
He is not Coleridge's "Iat, sleek, oily man,
of God" nor TenDyson's "snowy-hsnded.
dileitante, delicate handed priest" nor,
least of all, Chaucer's monk, ian esy man
to give peUancs ther as he wiste to have
good pit&nce,7 preferring to cultivate the
society of ''all with richie and sellers OF
vitaille-" He addresses himselfto the pee
pie who need the truth OF whatever sex or
class or race they may be, and he seeks 10
do them good ss a mao seeks Tor hidden
intensely dOgmatic, even opinionative, 1T
we please. He admits that he can not by
demonstration refuEe the objections of the
philosOphic skeptic. He does not make
the attempt. To him the Bible Is the veri-
table word of God. Why should man dis
cuss a truth which infinite wisdom has
promulgatedf Does man know more than
his Msker?-know better than his Maker? :?
Away with hermeneutics, and apologetics,
and biblical criticism. the Bible is not the
fluid, literary, poetic, oriental diction that
Matthew Arnold sees; 1t does not require
culture in q reader in order that he may
be understood; it is not the expression OF
an efJrt to grasp at the truth. Its nara
tives of miracles are exact scientific state
ments-not the allegories of Origen, nor the
myths OF Strauss, nor the pious frauds OF
| Rsnau. The God and the hereafter of
which its speaks are iDdisputably eternal
veri.ies. He would pity scholar like Mr..
Greg, to whom the existence OF a Creator
Is only "almost acertainty," and renewed
life alter death only a soiemn hope"
HIS CONVICTIONS
are absolute. He has as vivid conceptions
OF hell and of imps, of corporeal burning
in literal flames and of a personal devil,
as had Jerome and Cbrysostom, Wesley
aud Whitefeld, the Spanish inquisitionisls
and the Scotch clergy of the seventeenth
| century. We must not forget to
mention also bis executive ability,
mis- knowledge of men, his immense
| common sense Take single illustration:
lie knows better than any Clergyman in
this city now to get persons to stand up
and ask to be prayed for. He says just
enough in the way of appeal, and shows
| just enough apparent indifference as to re
suits. Let his SHINING hearers rise In their
seats and manifest their good Intentions.
Mr.. Sankey will sing ''soft and low, SOFT
and low" as the "wiBd of the western sea, !"
The audience will remain seated, with
| heads bowt d in silent prayer. All iDflu-
ences OF soul and sense, of heaven and
earth, of memory and cons cience, of fit
ness and duty, permeste the atmosphere.
The effect Is irresistible. The heart shapes
itself into a temple, aud every aspiration
enos in God. OF course, Mr.. Moody has
his faults, like The rest of us. In the first
place, being an unread, an uncultured d
mar, he has no sort OF appreciation of the
intellectual troubles and difficulties OF
scholars WI do 10 :, because they can not,
see doctrines as he sees them. II q man
does not believe all OF the cardinal truths
OF what is known as evangelical Cbris tian
ity, Mr. Moody, like many an earlier and
much more intempsrste doginatist, be-
holds in that PERSONS condition the result
OF wilful and csrnal unbelief. 1t is not
enough for him that poet such as Shelley,
for exampie-to take an extreme csse-be
lieves, ana says that he believes, in 'sthat
Power which wields the world with never
wear led love, sustains it from below and
kincles it above;" the poet must su bscribe
TO the eogma OF the verbal ins piration of
the Scriptures. II js not enough fer him
that an historian like Mr.. Froude is such q
philosopher OF unselhshness as to declare
that "tO serve God and love Him is higher
and better than happiness, though it he
with wounded feet, and bleeding brow
and heart loaded with soirow;" the histo-
rian mu.t give his unqualified assent to
the
| LITERAL INTERPRETATION
of the first three chapters OF Genesis.
Such laborious scholars and honest men
as Frederick Robertson, Charles Kingsley
and Arthur Stanley are, in his eyes, sim-
| ply promoters of iDfidelity and unworthy
| of their profession. Unitariaus, of course,
| 10 matter how many George Peabodys
| aud Peter Coopers may be among them
! are on the I road road that leads elsew here
| than to the kingdom of God. Belief,
:" soaDdness," are the first considerations;
morality. personal purity, the second. In
deed, Mr.. Moody somewhat frequently
mistakes MS grou0d and teaches as truth
that which clearly is not truth. For ex-
ample, he says that "infdels won't try