New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1886-07-14
A Great Pulpit Orator.


II the correspondents are to be believ
ed, shown by an Italian priest, Fa-
ther Agostino OF Monte Feltro, whose
preaching IN Pisa during Lent seems
to have created more powerful i'm
preston than has attended the efforts
OF any other European pulpit orator
within many years past. A year ago
Father Agostino attracted attention
by his brilliant sermons while preach
ing in Bologna. He not only drew to-
him andswayed the masses, but dem!
onstrated surprisingly potent infu1
ence over such minds as those of lilo
pantl, the pantheistic dreamer: Ceneri,
the radical advocate, and Cardneci,
the poet, and the great cathedral was
insufficient to hold the audience that
thronged to hear him. Then he was
something Of a star, but now he has
become a planet of the first order.
His preaching in Pisa this year has
thrilled all Italy. Trainloads OF peo-
pie came from Florence, Leghorn,
Lucca, and even more distant points,
simply to hear this eloquent Fran
ciscan. Two hours before the time
for his sermon each day every avail
able space in the cathedral would be
taken, and many persons would find
themselves unable even to enter the
doors. Merchants abandoned their
places OF business, lawyers left the
courts, professors and students to-
gether deserted the university, work
men threw down their tools, doctors
| neglected their patients, all to hear
Father Agostino's sermons.
Among the many thousands thus
gathered together, great numbers were
persons unaccustomed to find them
selves in the house Of prayer, and
they, to kill time while waiting, would
read the pages OF rustling periodicals,
talk together in low tones, shift their
seats uneasily and nAlrmur and cough.
Suddenly, at II o'clock, the noise of
sabres striking the stone floor would
arrest attention and put stop to
the impatient hum of the multitude.
Six carbineers were required to force
a way through the throng to enable
the Archbishop Capponi to reach his
place. Then ensued a profound silence.
Father Agostino had appeared in
the pulpit, his white hands crossed,
as If in prayer, upon the railing,
ray OF colored light from
lofty window bringing out in strong
relief his pallid face, his thin covering
OF curly dark hair and his Cfesar-like
beard. With head inclined, eyes half
closed, and in a low, but clear voice,
he would state in a few preparatory
phrases the subject of his sermon; then
raising himself erect and looking about
upon his vast congregation, in tones
clear, penetrating and forceful he.
would begin the swift utterance of a
torrent OF brilliant sentences, glowing
with poetic imagery, powerful witha
gumentative strength and thrilling
with magnetic earnestness, that never
slackened for an instant Or halted for
lack OF a word during the space of
full hour. Then, suddenly he stops,
quickly disappears, effects his exit by
a private door, reaches carriage and
is driven rapidly to his abode. Sew
eral times he has had to struggle to
prevent the enthusiastic populace de-
tanning his carriage to make a tri-
umphal dem onstration about him.
Father Agostino has already engag
ed to deliver the Lenten sermons Of
1887 in Florence. Ii but half of what
is said OF him is true, he is without
doubt the most effective pulpit orator
Of the Catholic church OF Europe to-
day.