Chapter III

BASIS OF SPEECH—THOUGHT AND EMOTION—HEART CULTIVATION.

Thought and emotion are two prime elements in the manifestations of mind. All the products of mental action, unless it be the mysterious power of will, are divided between them, and by them, through various means of expression, we reach and influence the outward world.

Thought springs from the intellect, and acts upon the facts received from every source, retaining, arranging and modifying them at will. Feeling is the mind’s response to all these, and comprises fear, love, hope, faith, hatred and all the sentiments and emotions that are described under the general name of “the heart.” Speech is founded on these two elements, which meet and mingle in every human production, though seldom in the same proportion. The speaker who has greatest mastery of one, is often most deficient in the other. But if so, the whole range of eloquence is not open to him. He is only a half-developed orator, and his usefulness will be very much narrowed.

A man of deep thought but sluggish emotion, may enchain the attention of an assembly by the novel and far-reaching views he presents and the ability with which he unfolds them, but the whole discourse will be dull and lifeless. He will find it very difficult to move his hearers to action. They may assent to every word he utters, and yet continue in their own course. Every minister’s experience furnishes proof that it is not enough to convince, or it would be very easy to convert the world. At times it is right to use the sword of intellect alone. In controversy, for example, a solid basis of reasoning must be laid before anything else can be done. But it is not always enough. Men are led as often by their sentiments and intuitions as by their judgments, and we are allowed to use all lawful means to win them. Even the pure light of truth is not always to be discovered through the intellect alone. A mere feeling of what is right, or just, or true, often leads, in an instant, to a conviction that all subsequent reasoning can only strengthen. The ideal orator, therefore, is one who, even in argument, can show the truth, and then, by a flash of heavenly sympathy, change our cold assent into fervent conviction.

On the other hand, a man of predominant feeling may make us weep, but as we see no reason for it, we resist the emotion to the extent of our power. If we yield, a reaction follows, and we go away ashamed of what we cannot justify. Of this class were some of the early Methodist preachers—the weeping prophets, as they were termed. Their tears, and the feeling with which they spoke, were often irresistible, and by the mere force of sympathy, men who had very little intellectual power were able to sway the passions of an audience at will. But had it not been for some of their brethren, who were men of thought as well as emotion—men who had clear heads to organize and combine, as well as tears to shed, the effect of their labor would have been evanescent as the emotions they excited.

Continuity is a highly important quality of thought. All men think; they cannot help it, for the mind is ever active. But with most these thoughts are but random flashes—illuminated pictures—that arise for a moment, and then vanish to give place to others. Powerful thinking consists in holding these scattered images together in a chain, and making them run uninterruptedly from one point to another. There is no man who does not at times catch glimpses of far-reaching, profound thoughts; but before he can combine them into harmony and place them in their proper relation to other thoughts, they disappear, and he may search long before he will find them again. All persons see the beauties of natural scenery, but it is only the poet who can reproduce the scattered elements and combine them into a harmonious description. Only the true thinker can gather the fragments of thought that flash through the mind, and give them form and consistency. This power is indispensable to the speaker. He must give, not a mere gallery of pictures, however beautiful they may be, but a succession of thoughts, naturally connected, by which the mind advances step by step through the discourse, without jar or interruption. We will endeavor to give some directions for the acquisition of this power, as far as may be necessary in extempore speaking. The capability of thought must indeed be possessed or all cultivation will be vain; but if the mind have any native vigor, it can learn to think consecutively and methodically, even as the unskilled but perfectly organized hand may be taught to carve beautiful and complicated forms.

As a general rule, men can be more easily moved by appeals made to their feelings than to their reason, and find the most masterly dissertation cold and lifeless unless relieved by some touches of humanity and passion. A man who does not possess true feeling cannot so counterfeit it as to reach the hearts of others, but he may, in a great measure, transform his own nature and acquire it. The most essential qualification for a religious teacher is a deep personal religious experience. One who has never passed through the mystic, mingled sorrow and joy of penitence and the agony of remorse—has never watched with straining eyes for the dawning light of salvation, and at last been enabled to say, “Abba, Father!” such a one cannot preach the gospel with power and success. His speech may glitter with all the flowers of rhetoric and the form of words be complete, but the vast power of the earnest soul sympathizing with all the lips utter, will be absent. Without genuine experience, our preaching will be apt to fall into that loose generalization which can do no good. For it is only when we plant our feet on living realities—those we have tested and know to be sure, and deal in particular, specified facts, that we are able to pierce through all the folds of ignorance and self-love, and awaken an echo of the conscience within.

As a mere form of knowledge, the experience of God’s dealings with the awakened soul is more valuable than any other lore. But its great advantage to the preacher is not the increase of knowledge. It produces a tide of emotion that can never sleep until the judgment day. It connects the Cross and the divine Sufferer with cords of living sympathy that always thrill to the very centre of our being. Conversion invariably deepens and intensifies the emotions of our nature; and if the speaker has passed through a strongly marked change he will have the power of imparting his impressions to others, and of giving to his descriptions the inimitable charm of reality. If his religious experience accords with the Bible, he can speak from his own heart with almost irresistible force. This was the secret of the power wielded by Luther, Wesley, Whitefield and others who have shaken the world. Thus prepared, John Bunyan wrote the most wonderful book of any age—recorded the world’s experience in religion, and made the cold, dead realms of allegory flash with life. He laid the spell of his genius on all alike, and the child prattles of the burdened pilgrim with the giants in his way, while the old man is cheered by the light that streams down from the high hill on which the city is built. The reason of his power is simply that he wrote his own spiritual experience in the language of truth. He had stood at the bar of Vanity Fair, had fought with the fiends, and groped his way through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. From the depths of his own heart, torn by internal conflict, or healed and made happy by a heavenly anointing, he drew the images that glow with all the color of life in his marvelous book.

Love is the mightiest of all forces, and Jesus was revealed to draw unto himself the love of the universe. Let the minister learn of him, and he will be able to speak as he never spoke before. He will strike the key-note of that song whose solemn music has rolled down through the centuries, and will wax louder and clearer until time shall be no more.

The story of the Cross, with all that depends upon it, forms principal part of the Christian orator’s theme. But he has other duties. His work is broad as human life. He stands by the bed of sickness; he weeps with the mourners when the last flutter of life is stilled, and strives to lift their eyes to the victor over death; he warns the impenitent of coming woe. It is his to deal with the highest and holiest emotions of the heart. And how can he touch these delicate chords gently, but firmly—not shrinking from the infliction of necessary pain, yet never causing a tear to flow “in the mere wantonness of grief”—unless he has passed through sorrow’s deep waters? He must have unfeigned sympathy for all, and be able to express it plainly and tenderly.

This power, both of feeling and expression, may be greatly increased by exercise. If the preacher will enter the abodes of rich and poor alike, and take a friendly interest in their hopes and fears, their joys and sorrows, he will find his heart drawn out toward them, and when he addresses them in public, it will be with far more intense anxiety for their good than if they were strangers. It will be comparatively easy for him to throw his heart into all he says.

There are two methods of cultivating genuine emotion that we would cordially recommend to all desirous of swaying the hearts of the people. The first is prayer. We need not enlarge on its general benefits, but will notice its effect on sacred oratory. The man who often addresses God in prayer is in the very best school of eloquence. It brings us close to Him, and in the awful light of His purity, we more clearly see anything that is bad in our hearts and strive to cast it out. As we pray for others, and spread their needs before him, we cannot fail to be inspired with a stronger desire for their welfare. Then, too, religion becomes something more than a mere form of words, and our hearts burn with a stronger flame. We speak now of prayer as it should be—a warm, pure, fervent outpouring of the heart to God. This is more difficult in the public congregation, for then many disturbing elements are brought to bear on the person praying. The listening people are apt to be in the preacher’s thoughts, and prevent him from enjoying simple and direct communion with heaven. It is the prayer “when none but God is nigh,” that will stir his heart to its profoundest depths and put his mind in the right frame for delivering his sermons. Let any one pray earnestly for help from above all the time his sermons are in course of preparation, and he will be surprised to find how much of the coldness and deadness supposed to belong to this species of composition will be swept away, and how beautifully over all will be spread the vivid charm of real experience. Yet we must not restrict our prayers to this time, for God may not meet us in loving friendship if we only approach him when we have a favor to ask. To reap the full benefit of prayer, it should be a habit woven into our life, and continued on every occasion. This will rebuke sinful ambition and moderate that sensitiveness which has reference to the opinions of our fellow-beings. Thus armed, the preacher will come as the messenger of God, rather than the caterer to men’s fancies. And from the mere operation of natural causes, he will speak with a boldness and earnestness that will draw the hearts of men as the magnet does the steel.

But prayer is far more than the means of cultivating emotion. There is a direct influence that comes from God to man. The power of the Holy Spirit is no fable. A heavenly anointing is sent down—an unction that gives sweetness and power even to the most commonplace words. It is not bestowed unasked, for God desires that we should feel the need of His high gifts before they are granted. But when humbly implored, there is often breathed an influence from above, mighty to sustain the faithful minister in his task. What an encouraging but awful thought! God himself stands by us in the time of our weakness and gives us His strength. If the minister would always go to the pulpit with this assurance, he would not fear the mass of upturned faces, but calmly view them with a heart stayed on the Master whose work he has to do.

The Spirit’s presence will not in the least absolve us from the need of complete preparation. In nothing is it more true that God helps those who help themselves. All that we contend for is such an influence as will cause the words uttered to penetrate the souls of those for whom they were spoken, remove the fear of man from the preacher’s heart, and make him bold in speaking the truth. It may be that clearer knowledge will be given, and the most fitting selection of words suggested, but this can only be hoped for after all preparation is made. God does not duplicate his work, and that which he gives man faculties to discover, he will not afterward bring to him by an express revelation.

The second method of imparting unction and feeling to the coldness of thought, is by meditating on the great truths and promises of Christianity. This subject is well treated in Baxter’s “Saint’s Rest,” though not with reference to the wants of the orator. The power of long-continued and earnest meditation varies in different persons, but all can acquire it to some degree. It may be defined as a method of transporting ones-self from a sense of the present reality to an ideal situation—reaching and experiencing the feelings that would naturally arise in that situation. Thus we may experience some of the pleasures of heaven and the society of the blest. We may walk the plains of Galilee with the Lord and behold his wondrous love there manifested, almost as if we mingled with the throng who hung on his gracious words; we may turn to the time of our own conversion, and recall the passage from despair to conscious life; or look forward to the day of our death, and think of its mingled sorrow and triumph. It is a kind of waking dream by which the mind is filled with one idea to the exclusion of all others. And when we select some high object of contemplation and return often to it, we acquire a susceptibility of strong and fervent emotion on that subject which it requires only a word to arouse. An illustration of this is often found in the case of an inventor or discoverer who has dwelt on one subject until his whole mind is filled with it, and he cannot hear it mentioned without the deepest feeling. However cold and listless he may be on other subjects, touch but the sacred one of his fancy, and his sparkling eye and animated voice tell how deeply you have roused the whole man. What an advantage it must be to the extempore speaker, with whom everything depends on feeling, to have all the cardinal facts he proclaims surrounded by fountains of holy emotion, continually supplied from the spring of meditation, and ready to flow copiously at the slightest touch! Such trains of thought may be carried on in moments too often given to idleness, and thus, not only will a mighty power be added to our pulpit ministrations, but our whole life ennobled and enriched. It has been conjectured that Milton’s mind, while composing “Paradise Lost,” existed in the state of a sublime waking dream, in which the forms of heaven and hell, chaos and creation, all mingled in one glorious vision. Something of this nature, though not necessarily continuous, must take place in the mental history of every true and powerful Christian minister.