Part 3

STUDENTS PROGRESSING BACKWARD.--Menedemus was wont to say "that the young boys that went to Athens the first year were wise men, the second year philosophers, the third orators, and the fourth were but plebeians, and understood nothing but their own ignorance." And just so it happens to some in the progresses of religion. At first they are violent and active, and then they satiate all the appetites of religion; and that which is left is that they were soon weary and sat down in displeasure, and return to the world and dwell in the business of pride or money; and by this time they understand that their religion is declined, and passed from the heats and follies of youth to the coldness and infirmities of old age.

DIOGENES AND THE YOUNG MAN.--Diogenes once spied a young man coming out of a tavern or place of entertainment, who, perceiving himself observed by the philosopher, with some confusion stepped back again, that he might, if possible, preserve his fame with that severe person. But Diogenes told him, "_Quanto magis intraveris, tanto magis eris in caupona_" ("The more you go back the longer you are in the place where you are ashamed to be seen"). He that conceals his sin still retains that which he counts his shame and burden.

No examples will have greater weight with you than those taken from among the Puritans, in whose steps it is our desire to walk, though, alas! we follow with feeble feet. Certain of them abounded in anecdotes and stories. _Thomas Brooks_ is a signal instance of the wise and wealthy use of holy fancy. I put him first, because I reckon him to be the first in the special art which is now under consideration. He hath dust of gold; for even in the margins of his books there are sentences of exceeding preciousness, and hints at classic stories. His style is clear and full; he never so exceeds in illustration as to lose sight of his doctrine. His floods of metaphor never drown his meaning, but float it upon their surface. If you have never read his works I almost envy you the joy of entering for the first time upon his "Unsearchable Riches," trying his "Precious Remedies," tasting his "Apples of Gold," communing with his "Mute Christian," and enjoying his other masterly writings. Let me give you a taste of his quality in the way of anecdotes. Here are two brief ones; but he so abounds with them that you may readily cull scores of better ones for yourselves.

MR. WELCH WEEPING.--A soul under special manifestations of love weeps that it can love Christ no more. Mr. Welch, a Suffolk minister, weeping at table, and being asked the reason of it, answered it was because he could love Christ no more. The true lovers of Christ can never rise high enough in their love to Christ. They count a little love to be no love, great love to be but little, strong love to be but weak, and the highest love to be infinitely below the worth of Christ, the beauty and glory of Christ, the fulness, sweetness, and goodness of Christ. The top of their misery in this life is that they love so little though they are so much beloved.

SUBMISSIVE SILENCE.--Such was the silence of Philip the Second, King of Spain, that when his Invincible Armada, that had been three years a-fitting, was lost, he gave command that all over Spain they should give thanks to God and the saints that it was no more grievous.

_Thomas Adams_, the Conforming Puritan, whose sermons are full of rugged force and profound meaning, never hesitated to insert a story when he felt that it would enforce his teaching. His starting-point is ever some Biblical sentence, or scriptural history; and this he works out with much elaboration, bringing to it all the treasures of his mind. As Stowell says, "Fables, anecdotes, classical poetry, gems from the fathers and other old writers, are scattered over almost every page." His anecdotes are usually rough-and-ready ones, and might be compared to those of Latimer, only they are not so genial; their humor is generally grim and caustic. The following may serve as fair specimens:

THE HUSBAND AND HIS WITTY WIFE.--The husband told his wife that he had one ill quality--he was given to be angry without cause. She wittily replied that she would keep him from that fault, for she would give him cause enough. It is the folly of some that they will be offended without cause, to whom the world promises that they shall have causes enough--"In the world ye shall have tribulation."

THE SERVANT AT THE SERMON.--It is ordinary with many to commend the lecture to others' ears, but few commend it to their own hearts. It is morally true what the _Christian Tell-Truth_ relates: A servant coming from church praiseth the sermon to his master. He asks him what was the text. "Nay," quoth the servant, "it was begun before I came in." "What, then, was his conclusion?" He answered, "I came out before it was done." "But what said he in the midst?" "Indeed I was asleep in the midst." Many crowd to get into the church, but make no room for the sermon to get into them.

_William Gurnall_, the author of "The Christian in Complete Armor," must surely have been a relater of pertinent stories in his sermons, since even in his set and solid writings they occur. Perhaps I need not have made the distinction between his writings and his preaching, for it appears from the preface that his "Christian in Complete Armor" was preached before it was printed. In vivid imagery every page of his famous book abounds, and whenever this is the case we are sure to light upon short narratives and striking incidents. He is as profuse in illustration as either Brooks, Watson, or Swinnock. Happy Lavenham, to have been served by such a pastor! By the way, this "Complete Armor" is beyond all others a preacher's book: I should think that more discourses have been suggested by it than by any other uninspired volume. I have often resorted to it when my own fire has been burning low, and I have seldom failed to find a glowing coal upon Gurnall's hearth. John Newton said that if he might read only one book beside the Bible, he would choose "The Christian in Complete Armor," and Cecil was of much the same opinion. J. C. Ryle has said of it, "You will often find in a line and a half some great truth, put so concisely, and yet so fully, that you really marvel how so much thought could be got into so few words." One or two stories from the early part of his great work must suffice for our purpose.

BIRD SAFE IN A MAN'S BOSOM.--A heathen could say when a bird (feared by a hawk) flew into his bosom, "I will not betray thee unto thine enemy, seeing thou comest for sanctuary unto me." How much less will God yield up a soul unto its enemy when it takes sanctuary in his name, saying, "Lord, I am hunted with such a temptation, dogged with such a lust; either thou must pardon it, or I am damned; mortify it, or I shall be a slave to it; take me into the bosom of thy love for Christ's sake; castle me in the arms of thy everlasting strength. It is in thy power to save me from or give me up into the hands of my enemy. I have no confidence in myself or any other. Into thy hands I commit my cause, my life, and rely on thee." This dependence of a soul undoubtedly will awaken the almighty power of God for such a one's defense. He hath sworn the greatest oath that can come out of his blessed lips, even by himself, that such as "flee for refuge" to hope in him shall have "strong consolation" (Heb. vi. 17, 18).

THE PRINCE WITH HIS FAMILY IN DANGER.--Suppose a king's son should get out of a besieged city where he hath left his wife and children, whom he loves as his own soul, and these all ready to die by sword or famine, if supply come not the sooner. Could this prince, when arrived at his father's house, please himself with the delights of the court and forget the distress of his family? or rather would he not come post to his father, having their cries and groans always in his ears, and before he ate or drank do his errand to his father, and entreat him if he ever loved him that he would send all the force of his kingdom to raise the siege rather than any of his dear relations should perish? Surely, sirs, though Christ be in the top of his preferment and out of the storm in regard of his own person, yet his children, left behind in the midst of sin's, Satan's, and the world's batteries, are in his heart, and shall not be forgotten a moment by him. The care he takes in our business appeared in the speedy despatch he made of his spirit to his apostles' supply, which, as soon almost as he was warm in his seat at his Father's right hand, he sent, to the incomparable comfort of his apostles and us that to this day--yea, to the end of the world--do or shall believe on him.

_John Flavel_ was greatest in metaphor and allegory; but in the matter of anecdote his preaching is a fine example. It was said of his ministry that he who was unaffected by it must either have had a very soft head or a very hard heart. He had a fund of striking incidents, and a faculty of happy illustration, and as he was a man in whose manner cheerfulness was blended with solemnity, he was popular in the highest degree both at home and abroad. He sought out words which might suit the sailors of Dartmouth and farmers of Devon, and therefore he has left behind him his "Navigation Spiritualized," and his "Husbandry Spiritualized," a legacy for each of the two orders of men who plow the sea and the land. He was a man worth making a pilgrimage to hear. What a crime it was to silence his heaven-touched lips by the abominable Act of Uniformity! Instead of quoting several passages from his sermons, each one containing an anecdote, I have thought it as well to give a mass of stories as we find them in his prelections upon

PROVIDENCE IN CONVERSION.--A scrap of paper accidentally coming to view hath been used as an occasion of conversion. This was the case of a minister of Wales who had two livings but took little care of either. He, being at a fair, bought something at a peddler's standing, and rent off a leaf of Mr. Perkins' catechism to wrap it in, and reading a line or two of it, God sent it home so as it did the work.

The marriage of a godly man into a carnal family hath been ordered by Providence for the conversion and salvation of many therein. Thus we read in the life of that renowned English worthy, Mr. John Bruen, that in his second match it was agreed that he should have one year's diet in his mother-in-law's house. During his abode there that year, saith Mr. Clark, the Lord was pleased by his means graciously to work upon her soul, as also upon his wife's sister and half-sister, their brothers, Mr. William and Mr. Thomas Fox, with one or two of the servants in that family.

Not only the reading of a book or hearing of a minister, but--which is most remarkable--the very mistake or forgetfulness of a minister hath been improved by Providence for this end and purpose. Augustine, once preaching to his congregation, forgot the argument which he first proposed, and fell upon the errors of the Manichees beside his first intention, by which discourse he converted one Firmus, his auditor, who fell down at his feet weeping and confessing he had lived a Manichee many years. Another I knew who, going to preach, took up another Bible than that he had designed, in which, not only missing his notes but the chapter also in which his text lay, was put to some loss thereby. But after a short pause he resolved to speak about any other Scripture that might be presented to him, and accordingly read the text, "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise" (2 Pet. iii. 9); and though he had nothing prepared, yet the Lord helped him to speak both methodically and pertinently from it, by which discourse a gracious change was wrought upon one in the congregation, who hath since given good evidence of a sound conversion, and acknowledged this sermon to be the first and only means thereof.

_George Swinnock_, for some years chaplain to Hampden, had the gift of illustration largely developed, as his works prove. Some of his similes are far-fetched, and the growth of knowledge has rendered certain of them obsolete; but they served his purpose, and made his teaching attractive. After deducting all his fancies, which in the present age would be judged to be strained, there remains "a rare amount of sanctified wit and wisdom"; and sparkling here and there we spy out a few telling stories, mostly of classic origin.

THE PRAYER OF PAULINUS.--It was the speech of Paulinus when his city was taken by the barbarians, "_Domine, ne excrucier ob aurum et argentum_" ("Lord, let me not be troubled for my silver and gold which I have lost, for thou art all things"). As Noah, when the whole world was overwhelmed with water, had a fair epitome of it in the ark, having all sorts of beasts and fowls there, so he that in a deluge hath God to be his God hath the original of all mercies. He who enjoyeth the ocean may rejoice, though some drops are taken from him.

QUEEN ELIZABETH AND THE MILKMAID.--Queen Elizabeth envied the milkmaid when she was in prison, but had she known the glorious reign which she was to have for forty-four years she would not have repined at the poor happiness of so mean a person. Christians are too prone to envy the husks which wandering sinners fill themselves with here below; but would they set before them their glorious hopes of a heaven, how they must reign with Christ forever and ever, they would see little reason for their repining.

THE BELIEVING CHILD.--I have read a story of a little child about eight or nine years old, that, being extremely pinched with hunger, looked one day pitifully necessitous on her mother, and said, "Mother, do you think that God will starve us?" The mother answered, "No, child; he will not." The child replied, "But if he do, yet we must love him and serve him." Here was language that spake a well-grown Christian. For, indeed, God brings us to want and misery to try us whether we love him for his own sake or for our own sakes, for those excellencies that are in him or for those mercies we have from him, to see whether we will say with the cynic to Antisthenes, "_Nullus tam durus erit baculus_," etc. ("There should be no cudgel so crabbed as to beat me from thee").

_Thomas Watson_ was one of the many Puritan preachers who won the popular ear by their frequent illustrations. In the clear flowing stream of his teaching we find pearls of anecdote very frequently. No one ever grew weary under such pleasant yet weighty discourse as that which we find in his "Beatitudes." Let two quotations serve to show his skill:

THE VESTAL AND THE BRACELETS.--Most men think because God hath blessed them with an estate therefore they are blessed. Alas! God often gives these things in anger. He loads his enemies with gold and silver: as Plutarch reports of Tarpeia, a Vestal nun, who bargained with the enemy to betray the Capitol of Rome to them in case she might have the golden bracelets on their left hands, which they promised; and being entered into the Capitol, they threw not only their bracelets but their bucklers, too, upon her, through the weight whereof she was pressed to death. God often lets men have the golden bracelets of worldly substance, the weight whereof sinks them into hell. Oh, let us, _superna anhelare_, get our eyes "fixed" and our hearts "united" to God the supreme good. This is to pursue blessedness as in a chase.

HEDGEHOG AND CONIES.--The Fabulist tells a story of the hedgehog that came to the cony-burrows in stormy weather and desired harbor, promising that he would be a quiet guest; but when once he had gotten entertainment he did set up his prickles, and did never leave till he had thrust the poor conies out of their burrows. So covetousness, though it hath many fair pleas to insinuate and wind itself into the heart, yet as soon as you have let it in, this thorn will never cease pricking till it hath choked all good beginnings and thrust all religion out of your hearts.

I think this must suffice to represent the men of the Puritanic period, who added to their profound theology and varied learning a zeal to be understood, and a skill in setting forth truth by the help of every-day occurrences. The age which followed them was barren of spiritual life, and was afflicted by a race of rhetorical divines, whose words had little connection with _the Word_ of life. The scanty thought of the Queen Anne dignitaries needed no aid of metaphor or parable: there was nothing to explain to the people; the utmost endeavor of these divines was to hide the nakedness of their discourses with the fig-leaves of Latinized verbiage. Living preaching was gone, spiritual life was gone, and consequently a pulpit was set up which had no voice for the common people; no voice, indeed, for anybody except the mere formalist, who is content if decorum be observed and respectability maintained. Of course, our notion of making truth clear by stories did not suit the dignified death of the period, and it was only when the dry bones began to be stirred that the popular method was again brought to the front.

The illustrious _George Whitefield_ stands, with Wesley, at the head of that noble army who led the Revival of the last century. It is not at this present any part of my plan to speak of his matchless eloquence, unquenchable earnestness, and incessant labor; but it is quite according to the run of my lecture to remind you of his own saying, "I use market language." He employed pure, good, flowing English; but he was as simple as if he spoke to children. Although by no means abounding in illustration, yet he always employed it when needed, and he narrated incidents with great power of action and emphasis. His stories were so told that they thrilled the people: they saw as well as heard, for each word had its proper gesture. One reason why he could be understood at so great a distance was the fact that the eye helped the ear. As specimens of his anecdotes I have selected two, which follow:

THE TWO CHAPLAINS.--You cannot do without the grace of God when you come to die. There was a nobleman that kept a deistical chaplain and his lady a Christian one. When he was dying he says to his chaplain, "I liked you very well when I was in health, but it is my lady's chaplain I must have when I am sick."

NEVER SATISFIED.--My dear hearers, there is not a single soul of you all that is satisfied in your station. Is not the language of your hearts when apprentices. We think we shall do very well when journeymen; when journeymen, that we shall do very well when masters; when single, that we shall do well when married? And, to be sure, you think you shall do well when you keep a carriage. I have heard of one who began low. He first wanted a house; then, says he, "I want two, then four, then six." And when he had them he said, "I think I want nothing else." "Yes," says his friend, "you will soon want another thing; that is a hearse-and-six to carry you to your grave." And that made him tremble.

Fearing that the quotation of any more examples might prove tedious, I would only remind you that such men as Berridge, Rowland Hill, Matthew Wilks, Christmas Evans, William Jay, and others who have but lately departed from us, owed much of their attractiveness to the way in which they aroused their audiences, and flashed truth into their faces by well-chosen anecdotes. Time calls upon me to have done, and how can I come to a better close than by mentioning one living man, who, above all others, has in two continents stirred the masses of the people? I refer to D. L. Moody. This admirable brother has a great aversion to the printing of his sermons; and well he may have, for he is incessantly preaching, and has no time allowed him for the preparation of fresh discourses; and therefore it would be great unwisdom on his part to print at once those addresses with which he is working through a campaign. We hope, however, that when he has done with a sermon he will never suffer it to die out, but give it to the church and to the world through the press. Our esteemed brother has a lively, telling style, and he thinks it wise frequently to fasten a nail with the hammer of anecdote. Here are three extracts from the little book entitled "Arrows and Anecdotes by D. L. Moody."

THE IDIOT'S MOTHER.--I know a mother who has an idiot child. For it she gave up all society--almost everything--and devoted her whole life to it. "And now," said she, "for fourteen years I have tended it and loved it, and it does not even know me. Oh, it is breaking my heart!" Oh, how the Lord must say this of hundreds here! Jesus comes here, and goes from seat to seat asking if there is a place for him. Oh, will not some of you take him into your hearts?

SURGEON AND PATIENT.--When I was in Belfast I knew a doctor who had a friend, a leading surgeon there, and he told me that the surgeon's custom was, before performing any operation, to say to the patient, "Take a good look at the wound and then fix your eyes on me, and don't take them off till I get through the operation." I thought at the time that was a good illustration. Sinner, take a good look at the wound to-night, and then fix your eyes on Christ and don't take them off. It is better to look at the remedy than at the wound.

THE ROLL-CALL.--A soldier lay on his dying couch during our last war, and they heard him say, "Here!" They asked him what he wanted, and he put up his hand and said, "Hush! They are calling the roll of heaven, and I am answering to my name." And presently he whispered, "Here!" and he was gone.

I will weary you no longer. You may safely do what the most useful of men have done before you. Copy them not only in their use of illustration, but in their wisely keeping it in subservience to their design. They were not story-tellers, but preachers of the gospel; they did not aim at the entertainment of the people, but at their conversion. Never did they go out of their way to drag in a telling bit which they had been saving up for display, and never could any one say of their illustrations that they were

Windows that exclude the light, And passages that lead to nothing.

Keep you the due proportion of things lest I do worse than lose my labor, by becoming the cause of your presenting to the people strings of anecdotes instead of sound doctrines, for that would be as evil a thing as if you offered to hungry men flowers instead of bread, and gave to the naked gauze of gossamer instead of woolen cloth.

LECTURE III.

THE USES OF ANECDOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

The uses of anecdotes and illustrations are manifold; but we may reduce them to seven, so far as our present purposes are concerned, not for a moment imagining that this will be a complete list.