[Side note:  III.]

The extemporary preacher challenges nature on her own ground.  No one need doubt the issue.  Nature will conquer, and the man who defies her will succumb.  He endeavours to think, to select word-clothing for his thoughts, to labour his memory, and deliver his sermon, and performs all four operations at the same time, a task clearly impossible, but more so when we remember the usual embarrassments that beset a young preacher—­the nervous agitation, the want of self-control, the desire to succeed.  It ends generally in a stammer and then a break, greeted by the congregation with a sigh of relief or perhaps a sneer of contempt.

Is it by preaching such as this you hope to challenge the respect and get a hold on the intellect of a cynical world?  Is it through such instrumentality you would bring home the Church’s message to proud and festering humanity?  No one can succeed who attempts more than one task at a time.

Look to analogy.  At the moment when a regiment is expected to charge, you don’t find it engaged in collecting ammunition, sharpening swords, and learning drill.  All these necessary preliminaries are long since completed.  Now every bridle is grasped, every sword hilt in grip, and the rowelled heels are ready to dash into the horses’ flanks at the first note of the trumpet blast.

The preacher should come to the pulpit in a like state of preparedness, with his thoughts already gathered, moulded, polished and clothed in the words that fit them best; with every argument as definite and well knitted as a proposition in Euclid; the page swept clear of superfluous verbiage; each idea standing out bright as a jewel in its setting, and the whole so thoroughly committed to memory that he can defy the most critical to discover a trace of effort.  He should come, holding his elocutionary forces in reserve, and ready, when the moment arrives, to flash from his lips each living thought and send from his heart the waves of subtle, unseen fire to melt, rock, or subdue the hearts of others, instead of attempting four tasks simultaneously, and failing in all.  His sole business in the pulpit is not to shape his message or to clothe his message, but to gather and converge all the powers within him for one grand purpose and it alone—­to send that message home.

These pages are written mainly for the Irish priest on the foreign mission.  It is well he should be under no delusion.  In Ireland a slipshod or unprepared sermon may meet with indulgent charity.  A very different reception awaits it abroad.  The priest who attempts it will quickly discover how he is set up for a sign that shall be contradicted.  The free, white light of open criticism penetrates even the sanctuary.  There is no dignity to hedge any man.  Congregations smart at being treated to such poor fare, and will not leave him long in ignorance of their opinions.  Perhaps while in the pulpit the sight of many a curving lip will make the blood tingle or cause the shame spot to burn on his cheek.