Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Preaching
Of right and wrong he taught
Truths as refined as ever Athens heard;
And (strange to tell) he practis’d what he preach’d.
John Armstrong—The Art of Preserving Health. Bk. IV. L. 301.
I met a preacher there I knew, and said,
Ill and overworked, how fare you in this scene?
Bravely! said he; for I of late have been
Much cheered with thoughts of Christ, the living bread.
Matthew Arnold—East London.
I preached as never sure to preach again,
And as a dying man to dying men.
Richard Baxter—Love Breathing Thanks and Praise. Pt. 2. St. 29.
Faites ce que nous disons, et ne faites pas ce que nous faisons.
Do as we say, and not as we do.
Boccaccio—Decameron. From the French of Sabatier de Castres—Troisième Journée. Novelle VII.
For the preacher’s merit or demerit,
It were to be wished that the flaws were fewer
In the earthen vessel, holding treasure,
But the main thing is, does it hold good measure?
Heaven soon sets right all other matters!
Robert Browning—Christmas Eve. Canto XXII.
Hear how he clears the points o’ Faith
Wi’ rattlin’ an’ thumpin’!
Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath,
He’s stampin’, an’ he’s jumpin’!
Burns—Holy Fair. St. 13.
And pulpit, drum ecclesiastic,
Was beat with fist instead of a stick.
Butler—Hudibras. Pt. I. Canto I. L. 11.
Take time enough: all other graces
Will soon fill up their proper places.
John Byrom—Advice to Preach Slow.
Oh, for a forty-parson power to chant
Thy praise, Hypocrisy!
Byron—Don Juan. Canto X. St. 34. Sydney Smith quotes this as “a twelve-parson power of conversation.”
But Cristes loore, and his Apostles twelve,
He taughte, but first he folowed it hymselfe.
Chaucer—Canterbury Tales. Prologue. L. 527.
There goes the parson, oh illustrious spark!
And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk.
Cowper—On Observing Some Names of Little Note.
I venerate the man whose heart is warm,
Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life,
Coincident, exhibit lucid proof
That he is honest in the sacred cause.
Cowper—Task. Bk. II. L. 372.
Would I describe a preacher,
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I would express him simple, grave, sincere;
In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain,
And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste,
And natural in gesture; much impress’d
Himself, as conscious of his awful charge,
And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds
May feel it too; affectionate in look,
And tender in address, as well becomes
A messenger of grace to guilty men.
Cowper—Task. Bk. II. L. 394.
The things that mount the rostrum with a skip,
And then skip down again, pronounce a text,
Cry hem; and reading what they never wrote
Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work,
And with a well-bred whisper close the scene!
Cowper—Task. Bk. II. L. 408.
He that negotiates between God and man,
As God’s ambassador, the grand concerns
Of judgment and of mercy, should beware
Of lightness in his speech.
Cowper—Task. Bk. II. L. 463.
The priest he merry is, and blithe
Three-quarters of a year,
But oh! it cuts him like a scythe
When tithing time draws near.
Cowper—Yearly Distress. St. 2.
A kick that scarce would move a horse,
May kill a sound divine.
Cowper—Yearly Distress. St. 16.
Go forth and preach impostures to the world,
But give them truth to build on.
Dante—Vision of Paradise. Canto XXIX. L. 116.
God preaches, a noted clergyman,
And the sermon is never long;
So instead of getting to heaven at last,
I’m going all along.
Emily Dickinson—Poems. VI. A Service of Song.
The proud he tam’d, the penitent he cheer’d:
Nor to rebuke the rich offender fear’d.
His preaching much, but more his practice wrought;
(A living sermon of the truths he taught:)
For this by rules severe his life he squar’d:
That all might see the doctrines which they heard.
Dryden—Character of a Good Parson. L. 75.
Alas for the unhappy man that is called to stand in the pulpit, and not give the bread of life.
Emerson—An Address to the Senior Class in Divinity College, Cambridge. July 15, 1838.
But in his duty prompt at every call,
He watch’d and wept, he pray’d and felt for all.
Goldsmith—Deserted Village. L. 165.
They shall knaw a file, and flee unto the mountains of Hepsidam whar the lion roareth and the Wang Doodle mourneth for its first born—ah!
Burlesque Sermon in Cole’s Fun Doctor. Attributed to Andrew Harper as a travesty on sermons preached by itinerant preachers on the Mississippi. Found in Speaker’s Garland. Vol. VIII. Also claimed for Dow—Patent Sermons.
Judge not the preacher; for he is thy judge:
If thou mislike him, thou conceiv’st him not.
God calleth preaching folly. Do not grudge
To pick out treasures from an earthen pot.
The worst speak something good. If all want sense,
God takes a text, and preaches patience.
Herbert—The Temple. The Church Porch. St. 72. Quoting, “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels.” II Corinthians. IV. 7.
Even ministers of good things are like torches, a light to others, waste and destruction to themselves.
Hooker. Quoted by Gladstone, 1880. See Morley’s “Life of Gladstone.” Bk. VIII. Ch. I.
Sir, a woman preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well: but you are surprised to find it done at all.
Samuel Johnson—Boswell’s Life of Johnson. (1763).
And he played on a harp of a thousand strings,
Spirits of just men made perfect.
Burlesque Sermon, ascribed to Rev. Henry Taliaferro Lewis, in the Brandon (Miss.) Republic (1854). Claimed for St. George Lee and William P. Brannan. Found in Dow’s Patent Sermons. T. L. Masson’s Masterpieces of Humor.
As pleasant songs, at morning sung,
The words that dropped from his sweet tongue
Strengthened our hearts; or, heard at night,
Made all our slumbers soft and light.
Longfellow—Christus. The Golden Legend. Pt. I.
Skilful alike with tongue and pen,
He preached to all men everywhere
The Gospel of the Golden Rule,
The New Commandment given to men,
Thinking the deed, and not the creed,
Would help us in our utmost need.
Longfellow—Prelude to Tales of a Wayside Inn. L. 217.
It is by the Vicar’s skirts that the
Devil climbs into the Belfry.
Longfellow—The Spanish Student. Act I. Sc. 2.
So clomb the first grand thief into God’s fold;
So since into his church lewd hirelings climb.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. IV. L. 192.
He of their wicked ways
Shall them admonish, and before them set
The paths of righteousness.
Milton—Paradise Lost. Bk. XI. L. 812.
And truths divine came mended from that tongue.
Pope—Eloisa to Abelard. L. 66.
The gracious Dew of Pulpit Eloquence,
And all the well-whip’d Cream of Courtly Sense.
Pope—Epilogue to the Satires. Dialogue I. L. 70.
He was a shrewd and sound divine
Of loud Dissent the mortal terror;
And when, by dint of page and line,
He ’stablished Truth, or startled Error,
The Baptist found him far too deep,
The Deist sighed with saving sorrow,
And the lean Levite went to sleep,
And dreamt of eating pork to-morrow.
Praed—The Vicar.
His sermon never said or showed
That Earth is foul, that Heaven is gracious,
Without refreshment on the road
From Jerome, or from Athanasius.
And sure a righteous zeal inspired,
The hand and head that penned and planned them,
For all who understood, admired—
And some who did not understand them.
Praed—The Vicar.
The lilies say: Behold how we
Preach without words of purity.
Christina G. Rossetti—Consider the Lilies of the Field.
I have taught you, my dear flock, for above thirty years how to live; and I will show you in a very short time how to die.
Sandys—Anglorum Speculum. P. 903.
Sermons in stones and good in every thing.
As You Like It. Act II. Sc. 1. L. 17.
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,
Whiles, like a puff’d and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,
And recks not his own rede.
Hamlet. Act I. Sc. 3. L. 47.
He who the sword of heaven will bear
Should be as holy as severe;
Pattern in himself to know,
Grace to stand, and virtue go.
Measure for Measure. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 275.
It is a good divine that follows his own instructions; I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.
Merchant of Venice. Act I. Sc. 2. L. 15.
Perhaps thou wert a priest,—if so, my struggles
Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.
Horace Smith—Address to a Mummy. St. 4.
He taught them how to live and how to die.
Wm. Somerville—In Memory of the Rev. Mr. Moore. L. 21.
By thy language cabalistic,
By thy cymbal, drum, and his stick.
Thomas Stanley—The Debauchée. (1651).
With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a daughter’s heart.
Tennyson—Locksley Hall. L. 94.
A little, round, fat, oily man of God.
Thomson—Castle of Indolence. Canto I. St. 69.
“Dear sinners all,” the fool began, “man’s life is but a jest,
A dream, a shadow, bubble, air, a vapour at the best.
In a thousand pounds of law I find not a single ounce of love,
A blind man killed the parson’s cow in shooting at the dove;
The fool that eats till he is sick must fast till he is well,
The wooer who can flatter most will bear away the belle.”
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And then again the women screamed, and every staghound bayed;
And why? because the motley fool so wise a sermon made.
George W. Thornbury—The Jester’s Sermon.
Le sermon edifie, et l’example detruit.
The sermon edifies, the example destroys.
(Practice what you preach.)
Abbé de Villiers. From a story in L’Art de Prêcher.