REITERATION IN PREACHING.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATJE."]
confirmation by an " Evangelist " from practical experience of your view in the Spectator of November 19th, may be of interest. The writer has been in intimate contact with many or most of the successful Evangelists in England, within and without the Established Church, as also with those in America and on the Continent; and, so far as he is aware, they all repeat the same addresses from year to year, some of them through the whole course of their ministry. I remember the remark being made : " Mr. Moody still preaches the 'Daniel sermon' that he has preached for twenty-five years."
Out of a number of addresses, a speaker finds a proportion which produce certain results ; and if he is wise, he will drop the less effective ones, and repeat certainly those more effec- tive. Each repetition makes them more clear and pointed, both in expression and illustration. The familiarity with them leaves him at more mental liberty to concentrate his attention on his hearers, and to use those oratorical adjuncts which increase the effectiveness of speaking. More earnest- ness and emphasis can be thrown into an address which, from its familiarity to the speaker, requires less mental effort in the arrangement of thought.
What success the writer has had with multitudes in every country, from Oregon to Berlin, he attributes largely to having laid aside the personal gratification of variety of composition, and to having confined himself to the repetition to fresh audiences of those addresses which he has found most effective in definite results. It is the general experience of the Evangelist that his own subjective experience, at the time of delivery, is no measure of the effect produced. The times when he most deeply feels a sense of mechanical repeti- tion and failure and humiliation, are often those of most manifest success, judged by the results; while elation and joy in giving his message are often accompanied by the smallest impression on his audience.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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