son's case, this was justified by his idea that the Bible as the word of God must harmonize with reason; in Mr. Staples's case, by his idea that the men who wrote the Bible were simple, child-like, earnest men, and so most likely to be fundamentally in the right in their ideas of God and man and their relations, whatever surface blunders they might commit. This thought runs through the whole texture of his biblical criticism. Perhaps careless persons were sometimes misled, by his appeals to Bible witnesses, into thinking that he regarded them as supernatural authorities. Nothing could be further from the truth; it is never, in the last years of his ministry, the supernaturalness of the Bible that he argues from, but its intense naturalness. At one time he says expressly, that it is only because the Bible is more familiar to us than other sacred writings, that it serves us better in the way of argument and illustration.

The poetry of his nature comes out in the expository introductions to his sermons; the strength of it in that which immediately follows-the development of his thought. This was the part he wrestled over and rejoiced in most of all. He was not content to impinge here and there upon great principles. He desired to know their sweep; to trace their curves till they returned again; to see them come full circle. His faith was of the firmest that “the world was made at one cast." He looked everywhere for unity. Given a principle, he felt that it must operate on every plane, in every sphere of life. His sermons ended almost invariably with a variety of illustrations; applications of his principles to the practical affairs of life. In almost every one of them "Extemporize" is written more than once, and the passages which he extemporized were those which told most on his audience.

Such being the structure of his sermons, it will at once appear, that they too were made at one cast and can not easily be shown in pieces. The illustrations need the development; the development, the illustrations. The only part that is not really essential is the exegetical beginning, though by itself this part was always full of suggestions and surprises.

But even if the reader could be put in possession of all the sermons that Mr. Staples ever wrote in their entirety, if he had never heard him, he would still be unable to appreciate his influence as a preacher. There was something about him which can not be reported. If I had known him ever so well I might have felt its magic spell and so have had a richer experience of my own, so have realized the power and wonder of the man as now I never can, but I could not have reported it any more than I can now. It was that mysterious something which we call presence. Nothing is so intangible, but nothing is more real. It is not here or there but it is everywhere. And Mr. Staples was thus gifted in a wonderful degree. Not always equally; far less so in the general intercourse of society than in the pulpit. That was his tripod, and when he mounted it the Spirit came and filled him with its power. It was a wonder to himself. Sermons that he had written with difficulty and pain, that had come to him without any gush or joyfulness, would sometimes, when he stood before his people, suddenly dilate, and glow with an afflatus that hardly seemed his own. Sometimes it would inform the words that he had written with new meaning, sometimes it would cast them scornfully aside, and substitute for them others more worthy of the inspiration of the hour.

For the very reason that Mr. Staples was thus gifted, his

printed sermons can not seem to others as they seemed to those who heard them in his living voice; saw them flash from his eye, quiver upon his lips, and exhale from every attitude and motion of his frame. It is not that the sermons are less, it is that the man was more. I can only hope that as those who knew him read the few I have selected, he will once more seem to stand bodily before them, and it will be less as if they read them than as if he preached them in the old strong, sweet tones, electrifying. sympathetic, that used to carry them away as with a flood. The real sermon is not a mere manuscript; but the manuscript is all that can be printed. That itself seems to me in our friend's case always noble, earnest; often great. But it is by no means a fair exponent of the effect which he produced upon his congregation. The kingdom of heaven as it voiced itself through him from week to week, was not in word but in power.

If these remarks on Mr. Staples's preaching, and introductory to the few sermons and fragments I have brought together are appropriate anywhere, is it not just here where he was in the full tide of his Brooklyn ministry? But to return to his sermon of September 14th, which was the occasion of my digression, we find that it was too flat-footed for some of his people. Of course the adverse criticism found him out; whereupon for September 28th he wrote a sermon on "The sphere of the pulpit." The early part of the sermon which was on the text "It is not lawful for thee to have her," was spent in showing that there is nothing that man can do or think, however remote in its inception from the ordinary teaching of the pulpit, which may not suddenly turn up a moral side, and come within its immediate reach. The conclusion shows to what extent he had

overcome the hesitation that he felt in Lexington about delivering his soul.

"There is no pulpit in our denomination which has so handsome a reputation for freedom as this has. It is generally known and admitted that any man who has a truth to speak in love, can speak it here; that the members of this society do not hold their opinions by so feeble a tenure that they are afraid to hear any other opinions expressed. And there is no prouder reputation to be won or lost. Numbers, wealth, influ

ence, are only mockeries of a church, without a perfectly free pulpit. For this blessing we are indebted partly to your own good sense, and partly to the true and loving heroism of your former pastor. And while the pulpit is mine I do not intend it shall lose a prize so nobly won.

"No man but a minister can tell what an exceeding great joy it is, when in the simple pursuit of his duty he preaches words which all are glad to hear, and which draw forth increased expressions of love and approbation from his people. And as sweet as that is, so bitter is it, when in the same pursuit of his duty, he speaks a truth which men will not hear gladly, but which they mock at and turn away from. It seems as if he could not nerve himself again to prophesy other than words of peace. Yet I imagine a deeper hell, a hotter torture than this to seize upon one who for the love of ease, and for the sake of peace and the fear of displeasure, has sold his manhood with his liberty and refused to declare the whole counsel of God. From such a torment, O Lord, deliver me! and may our relation of pastor and people ever remain what it has always been, a union of love in speaking and hearing the truth, and seeking and doing the right, in knowing and living the good and pure and holy."

"October 3rd.—Am writing another sermon on 'Life.' "October 10th.-Have written hardly on 'As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.'"

“October 14th.— The Autumnal Convention met here to-day.

Convention sermon by C. C. Everett of Bangor. cool and pure as a mountain brook. "

It was quiet,

A few of us young

"October 16th.-Third day of convention. men held a meeting at Mr. Mills's house after the morning session, to see if we could not effect some organization among ourselves of the radical wing of the denomination.

ness.

"October 17th, Philadelphia.—Stayed all night with Dr. FurWas thoroughly exhausted from excitement and want of sleep. There was a bright fire on the hearth, a soft pillow on the lounge, and no one in the room but the doctor and myself. He brought out the manuscripts of a new book which he is about to publish, and began to read in a soft, soothing tone about the Man of Nazareth. I listened until the music wrought its charm on my weary nerves, and I fell asleep. I slept, Oh how sweetly, breathing great draughts of repose, until the charm was broken, and I awoke to find the reading ceased and the book laid away. We had much laughter over the affair. The doctor said, 'Now, sleep is in the course of nature. My theory must be the natural one since it chimes in so easily with sleep.' Then we sat up till two in the morning."

Mr. Staples's reverence for, and love of Dr. Furness began when he was at Meadville, and increased until his death. In his letters and journals many of their interviews are recorded, and always with a deep and tender joy and thankfulness. The last entry in the journal is that of October 28th:

"A bright, charming day. Came back to Staten Island. It was too charming to be resisted."

So ended the first year of his Brooklyn ministry. Its outward success had been great; but its inward success, both for himself and for his people, had been greater. Coming up from Staten Island with his family, they went to house-keeping on Brooklyn Heights, where he could over