HAS THE SOUTHERN PULPIT FAILED?

WHO has been practicing upon the credulity of the Rev. David Swing? or how in the name of common honesty has he become possessed with the idea that the Southern pulpit has failed? He does not produce a scrap of evidence to lay a foundation in fact for his strange hallucination. His paper would not have been more astounding in its audacity, if it had been an effort to account for the failure of the Southern soil, or to explain the failure of the Southern sun to longer quicken and mature the cotton-plant!

He is content with no middle flight-he would be profound and philosophical; and so he summons at once the manes of Francis Bacon. How strange it is that men may admire and extol the "Novum Organum," and yet fail to understand, or wholly misapply, the simplest doctrines of the inductive philosophy! It would have been reasonable to suppose that one so enamored of the scientific method would have begun with particulars, and thus ascended to the enunciation of a proposition so astounding-one, so far as we know, never before sprung upon the world; but, instead of this, he has given us a brilliant example of the dogmatic method of the schoolmen which he so much abhors. If the story were not somewhat stale, we should like to recite for his benefit the artifice which, it is said, a certain monarch practiced upon his savants when he called upon them to explain why it was that a vessel of water does not weigh more with a live fish in it than it does without the fish! Sure it is, that he assumes for granted a proposition singularly at variance from fact, and then coolly sets himself to work to explain the absurdity.

This is itself such a remarkable phenomenon that we are impelled to look for some explanation of it; and where better can we look than in that authority which he so heartily commends and so strangely offends? In the "Novum Organum" we read: "The human understanding resembles not a dry light, but admits a tinc

ture of the will and passions, which generate their own system accordingly; for man always believes more readily that which he prefers." And, by way of corollary, we find in the "De Augmentis": "Another error is an impatience of doubt and haste to assertion without due and mature suspension of judgment. For the two ways of contemplation are not unlike the two ways of action commonly spoken of by the ancients-the one plain and smooth in the beginning and in the end impassable; the other rough and troublesome in the entrance, but after a while fair and even so it is in contemplation; if a man will begin with certainties, he will end in doubt; but, if he will be content to begin with doubt, he shall end in certainties." The dogmatic stride of the distinguished author of the paper under review is not a little marred by the limp in his logic. At one moment he pathetically exclaims, "How are the mighty fallen!" and the next he is tempted to abandon the inquiry with the reflection, "It never was well." But, whichever way he will have it, since we are quite ready to exonerate him from any malicious intention to misrepresent the Southern clergy, we must conclude that his information is very limited. The earnestness and power of the Southern pulpit have always been an admitted fact, as well in the North as in the South. Its representative men have always enjoyed the generous and hearty applause of their brethren in the North. There must be many people in New York who remember a remarkable scene at the old Tabernacle in that city in 1844. Dr. Bascom was to preach at night. Long before the time, the immense building was thronged so that not another soul could find room. The preacher began, and at once carried the vast concourse up to the highest pitch of tension. At three several times the proprieties of the place were quite forgotten, and the whole congregation burst forth in long and loud applause! Henry Clay declared him to be the "greatest natural orator in America." Marvelous things are told of his preaching. Entire congregations would rise unconsciously, and press toward the pulpit in uncontrollable excitement. On one occasion he produced such a frenzy of excitement by a morning sermon at a camp-meeting that nobody could be heard all the day through.

On another occasion in Kentucky Mr. Clay was in the congregation. He listened for some time to the daring sweep of thought, the electric and impetuous declamation, the searching appeals to conscience, until at last he was carried beyond all bounds of propriety, and gave vent to his excitement by exclaiming: "Well done,

Bascom-give it to them, give it to them!" When Dr. Bascom was chaplain in Congress, General Jackson was carried away in a similar manner by the vividness of a picture he was painting, and exclaimed aloud, "My God, he is lost!"

The South has always been full of men noted for their pulpit eloquence. How could it be otherwise among a people of open and generous impulses—in the land of all others in the world given to the freest and most open interchange of opinions in public assemblies? The South is the home of natural oratory, and from the days of Patrick Henry every hamlet has had fluent and forcible speakers.

Nor has the style of pulpit-speaking been at all confined to the rugged and exciting type of oratory. The South has produced, and still has, men of smoothest periods and most polished diction. Who that ever heard the great Dr. Hawks can forget his polished accents and his irresistible logic? How all who were present at his trial in New York delight to describe the matchless power by which he held that vast assembly in a thrill of excitement for days together! The people of New York will not soon forget this great master of eloquence and logic. Few men could have maintained the position he did through the stormy scenes of the war, when he refused either to withdraw or bend before the torrent of excitement.

And, again, in all the catalogue of eminent clergymen, what name is there which to this day will call up a deeper sense of reverence than that of Bishop Elliott, of Georgia? Dignity and culture, piety and power, were so wondrously blended in him that, with all the gentleness of a woman, he possessed the strength of a giant. His carriage and manner were inimitable. He was one of the committee appointed by the House of Bishops to adjust the unfortunate and vexatious Onderdonk difficulty. He presented and read the paper containing the concessions of Bishop Onderdonk. After it had been accepted and the case dismissed, Bishop Meade, of Virginia, who was not a little incensed at the action, approached the Bishop of Georgia, and said: "Elliott, that was all your doing. Your sympathetic tone and soft accents in reading that paper carried the House out of their senses. They never would have accepted it if anybody else had read it." Truly, the fame of this great Bishop is in all the churches. When shall we look upon his like again?

And then, again, that other Georgian whose life ran parallel with that of Bishop Elliott's through so many years-Dr. Lovick Pierce, so late fallen asleep. When great preachers are mentioned,

his name can not fail to rise to the lips of all who knew him, and who did not? The celebrated Dr. Olin bore testimony to his wondrous powers in the strong emotion, even to tears, which he is known to have shown under the effect of his preaching, as well as in the deliberate declaration that, "if left to choose among all the preachers in America the one under whose ministrations he should sit for years, Dr. Pierce would be the man of his choice."

And then there was Dr. William Capers, of South Carolina. In what enthusiastic terms the English bore testimony to the simplicity, and purity, and fervor of his preaching when he visited England in 1828, as the representative of the Methodist Church in America! When asked how he had acquired his pure Saxon style and simple earnestness, he replied that he did not know, unless it was in preaching to the simple-minded blacks upon the rice-plantations of Carolina.

In the memorable debate in the General Conference in New York in 1844, upon the case of Bishop Andrew, and which led to the unfortunate separation of the Methodist Church into North and South, the speaking of the Southern men was of the most brilliant type, as any one who remembers will bear witness, and the accounts given at the time will fully show. Dr. Winans, of the Mississippi Conference, opened the debate on the Southern side-"an impetuous speaker, after the Greek model. His massive strength, put in motion by a glowing spirit, furnished a mighty momentum which struck like the swell of the sea when stormy winds rule the waters." Remarkable speeches were made by Dr. William A. Smith, of Virginia; the Pierces, father and son; and Dr. Longstreet, of Georgia, Mr. Stringfellow, of North Carolina, and Dr. Green, of Tennessee. Dr. Capers spoke last. His bearing was marked by the highest refinement of manner. Though speaking at the close of a prolonged and exciting debate, his perfect command of voice, his easy flow of words, and his clear and vigorous thought held that weary body with a freshness and power which belonged rather to an opening effort. We speak of these things because they are historical, and because there must be many who can bear witness to their faithfulness.

The Presbyterians have had their full share of eminent preachers. There was the celebrated Dr. Thornwell, so powerful in controversy, so thorough in scholarship, so eloquent in manner. Where can we look for greater purity of character, sounder learning, or greater pulpit powers? The venerable Dr. Plummer, too, still with his

harness on, ranks with the foremost preachers in any land. With these men comes up the memory of the world-distinguished Dr. Bachman, of the Lutheran Church in Charleston, the associate and collaborator of Audubon. The stalwart blows he dealt the materialists, as the modern tide of infidelity came in, must be fresh in the memory of all who know anything of such matters. His reputation was not confined to this continent; he was a corresponding member of nearly all the learned societies of Europe. The Andrews, of Virginia, so intimately associated with Princeton, are too widely known to require more than a mere mention. Dr. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, was a man of Herculean mold.

Of the many eminent men among the Baptists we barely mention Jesse Mercer, of Georgia, who has given his name to Mercer University; Richard Furman, after whom Furman University is called; Andrew Broadus, a peerless pulpit orator, sometimes called "the Robert Hall of America"; Richard Fuller, of South Carolina, pastor for more than a quarter of a century in Baltimore; and Jeremiah B. Jeter, a writer and speaker of transcendent powers. The list could be prolonged indefinitely.

Some mention has already been made of the Episcopal clergy, but we can not forbear a reference to Bishop Ravenscroft, of North Carolina; Bishops Meade and Johns, of Virginia; Whittingham, of Maryland; Otey, of Tennessee; Cobbs, of Alabama, and Wilmer, of Louisiana.

The Roman Catholics have also had men of eminent parts in the South, such as Archbishop Kenrick, of Baltimore; Bishops England, of Charleston, and McGill, of Richmond. Surely, the past of the pulpit in the South teems with men of gigantic stature.

If we do not speak much of the present, it is not because there is not much to be said. If there has been any decadence in the pulpit, nobody in the South has yet discovered it. Where are there finer pulpit orators than Drs. Palmer, of New Orleans; Hoge, of Richmond; Dagg, of Georgia; and Robinson, of Kentucky? Bishop Beckwith has an immense reputation, as well in the North as in the South. Bishop Wilmer, of Alabama; Quintard, of Tennessee; Garret and Elliott, of Texas, are all superior preachers. The number of distinguished men who come to mind is so great that it is an embarrassment to decide whom to name.

But to return to Mr. Swing's paper. If his proposition were not "the baseless fabric of a vision," but a substantial reality, he would still be singularly unhappy in every point he advances as an ex