unknown to the greatest part of the believers who run in crowds to the feet of these Christian pulpits, and which are the ordinary cause of our ministry being attended with so little fruit.
Part I. — It is not the body of external works, says St. Augustine, which distinguishes the just from the carnal Christian: it is the invisible spirit which animates them. Pious actions are frequently common to the good and to the wicked; it is the disposition of the heart which discriminates them. All run, says the Apostle, but all reach not the goal, for it is not the same spirit which impels them.
Now, to apply this maxim to my subject: of all the duties of Christian piety, there is undoubtedly none of which the external is more equally fulfilled by the worldly, and by the pious, than that of coming to hear the word of the Gospel. All run in crowds, like the Israelites formerly to the foot of the holy mountain, to hear the words of the law. Our temples are hardly sufficient to contain the multitude of believers: profane assemblies break up to swell the number of the holy assembly at the hours of instruction; and the ages which have seen the zeal of Christians so relaxed on every other duty of religion, have not, it would seem, witnessed it in this. Nevertheless, of all the ministries confided to the church for the consummation of the chosen, there is scarcely any so unprofitable as that of the word; and the most efficacious means which the church hath, in every age, employed for the conversion of men, is become, at present, its feeblest resource. You, my brethren, are yourselves a melancholy proof of this truth. Never were instructions more frequent than in our days, and never were conversions so rare.
It is of importance, therefore, to explain the causes of so common and so deplorable an abuse. Now, the first is undoubtedly the want of those dispositions which ought to accompany you to this holy place, in order to listen to the word of salvation. And, surely, if St. Paul formerly commanded all believers to purify themselves before coming to eat of the bread of life, — if he declared to them, that not to distinguish it from ordinary food was to render themselves guilty of the body of the Lord, we have no less reason to tell you that you ought to prove yourselves, and to prepare your soul before you come to participate in that spiritual food which we break to the people: and that not to distinguish it from the word of men, in your manner of listening to it, is to render yourselves guilty even of the word of Jesus Christ.
The first disposition required of you by the sanctity of this word, when you come to hear it, is a sincere desire that it may be useful to you. Before coming to our temples, you ought, privately, in your own house, to address yourself to the Father of Light, to entreat him to bestow upon you that ear of the heart which alone makes his voice to be heard; to give to his word that efficacy, that inward unction, those attractions so powerful and so successful in the conversion of sinners, that he may overcome that insensibility
