Will he make a Preacher ?

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about the end of February, he became much worse; the physician announced that a rapid consumption had developed itself, and on the 11th of March, 1872, our dearly loved and much missed brother breathed his last.

All through his illness he manifested great interest in every item of news which Christian friends brought him as to the progress of Christ's kingdom; and for the most part he was calm and hopeful, being supported and comforted by the great truths of the gospel. Sometimes, however, a despondency, to which he was a little inclined by temperament, for a season overcame him; and on the night before his departure the struggle with the last enemy was painful; but joy followed in the morning, and at the end he calmly fell asleep in Jesus.

May all who peruse this brief sketch of the life of a good man be stimulated to imitate his Christian consistency and earnestness! Of few could it be said with greater propriety than of him, that whilst not "slothful in business" he was "fervent in spirit, serving the Lord." And may the young people more especially, for whose spiritual welfare he was so solicitous; as they, too, read this imperfect memorial of their friend, remember his faithful admonitions and earnest prayers; and determine, by God's grace, so to live that they may at length meet him at the Saviour's right hand!

"Captain and Saviour of the host
Of Christian chivalry;

We bless Thee for our comrade true
Now summoned up to Thee.

We bless Thee for His every step
In faithful following Thee;

And for his good fight fought so well,
And crowned with victory.

We Thank Thee that the way-worn sleeps

The sleep in Jesus blest:

The purified and ransomed soul
Hath entered into rest.

We bless Thee that His humble love
Hath met with such regard:

We bless Thee for His blessedness
And for His rich reward."

P.S.-Since the above was composed the following incident has been narrated to the writer, and is now mentioned as illustrative of the affectionate regard with which, as Sunday school superintendent, Mr. Squier inspired those who came in contact with him.

There is a little girl, now in the last stage of consumption, until recently a scholar in the Broad Street school. The other day she requested her mother to reach from the shelf a certain book. Opening it she turned to a photograph likeness of her late superintendent. Then looking at it fixedly in silence for some minutes, she closed the book and returned it to her mother, saying, "I shall soon see him." It is now nearly twelve months since this little one actually saw her friend at school; but such is her affectionate remembrance of him still. Probably before this paper meets the reader's eye the anticipation of her heart will be realised."

THIS is a question which is constantly cropping up. In the recent discussions concerning our College and the supply of ministers, it occupied a forward place. In determining the action of pastors and of churches with regard to candidates for the ministry, it is the most important consideration. Christian parents, solicitous for the future of the kingdom of Christ, not infrequently ask it about their children. Young men, full of love to Christ, and anxious for the largest usefulness in the world, put it concerning themselves. Of course I do not expect to give a complete answer in this brief paper to so comprehensive an enquiry. Probably no reply could meet the requirements of every case, any more than a general statement of the qualifications necessary for an eminent lawyer or a conspicuous civil engineer would make it an easy thing to determine the fitness of A or B for either profession.

The test of a large experience is the only infallible reply. Many an unpromising man has finally gained a high position. One who was once regarded as a "ministerial failure," now ranks amongst the foremost preachers of this metropolis. A young man who narrowly escaped rejection at the hands of a college committee, became a most useful pastor and effective preacher, and left behind him an honoured and beloved name. small schoolboy without promise, without brightness, developed into the clever author of "Waverley," and the charming delineator of the men and manners of byegone days. Gray's hackneyed lines have had many illustrations; but in no department of life more,

A

than in that of the ministry," Full many a gem of purest ray serene, the dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear." But these are exceptions. Genius mostly gives signs. Capacity will betray itself. The gem will now and again flash a ray of brightness to the eyes of the observant few. There are premonitions of greatness; indistinct, confused, hazy, perhaps, but still useful foreshadowings of the possbilities of the future. Joseph dreams dreams which foreloom the ruler of Egypt. His aspirations are the children of his great powers. David throws a lion and a bear, and by meekness conquers the taunts of Eliab his elder brother; and both the courage and the patience are foregleams of the heroic character whose accomplishments afterwards fill the daughters of Judah with song, and the spirit of the haughty Saul with envy.

And if the signs are indistinct, and the prophcies written in uncertain characters, let us remember that we do not ask "is he a preacher now?" but "will he make one?" i.e. will twenty years of training, of which four, say, are at college and sixteen at hard ministerial work, face to face with the demands of the age, bearing the trials of the ministry, and learning from the teaching of experience, will all that make him a preacher? It is not how much metal does the mine yield to-day; but will it pay for working? Has it enough virgin metal in it? Is there the living germ of a hardworking, sympathetic selfsacrificing preacher of the gospel of Christ? Does he give promise, if not of conspicuous endowments, and finely developed ability, at least of becoming such a preacher as this age needs, adapted to the necessities and capabilities of the churches of this hour? That is the question. Not, is he already richly furnished with knowledge, free from defects in speech, fluent in talk, capable of constructing a sermon with ease and delivering it with grace and force? These are greatly to be desired. But a man may to-day be without any one or all of these qualifications, and yet have the make in him of a most useful, if not a really great and distinguished preacher.

The acquisition of a certain measure of information is not at all a reliable sign. It may only indicate the kind fortune that has presided over our early years and favoured us with all the facilities of a good education. Indeed it may hide the native strength of the mind, and obscure the signs of force or weakness of character that otherwise would be clearly seen and easily interpreted. Memory may make a cicerone, a toast-master, or a wearying repeater of the worn-out platitudes of the hour, but not a teacher of men, a builder of souls. Putting cart loads of bricks together will not make a house; nor will bushels of information make a preacher. Two men started college life together. One had been at school from six to eighteen, and was provided with all sorts of scholarship. The other had snatched his knowledge with his scant meals, and after a hard day's work, and had gained but a very slender stock. To-day the first is a dreary, prosing scribe. The second flashes his great and earnest thoughts week by week into a thousand souls with almost electrical effect. What a man has in his possession is not valid proof of his power of getting. Good training and high scholarship are of immense value, but they will not compensate for the absence of those grand qualities that make the real preacher.

Other signs are also misleading. For example, mere power of talk is not enough. Voice is indispensable, and a facility in the expression of ideas a great advantage. But everybody knows that a man may have a sweet or sonorous voice, a fluent speech and a pleasing presence, and yet carry a woefully empty head and a still emptier heart. Nor is usefulness in Christian work to be trusted as an infallible warranty for entrance into the ministry. That "souls have been saved" by our preaching may be blessedly true; but surely such successes attend the labours of the Sunday school teacher, the visitor of the poor and neglected, and indeed of all who work for the Lord. Pleasing testimonies these are that the Lord of the harvest graciously prospers our efforts; but not in themselves guide-posts as to the direction in which we should regularly exert our powers. Hardly more helpful to us is that feeling which we interpret as "a call of God to the ministry." To the candidate the conviction, if he has it wrought within him by the Holy Spirit, will be an inspiration to self-sacrifice and to constancy of devotion. But since men have felt it,. who have proved very clearly that they were mistaken; others, beside the candidate, must answer the question by a light clearer to them than that which is sacredly confined to a man's own spirit.

What, then, are these trustworthy signs? They are various, and require to be taken together. (1). I should ask, Can the examinee work? Has he the capacity for taking immense trouble? Will difficulty excite him to labour? If he shows any fear of work, hard, continuous work he will never make an effective preacher. If the severity of the drill, the prolonged character and thoroughness of the discipline terrify him so that he cannot make up his mind to endure it, he plainly has no "call." The power of patient, plodding labour, of mapping out a programme and sticking to its essentials in a long life, of sustained effort is indispensable. It is necessary for the lawyer, for the physician, for the

Will he make a Preacher ?

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He

man of business; but it is more necessary to the minister than to any of them. has to grow, to grow mentally and spiritually, and to keep growing if he is to be a useful preacher; and there is no growth without work and without hard work. If he does not like work, will not leave his pleasures for it, will not fill spare moments with it, nor bind and rebind his soul to his chosen task, then let him get some mere mechanical employment, of making an entry, or wrapping up parcels, but by all means keep aloof from an occupation which demands the whole being from the centre outwards. I have seen not a few men for whom this test has been sufficient. They have needed no other. Half-an-hour in the drill ground has led them to utter a long farewell to the Christian ministry.

(2.) Still more important is it to see if the candidate loves the special work of the ministry with all his heart. If he is passionately fond of it, almost idolizes it, finds it in his dreams, and in his walks, colouring his fancies and his aspirations, coming out in his Sunday school teaching, and in his addresses at prayer meetings, affecting his book buying and his recreations, then you may rest assured that you are on the track of one of the surest qualifications for ministerial work that exists. Does he love the souls of men and want to save them? Is he burning with desire to mould the characters of men, to help them to heaven?-then as the musician turns everything into song, and the artist into pictures, so he will translate all things into sermons, into means for doing the great work of his life. Admit him to college at once; we shall hear of him again. He has the genius for preaching.

(3.) Bring another test. Has he faith as well as love, and does his faith rule him? I do not mean has he a bundle of beliefs, all appropriately labelled according to somebody's theological system and ready to be spread out before an Examining Committee like so many hard geological specimens, but has he firm and living trust in the Saviour and in His invisible dominion? Does he walk by faith in the unseen? Is he willing to do his work, and leave the keeping of his purse to God? Does he show any traces of the self-sacrifice that is begotten of such a grasp of the powers of the world to come? If there are no intimations of such a self-sacrificing faith as that, then, though he can talk with the tongue of angels, and knows all languages, he will not make an abidingly effective preacher. Under the pressure of ministerial trial and disappointment, or long deferred success, he will shrivel up into a prosperous insurance agent, or a well-paid reviser of printed texts.

(4.) I would ask yet another question. Has he a really broad sympathetic nature, a capacity to enter into and appreciate human conditions, a quickness in reading men and the way of dealing with them? Do his prayers contain a thrilling tenderness, a sweet moving pathos? Is he sensitive to the sorrows of the poor, and touched by the infirmities of age? Can he glow into a real ardour of enthusiasm over moral and spiritual ideas and facts? If so, then depend upon it you have one who will come to have wide sway over the hearts and consciences of men. But if there are not even feeble signs of these heart-qualities; but proofs of a cold, narrow, hard spirit, ready to take on prejudices, assume self-consequential airs, and cherish petty resentments, then know he certainly will not make a heaven-sent preacher. He might perhaps develope into a dissector of creeds, a classifier of the opinions of others, a systematizer of theology, but a living heart-moving character-elevating preacher never. Thus all these signs centre in what the man is, not in what he has; in his mental and moral and spiritual character, and not in his mental furniture, his power of voice, or grace of style. It is the whole man that preaches; and to tell whether a man will make a preacher or not, we must carefully put together all the indications we have of what he is capable of becoming.

Now if I did not want to know whether the examinee would make a preacher or not, I should let him preach "a trial sermon ;" put before him two or three D.D.'s and M.A.'s, and half-a-dozen wise-looking committee men, tell him he was on his trial, and that his hopes of getting qualified for the work that is so dear to his heart, all hung on the sermon he was about to preach. Such a plan is about as wise as if you were to put the poor fellow into a tank of cold water on a January night, up to the chin, and bid him orate from thence. We really must trust to our pastors and tutors, and safely-judging friends, a great deal more, and seek in less direct and formal methods a knowledge of the qualifications of applicants for the ministry. Interviews and efforts in which candidates are perfectly free and natural will discover more reliable evidence for judgment than dozens of trial sermons. If it be a good thing to give a young man a thorough fright, and make him perspire for an hour under it, by all means let him have it; but do not let us determine the question of his fitness for preaching work by the way in which he behaves under such torturing circumstances.

May the good Lord send us many men after his own heart, help us to know each one of them when they come, and to train them all effectively in His blessed service. JOHN CLIFFORD.

TWO TOURS IN THE UNITED STATES.

BY REV. DR. BURNS.

IN 1847 our Association appointed the Rev. Joseph Goadby and myself as a Deputation to the Free-will Baptist Triennial Convention in America. The Convention was held at Sutton, Vermont. Mr. Goadby, through a severe illness, was detained in Rhode Island, and was unable to be present till towards the end of the Convention; happily as soon as I landed I was able to take a somewhat extensive tour, comprising about 2,500 miles, and to visit Baltimore, Washington, and then to cross over by Harper's Ferry, Pittsburg, &c., to Oberlin, where I spent some days in that noble institution where President Finney and Professor Mahan were exerting so great an influence, both as it regards slavery, the preaching of a free salvation, and the training of men and women, irrespective of colour, for educational and evangelistic work. I visited, also, during that visit, Buffalo, the Falls of Niagara, and Montreal, and then crossed over into the States, and reached Sutton, where the brethren had already assembled. After the Convention, I took several of the Free Baptist Churches in my way back to Boston, and left with brother Goadby for home in November. My small book giving particulars of that tour has been out of print for twenty years. I often regretted that I had not spent a few weeks more during that visit, and I resolved, if providence permitted, to see the Western States; and when the Pacific railroad was completed, I began to prepare to carry my purpose into execution. Many very dear friends, since 1847, have passed away and gone to their better home. Elders Place, Perkins, Hutchings, Dr. Noyes, and brother Burr, were among the number. Many of the students and young ministers of 1847 are among the pillars of the connexion now. My tour of this year comprised 8,677 miles on the other side of the Atlantic, reaching from New York via Rhode Island, Massachussets, New Hampshire, to Portland in Maine; and then westward to Albany, Cleveland, and to Chicago. Then through Wisconsin to Lake Superior, Minnesota and Iowa to Omaha, on the Missouri river in Nebraska, thence by the Great Union and Central Pacific Railway to Salt Lake City, Utah, and on to Sacramenta and San Francisco and the Pacific. Preaching and lecturing in the chief places on the route, and returning taking in my way the Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Forest of bay trees. Revisiting Chicago, and attending a ministerial conference at Buffalo, I passed through the interior of New York State, and took on my way Connecticut, and paying a flying visit to the Wesleyan University at Middleton which conferred upon me the Doctorate in 1846. Then spending another Sabbath in New York City, and preaching and lecturing, I then returned by the same steamer, the "Adriatic," in which I went out, and which accomplished that voyage in the unprecedented short period of seven days, eighteen hours, and fifty-five minutes. After nineteen weeks absence I returned to my home and church, not having experienced one hour's sickness or inconvenience. I was acting chaplain on both voyages, and had an interesting audience of steerage passengers on the subject of Temperance going out, when a goodly number signed the pledge. Such is a rapid view of both tours. The manifest improvement in the Freewill Baptist churches was very striking, the progress in their educational institutions most remarkable. Hillsdale, and Bates' Colleges, will compare favourably with any schools of learning in the States. It would require a long paper to do justice to them. I never saw more delightful Christian congregations than those of Dover, N. H., Portland, Lewiston, and Chicago. Congregational singing is making progress, and the Sunday schools, many of them, are models of what we think such institutions ought to be. The Morning Star, edited by our dear brother, Dr. Day, is equal to any religious journal in the States; and the printing establishment in Dover, is a mighty and prosperous power for good to the whole connexion. The Baptist Union, published in New York, and edited by Dr. Ball, and which seeks to spread true Christian catholicity, and to promote real union in all Baptist churches, is obtaining an ever growing circulation, and is sustained by a great variety of influential ministers and writers. The only regret I felt was that in Boston the Freewill Baptist interest is not better located, and that in New York the cause is not stronger.

This tour can never be forgotten. I was greatly cheered by what I saw and heard. The revivals in some districts are very encouraging; and it was delightful to hear brother Curtis tell what God had done for the church in Concord, the capital of N. H. The life and spiritual vigour of their prayer meetings, their unflagging devotion to Temperance and Prohibition, the spreading out of their denomination to Minnesota, Nebraska, &c., and the improved spirit of liberality in sustaining their ministers and upholding their colleges, excited my highest admiration. No denomination in the States is more earnest than our Free Baptists, and I pray that God may bless them and increase them a thousandfold.

SCRAPS FROM THE EDITOR'S WASTE-BASKET.