“The warm emotions are kept from exhaling, and becoming vapory and obscure, by the systematizing tendency of the logical faculty, and the hard, dry forms of logic are softened, and enlivened, by the vernal breath of the emotions” (Shedd, Homiletics and Pastoral Theology, p. 233).
A Central Part of the Labor
“The Country Parson, if there be any of his parish that hold strange Doctrines, useth all possible diligence to reduce them to the common Faith” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 89).
Getting to the Inside
“When once all have learned the words of the Catechism, he thinks it the most useful way that a Pastor can take, to go over the same, but in other words: for many say the Catechism by rote, as parrots, without ever piercing into the sense of it” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 83).
Curiosity Killed the Preacher
“Curiosity in prying into high speculative and unprofitable questions, is another great stumbling block to the holiness of Scholars” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 67).
Both Ways
“In order that the human faculties may work with the greatest harmony and energy, the heart must be in the head, and the head in the heart” (Shedd, Homiletics and Pastoral Theology, pp. 227-228)
Choice Observations
“The Parson’s Method in handling of a text consists of two parts: first, a plain and evident declaration of the meaning of the text; and secondly, some choice Observations drawn out of the whole text, as it lies entire, and unbroken in the Scripture itself” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 64).
Always Potent
“Sermons are dangerous things . . . none goes out of Church as he came in, but either better, or worse” (Herbert, The Country Parson, pp. 62-63).
Joy and Throne
“The Country Parson preacheth constantly, the pulpit is his joy and his throne” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 62).
Different Ways It Can Go
“An ignorant, undisciplined, and unspiritual man cannot write a good sermon; neither need a learned, thoroughly disciplined, and holy man, preach a bad extemporaneous sermon” (Shedd, Homiletics and Pastoral Theology, p. 221).
Basic Qualifications
“Now if a shepherd know not which grass will bane, or which not, how is he fit to be a shepherd?” (Herbert, The Country Parson, p. 60; bane means poison).