Laicus; Or, the Experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish Part 23

CHAPTER XXIV.

Maurice Mapleson.

IT is not six weeks since Maurice Mapleson preached his first sermon here, at Wheathedge, and already events prove the wisdom of our selection. I have been studying somewhat and pondering more the secret of his success, and I have sat down this evening to try and clear up my own shadowy thoughts by reducing them to form. I often take my pen for such a purpose. Is it not Bacon who says the pen makes an accurate thinker?

Maurice Mapleson certainly is not what I should call a great preacher. He is not learned. He is not brilliant. He seldom tells us much about ancient Greece or Rome. He preached a sermon on Woman's function in the church, a few Sundays ago. I could not help contrasting it with Dr. Argure's sermon on the same subject. Maurice could not have made a learned editorial or magazine article out of his sermon. He did not even discuss the true interpretation of Paul's exhortations and prohibitions. He talked very simply and plainly of what the women could do here at Wheathedge.

He thanked them with unmistakeable sincerity for what they had already done, and made it an incentive to them to do more-more for Christ, not for himself.

Jennie says that is the secret of Maurice's success. He is appreciative. He never scolds. He commends his people for what they have done and so incites them to do more. She thinks that praise is a better spur than blame. She always manages her servants on that principle. Perhaps that is the reason why they are not the greatest plague of life to her.

But if Maurice's sermons are not great, neither are they long. He lays it down as a cardinal rule in moral hygiene that a congregation should not go away from the church hungry. Harry no longer begs to stay at home Sunday mornings, and even Mr. Hardcap rarely gets asleep.

If I compare Mr. Mapleson with Mr. Uncannon, I should say unhesitatingly that the latter was the more brilliant preacher of the two. No one ever comes out of church saying "What a powerful discourse! What a brilliant figure! What a pretty ill.u.s.tration! How eloquent!" But I find that we very often spend our dinner hour in discussing not the sermon, but its subject.

There are however two or three peculiarities which I observe about Maurice Mapleson's preaching. Dr. Argure tells me that he never writes a sermon without a reference to its future use. I once asked him whether he ever preached extemporaneously. "No," said he. "I have meant to. But I have so many fine sermons waiting to be preached that I could never bring myself to abandon them for a mere talk."

I do not think Maurice has any fine sermons waiting to be preached.

Indeed I know he has not. For one evening when he excused himself from accepting an invitation to tea, because he was behind-hand in his work and had his sermon to prepare, I replied, "You must have a good stock on hand. Give us an old one."

"I haven't a sermon to my name," he replied.

"What do you mean?" said I.

"I mean," said he, "that a sermon is not an essay; that every sermon I ever preached was prepared to meet some special want in my parish, and that when it was preached, there was an end of it. I could no more preach an old sermon than I could fire a charge of gun powder a second time."

"But experiences repeat themselves," said my wife. "What your people at Koniwa.s.set Corners knew of doubt, of trouble, of sorrow, of imperfect Christian experience, we know too. As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man."

"That is true," said Maurice thoughtfully. "But there are no two faces exactly alike. And my sermon is meaningless to me, if not to my people, unless I can see the want and bring out the truth to meet it."

"But the truth is always the same," said Jennie, "and the wants of the human heart are not widely different."

"That is both true and false," said he. "The truth is always the same; but not always the same to me. I fell into conversation with Mr. Gear last night on the subject of the atonement. He thinks it represents G.o.d as revengeful and unforgiving. Can I answer him with an old sermon? G.o.d's love is immutable. But I hope I understand it better and feel it more than I did three years ago. I cannot bring an old experience to meet a new want. No! a sermon is like a flower, it is of worth only when it is fresh."

His sermons at all events are always fresh. They are his personal counsel to personal friends. I dimly recognize this element of power in them. But this is not all. There is something more, something that I missed in Dr. Argure's learned essays, and in Mr. Uncannon's pulpit pyrotechnics. But it is something very difficult to define.

Did you ever consider the difference between a real flower and a wax imitation? The latter may be quite as beautiful. It may deceive you at first. And yet when you discover the deception you are disappointed. "The lack of fragrance," Jennie suggests. No! the flower may be odorless. It is the lack of life. I do not know what there is in that mystic life that should make such a difference. But I am sure that the charm of the flower is in its life.

The most beautiful statue that Powers ever chiseled does not compare for grace and beauty with the Divine model. The same mystic element of life is wanting.

There is life in Maurice Mapleson's sermons. What do I mean by life?

Earnestness? No! Mr. Work was earnest. But this mysterious life was wanting. I can feel it better than I can define it. It is not in the sermon. It is in the man. I get new information from Dr. Argure. I do not get much new information from Maurice Mapleson. I used to get new ideas occasionally from Mr. Work. I rarely get a new idea from Maurice Mapleson. But I get new life, and that is what I most want.

This element of life enters into all his work. It is in the man rather than in his productions.

Our prayer-meetings have improved wonderfully since he came. "How do you prepare for the prayer-meeting?" I asked him the other day.

"By an hour of sleep and an hour of prayer," he replied. "I always try to go into the meeting fresh."

And he succeeds. His coming into the meeting is like the coming of Spring. He brings an atmosphere with him. It is indescribable, but its effect is marvelous. Jennie says she never understood before as she does now what was meant by the declaration in Acts concerning the Apostles, that though they were unlearned men, the people took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus.

And it is this life which makes him so admirable as a pastor. "Is he social?" a friend asked me the other day. Yes. He is social. But that is not all. Mr. Work was social. But he was always a minister.

He went about the streets in a metaphysical white choker and black gown. He was everywhere professional. When he opened the subject of personal religion he did it with an introduction as formal and stately as that with which he habitually began his sermons. He formally inducted you into the witness box and commenced a professional inquisition on the state of your soul. I confess I have no fancy for that sort of Presbyterian confessional. I like the Papal confessional better. It does not invade your house and attack you with its questionings when you are in no mood for them. I told Mr. Work so once, whereat he was greatly shocked and somewhat indignant.

Mr. Uncannon too was very social. But he was never a minister.

Outside the pulpit he never introduced the subject of religion. I think it is perfectly safe to say that no one would have taken knowledge of him that he had been with Jesus. As to pastoral calls he expressly disavowed any intention of making any. "I have no time," said he, "for gadding about and spiritual gossiping. It's as much as I can do to get up my two sermons a week."

But Maurice is social in a different way. I asked him once what system he pursued as to pastoral calls.

"A very simple system," said he, "mix much with my people and be much with Christ. If I do both, Mr. Laicus, I shall not fail to bring them together. I don't trouble myself about ways and means."

The week after Mr. Mapleson came to Wheathedge, some ecclesiastical body met at Albany. I had a case before the Court of Appeals, and Maurice and I happened to take the same train. As we waited in the station he addressed himself to a surly looking baggage-master with this question, "What time will the train get to Albany?"

"Can't tell," said the surly baggage-master. "Nothing is certain to railroad men."

"Except one thing," said Mr. Mapleson.

"What's that?" said the surly baggage-master.

"Death," said Mr. Mapleson.

"That's a fact," said the surly baggage-master. "Specially certain to railroad men."

"And there is one other thing certain," added Maurice.

"What's that?" asked the baggage-master, no longer surly.

"That we ought to be ready for it."

The baggage-master nodded thoughtfully. "So we ought," said he; and he added as he turned away, "I hope you're readier than I be."

I note this little incident here because it revealed so much of Maurice Mapleson's character to me. I think it did more to disclose to me the secret of his success than any sermon he has ever preached. Mr. Work when he went away read us the statistics of his ministerial industry. He told us how many sermons he had preached, how many prayer meetings he had attended, how many sick he had visited, and how many religious conversations he had held with the impenitent. I should as soon think of Maurice Mapleson's keeping a record of the number of times he kissed his wife or taught his children-if he had any.

While I have been writing in a vain endeavor to put my vague and shadowy ideas of Maurice Mapleson's magnetic power into words, Jennie has come in and has seated herself beside me.

"Jennie, I cannot get into clear and tangible form my shadowy ideas.

What is the secret of ministerial success? What is the common characteristic which gives pulpit power to such widely dissimilar characters as Chalmers, Whitefields, the Westleys, Spurgeon and Robertson in England, and Edwards, Nettleton, Finney, the Beechers, father and son, Murray, John Hall, Dr. Tyng, and a score of others I could mention in this country?"

"Hand me your New Testament, John."

It was lying on the table beside me. She took it from my hand and opened it.

"I don't know as to all the names you have mentioned, John, but I think the secret of true pulpit power, the secret of Paul's wondrous power, the secret of Maurice Mapleson's power--the same in kind though smaller in measure--is this. And she read from Galatians, the second chapter and twentieth verse: