new year, and it requires great versatility of mind to educe from either of these lessons for successive years the trains of thought which are expected on the first of January. An illustration of the manner in which Reinhard steers through the difficulties of his position, is seen in the following summary of one of his sermons from Luke 2: 21.1 Introduction. The new year suggests to a man the importance of time. But time would lose for him much of its value were it not for his being known to the community by a proper name, which suggests his person to every one who hears it. Criminals often think that, by changing their names, they are made over again. If any one of us should give up the cognomen by which he has been designated, he would seem to have lost a part, at least, of himself, and after this disturbance of his identity, his future life would seem to be less intimately connected with the past, and would thus appear to him less important than it now does. Many persons had been called Jesus, before our Saviour was thus designated; but what a dignity has he imparted to that word! What a worthy appellation it has become through his virtues! Proposition. We shall best spend the year on which we entered to-day, if the names by which we are known, are as valuable to us, as they should be to true Christians. Division. I must first illustrate the value which a true Christian finds in his name, and secondly, show that we shall spend the new year in the best manner, if we feel that our own names possess this value.2 First Head. The name of a Christian is valuable to him, A. As a mark of distinction from other persons; for society would be confused and would fall into many and ruinous mistakes, if there were no such convenient methods of distinguishing different individuals. from which Reinhard usually preached. Different systems of lessons are used in different lands. Predigten, 1797, Band I. ss. 1—21. It should be said, however, that Reinhard speaks of his train of thought in this sermon, as unusual for the pulpit. * Here Reinhard inserts an explanation which exemplifies his extreme, sometimes unnecessary care in making all his assertions perspicuous and precise. “By the word name, I here mean those words which are employed for precisely designating our persons, and for distinguishing us from all others. They may or may not be in themselves specially significant, may be derived from our own or foreign languages, may have been selected for us with consideration and for some peculiar distinctive purpose, or capriciously and under the influence of accidental circumstances; all these things are of not the slightest weight, and do not affect the minds of rational Christians with regard to the intrinsic value of their names." s. 6. 1849.] Sermon on New Year's Day. 313 B. As a remembrancer of his reception into the bosom of the church. It was given him at his baptism, as Christ's at his circumcision, and is associated with all the vows then made for him, and all the significance of that initiatory rite. C. As a sign of his connection with an honored or beloved family. If the family be honored, how precious the word which associates all that reputation with himself; if it be not unusually revered by society at large, many members of it are beloved by himself, and how sweet the word which indicates his consanguinity with those to whom his heart clings in the fondest attachment. D. As the object around which is entwined all that others think of him or feel toward him. It is the ring which encircles within itself the various opinions and emotions which men have in regard to his character. What a multitude of thoughts and feelings are awakened at the bare name of Jesus! And in a degree, all the followers of Christ should associate their names with such a demeanor, as will give a peculiar meaning to those otherwise arbitrary letters, and make them suggestive of whatever is great and good. The mere mention of their names may and should be a stimulus to high and holy efforts. E. As the vehicle by which our influence may be transmitted to posterity. Our names will survive us, perhaps for centuries. We may so conduct ourselves that they will be associated with lessons of instruction to coming ages, will excite emotions, elevating men to virtue or alluring them into sin. Can a Christian, then, be indifferent to the spiritual associations, which may fruitfully cluster around his cognomen when he himself is no more? Second Head. We shall best spend the year on which we this day enter, if we attach to our names the importance which we have just ascribed to them; for this view of their importance will lead us, A. To rectify our faults; not to allow the very sound which suggests the idea of our persons, to be significant of odious qualities to our contemporaries and successors, and thus to disgrace ourselves, our relatives, and the church: B. To rescue our names from obscurity; not to permit them to be unconnected in the memory of man with deeds of wisdom and beneficence, with habits of punctuality and faithfulness: C. To adorn all our social and public relations; to make each member of our families rejoice in our names; each of our fellow citizens love to repeat them; the church of Christ at whose baptismal altar we received them, derive comfort from the virtues VOL. VI. No. 22. 27 which they bring to mind, and delight in them as the names which are written in heaven : D. To commend ourselves more and more to the consciences of men by multiplying our meritorious deeds; if we are now eminent and all eyes directed toward us, we should increase the worthiness of our example, so that our names shall be mentioned with new complacency by the multitudes who are proud to imitate us : E. To occupy every hour of the new year with zealous labors for the general welfare; for life is short; and we must be diligent, if we would scatter all along our pathway such memorials of ourselves as will excite the gratitude of posterity, and quicken them to cultivate the virtues which will be suggested by the very letters which designate our persons. By useful industry each man may acquire a good name, and one which is permanently useful. The preceding abstract from Reinhard leads us into the § 6. Rhetorical Structure of his Discourses. It is needless to say that one excellence of his sermons consists in their accurate arrangement. His mind was so severely disciplined that he wrote, both on the most intricate and the most familiar themes, with a remarkable exactness of method. Almost every one of his sermons is a system, having its general Divisions, each of which is subdivided into tributary parts, and each of these parts exhibits a wonderful precision in the sequence of its component thoughts. A skeleton of one of his sermons fails to exhibit the rigid order which pervades the entire composition, for the muscles of the body are as nicely and systematically collocated as the bones. He generally announces his main Divisions immediately after the statement of his theme. He often enumerates the Subdivisions of each principal topic, immediately after that topic is brought forward to be discussed. He distinctly repeats the Subdivision both at the commencement and at the close of its discussion. He announces its minute and specific parts with so much neatness and accuracy, as to make the whole discourse appear like a congeries of themes, particular and general, one rising above another, and all in their inter-dependencies, constituting a single, comprehensive, extensively related, organized, almost living subject. It must be confessed, indeed, that his arrangement is often artificial, that he sacrifices ease to order, and thus extends his excellence into a fault.1 He Reinhard comments very freely on his own errors in the arrangement of his sermons, but denies that he ever intended to force his thoughts into a preconceived or favorite order. See Geständnisse, Sulzbach, 1810, ss. 156, 157. 1849.] Their regular Structure. 315 is too much enamored of the poetry of the mathematics, the rhythm of numbers. He is, for example, too fond of a division into four general topics, and a subdivision of each of the four into a couple of secondary parts. He often divides the body of his sermon into six heads, and concludes with three inferences. Four and two, six and three are with him far preferable to seven and three, five and two. He devotes nearly an equal amount of space to each of his regular divisions, and thus gives to the whole sermon a balance and equipoise which indicate constraint in his own mind, and interfere with the natural growth of his theme. But although a syllabus of his discourses will not expose the whole extent of their symmetry, it will indicate the principle on which he elaborated them, a principle far too excellent to be disregarded as it often is, and appearing none the less important from the excess into which a scholastic preacher has carried it. Perhaps the structure of our author's and of many other German discourses, may be well exhibited in the following abstract of a double sermon which he preached on the two successive days of the Easter Festival. Doxology, from 1 Pet. 1: 3, 4 (instead of the Benediction with which his discourses usually commenced). Introduction, closed with a brief prayer. The instability of all things on earth depresses the heart; hence man strives to make himself immortal in the respect and affection of posterity. But he fails in his design. This festival presents the only object which can gratify man's love of permanence and immortality; for it shows him that he is not born to die, but dies to live forever and ever. The resurrection of Christ suggests the following Proposition. The Infinite in the employments and the experiences of man. Division. 1. Explanation and proof of the Infinite in human affairs. 2. The importance of recognizing it. Before discussing this subject let us entreat for the Divine aid in a silent prayer. (Here the congregation rise, offer a secret petition and remain standing until after the announcement of the text.3) Predigten, 1807, Band II. ss. 257-299. 2 Although the Introduction in the German discourses usually precedes the text, yet it is not the general, although with Reinhard it is a frequent custom to insert the Proposition before the text. 3 This practice of the hearers' standing while the text is read commends itself to the taste and judgment, as indicating reverence for the Scriptures and interest in the discourse. Text, same as the lesson of the day which had been previously read; Mark 16: 1-8. Explanation and Transition. The female friends of Jesus supposed that all was over with him. "They trembled, therefore, and were amazed," when they heard that he had returned to life. Suddenly the thought rushes into their minds, that in the duties and events of human life there is something boundless, infinite. Jesus is a man, but after his death lives forever. The design of his resurrec tion suggests our first Division, and leads us to show the meaning and the reality of the Infinite in the duties and events of life. Subdivision of the First Head, constituting the body of the first sermon. I. The employments and experiences of man contain the Infinite, A. in their design, B. in their continuance, C. in their consequences. A. In their design, as they relate to ends a. which are infinitely important, and b. which cannot be compassed without unceasing progress; both of these facts being illustrated by Christ's rising from death. B. In their continuance as they belong to a nature a. which will ever exist, b. which will be ever active, both of these truths being suggested to us by Christ, "the first fruits" of the general resurrection. C. In their consequences as these are a. ineffaceable in their nature, it being impossible for a man to revoke the influence which he has already exerted upon himself and upon others; b. immeasurable in their power, the influence which a man exerts being communicated from one to another interminably; an illustrious example of these indestructible results of life being suggested by Christ's resurrection. Conclusion of the first sermon, growing immediately out of I. C. b. above, in the form of an address to the Deity. Introduction to the second sermon, containing a recapitulation of the first, and a statement of the influence exerted on great men by a belief in their immortality. Text, Luke 24: 13-34, the lesson for the second day of the Easter Festival. Explanation and Transition. The two travellers to Emmaus were |
