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Lectures to My Students; A Selection From Addresses Delivered to the Students of the Pastors College, Metropolitan Tabernacle
Lectures to My Students A Selection From Addresses Delivered to the Students of the Pastors College Metropolitan Tabernacle Author:Charles Haddon Spurgeon Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1875. Excerpt: ... LECTURE VIIL ON THE VOICE. Our first rule with regard to the voice would be-- do not think too much about it, for recollect the sweetest voice is nothing without so... more »mething to say, and however well it may be managed, it will be like a well-driven cart with nothing in it, unless you convey by it important and seasonable truths to your people. Demosthenes was doubtless right, in giving a first, second, and third place to a good delivery; but of what value will that be if a man has nothing to deliver? A man with a surpassingly excellent voice who is destitute of a wellinformed head, and an earnest heart, will be "a voice crying in the wilderness;" or, to use Plutarch's expression, "Vox et prwterea nihil." Such a man may shine in the choir, but he is useless in the pulpit. Whitfield's voice, without his heart-power, would have left no more lasting effects upon his hearers than Paganini's fiddle. You are not singers but preachers : your voice is but a secondary matter; do not be fops with it, or puling invalids over it, as so many are. A trumpet need not be made of silver, a ram's-horn will suffice; but it must be able to endure rough usage, for trumpets are for war's conflicts, not for the drawing-rooms of fashion. On the other hand, do not think too little of your voice, for its excellence may greatly conduce to the result which you hope to produce. Plato, in confessing the power of eloquence, mentions the tone of the speaker. "So strongly," says he, "does the speech and the tone of the orator ring in my ears, that scarcely in the third or fourth day, do I recollect myself, and perceive where on the earth I am; and for awhile I am willing to believe myself living in the isles of the blessed." Exceedingly precious truths may be greatly marred by being delivered in monotonous tones. I onc...« less