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oratory. Truly they preached as dying men to dying men. But the question is, Should it ever
be otherwise? Should there ever be less fervor in preaching or less eagerness in hearing than
there was then? True, life was a little shorter then, but that was all. Death and its issues are
still the same. Eternity is still the same. The soul is still the same. Only one small element
was thrown in then which does not always exist to such an extent; namely, the increased
shortness of life. But that was all the difference. Why then should our preaching be less
fervent, our appeals less affectionate, our importunity less urgent? We are a few steps farther
from the shore of eternity; that is all. Time may be a little stronger than it was then, yet only a
very little. Its everlasting issues are still as momentous, as unchangeable. Surely it is our
unbelief that makes the difference! It is unbelief that makes ministers so cold in their
preaching, so slothful in visiting, and so remiss in all their sacred duties. It is unbelief that
chills the life and straitens the heart. It is unbelief that makes ministers handle
eternal realities with such

irreverence. It is unbelief that makes them ascend with so light a step "that awful place the
pulpit," to deal with immortal beings about heaven and hell.

Hear one of Richard Baxter's appeals: "I have been ready to wonder, when I have
heard such weighty things delivered, how people can forbear crying out in the congregation;
much more how they can rest till they have gone to their ministers and learned what they
should do. Oh, that heaven and hell should work no more upon men! Oh that everlastingness
should work no more! Oh, how can you forbear when you are alone to think what it is to be
everlastingly in joy or in torment! I wonder that such thoughts do not break your sleep; and
that they come not in your mind when you are about your labor! I wonder how you can
almost do anything else; how you can have any quietness in your minds; how you can eat or
drink or rest till you have got some ground of everlasting consolations! Is that a man or a
corpse that is not affected with matters of this importance? That can be readier to sleep than
to tremble when he heareth how he must stand at the bar of God? Is that a man or a clod of
clay that can rise or lie down without being deeply affected with his everlasting estate? That
can follow his worldly business but make nothing of the great business of salvation or
damnation; and that, when they know it is hard at hand? Truly, Sirs, when I think of the
weight of the matter, I wonder at the very best of God's saints upon earth, that they are no
better, and do no more in so weighty a case. I wonder at those whom the world accounteth
more holy than necessary, and scorns for making too much ado, that they can put off Christ
and their souls with so little; that they pour not out their souls in every supplication; that they
are not more taken up with God; that their thoughts are not more serious in preparation of
their accounts. I wonder that they be not an hundred times more strict in their lives, and more
laborious and unwearied in striving for the crown than they are. And for myself, as I am
ashamed of my dull and careless heart, and of my slow and unprofitable course of life; so, the
Lord knows, I am ashamed of every sermon I preach; when I think what I have been speaking
of, and who sent me, and that men's salvation or damnation is so much concerned in it, I am
ready to tremble lest God should judge me as a slighter of His truths and the souls of men,
and lest in the best sermon I should be guilty of their blood. Methinks we should

not speak a word to men, in matters of such consequence, without tears, or the greatest
earnestness that possibly we can; were not we too much guilty of the sin which we reprove,