36 LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP SHARP. 



excel in the pathetical way, as is acknowledged 

 even by some who will give no other recommen- 

 dation of him as a preacher. 



The learned Bishop Burnet, for instance, who 

 was never thought partial to him on the favour- 

 able side, gives this account of him in his History 

 of his Own Times, Vol. I. p. 674. " He was 

 (says his lordship) both a very pious wan and one 

 of the most popular preachers of the age, who had 

 a peculiar talent of reading his Sermons with much 

 life and zeal. 



This character is, indeed, so far as it goes, a 

 very just and true one ; and, when well consi- 

 dered, a great one too. For it is agreed by all 

 who have wrote upon the eloquence of the pul- 

 pit, that one of the first requisites to the making 

 a good preacher, is that he himself be a devout 

 and good man, deeply and seriously affected 

 with a sense of those things which he would 

 inculcate, and impress upon the minds and af- 

 fections of others. He who hath no other end 

 or view, either in composing or delivering his dis- 

 courses, than the making people better, and more 

 disposed to their duty, cannot well be otherwise than 

 an able preacher, and must have ill luck if he be 

 not a popoular one too; for he will certainly, 

 under this disposition, take more with his au- 

 dience than another of superior talents and 

 capacities can do, who happens to be guided 



