[Side note:  How he came to acquire it]

A hoary tradition made it venerable in his eyes.  As a boy he heard it from a pastor to whom he was accustomed to look with reverence.

He came to persuade himself that, like a “judge’s gravity” or a “soldier’s step,” a priest too should bear a professional hallmark, and this should be a “preacher’s voice,” so he acquired it.  Fatal acquisition!

The peculiarity of it is that this tone is reserved exclusively for the pulpit.  Not a whisper of it heard during the week.  It is his “preaching voice,” and like his “preaching stole” or “preaching surplice” it is laid aside till Sunday brings him again before the congregation.

[Side note:  The result of the artificial tone]

What madness!  Adopting this tone is like drawing the lead from the pistol or putting a foil on the rapier:  it defeats his purpose, it renders his weapon ineffective.  So far from setting his congregation on fire he sets them asleep; instead of sending them away with clenched convictions they leave the church tittering, or perhaps in bad temper.

[Side note:  Priests never use in moments of serious issues]

I would like to ask such a man—­If you were pleading in a court for your character or before an angry mob for your life is it on this antiquated weapon you would rely?  Would not nature’s unerring instinct tell you to fling it to the winds and stake your fortunes on the untrammeled outpouring of head and heart?  Every tone would ring with earnestness:  every sentence thrill with passion.

The thoughts, how clear!  How convincing the arguments!  Nature’s unfettered strength would then, like a tidal wave, sweep you triumphantly onward to the goal.

Yet when you stand in the pulpit to plead a brief for Christ the simple, unaffected earnestness that everywhere else carries conviction is abandoned for such a musty instrument as an unctuous whine or a holy drone.  The young priest should avoid it:  it spells ruin.

[Side note:  Voice dropping]

It is wonderful how few the speakers are who sustain the same pitch and energy of voice from the beginning of a sentence to its closing syllable.

[Side note:  Cause of the defect]

The temptation to exhaust the air in the lungs, and therefore permit the final words to drop, is so strong that unless a student watch it and assiduously guard against it he will discover that he has fallen victim to this weak point before he is twelve months a priest.

[Side note:  It destroys a sermon]

Whenever you hear the last words of each sentence of a sermon growing faint, like Marathon runners staggering feebly towards the goal, and the final word dropping completely under, that sermon, no matter how beautiful its conception or eloquent its composition, is doomed to failure.

The entire meaning of many a sentence is completely lost if the last words fail to reach the listeners’ ears.  Very often the last word is the important member of a sentence, the others being merely ancillary to it.  In oratory, especially, many a sentence has to depend for its driving force on the energy with which the final words are sent home.