The Works of the REV. Richard Cecil (Volume 1); With a Memoir of His Life

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1825 edition. Excerpt: ...a discovery, which much inferior writers seem not to have made. It was probably on this account that he published so little. The pieces delivered to me by Mrs. C. for republication, and printed in the volume of Discourses, will show the dates and occasions of their first appearing. Besides which, he published a Memoir of the life of the Rev. William Romaine, to whose eminent piety and usefulness he bore a faithful testimony. I cannot help adding, that the reader will see more of him in his Letters, than in any thing he published. As a Preacher, he certainly stood high: and I may safely affirm this, though his voice was rough, and his utterance rather indistinct, and at times unpleasantly monotonous. I am also ready to acknowledge, that, like many other useful men, he was more qualified to make the assault than to conduct the siege. He was more of an Ajax, than a Ulysses; more of a herald, than a casuist. His memory, indeed, was remarkably strong, his mind firm and vigorous, and his discourses studied; but he had not the imagination, taste, or ear that some have. Plain and convincing, decisive and commanding, he exhibited truth in the mass, and characters in the general, with great effect; but, to discriminate with accuracy--to touch the strings of the heart with skill--and to meet objection in its different forms, were talents he did not so much possess himself, though he knew how to value them in others. I fear not, however, again to assert, that he was a preacher of eminence in point of effect; and such a one as will scarcely be conceived by those, who knew him only by the sermons which he had printed. For, if he had not the Apostle's address, yet, like the Apostle, he had such a deep and evident persuasion of the truths he taught, that he...