Sermons (Massillon)/Life of the Author
LIFE OF THE AUTHOR.
BY D'ALEMBERT.
John-Baptist Massillon was born in 1663, at Hieres, in Provence. His father was a poor citizen of that small city. The obscurity of his birth, which gives such a relief to the splendour of his personal merit, should be the first topic of his praise; and it may be said of him, as of that illustrious Roman who owed nothing to his ancestors, " Videtur ex se natus, He was the son of himself alone." But his humble origin not only reflects high honour upon his own person; it is still more honourable to that enlightened government, which, having taken him from the midst of the people to place him at the head of one of the most extensive diocesses of the kingdom, confronted the prejudice too common even in our days, that Providence has not destined great places to the genius which it has produced in the lower ranks of society: if the disposers of ecclesiastical dignities had not possessed the wisdom, courage, or good fortune, sometimes to forget this maxim of human vanity, the French clergy would have been deprived of the glory of reckoning the eloquent Massillon among their bishops.
After finishing his grammatical studies, at the age of seventeen, he entered into the Oratory. Resolved to consecrate his labours to the church, he preferred (to indissoluble bonds which he might have assumed in some one of our very numerous religious orders) the free engagements contracted in a congregation on which the great Bossuet has bestowed this rare eulogy, " That every one obeys, yet no one commands. " Massillon preserved to the close of his life the most tender and pleasing recollection of the lessons he had received and the principles he had imbibed in this truly respectable society; which, without intrigue and ambition, cherishing and cultivating literature through the sole wish of being useful, has acquired a distinguished name in the annals of art and science; and which, sometimes persecuted, and almost always little favoured, even by those from whom it might expect support, has done all the good it was permitted to do, without injuring a single person, even an enemy; which, in fine, has at all times obtained the regard of the wise by practising religion without littleness, and preaching it without fanaticism.
Massillon's superiors soon formed a presage, from his first essays, of the honour he would confer on the congregation. They destined him to the pulpit; but it was only from obedience that he consented to fulfil their intentions : he alone did not foresee the celebrity with which they flattered him, and which was to be the recompense of his modesty and submission. There are some confident minds which recognize, as it were by instinct, the object marked out for them by nature, and seize it with vigour; while others, humble and timid, require to be apprized of their powers, and by this honest ignorance of themselves are rendered only the more interesting, and the more worthy of being snatched from obscurity, and presented to the renown which awaits them.
The young Massillon, at first, did what he could to withdraw himself from this glory. He had already, from pure obedience, while yet in the province, pronounced funeral orations on M. de Villeroy, archbishop of Lyons, and M. de Villars, archbishop of Vienne; and these two discourses, which were indeed first attempts, but attempts of a young man who already announced what he afterwards became, had the most brilliant success. The humble orator, affrighted at his rising reputation, and fearing, as he said, "the demon of pride," resolved to escape from him for ever, by devoting himself to the profoundest and even most austere retirement. He went and buried himself in the abbey of Sept-fons, where the same rule is followed as at La Trappe, and there took the habit. During his noviciate, the Cardinal de Noailles sent to the abbot of Sept-fons, whose virtue he respected, a Charge which he had just published. The abbot, more religious than eloquent, but still retaining a degree of self-love, at least on account of his community, wished to make the prelate a reply worthy of his Charge. He committed the task to his exoratorian novice, and Massillon executed it with as much success as promptness. The Cardinal, astonished at receiving from this Thebais a work so well written, was not afraid of wounding the vanity of the pious abbot by asking him who was the author. The abbot named Massillon; and the prelate told him that it was not fit such a genius should, in the Scripture-phrase, remain "hidden under a bushel." He required the novice to quit his habit, and resume that of the Oratory; and he placed him in the seminary of St. Magloire, at Paris, with an exhortation to cultivate pulpit eloquence. At the same time he took upon himself, as he said, the young orator's fortune; which Massillon limited to that of the apostles, that is, to the merest necessaries, and the most exemplary simplicity.
His first sermons produced the effect that his superiors and the Cardinal de Noailles had foreseen. Scarcely did he begin to show himself in the pulpits of Paris, than he eclipsed almost all those who at that period shone in the same career. He had declared " that he would not preach like them," not through a presumptuous confidence in his superiority, but through an equally just and mature idea, that if the minister fail, with such a theme, he must be destitute of Christian eloquence. He was persuaded that if the preacher of God's word, on the one hand, degrades himself by uttering common truths in trivial language; on the other, he misses his purpose by thinking to captivate his audience with a long chain of reasoning which they are incapable of following: he knew that if all hearers are not blessed with an informed mind, all have a heart, whence the preacher ought to seek his arms ; that, in the pulpit, man ought to be shown to himself, not so much to disgust him by a shocking [portrait, as to afflict him by the resemblance; and, in fine, that if it is sometimes useful to alarm and disquiet him, it is still more so to draw from him those tears of sensibility which are much more efficacious than the tears of despair.
Such was the plan Massillon proposed to himself, and he executed it like one who had conceived it: that is, like a master. He excels in that part of oratory which may stand instead of all the rest, that eloquence which goes right to the soul, but which agitates without confounding, appals without crushing, penetrates without lacerating it: he goes to the bottom of the heart in search of those hidden folds in which the passions are enwrapped, those secret sophisms which they so artfully employ to blind and seduce us. To combat and destroy these sophisms it merely suffices him to develope them; but he does it in a language so affectionate and tender, that he subdues less than he attracts; and, even in displaying before us the picture of our vices, he knows how to attach and please us. His diction, always easy, elegant, and pure, never deviates from that noble simplicity without which there is no good taste, nor genuine eloquence. This simplicity, being joined in Massillon to the softest and most seducing harmony, borrows from it still new graces; and, what completes the charm of this enchanting style is, that so many beauties are felt to flow freely from the spring, without expense to their author. Sometimes, even, there escape from him, either in the expressions, the turns, or the sweet melody of his periods, negligencies which may be called happy, since they perfectly efface not only the stamp, but even the suspicion, of labour. It was by this inattention to self that Massillon made as many friends as auditors : he knew that the more an orator seems occupied in catching admiration, the less his hearers are disposed to grant it; and that this ambition is the rock fatal to so many preachers, who, intrusted, if I may so express myself, with the interests of God himself, choose to mix with it the little interests of their vanity. Massillon, on the contrary, thought it a very empty pleasure "to have to do," as Montaigne expresses it, "with people who always admire and make way for us ; " especially at those seasons when it is so delightful to forget one's self, in order to be solely occupied with those unfortunate beings whom duty enjoins to console and instruct. He compared the studied eloquence of profane preachers to those flowers which stifle the products of harvest; and, though very agreeable to the sight, are equally hurtful to the crop.
It seemed wonderful that a man, devoted by station to retirement, should know the world so well as to draw such exact pictures of the passions, especially of self-love. " I have learned to draw them," he candidly said, "by studying myself." He proved it in a manner equally energetic and ingenuous, by his confession to one of his brethren, who congratulated him on the success of his sermons: "The devil," he replied, "has already told it me more eloquently than you."
Massillon derived another advantage from that eloquence of the soul which he so well understood: as in speaking to the heart of man, he spoke the language of all conditions. All went to hear his sermons; even unbelievers attended upon him, and often met with instruction where they only sought amusement. The reason was, that Massillon knew how to descend on their account to the only language they would hear, that of a philosophy, purely human in appearance, but which, finding every access to their hearts open, prepared the way for the Christian orator to approach them without effort and unresisted, and to obtain a conquest even without a combat.
His action was perfectly suited to his species of eloquence. On entering the pulpit, he appeared thoroughly penetrated with the great truths he was about to utter: with eyes declined, a modest and collected air, without violent motions, and almost without gestures, but animating the whole with a voice of sensibility, he diffused over his audience the religious emotion which his own exterior proclaimed, and caused himself to be listened to with that profound silence by which eloquence is better praised than by the loudest applauses. The reputation of his manner alone induced the celebrated Baron to attend on one of his discourses: on leaving the church, he said to a friend who accompanied him, "This man is an orator, and we are only players."
The court soon wished to hear him, or rather to judge him. Without pride, as without fear, he appeared on this great and formidable theatre. He opened with distinguished lustre; and the exordium of his first discourse is one of the master-strokes of modern eloquence. Louis XIV. was then at the summit of power and glory, admired by all Europe, adored by his subjects, intoxicated with adulation, and satiated with homage. Massillon took for his text a passage of Scripture apparently least applicable to such a prince, "Blessed are they that mourn;" and from this, he had the art to draw a eulogy the more noble and flattering, as it seemed dictated by the Gospel itself, and such as an apostle might have made: " Sire," said he, "if the world were here speaking to your majesty, it would not address you with ' Blessed are they that mourn;' ' Blessed,' would it say, f the prince who never fought but to conquer; who has filled the universe with his name; who, in the course of a long and flourishing reign, has enjoyed with splendour all that men admire, the greatness of his conquests, the love of his people, the esteem of his enemies, the wisdom of his laws: "but, Sire, the Gospel speaks not as the world speaks." The audience of Versailles, accustomed as they were to the Bossuets and Bourdaloues, were unacquainted with an eloquence at the same time so delicate and so noble; in consequence, it excited in the assembly, notwithstanding the gravity of the place, an involuntary expression of admiration. There only wanted, to render this passage still more impressive, that it should have been pronuonced in the midst of the misfortunes which succeeded our triumphs, and at a time when the monarch, who, during fifty years, had experienced nothing but prosperity, lived only to sorrow. If ever Louis XIV. heard a more eloquent exordium, it was perhaps that of a religious missionary, who, on his first appearance before the king, thus began his discourse : " Sire, I mean not to pay a compliment to your majesty, I have found none in the Gospel."
Truth, even when it speaks in the name of God, ought to content itself with knocking at the door of kings, and should never break it open. Massillon, convinced of this maxim, did not imitate some of his predecessors, who had displayed their zeal by preaching Christian morality in the mansions of vice with an austerity capable of rendering it odious, and of exposing religion to the resentment of haughty and offended power. Our orator was always firm, but always respectful, while he announced to his sovereign the will of the Judge of kings. He filled the measure of his ministry, but he never surpassed it; and the monarch, who might have left his chapel discontented with the liberty of some other preachers, never left it after a sermon of Massillon, but "discontented with himself." These were the very words of the prince to this orator; words which contained the highest eulogy he could give; yet one, which so many preachers before and since Massillon have not even wished to obtain, while they were more solicitous to please the critics than to convert sinners.
Successes so brilliant and repeated did not fail of their usual effect; they created Massillon implacable enemies, especially among those who considered themselves as his rivals. Their aim was, if possible, to shut the mouth of so formidable a competitor; but this was only to be done by an accusation against his doctrine, and on this delicate point the preacher gave not the least scope to their charitable intentions. He was, indeed, member of a congregation, the opinions of which were then much the object of suspicion; and through this pious consideration several of his brethren had been dexterously excluded from the pulpit of Versailles. But Massillon's sentiments, daily exposed to court criticism, were so irreproachably orthodox that they baffled the keenest scrutiny of hatred. The church and the nation already destined him to the episcopacy; and envy, usually blind to its own interests, might, with subtler policy, have regarded this dignity as a decent mode of burying his talents, by banishing him to a distance from Paris and the court. It did not carry so far its dangerous penetration; but, considering a bishopric only in the light of a splendid recompense, it resolved to make a last effort to deprive the orator of what he had so well merited. The means employed were to calumniate his morals; and, according to custom, ears were found ready to hear, and hearts to believe, the charge. The sovereign himself, so artful is falsehood in insinuating itself to the presence of monarchs, was shaken, if not convinced : and the same prince, who had told Massillon, " that he meant to hear him every two years," seemed to fear giving to another church the orator he had reserved to himself.
Louis XIV. died; and the Regent, who honoured the talents of Massillon, and despised his enemies, nominated him to the bishopric of Clermont. He wished also that the court should hear him once more; and engaged him to preach a Lent course before the King, then nine years of age.
These sermons, composed in less than three months, are known by the name of Petit Careme, (Little Lent) . They are, perhaps, if not the master-piece, at least the true model of pulpit eloquence. The great sermons of this orator may have more animation and vehemence; the eloquence of the Petit Careme is more pathetic and insinuating; and the charm resulting from it is augmented by the interesting nature of the subject, and by the inestimable value of those simple and affecting lessons which, intended to penetrate with equal force and softness the heart of a monarch yet a child, seem to prepare the happiness of millions of men, by showing what they have a right to expect from the prince who is to govern them. Here the preacher places before the eyes of sovereigns the dangers and the evils of supreme power; truth flying the throne, and concealing herself even from the princes who seek her; the unmeasured confidence with which even the justest praises may inspire them; the almost equal danger of the weakness which has no opinion of its own, and that pride which never listens to another's; the fatal influence of their vices in corrupting and debasing a whole nation; the detestable glory of conquering kings cruelly purchased by blood and tears; in fine, the Supreme Being himself, placed between oppressor kings and oppressed people, to intimidate the one and avenge the other : such is the object of the Petit Careme, worthy of being learned by all children destined to the throne, and meditated by all men intrusted with governing the world. Some severe censurers, however, have charged these excellent Discourses with being too uniform and monotonous : they contain, according to them, but a single idea constantly recurring that of the kindness and beneficence due from the great and powerful of the earth to the little and feeble, whom nature has created their fellows, humanity has made their brethren, and fortune has doomed to wretchedness. But, without inquiring into the justice of this censure, we may say that the truth here mentioned is so consolatory to all who groan under affliction, so precious in the education of a prince, and especially so necessary to be impressed on the callous hearts of courtiers, that humanity may bless the orator who has inculcated it with so much force and perseverance.
The year in which Massillon pronounced these Discourses, was that in which he entered the French Academy. The date of his admission was February 23d, 17 19. The Abbe Fleury, who received him in his capacity of director, among other praises, gave him that of having accommodated his instruction to the tender age of the king. " You seem," said he, " to have imitated the prophet, who, in order to resuscitate the son of the Shunamite, contracted as it were his dimensions, by placing his mouth upon the mouth, his eyes upon the eyes, his hands upon the hands of the child; and, having thus recalled the vital heat, restored him alive and vigorous to his mother."
The director's discourse contains another passage equally edifying and remarkable. Massillon had just been consecrated a bishop; and no place at court, no business, no pretext could be urged to keep him from his diocess. The Abbe Fleury, an inflexible observer of the canons, while he admitted the new member, had his eyes fixed upon the rigorous duties which the episcopacy imposed upon him, in comparison with which those of academician entirely disappeared. Far, then, from inviting him to frequent attendance on the academy, he exhorted him to a perpetual absence; and he rendered his counsel more cogent by the obliging manner in which he expressed his regret for its necessity. ie We foresee with grief," said he, " that we are about to lose you for ever, and that the Indispensable law of residence will sequester you without return from our assemblies : we cannot hope to see you again, but when some vexatious business shall, in spite of yourself, tear you from your church."
This counsel had the more weight, as he to whom it was addressed had already given it himself. He departed for Clermont, and only returned on indispensable, consequently rare, occasions. He gave all his cares to the happy flock intrusted to him by Providence. He did not conceive that his episcopal function, which he had acquired in consequence of his success in the pulpit, gave him a dispensation from again ascending it, and that he ought to cease being useful because he had been rewarded. He consecrated to the instruction of the poor, those talents which had so often been applauded by the great; and preferred, to the noisy praises of courtiers, the simple and serious attention of a less brilliant but more docile audience. Perhaps the most eloquent of his discourses are his conferences with his clergy. He preaches to them the virtues of which he gave the example; disinterestedness, simplicity, forgetfulness of self, the active and prudent ardour of enlightened zeal, widely different from that fanaticism which is only a blind, and often a very suspicious zeal: moderation was, indeed, his ruling character. He loved to assemble at his country seat, Oratorians and Jesuits, whom he accustomed to endure, and almost to love each other. He set them to play together at chess, and exhorted them never to engage in more serious warfare. Th, conciliatory spirit which shone in his conduct, and his well-known sentiments on the scandal of theological quarrel, caused the government to wish that he should try to bring to an agreement the Cardinal de Noailles, and those who attacked the doctrine of this pious archbishop; but this impartiality in this negotiation produced its usual effect, of dissatisfying both parties. His sage remonstrances in favour of peace and union were fruitless; and he learned, by his own experience, that it is often easier to persuade unbelievers, than to reconcile those who have so much interest in uniting to confound them.
Deeply penetrated with the real obligations of his station, Massillon was especially attentive to fulfil that first and most respectable of episcopal duties, the duty, or rather the pleasure, of beneficence. He reduced his rights as bishop to very moderate sums, and would entirely have abolished them, had he not thought himself obliged to respect the patrimony of his successors, that is, to leave them wherewith to perform good actions. Within two years he sent twenty thousand livres to the hospital of Clermont. All his revenue belonged to the poor. His diocess preserves the remembrance of his deeds after thirty years : and his memory is daily honoured with the most eloquent of funeral orations that of the tears of one hundred thousand distressed objects. During his life time he had anticipated this testimony. When he appeared in the streets of Clermont, the people prostrated themselves before him, crying, " Long live our father !" Hence it was a frequent observation of this virtuous prelate, that his episcopal brethren did not sufficiently feel the degree of consideration and authority they might derive from their station; not, indeed, by pomp, or by a punctilious devotion, still less by the grimaces and intrigues of hypocrisy, but by those virtues which are recognised by the hearts of the people, and which, in a minister of true religion, represent to all eyes that just and beneficent Being of which he is the image.
Among the countless alms he gave, there were some which he concealed with the greatest care, not only to favour the delicacy of unfortunate individuals, but sometimes to spare whole communities the sensation of inquietude and fear, however groundless, which these donations might occasion them. A numerous convent of nuns, had, for several days, been without bread. The sisterhood had resolved to perish rather than make known their shocking distress, through the apprehension that it might cause the suppression of their house, to which they were more attached than to life. The Bishop of Clermont learned at the same time their extreme necessity and the motive of their silence. Eager to give them relief, he was fearful of alarming them by seeming informed of their situation; he therefore secretly sent them a very considerable sum, which rendered their subsistence secure, till he had found means to provide them with other resources; and it was not till after his death that they became acquainted with the benefactor to whom they were so greatly indebted.
He not only lavished his fortune upon the indigent; he farther assisted them, with equal zeal and success, by his pen. Being a witness, in his diocesan visits, of the wretchedness under which the inhabitants of the country groaned, and finding his revenue insufficient to supply with bread so many miserable creatures who asked it, he wrote to the court in their favour ; and, by the strong and affecting picture he drew of their necessities, he obtained for them either donations, or a considerable diminution of their taxes. His letters on this interesting subject are said to be master-pieces of pathetic eloquence, superior to the most touching of his sermons.
The more sincerely he respected religion, the more he despised the superstitions which degrade it, and the more zealous he was to destroy them. He abolished, though not without difficulty, some very ancient and very indecent processions which the barbarism of the dark ages had established in his diocess, and which travestied the divine worship into a scandalous masquerade. The inhabitants of Clermont were used to run to these exhibitions in crowds, some through a stupid devotion, others to turn this religious farce into ridicule. The clergy of the city, through fear of the people, who were attached to these shows in proportion to their absurdity, dared not publish the mandate for their suppression. Massillon ascended the pulpit, published his own mandate, and caused himself to be heard by a tumultuous audience who would have insulted any other preacher : such was the fruit of his virtue and beneficence !
He died, as Fenelon died, and as every bishop ought to die, without money and without debts. It was on the 28th of September, 1742, that the church, eloquence, and humanity, sustained this irreparable loss.
A recent incident, well calculated to affect feeling hearts, affords a proof how dear the memory of Massillon is, not only to the indigent, whose tears he dried, but to all who have known him. Some years since, a traveller who happened to be at Clermont, wished to see the country-seat where the prelate was accustomed to pass great part of the year. He applied to an ancient grandvicar, who, since the bishop's death, had not had resolution to return to this country mansion, now deprived of its inhabitants. He consented, however, to satisfy the traveller's desire, notwithstanding the pain he expected from revisiting a spot so sadly dear to his remembrance. They went together, and the grand-vicar showed every thing to the stranger. " Here," said he, with tears in his eyes, "is the alley where this worthy prelate took his walks with us : here is the arbour under which he used to repose while he read: this is the garden which he cultivated with his own hands." They then entered the house, and when they came to the chamber in which Massillon had breathed his last, " This," said the grand-vicar, "is the place where we lost him ;" and as he spoke these words, he fainted away. The shade of Titus or Marcus Aurelius might have envied such a homage !
Massillon has been compared with Bourdaloue, as often as Cicero with Demosthenes, and Racine with Corneille. Parallels of this kind, fertile topics for antithesis, prove nothing more than the degree of ingenuity in him who makes them. We shall resign this common-place matter without regret, and confine ourselves to a single reflection. When Bourdaloue appeared, the pulpit was yet barbarous; rivalling, as Massillon himself observed, the theatre in buffoonery, or the schools in dryness. That Jesuit orator, was the first who gave to Religion a language worthy of her : it was solid, serious, and above all, strictly and closely logical. If he who enters an untrodden path has many thorns to obstruct him, he also enjoys great advantages, for his advance is more marked and his immediate celebrity greater, than those of his successors. The public, long accustomed to the reign of Bourdaloue, who had been the first object of their veneration, were long persuaded that he could have no rival, especially while Massillon was living, and Bourdaloue from his tomb no longer heard the cry of the multitude in his favour. At length, Death, which brings justice in its train, has assigned to each orator his proper place : and Envy, which had excluded Massillon from that which was his due, may now seat him in it without the fear of his enjoying it. We shall, however, refrain from giving him a pre-eminence which grave authorities would disallow: it is Bourdaloue's greatest glory, that the superiority of Massillon is still disputed; but if it were to be decided by the number of readers, the advantage would be on the side of Massillon. Bourdaloue is little read but by preachers and devotees; his rival is in the hands of all who read; and we must be permitted to say, as completing his Eulogy, that the most celebrated writer of our age and nation is particularly assiduous in the perusal of this great orator's sermons; that Massillon is his model for prose, as Racine is for verse; and that the Petit Carime is always laid on his table by the side of Athaliah,
If, however, a kind of parallel were to be drawn between these two illustrious orators, we might say, with an intelligent judge, that Bourdaloue argues the best, and Massillon is the most pathetic; and that a sermon excellent in all respects would be one, of which Bourdaloue should write the first head, and Massillon the second. Perhaps a still more perfect discourse would be one in which they should not appear apart; but their talents, melted together, should, as it were, mutually penetrate each other, and the logician should at the same time write with pathos and sensibility.
We ought not to conceal, that all the sermons of our eloquent academician, as well as his Petit Careme, are accused of the fault of frequently presenting in the same page only a single idea, varied, indeed, with all the richness of expression, but by its fundamental uniformity, somewhat dragging in its enunciation. The same criticism has been made upon Seneca, but with more justice : that writer, solely ambitious of astonishing his reader by the profusion of wit with which he overwhelms him, becomes the more wearisome, as he seems to weary himself by a pompous display of riches, which he collects on all sides with manifest effort. Massillon, having his heart solely filled with the interest of his hearer, appears to present before him, in many forms, the truth he wishes to impress upon him, only through fear lest he should not engrave it deeply enough on his soul. Not only, therefore do we pardon him these tender repetitions, but we feel obliged to him for the motive which has multiplied them: we are convinced that they proceed from one who delights in the love of his fellow-creatures, and whose overflowing sensibility requires room for expansion.
It is surprising that the French clergy, who possessed so eminent an orator, should not once have nominated him to preach in their assemblies. He never desired this honour, but left to moderate capacities and ambitious tempers a petty glory of which he had no need. He was even rarely chosen a member of the Assembly; and readily consented, as he said, that prelates less attached than himself to residence should have recourse to this decent excuse for intermitting it. The marked indifference which his episcopal brethren seemed to display toward him was neither intentional, on their parts, nor even voluntary : it was the obscure work of some men in place, who, from motives worthy of them, secretly kept Massillon out of the view of the court, not as an intriguer, for they knew him too well to believe him one, but as an illustrious and a respected prelate, whose superiority, viewed too near, might have shone with a lustre which powerful men of inferior capacity can never bear. But what a loss to such an auditory was a preacher such as Massillon ! What could be a more interesting topic than to address the assembled princes of the church on the august duties imposed on them by their dignity; on the great examples expected from them by a whole people; on the right they may acquire, from the sanctity of their character and of their lives, to speak the truth to kings, and to lay at the foot of the throne the complaint of the innocent and the oppressed ? Could it be thought that Massillon was unworthy to treat so grand a subject, or was it rather feared that he would treat it with too much eloquence ?
This great orator, either before or after becoming a bishop, pronounced some funeral orations, the merit of which was eclipsed by that of his sermons. If he had not that flexibility which proclaims the truth with harshness, he had that candour which does not permit to disguise it. Even through the praises which in these discourses he grants to decorum, or perhaps to truth, the secret judgment of his own heart concerning the persons whom it was his office to celebrate, escapes from his natural frankness, and swims on the surface, as it were, in hair of himself; and it is apparent, on reading them, that there are some of his heroes whose history he would rather have composed than their eulogy.
Once alone, a failure of memory happened to him on preaching. Deceived by the mortification this slight accident caused him, he thought it would be much better to read than to repeat his sermons. We venture to differ from him in this point. Reading forces an orator either to renounce that free action which is the soul of the pulpit, or to render it ridiculous by an air of preparation and exaggeration which destroys its nature and truth. Massillon seems himself to have been sensible that the greatest merit in an oratorical discourse, with regard to effect, is, that it should appear produced on the spot, without any trace of premeditation; for, when he was asked, which of his sermons he thought the best, he replied, " that which I recollect the best."
Though by taste and duty devoted to Christian eloquence, he sometimes, by way of relaxation, exercised his faculties upon other objects. It is asserted that he left in manuscript a life of Coreggio. He could not have selected for his subject a painter whose talents were more analogous to his own; for he himself was, if the expression may be allowed, the Coreggio of orators. It may be added, that as Coreggio had formed himself by opening a new track after Raphael and Titian, so Massillon, who had also found out a new walk of pulpit eloquence, might have said, on comparing himself to other orators, what Coreggio did on viewing the pictures of other artists, - "I, too, am a painter."