By NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS The Great Refusal And Other Evangelistic Sermons. A Man's Value to Society Studies in Self-Culture and Character. The Investment of Influence Studies in Social Sympathy and Service. Great Books as Life-Teachers Studies of Character, Real and Ideal. The Contagion of Character Studies in Culture and Success. Great Men as Prophets of a New Era The Battle of Principle Heroism and Eloquence of Anti-Slavery German Atrocities The Blot on the Kaiser's 'Scutcheon Rebuilding Europe in the Face of World-Wide Bolshevism All the Year Round Sermons for Church and Civic Celebrations. BOOKLETS Foretokens of Immortality How the Inner Light Failed Right Living as a Fine Art The Master of the Science of Right Living The School in the Home EDITED BY DOCTOR HILLIS Lectures and Orations by Henry Ward Beecher ODLEIAN MAR FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY New York: 158 Fifth Avenue A Foreword MONG the difficulties of present-day preaching is the fact that the press, the platform, the college, even business and finance, have become competitors of the pulpit. Centuries ago the people of ancient Israel overheard Saul, the son of Kish, warning a group of servants that it was folly to make war upon God. In their astonishment, the people exclaimed, "Is Saul also among the prophets?" It is a distinct gain for society that laymen are warning our people against lawlessness, luxury, and frivolity, since any movement that calls the people back to the faith of the founders and fathers, makes for social betterment. One thing, however, is still left to the preacher,—moral passion, passion for men, and it is this passion that turns the pulpit into a throne. In the belief that the issues of life and death for modern society are in the pulpit, John Ruskin once called the sermon, "thirty minutes to raise the dead in." These sermons are sparks struck out on the anvil of events. They are here given as they were spoken. In his book, The Black Arrow, Stevenson tells us that a soldier in the thick of the fight, fitted his arrow to the bow, and let the shaft fly against the enemy, without stopping to ask whether the point was polished, or the feathers beautiful. These chapters, plain, simple and unadorned, repre |