His sermons began with scholastic exposition; as they advanced, the ecstasy of inspiration fell upon the preacher, till the sympathies of the whole people of Florence gathered round him, met and attained, as it were, to single consciousness in him. He then no longer restrained the impulse of his oratory, but became the mouth-piece of God, the interpreter to themselves of all that host. In a fiery _crescendo_, never flagging, never losing firmness of grasp or lucidity of vision, he ascended the altar-steps of prophecy, and, standing like Moses on the mount between the thunders of God and the tabernacles of the plain, fulminated period after period of impassioned eloquence. The walls of the church re-echoed with sobs and wailings, dominated by one ringing voice. The scribe to whom we owe the fragments of these sermons at times breaks off with these words: “Here I was so overcome with weeping that I could not go on.” Pico della Mirandola tells us that the mere sound of Savonarola’s voice, startling the stillness of the Duomo, thronged through all its space with people, was like a clap of doom; a cold shiver ran through the marrow of his bones, the hairs of his head stood on end, as he listened. Another witness reports: “These sermons caused such terror, alarm, sobbing, and tears that every one passed through the streets without speaking, more dead than alive.” Such was the preacher, and such was the effect of his oratory. The theme on which he loved to dwell was this: “Repent! A judgment of God is at hand. A sword is suspended over you. Italy is doomed for her iniquity--for the sins of the Church, whose adulteries have filled the world--for the sins of the tyrants who encourage crime and trample upon souls--for the sins of you people, you fathers and mothers, you young men, you maidens, you children that lisp blasphemy!” Nor did Savonarola deal in generalities. He described in plain language every vice; he laid bare every abuse; so that a mirror was held up to the souls of his hearers, in which they saw their most secret faults appallingly betrayed and ringed around with fire. He entered with particularity into the details of the coming woes. One by one he enumerated the bloodshed, the ruin of cities, the trampling down of provinces, the passage of armies, the desolating wars that were about to fall on Italy. You may read pages of his sermons which seem like vivid narratives of what afterward took place in the sack of Prato, in the storming of Brescia, in the battle of the Ronco, in the cavern-massacre of Vicenza. No wonder that he stirred his audience to their center. The hell within them was revealed. The coming down above them was made manifest. Ezekiel and Jeremiah were not more prophetic. John crying to a generation of vipers, “Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” was not more weighty with the mission of authentic inspiration.