'The theology that should be preached to make the pulpit what it should be, should be based on obvious and honest principles of Scripture interpretation. The preacher is the interpreter of a book, and he should be the voice, the organ, of its true and natural meaning. Nothing should be misquoted; nothing should be perverted or misapplied. His interpretation should be seen and felt to be in harmony with the scope, the drift, the spirit, the aim of the Bible. The success of preaching has been greatly hindered by false principles of Biblical interpretation. In interpreting other books men have gone on rational principles; but in interpreting the Bible they have gone on principles quite irrational. They have sought for double senses, and mystical meanings, and used texts as proofs of doctrines, that had no reference to the doctrines whatever. Metaphors and symbols have had all possible meanings forced on them. Infidels and men of the world are approached with arguments that are little less than insults to their understandings. They are disgusted, instead of being convinced. They are led to look on the Bible with disdain. They are willing to remain infidels, rather than become idiots. One is pained and sickened that such a multitude of impertinent and inapplicable texts should be brought as proofs of Christian doctrine;--texts applicable to anything else rather than the points under consideration. Even Dr. Edwards misuses texts of Scripture thus. The Bible is to be interpreted as other books are. Men are not to hide themselves in the mist of a hidden meaning, and shock the common sense of the world. Preachers should go on the supposition, that in every congregation there are shrewd and sagacious men, who can appreciate a good argument, and see the weakness of a bad one; men who can appreciate a good sermon, if there be a good sermon to be appreciated. For such, he may be assured, is the fact.' All these unwise things had a tendency to shake my faith in writers on the evidences, to lessen my interest in the subject, to abate my confidence in the knowledge and integrity of the authors, and to diminish my faith in the supernatural origin of the Bible and Christianity. 18. The evidences that had most weight with me were the internal evidences. But these were often handled in an unsatisfactory way. The greater part of Soame Jenyns' little work was good, as far as it went; but it went only a very short way. It took a step or two, in the most difficult, doubtful, and uninviting part of the road, but it left the vast paradise of internal evidences unexplored, and even unapproached. His work was rather an apology for Christianity, proving that it was not open to censure, than a demonstration of its incalculable worth and power.