"Oh," was the reply, "we _must_ go to market." Oratorical Preaching My friends, we have too many orators in the pulpit, I am tired and sick of your "silver-tongued orators." I used to mourn because I couldn't be an orator. I thought, Oh, if I could only have the gift of speech like some men! I have heard men with a smooth flow of language take the audience captive; but they came and they went. Their voice was like the air--there wasn't any _power_ back of it; they trusted in their eloquence and their fine speeches. That is what Paul was thinking of when he wrote to the Corinthians: "My speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God." Take a witness in court and let him try his oratorical powers in the witness-box, and see how quickly the judge will rule him out. It is the man who tells the plain, simple truth that has the most influence with the jury. Suppose that Moses had prepared a speech for Pharaoh, and had got his hair all smoothly brushed, and had stood before the looking-glass, or had gone to an elocutionist to be taught how to make an oratorical speech and how to make gestures. Suppose that he had buttoned his coat, put one hand in his chest, had struck an attitude, and begun: "The God of our fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, has commanded me to come into the presence of the noble King of Egypt." I think they would have taken his head right off! They had Egyptians who could be as eloquent as Moses. It was not eloquence they wanted. To Which Class Do You Belong? Some one has said that there are three classes of people: the "wills," the "won'ts," and the "can'ts"; the first accomplish everything, the second oppose everything, and the third fail in everything. Sunday Work A Christian man was once urged by his employer to work on Sunday. "Does not your Bible say that if your ass falls into a pit on the Sabbath, you may pull him out?" "Yes," replied the other; "but if the ass had the habit of falling into the same pit every Sabbath, I would either fill up the pit or sell the ass." There Must Be Roots Suppose I hire two men to set out trees, and after a day or two I go out to see how they are getting along. I find that one man has set out a hundred trees, and the other only ten. I say: "Look here; what does this mean? That man has set out a hundred trees, and you have set out only ten. What does it mean?" "Yes, but he has cut off all the roots, and, just stuck the tops into the ground." I go to the other man, and say: "What does this mean? Why have you planted all of these trees without roots?" "I don't believe in roots; they are of no account. My trees look just as well as his." But when the sun blazes upon the trees, they all wither and die.