Two extremes are here to be avoided--the one, in which the pastor lives
a recluse life, isolated from the life of the people and unfelt in
directing the currents of thought and feeling around him; the other, in
which he maintains a loose, familiar intercourse with all society,
lounging about in public places, a "hail-fellow-well-met" with
everybody. Avoiding these extremes, a pastor should never allow himself
to be a cipher in social life but should make himself a vital force
controlling and elevating it. The gravity of his character and work,
however, requires him to use special care in regard to deportment and
associations. He is, indeed, to be and to act out himself, but, while
true to his own nature as a man, he is so to control it as never to
forget his character and office as a minister of God. Here I offer the
following suggestions:
1. The minister should be, always and everywhere, the unaffected
Christian gentleman, showing all courtesy to all men. It is here some
fail, and either through a neglect of the courtesies and amenities of
social life render themselves repulsive, or by a stiff and artificial
manner of observing them, without geniality and warmth, make themselves
unapproachable. Men ordinarily and justly regard manners as an index of
character. Good manners, therefore, cannot be put on from without; they
spring from a sense of the relations we bear to others and a
disposition to act in accordance with them. A kindly, unselfish heart,
a quick, keen sympathy, a sensitive regard for others' rights and
feelings; a ready, generous appreciation for the excellences of others,
and a tender charity for their faults and foibles--in short, a
well-developed Christian manhood, with refined sensibilities, noble,
pure, upright, transparent, touching life on every side, and fitted to
bless whatever it touches,--this is the only real basis of correct
manners. The cultivation of such a character, therefore, is the prime
necessity, for in this will exist all the instincts of the true
gentleman from which the gentlemanly manner spontaneously results.
2. In the matter of dress. I do not know that any law of propriety
requires the minister to be distinguished either in the cut or the
color of his garments. Many, however, prefer some kind of ministerial
costume as a matter of convenience to indicate everywhere their
vocation, and this is, of course, a subject to be left wholly to
individual preference. The principle to be insisted on as important is
that the dress be not such as to arrest special attention, as
suggesting foppishness and fastidiousness on the one hand, or
carelessness and slovenliness on the other. The man, not the dress,
should arrest and hold attention.
3. In conversation he should be genial, courteous, affable, avoiding
that tone and manner of condescension which carries in it an implied
sense of superiority, and exhibiting that breadth of intelligence and
culture which will secure respect for his views in general society.
Slang phrases, vulgar anecdotes, boisterous discussions, idle gossip,
and scandal, it is hardly necessary to say, ill become a pastor, and
will in the end seriously militate against his usefulness. Coarseness,
indelicacy, and all that is suggestive of impurity should be
scrupulously avoided; such words, when uttered by a minister, live and
fester in the memory, and are destructive of all pastoral influence
afterward over those who hear them. "An obscene story, a lewd double
_entendre,_ a filthy joke, a questionable word or gesture, a sentence
that would make a pure woman blush in public or in private, in select
or in mixed company, is a burning shame and scandal to any minister of
the Gospel." Nor should his chief distinction in society be that of the
wit or mimic. Wit and humor, when natural, are often elements of real
power, as giving sparkle and flavor to speech, but in the pastor their
place is subordinate; when they appear as his chief characteristic,
they inevitably injure his influence. Attractive social qualities, such
as enable the pastor to exercise a leading and governing power in
society, are to be most earnestly sought; their effect on pastoral
usefulness can hardly be overstated.
The minister, when a guest, enjoying the temporary hospitality of a
family circle, should bring into it the blessing of a genial, sunshiny
spirit, showing always a thorough appreciation of kindness received and
avoiding all unnecessary trouble to the hosts. If other ministers are
present, beware of that ministerial clannishness which centers
conversation on topics adapted only to ministers or makes it consist of
ministerial criticism, gossip, and scandal adapted to lower the
estimation in which other ministers are held. In the freedom and
_abandon_ of ministerial society there is often much temptation to
this, but words thus thoughtlessly spoken sometimes do incalculable
injury, both by lowering the ministerial character in the eyes of the
household, and by inflicting an incurable wound on the reputation of
those made the subjects of gossip. The injunction of Scripture cannot
be too carefully heeded: "Let your speech be always with grace,
seasoned with salt" (Col. iv. 6); for thus the spirit you breathed and
the words you spake will remain a benediction with that household and
make your memory fragrant there for ever.
4. In his amusements and recreations a pastor should indulge only in
such as are not only in themselves innocent but are not commonly
offensive to the Christian conscience. The grand principle of
self-denial enunciated by Paul as the rule of his own life is here,
undoubtedly, the guiding principle of ministerial duty. He says: "Give
none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the
church of God: even as I please all men in all things, not seeking mine
own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved" (1 Cor.
x. 32, 33). He relinquished self-gratification, even though innocent,
rather than put a cause of stumbling before others and hinder their
salvation. Recreation is doubtless a necessity--the bow always bent
loses its spring--but recreation should never be taken in a form which
may give offence to Christian souls, or which may set an example such
as, if followed by others, might work their injury. A pastor's
influence also may be impaired by undue absorption in any form of
recreation. There is no wrong, it may be, in using a good horse, in
playing a game of ball or croquet, in fishing or hunting, or many other
forms of recreation; but the pastor who is specially distinguished for
his interest in fast horses or for his sporting habits, or as a devotee
of amusements, violates most seriously the proprieties of his position,
and sinks in the estimation of all thoughtful people.
5. A minister's associations or special intimacies should not be with
bad or loose or irreligious men; the taint will necessarily tarnish and
injure his own reputation, even if it does not corrupt his character.
He is to be "a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, temperate" (Tit.
i. 8). He should show all courtesy and kindness, indeed, to even the
worst men around him, but his special friendships should not be sought
there, nor his habitual associations. Some ministers have here made
wreck of their influence with the better classes in the community,
while their association with the loose and irreligious class, so far
from winning them to Christ, has only the more hardened them in
rejecting Him by lowering in their eyes the character of His servant.
6. The pastor's relations with the other sex should not only always be
pure in fact but should also be such as to avoid even the possibility
of misconstruction. No point needs to be more carefully guarded, for
even the suspicion or thought of wrong in this, however ill-grounded,
is commonly fatal to usefulness, and often follows him through the
remainder of life.