A Dovetailer of Sermons

1845

The Rev. Dr. B—— was what is commonly termed a popular preacher; not, however, by drawing on his own stores, but by the knack when he possessed of appropriating the thoughts and language of other great divines who had gone before him to his own use, and by a skillful splicing and dovetailing of passages, so as to make a whole. Fortunately for him, those who composed his audience were not deeply skilled in pulpit lore, and with such he passed for a wonder of erudition. It happened, however, that the doctor was detected in his literary larcenies. One Sunday, a grave old gentleman seated himself close to the pulpit, and listened with profound attention. The doctor had scarcely finished his third sentence, before the old gentleman said loud enough to be heard by those near him, "That's Sherlock." The doctor frowned, but went on. He had not proceeded much farther, when his grave auditor broke out with "That's Tillotson." The doctor bit his lips and paused, but again went on. At a third exclamation of, "That's Blair," the doctor lost all patience, and leaning over the side of the pulpit, cried, "Fellow, if you don't hold your tongue, you shall be turned out!" Without altering a muscle the old cynic, looking the doctor full in the face, says, "That's his own."


Geniuses Shouldn't Marry

A woman named Christian poisoned her husband, lately, at Wurtemburgh, for which she had her trial. The reasons for the act were, that he was always looking for the Philosopher's stone or inventing the perpetual motion. — St. Louis Reveille.

—Mineral Point Democrat, Mineral Point, Wisconsin, May 2, 1845, p. 1.