It is the preacher's duty to break that seal; to take out the dry
truths stored there; to render them palatable and inviting, and
bring them within the grasp of the plainest intelligence.

[Side note: Solicitor and barrister]

Few occupations more aptly illustrate this difference than those
of solicitor and barrister.

The attorney works up the materials for the case: he groups
statutes, discovers principles, tabulates references, supplies
dates. While he does not plead himself, a man so armed is
invaluable at the elbow of an able advocate; without the
barrister, however, especially where the prejudices, interests,
and the imagination of a jury have to be worked upon, his load of
learned lumber would be of small value. The theologian makes out
the brief: the preacher pleads it.

To render this distinction clearer let us take one more
illustration. No animal can exist on air and clay and sunlight
alone. Though these contain the elements on which it is fed; yet,
though surrounded by them in most ample abundance, he must perish
if a third power is not brought into play. The vegetable world
comes intervening between the raw chemicals and the hungry man.
Out of earth and air and light it builds the ripened sheaf, the
succulent apple and the savoury potato. So, though bookshelves
groan under calf-bound tomes hoarding the hived treasures of the
masters of theology, the common minds of the multitude would
starve did not the preacher interpose as interpreter of the
theologian's message, drawing forth from his storehouse truths