Messages to The Multitude

being

Ten Representative Sermons selected at Mentone, and Two Unpublished Addresses Delivered on Memorable Occasions

by

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

“Take my lips, and let them be

Filled with messages from Thee”

London

Sampson Low, Marston & Company

limited

St. Dunstan’s House

Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C.

1892

Publishers’ Note

Just twelve months ago, Mr. Spurgeon kindly consented to contribute a group of sermons to the present series, but almost immediately afterwards he was seized with critical illness, and it seemed in the early autumn as if he never would be able to carry out his purpose. At the request of the publishers, his brother and colleague, the Rev. J. A. Spurgeon, undertook to make the selection, but towards the end of the year Mr. Spurgeon recovered sufficiently, amid the sunshine of Mentone, to feel a revived interest in the task. He accordingly took the matter once more into his own hands, and in December last selected the majority of these sermons as typical of his pulpit teaching during the entire period of his ministry at the Metropolitan Tabernacle. He showed keen interest in the preparation of the volume for the press, and was busily engaged in the revision of the printed slips, when the sudden return of his illness in an aggravated form compelled him to lay down finally his busy pen. In a letter to the publishers, dated January 12, 1892, he said, “Call the volume ‘Messages to the Multitude,’ ” and he added, “I will write three or four pages of preface.” That letter was hardly despatched, when his illness assumed an alarming character, and it is needless to add that the words of greeting which the great preacher had intended to address through these pages to his absent friends remain unwritten. The two concluding addresses were both delivered on special occasions, and neither of them have hitherto been published; they were selected from Mr. Spurgeon’s papers preserved in the library at Westwood. The publishers desire to thank the Rev. J. A. Spurgeon for writing a preface to the book, and they are not less indebted to the Rev. J. W. Harrald—Mr. Spurgeon’s private secretary and companion at Mentone—for the painstaking and loving care with which he has seen the volume through the press.

Preface

This volume has passed—as to the chief part of it—under the author’s own revision. He took much interest in it during the closing weeks of his life, and it is amongst the last of his literary productions. Other hands have put some final touches, but it may be accepted as substantially his own, alike as to authorship and as to the choice of the sermons to represent him amongst the preachers of his age. It is a sad task to compose an introduction to a book which the departed one should himself have penned, but perhaps a brother can fitly say what must have been under those circumstances left unsaid.

The preacher will ever be remembered as the teacher of the people. One who spoke forcefully the thoughts of the great heart ...