Puritan preaching was studiously symmetrical. There was in Puritan preaching both well-roundedness and good balance. Puritan preaching achieved this symmetry in four ways: First, Puritan preaching allowed Scripture to dictate the emphasis for each message. The Puritans did not preach sermons that were a kind of balancing act between various doctrines. Rather, they let the biblical text determine the content and emphasis of each message. When Jonathan Edwards preached