I can only appeal with all my heart to my younger Brother not to let it be thus with him. And the only effective recipe against the trouble is faith, exercised in prayer and watching, with a full recollection of the urgent importance of the matter. For indeed it _is_ all-important that the servant of God should be "given wholly to" his work, at the reading desk, at the lectern, at the Table, at the Font.
It is easy to say, as it is often said, that we "must not preach the prayers," must not obtrude our personality in leading the devotions of the congregation; that our part is to be regular and audible, and otherwise to "efface ourselves." Most certainly we ought not to _preach_ the prayers, in public any more than in private. But then, we ought to _pray_ them. Most certainly we ought not to obtrude our personality upon the thought of the worshippers. But then, we ought to serve them with our personality, and we can best do this, surely, by a spirit and a manner which is unmistakably that of the fellow-worshipper, who feels _himself_ to be in the presence of the King, and knows that the petitions and the promises are for him at least a holy reality. I am perfectly well aware that it is not _easy_ to steer between a more or less mechanical manner and a demonstrative one, and that perhaps of two evils the former is the less. But I am sure it is _possible_ to steer the right line, by using sanctified common-sense, and asking for a little candid counsel from those who hear us, and above all by being what we seek to seem--true worshippers, spiritually awake and humbly reverent.
As long as man is man, so long will the law of sympathy hold good. And by that law it is certain that the way to promote, so far as we can, a spirit and tone of true worship in our people is to possess--and to show--that spirit ourselves, as we lead, and also join, their worship. Never declaim the prayers, but always pray them, from the soul and with the voice.