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Rh writer of sermons whom the British race has produced. His matchless collection of discourses delivered at Golden Grove, The Eniautos, was published in 1653-1655. The fault of the 17th-century sermon was a tendency, less prominent in Jeremy Taylor than in any other writer, to dazzle the audience by a display of false learning and by a violence in imagery; the great merit of its literary form was the fullness of its vocabulary and the richness and melody of style which adorned it at its best. Some of the most remarkable divines of this great period, however, are scarcely to be mentioned as successful writers of sermons. At the Restoration, pulpit oratory in England became drier, less picturesque and more sententious. The great names at this period were those of Isaac Barrow (1630-1677); Robert South (1634-1716), celebrated for his wit in the pulpit; John Tillotson (1630-1694), the copyright of whose sermons fetched the enormous sum of 2500 guineas after his death, and of whom it was said that he was “not only the best preacher of the age, but seemed to have brought preaching to perfection”; and Edward Stillingfleet (1635-1699), styled, for his appearance in the pulpit, “the beauty of holiness.” These preachers of the Restoration were controversialists, keen, moderate and unenthusiastic. These qualities were accentuated in the 18th century, when for a while religious oratory ceased to have any literary value. The sermons of Benjamin Hoadly (1676-1761) have a place in history, and those of Joseph Butler (1692-1752), the Rolls Sermons of 1726, have great philosophical importance. Thomas Boston's (1676-1732) memory has been revived by the praise of Stevenson, but his zeal was far exceeded by that of John Wesley (1703-1791), who preached 40,000 sermons, and by that of George Whitefield (1714-1770).

Of all countries, however, France is the one which has shown most brightly in the cultivation of the sermon. In the 14th century Gerson (1363-1429) seems to have been the earliest divine who composed and preached in French, but his example was not followed by any man of equal genius. It was the popular movement of the Reformation, which made the sermon a piece of literature, on the lips of Jean Calvin (1509-1564), Pierre Viret (1511-1571) and Théodore de Bèze (1519-1605). With these stern Protestant discourses may be contrasted the beautiful, but somewhat euphuistical sermons of St François de Sales (1605-1622), full of mystical imagery. Father Claude de Lingendes (1591-1660) has been looked upon as the father of the classic French sermon, although his own conciones were invariably written in Latin, but his methods were adopted in French, by the school of Bourdaloue and Bossuet. In the great body of noble religious eloquence delivered from French pulpits during the 17th century, the first place is certainly held by the sermons of J. B. Bossuet (1627-1704), who remains perhaps the greatest preacher whom the world has ever seen. His six Oraisons Funèbres, the latest of which was delivered in 1687, form the most majestic existing type of this species of literature. Around that of Bossuet were collected other noble names: Louis Bourdaloue (1632-1704), whom his contemporaries preferred to Bossuet himself; Esprit Fléchier (1632-1710), the politest preacher who ever occupied a Parisian pulpit; and Jules Mascaron (1634-1703), in whom all forms of eloquence were united. A generation later appeared Baptiste Massillon (1663-1742), who was to Bossuet as Racine to Corneille; and Jacques Saurin (1677-1730), whose evangelical sermons were delivered at the Hague. These are the great classic preachers whose discourses continue to be read, and to form an inherent part of the body of French literature. There was some revival of the art of the sermon at Versailles a century later, where the Abbé Maury, whose critical work has been mentioned above, preached with vivid eloquence between 1770 and 1785; the Père Elisée (1726-1783), whom Diderot and Mme Roland greatly admired, held a similar place, at the same time, in Paris. Since the end of the 18th century, although a great number of volumes of sermons have been and continue to be published, and although the pulpit holds its own in Protestant and Catholic countries alike, for purposes of exhortation and encouragement, it cannot be said that the sermon has in any way extended its influence as a form

of pure literature. It has, in general, been greatly shortened, and the ordinary sermon of to-day is no longer an elaborate piece of carefully balanced and ornamental literary architecture, but a very simple and brief homily, not occupying the listener for more than some ten minutes in the course of an elaborate service.

In Germany, the great preachers of the middle ages were Franciscans, such as Brother Bertold of Regensburg (1220-1272), or Dominicans, such as Johann Tauler (1290-1361), who preached in Latin. The great period of vernacular preaching lasted from the beginning of the 16th to the end of the 17th century. Martin Luther was the most ancient type of early Reformation preacher, and he was succeeded by the mystic Johann Arndt (1555-1621); the Catholic church produced in Vienna the eccentric and almost burlesque oratory of Abraham a Santa Clara (1642-1709). The last of the great German preachers of this school was P. J. Spener, the founder of the Pietists (1635-1705).

Among the best authorities on the history of the sermon are Abbé Maury: Essai sur l'eloquence de la chaire (2 vols., Paris, 1810); Rothe, Geschichte der Predict (Bremen, 1881).

 SEROUX D'AGINCOURT, JEAN BAPTISTE LOUIS GEORGE (1730-1814), French archaeologist and historian, was born at Beauvais on the 5th of April 1730. He belonged to a good family, and in his youth served as an officer in a regiment of cavalry. Finding it necessary to quit the army in order to take charge of his younger brothers who had been left orphans, he was appointed a farmer-general by Louis XV. In 1777 he visited England, Germany and Holland; and in the following year he travelled through Italy, with the view of exploring thoroughly the remains of ancient art. He afterwards settled at Rome, and devoted himself to preparing the results of his researches for publication. He died on the 24th of September 1814, leaving the work, which was being issued in parts, unfinished; but it was carried on by M. Gence, and published complete under the title L'Histoire de l'art par les monuments, depuis sa décadence au quatrième siècle jusqu'à son renouvellement au seizième (6 vols. fol. with 325 plates, Paris, 1823). An English translation by Owen Jones was published in 1847. In the year of his death Seroux d'Agincourt published in Paris a Recueil de fragments de sculpture antique, en terre cuite (1 vol. 4to).  SEROW, or, the Himalayan name of a goat-like antelope of the size of a donkey, nearly allied to the goral (q.v.) of the same region, but considerably larger, and with small face-glands. The Himalayan animal is a local race of the Sumatran Nemorhaedus sumatrensis; and the name serow is now extended to embrace all the species belonging to the same genus, the range of which extends from the Himalaya to Burma, the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra in one direction, and to Tibet, China, Japan and Formosa in another. Serows inhabit scrub-clad mountains, at no great elevation.

 SERPA PINTO, ALEXANDRE ALBERTO DE LA ROCHA (1846-1900), Portuguese explorer in Africa, was born at the castle of Polchras, on the Douro, on the 10th of April 1846. Entering the army in 1864, he served in Mozambique, and in 1869 took part in an expedition against tribes in revolt on the lower Zambezi. In 1877 he and Captains Capello and Ivens of the Portuguese navy were sent on an expedition to south central Africa. The explorers left Benguella in November 1877 for the interior, but Serpa Pinto soon parted from his colleagues, who went north, while Serpa Pinto continued east. He crossed the Kwando in June 1878, and in August reached Lialui, the Barotse capital on the Zambezi, where he received help from the Rev. F. Coillard which enabled him to continue his journey down the river to the Victoria Falls, whence he turned south, arriving at Pretoria on the 12th of February 1879. He was the fourth explorer to traverse Africa from west to east, and was the first to lay down with approximate accuracy the route between Bihe and Lialui. Among other rewards the Royal Geographical Society of London awarded him (1881) the Founder's medal. The account of his travels appeared in English under the title How I crossed Africa (2 vols., London, 1881). In 1884 he attempted, with less success, the exploration of the regions between Mozambique and Lake Nyasa. Appointed governor of