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/sˈərmən/ Listen

noun

Sermon n.

A discourse or address; a talk; a writing; as, the sermons of Chaucer. (Obs.)

Specifically, a discourse delivered in public, usually by a clergyman, for the purpose of religious instruction and grounded on some text or passage of Scripture. "This our life exempt from public haunts Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones and good in everything." "His preaching much, but more his practice, wrought, A living sermon of the truths he taught."

Hence, a serious address; a lecture on one's conduct or duty; an exhortation or reproof; a homily; often in a depreciatory sense.

verb

Sermon v. t.

To discourse to or of, as in a sermon. (Obs.)

To tutor; to lecture. (Poetic)

Sermon v. i. To speak; to discourse; to compose or deliver a sermon. (Obs.) "What needeth it to sermon of it more?"

See images of 'Sermon'

Etymology of 'Sermon'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Sermon" Quotes from Famous Books

... tendency to check that barbarous spirit, which has more frequently its source in an early acquired habit, arising from the prevalence of example, than in natural depravity, if every divine in Great Britain were to preach at least one sermon every twelve months, on our universal insensibility to the ...

— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler

... Mure of Caldwell, containing a criticism of Leechman's sermon (Burton, I. p. 163), bears strongly ...

— Hume - (English Men of Letters Series) • T.H. Huxley

... "allow me to tell you that I think you are very impertinent. You come here meddling with my affairs. What authority have you? Are you a relative? A connection? By what right do you preach this sermon?" ...

— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... wilder, especially as his mother grew more tired and despondent, and left matters to take their own course. But he began his educational experiments at the wrong end. His warnings were of no avail, and once as he was in the middle of a beautiful sermon one of them suddenly jumped on his knee, pulled his nose, and called out to his sister, "Fanny, he is getting ...

— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann

... of Americans fought continually for better and cleaner government as the evils of boss rule became more visible. One of them, Bishop Potter, of New York, gained wide hearing through a sermon preached at the centennial of the Constitution, in 1887, in which he turned from the usual patriotic congratulation to discuss actual government. The keenest interest in the subject was aroused by the ...

— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson

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