John Donne (1572-1631) wrote something that long-winded pastors everywhere should take to heart:

It needs not for perspicuousness, for God knows they are plain enough: nor do all of them use Sem-brief-Accents, for some of them have Crotchets enough. It may be they intend not to rise like glorious Tapers and Torches, but like Thin-wretched-sick-watching-Candles, which languish and are in a Divine Consumption from the first minute, yea in their snuff, and stink, when others are in their more profitable glory. I have thought sometimes, that out of conscience, they allow long measure to course ware. And sometimes, that usurping in that place a liberty to speak freely of Kings, they would reigne as long as they could. But now I think they do it out of a zealous imagination, that, It is their duty to Preach on till their Auditory wake. [From The Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne, PROBLEMES: "Why Puritans Make Long Sermons?" (NY: Modern Library, 2001) 306.]

I’m not sure I know what all of that means, but I like it.