ments which were adduced in vindication of free prayer, bear upon the question of extemporaneous delivery. The most ordinary sermons presuppose and require some degree of intellectual training, as well as a tolerable acquaintance with the Scriptures; and whether a sermon is written out at length and read, or recited memoriter, or whether the detail of expression is in a great measure left to be determined by the impulse of the occasion, the average results, as respects the quality of the composition, will not be found on that account greatly to differ, inasmuch as the mind may be habituated to exercise itself in either predicament with equal facility. Nor is extemporaneous speaking, when the subject is one which interests the feelings, and which comes fairly within the grasp of the understanding of the speaker, a habit more difficult to be attained than that of written composition. Nothing is more common than to meet with individuals possessing highly respectable pulpit talents, who are utterly unable to succeed in the expression of their sentiments by means of the pen, with any thing like a corresponding advantage. As to the improprieties which may fall from the lips of a public speaker, they can hardly be more gross or more numerous than are every day deliberately committed to the press.

Extemporaneous preaching, if that phrase is

meant to apply in a less restricted sense than regards the habit of delivery, is not the practice of the Protestant Dissenters. The most illiterate of their preachers are, with exceptions too few to affect the general statement, addicted to Scriptural research by the help of expositors and commentators, and to extensive theological reading, preparatory to the public service; and this habit arises not merely from the same bent of inclination which has led them to desire the work of the ministry, but from a sort of necessity imposed upon them by the religious knowledge and intelligence which are found diffused among the members of the humblest Dissenting community. Detraction may always discover some two or three cases to blazon as specious proofs of her calumnies; but, taking the very lowest ground in estimating the qualifications of the great body of Dissenting ministers, educated and uneducated, the assertion is far within the line of truth, that with whatsoever deficiencies they may be chargeable on the score of elocution, classical literature, mathematical science, and general knowledge, of this one thing they are not ignorant-the religion of the Bible: their acquaintance with theology is far beyond that of the generality of the clergy; their attainments in Biblical literature, so far as accessible in the vernacular language, may often bear a similar comparison; a large proportion of the

are,

works of this kind which issue from the press, it is notorious, purchased by Dissenting ministers, notwithstanding their limited incomes. But with regard to the experimental science of Christianity, as the business of the heart and of the life, in its relations to the wants and hopes and characters of men, as sinful and as dying, to whom as such the Gospel brings the message of salvation,-in this respect, their competency for the office they have assumed, rests on far better grounds than that of many of the schoolbred clergy, who glory in an episcopal ordination, which has conveyed to them nothing but the burden of an abused responsibility. "By their "fruits ye shall know them." The beneficial influence which the despised efforts of licensed preachers, has visibly exerted on the morals and social character of the lower classes, when all other expedients have failed, extending itself, in numerous instances, to the population of a township or a district which previously exhibited the most unfavourable aspect, is a fact attested by what is continually taking place in the light of day. Let the means be decried as fanatical; their operation must needs be viewed by men of this world as mysterious, but the effects it will be hard to dispute against. So it has ever pleased God, by that preaching which men deem foolishness, to save them who believe.

The preaching of the more regularly edu

cated Protestant Dissenters, (who, if the Wesleyan Methodists are not included, form a very considerable proportion oflicensed teachers, very few persons being admitted to the pulpits of the Nonconformists, who have not received some academical preparation for the ministry,) is of a description which does not warrant the subdued tone of apology. It exhibits, for the most part, an exertion of intellect, a solidity of thought, and an energy of feeling, which combining with the transcendent interest of the subject, present, in some instances, the nearest approaches to eloquence with which modern assemblies are familiar. Not that the crowded auditories which evangelical preaching, and such preaching only is found uniformly to attract, are held together by the mere powers of oratory: much as it is adapted to interest and impress, to witness the animation of a speaker who is obviously in earnest, the true secret of the attraction lies not in the preacher, but in his doctrine; is not attributable to the wisdom of man, but to the power of God.

"The greater part of most Dissenting con"gregations," remarks a writer who will be admitted as a credible witness,*"* consisting of "plain people, who have not enjoyed the advantages of a learned education, nor had lei

*The Rev. Dr. DODDRIDGE in his "Free Thoughts on "the most probable Means of reviving the Dissenting Inte"rest." 1729.

"sure for improvements by after-study, it is ap

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parently necessary, that a man should speak

plainly to them, if he desire they should un"derstand and approve what he says. And as "for those who are truly religious, they attend

on public worship, not that they may be "amused with a form or sound, or entertained "with some new and curious speculation; but "that their hearts may be enlarged as in the

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presence of God, that they may be powerfully "affected with those great things of religion "which they already know and believe, that so "their conduct may be suitably influenced by "them. And to this purpose they desire that "their ministers may speak as if they were in "earnest, in a lively and pathetic, as well as a "clear and intelligible manner. Such is the "taste of the generality of Dissenters; a taste "which I apprehend they will still retain, what"ever attempts may be made to alter it; and I "conceive this turn of thought to be the great support of our interest: He who would be

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generally agreeable to Dissenters, must be an “evangelical, an experimental, a plain and an "affectionate preacher. Now I must do our "common people the justice to own, that when "these points are secured, they are not very de"licate in their demands, with regard to the "forms of a discourse. They will not, in such "a case, be very much disgusted, though there