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second time, to the public, will, it is thought, be less liable to exception, for a few trifling marks of inadvertency that may possibly be found, than to admiration for the many exquisite beauties which pervade them, and their general superiority of style over the ordinary effusions of the desk.

But, it is said, they are addressed to the passions. In what manner? Is it by juggling and incantation? No: it is by the plain dealing of reason and Revelation. For what purpose ? Is it to excite eivil commotion ? No it is to feed the poor, to gospelize the savage, to make crime odious and avert the horrors of the second death. With such views can a Christian mind be calm? Again it is said, the understanding should be first convinced. It is already so. The duty of man is plain. God has written it in capitals. He that runs may read. So that the business of an apostle that is uninspired, is, not to teach new doctrines, but to declare and enforce the old. Alas, though many sermons are printed, few, after they have lost the little animation of the personal delivery, are calculated to produce any effect. We mean no disparagement. They are pious, and therefore respectable. We only mean that the fire of religion should emit a brighter flame. The heart of a preacher should swell and burst in his discourse. The wretches of the curse should see his blood.

President Norr does, indeed, apply himself assi duously to the feelings of his hearers. He inclines to the character of the French divines. His object and talent are at once persuasion. He has all the benefit of

order without its formality. Around his argument, which is well adjusted, he scatters the fairest flowers of rhetoric, to entice and fix the attention. He excels most in the descriptive, the pathetic, and the sublime; which indeed, are nearly allied, and which he sometimes unites with resistless effect. His sense is always full and dignified. He seldom sinks, never falls; and does every thing by design. Would to heaven there were thousands such in the vineyard of Christ! As far as we are able to judge, he is decidedly first on the catalogue of pulpit orators in this country. We submit the question to the public and posterity.

A

DISCOURSE

DELIVERED IN THE

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH,

IN ALBANY,

The Fourth of Julp, 1801.

AT THE

CELEBRATION OF THE TWENTY-FIFTH

ANNIVERSARY

OF

AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE.

BY

ELIPHALET NOTT, A. M.

1

THE

PROVIDENCE OF GOD,

TOWARDS

AMERICAN ISRAEL.

THE celebration of events, which have been replete with consequences beneficial to mankind, has long been practised among the nations of the world. A sacred festival, annually solemnized, kept alive in Israel the recollection of their deliverance from Egyptian thraldom, and an altar erected upon the banks of Jordan perpetuated the remembrance of the joyful day, when passing that river, they entered in triumph the promised land.

Hence probably arose the commemorating statues, festivals and anniversaries of the east. But however this may be, such memorials are doubtless rational, when instituted to preserve unanimity in a nation, and hand down the knowledge of important eras in its history.