degradation. When they would paint him with their best art, they summon some Satan of the most diabolical class to sit for the picture. The men of these sermons are not the men whom we meet in daily life. They are monsters; they have no image of God in them, no trace of heavenly nobleness. They have no sympathy, no truth, no faith, no aspiration. They have no law in their minds opposed to the law in their animal nature, but are wholly bent upon evil. They riot in sin. "Evil, thou art my good," is their ruling principle. If they detect any thing in themselves that seems right and good, they are made to believe that this is only a manœuvre of the adversary in order to gain some new advantage. In the sight of God and angels they are miserable, worthless, loathsome beings. Such representations, abounding in these volumes, insure to them early oblivion. Dr. Payson's sermons want breadth of scope. They do not sweep the circle of religion, but describe only a single segment. They do not traverse humanity in its amplitude, but are confined to a small and dark corner of it. In imagination they are often bright and soaring, but seldom, though sometimes, brilliant and sublime. They deal with their hearers, in too many instances, as if they had no intellect to question their postulates, and no heart to feel their aspersions. They lack the spirit of brotherly kindness and charity, the humane and social element of religion, — the spirit of the second great commandment, to give practical activity to that of the first. And yet many of them are striking, pertinent, forcible, abounding in apt illustration, and in the delivery must have been exceedingly effective. To this praise they are entitled, and it may be considered the highest, -that they probably fulfilled the object for which they were prepared in a measure beyond that which it is often the lot of sermons, even those of distinguished ministers, to do. Nor are we unmindful of the difficulty of composing sermons which, whilst they suit the circumstances of a particular congregation and serve an immediate end, shall also be of a character so general and broad, and receive a finish so exact and beautiful, as to commend them to the taste and fit them for the use of readers at large. But of this we are sure, that sermons which do not treat fairly the intellect of the hearers, sermons which aim to carry their points by stratagem or by volleys of eloquence, sermons which are not in harmony with the nature of man and the progress of can the race, sermons of menace and impassioned declamation merely, however solemn and moving at the time, have no permanent interest or value. The name and mem ory of their authors may long be preserved and held in honor, but the sermons themselves will soon be forgotten. To this fate we think most of the sermons in these volumes are destined. How, then, it may be asked, do we account for Dr. Payson's great celebrity as a preacher? We should be glad, in reply, to go into a critical analysis of his powers; but must content ourselves here with a very general view of them. Dr. Payson possessed many of the essential qualities of a pulpit orator, a fine voice, simplicity and dignity of appearance and manner, quick and clear perceptions, skill in disposing the materials of his discourse, a lively interest in his subject, unquestioned sincerity, an imagination easily excited and often rich in its creations, sensibilities that moved with lightning rapidity, a heartfelt concern for the salvation of his fellow-men, and an overwhelming sense of the magnitude of the work in which he was engaged. With these qualities no man could fail of producing an impression, of attracting notice, of winning popular regard. Add to these, uncommon variety, copiousness, and fluency in his public prayers, poured forth from depths of thought and feeling that seemed inexhaustible, suited to every occasion, to every state of character and mood of mind or heart in his congregation, uttered with a fervor and earnestness of manner that drew the undivided attention of all, and prepared them for receiving the sermon as a veritable message from heaven. In this union of gifts and attainments is found, we think, the secret of Dr. Payson's unusual fame as a preacher. Had these qualities been combined in him with a more generous faith, with a better appreciation of the actual condition and wants of men, - of the good that is in them to be commended, as well as of the evil to be condemned, - with a view of the nature and means of salvation more strictly evangelical, with a more genial and hopeful humanity, we doubt not his influence would have been broader, deeper, and more beneficent, and the memorials of his ministry, in the place where it was exercised, more conspicuous, gratifying, and enduring. J. W. T. THERE is a general complaint at present of a decline of religious interest in the churches of our land. From all denominations arises this lamentation, united with more or less rebuke of those who are represented as participating in an apathy which they should have prevented. In some quarters very strong language is used on the subject. The present is pronounced "a period of spiritual death." "There are few or no revivals." "Coldness has crept over our religious assemblies." "Worldliness has chilled the sensibilities of the devout, and diverted to its own ends the energies of the active." "Religion is at a low ebb in the community." "Zeal has given place to torpor, and piety to indifference." In such terms as these is the character of the present time described by some persons; while others content themselves with speaking of a comparatively low state of religion, and deplore the absence of those signs of spiritual life which were seen a few years ago. We are far from denying that there is occasion for such remarks. There is apparently, and, we believe, really, less interest felt in religious subjects now than prevailed three or four years since. Those who have adopted the religious life are generally less strict in their fidelity to its requisitions, and among the irreligious or the worldly fewer examples occur of a change of character. We may, with entire truth, confess the poverty of our faith and the emptiness of our lives. But we must not exaggerate the evil, imputing to our times more of irreligion than belongs to them, nor continue to present to our own or to others' observation only one side of the reality, as if there was no reverse to the gloomy truth. We should avoid this mistake, both because it is a mistake, a virtual falsehood, and because it does no inconsiderable harm. It is a virtual falsehood, as all one-sidedness is. He who dwells exclusively on the dark or the bright aspect of society misrepresents it, as much as he who looks only on the joy or the sorrow of life misrepresents the Divine Providence. There is never an entire degeneracy, an indifference which sweeps over all hearts, as there can never be found an individual who is wholly and only bad. In the worst times there are some faithful souls who withstand, if they cannot arrest, the tendency of their age. When the Papal Church was at the height of its power, and the depth of its corruption, the Waldenses stood forth as the champions of a purer religion, or maintained their virtue in the seclusion which was their only means of safety. Even in Sodom there was one Lot, an exception to the general character of the people. We are apt, too, when grieved or indignant at the proofs of laxity around us, to forget how much excellence is hidden from sight in the quiet homes of the land. Who can tell how many morning and evening sacrifices are laid on altars which no eye but God's has counted? Who can estimate the amount of private virtue, of Christian self-denial, of unostentatious goodness, of secret communion, which comes up into constant remembrance before the Omniscient One? At the moment when the lust of gain and the love of pleasure may seem to divide the community between them, in hundreds of households might we find lives worthy of all praise. There never was an Elijah to complain that he alone was left of the servants of the Lord, who might not have been rebuked by a declaration like that which taught the prophet that God's knowledge, like God's patience, was greater than his own. The partial judgment of which we speak does harm, because it discourages some persons, and in the minds of others raises painful questions respecting Christianity. It disheartens those who depend very much on sympathy, and who, if they be told that their fellow-Christians are all sinking into religious unconcern, will lose their own energy of faith, and illustrate the truth of the remark by which they will themselves have been overborne. Yet more serious is the evil which is done, when persons, who are not established in that Christian experience which is a witness to itself of the Divine origin of the Gospel, are tempted to inquire how that can be from God which is so inefficacious. Can a religion which produces no fervor or force of character have come from above? Christianity is now hampered, in its attempts to win the submission of some men, by difficulties enough arising from its confessedly slow progress and imperfect establishment in the world, without our increasing the obstacles in the way of faith by holding up to view only the less favorable passages of its history. By speaking only of our neighbour's ill-success or want of influence, we may very soon create a prejudice against him that shall never be over come. In like manner may we prejudice the cause of truth and of God. In regard to the alleged, and actual, departure of our times from a high standard of Christian experience, it should not be forgotten that similar complaints have been made, and not without reason, in all ages. We find them at no great intervals, as we traverse the whole extent of ecclesiastical history. To go no farther back than the settlement of our own country, this neighbourhood had scarcely become the seat of a Christian population, when the charge of degeneracy was brought against the people. In the sermons of a hundred years ago, and of a still more distant date, we meet with as strong descriptions of prevalent immorality and declension of piety, as in any of the discourses or journals of our own day. It does not follow that either now or then the imputation was unjust, but from such facts we may learn to avoid alike excessive severity of judgment and extreme indulgence of anxiety. Such Another fact of a general nature is established, we think, by a survey of the history of the Christian Church. Is it not manifest, that there are alternations of religious interest and religious apathy? Are there not periods at which God seems to awaken a wider and deeper thoughtfulness on spiritual subjects than at others? It is plain that a uniform religious experience is no more to be expected in a community than in an individual. There will be seasons of earnestness and seasons of dulness. For a time an anxiety about the welfare and destiny of the soul will appear to pervade all classes, and then again little concern will seem to be felt by any class of persons. Unusual engagedness in divine things will be followed by apparent forgetfulness of them. variations no one who has observed the state of society even for a few years can deny. Much of the language which has been used in regard to the fact we are noticing we would avoid, as being founded in a wrong philosophy of religion, and suited, while it represents God as capricious, to render man indolent. But that seasons of religious excitement alternate with seasons of religious depression, we hold to be undeniable. The law which governs such changes, if a law there be, is known only to the Supreme Intelligence; if they are what in human language we term accidental, the causes which produce them are either so obscure or so various that they elude our power of description. Still, the |