labours. The very last sermon we heard him deliver, extended to fifty-five or sixty minutes, and there was no faltering, no hesitation, no inaccuracy; but delivered with extreme precision and facility. There was not the slightest loss for a word. He was the closest and most minute observer, and forgot very little. He read continually, and what he read he made his own. You could gather, from his conversation and preaching, that he was perfectly familiar with our giants in theology, and general literature, and that he vividly remembered a great portion of that which he had perused.

His memory to the last was unusual, and had been vigorously exercised during his long life. His acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures, and his remembrance of their various parts, always surprised us. He seemed to have not only the richest, most devotional, and most familiar passages before his memory continually, but, also, the most recondite, the most prophetic and unusual, those which large numbers seldom peruse, and which few, if they read, can remember. He had them so fixed on his mind, as to be familiar with the very expressions employed.

Verses and paragraphs in the historical, and, especially, the prophetic books were remembered

and quoted by him with the utmost facility, and with great beauty and effect; sometimes, indeed, with surprising point and power, reaching the hearts, and awakening the admiration of his audience.

We refer, secondly, to his imagination. This, to every intellectual man, was very conspicuous, though not unduly predominant. It was marked by its tenderness and beauty, rather than by its power and elevation. Still, it was one of Mr. Jay's prominent and most interesting characteristics, and was unfolded in a very chaste and impressive manner. He was a man of deep sensibility, of tender and intense emotion, and his imaginative power was developed to those who were acquainted with him, and who were favoured with his ministry, by its purity, its pathos, and its beauty. The rich and imaginative passages in his writings are very numerous, and the strokes of pathos are very fine. Many pictures in his discourses, exhibiting the vividness of his imagination, are remarkably graphic and impressive. Numbers of his touches, his beauteous and radiant gleams, are exquisite.

We refer, thirdly, to his wit. This was racy, original, peculiar: it struck us invariably, and with power. We never met him without in some

degree observing it, and often and often have we been charmed by it. It was genuine, it was very superior. Dry, playful, and vivacious,-sometimes brilliant. No person could spend a few hours, or even a few minutes frequently, with Mr. Jay, without marking that an original and dry humour was one of his most striking characteristics. Many of his remarks on character, on books, on preachers, and on the incidents of life, were unusually playful and witty, and, while they amused, they instructed; they remained with us; we could not possibly forget them,-sententious, aphoristic, pungent, vivid, they lodged themselves in the memory, and could not be displaced. There was nothing, generally, that was sour, biting, caustic in his humour; it was dry, animated, lively, and pleasant; withal, very intelligent.

These appear to us, after much and prolonged observation and reflection on the honoured man whose character we briefly portray, to have been the prominent features of his mind. We by no means class him with men of the greatest genius and mental power. He had not the profundity of Barrow, the elevated conceptions of Howe, the splendour of Jeremy Taylor, the ponderous weight of John Foster, the brilliance of Chalmers, or the classic beauty and elegance

of Robert Hall; still, his mind was of a very superior order. It was individual and striking in its features, original, discursive, vigorous, full, and was the source, or the medium, of the most valuable instruction to multitudes while he was living; and will be, through the instrumentality of his writings, the means of conveying instruction, encouragement, and consolation of the most important and precious kind to multitudes, now that he has entered on the rest of immortality, and has had all his powers fully expanded and perfected in the realms of cloudless light and unending felicity:

"Where glory ever shines,

And loveliness of mind and heart can never fade."

CHAPTER V.

AN OUTLINE OF THE MORAL AND CHRISTIAN

CHARACTER OF MR. JAY.

WE always regarded the character of Mr. Jay as being one of a high order. We write from knowledge, from long and intimate observation: we are not hasty in our conclusions. He required to be known, and known well, to understand and appreciate him correctly. He was cautious, and wisely too, in unfolding his sentiments and feelings to strangers, unless their character and credentials were good; and he well knew how many eyes were fixed on him, and how many curious observers were continually marking him; besides, he had visitors of every grade from all parts of the united kingdom; and indeed, as he had a European reputation, and one as a preacher and theological writer, even world-wide, he was visited by distinguished persons, who valued and loved the Gospel, of every communion, from America, from France,