ornaments of speech."

True: gold is welcome even in a purse of the coarsest canvas; and,
although it is not in such caskets that people look for gems, no man
would despise a diamond because he found it in an earthen porringer. In
the treatises of Owen there is many a sentence which, set in a sermon,
would shine like a brilliant; and there are ingots enough to make the
fortune of a theological faculty. For instance, we open the first
treatise in this new collection of his works, and we read:--"It carrieth
in it a great condecency unto Divine wisdom, that man should be restored
unto the image of God, by Him who was the essential image of the Father;
and that He was made like unto us, that we might be made like unto Him,
and unto God through him;" and we are immediately reminded of a recent
treatise on the Incarnation, and all its beautiful speculation regarding
the "Pattern-Man." We read again till we come to the following
remark:--"It is the nature of sincere goodness to give a delight and
complacency unto the mind in the exercise of itself, and communication
of its effects. A good man doth both delight in doing good, and hath an
abundant reward _for_ the doing it, _in_ the doing of it;" and how can
we help recalling a memorable sermon "On the Immediate Reward of
Obedience," and a no less memorable chapter in a Bridgewater treatise,
"On the Inherent Pleasure of the Virtuous Affections?" And we read the
chapter on "The Person of Christ the great Representative of God," and
are startled by its foreshadowings of the sermons and the spiritual
history of a remarkably honest and vigorous thinker, who, from doubting
the doctrine of the Trinity, was led to recognize in the person of Jesus
Christ the Alpha and Omega of his theology. It is possible that
Archdeacon Wilberforce, and Chalmers, and Arnold, may never have perused
the treatise in question; and it is equally possible that under the
soporific influence of a heavy style, they may never have noticed
passages for which their own minds possessed such a powerful affinity.
But by the legitimate expedient of appropriate language--perhaps by
means of some "ornament or elegance"--Jeremy Taylor or Barrow would have
arrested attention to such important thoughts; and the cause of truth
would have gained, had the better divine been at least an equal orator.

However, there are "masters in Israel," whose style has been remarkably
meagre; and perhaps "Edwards on the Will" and "Butler's