may be added a discriminating judgment and a taste improved by cultivation.

Whatever merit attaches to industry in his profession, may be justly considered as belonging to Mr. Bernard. He studies the sense of his author with indefatigable diligence; and is always at home in the various parts which he undertakes to act. An enlightened audience, which will not be insulted with impunity, by the culpable negligence of actors, appreciates this respectful attention more than is generally imagined.

His range of acting has been extensive--from the most polished gentleman to the most awkward clown, through the intermediate families of fops, humourists, and distinctive characters of various kinds. Our limits will only allow us to mention such as, Lord Ogleby, Goldfinch, Sheva, in "the Benevolent Hebrew," the Jew in the "Jew and Doctor," Nipperkin, Dennis Brulgruddery, Farmer Ashfield, Ruttekin, Lovegold and Diddler. All which characters, and many more, it is well known, have been been personated by him with great applause.

Mr. Bernard's Lord Ogleby, which appeared first on one of the London Theatres, at the same time the celebtated Mr. King was playing in the same character at the other, was alone sufficient to have made the former rank high on the list of the distinguished actors of the age. Since that period, he has improved much in this part, and since the

death of Mr. King, is it presumed by those who have seen it performed in Europe as well as in America, Mr. Bernard's assumption would not suffer by a comparison with that of any performer now on the stage.

We must still be indulged in just touching on his uncommon success in the difficult part of Lovegold, in the "Miser." This he played in Boston the winter before last, for the first time in his life. In it, he displayed the skill of a master for it proved to be his chef d'œuvre. It has been said by a person who has seen Moliere's Miser performed in Paris and Fielding's in London, that it is doubtful in his mind, whether this character has not been exhibited with as much fidelity to nature, in Boston, as in either of those capitals. The lesson, on the miserable consequences resulting from an inordinate love of riches, could not have been more strongly impressive. Nor could the the ill-sorted connection of avarice and gallantry have been more effectually exposed to ridicule, than it was by Mr. Bernard in this character of Lovegold, aided by Mrs. Shaw in that of Lappet. It is but justice to say, her representation was highly spirited and correct. The inimitable comick humour interspersed in the principal scene between them must have set all human gravity of muscles at defiance. In the excess of frantick feeling, when the miser discovers he has been robbed of his darling treasure, Bernard rose with his subject; and

without ranting, or outstepping" the modesty of nature," he expressed by turns, the furious yet debilitating passions of rage, grief and despair, with their appropriate characteristicks and with uncommon effect.

It is with great satisfaction we have to add, that the person of whom we are now treating is not less estimable for his moral, than respectable in his professional, character. He is entitled to the better plaudit for having performed well all the relative duties of life. He is a constant and serious attendant on religious worship. He was a good husband. During the last winter he lost an excellent wife, with whom he had lived many years in the greatest conjugal happiness. By her he has three children, to whom he is a tender and indulgent parent, and for whose welfare, he is solicitious to realize a competent and independent provision. This induces him, however liberal in his disposition, to attend to a strict economy in the management of his affairs. His salary and benefits have been so handsomely productive, that he has laid up money since he has been in America. His prospects are now still more favourable than they have been.

The Theatre in Boston has been let by the proprietors, for five years, to the present managers, of whom Mr. B. is one. He embarked for England, a few days ago, to bring out a reinforcement to the company. We sincerely wish that he may meet with suc

cess; that the publick may be gratified with the elegant and interesting amusement of a well regulated and improved Theatre; and that the managers and all concerned may be generally rewarded for their honest endeavours to provide this rational gratification for the town.

We understand there are a number of anecdotes respecting Mr. Bernard, in a work printed some years since in England, from which we entertain a hope of being able to make some amusing extracts in a future number.

Newbury-Street, April, 1806.

J.

FOR THE POLYANTHOS.

EXTEMPORANEOUS PREACHING.

The cloak that I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest, bring with thee, and the books, especially the parchments. 2 Tim. iv. 13. SEVERAL conjectures upon the contents of the parchments, which Paul seems most anxious to regain, have been made by the curious and learned. Some have supposed that they contained his freedom bill, as a Roman citizen, which he thought would be of use to him in his trial. Others have conjectured that they were the originals of his epistles, which he had written and sent to several churches. As this second epistle to Timothy was written during his last confinement at Rome, and not long before his martyr

B...VOL. 2.

dom, it is highly probable that they contained some instructions which he had penned. under divine inspiration, and wished to preserve for the edification of the body of Christ, which is the church.

That written notes, or sermons, are better calculated to answer this important end, which is the grand object of the christian ministry, than extemporaneous addresses, I shall endeavour in the following paragraphs to show.

The opposers to written sermons, who are generally among the illiterate, the artful and the vain, refer us to apostolick example. Whatever conclusion may be drawn from this argument, it is certainly a very unfair way of reasoning. The principles on which the argument is founded are not of general application; of course the conclusion is unjust when applied to preachers in general. The apostles, it is granted, were under immediate inspiration; they were endowed with various miraculous gifts, which eminently qualified them without previous study and labour for the work of the ministry. To make their reasoning just and conclusive, they ought to grant what they seem not disposed to grant, that all whom Christ commissions to preach are endowed with miraculous gifts. Besides, it does not appear that the apostles did not occasionally write their discourses. We know that they wrote many epistles, which differ in nothing but the

A