Among his other excellencies in preaching (which were many) this was none of the least, that he could so order his subject as to make it relish every palate. He could so dress a plain discourse as to delight a learned audience, and at the same time preach with a learned plainness, having so learned to conceal his art. He had such a clear notion of high mysteries, as to make them stoop to the meanest capacity. He had so learned Christ, and being a man of a most zealous temper, the great bent of his spirit and that which he did spend himself anent, was to make people know their dangerous state by nature, and to persuade them to believe and lay hold of the great salvation. All which singularities seem to have been his peculiar mercy from the Lord, to make him a burning and shining light in the western climate, for about the space of two years[80] only, the Spirit of the Lord as it were stirring up a lamp unto a sudden blaze, that was not to continue long in his church. On which a late prefacer of some of his sermons has very pertinently observed,----"Yea, how awakening, convincing and reproving may the example of this very young minister be to many ministers of the gospel, who have been many years in the vineyard, but fall far short of his labours and progress! God thinks fit now and then to raise up a child to reprove the sloth and negligence of many thousands of advanced years, and shews that he can perfect his own praise out of the mouth of babes, &c." His sermons are now in print, and well known in the world. His works do praise him in the gates, and though they are free from the metaphysical speculations of the schools, yet it must be granted that the excellencies of the ancient fathers and school-men do all concenter in them: For his doctrine carries light, his reproofs are weighty, and his exhortations powerful, and though they are not in such an accurate or grammatical style as some may expect, yet that may be easily accounted for, if we consider, (1.) The great alteration and embellishment in the style of the English language since his time. And (2.) There can be no ground to doubt but they must be far inferior unto what they were when delivered by the author, who neither corrected, nor, as appears, intended that they should ever be published, and yet all this is sufficiently made up otherwise, for what is wanting in symmetry of parts or equality of style, in the pleasure of variety, like the grateful odours of various flowers, or the pleasant harmony of different sounds, for so is truth in its own native dress. It hath been often said that Mr. Gray many times longed for the 22d year of his age, wherein he expected to rest from his labours by a perpetual jubilee, to enjoy his blessed Lord and Master. However it is certain that in his sermons we often find him longing for his majority, that he might enter into the possession of his heavenly Father's inheritance prepared for him before the foundations of the world were laid.