"It always appeared to me inconsistent," says Mr. Ballou, "with the profession of a minister of the gospel, to live expensively; that is, far beyond what is required for the necessities and comforts of life. As the minister is supported by the people of his charge, the propriety of his living beyond the income of his parishioners in general, seems questionable. Moreover, it has best suited my natural taste to avoid extravagances and superfluities." Tupper, the erudite and truthful author of Proverbial Philosophy, has very beautifully said,--"The choicest pleasures of life lie within the ring of moderation." Believing thus, Mr. Ballou wrote contentment on every dispensation of Providence that fell to his share. The work we have in hand might be filled alone with the most sincere eulogiums from ministering brethren, who have referred in public to the life and character of the subject of this biography; but, in the few which we have selected and introduced here, we have been guided by the purpose of presenting only such as have seemed to us--knowing the facts from long experience--to be the most truthful in the delineation of the character and disposition of Mr. Ballou. Moreover, the reader will, perhaps, be too often led to remember that it is a son who writes this biography of a father; and when he can bring to bear the mind and evidence of older and abler writers than himself, as treating upon the subject before us, the work may be thus strengthened and enriched. In this spirit, and under this chapter of "Domestic Characteristics," the following extract from the discourse delivered upon this subject by Rev. Henry Bacon is given:-- "I am not now to speak of a stranger, known only by reputation, but of one with whom I have been familiar from my earliest childhood. The more I attained power to judge his qualities, the more have I learned to esteem the man, his character and ministry. He came to Boston, as pastor of the Second Universalist Society, when I was scarcely four years old, and though my parents were members of the First Society, yet their house was one of his homes. The impression made in boyhood by the stately form of Mr. Ballou,--his meekness, his speech of singular clearness, adaptedness and wisdom, his singular temperance at the table, and his kindness to childhood,--was never removed; and I use no strained and forced language when I say Hosea Ballou was a great man. I say this, not looking from a sectarian point of view, but as guided by the principles that ought to govern us in our judgment of men, comprehensively regarding their qualities, and what they have been to their age.