To speak extempore and at the same time to speak well and to the purpose, to arrange certain points and arguments mentally with nice precision, so as to deliver them with fluency and effect, must require a strong and healthy intellect, a powerful and original mind. But a man with an ordinary degree of mental cultivation, who cannot write a discourse and read it afterward, must be singularly deficient in his intellectual capacity. It is impossible for an audience to feel so deep an interest in the service as that which is felt in listening to the spontaneous outbreakings of a warm and ardent mind while it is engaged upon the holy theme. The speaker must invariably grow enthusiastic in so glorious a cause as he advocates, and his audience necessarily partake of his feelings. But when there is any particular degree of spirit or animation evinced by one who is reading his discourse _verbatim et literatim_, it is of necessity a preconcerted exhibition, and as such must fail of its effect with the majority. It may be said that no man can lay out so well his matter, nor give so good and sound an argument, spontaneously, as when he commits his ideas to paper. This, as a general thing, must be conceded, for there are comparatively few intellects sufficiently powerful to adopt the opposite course. The advantages of extemporaneous speaking are doubtless many. It enables the individual to place himself in closer contact with the feelings of his audience, giving him the power to take advantage of any bright thought that unexpected impulse may impart. An experienced commander arranges the general plan of an engagement before going into battle, but he can do no more, for circumstances must guide him in the conflict. He must improve the opportunity to throw forward his forces just at the right moment, not too soon nor too late, as such an indiscretion might change the fortunes of the day, and lose the battle to him who would else have won it. So with the preacher; he must watch the inner man of his hearers, and, as he gains ground in the heart, follow up his influence by well-sustained argument, and strengthen his position by proper means made available at the appropriate moment,--neither too lightly nor yet with too much force, but be guided safely by the strength of the position he already holds in the minds of his audience.