Of Whitefield, Mr. Taylor remarks, that the secret of his power over the vast multitudes that he moulded like wax, was a vivid perception of the reality of spiritual things, and the concentrated force with which he brought them to bear on the conscience and imagination of his hearers. His singular gifts as a speaker rested on the conceptive faculty as related to those objects that are purely spiritual, both abstract and concrete; and with him this faculty had a compass, a depth, and an intensity of sensitiveness, never, perhaps, equaled. While he spoke the visible world seemed to melt away into thin mist, and the real, the eternal world to come out from among shadows, and stand forth in awful demonstration. This faculty was by no means that of the poet or the painter, which is sensuous in its material. If it had been of this sort, he would have left us monuments of his genius, like a Divina Commedia, or a Paradise Lost, or a series of Michael Angelo cartoons. The history of Whitefield's ministry is simply this: The Gospel he proclaimed drew around him dense masses of men as soon as he commenced his course; it was the power of religious truth, not the preacher's harmonious voice, not his graceful action, not his fire as an orator, that gained him power over congregations to the last. In the remainder of the volume, Mr. Taylor considers the primary elements of Methodism, its relations to society, and its position in the future. These topics are discussed with sagacity, and with perfect candor, although not in a manner to command universal assent. Whatever opinion may be formed as to his conclusions, no one can doubt the suggestiveness of his comments, nor the earnestness of his inquiries. The style of this work, which we do not admire, betrays the same intellectual habits as the former treatises of the author. He writes like a man more addicted to reflection than to utterance. He simply records his own musings as they succeed each other in the solitude of the closet, without aiming, at the force, point, and effective brevity of expression, which is necessary to obtain a mastery over the minds of others. He seems to regard language as an aid to his own meditations, rather than a medium of intercourse with his fellow-men. His writings are far more like a monologue than an address. He aims to clear up his own convictions, to reduce them to order, and to give them an outward embodiment, by their visible expression, rather than to enforce them on the attention of his readers. Hence, he is often diffuse, even to languor; and nothing but the vigor of his thought could prevent a wearisome monotony. No one, however, can call in question the originality and genuine earnestness of his speculations; and accordingly, it is impossible to follow their track, without a profound interest, in spite of the defects of his style.