[242] his unmarried state, did not press the town for his salary. The fugitive value of the old continental money caused some embarrassment a few years later; but he bore with cheerfulness his share of the common public burdens. While a part of the continental army was stationed at Charlestown, on Winter Hill, the soldiers walked to Medford for the pleasure of attending his public ministrations. Citizen.--Dr. Osgood, as a citizen, was a lover of peace, and an early advocate of temperance societies. His love of country showed itself prominently during our difficulties with Great Britain in 1812. His sermon at the annual election in 1809, that before the students of Harvard College in 1810, and his “Solemn protest” against the declaration of war in 1812, prove that the fear of man was not before his eyes. As a federalist of the old school, he felt bound to thunder his anathemas against the new doctrines of the national administration; but it was felt by some of his friends that his offerings on the altar of patriotism burned too brightly. So keen were his applications, that it could not be said of him, Tam unice vituperat, ut laudare videtur. Preacher.--As a preacher, his mind was not so much the rapid, inventive, and poetic, as the clear, metaphysic, and practical. It was ardent, but not glowing; always free, but always reverent; and particularly excelled in illustrating moral truth. To sterling Anglo-Saxon sense he added a vast mental industry; and, had he been a poet, his power as a preacher would have been well-nigh doubled. Pithy and sententious apothegms were not common with him. His writings were not clusters of maxims; but consecutive thought, expressed in pure, plain English. During the first part of his ministry, it seemed to be his leading aim to convince his people of the truth of his creed; and this immersed him in the acute metaphysics of Edwards. In a discriminating notice of him, written immediately after his death, there is the following:--
As a preacher, he was very distinguished. His matter was copious and sensible, and drawn, for the most part, from the moral precepts and the undisputed doctrines of the gospel. His style was animated and forcible, and his manner one of the most striking which we have ever witnessed. His looks, his gesture, and the tones of his voice, were altogether peculiar to himself. Without being at all like those which we are accustomed to find in what is called a finished speaker, they were so energetic, so full of meaning,
