[p. 112] free intercourse between himself and his children. These he had instructed with great care, so that they are among our most distinguished proficients in the Greek and Latin languages. I believe he wrote a much smaller number of sermons than is common during a long ministry. Most of them, however, were so thoroughly elaborated that they might very well have been sent to the press without revision. His favorite discourses he often repeated at home; and in his later years he delivered them wholly memoriter whenever he preached on exchange, so that they became generally celebrated in the neighboring parishes. He had a parishioner who, though simple enough in other respects, had a remarkably retentive memory; and when hearing the Doctor preach an old sermon he used to raise his arm and signify with his fingers how many times it had been preached before. In the pulpit he certainly attained an eminence that was reached by few of his contemporaries. In the delivery of his sermons he was usually very deliberate; but when he became greatly excited his utterance waxed rapid and earnest, and he came down upon his audience with the overwhelming force of a torrent. To the discourses he committed to memory his stirring and impassioned delivery gave the effect in a great degree of extemporaneous efforts.Under date of 1848, Rev. Convers Francis writes:
My early recollections of Dr. Osgood's pulpit services are strong, though of course I could not appreciate them as I did subsequently. But even when I was a child they seemed to me something extraordinary—different from those of any other minister. His prayers were evidently elaborated with devout care; they were always strong and earnest. There were a certain number of them which he so constantly repeated that when I was young I could easily rehearse large portions of them, and while he was praying could anticipate what was coming next. In pouring out his petitions his voice
