It was the celebrated Charles James Fox who said to a young man just entering Parliament, if he desired to become a great orator, and had the genius and feeling from nature, all he had to do was to speak often and learn to think on his feet.  It is to this practice the lawyer and the preacher owe the oratory which distinguish these above every other class of men.  And yet, how few of them ever attain to the eminence of finished orators.  Eloquence and oratory are by no means identical:  one is the attribute of the heart, the other of the head; and eloquence, however unadorned, is always effective, because it is born of the feelings; and there is ever a sympathy between the hearts of men, and the words, however rude and original, which bubble up from the heart freighted with its feelings, rush with electrical force and velocity to the heart, and stir to the extent of its capacities.  Oratory, however finished, is from the brain, and is an art; it may convince the mind and captivate the imagination, but never touches the heart or stirs the soul.  To awaken feelings in others, we must feel ourselves.  Eloquence is the volume of flame, oratory the shaft of polished ice; the one fires to madness, the other delights and instructs.

Religion is the pathos of the heart, and must be awakened from the heart’s emotions.  The imagination is the great attribute of the mind, gathering and creating thought and inspiring feeling.  Hence, the peculiar system of the Methodists in their worship is the most efficient in proselyting, and especially with a rude, imaginative people.

The camp-meeting was an admirable device for this purpose, and its abandonment by the sect is as foolish as would be that of a knight who would throw away his sword as he was rushing to battle.  Fashion is omnipotent in religion, as in other things, and with the more general diffusion of education, camp-meetings have come to be considered as vulgar and unfashionable.  To be vulgar, is to be common; to be common, is to be natural.  The masses, and especially in democratic communities, must always be vulgar or common—­must always be, in the main, illiterate and rude; and it is for the conversion and salvation of these multitudes the preacher should struggle, and in his efforts his most efficient means should be used.

The camp-meeting, at night, when all the fire-stands are ablaze, and the multitude are assembled and singing, is beyond description picturesque:  when, too, some eloquent and enthusiastic preacher is stimulating to intense excitement the multitude around him with the fervor of his words, and the wild, passionate manifestations of his manner, to see the crowd swaying to and fro, to hear the groans and sobs of the half-frenzied multitude, and, not unfrequently, the maddened shriek of hysterical fear, all coming up from the half-illuminated spot, is thrillingly exciting.  And when the sermon is finished, to hear all this heated mass break forth