surrounding towns, in addition to the collegiate classes--a compliment
which few of the professors since his day have received.

Mr. Adams continued his connection with the University, delivering
lectures and conducting exercises in declamation, until July, 1809. "It
was at this time, and as a member of one of the younger classes at
college, that I first saw Mr. Adams, and listened to his well-remembered
voice from the chair of instruction; little anticipating, that after the
lapse of forty years, my own humble voice would be heard, in the
performance of this mournful office. Some who now hear me will recollect
the deep interest with which these lectures were listened to, not merely
by the youthful audience for which they were prepared, but by numerous
voluntary hearers from the neighborhood. They formed an era in the
University; and were, I believe, the first successful attempt, in this
country, at this form of instruction in any department of literature. They
were collected and published in two volumes, completing the theoretical
part of the subject. I think it may be fairly said, that they will bear a
favorable comparison with any treatise on the subject, at that time extant
in our language. The standard of excellence, in every branch of critical
learning, has greatly advanced in the last forty years, but these lectures
may still be read with pleasure and instruction. Considered as a
systematic and academical treatise upon a subject which constituted the
chief part of the intellectual education of the Greeks and Romans, these
lectures, rapidly composed as they were delivered, and not revised by the
author before publication, are not to be regarded in the light of a
standard performance. But let any statesman or jurist, even of the present
day, in America or Europe--whose life, like Mr. Adams's, has been actively
passed in professional and political engagements, at home and
abroad--attempt, in the leisure of two or three summers--his mind filled
with all the great political topics of the day--to prepare a full course