No frosts as yet. It would seem as if we were to have no Winter this year. This day was like September. I occupied myself reading until time for divine service which I attended all day. Mr. Motte in the morning. 97. Psalm 2. “Clouds and darkness are round about him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne.” A discourse upon the mysteries of the Christian Religion not considered as any drawback upon the natural belief in a wise and beneficent deity. Mr. Ripley in the Afternoon from Luke 3. 15 and 16. A parallel between the doctrines of John the Baptist and the Saviour.

Mr. R. is to me the most utterly uninteresting preacher I ever heard. All the other gentlemen who preach strike me as far above him in point of eloquence. But this may partly arise from the prejudice which I have entertained against him from the day of my first seeing him at 261College to this. He always looked that expressive though vulgar word, a sneak. Nor have I forgotten an incident which occurred at Cambridge in my Freshman year which stamped him in my mind of a cowardly nature. However let us pass to more agreeable topics.

I read a discourse of Dr. Barrow this afternoon in continuation of that last Sunday. He then discussed the text as a warning to put no stress upon the objects of this life. He now considered it as consolatory of its evils. The subject is a melancholy one, in either way that we regard it, but a very necessary one to reflect upon at all times and seasons. Evening Mr. and Mrs. Dewint with Miss H. Welsh called to return a visit paid by us this afternoon. They are here to put a son to school.