PUBLISHERS' ADVERTISEMENT, 



THE publishers announce that Dr. LARDNER, having brought to a 

 close his public lectures in this country, they have availed themselves 

 of the opportunity thus presented to induce him to prepare for publica- 

 tion the present complete and authentic edition of these discourses. 

 The general interest which they excited in every part of this country is 

 universally felt and acknowledged. Probably no public lecturer ever 

 continued for the same length of time to collect around him so nu- 

 merous audiences. Nor has there been any exception to this favorable 

 impression. Visit after visit has been made to all the chief cities ; and, 

 on every succeeding occasion, audiences amounting to thousands have 

 assembled to hear again ana' again these lessons of useful knowledge. 

 The same simplicity of language, perspicuity of reasoning, and felicity 

 of illustration, which rendered the oral discourses so universally ac- 

 ceptable, are preserved in these miscellanies, which are, as nearly as 

 possible, identical with the lectures as they were delivered. 



The publishers feel that in these volumes they present to the Ameri- 

 can public a most agreeable offering, and an interesting and useful 

 miscellany of general information, which will also afford that large class 

 of persons, who have attended the lectures, an agreeable means of 

 reviving the impressions from which they have already derived so much 

 profit and pleasure. 



NEW YORK, April, 1855. 



THE PUBLISHERS. 



