"We thought it would be nice to be able to have campus-wide conversations, and it fits in nicely with a lot of things coming up this fall, the forums, the Sept. 11 devotional, and freshmen courses like American Heritage," Turley said.

"The Words We Live By" was suggested by a social science librarian and approved before Philbrick's visit was confirmed.

"At first I didn't understand who was assigning us this book," said Jaz Beckwith, an 18-year-old nursing major from Fayetteville, Ga. "I thought it was for a class. I really liked it, especially the section about the importance of the Preamble. The main emphasis was on the men of that day and just how inspired the Constitution was."

The book also strongly tied together current events and the Constitution, said Jessie Grange, 19, a nursing major from Vancouver, Wash.

The university cultivated an online discussion group, assigning chapters before each discussion and e-mailing the chats to all freshmen, Beckwith said.

Tuesday's event marked the seventh time the Samuelsons have delivered the opening devotional of a semester since Cecil Samuelson became BYU's president in the spring of 2003.

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