should arise, and for a season prevail over both purity, and nature, and antique recollections now meretriciously ornamented, more than half French in the phrase, and to mere figures fantastically sacrificing the sense-now heavily and regularly fashioned as if by the plumb and rule, and by the eye rather than the ear, with a needless profusion of ancient words and flexions, to displace those of our own Saxon, instead of temperately supplying its defects. Least of all could those lights of English eloquence have imagined that men should appear amongst us professing to teach composition, and, ignorant of the whole of its rules, and incapable of relishing the beauties, or in deed apprehending the very genius of the language, should treat its peculiar terms of expression and flexion, as so many inaccuracies, and practise their pupils in correcting the faulty English of Addison, and training down to the mechanical rhythm of Johnson the lively and inimitable measures of Bolingbroke. But in exhorting you deeply to meditate on the beauties of our old English authors, the poets, the moralists, and perhaps more than all these, the preachers of the Augustan age of English letters, do not imagine that I would pass over their great defects when compared with the renowned standards of severe taste in ancient times. Addison may have been pure and elegant; Dryden airy and nervous; Taylor witty and fanciful; Hooker weighty and various; but none of them united force with beauty-the perfection of matter with the most refined and chastened style; and to one charge all, even the most faultless, are exposed-the offence unknown in ancient times, but the besetting sin of latter days-they always overdid never knowing or feeling when they had done enough. In no thing, not even in beauty of collocation and harmony of rhythm, is the vast superiority of the chaste, vigorous, manly style of the Greek orators and writers more conspicuous than in the abstinent use of their prodigious faculties of expression. A single phrase sometimes a word-and the work is done-the desired impression is made, as it were, with one stroke, there being nothing superfluous interposed to weaken the blow, or break its fall. The commanding idea is singled out; it is made to stand forward; all auxiliaries are rejected; as the Emperor Napoleon selected one point in the heart of his adversary's strength, and brought all his power to bear upon that, careless of the other points, which he was sure to carry if he won the centre, as sure to have carried in vain if he left the centre unsubdued. Far otherwise do modern writers make their onset; they resemble rather those campaigners who fit out twenty little expeditions at a time, to be a laughing stock if they fail, and useless if they succeed; or if they do attack in the right place, so divide their forces, from the dread of leaving any one point unassailed, that they can make no sensible impression where alone it avails them to be felt. It seems the principle of such authors never to leave anything unsaid that can be said on any one topic; to run down every idea they start; to let nothing pass; and leave nothing to the reader, but harass him with anticipating everything that could possibly strike his mind. Compare with this effeminate laxity of speech, the manly severity of ancient eloquence; or of him who approached it, by the happy union of natural genius with learned meditation; or of him who so marvellously approached still nearer with only the familiar knowledge of its least perfect ensamples. Mark, I do beseech you, the severe simplicity, the subdued tone of the diction, in the most touching parts of the " old man Eloquent's"-loftiest passages. In ening of the horizon"-the "menacing meteor"-the" storm of unusual fire," rather disarm than augment the terrors of the original black cloud; and that the "goading spears of the drivers," and "the trampling of pursuing horses," somewhat abate the fury of the whirlwind of cavalry.Δουλεύουσί γε μαστιγούμενοι καὶ στρεβλού μενοι, says the Grecian master, to describe the wretched lot of those who had yielded to the wiles of the conqueror, in the vain hope of securing their liberties in safety. Compare this with the choicest of Mr Burke's invectives of derision and pity upon the same subject-the sufferings of those who had made peace with Regicide France-and acknowledge the mighty effect of relying upon a single stroke to produce a great effect if you have the master hand to give it. The king of Prussia has hypothecated in trust to the Regicides his rich and fertile territories on the Rhine, as a pledge of his zeal and af the oath, when he comes to the burial place where they repose by whom he is swearing, if ever a grand epithet were allowable, it is here-yet the only one he applies is ἀγαθοὺς-μὰ τοὺς * ἐν Μαραθῶνι προκινδυνεύσαντας τῶν προγόνων—καὶ τοὺς ἐν Πλαταιαῖς παραταξαμένους—καὶ τοὺς ἐν Σαλαμῖνι ναυμαχήσαντας · καὶ τοὺς ἐπ ̓ ̓Αρτεμισίῳ, καὶ πολλοὺς · ἑτέρους τοὺς ἐν τοῖς δημοσίοις μνήμασι κειμέτους ̓ΑΓΑΘΟΥΣ άνδρας. When he would compare the effects of the Theban treaty in dispelling the dangers that compassed the state round about, to the swift passing away of a stormy cloud, he satisfies himself with two words, one pos-the theme of just admiration to succeeding ages; and when he would paint the sudden approach of overwhelming peril to beset the state, he does it by a stroke, the picturesque effect of which has not perhaps been enough noted-fection to the cause of liberty and equalikening it to a whirlwind or a winliter torrent, ὥσπερ σκηπτὸς ἢ χειμάρρους. It is worthy of remark, that in by far the first of all Mr Burke's orations, the passage which is, I believe, universally allowed to be the most striking, owes its effect to a figure twice introduced in close resemblance to these two great expressions, although certainly not in imitation of either; for the original is to be found in Livy's description of Fabius's appearance to Hannibal. Hyder's vengeance is likened to "a black cloud, that hung for a while on the declivities of the mountains," and the people who suffered under its devastations, are described as "enveloped in a whirlwind of cavalry." Whoever reads the whole passage, will, I think, admit that the effect is almost entirely produced by those two strokes; that the amplifications which accompany them, as the "black lity. He has been robbed with unbounded liberty and with the most levelling equality. The woods are wasted; the country is ravaged; property is confiscated; and the people are put to bear a double yoke, in the exactions of a tyrannical government, and in the contributions of a hostile conscription." "The grand Duke of Tuscany, for his early sincerity, for his love of peace, and for his entire confidence in the amity of the assassins of his family, has been complimented with the name of the wisest sovereign in Europe.' This pacific Solomon, or his philosophic, cudgelled ministry, cudgelled by English and by French, whose wisdom and philosophy between them have placed Leghorn in the hands of the enemy of the Austrian family, and driven the only profitable commerce of Tuscany from its only port."-Turn now for refreshment to the Athenian artistΚαλήν γ' οἱ πολλοὶ νῦν ἀπειλήφασιν Ωρειοτῶν χάριν ὅτι τοῖς Φιλίππου φίλοις ἐπέτρεψαν αὑτοὺς, τὸν δ ̓ Εὐφραῖον ἐώθουν καλὴν γ' ὁ δῆμος ὁ τῶν Ἐρετριέων, ὅτι τοὺς ὑμετέρους μὲν πρέσβεις ἀπήλασε, Κλειτάρχῳδ ̓ ἐνέδωκεν αὐτόν· δουλεύουσί γε μωστιγούμενοι xai στgeßλouμevo. Phil. 3.-Upon some very rare occasions indeed, thé orator, not content with a single blow, pours himself all forth in a full torrent of invective, and then we recognise the man who was said of old to eat shields and steel-oxidas nai oidngov Qayar. But still the effect is produced without repetition or diffuseness. I am not aware of any such expanded passage as the invective in the Пgi Erpávou against those who had betrayed the various states of Greece to Philip. It is indeed a noble passage; one of the most brilliant, perhaps the most highly coloured, of any in Demosthenes; but it is as condensed and rapid as it is rich and varied."Ανθρωποι μιαροὶ καὶ κόλακες καὶ ἀλάστορες, ἠκρωτηρισμένοι τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἕκαστοι πατρίδας, τὴν ἐλευθερίαν προπεπωκότες πρότερον μέν Φιλίππῳ, νῦν δὲ Αλεξάνδρῳ— τῇ γαστρὶ μετροῦντες καὶ τοῖς αἰσχίστοις τὴν εὐδαιμονίαν τὴν δ ̓ ἐλευθερίαν καὶ τὸ μηδένα ἔχειν δεσπότην αὑτῶν, (ἃ τοῖς προτέροις "Ελλησιν ὅροι τῶν ἀγαθῶν ἦσαν καὶ κανόνες) ἀνατετροφότες.—This requires no contrast to make its merits shine forth; but compare it with any of Cicero's invectives-that, for instance, in the third Catilinarian, against the conspirators, where he attacks them regularly under six different heads, and in above twenty times as many words; and ends with the known and very moderate jest of their commander keeping "Scortorum cohortem Prætoriam." The great poet of modern Italy, Dante, approached nearest to the ancients in the quality of which I have been speaking. In his finest passages you rarely find an epithet hardly ever more than one; and never two efforts to embody one idea. " A guisa di Leon quando si posa,” is the single trait by which he compares the dignified air of a stern personage to the expression of the lion slowly laying him down. It is remarkable that Tasso copies the verse entire, but he destroys its whole effect by filling up the majestic idea, adding this line, "Girando gli occhi e non movendo il passo." A better illustration could not easily be found of the difference between the ancient and the modern style. Another is furnished by a later imitator of the same great master. I know no passage of the Divina Commedia, more excursive than the description of evening in the Purgatorio; yet the poet is content with somewhat enlarging on a single thought-the tender recollections which that hour of meditation gives the traveller, at the fall of the first night he is to pass away from home, when he hears the distant knell of the expiring day. Gray adopts the idea of the knell in nearly the words of the original, and adds eight other circumstances to it, presenting a kind of ground plan, or at least a catalogue, an accurate enumeration (like a natural historian's) of every one particular belonging to night-fall, so as wholly to exhaust the subject, and leave nothing to the imagination of the reader. Dante's six verses, too, have but one epithet, dolci, applied to amici. Gray has thirteen or fourteen; some of them mere repetitions of the same idea which the verb or the substantive conveys-as drowsy tinkling lulls, the moping owl complains, the ploughman plods his weary way. Surely, when we contrast the simple and commanding majesty of the ancient writers, with the superabundance and diffusion of the exhaustive method, we may be tempted to feel that there lurks some alloy of bitterness in the excess of sweets. This was so fully recognised by the wise ancients, that it became a proverb among them, as we learn from an epigram still preserved, Εἰς τὴν μετριότητα. Πᾶν τὸ περιστὸν ἄκαιρον, ἐπεὶ λόγος ἐστὶ παλαιὸς, In forming the taste by much con- more exquisite parts of his compositions. I could point out favourite passages, occurring as often as three several times, with variations and manifest amendment. The I am now requiring, not merely great preparation while the speaker is learning his art, but after he has accomplished his education. most splendid effort of the most mature orator will be always finer for being previously elaborated with much care. There is, no doubt, a charm in extemporaneous elocution, derived from the appearance of artless unpremeditated effusion, called forth by the occasion, and so adapting itself to its exigencies, which may compensate the manifold defects incident to this kind of composition: that which is inspired by the unforcseen circumstances of the moment, will be of necessity suited to those circumstances in the choice of the topics, and pitched in the tone of the execution to the feelings upon These are which it is to operate. great virtues: it is another to avoid the besetting vice of modern oratory -the overdoing everythng-theexhaustive method-which an offhand speaker has no time to falil into; and he accordingly will take only the grand and effective view: nevertheless, in oratorical merit, such effusions must needs be very inferior; much of the pleasure they produce depends upon the hearer's surprise that, in such circumstances, anything can be upon his delivered at all, rather than deliberate judgment, that he has heard anything very excellent in itself. We may rest assured that the highest reaches of the art, and without any necessary sacrifice of natural effect, can only be attained by him who well considers, and maturely prepares, and oftentimes sedulously corrects and refines his oration. Such preparation is quite consistent with the introduction of passages prompted by the occasion; nor will the transition from the one to the other be perceptible in the execution of a practised master. I have known attentive and skilful hearers com. pletely deceived in this matter, and taking for extemporaneous, passages which previously existed in manuscript, and were pronounced without the variation of a particle or a pause. Thus, too, we are told by Cicero in one of his epistles, that having to make, in Pompey's presence, a speech after Crassus had very unexpectedly taken a particular line of argument, he exerted himself, and it appears successfully, in a marvellous manner, mightily assisted, in what he said extempore, by his habit of rhetorical preparation, and introducing skilfully, as the inspiration of the moment, all his favourite commonplaces, with some of which, as we gather from a good-humoured joke at his own expense, Crassus had interfered: " Ego autem ipse, Di Boni ! quomodo ἐνεπερπερευσάμην novo auditori Pompeio! Si unquam mihi περίοδοι, si καμπαὶ, εἰ ἐνθυμήματα, si xaτaonival, suppeditaverunt, illo tempore. Quid multa? clamores. Etenim hæc erat volsos, de gravitate ordinis, de equestri concordia, de consensione Italiæ, de immortuis reliquiis conjurationis, de vilitate, de otio-nôsti jam in hâc materiâ sonitus nostros; tanti fuerunt ut ego eo brevior sim, quod eos usque isthinc exauditos putem." (Ad Att. I. 14.) If, from contemplating the means of acquiring eloquence, we turn to the noble purposes to which it may be made subservient, we at once perceive its prodigious importance to the best interests of mankind. The greatest masters of the art have concurred, and upon the greatest occasion of its display, in pronouncing that its estimation depends on the virtuous and rational use made of it. Let their sentiments be engraved on your memory in their own pure and appropriate diction. Kaλò (says Es chines) τὴν μὲν διάνοιαν προαιρείσθαι τὰ βέλτιστα, τὴν δὲ παιδείαν τὴν τοῦ ῥήτορος καὶ τὸν λόγον πείθειν τοὺς ἀκούοντας—εἰ δὲ μή, τὴν εὐγνωμοσύνην αἰεὶ προτακτέον τοῦ λόγου (Κατὰ Κτησιφῶντος). "Εστι (says his illustrious antagonist) ou ó nógos τοῦ ῥήτορος τίμιος, οὐδ ̓ ὁ τόνος τῆς φωνῆς, ἀλλὰ τὸ ταὐτὰ προαιρεῖσθαι τοῖς πολλοῖς (Yig Kro.) It is but reciting the ordinary praises of the art of persuasion, to remind you how sacred truths may be most ardently promulgated at the altar, the cause of oppressed innocence be most powerfully defended, the march of wicked rulers be most triumphantly resisted, defiance the most terrible be hurled at the oppressor's head. In great convulsions of public affairs, or in bringing about salutary changes, every one confesses how important an ally eloquence must be. But in peaceful times, when the progress of events is slow and even as the silent and unheeded pace of time, and the jars of a mighty tumult in foreign and domestic concerns can no longer be heard, then, too, she flourishes, protectress of liberty-patroness of improvement-guardian of all the blessings that can be showered upon the mass of human kind; nor is her form ever seen but on ground consecrated to free institutions. " Pacis comes, otiique socia, et jam bene constitutæ reipublicæ alumna eloquentia." To me, calmly revolving these things, such pursuits seem far more noble objects of ambition than any upon which the vulgar herd of busy men lavish prodigal their restless exertions. To diffuse useful information-to further intellectual refinement, sure forerunner of moral improvement-to hasten the coming of that bright day when |