may maintain, without being at bottom a ruly worthy man, I muft obferve farther, that befides the weight which it adds to charafter, real virtue operates alfo in other ways, to the advantage of cloquence. But, befides this confideration, there is another of ftill higher importance, though I am not fure of its being attended to as much as it deferves; namely, that from the fountain of real and genuine virtue, are drawn First, nothing is fo favourable as virtue to thofe fentiments which will ever be most the profecution of honourable studies. It powerful in affecting the hearts of others. prompts a generous emulation to excel; it Bad as the world is, nothing has fo great and inures to induftry; it leaves the mind vacant univerfal a command over the minds of men and free, matter of itself, difencumbered of as virtue. No kind of language is fo generally thole bad paffions, and difengaged from thofe underftood, and fo powerfully felt, as the na mean purfuits, which have ever been found tive language of worthy and virtuous feelings. the greatest enemies to true proficiency. He only, therefore, who poffeffes thefe full Quinctilian has touched this confideration and ftrong, can fpeak properly, and in its very properly: "Quod fi agrorum nimia own language, to the heart. On all great cura, et follicitior rei familiaris diligentia, fubjects and occafions, there is a dignity, “et venandi voluptas, et dati fpectaculis dies, there is an energy in nobic fentiments, which multum ftudiis auferunt, quid putamus is overcoming and irrefiftible. They give an "facturas cupiditatem, avaritiam, invidiam ardour and a flame to one's difcourfe, which “Nihil enim eft tam occupatum, tam multi-feldom fails to kindle a like flame in those who forme, tot ac tam variis affectibus conci“fum, atque laceratum, quam mala ac im"proba mens. Quis inter hæc, literis, aut “ulli bonæ artî, locus? Non hercle magis quam frugibus, in terra fentibus ac rubis occupata *." hear; and which, more than any other caufe, beftows on eloquence that power, for which it is famed, of feizing and tranfporting an au dience. Here art and imitation will not avail. An affumed character conveys nothing of this powerful warmth. It is only a native and unaffected glow of feeling, which can tranfmit the emotion to others. Hence the moft re "If the management of an eftate, if an"xious attention to domestic economy, a paf-nowned orators, fuch as Cicero and Demof"hion for hunting, or whole days given up to "public places and amufements, confume fo "much time that is due to ftudy, how much "greater wafte must be occafioned by licentious "defires, avarice, orenvy? Nothing is fo much "burried and agitated, fo contradictory to its "felf, or fo violently torn and shattered by "conflicting paflions, as a bad heart. Amidft "the distraction which it produces, what room "is left for the cultivation of letters, or the "parfait of any honourable art? No more "afforedly, than there is for the growth of "corn in a field that is over-run with thorns "and brambles," thenes, were no lefs diftinguifhed for fome of the high virtues, as public fpirit and zeal for their country, than for eloquence. Peyond doubt, to thefe virtues their cloquence owed much of its elect; and thole orarions of theirs, in which there breathes mothe virtuous and magnanimous fpirit those which have most attracted the miration of ages. Nothing, therefore, is more necefry for those who would excel in any of the higher kinds of oratory, than to cultivate habits of the the feveral virtues, and to refine and improve great and high objects which mankind are CONTENTS. |