VARIOUS EMOTIONS-THE PULPIT. 247 disapproval enlarge this field. Pictures of tyranny, whether exercised by a sovereign over a nation, or the head of a family, or the master of servants; covetousness, leading to the violation of right, and of natural affection; malice, steadily hunting down an innocent victim; envy, hating and slandering and destroying the innocent simply because they prosper; the selfish, ruining the virtuous for personal gratification, animal or mental; and all kinds of injustice, excite abhorrence, and detestation and revenge. All these chords are to be touched, sometimes singly, sometimes many together, sometimes producing harmony, and sometimes intentional discord, by the skillful orator. 79. Application to the Rhetoric of the Pulpit. - In this fact lies the boundless power of the oratory of the pulpit. The preacher of religion deals with all actual human character. It is his business to commend all forms of virtue, and to show the detestableness of all forms of vice. In addition to all that is human, he has also the supernal emotions of the Supreme Being toward man, the immaculate character of the Saviour in his relations to man, to portray. His subjects, if they lack the vividness of the appeals made by the lawyer, growing out of present and personal circumstances, and if they are not so direct as the appeals of statesmen on subjects that call for immediate political action, still take hold of the highest and dearest interests of man, and are absolutely boundless in their scope and variety. 80. Degrees of Emotion considered, with Reference to Figurative Language. - To awaken gentle emotion, pleasing or painful, it is only needful to set before the mind perspicuously the characters, facts, or actions, or thoughts that naturally produce it. The fancy may ornament the description, and figurative language is appropriate. Even a highly ornamented style may not interfere with the impression. But when the passion, painful or pleasing, becomes strong, the language must become more direct. Ornaments will be discarded. Figures only the most abrupt and condensed, and perhaps not strictly correct according to severe rule, will be suggested-mixed metaphors, if ever, are allowable - and the sentences are short and strong. Passion discards superfluities and niceties of expression. Strong passion loses self-consciousness. When a man has time to say that he is angry, or is inclined to think whether he is angry or not, his passion is more sentimental than real. 81. How far egotistical References are proper.-Quiet emotion, held under control by the intellect, is more self-conscious, and often leads to egotistical expressions. Thus Henry Clay said in an eloquent speech, properly endeavoring to produce emotion that should lead to action: "I have no desire for office, not even the highest. The most exalted is but a prison, in which the incarcerated incumbent daily receives his cold, heartless visitants, marks his weary hours, and is cut off from the practical enjoyment of all the blessings of genuine freedom. Pass this bill, and I am willing to go home, and renounce public service forever." So Daniel Webster, in his great speech, full of emotion himself, awakened unselfish appreciation of merit anywhere, and produced a contempt for his opponent, EGOTISM-PATHOS. 249 who had manifested a different sentiment, by exclaim ing: "When I shall be found, sir, in my place here in the Senate or elsewhere, to sneer at public merit because it happened to spring up beyond the little limits of my own State or neighborhood; when I refuse, for any such cause, or for any cause, the homage due to American talent, to elevated patriotism, to sincere devotion to liberty and the country if I see extraordinary capacity and virtue in any son of the South-and if, moved by local prejudice, or gangrened by State jealousy, I get up here to abate the tithe of a hair from his just character and fame, may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth." How deep the emotion in the speech of the Irishman Emmett, when about to receive his sentence of death for what was called treason! "I have but a few words more to say. I am going to my cold and silent grave; my lamp of life is nearly extinguished; my race is run; the grave opens to receive me, and I sink into its bosom. I have but one request to make at my departure from this world: it is the charity of its silence! Let no man write my epitaph; for as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me repose in obscurity and peace, and my tomb remain uninscribed until other times and other men can do justice to my character. When my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written. I am done." 82. Pathos. What is commonly called Pathos in a speaker or writer is an emotion of pity or deep interest awakened by the suffering of others, generally associated with a respect for their moral character, and perhaps a love of them for some extraordinary excellence. It is a sympathetic pain, not wholly without pleasure. Washington Irving's description of the death of the wife of Emmett on account of her grief, and his description of the burial of a mother, are full of pathos. Dickens's description of the death of Little Nell, in the "Old Curiosity Shop," is deeply touching. Pathos is a great element of power in the pulpit. It might be supposed that inasmuch as the passion must exist before it can be expressed, and that if it exists it will naturally clothe itself in appropriate language, no rules of Rhetoric will compass it or help the orator. But if its power is known, and the best examples of its expression are studied, its appropriate expression will become more natural and easy. 83. A common Fault. - The great fault of many writers is an attempt to express pathos that they do not feel, and particularly to overload their productions with empty declamation about passion, instead of encouraging the true feeling where it should exist, and expressing it in simple language. In such a case the speaker defeats his own purpose, and excites only disgust. TASTE. 251 CHAPTER XI. TASTE, AND ITS CULTIVATION. 84. Definition, and Illustrations. - TASTE is the susceptibility to pleasure from works of art. The pleasure, however, which is awakened by the utility of a work, is not primarily attributed to the Taste, but particularly the gratification arising from its beauty, or from the qualities which seem designed primarily to please. A house may be strong, durable, in a healthy location, convenient, and therefore please our judgment on account of its utility; but it may be at the same time ill-shapen, of a disagreeable color, and so placed, with reference to the streets and the localities around, as to offend our sense of the fitness of things. In such a case we say that, though useful, it is built in poor taste. A written production or speech ought to please usif it accomplishes its end, and so it does in that respect; but if, in addition to accomplishing its main purposewhatever that may be it pleases us by its beauty, appropriateness, and conformity to what we think is fitting and proper, it is peculiarly commendable. Nor is that all: whatever exhibits good taste is thereby so much the more likely to receive attention, and to exert its full force, perhaps indeed more than it |