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Reckon up all the illustrious orators. Will you find among them conceited, or subtle, or epigram

just and agreeable. But it commonly happens to such writers that they seek for their favourite ornaments even where the subject affords them not, and by that means have twenty insipid conceits for one thought which is really beautiful."-HUME's Essays, Ess. xix., p. 240, 241.

"I like none of those witty turns which have nothing in them that is either solid, natural, or affecting, and which tend neither to convince, nor paint, nor persuade. All such tinsel wit (as that of Isocrates) must appear still more ridiculous when it is applied to grave and serious matters. You ask, will you then allow of no antithesis? Yes, when the things we speak of are naturally opposite one to another, it may be proper enough to show their opposition. Such antitheses are just, and have a solid beauty, and a right application of them is often the most easy and concise manner of explaining things; but it is extremely childish to use artificial terms and windings to make words clash and play one against another. At first this may happen to dazzle those who have no taste; but they soon grow weary of such a silly affectation. It looks very strange and awkward in a preacher to set up for wit and delicacy of invention, when he ought to speak with the utmost seriousness and gravity, out of regard to the authority of the Holy Spirit whose words he borrows."FENELON'S Dialogues concerning Eloquence, dial. ii., p. 26, and dial. iii., p. 146.

"To form a just notion of TULLY's eloquence, we must observe the harangues he made in his more advanced age. Then, the experience he had in the weightiest affairs, the love of liberty, and the fear of those calamities that hung

matic writers? No; these immortal men confined their attempts to affect and persuade; and their having been always simple is that which will always render them great. How is this? you wish to proceed in their footsteps, and you stoop to the degrading pretensions of a rhetorician! and you appear in the form of a mendicant soliciting commendations

over his head, made him display the utmost efforts of his eloquence. When he endeavoured to support and revive expiring liberty, and to animate the commonwealth against Antony his enemy, you do not see him use points of wit and quaint antithesis: he is then truly eloquent. Everything seems artless, as it ought to be when one is vehement; with a negligent air he delivers the most natural and affecting sentiments, and says everything that can move and animate the passions.”—Ibid., dial. ii., p. 54.

POPE justly observes,

"True wit is nature to advantage dress'd,

What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd;
Something, whose truth convinced at sight we find,
That gives us back the image of our mind.
As shades more sweetly recommend the light,
So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit.

For works may have more wit than does them good,
As bodies perish through excess of blood."

Essay on Criticism, 1. 300.

The judicious FENELON also remarks, from St. AUSTIN, that "in the Apostle PAUL, wisdom did not seek after the beauty of language, but that the beauties of language offered themselves and attended his wisdom."-Dialogues concerning Eloquence, dial. iii., p. 106.

before those very men who ought to tremble at your feet! Recover from this ignominy. Be eloquent by zeal, instead of being a mere declaimer through vanity. And be assured that the most certain method of preaching well for yourself is to preach usefully to others.

SECTION X.

ON THE EXORDIUM.

WIT pleases in an epigram or a song, but it never produces great effects in a numerous assembly. True eloquence proscribes all those thoughts which are too refined or far-fetched to strike the people; for, indeed, what else is it than a brilliant stroke affecting and enlivening a multitude, which at first view merely presents to the orator an extended and motionless heap, and which, so far from participating the sensations of him who speaks, scarcely grants him a cold and strict attention?

The beginning of a discourse ought to be simple and modest, in order to conciliate to the preacher the good-will of his auditory. The exordium, nevertheless, deserves to be studied with the greatest

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It is proper to confine one's self in this part to the unfolding of a single idea which may include the whole extent of the subject. It is here where indications of the plan should be quickly made known; where the leading aim of the discourse should be pointed out, without filling up too much

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room; where lucid principles should discover the deep reflection of the orator, who is capable of obtaining at once a commanding influence over all his hearers.*

Such is the art of Bossuet, when, that he might strike the mind forcibly, he says, at the beginning of his funeral oration for Henrietta of England, that he will "in one single wo deplore all the calamities, and in one single death show the death and the emptiness of all human grandeur."

Whatever doth not lead towards the principal points of a sermon is useless in an exordium. Let us, therefore, in this part of the discourse, avoid

* "The first quality of an exordium is brevity. This, however, has a proper measure; for as it ought not to be excessively long, so neither should it be too short: the middle way is best. If the exordium were too short, it would oblige the hearer to enter too soon into the matter, without preparation enough; and excessive length would weary him for it is with an auditor as with a man who visits a palace; he does not like to stay too long in the court or first avenues; he would only view them transiently without stopping, and proceed as soon as possible to gratify his principal curiosity."-ROBINSON'S CLAUDE, vol. ii., p. 469.

M. CLAUDE farther observes, that an exordium should be clear, cool, and grave; engaging and agreeable; connected with the text or subject to be discussed; simple and unadorned; not common, and sometimes figurative : his illustration of these points well deserves perusal.Ibid.

subtle reflections, quotations, essays, commonplaces, and even tropes and metaphors.

“We must not then," says the Roman orator, "depart from the familiar sense of words, lest our discourse appear prepared with too much labour."* Let us proceed to our design by the shortest course. Everything here ought to be adapted to the subject, since, according to the expression of Cicero, "The exordium is only its porch."+ Let us not imitate those prolix rhetoricians, who, instead of entering at once on their subject, turn and turn again on all sides, leaving their hearers uncertain of the matter which they are going to handle.

The exordium doth not properly begin till the object and design of the discourse are discovered.

SECTION XI.

OF THE EXPLICATION OF THE SUBJECT.

No sooner is the subject stated, than we must hasten to define it. This precaution is to be regarded especially in treating on metaphysical subjects, such as Providence, Truth, Conscience, &c. He is sure to wander in vague speculations who neglects to be guided at first by clear ideas. It is certainly hazardous to rise too much in those pre

* In exordiendâ causâ servandum est ut usitata sit verborum consuetudo, ut non apparata oratio esse videatur.—Ad. Herrennium, lib. i., 7.

† Aditus ad causam.-Brutus.

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