no exercise that will be found more useful for acquiring a proper Style, than to tranflate fome paffage from an eminent English author into our own words.

In the fourth place, I must caution, at the fame time, against a fervile imitation of any author whatever. This is always dangerous. It hampers genius; it is likely to produce a ftiff manner; and those who are given to clofe imitation, generally imitate an author's faults as well as his beauties. No man will ever become a good writer or speaker, who has not fome degree of confidence to follow his own genius. We ought to beware, in particular, of adopting any author's noted phrafes, or tranfcribing paffages from him. Such a habit will prove fatal to all genuine compofition. Infinitely better it is to have fomething that is our own, though of moderate beauty, than to affect to shine in borrowed ornaments, which will, at last, betray the utter poverty of our genius.

In the fifth place, it is an obvious, but material rule, with respect to Style, that we always ftudy to adapt it to the subject, and alfo to the capacity of our hearers, if we are to speak in public. Nothing merits the name of eloquent or beautiful,

which is not fuited to the occafion, and to the perfons to whom it is addressed.

In the last place, I conclude the subject with this admonition, that, in any cafe, and on any occafion, attention to Style must not engross. us fo much, as to detract from a higher degree of attention to the thoughts:-" To your expref"fion be attentive;" fays the great Roman Critic, "but about your matter be folicitous." A direction the more neceffary, as the present tafte of the age in writing feems to lean more to Style than to thought. It is much easier to dress up trivial and common fentiments with fome beauty of expreffion, than to afford a fund of vigorous, ingenious, and useful thoughts. The latter requires true genius; the former may be attained by induftry, with the help of very fuperficial parts. Hence, we find fo many writers frivolously rich in Style, but wretchedly poor in fentiment. The public ear is now fo much accuftomed to a correct and ornamented Style, that no writer can, with fafety, neglect the ftudy of it. But he is a contemptible one, who does not look to fomething beyond it; who does not lay the chief stress upon his matter, and employ fuch ornaments of Style to recommend it, as are manly not foppish,

RISE OF ORATORY.

N tracing the rife of Oratory, we need not attempt to go far back into the early ages of the world, or fearch for it among the monuments of Eaftern or Egyptian antiquity. In thofe ages there was, indeed, an Eloquence of a certain kind; but it approached nearer to Poetry, than to what we properly call Oratory. There is reason to believe, as I formerly fhewed, that the Language of the firft ages was paffionate and metaphorical; owing partly to the fcanty stock of words, of which Speech then confifted; and partly to the tincture which Language naturally takes from the favage and uncultivated state of mén, agitated by unrestrained paffions, and ftruck by events, which to them are ftrange and furprifing. In this ftate, rapture and enthusiasm, the parents of Poetry, had an ample field. while the intercourfe of men was as yet unfrequent, and force and ftrength were the chief means employed in deciding controverfies, the arts of Oratory and Persuasion, of Reasoning and Debate, could be but little known. The first empires that arofe, the Affyrian and Egyptian, were of the defpotic kind. The whole power was in the hands of one, or at most of a few. The multitude were accuftomed to a blind reverence;

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But

verence; they were led, not perfuaded; and none of those refinements of fociety, which make public fpeaking an object of importance, were as yet introduced.

IT

GRECIAN ELOQUENCE.

T is not till the rife of the Grecian Republics, that we find any remarkable appearances of Eloquence as the art of perfuafion; and thefe gave it fuch a field as it never had before, and, perhaps, has never had again fince that time.

Greece was divided into a multitude of petty ftates. Thefe were governed, at firft, by kings who were called Tyrants; on whofe expulfion from all thefe ftates, there fprung up a great number of democratical governments, founded nearly on the fame plan, animated by the fame high fpirit of freedom, mutually jealous, and rivals of one another.

Of thefe Grecian Republics, the most noted, by far, for Eloquence, and, indeed, for arts of every kind, was that of Athens. The Athenians were an ingenious, quick, fprightly people; practifed in bufinefs, and fharpened by frequent

and

and fudden revolutions, which happened in their government. The genius of their government was altogether democratical; their legiflature confifted of the whole body of the people. They had, indeed, a Senate of five hundred; but in the general convention of the citizens, was placed the last refort; and affairs were conducted there, entirely by reasoning, speaking, and a skilful application to the paffions and interefts of a popular affembly. There, laws were made, peace and war decreed, and thence the magiftrates were chofen. For the highest honours of the state were alike open to all; nor was the meaneft tradesman excluded from a feat in their fupreme courts. In fuch a ftate, Eloquence, it is obvious, would be much studied, as the fureft means of rifing to influence and power; and what fort of Eloquence? Not that which was brilliant merely, and showy, but that which was found, upon trial, to be most effectual for convincing, interefting, and perfuading the hearers. For there, public speaking was not a mere competition for empty applause, but a ferious contention for that public leading, which was the great object both of the men of ambition, and the men of virtue.

In fo enlightened and acute a nation, where the highest attention was paid to every thing elegant in the arts, we may naturally expect to find the A a 3 public