ment," correctness of Taste. Bain thinks it may also mean "the kind of artistic excellence that gives the greatest amount of pleasure to cultivated minds;" and, hence, he accepts it as the name of the quality; but to say the least, the word is unfamiliar in this meaning, and the term Elegance is now so well established, that it would seem unfortunate to substitute for it an unfamiliar name. As used here, Taste means artistic judgment, and Elegance the quality of Style that disposes this judgment favorably. A few examples of the Elegant in composition may be added ;

"They walked out hand-in-hand, through the court, and to the terrace-walk, where the grass was glistening with dew, and the birds in the green woods above were singing their delicious choruses under the blushing morning sky. How well all things were remembered! The ancient towers and gables of the hall darkling against the east, the purple shadows on the green slopes, the quaint devices and carvings of the dial, the forestcrowned heights, the fair yellow plain cheerful with crops and corn, the shining river rolling through it towards the pearly hills beyond; all these were before us, along with a thousand beautiful memories of our youth, beautiful and sad, but as real and vivid in our minds as that fair and always remembered scene our eyes beheld once more. We forget nothing. The memory sleeps, but wakens again; I often think how it shall be when, after the last sleep of death, the réveille shall rouse us forever, and the past in one flash of self-consciousness rush back, like the soul revivified.'

1

"My soul is an enchanted boat

Which, like a sleeping swan, doth float

Upon the silver waves of thy sweet singing;

And thine doth like an angel sit

Beside the helm conducting it,

While all the winds with melody are ringing.

It seems to float ever, forever,

Upon that many-winding river,

Between mountains, woods, abysses,

A paradise of wildernesses!

Till, like one in slumber bound,

Borne to the ocean, I float down, around,

Into a sea profound of ever spreading sound."2

1 Thackeray, Henry Esmond.

2 Shelly, Prometheus Unbound.

340. Bain has aptly defined two elements of Taste, one permanent, and one variable. Certain questions of taste though men should dispute about them forever, do not admit of discussion. The points at issue have been decided by an appeal to fundamental and unchallengeable truths: the questions are closed. Many rules of Rhetoric are of this kind, -the doctrine of judicious Brevity, the necessity of Clearness, the evil effect of incessantly recurring mannerisms, the excellence of an idiomatic style, the importance of being oneself in composition, etc. But on other questions, tastes vary in different ages and in individuals. Neither the drama of the Greeks nor the "license of personal vituperation" they allowed their orators are in taste to-day. English literature of the Classic Period-loosely 1660 to 1789-accepted many rules of composition which the common sense reaction of the succeeding period abrogated. Lessing gave form as well as life to German literature, till his time almost a wilderness. So, "the emotional constitution, the intellectual tendencies, and the education of each individual" cause divergencies of taste. Poetry appeals to many minds that music fails to touch, and vice versa. Men "of wider literary knowledge and superior discernment groan inwardly, some of them outwardly, at the judgment of the multitude in the matter of sublimity, pathos, and humour.” Further, there are schools of writers, each with its own admirers and its own clamorous defenders. In a word, as there are "many men," so there are "many minds;" and, provided the disagreement turns solely on matters of a personal, individual character, "there is no disputing about tastes." Perhaps the whole case for both elements of Taste may be summed up in a single law;-Men differ most when their sensibilities are engaged; their intellectual judgments are more nearly at one.

PART SECOND.

INVENTION.

SUB-DIVISIONS.

341. INVENTION states the Rules that direct and control the Discovery of Matter for the Composition.' These rules concern either the subject about which one writes, the Theme, or else the composition itself, what one writes about the Theme, the Discussion. Hence, two subdivisions of Part Second,-(A) The Theme, (B) The DISCUSSION.

342. The word Discussion is used here in a slightly broader sense than in 280, above. There it meant the body of the composition, as opposed to the Proposition, the Introduction, and the Conclusion: here it includes these parts as well as the Discussion properly so called. But, all told, these parts add but little, in proportion, to the Discussion Proper; and the extension of the term to include everything but the Theme is, hence, not a material variation of its meaning. Besides, although the parts named must be considered as belonging to the Discussion in this broader sense of the term, yet the rules to be stated for the Discussion apply to it most particularly in its narrower meaning. The Introduction and the Conclusion have already been characterized as non-essential; and the Proposition itself is in a certain sense outside the composition, since, in any case, it is determined rather as a part of the development of the Theme than as a part of the Discussion properly so called. 18 23, above.

2Greek Tivéval, to put (forward as the subject of a composition).

(A) THE THEME.

343. The Theme may be (1) given, (2) suggested (or, at least, limited) by the occasion for which the composition is intended, (3) left wholly to the choice of the writer. For example;

(1) The lawyer has his “case" brought to him; and it is to that case, and no other, that he must address himself, whether in the papers filed as preliminaries to the trial, or in what he may say before judge or jury. His theme is chosen for him: should he for any reason speak on a subject not fairly raised by the case, the judge but discharges a plain duty in demanding that he shall keep to his subject. So, the legislator must speak on the bill before the house. A "Duluth" Knott or a "Sunset" Cox may spend his store of humor or wit on his colleagues; but there is no pretence that in this sort of talk the house is occupied with the debate.

(2) The sacred preacher has, indeed, a wide range of subjects for his sermons; but, nevertheless, he meets much adverse criticism, if he steps far beyond the limits of the religious or the moral. Important public questions that affect these sides of man's nature,—even the political life of the people considered as one means of their education by Divine Providence,—may (perhaps, should) receive his attention; but merely secular topics, topics not even remotely his, are justly objected to in the pulpit. Besides, the many special occasions that arise in the year, even in the churches that do not observe a fixed order of services, often limit the preacher in his choice of subject; while many occurrences are not unusual that render one subject more fit than another. The preacher's subject is, of course, not set; but in many ways his choice is biassed.

(3) The public lecture, the magazine article, the opus magnum of a scholarlike Casaubon, have their subjects at the will of their authors. Circumstances, to be sure, may influence even these cases; but, so far as any subject of composition is at will, the subjects of these and other such works are so.

344. In all three instances, however, ample room is left the writer to exercise his judgment.

(1) In the suit at law, not a little depends upon how a case is put before the court. The question that presents itself on the surface is not always the real point at issue; and the lawyer may therefore abundantly employ his ingenuity in finding this real question: in fact, by thus "making" his case, he all but chooses his subject. For example, John Hampden, sued in the time of King Charles the First for non-payment of taxes, showed the magistrate that the real question was whether the King should be allowed to usurp unconstitutional powers. Many a proposed act of legislature has been successfully represented or misrepresented by a re-reading of its title or by an open or covert sneer. The repeal of the Corn Laws in England was, on different views of the bill, either an act to put bread into the mouths of starving women and children or a measure to ruin the English farmer. A certain "bill for the Relief of the Surviving Officers of the Revolution" was kindly mentioned by Mr. Webster as proposing “an annuity:” a senator from Georgia had sneered at its beneficiaries as willing to accept a pensión."

(2) The clergyman, more than any other public speaker, will find room for a wise judgment in selecting his theme. The pro's and con's are often nicely balanced in regard to a subject; and a mistake on his part is commonly fatal. When Slavery was still a factor in American politics, a famous clergyman preaching on the Psalms in course, found himself face to face with the story of Doeg the Edomite who betrayed to Saul the hidingplace of David. A general discourse on Doeg's treachery would have avoided the "burning question of the day, the Fugitive Slave Law. But the preacher held decided AntiSlavery views, and he considered his meeting thus incidentally a text that allowed him to free his soul of a long undischarged weight of responsibility, a call from Heaven. Till then, had he introduced the subject, he must have gone out of his way to bring it into his pulpit; and his conscience had hitherto absolved him: But now the question had presented itself to him: to evade it would be cowardice. His sermon broke some old friendships, might have rent his church asunder; but the topic was not of his choosing, and consequences, he felt, might wisely be left to Him in whose name he stood before the people. (3) Even the writer whose choice seems wholly unbiassed can not be absolutely indifferent to circumstances. A number of 1U. S. Senate, April 1828.