*

A. That he was the first Athenian whe composed and put into writing a discourse designed for the public.

Q. What class of Men arose after the age Pericles?

of

A. The Rhetoricians or Sophists, whose business was to teach Eloquence, and give receipts for all sorts of Orations.

Q. What was the effect of their instructions? A. To degrade eloquence from its masculine character to a trifling, sophistical art. Q. Who opposed them?

A. Socrates; who exploded their sophistry and recalled the attention of men to natural language, to sound and useful thought.

Q. What work did Aristotle compose on this subject?

A. His Institutions of Rhetoric.

Q. What was his object?

A. To direct the attention of Orators more towards convincing and affecting their hearers, than toward the musical cadence of periods. Q. Who was the Prince of Grecian Orators?

A. Demosthenes.

Q. What early efforts did he make to become an Orator?

A. He shut himself up, for study, in a cave; declaimed by the sea-shore, to accustom himself to noise; spoke with pebbles in his mouth, to correct a defect of speech; and, with a sword over his shoulder, to check an ungraceful motion.

Q. What are his capital Orations?
A. His Olynthiacs and Philippics.
Q. What was his object in these?

A. To rouse the indignation of his countrymen against Philip of Macedon, the public enemy of the liberties of Greece.

Q. What was the style of his eloquence? A. Strong, concise, and vehement. He was torrent that nothing could resist.

Q. What was the state of eloquence after his time?

A. It languished and expired, for Greece lost her liberty.

ROMAN AND MODERN ELOQUENCE.

Q. When was eloquence first cultivated at Kome?

A. Not until near the close of the Republic. Q. How are we to account for this?

A. The Romans were long a martial nation, altogether rude and unskilled in arts.

Q. From whom did they derive Poetry, Eloquence, and Learning?

A. From the Greeks.

Q. Did they ever equal their masters?

A. Never. They were a more grave and magnificent, but a less acute and sprightly people. What the Greeks invented, the Romans polished.

Q. Who became predominant at Rome?

A. Cicero.

Q. What does his name suggest?

A. Every thing that is splendid in Oratory. In all his Ŏrations, is high Art. His method is clear; his language, full and flowing; his manner, magnificent; and his sentiments, highly moral.

Q. What are his chief defects?

A. Great vanity and an ostentatious parade of eloquence.

Q. Which has generally been considered the greatest orator, Cicero or Demosthenes? A. Demosthenes.

Q. Was their style of eloquence the same? A. No. The character of Demosthenes is vigour and austerity; that of Cicero, gentleness and insinuation. In the one, you find more manliness; in the other, more ornament. Q. Was eloquence cultivated after the age of Cicero ?

A. No. It soon languished under the Roman Emperors and expired.

Q. What gave rise to a new species of eloquence, in the decline of the Roman Empire ? A. The introduction of Christianity.

Q. Where was it exhibited ?

A. In the Apologies, Sermons, and Pastoral writings of the Fathers of the Church.

Q. Who, of the Latin Fathers, were most distinguished for eloquence?

A. Lactantius, Minutius Felix, Augustine. Q. Did any of them afford just models of eloquence ?

A. No. Their language was harsh; they had a love of swoln and strained thoughts and of a play of words, which was the taste of their age. Q. Who among the Greeks?

A. Crysostom. He is copious, smooth, and sometimes, pathetic.

Q. What has been the state of eloquence in modern times ?

A. Far inferior to its state in Greece and Rome.

Q. Where has it been chiefly cultivated? A. In France and England.

Q. What reason can be given for the inferiority of modern to ancient eloquence?

A. Among the moderns there is a more correct turn of thinking, which guards them against the power of Oratory; and there are no fields of eloquence, like those enjoyed by the Ancients.

Q. What curbs the Orator in the parliament of Great Britain?

A. The power of the Ministry.

Q. What, at the bar ?

A. The extent and precision of the law.
Q. What, in the pulpit ?

A. The practice of reading sermons and the character of the composition;-an English sermon being a piece of dry reasoning rather than a persuasive, animated Oration.

Q. What is the characteristical difference between the state of eloquence in France and England?

A. In France the style of orators is orna

mented with bolder figures, and carried on with more warmth and elevation than in Great Britain.

ELOQUENCE OF POPULAR ASSEM-
BLIES.

Q. How did the Ancients divide all Orations?

A. Into the demonstrative; the deliberative; and the judicial.

Q. What was the scope of these?

A. That of the demonstrative was to praise or blame; that of the deliberative, to advise or dissuade; that of the judicial, to accuse or condemn.

Q. Where were these employed?

A. The first, on gratulatory and funeral occasions; the second, in matters of public concern before the Senate and people; the third, in addressing Judges.

Q. What division of eloquence does the train of modern speaking point out?

A. The eloquence of popular assemblies, of the bar, and the pulpit.

Q. What is the object of popular speaking?

A. Persuasion.

Q. What should be the basis?
A. Argument and reasoning.

Q. What should characterize it?