Second Dialogue

The oratory in order to attain his object, must PROVE, must POURTRAY, and must IMPRESS the hearer. Principles of the art of oratory. Observations on the method of learning sermons and delivering them by heart, also on divisions and sub-divisions. The orator ought severely to exclude frivolous ornaments from his discourse.

B: It is very good of you to have returned so punctually; our conversation of yesterday has left us impatient to continue the subject.

C: As for me, I have come in haste, fearing to be late, for I did not wish to lose any part of the conversation.

A: Interviews like this of ours are by no means without their use for those who are calm and candid; we communicate our thoughts to each other, and each brings forward the best results of his reading. And on my part, gentlemen, I profit greatly by discussing the subject with you, and you are good enough to pardon my freedom of speech.

B: You are very courteous; but for my part it is only fair to confess that I should have been, I am convinced, still sunk in many errors without your assistance. I beg of you to be so good as to complete my deliverance from them.

A: Your mistakes, if you permit me to speak of them as such, are those of the greater number of respectable people who have not investigated these matters.

B: I beg of you then to set me completely right: we shall have a thousand things to say, so let us lose no time, but come at once to the point without further preface.

A: Of what were we speaking yesterday when we separated? If I remember rightly it was of the object to be contemplated by the orator.

C: You were speaking of eloquence, which con sists entirely in touching and influencing the hearer.

B: Yes, I scarcely understood that; what did you mean?

A: I will explain. What would you say of a man who should persuade without proving? Such a person would not be a true orator; but still he would be able to allure and lead away other men, having the trick of making them agree with him without showing them that what he would persuade them of was the truth. Such a man would be dangerous in the State; we have already seen that in the argument of Socrates.

B: I allow that.

A: But what would you say of a man who should demonstrate that which was true, but in a manner dry and bare, although exact; who should put his arguments in correct form, or who should make use of the method of mathematicians in his public discourses, without adding anything vivid, striking, or figurative? Would he be an orator?

B: No, he would be only a philosopher.

A: To make an orator then, it is necessary to take a philosopher, that is to say a man who knows how to demonstrate the truth, and to add to the exactness of his reasonings, the beauty and the vehemence of a varied discourse; and thus you will have made an orator.

B: Yes, no doubt.

A: That shows precisely the difference between Philosophy, which demonstrates, and Eloquence, which persuades.

B: I do not quite understand you.

A: I mean that the philosopher's only aim is to convince; but the orator, besides convincing, persuades.

B: Still, I do not altogether follow you. When the hearer is convinced, what is there left to be done?

A: You will see what remains to be done if you suppose an orator and a metaphysician, each proving to you the existence of God. The one will give you simply a demonstration, which does not pass at all out of the sphere of speculation; the other will add to that everything calculated to excite in you the feelings of devotion and love towards that holy and glorious Being whose existence is thus shown: that is called persttaston.

B: Now I understand your view.

A: Cicero was quite right in saying that philosophy ought never to be separated from eloquence; for the cibility to persuade is, without knowledge and wisdom, simply pernicious; while without this art of persuasion wisdom is unable to win over the hearts of men, so that they shall apply themselves unto virtue. It is well just to remark that in passing, in order that we may understand how greatly mistaken were the people of the last century. There were, on one side, men of letters who cared only for the purity of style, and the polish of the periods, in books; these people, being without solid principles of doctrine, with all their culture and learning, were for the most part freethinkers. On the other side there were scholastic theologians, dry and thorny, who put forward truths in a manner so disagreeable and so little calculated to attract attention, that they repelled almost everybody.¹ Pardon me this digression. I will now return to our subject. Persuasion has this, in addition to simple conviction, that not only does it display the truth, but displays it in attractive colours, and disposes men to be in favour of it. Thus in eloquence everything consists in adding to the solid proof of a proposition the means of interesting the hearer in it, and enlisting his feelings in favour of that which is proposed to him. He is inspired with indignation against ingratitude, horror against cruelty, compassion for misery, love for virtue, and so on. That is what Plato calls working on the soul of the hearer, and influencing his feelings. Do you still follow me?

B: Yes, I quite understand, and I see clearly that eloquence is not at all a frivolous expedient for dazzling men by brilliant discourses: it is a very serious art, and of great usefulness for the promotion of goodness.

A: And on that account Cicero says that though he had known many good speakers, that is to say, men who spoke in an agreeable and effective manner; he had scarcely ever known a true orator, that is, a man who knows how to enter into the hearts of others, and to lead and influence them as he wills.

B: I am not surprised at that, and I am quite sure that scarcely any one ever aims at that result. I confess to you that even Cicero, who lays down that rule, seems to me to wander from it sometimes. What do you say of all those flowers of rhetoric with which he has adorned his Orations? That appears to me to be merely the play of intellectual ingenuity, which takes no hold upon the feelings at all.

A: There is a distinction to be borne in mind. Those orations which Cicero wrote while he was yet young, and in which he is principally concerned to establish a reputation for himself, often have that defect. It is very evident in them that he was much more engrossed with the wish to be admired than with the thought of the justice of his cause. That will always be the case, when a litigant shall employ, to plead his cause, a man who cares for the matter only as a means of making a brilliant entrance into his profession, and we know well that pleading among the Romans was often turned into nothing but gaudy declamation. But after all, it must be allowed that even in the most flowery of those harangues, there is much that is touching and persuasive. It is not, however, at that class of Cicero's writings that we ought to look in order to become well acquainted with him, but at the orations which he composed at a later period of his life on behalf of the Republic in its time of need, when experience of great affairs, the love of liberty, and fear of the calamities with which it was threatened, urged him to efforts worthy of an orator. When he strove to sustain expiring liberty, to arouse the whole Republic against his enemy Antony, you no longer find him striving after antitheses and witti cisms; then he is truly eloquent. All he says is direct and unstudied, as he says himself in his treatise De Oratore that a speaker ought to be when he desires to be forcible and vehement: he is a man who simply seeks in unsophisticated and natural appeals and persuasions, all that is capable of arresting, of animating, and of influencing the nature of man.

C: You have often spoken of epigrams; I should be glad to know precisely what you intend by this term; for I confess that I am not always able to distinguish epigrams from other enrichments of a discourse: and it seems to me that this play of wit occurs in all great efforts of oratory.

A.: Excuse me: there are, even according to Cicero, expressions in which the whole of the enrichment comes from their own emphasis and from the nature of the subject.

C: I do not understand at all these technical terms; explain to me, if you please, in a simple way, how I can distinguish a substantial and valid ornament of oratory from a mere epigram.

A.: Only reading and observation will teach you to distinguish: there are a hundred different kinds of epigrams and witticisms.

C: But still, pardon me for persisting: what is the broad and general mark (of the epigram): is it affectation?

A: It is not every kind of affectation: but that particular kind which is prompted by the wish to please, and to display one's own cleverness.

C: That is something gained: but I should be glad of marks more precise still, to aid me to discriminate between them.

A: Well! here is one with which perhaps you will be satisfied. I have already said that eloquence consists, not only in proving truths, but still more in the art of arousing the feelings and sentiments. In order to arouse them, recourse must be had to descriptions of characters or scenes that are of a touching character: thus I conclude that the whole of eloquence is reducible to these three elements: to prove, to portray, to impress. Thoughts, however brilliant, which do not conduce to one of these three ends are, all of them, only epigrams or conceits.²

C: What do you mean by "to portray" r I do not at all understand that term as applied to rhetoric.

A: To portray, is not merely to describe scenes or events, but to represent them with all their circumstances, in a manner so vivid and distinct, that the auditor almost imagines that he beholds them. For example, a frigid historian, who was describing the death of Dido, would content himself with saying: " She was so overwhelmed with grief after the departure of Æneas, that she was not able to endure her life: she went up to the roof of her palace, placed herself on a funeral pile, and killed herself." In listening to these words you learn the fact, but you do not see it. But now listen to Virgil; he puts the whole scene before your eyes. Is it not true that when he accumulates all the circumstances of that despair; when he shows you Dido in her frenzy, with her countenance, on which death is already painted; when he repeats her soliloquy at the sight of the portrait and of the sword; your imagination transports you to Car thage? You fancy you see the fleet of the Trojans sailing away from the shore, and the inconsolable queen: you enter, in fact, into all the sentiments of which you seem to be in truth spectators. You are no longer listening to Virgil: you are too intent upon the last words of the unhappy Dido to think of him. The poet has disappeared; but you no longer see anything but what he makes you see, nor hear anything but what he causes you to hear. See the power of portrayal, of illusion !³ That is the cause why a painter and a poet have so much in common: one paints for the eyes, the other for the ears: and both one and the other ought to carry objects direct to the imagination. I have quoted an example from a poet to give you a clearer comprehension of what I mean: since the power of portrayal is still more strong and vivid in poets than in orators. Poetry does not differ from simple eloquence, except that it depicts with enthusiasm, and with more grand and bold strokes. Prose has its pictures, though they are less glowing; and without these pictures it is not possible to warm the imagination of the hearer, nor to excite his feelings. A simple narrative does not touch and arouse: it is needful not only to inform the hearers of facts, but to render these living before them, and to strike their senses by a perfect representation of all that was touching in the way they took place."⁴

C: I had never understood all that before. I see now perfectly that what you call portrayal is essential to eloquence; but you would also have me believe that there is no eloquence at all without poetry.

A: You may firmly believe it, if only you take away from poetry the versification; that is, the measured line of a limited number of syllables, in which the poet is obliged to cramp his thoughts. The ignorant vulgar believe this to be the essential part of poetry; they suppose a man to be a poet who has written in measured lines. But on the contrary, many people write verses without the least poetry in them; and many others are full of poetry without writing verses. Put versification then out of the question. For all the rest, poetry is nothing else than the production of a powerful impression or illusion in which nature is portrayed. No one, who has not this genius for portrayal, will ever impress facts and truths on the minds of his hearers: all will be dry, uninteresting, and tiresome. Since the first sin, man has been, so to speak, buried in what he sees and hears: it is a great evil that it is so: and he cannot be long attentive to that which is wholly of an abstract character.⁵ All the instruction which we wish to convey to the spirit must be given to the body: and the body requires concrete and inviting ideas to engage its attention. From this it followed that soon after the fall of the human race, poetry and idolatry, always joined together, made up the entire religion of the early races of mankind. But let us not diverge farther. You see clearly that poetry, that is to say, the vivid realization and depicting of facts and truths is, as it were, the very soul of eloquence.

C: But if true orators are poets, it seems to me that poets are also orators: for poetry has a persuasive power.

A: No doubt they have the same object: the difference between them lies in what I have already noticed. Poets have enthusiasm in a higher degree than orators, and this renders their expressions even more lofty, vivid, and daring. Do you remember what I have so often observed to you about Cicero:

C: Do you mean that —?

A: That the orator ought to have almost the diction of the poets ;⁶ that almost says everything.

C: I begin to understand: all that is growing clear to my mind. But let us go back to what you have promised us.

A: You will soon quite understand. Of what service in a discourse can anything be which does not keep towards one of these three things: to prove, to describe, or to affect and persuade?

C: It will serve to please the hearer.

A: Let us distinguish. That which serves to please in order to persuade is good. Proofs which are solid and well expressed doubtless please; the natural and vivacious appeals of the orator have much that is attractive; faithful and animated descriptions have their charms. Thus the three elements which we allow in eloquence please, but they do not limit themselves to pleasing. The question to be decided is whether we shall approve thoughts and expressions which tend only to please, and have no effect more solid. It is they which I call jeux d' esprit. Remember then, always, that I approve of all the graces of discourse which are serviceable for persuasion: I reject only those in which the orator, from his own self-love, has been desirous to exhibit himself, and amuse the hearer by his own talent, instead of occupying his mind with the subject of the discourse. Thus it appears to me that not only ought witticisms (which are mere plays upon words) to be condemned, since they are cold and puerile, but also all mere plays of thought; that is to say, those whose only effect is to sparkle and astonish, since they have in them nothing tangible and calculated to persuade.

C: I should willingly agree to that. But would you not, by this severity, lop off the principal ornaments of discourse?

A: Do you not find that Virgil and Homer are sufficiently agreeable as authors? Do you think they could be more attractive? Yet you will not find in their writings any jeux d' esprit: only simple language, everywhere natural, and art everywhere carefully concealed: you will not find in them a single word which appears to have been used to display the genius of the poet; he makes it a point of honour not to appear at all himself, in order to occupy you with the things which he describes; just as a painter aims to put before your eyes forests, mountains, torrents, distances, buildings: the actions and adventures of men and their various passions, without your being able to remark the separate strokes of the brush: art would be coarse and contemptible in proportion as it were suffered to be apparent. Plato, who had considered the matter much more deeply than the greater number of orators, asserts positively that in writing an author should always conceal himself, should not allow himself to be remembered, and should put forward only the things and the persons which he wishes to impress upon the reader. See how much more elevated and well-founded were the ideas of those ancient writers than ours.

B: You have told us much regarding the descriptive art: will you now make some observations respecting action: of what service is it?

A: To impress upon the mind of the hearer what the speaker wishes.

B: What does this action consist of?

A: Of words, and of gestures of the body.

B: What action can there possibly be in words?

A: Very much indeed. Cicero relates that even the enemies of Gracchus were not able to refrain from weeping when he pronounced these words: "Unhappy that I am! whither shall I go? in what asylum shall I find rest? In the Capitol? it is deluged with the blood of my brother! In my own house? there I shall behold an unhappy mother dissolved in tears and overwhelmed with grief." This is the kind of action I mean. If that were repeated quietly and tamely it would lose all its force.

B: Do you think so?

A: You will think so, too, if you try the experiment. Suppose that I say: "I do not know where to go in my unhappiness; no refuge remains open to me. The Capitol is the spot where the blood of my brother has been spilled: my own house the place where I shall see my mother weeping for grief." This is essentially the same as the other speech. But what has become of that fire and vivacity which was in the words? Where are those half-stifled words which expressed so naturally and so well the transports of grief? The manner in which things are said makes visible the intensity with which they are felt, and that forces the hearer to feel them much more. In those passages, not only are many thoughts not needed, but one may even do without order and coherence in the words: unless this is remembered there is no longer any similarity to passion; and nothing is so unnatural and offensive as to hear passionate sentiments declaimed with pompous language and in measured periods. On that subject I send you back to Longinus: you will see there some marvellous examples out of Demosthenes.

B: I understand all that: but you have made us hope for an explanation of the bodily gestures suitable for oratory, and this I cannot let you pass over.

A: I do not pretend here to deliver an entire course of Rhetoric, if even I were capable of doing so: I only repeat to you certain facts which I have remarked. Action among the Greeks and Romans was much more violent than it is with us: we see this in Cicero and in Quintilian: they used to stamp with the feet, and even give themselves blows on the forehead. Cicero tells a story of an advocate who threw himself upon the client whom he was defending, and tore open his garments in order to show to the judges the wounds which he had received in the service of the Republic. That was a violent action indeed; but such action was reserved for extraordinary occasions. He does not even mention the continual repetition of a gesture. For example, it is not at all natural to be constantly waving the arm while speaking. When one is animated, it is proper to wave the arm; but it is not proper to wave the arm in order to give an appearance of animation. There are even sentiments that it is desirable to utter tranquilly, and without any gesture at all.

B: What! would you wish that a preacher, for example, should not make a gesture occasionally? That would seem very extraordinary.

A: I allow that it is the rule, or at least, the custom, for a preacher to employ action to accompany almost everything he says: but it is easy to show that our preachers often use too much action: and that they sometimes also use too little.

B: Indeed! please to explain that; for I have always thought from the example of N., that there should be only two or three kinds of movements of the hands made throughout an entire sermon.

A: Let us come to the principle of the thing. Of what service is a gesture of the body while speaking? Is it not to express the feelings and passions which occupy the soul?

B: I think so.

A: The movement of the body is then a depicting of the thoughts of the mind f

B: Yes.

A: Then that copy ought to be like the original. Everything in it should represent naturally and vividly the sentiments of the speaker, and the nature of the words he speaks. I know, of course, that a low or comic imitation would not be admissible.

B: It seems to me that you are right; and I understand already what you mean. Permit me to interrupt you, in order that I may show you how far I enter into all the consequences of your principles. You would have an orator express by a vigorous, but natural action what his words express only in a comparatively feeble manner. Thus, according to your view, the action is really a picture of the thought predominating at the moment in his mind.

A: No doubt. But notice what follows from that: it is, that in order thus to depict in a life-like manner, we must imitate nature, and observe what she does when left unconstrained by art.

B: Yes, I agree to that.

A: Well, then, when merely simple ordinary things are said, unmingled with any deep feeling, would there naturally be many gestures used?

B: No.

A: It must then be proper not to make any, or to make but few, on similar occasions in public speeches: for everything should be made to accord with nature. Even more, there are subjects on which a speaker will better express his sentiments by a cessation of every movement. If a man, possessed by a lofty sentiment, remains for an instant motionless: that kind of shock holds the very souls of his hearers for a moment in suspense.

B: I understand that those suspenses, well employed, are fine, and touch the hearer powerfully: but it seems to me that you would reduce one wrho speaks in public to the use of only the same amount of gesture as would be employed by one who was conversing in a private company.

A: Pardon me: the sight of a great assemblage, and the importance of the subject to be treated, ought, without doubt, to animate a preacher to a much greater effort than if he were simply in conversation. But, whether in public or in private, he should always act naturally, so that the body should have movement when the words have stir and energy, and should remain quiet when they are only simple and calm. Nothing seems to me so shocking and absurd as to see a man who frets and excites himself in order to say to me things that are cold and unimpassioned: while he perspires, he makes my blood run absolutely cold. It is some time since I slept at a sermon; but you know that sleep sometimes surprises one during the afternoon sermons: indeed, anciently there was no preaching, except in the morning, after the Gospel in the Liturgy. I soon awaked, and I heard the preacher throwing himself into an extraordinary state of excitement; so that I supposed for a moment that he was treating upon some extremely important point of morality.

B: What was it then?

A: Well, he was only giving notice to his hearers that on the following Sunday he would preach upon penitence. That notice, given with so great an amount of vehemence, surprised me, and would have made me laugh had not respect for the place and the service forbidden it. The greater number of these declaimers use gestures as they use their voice: the one has a perpetual monotony, and the other a uniformity,⁷ which is not less wearisome, not less far removed from nature, not less detrimental to the good effect which might be expected to follow from action.

B: You asserted also that sometimes they have not sufficient action.

A: Is that astonishing? They do not at all preacher being regarded as artificial, and his subject foreign to our distinguish the subjects in which it is needful to be animated: they exhaust themselves upon common place subjects, and are reduced to say feebly those which require some vehemence of action. It must be confessed that our nation has but little capability for that vehemence; it is too light, and does not take things with sufficient seriousness. The Romans, and still more the Greeks, were admirable in that respect; the Easterns, and particularly the Hebrews, excelled in it. Nothing equals the. vivacity and the power, not only of the metaphors which they used in their discourses, but also of the gestures which they employed to express their feelings: as the putting ashes upon their heads, rending their garments, and putting on sackcloth in times of great distress and grief. I do not speak at all of the actions which the prophets did in order to symbolize more vividly the predictions which they made, because they were inspired by God: but without considering things Divinely inspired, we see that those people understood how to express grief, fear, and other passions, in a very different way than that we now employ. Thence came, without doubt, those great effects of eloquence which now are seen no longer.

B: You would wish then for considerable variety in gesture and in the inflections of the voice?

A: It is that which renders action so powerful, and in which Demosthenes is said to have excelled. The more simple and familiar are the action and the voice in those passages, of which the only object is to instruct, to relate, or explain; the more surprise and emotion are reserved for those other passages in which voice and gesture are raised by a sudden enthusiasm. [Oratory] is a kind of music; and all its beauty consists in the variety of tones which rise or fall according to the nature of the feelings which they are to express.*

B: But if you are right in this matter, even our principal orators are far removed from the perfection of art. The preacher whom we listened to together a fortnight ago did not follow that rule; he did not appear even to try to do so. He said everything in the same tone, the first thirty words excepted; and all the difference there was between the passages in which he wished to be animated, and others, was that in the former he spoke still more rapidly than usual.

A: Pardon me, his voice seemed to have two tones, but they were not at all well adapted to the sense of the words. You are right to say that he

• "A man may do good even though he be subject to half-a-dozen drawbacks. Mistakes are often made on this score. One gratification only may suffice to render a man a remarkable orator, whereas another may be free from all obvious defects, and yet be a sorry preacher. The Lord deliver us from a faultless preacher! for he is generally a very bore, as incapable of a trait of genius as he is of a blunder. Always intent on guarding against this and that defect, he loses his personality. He is no longer a man; he is no longer a priest; he is merely a scholar. doing his recitation." — MULLOIS, p. 245. V» BUlO

"

T8RGTO does not follow the rules of inflexion; I think that he has not even felt the need of them. His voice is naturally melodious; but it is very ill-managed, and therefore is not pleasing; as you observed, it did not make any of those touching impressions which it naturally would have done if it had all the inflexions which express the variations of feeling. Such preachers are like fine bells, the sound of which is clear, full, sweet, and agreeable; but after all, are merely bells, which have no meaning, no variety, and on that account no harmony nor eloquence.⁸

B: But that rapidity of discourse has nevertheless much beauty of its own.

A: No doubt that is the case: and I agree that in certain vigorous passages it is proper to speak more quickly: but to speak with precipitation, and not to be able to restrain oneself, is a great defect. There are sentiments which need to be supported by a suitable tone of voice and corresponding gesture. It is then with action and voice as it is with verses: sometimes a slow and grave measure is needed for sentiments of that kind, as there is also need sometimes of a short and rushing rhythm of speech to signify ardent and vigorous feelings. To make use always of the same gesture and the same speech of voice would be like one who should give the same remedy to all kinds of sick. But that preacher must be pardoned for his sameness of voice and gesture, for he has many very estimable qualities; and besides, this defect of his is inevitable in him. Have we not said that the management of the voice should correspond with the sense of the words? Well, his style is the same all through: it has no variety: on the one side, it has nothing familiar, winning, and popular: on the other, nothing vivid, figurative and sublime: it is a steady stream of words which press one upon the other; the conclusions are exact, the arguments well maintained and conclusive, the descriptions faithful: in one word, he is a man who speaks in very suitable terms, and who expresses very judicious sentiments. We must even acknowledge that the pulpit is under great obligations to him; he has withdrawn it from slavery to declaimers, and has filled it with much power and dignity. He is very capable of producing conviction: but I know hardly any preacher who has less power of persuad ing and touching an audience. If you watch him carefully, you will see that he is not even veryskilful; for, besides that his manner is neither familiar nor winning, he has, as we have already remarked elsewhere, no tenderness nor warmth. He addresses the understanding only, and the imagination not at all. Now there are arguments which require warmth and intensity of spirit. Scarcely anything which he may have said remains in the memory of those who have listened to him: his discourse is a torrent which suddenly rushes past, and leaves its channel dry. In order to make a durable impression, it is needful to aid the mind by touching the feelings: instructions that are dry and uninteresting can scarcely ever succeed. But what I regard as least natural of all in this preacher, is that he keeps his arms in continual movement, even when there is neither stir nor earnestness in words. For such a style, what would be needed is merely the ordinary conversational gesture; or, conversely to such impetuous action, a style full of vehemence and passionate bursts of feeling would be suitable: or, again, it wTould be well, as I have said, to render the one less vehement, and the other less monotonous. I conclude that he is a great man; but not in the least an orator. A village mission preacher, who knows how to startle hearers and make them weep, reaches far more nearly the point of eloquence.

B: But what means are there of learning in detail the gestures and inflexions of voice which are natural?

A: I have already mentioned to you that the art of good orators consists wholly in observing what nature does when unrestrained. Do not act, as do those bad orators who always declaim, and never talk to their hearers. On the contrary, each hearer should be made to think that you are speaking to him in particular. That is, in fact, the use of natural, familiar, and winning tones. To be natural, they should be always grave and modest: and become sonorous and pathetic only in the passages in which the discourse rises and grows earnest. But do not expect to show forth the feelings by the mere effort of the voice: many people, when they shriek and throw themselves into violent passions, only shock and bewilder their hearers. To succeed in depicting the passions, it is needful to study the movements which they inspire. For example, remark the movements of the eyes, the hands, the motions and postures of the whole body: take careful note of the voice of a person when penetrated with grief, or astonished at the sight of something strange. That is nature displaying itself to you; and you have only to follow it. If you employ art, conceal it so well by imitation, that it may be taken for nature. But to speak truth, it is with orators as it is with poets who write elegies and other impassioned forms of poetry: it is necessary to feel the passion in order to depict it well; art, however exquisite it be, never speaks like the real passion of nature undisguised. Thus you will always be a very imperfect orator, if you are not yourself penetrated with the feelings which you wish to depict and inspire in others :⁹ and it is not from religious feelings that I say this; I speak

B: I quite understand that. But you have spoken of the eyes; have they also an eloquence belonging to them?

A: You might be quite sure that they have. Cicero and all the ancients assure us of the fact. Nothing speaks so eloquently as the countenance; it expresses every passion of the soul, but in the countenance, the eyes have the principal power; a single look at the right time will penetrate to the bottom of the heart.

B: You remind me that the preacher of whom we were speaking usually kept his eyes closed; when you looked at him in front, the effect was unpleasing.

A: Because you feel that he was wanting in one of the elements which should have given life and animation to his discourse.

B: But why does he do that?

A: He is under pressure to continue speaking: and he shuts his eyes, because his memory is working laboriously, and this assists it.

B: I certainly remarked that he was burdened with his discourse: sometimes he even repeated many words in order to regain the thread of it. Those repetitions are disagreeable, and seem like a scholar who has learned his lesson imperfectly: they do injustice to any preacher, even the least gifted.

A: It is not the fault of the preacher, but of the method which he, like so many others, followed. As often as they preach sermons learned by heart, so often will they be liable to that embarrassment.

B: What, would you not have sermons learned by heart to be preached? You could not otherwise have them full of power and precision.

A: I would not prevent preachers from learning by heart discourses on extraordinary occasions, when they would have ample time to prepare themselves well beforehand: yet they should be able to preach without doing this.

B: How then? What you say appears incredible.

A: If I am wrong, I am ready to retract: let us examine the matter without prejudice. What is the principal object of the orator? Have we not seen that it is to persuade? And in order to persuade, did we not say that it was needful to touch and arouse the feelings?

B: Yes, undoubtedly.

A: That manner of preaching is then the best which is the most vigorous and the most touching.

B: That is true: but what do you conclude from that?

A: Which of two orators will have the more vigorous and the more touching manner of preaching, he who learns by heart, or he who speaks without reciting" word for word a sermon previously prepared?

B: I maintain that it will be he who has learned his discourse by heart.

A: Wait then: let us state clearly what the question is. On the one hand, I suppose a man who writes down his whole discourse exactly, and learns it by heart to the least word. On the other hand, I suppose another, a man of adequate learning, who fills his mind with his subject, who has considerable facility in speaking" (for you would not wish that persons without any ability for it should take upon them this duty); a man, in short, who meditates deeply on all the principles of the subject which he has to treat, and all their various applications; which he arranges in an orderly manner in his mind; who prepares the most expressive words by which he designs to make the subject clearly understood; who sets in order all his proofs; who prepares a certain number of touching examples and similes. That man knows, without doubt, all that he ought to say, and the order in which he ought to treat each part of his subject; nothing remains for him to do but to find the familiar expressions which are to make up the body of his discourse. Do you suppose that such a man as that would have any difficulty in finding them?

B: Those that he will find will not be so exact and so graceful as if he had sought them at his leisure in his study.¹⁰

A: Perhaps so. But according to your own showing he will lose nothing but a little ornament; and you know what, according to the principles which we have already laid down, we ought to think of such a loss as that. On the other side, what will he not gain in force and liberty of action, which is the chief thing? Supposing that he is thoroughly skilled in composition, as Cicero declares to be necessary; that he has read all the best models ;¹¹ that he has much natural and acquired facility; that he has an abundant stock of principles and of learning; that he has well thought out every part of his subject, and arranged it in his mind; we have a right to conclude that he will speak with power, with consecutiveness, and with fulness. His periods will not delight the ear so much, and that will be an advantage; he will be the better orator for that. His transitions from one part of the subject to the other will not be so elegant. That, however, will not be a matter of great consequence. He may, indeed, have prepared these without learning them by heart; but putting that aside, these negligences will be common to him as with the most eloquent orators of antiquity, who have thought it advisable thus often to imitate nature and not to betray too elaborate a preparation. In what then will he be wanting? He will make various little repetitions; but they will not be useless. Not only will the hearer, who has good taste, take pleasure in this touch of nature, for it is natural to return again and again to that which is striking in a subject; but this repetition will impress truths more strongly; it is the surest and safest method of instruction. What then? Suppose that you do find in his discourse some construction hardly exact, some term not quite suitable, or not approved by the Academy; something irregular, or even weak or misapplied; which will have escaped from the speaker in the warmth of his oration? A person must have a very small intellect to imagine that such faults are great. Such faults may be found in the most approved authors. The most skilful among the ancients thought nothing of them. If we had as broad views as they we should not occupy ourselves at all with those minuticc. It is only petty grammarians, people who are not qualified to appreciate great things, who amuse themselves with such trifles as these. Pardon my freedom: it is only because I am quite sure that you think very differently from people of that kind, that I speak to you about the matter so frankly.

B: Pray do not measure your words in the least with me; but come to your conclusion without hesitation.

A: Consider then, in the next place, the advan tages of a man who does not commit his discourse to memory. He has complete self-possession, he expresses himself in an easy and unaffected way, he does not adopt a declamatory tone; his thoughts flow freely, his expressions (if his natural endowments are well adapted for eloquence) are forcible and full of energy; even the warmth which animates him enables him to find expressions and metaphors which he would not have been able to elaborate in his study.

B: Why? A man may be animated in his study, and may compose very vigorous discourses.

A: That is true: but the warmth of speaking enables him to go in much greater vivacity. Farther, that which comes from the warmth of speaking is altogether natural and acceptable; it has an unstudied air, and has none of the artificial look which belongs to almost all discourses composed at leisure.¹² Then a skilful and experienced orator adapts his utterances to the impression which they seem to be producing on the hearer: for he watches closely which of these enters, and which does not enter, into their minds, what attracts their attention and touches their hearts, and what produces no effect upon them. The latter he repeats in another form, reclothing it with images and comparisons more familiar and engaging: or he even rises to the principles which are the sources of those truths he is enforcing; or strives to remove the feelings which prevent those truths from making a due impression. This is the true art of instruction and persuasion: without these methods only vague and unfruitful discourses can be preached. See how far the orator, who speaks only what he has learned by heart, is from attaining this degree of success. Set before your mind a man who dares say nothing but what is in the lesson he has committed to memory: all is necessarily dependent upon the style of his discourse; and it will come to be the case with him, as Dionysius of Halicarnassus remarks that it did with Isocrates, that his composition is better adapted to be read than to be delivered by word of mouth. Besides, let him do what he will, his inflexions of voice will be monotonous and always a little forced; he is not a man speaking, but an orator reciting or declaiming: his action is at random, his eyes too fixed show the labour of his memory, and he dare not yield himself to any extraordinary impulse or emotion, without incurring the danger of losing the thread of his discourse. The hearer, seeing the artifice, which is so evident, is far from being interested and carried out of himself, as he should be; but on the contrary, watches coldly and critically the whole method and contrivance of the discourse.

B: But did not the ancient orators do that which you condemn?

A: I believe not.

B: What! do you suppose that Demosthenes and Cicero did not know by heart those harangues, so finished and so polished, which we have of theirs?

A: We see, of course, that they committed them to writing: but we have many reasons for believing that they did not commit them to memory word for word. In fact, the discourses of Demosthenes, such as we have them now in a written form, bear much clearer signs of the vehemence and loftiness of a great genius accustomed to speak strongly on public affairs, than of the exactitude and polish of an author who is composing an oration before delivering it. As for Cicero, there are to be seen, in various passages of his Orations, sentences adapted to incidents that happened at the moment, and which could not possibly, therefore, have been prepared previously. But let us take his own statement upon that matter. He thinks that an orator should have a good memory. He even speaks of artificial memory as a useful invention: but nothing that he has said goes so far as to lay down that a discourse should be learned by heart to the last word. On the contrary, he appears to limit himself to the wish that a speaker should arrange in his mind all the parts of his discourse, that he should prepare beforehand all the illustra tions and principal expressions that he ought to use, reserving, however, the power to add at the moment what the sight of the audience may suggest, or what need may require to be said; it is for this reason that he is express in demanding so much care and presence of mind in the orator.¹³

B: Permit me to say that I am not in the least convinced by all that: I cannot believe that anyone can speak so well, without having weighed every word that he utters.

C: For my part, I can well understand what renders you so incredulous: you judge of this matter by common experience. If people who are in the general habit of learning their sermons by heart should perchance preach without that preparation, they would evidently preach very badly. I am not astonished at that: for they are not accustomed to throw themselves upon the natural powers of speech: their efforts have been directed only towards learning to write, and, moreover, to write with this particular intention: they have never thought of learning to speak in a manner noble, strong, and natural. Furthermore, the greater number have not a sufficient foundation of doctrinal knowledge to be able to trust themselves to their own resources in the pulpit. The method of learning by heart puts a certain number of persons who have but narrow and superficial minds in a condition to deliver public discourses with some credit; all that they need do is to collect a sufficient store of thoughts and quotations from the writings of others, and combine these: and, however small be their genius and constructive power, they can, in time, give a polished and regular form to that material. But, for the other method, is needed a serious consideration of the first principles of Religion, an extensive knowledge of character, some reading in ancient authors, with a power of reasoning and of action. Is not that what you think requisite for an orator who dispenses with learning his discourse by heart r¹⁴

A: You have stated it very well. Only it may not be superfluous to add that even when the qualities which this method requires are not found in any marked degree in a man, he may nevertheless succeed in making good discourses, provided that he has a fair degree of mental power, a reasonable stock of knowledge, and some facility in speaking, In this method, as in the other, there will be various ranks of orators. Take notice also, that the greater number of those who speak without learning by heart do not prepare sufficiently :¹⁵ it is-really necessary for them to study their subject with the closest attention, to prepare all the passages by which they hope to touch and impress their audience: and to arrange all in order which may be of use in helping them to recall all parts of their subject again, in their proper connexion.

B: You have already frequently mentioned that order: do you mean anything else than a division? Have you upon that subject also some peculiar opinion?

A: You are, as you think, speaking in jest: but the fact is, that I am not less singular in my opinion on that subject than on the others.

B: Are you really serious?

A: Be assured that I am: and since we are on the subject, I am going" to show you how defective is the order adopted by the greater number of orators.

B: Since you love order so much, divisions ought not to displease you.

A: But I am far from approving of them.

B: Why? Do they not render a discourse orderly and methodical?

A: Frequently, and indeed generally, they are put where they should not properly be, and thus they hinder a discourse, and render it uninteresting. They cut it up into two or three parts, which interrupts the action of the orator, and hinders the effect which it ought to produce. There is no longer a true unity in the discourse: it is divided into two or three different discourses, which are united only by an arbitrary bond. The sermon of the day before yesterday, that of yesterday, and that of to-day, provided that they are according to .a plan strictly followed out, like the plans of .sermons for Advent, make up just as much the body of a single discourse as the three points of one of those sermons make up together one sermon.

B: But what is order then, according to your views? What confusion there would be in a -discourse which was not divided at all !¹⁶

A: Do you suppose that there was much more confusion in the harangues of Demosthenes and of Cicero, than in the sermons of the preacher of your parish?

B: I do not know: I suppose not.

A: Do not be afraid to concede too much: the harangues of those great men are not divided as are the sermons of the present time. Not only they, but also Isocrates, of whom we have said so much, and the other ancient orators never adopted that method of division at all. The Fathers of the Church did not even know of it. S. Bernard, the last of them, often marks divisions; but he does not follow them, nor does he formally divide his sermons at all. Preaching existed for a long while without sermons having been divided; and it is a very modern invention which comes to us from the scholastic divines.

B: I allow that the schoolmen are but a faulty model for eloquence; but what form was there then anciently given to a discourse?

A: I am about to tell you that. A discourse was not formally divided at all: but all the subjects which it was necessary to distinguish from each other were carefully taken in succession, its own place was assigned to each, and each subject was arranged in proper order, so that it should follow where it would be most likely to make an impression upon the hearer.¹⁷ Often a consideration which, if put forth at first, would have appeared of little importance, becomes decisive when it is reserved for the time when the hearer shall have been prepared by other reasonings to appreciate all the power of it. Often a single word, happily employed in the place to which it belongs and which suits it, brings out an entire truth in all its clearness. Sometimes it is needful to leave a truth veiled and disguised till the very end of the speech: it is Cicero who asserts this. In every case there ought to be an orderly succession of proofs; the first should prepare the way for the second, and the second should strengthen the first. It is needful to give a general view of the whole subject to begin with, and to dispose the mind of the hearer favour ably towards it, by a modest and winning opening, by order of probity and candour. Then the preacher should go on to lay down his general principles; after that to state the facts he is engaged upon in a simple, clear, and telling manner, laying special stress upon those of which he means to make use afterwards. First principles; then facts; and from these draw the conclusions which you desire to reach; taking care to arrange the reasoning in such a manner as that the proofs will admit of being borne in mind easily.¹⁸ All this ought to be done in such a manner that the discourse should be continually growing; and that the hearer should feel more and more the growing weight of truth. Then is the time to throw out vivid and striking metaphors, and transitions of rhetoric calculated to excite the feelings. For that purpose it is needful to be acquainted with the interconnections of the feelings; to know which of them may be aroused most easily at first, and may then serve to arouse the others; and finally, which of them are able to produce the greatest effects; for with these latter the discourse should be brought to a close. It is often useful to make at the end a recapitulation or summary, which gathers up in a few sentences all the power of the orator, and sets anew before the hearers all that he has said which is most winning and persuasive. At the same time, it is not absolutely necessary always to follow that order in an uniform manner; each subject has its fitnesses and its exceptions. But even in this order a variety may be found almost infinite. This method, which is almost marked out for us by Cicero, cannot, as you see, be followed in a discourse which is cut invariably into three parts, nor observed absolutely in every point. An order is needful, but not an order that is expressly stated and shown from the commencement of the discourse. Cicero says that the best course, almost always, is to conceal it; and to lead on the hearer without his perceiving it. He goes so far as to state distinctly (I remember it well) that a speaker ought to conceal even the number of his arguments, so that they may not be counted, although they may be distinct in themselves, and in his own mind: and that a discourse ought not to have any clearly marked divisions. But the lack of discernment of late has gone so far that people do not recognize at all the order of a discourse, unless the speaker warns them of it at the commencement, and makes a pause at each point.¹⁹

C: But do not divisions serve as an assistance to the mind and memory of the hearer? It is for this practical purpose they are made.

A: Divisions help the memory of the speaker. But the observance of a natural and consecutive order in subjects would effect that object still better, and that without being specially marked: since the true connexion of subjects best guides the mind. But as for divisions, the only people whom they help are those who have studied it, and whom their course of instruction has rendered familiar with that method; and if the great body of hearers remember the divisions better than the rest of the discourse, it is because they have been repeated more frequently. Generally speaking, things which are plain and practical will be best remembered.

B: The order which you propose may be good for certain subjects, but it is not suitable for all; it is not always the case that there are facts to be made landmarks of.

A: When there are none such we must do with out them; but there are scarcely any subjects in which they are wanting. One of the excel lences of Plato is that he is in the habit of setting down, at the commencement of his treatises on morals, the histories and traditions which form, so to speak, the foundation of the rest of the discourse. That method is still more suitable to those who are preaching sermons; since Religion is entirely founded on antiquity, on history, on tradition. The greater number of preachers do not give sufficient instruction in their sermons; and because they do not go back to those original sources [of Religion] their proofs of it are but weak.

B: You have already been speaking to us for a long time, and I am ashamed to delay you still more; but curiosity obliges me. Permit me, then, to ask you some farther questions respecting the rules to be observed in discourses.

A.: Willingly; I am not yet wearied, and I have still a little time to devote to conversation.

B: You would strictly exclude from discourses all frivolous ornaments: now would you show me, by some plain examples, how to distinguish between such paste jewels (so to speak) and those which are solid and natural?

A: Have you any liking for trills in music? Do you not prefer those stirring tones which are descriptive of facts, and which express the feelings?

B: Yes, undoubtedly. Trills and quavers do nothing but amuse the ear: they mean nothing, and express no feeling. At one time our music was full of them: and then its general character was feeble and confused. At the present time we are beginning to make some return to the music of an earlier period. That music was a kind of impassioned declamation: and it acts powerfully on the mind.

A: I am sure that music, of which you are so good a judge, would assist me to make the matter in hand, which relates to eloquence, clear to you. And there should be a kind of eloquence even in music: trills should be rejected in eloquence as well as in music. Do you not understand now what it is that I call trills in discourse — a succession of similar and monotonous periods, which continually return like refrains; a sort of humming (bourdonnement) of words which return perpetually like the burden of a song? That is false eloquence, which resembles music in bad taste.

B: But still, make that yet a little more plain and clear to me.

A: The reading of good orators and of bad ones will form your taste more certainly than all rules: nevertheless, it is easy to satisfy you by bringing forward some examples. I will not take any from our own time, although it is fertile in instances of false ornament. Let us, in order not to wound anyone, return to Isocrates; especially as he is the model of those flowery and pompous discourses which are now the fashion. Have you read that eulogy of Helen which is so much admired?

B: Yes, I once read it.

A: What opinion did you form of it?

B: I thought it admirable: I have never read a composition displaying so much genius, eloquence, sweetness, fancy and tenderness. I confess to you that Homer, whom I read afterwards, did not appear to me to have in any degree the same power of genius. But just now, that you have pointed out to me the true 'object of poets and orators, I see clearly that Homer greatly surpasses Isocrates in as much as his art is concealed, while that of the other is visible and purposely displayed. But still, I was charmed with Isocrates at that time, and I should be still if you had not opened my eyes. M is the Isocrates of our time; and I see clearly that, in pointing out the weakness of that orator, you are arraigning all those who try to imitate that flowery and effeminate eloquence.

A: I speak now only of Isocrates. In the commencement of that eulogy he brings forward the love which Theseus had had for Helen, and he imagines that he will give an exalted idea of that lady by depicting the heroic qualities of that great man who was so passionately attached to her: as if Theseus, whom antiquity has always described as feeble and inconstant in his attachments, could not possibly have been attracted by any woman, but one of surpassing charms. Then he comes to the judgment of Paris. Juno, he says, promised to him the Empire of Asia, Minerva, victory in war, and Venus, the beautiful Helen. Then he goes on to say, that as Paris was not able, in that judgment, to gaze upon the faces of those god desses because of the lustre which shone from them, he could only form his judgment from the value of the three prizes which were offered to him: and he preferred Helen to an Empire and to victory. Then he praises the judgment of him to whose discernment even goddesses submitted themselves. "I am astonished,"* he says, again in favour of Paris, "that anyone should regard him as ill-judging in deciding to live with her, on whose account so many demi-gods were willing to die."

C: I can imagine that I hear the preachers of our day indulging in antitheses and epigrams. There is a good deal of Isocrates in many of them!

A: Here is their master. All the rest of that eulogy is full of the same peculiarities; he is greatly occupied with the long war of Troy, with the evils which the Greeks suffered in order to recover Helen by force, and with the praise of that beauty which is so powerful over men. Nothing at all is taken in a serious spirit; not one truth of morals is brought out in the course of all this; he judges of the value of things only by the violent passions of men. And not only are his arguments feeble, his style is also weak and overloaded with ornament. I have reminded you of that passage, although it is so objectionable, because it is very much praised, and because that faulty style is now very much imitated. The other and more serious orations of Isocrates show much of that effeminacy of style, and are full of those false jewels of rhetoric.

B: I see very clearly that you will have nothing to do with those clever terms of phrase which are neither solid and conclusive arguments, nor the expression of natural and tender impulses. Even the example from Isocrates, which you bring forward, although it is on a frivolous subject, does not fail to be convincing; and all that tinsel is still less becoming to serious and grave subjects.

A: Let us return to Isocrates. Am I wrong in speaking of that orator as Cicero assures us Aristotle spoke of him?

B: What has Cicero said?

A: That Aristotle, seeing that Isocrates had turned the eloquence of tone and gesture to the purposes of displaying and amusement, and was drawing after him many imitators, applied to him a verse from the "Philoctetes," in order to show how much he was ashamed to be silent and listen to that declaimer. But now enough of this matter; it is necessary that I should leave you.

B: Pray stay for a moment yet. Do you not then admit any antitheses at all?

A: Pardon me: when subjects naturally opposed the one to the other are touched upon, it is quite right to emphasize their opposition. Antithesis is then the briefest and most simple manner of explaining the true nature of things; it is natural, and has, without doubt, a real beauty of its own. But to make a circuitous preparation in order to explode a sort of battery of words is puerile. At first people of bad taste are dazzled; but presently those affectations weary the hearer. Do you know the architecture of our old churches, which is called Gothic?

B: Yes, I know it; it is seen everywhere.

A: Have you not remarked those roses, those projections, those litttle irregular carved orna ments; in short, all those gewgaws of which it is full? They are in architecture what antitheses and the other plays upon words are in eloquence. Greek architecture is much more simple: it admits only dignified and natural ornaments. In it you see nothing but what is grand, regular, and in proportion. The architecture which is called Gothic came to us from the Arabs. That race of people, being very full of impulse, and without discipline and culture, could not help devoting themselves to such false refinements; and out of that tendency came bad taste in all other depart ments. They became sophistical in reasoning, lovers of gewgaws in architecture, and inventors of phrases and witticisms in poetry and in eloquence. All of these belong to the same class of mind.

B: That is very amusing. According to you, a sermon full of antitheses and similar ornamenta tions is like a church built in the Gothic style.

A: Precisely.

B: Just one more question, I beg of you, and then I will let you go.

A: What is it?

B: It seems to me that it is very difficult to treat details in a dignified style; yet that is necessary when we wish to be sound, natural, and unaffected in diction, as you require. Be so kind as to say a word on this subject also.

A: In our nation there is so much apprehension of being undignified, because the expressions used, as a general rule, are plain, bold, and indefinite. If anyone wishes to praise a saint, he seeks out magnificent phrases; he declares that the object of his praise was admirable, that his virtues were heavenly, that he was rather an angel than a man; and all this he says in a series of exclamations, without connection or graphic power. The Greeks, on the contrary, made little use of all these general terms, which prove nothing, but brought forward great numbers of facts. For example, Xenophon, in the whole of his Cyropsedia, does not say once that Cyrus was admirable; yet he makes him everywhere to be admired. It is thus that it is proper to praise the saints by exhibiting their sentiments and their actions in detail. We have, in this respect, a false politeness very similar to that of certain people from the provinces who pride themselves on their good breeding: they do not dare to use any expression which does not appear to them to be elegant and refined; thus they are always stiff and high-flown, and think that they would let themselves down too much if they called things by their proper names.²⁰ Eloquence ought to be able to treat upon every subject. Even poetry, which is the most elevated kind of speech, is only successful when it depicts things with all their circumstances. See Virgil, when he represents the Trojan ships leaving the coast of Africa, or arriving on that of Italy; every detail is to be found in his poem. But it must be confessed that the Greeks pushed detail much further still, and followed nature very closely indeed. On account of this multiplicity of details many people would say, if they dared, that Homer was too plain and simple in his narrative. By this strongly marked simplicity, for which we have too much lost the taste at the present day, this poet resembles the Scriptures in a considerable degree; but the Scriptures surpass him as much as they have surpassed all the rest of antiquity in depicting events naturally and artlessly. When detail is being described nothing should be presented to the mind of the hearer which does not merit his attention, and which does not contribute to the impression which it is desired to make upon him. It is necessary to be judicious in the choice of the circumstances to be described, but no hesitation ought to be felt in using any word which serves to describe them. It is a mistaken politeness to suppress certain useful details because they are not found capable of being presented in an orna mental way. Besides this, Homer teaches us sufficiently, by his example, that it is possible to embellish all subjects in a way appropriate to each. Nevertheless, it must be understood that every discourse ought to have its light and shade; it is proper to be dignified in speaking of great things; to be simple, without being low, when treating of little things; sometimes artlessness and liberality is needful, sometimes sublimity and passion. A painter who only represented palaces of sumptuous architecture would not be true to nature, and would soon weary the beholder. Nature must be followed in her contrasts: after having depicted a stately town, it is often advisable to put before the spectator a desert and the huts of shepherds.²¹ Most people, who wish to make a fine discourse, try to employ a pomp of words indiscriminately in all parts of it: they think they have done everything necessary when they have drawn together a mass of sounding words and vague sentiments: their sole object is to load their discourses with ornament: in this they are like to unskilful cooks, who do not know how to observe moderation in seasoning, and think that they have given an exquisite flavour to viands, when they have heaped them with salt and pepper. True eloquence is in no way ambitious or ostentatious; it is restrained, and always adapted and proportioned to the people addressed and the subjects treated of: it is grand and sublime only when it is needful so to be.

B: The mention that you made just now of the Holy Scripture has made me extremely desirous that you would enable me too to appreciate intelligently its beauty: shall we not have that pleasure at some hour to-morrow?

A: It will be difficult for me to come to-morrow: but I will try to do so this evening. Since you wish it, we will speak then of the word of God; hitherto we have spoken only of the words of men.

B: Adieu, then, sir; I beg you not to fail us. If you do not appear, we shall come to look for you.

Footnotes

1. "If we go back to the period of the Renaissance, we tind the Church, instead of putting herself at the head of the great movements of science, discovery and manufacture, spending her time, as Father Barry says, in fruitless discussions, chanting lovely anthems and weaving copes of broidered gold in cathedral stalls, while commerce and inventive industry were calling into existence huge black cities and millions of machine-made proletariat, who stand outside, brawling and drinking, tearing their bread from one another, working with despair in their hearts the while, as many hours of the day and night as they can toil and live, refusing to see any salvation in Christ, as represented in the Church of the period." — PROF. M. D. BISBEE. ↩

2. "As for jest, there be certain things which ought to be privileged from it; namely religion, matters of state, great persons, any man's present business of importance, and any case that deserveth pity. Yet there be some that think their wits have been asleep, except they dart out something that is piquant and to the quick. That is a vein which should be bridled: ' Parce, puer, stimulis, et fortius utere horis.'" — BACON'S Essays, xxxii. "Humour is no new thing in the pulpit. There is humour in the Bible; there are flashes of it among the Fathers. It gleamed from Wyclif's solemn eyes. Luther broke into it, often wildly enough. In Latimer it was a full and ceaseless fountain. Zwingli did not disdain it. Erasmus wielded it with power. The grim earnestness of Bunyan was suffused with its brightness. Abraham-a-Sancta Clara made it the fashion in the seventeenth century of all the Roman Catholic pulpits of Germany. In religious controversy how Abelard and Pascal triumphed with it; how Sidney Smith and John Henry Newman irradiated with it the weak places of the positions, by them so vehemently attacked." — C. J. LITTLE, D.D. ↩

3. "The more you lose your isolated self, and the thoughts and feelings which cluster round it, and take instead into you the thoughts and feelings of others, the richer and the more varied, the more complex and the more interesting, and therefore the more vividly individual, becomes your being. . . . It is in such a moment when, as it were, you find your individuality outside of you in the being of the universe, that you are most individual, and most able to feel your being, though not to think it." — STOPFORD A. BROOKE, Sermon on Individuality. ↩

4. An obvious limitation of this principle, with regard to descriptions of scenery, is stated below: "It is hazardous to introduce extended descriptions of natural scenery into sermons, lest the personal experience with which they are connected be rather hidden than illustrated by them; and lest — as has sometimes happened — the sermon itself shall seem to have been constructed with reference to them, as if a house had been planned to match a mantel-piece. But occasionally they add to a discourse a vivid and memorable moral force, as well as rare pictorial beauty." — Dr. R. S. STORRS. ↩

5. "Plain speech should be coupled with plain thought. The thoughts which serve as starting points, should always be simple, natural and popular. The people do not understand abstractions or the speculations of reason, which are to them a strange language. You should start from the known to lead them to the unknown. That is the mathematical and logical method. You must begin with sensible, visible, and above all with actual things, in order to draw them gently towards spiritual and invisible things, and to the life that is to come. By adopting this course, you may conduct them far onward and elevate them to great heights, even to the sublimest aspirations of heart and soul. . . . As we have already said, by way of example: first exhibit religion to them as grand, good, and lovely, then as true and divine; winding up by fervently and energetically insisting on the necessity of submission to its moral law." — L'AfiBE MULLOIS, Cours d? Eloquence Sacree Populaire, p. 149. " A crowd always tires of, the abstract; but the concrete fatigues it also, if only serious or sublime. Hence the rifts of humour in natures charged with solemn message and responsibility are sunshine and relief, enhancing and not diminishing the preacher's power. A wrath that would be blinding in its full intensity, dissolved to lambent mockery, sharpens and strengthens the sight by the rest it gives to overwrought emotion. So it was with Theodore Parker: so it was with Sancta Clara in his nobler days. Or the argument that crushed attention rather than opposition, suddenly relieves us of its weight and dances before us a tricksy epigram, its meaning flashing from its face and making all that went before blaze with its significance. Such, since the days of Wyclif, has been the humour of many of the noblest preachers in the English tongue. But humour is full of peril to the preacher.'1'' — C. J. LITTLE, D.D. ↩

6. "Omnes enim, sive artis sunt loci, sive ingenii cujusdam atque prudentise, qui modo insunt in ea re, de qua scribimus, anquirentibus nobis, omnique acie ingenii contemplautibus ostendunt se et occurrunt; omnesque sententiae, verbaque omnia, quse sunt cujusque generis maxime illustria, sub acumen styli subeant et succedant necesse est; turn ipsa collocatio conformatioque verborum perficitur in scribendo, non poetico, sed quodam oratorio numero et modo." — CICERO: De Oratore, lib. i. cap. xxxiii. ↩

7. "It is certain that the adoption of a religious voice in the pulpit, a voice distinct from the ordinary tone, and intended to convey an impression of greater solemnity, is one of the chief causes of the ordinary business and our serious worldly interests. No one can tell how much this simple and common blunder has done to sever our religion from our ordinary life, and relegate it to special movements, so as to be assumed with Sunday clothes and services. It should, therefore, be the first duty of a sound rhetorician to extirpate this fatal mannerism in the preacher, and insist that real seriousness is quite inconsistent with any such airs and graces." — MAHAFFY: Decay of Modern Preaching, p. 146. "A novice among the Jesuits, no matter what he may have been previously — whether a lawyer, author, preacher, canon, grand vicar, bishop, or even a cardinal — must attend a reading-class three or four times a week. There he is made to read like a child, is taught to articulate and accentuate, and every now and then is stopped, while those present are called upon to point out the merits and defects in his reading. This training is persisted in until his pronunciation is perfect, and he is free from all disagreeable accent. But that is not all: every Monday during his noviciate, or during the term of his studies, that is for five, six, eight, or ten years, he has to undergo a training in the tones, which consists in his being made to recite what is called the formula of the general tones — a short discourse, comprising all the tones ordinarily used in oratorical compositions; such as the tone of persuasion, of menace, of kindness, of anger, of the mercy and justice of God, of prayer and of authority. Thereby the young preacher is taught how to supple, to break in his own organisms, and to adapt it to those different tones. After these come the special tones. This consists of a short discourse, to be composed in two hours, on a given text, and must contain certain specified strokes of oratory." — MULLOIS, p. 243. ↩

8. "The modern public is so unused to real rhetoric (as an art) that we set down the vulgarities and failures of rhetoricians as the natural outcome of their science. It must be owing to this strange misapprehension concerning rhetoric, that in our principal divinity schools among Protestants no care is taken to train men in the externals of eloquence, in the proper use of the voice and of the hands, still less in the proper method of constructing a persuasive discourse by an adherence to reasonable rules. . . . Are we to insist that preachers now-a-days are, like the Apostles, to take no heed what they shall say for that the Spirit will give them utterance? For this, too, is a reason why the study of rhetoric is discouraged among religious people. Here we again stand face to face with that very noble but ideal view of the preacher as a man of intense piety, inspired to speak with more than mortal power and wisdom, and trusting implicitly to the Divine Spirit to give him words. Without for one moment denying the existence of such men in all ages of the Church, we may fairly say that to depend on such grounds in ordinary preaching is not only chimerical, but tends to prevent the preacher from adopting the lawful means of persuasion placed within his reach. He might as well start upon a voyage round the world, and expect that the power of strange tongues would be given him to preach to the nations he found on his way." — J. P. MAHAFFY: Decay of Modern Preaching, p. 72. simply as an orator. ↩

9. "Some one has said that ' no faculty of the mind is weak which has heart in it.' Certainly it is true that no faculty is strong which has not heart in it; and whoever addresses men has to learn the lesson. If he speaks of the Gospel, he must feel how glorious that is in itself, and how adapted to man's vast need. This must be the undertone of every sermon; like the golden ground on which the angels of Fra Angelico walk and worship. The conviction of it must be as a sun-gleam, smiting his mind, and quickening to activity all its beauty and all its force. If he has not this, his thought will inevitably be obscure, his feeling dull, his utterance wanting in the elements of power. A deist, a fatalist, a materialist, a sceptic of whatever sort, undertaking as a business to preach the Gospel, will inevitably be like a blind man discoursing on the splendors of light the charming and delicate interplay of colours, or like a deaf man describing oratorios. Every one who loves the Gospel will see that he is speaking theoretically, in the way of imitation from report of others, and not from real and rich experience. So his words will want fire. They will stir no emotion, and touch no heart. They will be like a smile, in which the lips laugh, while the rest of the face is harsh and sullen."— R. S. STORRS, D.D. ↩

10. In the same sense a defender of the written sermon argues: "(a) In extemporaneous preaching there are many errors in language which mar the beauty and power of the sermon, so that, in the presence of an educated audience, it can not have the force of a well written composition. (~b) Off-hand preaching is full of inaccuracies of statement, misquotations, and fanciful rhetoric which adds to the distrust, which a want of elegant language has already made, (c) There can never be that consistent and systematic handling of a subject by the extemporaneous speaker, which would be possible to him in the deliberate preparations of a written sermon. This off- hand preaching is like off-hand shooting, very liable to miss the mark, (d) Extemporaneous preaching is generally addressed to the passions rather than the judg ments of men. And the impressions made are like the running of a wet weather spring which soon dries away. Impressions made under excitement, and in the haste of an unguarded moment, are wanting in that solidity which characterizes the changes which are wrought out by clear, well-defined principles, (e) The manuscript preacher does all things in decency and in order,' as saith the Scripture, I Cor. xiv. 40. He appeals with enlightened judgment and chosen language to the spiritual nature of man. He beautifies and adorns known facts with correct language, and points the soul to the blissful home above with words and sentiment culled from the broad fields of Christian literature in which the ' precious promises ' shine with a glory which God has given them." — JOHN A. WILLIAMS, D.D. ↩

11. "The Bible and the sermons of Chillingworth and Butler were Webster's models. Pitt, when asked the secret of his lofty style, pointed to a volume of Barrow's sermons. The Addisonians were students of Tillotson. Said Dugald Stewart: ' There is a living writer who combines the beauties of Johnson, Addison, and Burke, without their imperfections — Rev. Robert Hall.' Jeremy Taylor is another of the masters. Beecher tells us that Hooker's English was one of his ideals. 'Hooker's elaborate sentence, like the sentences of Demosthenes, composed of parts so hinged, of clauses so subordinated to the main thought, that we foresee the end from the beginning, and close the period with a sense of perfect roundness and totality,' was the model of the most sublime eloquence the world has heard since Demosthenes. Talmage acknowledges Ruskin as his literary and linguistic mentor. However open to criticism Macaulay may be in the choice of words, propriety of phrase, and rhythm of sentence, nevertheless for pervading power, lucidity, coherence, and dramatic progress he stan Is almost alone." — REV. J. M. DRIVER. ↩

12. "The system of preaching lives upon the value of the personal element in it. There is truth enough in the countless volumes of homilies already encumbering our libraries. There is, too, abundant instruction in the ceaseless issues of the religious press. Yet our churches are as well filled as in any previous age, because the people are interested to catch the momentary thoughts and feelings of a living man. It is the personality which makes the sermon. But for this very reason the demand is for genuineness and heartiness in him who -speaks. He must be visible. He must have latent heroism. He must have capacity for enthusiasm and the courage of his convictions. When the preacher appears in the pulpit, therefore, he must not exhibit himself as a student, though he needs thorough scholarship; he must not wear the manner of an ecclesiastic, though he may be in very deed a priest dealing with things pertaining to God; he must not seem to have come from the covert of a recluse, though he may have gained power from .solitary communings with God." — E. G. SELDEN. ↩

13. "If by extempore sermons you mean those delivered without manuscript, I believe them to be, speaking generally, the sermons of the future. In the sense of being produced on the spur of the moment, very few sermons are, and none ought to be, extempore. But preaching without manuscript has, in my opinion, formed a very material element in the past success of dissent. There is a prima facie reality about it which is rarely communicated to discourses delivered from writing. The Church is very seriously handicapped so long as the majority of the clergy are tied to their sermon-books. This seems to be more and more admitted, with the probable. result that the coming generation will, in the main, leave their sermon-books behind them." — TwELLS, Colloquies, p. 153. ↩

14. Here is a brief summing up of the entire question: "There are some who ought not to use written sermons ordinarily. They have the off-hand instinct. They take fire in presence of an audience. The ' nimble senators ' are never found off duty. Thought crystallizes, lor them, into richer forms in the pulpit than in the study. The mechanism of their minds is adjusted to extemporaneous work. They have the temperament in which the requisite elements are mingled with fulness of all and waste of none. There are others who can work most effectively when their hand grips the pen. They can penetrate deeper. They can see more clearly They can gain broader outlook. The work of clothing their thought in words worthy of being reduced to record reacts to clarify and intensify and liberalize the thought. They can use a manuscript in the pulpit with effectiveness. They can speak more forcibly because of the aid which it gives. They can read without reading. They are not exposed to the peril of repeating themselves. They have no need to hesitate between different forms of expression; the question of preference has been carefully considered and settled. The instinctive feeling that they are not quite sure of saying what they desire, and as they desire, is not interfering with the free play of their powers. They are not dependent on the presence of an audience for an enkindling of the intellectual and emotional fires of their nature. Tears drop on the sheets as they are covering them. Underneath the sentences are unrecorded prayers. The spaces between the lines are replete with thanksgiving and hope." — REV. S. C. LEONARD. ↩

15. "That the sermon ought to be thoroughly prepared, whether the one or the other method is adopted, is a truism. A mushroom cannot be transfonned into a shock of corn fully ripe by any method of gathering it. Writing is as indispensable to the improvisator as to the pastor who has a manuscript back of his sermon. The pen ought to be in daily use by the pastor, whatever method he adopts of ' attaching truth to the life of his people.' Writing is one of the conditions of his mental health. He needs to write in order to do unwritten work. He needs to write in order to understand himself." — REV. S. C. LEONARD, ↩

16. "When a sermon is mainly didactic, when it consists of a series of .motives to enforce some duty, or of a carefully organized procession of proofs in support of some doctrinal or ethical proposition, the announcement of the divisions will probably help your congregation to understand and to remember what you are saying. But I see no more reason for always announcing the divisions of a sermon than for always announcing the divisions of a speech. If the thoughts of the sermon are well massed, if land and water, earth and sky, are definitely separated from each other, instead of being left in the confusion of chaos, the sermon will be effective at the time, and the main points of it will be remembered afterwards, whether the divisions are announced or not. There are some obvious disadvantages in announcing them. The sermon is in danger of becoming a series of short sermons, with the divisions for separate texts; and there is sometimes a great deal of trouble in making a natural and easy transition from one division to another. . . . This method has the advantage of stimulauug and suspending curiosity. When the preacher begins by announcing the proposition which he intends to prove or to illustrate, the congregation will generally see a straight piece of road before them, and will feel that their attention may be relaxed till the next turn comes. Sometimes, however, the proposition will be misunderstood, sometimes it will provoke antagonism. The misunderstanding will be obviated if the misunderstanding comes first and the proposition afterwards; and if the proof is given before the proposition is stated, the antagonism may not arise." — R. W. DALE: Lectures on Preaching, p. 139. ↩

17. "It is indispensable, therefore, that the main plan of the sermon be from the start so plainly in view that it comes up of itself, as it is needed, and does not require to be pulled into sight with any effort. To this end it must be simple, obvious, natural, so that it fixes itself in the mind; and must be clearly articulated in its parts. If possible, let it be so arranged that one point leads to another, and when the treatment of it is fhrshed, leaves you in front of that which comes next. Then take up that, and treat it in its order until, through that treatment, you reach the third, and find it inevitable to proceed to consider that. By such a progressive arrangement of thought you are yourself carried forward; your faculties have continual liberty; you are not forced to pause in the work of addressing yourself directly to the people." — < R. S. STORKS, D.D. ↩

18. "The introduction should be as brief as possible. As a rule it should spring directly and naturally out of the text; that is, if the text is announced first. If you want to say something before you refer to your text, keep back your text till you have said it. But the best advice I can give you is to get to work as soon as you can. If your text requires explanation, explain it; if not, do not waste your time by explaining it. The time which most young preachers devote to the introduction would be far better spent on the close, or what our fathers used to call the 'Application' of their sermons. About this all our authorities are agreed. An English preacher of the last generation used to say that he cared very little what he said the first half hour, but that he cared a very great deal what he said the last fifteen minutes. I remember reading many years ago an address delivered by Mr. Henry Ward Beecher, in which he gave a very striking account of the sermons of Jonathan Edwards. Mr. Beecher said that in the elaborate doctnnal part of Jonathan Edwards' sermons the great preacher was only getting his guns into position; but that in his ' Application ' he opened fire upon the enemy. There are too many of us, I am afraid, who take so much time in getting our guns ' into position,' that we have to finish without firing a shot. We say that we leave the truth to do its own work. WTe trust to the hearts and consciences of our hearers to ' apply it.' Depend upon it, gentlemen, this is a great and fatal mistake." — DALE: Lectures, p. 145. ↩

19. "It is not always best, I think, to have the frame of a sermon like the frame of a Swiss cottage, all shown on the outside. It may be better to keep it within, and to have the presence and the strength of it manifested only in the dignity and stability of the structure which it braces and governs. But it must be there, and give symmetry and security to all the details which grow up upon it." — R. S. STORRS, D.D. r<s otcrat KGIKWS tovtvcrai rov /zero. TroAAot TWV ↩

20. "If [persons] are to speak at all, let 'em speak out. Persons beat about the bush until you quite lose sight of 'em, ay, and the bush too." — TWELLS: Colloquies, p. 197. "I do not know how far, in the country districts and in the quieter towns, the educated feeling has let go of religion as it has been hitherto taught in the churches, but I am confident that in our larger cities and centres, and particularly in circles of artists, of scientists, and of literary men, there is an essential unclasping of the mind in this respect; and we hear thousands of men saying, ' The pulpit has had its day; these old-fashioned doctrines have no more juice in them; and according to the great principle of evolution, we have so far grown that at last the whole world is becoming man's text-book, and the minister ought to preach to his people the great elements of physical life and health, the great sociological laws, the great civil laws, and the great laws of political economy.' In short, there are many men who would teach you that now, in the light that has been growing through the ages, the time has come when science is to be the saviour of the world, that the minister should be its instrument, and that the pulpit should be the place where it is taught, in its relations to life and duty. Far be it from me to undervalue science, which I believe to be one of the revelations of God in this world. The heavens declare His glory, and the earth shows. His handiwork; and if rightly understood and reverently observed, they lead us back to God; but physical science has not in it the power to develop spirituality in man. When taught only upon this lower plane of knowledge — namely, the knowledge which they can see, and hear. and smell, and taste, and handle — men can never become spiritual. . . . As an auxiliary, material science is invaluable, but it touches man only in the lower sphere of life, and never exalts him into that higher realm upon which he may enter as a Christian." — H. W. BEECHER: Lectures on Preaching, Third Series, p. 3. ↩

21. The quintessence of plainness and homeliness is the proverb. Of the use of these in the pulpit an American writer says: "The proverb is the concentration and crystallization into the smallest compass, of universal truths — the ' wisdom which knows neither language or race.' Often a nation's history is contained in a single sentence, a volume of wisdom in a single line, an age-long, world- wide truth in a single word. Our Saviour strung these glittering gems upon the threads of His discourses. The whole Bible scintillates like a diamond-bank, with these undated, cosmopolitan coins. To digest a proverb each day would, in a single year, transform our sounding brass and tinkling cymbals into discourses of gold." — REV. J. M. DRIVER. ↩