tionate figure, the rounded outlines of which are expressed with softness, to a cold and badly-finished figure. An orator may convince and affect, even without elegance, purity, or number; a poet cannot really do so without being elegant: it is one of the principal merits of Virgil. Horace is much less elegant in his satires and epistles, so that he is much less of a poet sermoni proprior. The great point in poetry and the ora The severity of the ancient Romans gave an odious sense to the word elegantia. They regarded all kinds of elegance as affectation and far-fetched politeness, unworthy the gravity of the first ages. "Vit, non laudit fuit," says Aulus Gel-torical art is, that the elegance should lius. They called him an elegant man, who in these days we designate a petitmaître (bellus homuncio), and which the English call a beau; but towards the time of Cicero, when manners received their last degree of refinement, elegans was always deemed laudatory. Cicero makes use of this word in a hundred places, to describe a man or a polite discourse. At that time even a repast was called elegant; which is scarcely the case among us. never appear forced; and the poet in that, as in other things, has greater difficulties than the orator; for harmony being the base of his art, he must not permit a succession of harsh syllables. He must even sometimes sacrifice a little of the thought to elegance of expression, which is a constraint that the orator never experiences. It should be remarked, that if elegance always appears easy, all that is easy and natural is not, however, elegant. It is seldom said of a comedy that it is This term among the French, as among the ancient Romans, is confined to sculp-elegantly written. The simplicity and ture, painting, eloquence, and still more to poetry: it does not precisely mean the same thing as grace. The word grace applies particularly to the countenance; and we do not say an elegant face, as we say elegant contours; the reason is, that grace always relates to something in motion, and it is in the countenance that the mind appears: thus we do not say an elegant gait, because gait includes motion. The elegance of a discourse is not its eloquence; it is a part of it; it is neither the harmony nor metre alone; it is clearness, metre, and choice of words, united. { There are languages in Europe in which nothing is more scarce than an elegant expression. Rude terminations, frequent consonants, and auxiliary verbs grammatically repeated in the same sentence, offend the ears even of the natives themselves. rapidity of a familiar dialogue exclude {this merit, so proper to all other poetry. Elegance would seem inconsistent with the comic. A thing elegantly said would not be laughed at; though most of the verses of Moliere's Amphitrion, with the exception of those of mere pleasantry, are elegantry written. The mixture of gods and men in this piece, so unique in its kind, and the irregular verses, forming a number of madrigals, are perhaps the cause. A madrigal requires to be more elegant than an epigram, because the madrigal bears somewhat the nature of the ode, and the epigram belongs to the comic. The one is made to express a delicate sentiment, and the other a ludicrous one. Elegance should not be attended to in the sublime: it would weaken it. If we read of the elegance of the Jupiter Olympus of Phidias, it would be a satire. The elegance of the Venus of Praxiteles may be properly alluded to. A discourse may be elegant without being good; elegance being, in reality, only a a choice of words; but a discourse cannot be absolutely good without being elegant. Elegance is still more necessary ELIAS OR ELIJAH, AND ENOCH. to poetry than eloquence, because it is a ELIAS and ENOCH are two very impart of that harmony so necessary to verse.portant personages of antiquity. They fore the last judgment, to oppose the antichrist; that Elias will preach to the Jews, and Enoch to the Gentiles." St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Hebrews (which has been contested), says ex are the only mortals who have been taken out of the world without having first tasted of death. A very learned man has pretended that these are allegorical personages. The father and mother of Elias are unknown. He believes that his coun-pressly, "by faith Enoch was translated, try, Gilead, signifies nothing but the cir- that he should not see death, because culation of time. He proves it to have death had translated him." come from Galgala, which signifies revolution. But what signifies the name of the village of Galgala ! The word Elias has a sensible relation to that of Elios, the sun. The burnt sacrifice offered by Elias, and lighted by fire from heaven, is an image of that which can be done by the united rays of the sun. The rain which falls, after great heats, is also a physical truth. The chariot of fire and the fiery horses, which bore Elias to heaven, are a lively image of the four horses of the sun. The return of Elias at the end of the world seems to accord with the ancient opinion, that the sun would extinguish itself in the waters, in the midst of the general destruction that was expected; for almost all antiquity was for a long time persuaded that the world would sooner or later be destroyed. We do not adopt these allegories; we only stand by those related in the Old Testament. Enoch is as singular a personage as Elias, only that Genesis names his father and son, while the family of Elias is unknown. The inhabitants of both east and west have celebrated this Enoch. St. Justin, or somebody who had taken his name, says that Elias and Enoch are in a terrestrial paradise, and that they there wait the second coming of Jesus Christ. St. Jerome, on the contrary, believes that Enoch and Elias are in heaven. It is the same Enoch, the seventh man after Adam, who is pretended to have written the book quoted by St. Jude. Tertullian says that this work was preserved in the ark, and even that Enoch made a second copy of it after the deluge. This is what the holy scripture and the holy fathers relate of Enoch; but the profane writers of the east tell us much more. They believe that there really was an Enoch, and that he was the first who made slaves of prisoners of war; they sometimes call him Enoc, and sometimes Edris. They say that he was the same who gave laws to the Egyptians under the name of Thaut, called by the Greeks Hermes Trismegistus. They give him a son named Sabi, the author of the religion of the Sabeans. There was a tradition in Phrygia on a certain Anach, the same whom the Hebrews call Enoch. The Phrygians held this tradition from the Chaldeans or Babylonians, who also recognised an Enoch, or Anach, as the inventor of astronomy. They wept for Enoch one day in the year in Phrygia, as they wept for Adonis among the Phenecians. The holy scripture, which is our infallible guide, informs us that Enoch was the father of Methusala, or Methusalem, and that he only dwelt on the earth three hundred and sixty-five years, which seems a very short life for one of the first patriarchs. It is said that he walked in the The ingenious and profound writer, way of God, and that he appeared no who believes Elias a person purely allelonger, because God carried him away. gorical, thinks the same of Enoch. He "It is that," says Calmet, " which makes believes that Enoch, Anach, Annoch, the holy fathers and most of the commen-signified the year; that the orientals wept tators assure us that Enoch still lives; for it, as for Adonis, and that they rethat God has borne him out of the world joiced at the commencement of the new as well as Elias; that both will come be- year. That Janus, afterwards known in Italy, was the ancient Anach, or Annoch, of Asia. That not only Enoch formerly signified, among all nations, the beginning and end of the year, but the last day of the week. That the names of Anne, John, Januarius, Janvier, and January, all come from the same source. It is difficult to penetrate the depths of ancient history. When we seize truth in the dark, we are never sure of retaining her. It is absolutely necessary for a Christian to hold by the scriptures, whatever difficulty he may have in understanding them. ELOQUENCE. ELOQUENCE was created before the rules of rhetoric, as the languages are formed before grammar. Nature renders men eloquent under the influence of great interests or passions. A person much excited sees things with a different eye from other men. To him all is the object of rapid comparison and metaphor. Without premeditation, he vivifies all, and makes all who listen to him partake of his enthusiasm. A very enlightened philosopher has remarked, that people often express themselves by figures; that nothing is more common or more natural than the turns called tropes. Thus, in all languages, the heart burns, courage is kindled, the eyes sparkle; the mind is oppressed, it is divided, it is exhausted; the blood freezes, the head is turned upside down; we are inflated with pride, intoxicated with vengeance. Nature is everywhere painted in these strong images, which have become common. It is the same nature which sometimes inspires lively and animated sallies; a strong impulse on a pressing danger, prompts the imagination suddenly. Thus a captain of the first caliphs, seeing the Mussulmen fly from the field of battle, cried out, "Where are you running to? your enemies are not there." This speech has been given to many captains; it is attributed to Cromwell. Strong minds much oftener accord than fine wits. Rasi, a Mussulman, captain of the time of Mahomet, seeing his Arabs frightened at the death of their general Derar, said to them, "What does it signify that Derar is dead? God is living, and observes your actions." Where is there a more eloquent man than that English sailor who decided the war against Spain in 1740 ? "When the Spaniards, having mutilated me, were going_to_kill me, I recommended my soul to God, and my vengeance to my country!"." Nature, then, elicits eloquence; and if it be said that poets are created and orators formed, it is applicable only when eloquence is forced to study the laws, the genius of the judges, and the manners of the times. Nature alone is spontaneously eloquent. { Aristotle, also, showed that true philosophy is the secret guide to perfection It is from her that instinct learns to as- in all the arts. He discovered the sume a modest tone and air, when it is sources of eloquence in his book of Rhenecessary. The natural desire of capti- toric. He showed that logic is the foundvating our judges and masters; the con-ation of the art of persuasion, and that to centrated energies of a profoundly stricken be eloquent is to know how to demonsoul, which prepares to display the sentiments which oppress it, are the first teachers of this art. strate. He distinguished three kinds of eloquence; the deliberative, the demonstra tive, and the judiciary. The deliberative, is employed to exhort those who deliberate in taking a part in war, in peace, &c.; the demonstrative, to show that which is worthy of praise or blame; the judiciary, to persuade, absolve, condemn, &c. He afterwards treats of the manners and passions with which all orators should be acquainted. He examines the proofs which should be employed in these three species of eloquence, and finally he treats of elocution, without which all would languish. He recommends metaphors, provided they { are just and noble; and, above all, he requires consistency and decorum. All these precepts breathe the enlightened precision of a philosopher, and the politeness of an Athenian; and, in giving the rules of eloquence, he is eloquent with simplicity. It is to be remarked, that Greece was the only country in the world in which the laws of eloquence were then known, because it was the only one in which true eloquence existed. pliment better than the sublimest eloquence. Cicero, after having given the examples in his harangues, gave the precepts in his book of the Orator; he followed almost all the methods of Aristotle, and explained himself in the style of Plato. It distinguishes the simple species, the temperate, and the sublime. Rollin has followed this division in his Treatise on Study; and he pretends that which Cicero does not, that the 'temperate' is a beautiful river, shaded with green forests on both sides; the 'simple,' a properly-served table, of which all the meats are of excellent flavour, and from which all refinement is banished; that the sublime' thunders forth, and is an impetuous current which overthrows all that resists it. Without sitting down to this table, without following this thunderbolt, this current, or this river, every man of sense must see that simple eloquence is tha which has simple things to expose, and that clearness and elegance are all that are necessary to it. The grosser art was known to all men ; sublime traits have everywhere escaped There is no occasion to read Aristotle, from nature at all times; but to rouse the Cicero, and Quintilian, to feel that an minds of the whole of a polished nation-advocate who begins by a pompous exto please, convince, and affect at the same time, belonged only to the Greeks. The Orientals were almost all slaves; and it is one of the characteristics of servitude to exaggerate everything. Thus the Asiatic eloquence was monstrous.— The west was barbarous in the time of Aristotle. ordium on the subject of a partition wall is ridiculous; it was, however, the fault of the bar until the middle of the seventeenth century; they spoke with emphasis of the most trivial things. Volumes of these examples may be compiled; but all might be reduced to this speech of a witty advocate, who, observing that his adverTrue eloquence began to show itself in sary was speaking of the Trojan war and the time of the Gracchi, and was not per- of Scamander, interrupted him by sayfected until the time of Cicero. Marking, "The court will observe that my Antony, the orator Hortensius, Curion, client is not called Scamander, but MiCæsar, and several others, were eloquent chaut." men. This eloquence perished with the republic, like that of Athens. Sublime eloquence, it is said, belongs only to liberty; it consists in telling bold truths, in displaying strong reasons and representations. A man often dislikes truth, fears reason, and likes a well-turned com The sublime species can only regard powerful interests, treated of in a great assembly. There may still be seen lively traces of it in the parliament of England: several harangues partook of it which were pronounced there in 1739, when they debated about declaring war against Spain The spirits of Cicero and Demosthenes seem to have dictated several passages in their speeches; but they will not descend to posterity like those of the Greeks and Romans, because they want the art and charm of diction, which place the seal of immortality on good works. by M. Massillon, since Bishop of Clermont, the first time that he preached his famous sermon on the small number of the elect. A kind of transport seized all the audience; they rose involuntarily; the murmurs of acclamation and surprise were so great as to disturb the orator; The temperate species is that of those and this confusion only served to augment } preparatory discourses, of those public the pathos of his discourse. The followspeeches, and of those studied compli-ing is the passage:ments, in which the deficiency of matter must be concealed with flowers. 3 These three species are often mingled, as also the three objects of eloquence, according to Aristotle: the great merit of the orator consists in uniting them with judgment. ? Great eloquence can scarcely be known to the bar in France, because it does not conduct to honours, as in Athens, Rome, and at present in London; neither has it great public interests for its object; it is confined to funeral orations, in which it borders a little upon poetry. Bossuet, and after him Flechier, seem to have obeyed that precept of Plato, which teaches us that the elocution of an arator may sometimes be the same as that of a poet. Pulpit oratory had been almost barbarous until P. Bourdaloue; he was one of the first who caused reason to be spoken there. The English did not arrive at that art until a later date, as is avowed by Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury. They knew not the funeral oration; they avoided, in their sermons, all those vehement turns which appeared not to them consistent with the simplicity of the gospel; and they were diffident of using those farfetched divisions which are condemned by Archbishop Fenelon, in his dialogues "Sur l'Eloquence." "I will suppose that this is our last hour, that the heavens open over our heads, that time is past, and that eternity commences; that Jesus Christ is going to appear to judge us according to our works, and that we are all here to receive from him the sentence of eternal life or death: I ask you, overwhelmed with terror like yourselves, without separating my lot from your own, and putting myself in the same situation in which we must all one day appear before God our judge-if Jesus Christ, were now to make the terrible separation of the just from the unjust, do you believe that the greatest part would be saved? Do you believe that the number of the righteous would be in the least degree equal to the number of the sinners? Do you believe that, if he now discussed the works of the great number which is in this church, he would find ten righteous souls among us?— Would he find a single one?" There are several different editions of this discourse, but the substance is the same in all of them. This figure, the boldest which was ever employed, and the best timed, is one of the finest turns of eloquence which can be read either among the ancients or moderns; and the rest of the discourse is not unworthy of this brilliant appeal. Preachers who cannot imitate these fine models, would do well to learn them by Though our sermons turn on the most heart, and deliver them to their congreimportant subjects to man, they supplygations (supposing that they have the rare few of those striking parts which, like the talent of declamation), instead of preachfine passages of Cicero aud Demosthenes, {ing to them, in a languishing style, things are fit to become the models of all the as common-place as they are useless. western nations. The reader will therefore be glad to learn the effect produced It is demanded, if eloquence be permitted to historians? That which belongs i |