against nature, for which we shall receive a retribution in the production of artificial habits.

Declamation also, with certain restrictions, may be introduced into our educational system. The pieces selected may be of the narrative or descriptive kind, where the speaker is not required to assume a character, but where he may speak under the influence of his own naturally-awakened feelings. But then he ought not to speak such pieces, unless, upon trial, he finds his own feelings readily entering into them. The sentimental are the best, but the sentiments should be such as the speaker feels interested in, such as he can easily make his own, such as he feels he would himself have written had he possessed the ability. The principle is, to select such pieces as will lead to the habit of expressing our own sentiments with unaffected interest. But what shall we think of the practice of mounting the stage and, in the character of Hannibal or Bonaparte addressing an army on the eve of battle; or in the character of Antony making a speech over the body of Cæsar; or in the character of Hamlet uttering a soliloquy; or in the character of satan making a speech to the fallen spirits in Pandemonium? If this were action it would not be oratory. But it cannot be action. No imagination is vivid enough for the performance. It is nothing more than a miserable, absurd, and ridiculous attempt at imitation. If oratory cannot be gained in this way, why practice it? It is worse than no instruction to learn what must be hereafter unlearned when we come upon the great theatre of the world, where every man must act his own character, and where, not frothy declamation, but burning thought must speak to men.

Another method of cultivating oratory, is the speaking of original compositions. This cannot be followed with too much assiduity. If performed carelessly it avails little; but if the compositions be prepared with pains and a laudable ambition, if the subject be one in which the writer is interested, and which he feels desirous to impress upon his hearers, there will be in the whole performance a salutary discipline, both as respects eloquence of style and genuine oratory.

Forensic debates are superior to all other exercises, when properly conducted. The speaker should speak only from his own convictions, he should make ample preparation in the thought, and

Expression of Passion in Oratory.

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then yield himself to the interest and ardor of discussion. Such exercises may give birth to oratory; they certainly will prepare the way. Here mind comes in conflict with mind, and the studied gesture and artificial tone are forgotten. The arts and tricks of a spurious oratory could not be made to appear more despicable than by introducing them into the forum.

In forming the orator, however, the principal discipline relates to the thoughts and feelings. Oratory is composed of the tones which thought and feeling inspire, and the thought and feeling contain the only true measure of the oratory. The loftier thought, the nobler and more glowing feeling of one mind will mark the superiority of his oratory, if he speak inartificially. But still the humbler thought, and the less soaring passion of another, will have its measure of oratory.

Whilst, therefore, all that direct attention should be paid to oratory which has been remarked above, let it be remembered that the finished and disciplined intellect, the purified and exalted heart, and a thorough acquaintance with language, form its springs. One of the strongest objections against popular elocution is, that it deludes its pupils into the belief that they have become orators by the cultivation of the voice, while as yet its fountains have not been opened in the soul. Oratory is not an accomplishment of the schoolboy, but the attribute of a ripened and godlike mind.

As a specimen of oratory, let us take the oratory of Lord Bacon, as described by Ben Jonson: "There happened in my time one noble speaker who was full of gravity in his speaking. No man ever spoke more neatly, more pressly, more mightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of its own graces. His hearers could not cough, or look aside from him without loss. He commanded when he spoke, and had his judges angry or pleased at his devotion. The fear of every man that heard him was, that he should make an end."

There is but one thing more that we shall mention as a part of this discipline and preparation for oratory. It is this, to enter into the world neither as an isolated nor as a selfish being, but with all the generous sympathies of humanity, feeling that the great interests of the world are common interests in which all must bear a part. These interests are expressed by a few words, but

how vast their relations! Art, science, law, politics, and religion. He that will enter the world to prosecute these in truth and righteousness, must think, and feel, and speak; and then thought will be the birth of wisdom, and feeling will be the soul of speech, and such speech will be oratory.

To conclude, all that can be done for oratory in education is merely preparatory. We might as well try to make poets as to make orators. We may prescribe fitting and genial studies and exercises, but the orator, as well as the poet, can alone make himself, or must be made by an inspiration from heaven.