sist the faculties of discrimination and memory, little remains to be done in this place. The remaining requisites, articulation, emphasis, and gesture, are already well understood; and have also been discussed and taught, by many able and well-known writers. Nevertheless, they are each reduced to clear, practical rules in this work.

To speak distinctly, and sufficiently loud to be heard by those who are addressed, is necessary for conversation and reading, as well as for recitation and oratory.* In public speaking, every word should be uttered, as though it were spoken singly. The solemnity of an oration justifies and demands such scrupulous distinctness. That careful pronunciation which would be ridiculously pedantic in colloquial intercourse, is an essential requisite of good elocution.

* Lord Chesterfield, in one of his letters, thus advises his son :-"Take care to open your teeth when you speak; to articulate every word distinctly; and to beg of any friend you converse with to remind and stop you, if ever you fall into a rapid and unintelligible mutter. You should even read aloud to yourself, and tune your utterance to your own ear; and read at first much slower than you need to do, in order to correct that shameful habit, of speaking faster than you ought. In short, you will make it your business, your study, and your pleasure, to speak well, if you think rightly."

A*

There are in every sentence some word or words which require peculiar emphasis, so that they may reach the hearer with distinguishing force. In selecting them, the meaning intended to be conveyed by the passage, is certainly the best guide; but the judgment of the preceptor will, in this instance, be of great assistance to the pupil. It is likewise an excellent mode, for the student to read or repeat a passage from some author, to a person of correct taste and good delivery, who would immediately afterwards recite the same selection. The difference in effect would be perceived, and would furnish an excellent general lesson to the unformed orator. The well known anecdote of Demosthenes and the player affords a striking instance of the efficacy of such instruction.

Upon the same principle, much advantage may accrue to a young person from hearing some of the best public speakers and theatrical performers, particularly if a discreet friend point out at the time their respective excellences: and it may reasonably be hoped, that when the youthful capacity shall be enabled to appreciate in the works of others, the particular words which require emphasis, that it will have little difficulty in ascertaining the emphatic words in its own compositions, whether written or oral. As gesture must be regarded in the discipline

for public speaking, it claims attention in this treatise.

It should be clearly understood, that the gesture suitable for an orator, is very different from that which is displayed on the stage. The business of an orator is to instruct and persuade. The business of an actor is to exhibit the effect, which the passions produce on the figure and countenance. The former is the adviser; the latter, the representation of his fellow-creatures. The orator is guided by reason; and his appeals are more to the reason than the feelings. The player is guided by feeling alone; and addresses the feelings only. The violence of gesticulation which is correct in one, would be hyperbolical or ludicrous in the other.

That the figure should be erect, but not perpendicular: the body resting upon one leg; the other leg being a little advanced: and that the arms should be employed alternately, in temperate action, are among the plainest and most useful precepts for the gesture of an orator. But to observe the deportment of those public speakers who possess elegance of manner, is to obtain the most efficacious lesson.

It should be remembered, that gesture is an accomplishment worthy even of great attention. The advantage of a graceful appearance and suitable action is of too much consequence to

be dispensed with. An audience is always more favourably disposed toward a prepossessing, than an uninteresting speaker. Demosthenes having been asked what was the first and most essential qualification of a public speaker, answered, Gesture. Being asked, what was the second, he replied as before, Gesture. Being asked, what was the third, he answered again, Gesture: still continuing to make the same reply till they had done questioning him; giving them to understand, that, without gesture, all the other qualifications of a speaker were to be considered as of little or no moment,-a truth which he himself had been taught too sensibly not to abide by it for ever. After intense application to private study, and notwithstanding the uncommon vigour of his genius, and the matchless energy of his language, he was ill received by the people till he learned how to manage his weapons,,-how to direct his thunder, how to rouse or allay the passions at pleasure by the powers of utterance and action. As he withdrew, in the utmost confusion, Satyrus, one of the most excellent actors of those times, who was his friend, met him; and having learned from himself the cause of his being so much dejected, he assured him, that the evil was not without remedy. He desired him to repeat some of the verses of Sophocles

or Euripides to him, which he accordingly did. Satyrus spoke them after him, and gave them such effect, by the tone, gesture and spirit with which he pronounced them, as clearly discovered to Demosthenes, that without animated gestures, the most beautiful language may be compared to a lifeless corpse, and is more likely to chill the hearer than to warm and transport him.

Such are the powers which the art of extem. poraneous public speaking requires. To accommodate the preceding views to the acquisition of this valuable attainment, the present work is divided into four parts. The First treats of the faculties of reading and recitation; and includes a practical discipline for articulation, accent, emphasis, pauses, tones, inflections, and gesture. The Second contains compositions and selections, narrative, descriptive and argumentative. Each of these is analyzed, that the pupil may perceive its several parts; and thus become initiated in the practice of discriminating all the branches of a discourse. Clear and copious rules are therefore given to assist the student in the practice of distinguishing the members of every species of literary composition: and their connection and dependence are reduced to method, as the most efficacious mode of fixing them