The perception of this law of laws awakens in the mind a sentiment which we call the religious sentiment, and which makes our highest happiness. Wonderful is its power to charm and to command. It is a mountain air. It is the embalmer of the world. It is myrrh and storax, and chlorin and rosemary. It makes the sky and the hills sublime, and the silent song of the stars is it. By it is the universe made safe and habitable, not by science or power. Thought may work cold and intransitive in things, and find no end or unity; but the dawn of the sentiment of virtue on the heart gives and is the assurance that Law is sovereign over all natures; and the worlds, time, space, eternity, do seem to break out into joy. This sentiment is divine and deifying. It is the beatitude of man. It makes him illimitable. Through it, the soul first knows itself. It corrects the capital mistake of the infant man, who seeks to be great by following the great, and hopes to derive advantages from another, by showing the fountain of all good to be in himself, and that he, equally with every man, is an inlet into the steps of Reason. When he says, "I thought"; when love warms him; when he chooses, warned on high, the good and great deed; then, deep melodies wander through his soul from Supreme Wisdom. Then he can worship, and be enlarged by his worship; for he can never go behind this sentiment. In the sublimest flights of the soul, rectitude is never surmounted, love is never outgrown. "The Divinity School Address." RALPH WALDO EMERSON. ROUNDNESS AND RESONANCE OF TONE The orotund voice is the simple pure tone rounded out into greater fulness. The word comes from rotundus, meaning round. It is produced mainly by an increased resonance of the chest and mouth cavities, and a more vigorous action of the abdominal muscles. It always has the character of fulness, but is not necessarily a loud tone. Neither is it an "assumed" voice, but should result from expanded thought and increased intensity of feeling. Its force varies in degree with the thought being exprest. It may be effusive or flowing, expulsive or rushing, explosive or bursting. It is used in language of great dignity and power, in intense and ponderous thought, and in grandeur and sublimity. It is also used in public prayer, and in certain Bible and hymn reading. Coupled with the simple conversational style of speaking, it greatly enlarges the public speaker's possibilities of expression. It gives variety and appropriateness to the spoken word. An ordinary colloquial style of speaking, when long continued, becomes tame and uninteresting to an audience; but when all the gradations of soft, medium, and full orotund voice are added, the speaker is conscious of vastly increased scope and power. It will be found helpful in the following exercises to keep the chest high and active throughout. The abdomen may expand and contract fully without letting the chest down from its full active position. If the student will also think depth and roundness during the exercises, it will assist in securing the desired qualities. A resonant voice avails itself of all the various parts of the throat and chest that can contribute vibration. Like the strings of a violin or the stem of a tuning-fork, the voice needs some kind of solid body to give it character. This is imparted principally by the resonance chambers; viz., by the cavities of the mouth and throat, by the chest, and by the facial resonators. 1. Facial resonance. The face immediately surrounding the mouth and extending into the cheek bones can be employed to advantage in producing resonance. Inhale a full deep breath, and begin a low humming sound on the element maw. Project the lips but do not part them, as the element is to be thought rather than exprest. The trembling sensation felt at the lips in producing this sound should be helped as much as possible until it extends up the face. This vibratory effect will be made to spread the more rapidly if the student thinks of circles while practising, of water rising from a fountain, or some other suggestive thought. While the humming is in progress keep to one tone at a time, but in turn change to other pitches. Aim to increase the vibrations and use considerable force in doing so. No harm can possibly come to the throat or voice through this exercise, so it may be practised with impunity. 2. Open resonance. Repeat the last exercise, but gradually open the mouth so that the element maw will pour forth in free liquid quality. There will be a tendency to lose the facial resonance as the mouth is opened, but this must be resisted. Open the mouth very gradually and endeavor to maintain the same degree of resonance throughout. 3. Throat resonance. Gently sing the vowel e, endeavoring to bring into vibration all the parts around the back of the mouth, particularly the soft palate and root of the tongue. As this vowel has a natural tendency to be throaty, great care should be taken to avoid rigidity and squeezing the tone. 4. Chest resonance. Inhale a full deep breath, and while singing the vowel o hold the chest high and rigid throughout the exercise. Think of the chest as a soundingboard and make it vibrate as much as possible. Repeat this vowel in the speaking voice, with rising and falling in flection, following the directions given for the singing tone. As the tone is in progress think of roundness and fulness of voice. Hold in mind some lofty thought, or think of immensity, power, and majesty. EXAMPLES FOR PRACTISE IN RESONANCE 1. My Lords, I do not mean to go further than just to remind your Lordships of this, that Mr. Hastings' government was one whole system of oppression, of robbery of individuals, of spoliation of the public, and of supersession of the whole system of the English government, in order to vest in the worst of all the natives all the power that could possibly exist in any government; in order to defeat the ends which all governments ought, in common, to have in view. In the name of the Commons of England, I charge all this villainy upon Warren Hastings, in this last moment of my application to you. Therefore, it is with confidence that, ordered by the Commons of Great Britain, I impeach Warren Hastings of high crimes and misdemeanors. I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain in Parliament assembled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed. I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain, whose national character he has dishonored. I impeach him in the name of the people of India, whose laws, rights, and liberties he has subverted, whose property he has destroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate. I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of justice which he has violated. I impeach him in the name of human nature itself, which he has cruelly outraged, injured, and opprest, in both sexes, in every age, rank, situation, and condition in life. "The Impeachment of Warren Hastings." EDMUND BURKE. 2. Upon the principle on which the attorney-general prays sentence upon my client-God have mercy upon us! Instead of standing before Him in judgment with the hopes and consolations of Christians, we must call upon the mountains to cover us; for which of us can present, for omniscient examination, a pure, unspotted, and faultless course? But I humbly expect that the benevolent Author of our being will judge us as I have been pointing out for your example. Holding up the great volume of our lives in His hands, and regarding the general scope of them-if He discovers benevolence, charity and good will to man beating in the heart, where He alone can look; if He finds that our conduct, tho often forced out of the path by our infirmities, has been in general well-directed, His all-searching eye will assuredly never pursue us into those little corners of our lives, much less will His justice select them for punishment without the general context of our existence, by which faults may be sometimes found to have grown out of virtues, and very many of our heaviest offenses to have been grafted by human imperfection upon the best and kindest of our affections. No, gentlemen, believe me, this is not the course of divine justice, or there is no truth in the gospels of heaven. If the general tenor of a man's conduct be such as I have represented it, he may walk through the shadow of death, with all his faults about him, with as much cheerfulness as in the common paths of life; because he knows that, instead of a stern accuser to expose before the Author of his nature those frail passages which, like the scored matter in the book before you, checker the volume of the brightest and best-spent life, His mercy will obscure them from the eye of His purity, and our repentance will blot them out forever. "The Freedom of the Press." LORD ERSKINE. 3. When Freedom from her mountain height She tore the azure robe of night, She mingled with its gorgeous 'dyes |