mind, a way of thinking and of expressing himself which are peculiar to himself. The questions ought to be clearly stated, and every thing that is said ought to tend to illustrate the subject under discussion. The replies should be prompt and appropriate. Courteousness, simplicity, clearness, and a graceful ease of expression ought to prevail throughout the dialogue, in the same manner as it should do in a conversation actually carried on among well-bred and well-educated persons.

Ex-Plato; Lucian, Dialogues of the Dead; Cicero de Oratore, de Amicitia, de Senectute, de Naturâ Deorum; Fenelon, Dialogues sur l'Eloquence; de Maistre, Soirées of St. Petersburgh, Conversations on Chemistry, etc.

ART. VII.-OF WORKS OF FICTION.

243. Besides the didactic works of which we have spoken, there are others of the same class which borrow the veil of fiction under which they convey instruction. Their aim is to polish and refine the mind, to purify and elevate the heart by presenting a vivid picture of human life and manners.

Ex.-Fables, Allegories, Romances, etc.

244. To inspire the love of virtue and the hatred of vice, to portray the true happiness and solid glory that springs from virtue alone, even when suffering under the most frightful calamities and reverses of fortune; to lay before our eyes the fatal effects of the passions, the misery entailed by crime, and the horror which it inspires, even although elevated to

the highest honours and seated on the very summit of prosperity, such ought to be the true and principal aim of this kind of writing. The amusement and recreation of the reader is only made use of by the writer as a lure to receive instruction, to improve his mind, and to reform his morals.

245. Unfortunately the greater part of writers of romance have lost sight of these principles, and write only to gratify a perverted taste; and, even among those who have kept them in view, too many, carried away by their desire to please, and more, seduced by their imagination, have often failed in accomplishing the legitimate object of this kind of writing. They pretend to correct the morals of their readers by presenting them with the disorders produced by unbridled passion, whilst they seem to be ignorant that the nearer their pictures approach to truth and nature, the more likely they are to defile the imagination and to seduce and inflame the heart. Hence we may truly say of romances, with St. Francis of Sales, that they are like mushrooms: the best of them are worth nothing. Besides, experience proves that the reading of these productions has no other tendency than that of dissipating the mind, of vitiating the taste, of producing a disrelish for all works of grave import, of rendering every serious occupation painfully irksome, and hence of encouraging idleness, the source of every vice.

246. Fictitious works all belong more or less to one or the other of three kinds of writing, the didactic, historical, and poetical, and according as they

approach the one or the other of them they follow the rules of it. Thus certain philosophical works may specially be referred to the didactic class, such as The Count of Valmont, by Gerard; The Triumph of the Gospel, by Olavidez, etc.

To the historical class may be referred historical romances, adventures, voyages, travels, etc., which are invented to please the imagination. Such are The Travels of Anacharsis, by Barthelemi; Robinson Crusoe, by De Foe; the Waverley Novels, by Sir Walter Scott, etc.

And to the poetical class may be referred those works which properly deserve the name of Romances, such as Fables, Allegories, etc. Such also are Don Quixote, by Cervantes; Il Orlando Furioso, by Ariosto; Télémaque, by Fenelon, etc.

PART IV.

OF ORATORICAL COMPOSITION.

247. An oration or speech is a discourse delivered to a public audience. Its object is to convince those to whom it is addressed of something being good, just, true, or useful, which forms the subject of the discourse, and to persuade them to pursue a corresponding course of conduct.

248. It differs from the kinds of composition hitherto treated of, it being designed to be spoken

before an audience, and hence it admits all the graces of elocution in the delivery, accompanied by a becoming energy and appropriateness of gesture, which the orator judges suitable to enforce what he has to say upon the attention of his hearers.

CHAPTER I.

Of the different kinds of Public Speaking.

249. The different kinds of public speaking may be arranged under three grand classes, called by the Rhetoricians genera causarum; the DEMONSTRATIVE, the DELIBERATIVE, and the JUDICIAL.

250. The scope and tendency of the demonstrative species of public speaking is to praise or blame.

To this class belong panegyrics, satires, eulogiums, funeral orations, academic discourses, inaugural harangues, etc.

251. Discourses of this nature may be conducted in two ways; 1. When, without any regard to the order of time, the whole subject is reduced to two or three heads; as, for example, in discoursing on the praises of the elder Cato, the subject may be reduced to these three points;-that he was an excellent senator, an excellent orator, and an excellent general. This mode is principally adopted in funeral orations and in panegyrics, etc.

2. When we observe the order of time and history; as, for example, the time before the death of him we praise,-the time in which he lived, the time after his death. For instance, in panegyrizing

Washington, we might consider the state of America before the time in which he lived; its state during his life; and its condition after his death.-Isocrates and Cicero have adopted this method, and all the ancients seem to give it the preference. So also has Pliny in his celebrated panegyric on Trajan.

252. The object of the deliberative is to advise or dissuade. This kind of public speaking is employed when men meet together to deliberate on subjects which regard the common weal, the administration of governments, matters of legislation, the declaration of war or the confirming of treaties, etc. To this class belong also the sermons or exhortations which are delivered in our churches, the object of which is to inspire the love of virtue and piety, and to excite in us a hatred of vice and immorality; and to persuade us to follow the one and abandon the other.

253. The aim of the judiciary kind of public speaking is to accuse or to condemn. It belongs especially to the bar, and to our courts of law. It treats of what is right or wrong, just or unjust, and has for its object the investigation of all matters of fact or of right that come before the judicial tribunal.

The business of the judicial orator is to support the authority of the laws, and to enforce their observance; to make them prevail over fraud and injustice, and to show wherein the common interest suffers or humanity is outraged in the action for which he demands justice. His aim is to convince