have forgotten, and though it does not matter whether he had a name or not, the narrative is made to stand still until they have gone through the tiresome and fruitless task of trying to remember it, in which they never succeed.

A gorgeous instance of method occurs in W. J. Fox's Sermon on Human Brotherhood,* in which polished taste has so adjusted each clause that they reach the climax worthy of that Grecian art which the passage celebrates.

"From the dawn of intellect and freedom Greece has been a watchword on the earth. There rose the social spirit to soften and refine her chosen race, and shelter, as in a nest, her gentleness from the rushing storm of barbarism-there liberty first built her mountain throne, first called the waves her own, and shouted across them a proud defiance to despotism's banded myriads; there the arts and graces danced around humanity, and stored man's home with comforts, and strewed his path with roses, and bound his brows with myrtle, and fashioned for him the breathing statue, and summoned him to temples of snowy marble, and charmed his senses with all forms of eloquence, and threw over his final sleep their vail of loveliness; there sprung poetry, like their own fabled goddess, mature at once from the teeming intellect, gilt with the arts and armor that defy the assaults of time and subdue the heart of man; there matchless orators gave the world a model of perfect eloquence, the soul the instrument on which they played, and every passion of our nature but a tone which the master's touch called forth at will; there lived and taught the philosophers of bower and porch, of pride and *Sermons on Christian Morality.

pleasure, of deep speculation and of useful action, who developed all the acuteness, and refinement, and excursiveness, and energy of mind, and were the glory of their country, when their country was the glory of the earth."

CHAPTER V.

DISCIPLINE.

SINCE custom, says the wise Bacon, is the principal magistrate of a man's life, let him by all means endeavor to obtain good customs. Digressiveness is the natural state of the human faculties, till custom or habit comes in to give them a settled direction. Man is as liable to be influenced by the last impression as by any preceding one; and the liability of man is the characteristic of children. The teacher knows this, for it is only by infinite diversion that children can be instructed for hours together, or governed without coercion. It is the object of discipline to check the tendency to diversion, and give stability to method. A man may be made to perceive method, but not to follow it, without the power of discipline. A child accustomed to it will go to bed in the dark with peace and pleasure, but all the rhetoric in the world would not accomplish the same end without habit. Nothing but habit will give the power of habit.

Mr. John Foster, in his prospectus of his ruled copy-books, remarks that "the grand secret in teaching writing is to bestow much attention upon a little

variety. The necessity of a continued repetition of the same exercise till it can be executed with correctness, cannot be too strongly insisted on. But as this reiteration is tedious for an age so fond of novelty as that of childhood, we should keep as close to the maxim as possible, and by a judicious intermixture of a few slightly differing forms, contrive to fix attention, and to insure repetition. The method of teaching anything to children,' says Locke, 'is by repeated practice, and the same action done over and over again, until they have got the HABIT of doing it well; a method that has so many advantages, whichever way we come to consider it, that I wonder how it could possibly be so much neglected.' Again: Children should never be set to perfect themselves in two parts of an action at the same time.' We have here the highest authority insisting on the very points which we labor to enforce, namely: 1. That it is only by constant reiteration, and persevering, pains-taking efforts, that ease and correctness in penmanship can be attained. 2. That the pupil should not advance too hastily, but proceed by natural gradations, from the simplest to the more difficult combinations." The discipline of penmanship may stand, also, for the discipline of elocution, for men are as children on the verge of a new art.

A speaker, like an actor, is subjected to the criticism of a casual hearing. The auditor who hears you but once will form an opinion of you forever. Against this injustice of judgment there is no protection but in acquiring such a mastery over your powers as to be able always to exert them well-to strike, astonish, or impress, in some respect or other, at every appearance. A man, therefore, who has a reputation

to acquire or preserve will keep silence whenever he is in any danger of speaking indifferently. He will practice so often in private, and train himself so perseveringly, that perfection will become a second nature, and the power of proficiency never desert him. The uninitiated, who think genius is an impulsive effort that costs nothing, little dream with what patience the professional singer or actor observes regular habits and judicious exercise; how they treasure all their strength and power for the hour of appear

ance.

From Demosthenes to Curran, the personnel of orators has illustrated the triumphs of application as much as the triumphs of genius. "One day an acquaintance, in speaking of Curran's eloquence, happened to observe that it must have been born with him. Indeed, my dear sir,' replied Curran, 'it was not; it was born three and twenty years and some months after me; and if you are satisfied to listen to a dull historian, you shall have the history of its nativity. When I was at the Temple a few of us formed a little debating club. Upon the first night of meeting I attended, my foolish heart throbbing with the anticipated honor of being styled "the learned member that opened the debate," or "the very eloquent gentleman who has just sat down," I stood up; the question was the Catholic claims or the slave-trade, I protest I now forget which, but the difference, you know, was never very obvious; my mind was stored with about a folio volume of matter, but I wanted a preface, and for want of a preface the volume was never published. I stood up trembling through every fiber, but remembering that in this I was but imitating Tully, I took courage and had actually proceeded

almost as far as " Mr. Chairman," when to my astonishment and terror I perceived that every eye was turned upon me. There were only six or seven present, and the room could not have contained as many more, yet was it, to my panic-stricken imagination, as if I were the central object in nature, and assembled millions were gazing upon me in breathless expectation. I became dismayed and dumb. My friends cried "Hear him!" but there was nothing to hear. My lips indeed went through the pantomime of articulation, but I was like the unfortunate fiddler at the fair, who, upon coming to strike up the solo that was to ravish every ear, discovered that an enemy had maliciously soaped his bow. So you see, sir, it was not born with me. However, though my friends despaired of me, the cacoethes loquendi was not to be subdued without a struggle. I was for the present silenced, but I still attended our meetings with the most laudable regularity, and even ventured to accompany the others to a more ambitious theater, the club of Temple Bar. One of them was upon his legs-a fellow whom it was difficult to decide whether he was most distinguished for the filth of his person or the flippancy of his tongue-just such another as Harry Flood would have called "the highly gifted gentleman with the dirty cravat and greasy pantaloons." I found this learned. personage in the act of calumniating chronology by the most preposterous anachronisms. He descanted upon Demosthenes, the glory of the Roman forum; spoke of Tully as the famous cotemporary and rival of Cicero, and in the short space of one half hour, transported the straits of Marathon three several times to the plains of Thermopyla. Thinking that I had a right to know something of these matters, I looked