establishments like those which have failed along a coast of a thousand miles, cannot be taken as the model of others with any rational hope of success; and we say, that by much the wiser plan would be to abandon the whole of the existing settlements at the same time with the project of new

ones.

We

But it is with other feelings that we look to our actual progress in the south. There we have planted our foot, never to be retracted, and we exult in this, not for its aggrandizement of the empire; not for its addition to our wealth, nor its opening to our population; but for its inevitable and incalculable uses to Africa itself. are strongly inclined to believe, that for this especial purpose this vast and magnificent portion of the earth has been given to the trusteeship of England. The Dutch possessed the Cape for a hundred years, and yet in that time never advanced beyond a few miles from the shore. Our settle ments now extend over a space as large as England, with every variety of soil, every species of fertility, the serenest sky, and some of the noblest and loveliest landscapes in the world. And this mighty settlement is spreading still. The land before is in its virgin state, its fertility unexhausted, its mineral wealth unwasted, and its boundaries only the equator and the

ocean.

We are fully aware that the system is not perfect yet, that the natives continue to plunder cattle from the border, and that the English complain, according to the habits of man, of the want of those comforts which even at home they found beyond their reach. But these are only whispers in the general and regular cheer of public prosperity. The Colonists are increasing in number, wealth, and activity. The mail-coach is running, the steam-boat is sweeping along, the gaslight is blazing, and the press is animating, informing, and exciting, where but twenty years ago there was nothing but savage nature or more savage humankind-the desert and the antelope; the swamp and the Hottentot. As the settlements advance

towards the east and north, they will find a still richer country and a bolder shore, an ocean bordered with harbours and a soil of tropical luxuriance. All this increase may be the work of time, but time will produce its work. Still, in our view, the noblest trophy of all, will be its effect on the whole barbaric region. Every part of those great, neglected, or fallen countries of the east and south, seems to be preparing for some illustrious change. The present commotions in Turkey, Syria, and Egypt, have been so little at the disposal of merely human impulses, that we may not unjustly attribute them to something higher. The sudden and general contact into which Mahometanism throughout all its kingdoms has been brought with the Christian nations, is at least an extraordinary circumstance, and one peculiar to our time. The Turk, the Arab, the Egyptian, the Algerine, in the north; the tribes of the south, the Circassian, the Persian, the Affghan, and the Tartar, have all been forced by unexpected events into either collision or confederacy with the European. And yet though war in some instances has been the instrument-and perhaps the contact could have been effected by nothing less-it is remarkable that perhaps in no period of the world has that fiery storm been so much restrained in its devastation, the thunderbolt so "checked in mid volley," the lesson given with so little penalty to mankind. But, to the British settlements in South Africa, we look for the most perfect, because the most regular, conversion of the barbarian to civilization. There the grand experiment of British laws is going on among a British people; our language, literature, and principles will be exhibited there, undebased by the pursuit of pecuniary gain, unalloyed by the habits of rude and low adventurers. The barbarian will see our tribunals in their purity, our manners in their gracefulness, our government undegraded by the sordidness of irresponsible authority, and our religion in the form of the noblest and purest church that has ever thrown light upon mankind.

VOL. XLIX. NO. CCCIII.

H

MUCH misconception prevails on the subject of ancient oratory. When the eloquence of Greece and Rome is the theme, two great names arise out of the darkness of ages, as embodying to our conceptions all that is excellent in that glorious art. We are in the habit of looking back to Demosthenes and Cicero as those who have "sounded all the depths and shoals of honour" in the difficult achievement of carrying men captive by the power of language; and as models for the young aspirant who aims at victory in intellectual debate, we are apt to think that these two stand not only prominent but alone. Yet we doubt not that the greater number of those who talk most familiarly of these illustrious dead, know little of their peculiar characteristics, and, deceived by the common verdict of mankind in their favour, fancy that in their speeches will be found all that the highest triumphs of oratory can accomplish; and that, therefore, to imitate them is to ensure success. Ignorance is ever fond of generalizing, and cannot use the faculty of discrimination. Hence it is that we find extravagant praise or censure issuing from the lips of those who have but a superficial knowledge of the subject on which they speak. Like men of imperfect vision-who are mistaken in their estimate of objects, because they cannot distinguish their shades of colour or differences of form, and have only a confused notion of something graceful or beautiful or sublime before them the sciolists of literature are unable to separate the good from the bad-to sift the chaff from the wheat-in the writers whose merits they undertake to appreciate. Hence it is that we always find popular idols held up to our admiration as beings of faultless and superhuman excellence.

The

vulgar cannot bear to see calm judgment preparing her weights and scales, and are indignant to think that what is so beautiful should be submitted to the knife of the critical anatomist. As a proof of this, we may instance the common opinions as to the merits of some of the greatest writers of former times. Those who are least

intimately versed in their productions, having been accustomed from their youth upwards to hear their names quoted with reverence, and their sentiments cited with applause, regard them at last with so superstitious a feeling as to palliate their most obvious imperfections, or perhaps deny the existence of any imperfections at all. It was much in this spirit that so many of the ancients looked upon the Iliad and Odyssey not only as absolutely free from faults, but, devoutly believing that the Father of epic poetry must have had an intellect of gigantic dimensions, regarded his poems as a sort of repository and encyclopædia of all knowledge. So with respect to our own Shakspearehow difficult it is to convince many of the possibility of inconsistency and false taste in any of the plays of that mighty master!-how impossible to make them feel the force of the very just and sober judgment of Dr Johnson, that "Shakspeare with his excellences has likewise faults, and faults sufficient to obscure and overwhelm any other merit!"

In the same manner, men are led away when they talk of the ancient orators. Without giving themselves the trouble to analyse their speeches, and discover the distinctive features which secured for each a reputation for a particular excellence, as well as note the absence of many of the requisites for a composition at all approaching to perfection, they think and speak of them as masterpieces which contain all that eloquence can supply for the attainment of her high and noble ends. We are persuaded that comparatively few know wherein consists the great excellence of Demosthenes as an orator. But, before we proceed, it will be better to premise a few remarks:

There are two kinds of oratory. The one local-passionate and transitory, admirably adapted for the attainment of a particular end in view, by working upon the feelings and persuading the will of the multitude

thoroughly objective and unideal in its character, and as intended for the purposes of the moment, making use

of such arguments as are popular and easily apprehended, though sophistical and illogical. The other philosophical, calm, and permanent-comprehensive in its views, laboured in its (demonstrations, and imaginative in its character-influencing the will through the understanding, rather than the understanding through the will, and elucidating principles rather than occupying itself with results.

It is easy to see that the former is the kind best adapted for securing the purpose of the hour, and producing a sensible and immediate effect. In every popular auditory the majority consists of men who possess that excitable state of feeling which is too impatient to wait for the slow process of ratiocination, and eagerly seizes upon topics which appeal to the passions rather than the judgment. This is a truth of which all demagogues know well how to appreciate the importance.

In them, indeed, public speaking too often assumes its most degraded form. Destitute of the higher qualities of mind, confused in their ideas by the mists of prejudice and ignorance, and incompetent or unwilling to follow out, in reasoning, their principles to their legitimate applications, they appear upon the stage of life as panders to the follies, the vices, and the crimes which too often disgrace the acts of an irrational multitude. But we would by no means be understood to contend, that the first of the two kinds into which we have divided oratory is solely applied, or applicable, to a bad purpose. It is a weapon for good as well as for evil; and when used by men who are wise enough to appreciate, and honest enough to admit, the evils of popular licentiousness, may become an instrument in their hands of beneficial and effective power.

Now we maintain that the eloquence of Demosthenes falls under our first division, and is strongly marked by its characteristic features. The word which Longinus uses to describe his idea of its nature, is one of the happiest that could be selected. He talks of the duverns of Demosthenes-a Greek word for which "energetic force" or "nervousness" seems to be the most appropriate translation. In examining the torrent eloquence of this great orator, we are struck with the

almost total absence of any thing like philosophical or general reflection. Few sentences occur which remain to mankind as a xтu s at, applicable at all times, and in all political societies, because embodying principles of abstract truth. Hence it is that of his speeches which have come down to us, few contain maxims of political wisdom that can be disjoined from the peculiar occasions, and special emergencies which he was endeavouring to meet. Principles of government are not there propounded and discussed. Springs of action are not assigned and traced to their consequences-remote effects are not deduced from certain though unapparent causes. Let it not be thought that we are insensible to the merits of Demosthenes as an orator-we are only anxious that those merits should be distinctly understood, and not confounded with others which, for his purpose, he could well afford to do without. No one can read a page of that fiery eloquence without feeling his spirit burn within him, and confessing how resistless must have been its force when rolling like thunder over the heads of the Athenian multitude. Every chord is touchedevery passion played upon-every sympathy awakened-quick, startling, and abrupt, he appeals to every consideration which could move the most easily excited populace in Greece. If he has to crush an opponent, he deals blow after blow with terrific force, and language seems to fail under the withering power of his indignant elo. quence. If he wishes to animate the sinking spirit of his countrymen, he pours around them the flood of their ancient glory, and swears by the souls of those who fell at Marathon, that victory shall be theirs. Impatient of detail, and unwilling to entangle himself and his audience with the intricacies of circumstantial facts, he launches forth the arrows of invective, and by a sarcasm and a sneer, breathes out the intensity of contempt which he feels, or affects to feel, for the conduct he is holding up to reprobation. Another great feature of his oratory is, the irresistible conviction it leaves upon the mind, of sincerity in the speaker. It is impossible to believe that he is not thoroughly in earnest, and this is one of the most essential requisites in an orator who wishes to

persuade. He fully realizes the truth of the precept given by Horace :

"Si vis me flere, dolendum est Primum ipsi tibi."

But our intention at present is not to analyse the eloquence of Demosthenes so much, as to use it as an illustration of the first of the two kinds into which we have divided oratory.

As the best example of the second, we would instance Burke. Endowed with a mind which could grasp the universe, and revelling in the luxuriance of a prodigal imagination, he stood upon an intellectual eminence from which he was enabled to throw his clear-sighted vision over all the varieties of human institutions-on every subject he sought to enucleate principles, and then with unerring sagacity point out the progress of their development. Too proud in the

consciousness of truth to resort to sophistry, and too confident in his own boundless resources to stoop to the petty tricks of inferior minds, (except indeed in one memorable instance, the dagger-scene, where being inconsistent with himself, he signally failed,) he presented for the acceptance of his audience grand and sweeping maxims of political wisdom, the truth of which he so powerfully demonstrated as to make it matter of wonder how any could remain unconvinced and unpersuaded. Sometimes, indeed, the eagle wings of his imagination carried him too far; but still his flight was ever towards the sun. His speeches embrace not only the practice but the science of governments; and now that the occasions that called them forth have ceased to exist, and the tumults and passions in the midst of which they were uttered have died away, they remain as manuals for the statesman, and treasures for the philosopher. Like Cassandra of old, he was fated to be disbelieved by the party whom he stretched forth his arm to save from the abysmal depths of revolutionary fury; and yet his warnings were as oracular as those of the Phrygian prophetess. For him, coming events did indeed cast their shadows before, and he knew well how to predict what those events were which would assuredly follow because he reasoned from cause to effect, in the spirit of true philosophic induction; and drew, from the depths of human nature itself, the

principles which guided him to his conclusions.

They

We have thus far spoken of Burke, because we believe him to be the most perfect example of the philosophical orator. There is, if we may so express it, a vitality in his speeches which renders them as enduring as the language in which they are expressed. are, to a great extent, condensations of political experience, embodying views of society, which it is of the last importance for the practical legislator to study and understand. Amongst the ancients, few of those who studied speaking as an art, carried the spirit of philosophy to the bema or the ros trum. Perhaps amongst the professed public speeches which time has spared us as the compositions of the rhetors of antiquity, those of such men as Isocrates and Lysias, who were paid to write them for the use of others, approach most nearly to the particular kind of eloquence which we have last discussed.

But there is another class of speeches totally different, in their nature, from these hired labours of the advocate, on which we think it may be useful to be somewhat more copious in our remarks. These are the specimens of oratory which we find interspersed in the histories written by the ancients, and our present intention is to devote ourselves principally to those which occur in the history of Thucydides. Lord Chatham is said to have recommended this author and Demosthenes as those whom the youthful orator should study, in preference to all others, if he sought to arrive at excellence in his art. Demosthenes himself had anticipated this opinion with regard to Thucydides; and it is a wellattested fact, that he transcribed the work of that historian eight times with his own hand. We do not hesitate to say, that we hardly know where we could find a more useful exercise of mind, than in an attentive perusal and intelligent examination of the speeches attributed, in the history of the Peloponnesian war, to different soldiers, orators, and statesmen. As to how far they were the actually delivered sentiments, the ipsissima verba of the different speakers, Thucydides himself, informs us that his intention was not to aim at verbal accuracy, or even general sameness of expression; but,

to translate his own words,* "with regard to strict accuracy in reporting what was said, it was difficult both for me to remember what I have myself heard, and for those who from various quarters brought me information. But I have attributed speeches according as it appeared to me likely that the speakers would have delivered them on emergencies as they arose, keeping as closely as possible to the spirit and tenor of those which were actually delivered." This, then, is the nature of the speeches in Thucydides. They are orations adapted by the historian to the occasions on which he introduces them. At the same time, they have a substratum of fidelity, and represent with tolerable exactness the views and arguments of those into whose mouths they are put. But, without the ingenuous confession of the writer, it would have been easy to decide that they were not the offspring of particular emergencies, and addressed in the shape in which we read them to the rude soldiery or tumultuous ecclesia. The speeches which occur in the History of Livy are declamatory and popular enough to have been really uttered at the time, and by the persons there represented; but several circumstances concur to make us abandon such a supposition. Thanks to the deep research and far-sighted sagacity of Niebuhr, we now know how much of the stately fabric of Roman history, as it grows up in the immortal work of Livy, is the creature of his imagination-shaping, combining, and modifying the scanty materials which early antiquity supplied, and in the true spirit of Roman patriotism making every incident subservient to the great object of his idolatry, an increase of the greatness of the Eternal City. And when such is the case with important facts, can we doubt that his own exuberant genius framed for his own purposes such speeches as best suited the character and pretensions of his work? Besides, the utter impossibility of his having any access

to records of what was publicly spoken in the earlier periods of the Republic, (for in those days there were no shorthand writers at Rome,) proves that by far the greater number are pure fictions; and that of the rest, the meagre and scanty skeletons of tradition have been clothed with flesh and sinews by the creative intellect of the historian. Their origin is betrayed in the praise of Rome, and every thing that is Ro man; and the writer, in his eagerness to eulogize his country, too often forgets the dramatic propriety which requires the speeches to be consistent with the character and situation of the speakers.

Of a very different stamp are those which we meet with in the pages of Thucydides. So little was he carried away with a spirit of undue partiality for Athens and her institutions, that Dionysius of Halicarnassus, in his elaborate parallel between that historian and Herodotus, accuses him of a spiteful malignity towards his native city, as though he took a morbid pleasure in narrating the defeats and losses which the Athenians sustained, in revenge for their ungenerous treatment of himself by condemning him to exile-a sentence so common against the most illustrious citizens, that Cicero speaks of it as "id quod optimo cuique Athenis accidere solitum est."t This charge of unfair resentment cherished in the breast of Thucydides against his countrymen is utterly without foundation; but truth may be a libel, and too often in the history of the Grecian states does the faithful recorder of events appear as a calumniator. Thucydides lived in one of the most remarkable periods of Grecian history, and he has left us an imperishable record of the views, objects, failures, and successes of the various states then engaged in the longest and fiercest struggle that had yet convulsed his native country. In his narration of events he strictly confines himself to the province of a relater. He seldom adds any comments of his

ἕκαστοι περι

↑ De Oratore, ii. 13.