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mixed with instruction, it was confined to the CHAP. Olympic and other public solemnities, to which nothing parallel now exists in the world. But it should be remembered that, before the invention of printing, such rehearsals were essential to the wide and speedy diffusion of works courting celebrity. Herodotus thus read his account of the Persian expedition, at the Olympic games, where Thucydides, then in early youth, wept mingled tears of wonder and emulation. And "with what other voice, but that of demonstrative eloquence, is history, as contra-distinguished from the compilement of annals; history, the witness of time, the light of truth, the guide of life', to be delivered down from age to age, and transmitted with unimpaired effect, to the latest posterity?" Are men deserving of remembrance, that have not been distinguished by energy either in good or in evil? Can actions, entitled neither to praise nor to blame, be held worthy of commemoration? The document is taken from history, if stripped of its moral tendency, if it does not in particular describe generous and noble feelings, and by describing, inspire them. It must be acknowledged, indeed, that, in later times, a cold sceptical philosophy has infected the warmer regions of history: and writers, learned, elegant, and acute, have not exerted their highest powers in holding up good and great men to admiration, or in loading contrary characters with infamy. By a pretended balance of virtues and defects, by refined conjectures, by gratuitous suppositions,

• Historia vero testis temporum, &c. Cicero de Oratore, l. ii. c. 9.

CHAP. and sometimes by penetrating too audaciously

1.

Dependence of oratory on the passions.

into the hidden secrets of the heart, they would have laboured in vain to abolish the unalterable distinctions of things, but they have succeeded, in some degree, in placing historical characters more nearly on the same level. The contrary of this was the aim of an author, than whom none better understood the chief ends and uses of history. The actions of his patriots and heroes will live through all time, and keep alive for ever the flame of glory and of virtue. But the same author is not sparing in severity of censure; for he had observed " that by strong delineations of guilt and of misery, men are as powerfully restrained within the bounds of duty, as by the most engaging pictures of virtue and of happiness."'10

Aristotle does not agitate what should seem to have become already a trite question, whether an orator must of necessity be a good man. But he maintains that he should appear to his hearers both able and willing to serve them, and should give them a favourable impression of himself, by assuming at least the semblance of virtue, and by touching their feelings in the way most favourable to his cause. It becomes necessary, therefore, to enter into an examination of the passions, in which disquisition Aristotle shows Aristotle's the deepest insight into human nature. them. begins, as usual, with definitions, carefully collected from observation; and from them educes the causes, circumstances, and events, in which the various passions originate; the persons most likely to be actuated by them, and also the per

account of

10 Plutarch in Demetrio sub initio.

He

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sons towards whom they are most likely to be CHAP. directed; in other words, the persons who are their most natural objects. Having taken a general view of his subject, he proceeds to examine the passions in detail, whether simple or complex, and as differently modified by age, sex, and the external circumstances of birth, wealth, and power, or the direct contraries of these advantages. From this investigation, equally accurate and ample, sure rules are collected for exciting and managing the passions, and thus rendering them subservient to our purposes.

Such is the material part of the Rhetoric; the formal relates to style and method: it is the counterpart of what the Poetic would have been, had that treatise come down to us entire; and it may be safely left, without any introduction, to the taste of the modern reader. Taken in the whole, the "Rhetoric" is the most complete didactic performance in existence, not excepting the elements of Euclid or the Georgic of Virgil. But in another point of view, in which it has never hitherto been regarded, the same work is entitled to much importance. For many years back, students in antiquity have not been confined to mere philology. They have even extended their views beyond wars, negotiations, and the revolutions of empires. Their thoughts have been more seriously directed to the internal arrangements of free states, to the pursuits and attainments of their citizens; their arts, occupations, and turn of mind; and their domestic manners.

their private lives

Of all nations, the

The "Rhetoric," a picture of the mind ners of the Athenians,

and man

I.

CHAP. Greeks, and of all Greeks the Athenians, have obtained the greatest share of regard, and excited the deepest interest; and this they unquestionably deserved, as being, of all people in the ancient world, those who approached most nearly to the actual state of modern civilization. But it appeared to me, that in the delineation of their character, the learned were too much swayed by unfair testimony; such as the profligate buffoonery of Aristophanes, and the lying whispers of Athenæus: and I presumed to point out a purer source of information in the copious remains of the Greek orators, whose speeches, of unrivalled excellence, were, I thought, too much neglected in the ordinary course of a learned education. Under this impression, nearly half a century ago, I translated the speeches of Lysias and Isocrates, which were accompanied with a discourse on the manners and character of the Greeks, from the conclusion of the Peloponnesian war to the battle of Charonæa. In this discourse, my proofs and illustrations were taken chiefly, or rather wholly, from the Greek orators: and the period prescribed to it comprehended almost the entire lifetime of Aristotle. His treatise on popular eloquence may be considered, therefore, as a new and valuable kind of history; a history, not of battles, sieges, and seditions; not of military movements, or of civil commotions; but a history of opinions, of judgments, and of feelings; forming, as it were, the concentration or essence of all the most noted speeches and pleadings,

I.

either in his own times, or in the age immedi- CHAP. ately preceding them. Under this aspect, an elaborate didactic work assumes a degree of historical importance, scarcely belonging to any other. It is a picture of the mind of the Athenians; a living monument of the habits of thinking, the sentiments, and maxims which prevailed among that most ingenious, and most interesting people.

the ne

With such high recommendations, how does it Causes of happen, we may ask, that the Rhetoric is little glect of read, and less understood? The same question Aristotle's writings. may be asked, with regard to Aristotle's works First, the in general; and a distinct answer can be internal. given, which will include a very curious disquisition, illustrative of the most whimsical aberrations of the human understanding. Various causes have concurred to diminish the popularity of those works, originating sometimes in the very qualities which constitute their principal merit. The causes alluded to may, therefore, be divided into the internal and external: the internal, depending on the style and method of the works themselves; the external, on the singular circumstances and events, which I shall proceed presently to relate. The Stagyrite's style, and still more his method, is totally different from that to which the caprice of fashion, even in writing on philosophy, has given its temporay sanction. This, however, by no means arises from his ignorance of the rules fit to be observed in speaking, or writing, popularly. In all addresses to the multitude, he teaches, that not