IT SECTION XIV. OF CICERO. T would be a vain attempt to excuse the distance so perceptible, between the Advocates of the French Bar, and the Orators of the Roman Senate, by suggesting the different interests which were entrusted to them. Cicero, I know, has sometimes had the glory of being styled "the Defender of the Republic;" but did he not often undertake causes of less importance? and are not most of his Orations devoted to the affairs of his fellow-citizens? This great man wanted not an extraordinary Auditory in order to display all the riches of his genius. He was more eloquent when he pleaded before the Roman people, than when he spoke in the presence of Cæsar. His Oration for Ligarius is written in a charming style; but it is not considered as the most eloquent of his works. Cicero requests the life The English Bar has long continued to be a school for Eloquence. There, some of our greatest Statesmen and Parliamentary Orators have been formed for eminence.While the names of Harcourt, Hardwicke, Blackstone, and others, are left on record, and such men who still exist are mentioned, as Mansfield, Thurlow, Loughborough, Pitt, Erskine, and others, the reputation of the English Bar is secured, and the noblest patterns are presented for the imitation and laudable emulation of others of the same learned body who are rising into public notice and estimation. of Ligarius, of an usurper, as if he were implorring the clemency of a lawful sovereign. The commendations which, he lavishes on Cæsar in the ingenious conclusion of his speech, seem to justify the reproaches which he received from the stoic Brutus, after the death of the Dictator, in that famous letter where Brutus accuses him of flattering Octavius, and which is justly ranked amongst the chief productions of antiquity. It is in his orations against Verres: against Cataline; in his second Philippic; in the conclusions of all his speeches; it is in his treatises of "the Orator," and "of illustrious Orators," that we find the Eloquence of Cicero. All his writings ought to be the manual of Christian Orators. The rapidity with which he composed his immortal discourses, notwithstanding the multiplicity and importance of the concerns which oppressed him, did not prevent him from bestowing on his style a perfection so uncommon, that it is as easy to understand his Orations, as it is difficult, and perhaps even impossible to translate them well. His example evidently proves that our Advocates should not justify their inattention to Elocution by the inevitable avocations of their profession. It was during a very short interval, and amidst the agitation of a civil war, that Cicero published his famous Orations against Marc Antony, which he called his Philippics. 7 We are at a loss to conceive how he could retain sufficient freedom of mind, after the death of Cæsar, and in the sixty-fourth and last year of his life, to compose those fourteen discourses with which he finished his rhetorical career...... Brutus, whose taste was as severe as were his morals, openly disapproved, in the writings of the Roman Orator, of this inexhaustible exuberance, this copiousness, always elegant and harmonious, which sometimes, perhaps, enervated his vigour; and he told Cicero himself that his Eloquence wanted reins. Posterity hath thought with Brutus*. * Of CICERO, Apb. FENELON makes the following remarks in his Dialogues: he observes that Tully said there were very few complete Orators who knew how to seize ⚫ and captivate the heart, and he owns that even this Orator was sometimes deficient in this respect, as the rhetorical flowers with which he embellished his harangues were more calculated to amuse the fancy than to touch the heart: he observes farther, that we should distinguish between those orations which Tully composed in his youth, (and which have frequently this defect, while they discover much of his moving and persuading art) and those harangues which he made in his more advanced age, for the necessities of the republic. In these, he displays the utmost efforts of his eloquence. He is artless and vehement. With a negligent air he delivers the most natural and affecting It is not, surely, to be ascribed to any principle of taste, but to the fear of displeasing Augustus, who had shamefully sacrificed his benefactor Cicero, that Virgil and Horace were cowardly enough never to make mention in their poetry of this Orator, as celebrated in the present day as is Rome itself. Virgil, especially, ought not to have forgotten him when celebrating the privi leges of the Roman, people. But the assassin of sentiments, and says every thing that can move and animate the passions.-FENELON'S Dialogue ii. p. 52, 54. CICERO, as an orator, is thus characterized by Dr. BLAIR? In all his orations there is high art. He begins generally 'with a regular exordium; and with much preparation and insinuation prepossesses the hearers, and studies to gain their affections. His method is clear, and his arguments are arranged with great propriety. His method is indeed more clear than that of Demosthenes, and this is one advantage which he has over him: we find every thing in its proper place. He never attempts to move till he has endeavoured to convince; and in moving, especially the ́ softer passions, he is very successful. No man that ever < wrote, knew the power and force of words better than Cicero. He rolls them along with the greatest beauty and pomp; and, in the structure of his sentences, is curious ⚫ and exact to the highest degree. He is always full and • flowing, never abrupt. He is a great amplifier of every subject; magnificent, and in his sentiments highly moral. Though his manner is, on the whole, diffuse, yet it is often ⚫ happily varied, and suited to the subject. When a great public object roused his mind, and demanded indignation ́ and force, he departs considerably from that loose and ' declamatory manner to which he inclines at other times, * and becomes exceedingly cogent and vehement.—This Cicero was upon the throne: and the courtly poet did not scruple to make a sacrifice to Augustus of one of the most glorious monuments of his country, in yielding the palm of Eloquence to the Orators of Greece, in preference to the consul of Rome. Orabunt (alii) melius causas, &c*. great Orator, however, is not without his defects. In most of his orations there is too much art, even carried to the length of ostentation. He seems often to aim at obtaining admiration, rather than at operating conviction. Hence, on some occasions, he is shewy rather than solid; and 'diffuse, where he ought to have been pressing. His sen*tences are, at all times, round and sonorous; they cannot be accused of monotony, for they possess variety of ca⚫dence; but from too great a study of magnificence, he is sometimes deficient in strength. Though the services which he had performed to his country were very consi⚫derable, yet he is too much his own panegyrist. Ancient • manners, which imposed fewer restraints on the side of decorum, may, in some degree, excuse, but cannot entirely 'justify his vanity."-BLAIR's Lectures, vol. ii. p. 28. * The passage referred to by our Author, is to be found in Æneid, lib. vii 1. 849, and stands thus in connection : Excudent alii spirantia mollius æra : Credo equidem, vivos ducent de marmore vultus; Tu regere imperio populos. Romane, momento, IN ENGLISH. 'Let others better mould the running mass < Plead better at the Bar, &c. I |