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tion; descend the stairs of humility. So shall you come to the door of deliverance from the prison of iniquity, and escape from the clutches of that old executioner the devil, who goeth," etc., etc.*

The child when he first learns to speak will say anything, thinking he accomplishes much in continuing to talk. So with the public speaker when he first commences, and so with the early efforts of the young writer. He knows nothing of symbolic beauty or rhetorical proportion; he does not suspect that there are gaudy images and encumbering ornaments. When he first rises above the level of plain prose, he never knows when to descend to the earth; and instead of finding an elevation whence he can show his readers a wider landscape and new objects, he thinks he does enough by showing himself.

Prodigality of metaphors, like multitudes of superlatives, confound meaning. "It is an idle fancy of some," says Felton, "to run out perpetually upon similitudes, confounding their subject by the multitude of likenesses, and making it like so many things that it is like nothing at all."

The general rule to be observed is obvious. When we intend to elevate a subject, we must choose metaphors which are lofty or sublime. If our purpose is to degrade, the similes which sink the subject to contempt or ridicule are proper for employment. These are the two poles of tendency. A member of the Indiana Legislature has said: "Mr. Speaker-The wolf is the most ferocious animal that prowls in our western prairies, or runs at large in the forests of Indiana. He creeps from his lurking-place at the hour of mid

* Volume of Trials of Criminals, printed at Leeds, 1809, for J. Davies, by Edward Baines.

night when all nature is locked in the silent embraces of Morpheus, and ere the portals of the east are unbarred, or bright Phoebus rises in all his golden majesty, whole litters of pigs are destroyed." Wanting sustainment, these figures end in the ridiculous.*

CHAPTER XII.

PLEASANTRY.

I OFFER only a few suggestions on this subject. The happiest vein of pleasantry is needed to pen a suitable essay upon it. If men of wit and humor would analyze the sources of their inspirations, pleasantry might be taught as an art. And why not? Recreation is an element of health, a component of human nature, the third estate of life. It ought to have its professors and cultivators.

A comedian went to America and remained there two years, leaving his wife dependent on her relatives. Mrs. Ftt, expatiating in the greenroom on the cruelty of such conduct, the comedian found a warm advocate in a well-known dramatist. "I have heard," says the latter, "that he is the kindest of men, and I know that he writes to his wife every packet." "Yes, he writes," replied Mrs. F., "a parcel of flummery about the agony of absence, but he has never remitted her a shilling. Do you call that kindness ?" "Decidedly," replied the author, "unremitting kindness." Here the wit turns upon words. Goodrich relates a converse instance: "I once

*See Note G, page 173.

heard of a boy who, being rebuked by a clergyman for neglecting to go to church, replied that he would go if he could be permitted to change his seat. But

why do you wish to change your seat?' said the minister. You see,' said the boy, 'I sit over the opposite side of the meeting-house, and between me and you there's Judy Vicars and Mary Staples, and half a dozen other women, with their mouths wide open, and they get all the best of the sermon, and when it comes to me it's pretty poor stuff.""

"Wit is the philosopher's quality, humor the poet's; the nature of wit relates to things; humor to persons. Wit utters brilliant truths, humor delicate deductions from the knowledge of individual character. Rochefoucault is witty, the Vicar of Wakefield the model of humor."*

English humor is frank, hearty, and unaffected. Irish light as mercury. It sets propriety at defiance. It is extravagant. Scotch humor is sly, grave, and caustic. Surely the analysis of Pleasantry is possible, and its cultivation practicable.

Many persons never think of pleasantry as an agent of relief in exposition, and of effect in many departments of enforcement. Some worry jokes to death. A man who runs after witticisms is in danger of making himself a buffoon. Some speakers are so beset with the love of this display that they virtually announce to their audiences that the smallest laugh would be thankfully received. A degree of wit pertains to all topics. That which lies in our way is that which is relevant.

*Bulwer's Student.

See Note H, page 175.

CHAPTER XIII.

ENERGY.

ENERGY is the soul of oratory, and energy depends on health. Dr. Samuel Johnson, with that strong sense for which he was distinguished, once said, we can be useful no longer than we are well. Of the rhetorician it may as safely be said that he is effective no longer than he is well. A variety of arts may be pursued in indifferent health; feebleness only prolongs execution; in rhetoric it mars the whole work. Even in the matter of efficient thinking health is worth attention. The senses being the great inlets of knowledge, it is necessary that they be kept in health. It will be idle to conceal from ourselves that the physical is the father of the moral man. depend upon temperaments."*

"Morals

The patience necessary for investigation cannot be preserved with impaired nerves. Long-continued wakefulness is capable of changing the temper and mental disposition of the most mild and gentle, of effecting a complete alteration of their features, and at length of occasioning the most singular whims, the strangest deviations in the power of imagination, and in the end absolute insanity.

It may not be necessary, because Carneades took copious doses of hellebore as a preparative to refuting the dogmas of the Stoics, or because Dryden, when he had a grand design, took physic and parted with blood, that the searcher after truth should commence *Edward Johnson-Life, Health, and Disease.

with an aperient; yet it will be useful that some attention be paid to the physiology of the

-intellect, whose use

Depends so much upon the gastric juice.

The public will remember the case of an ex-occupant of the woolsack who, after "six days' indisposition," attempted the annihilation of Lord Aberdeen on account of his Scotch Church Bill. The "Times," with some satire, expressed in reference to it much. truth. "We recognize the deep interest of the public in Lord B.'s medicine chest. We pray him to take care of himself for all our sakes. We entirely enter into the feelings of a man who, after suffering six days under dyspepsia, bile, or otherwise, rushes into the House of Lords to avenge upon some minister the disarrangement of his system. The castigation of a secretary of state is an interesting incident in his disorder, a gratifying palliative of his discomfort, but it is, after all, in Epsom salts or quinine that the true and only effectual remedy must be found."*

Perhaps the lowest quality of the art of oratory, but one on many occasions of the first importance, is a certain robust and radiant physical health; great volumes of animal heat. In the cold thinness of a morning audience, mere energy and mellowness is inestimable; wisdom and learning would be harsh and unwelcome compared with a substantial man, who is quite a house-warming. I do not rate this animal life very high; yet, as we must be fed and warmed before we can do any work well, so is this necessary. It often happens that you cannot come into collision with opinion without coming into col*"Times," June 29, 1843.

+ Emerson.

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