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kind for which we are indebted to nature LECT. merely. Nature has, indeed, conferred upon fome a very favourable diftinction in this respect, beyond others. But in thefe, as in

most other talents fhe bestows, fhe has left much to be wrought out by every man's own industry. So confpicuous have been the effects of study and improvement in every part of eloquence; fuch remarkable examples have appeared of perfons furmounting, by their di-. ligence, the difadvantages of the most untoward nature, that among the learned it has long been a contested, and remains still an undecided point, whether nature or art confer moft towards excelling in writing and difcourfe.

WITH respect to the manner in which art can most effectually furnish affiftance for fuch a purpose, there may be diverfity of opinions. I by no means pretend to fay that mere rhetorical rules, how juft foever, are fufficient to form an orator. Suppofing natural genius to be favourable, more by a great deal will depend upon private application and study, than upon any system of inftruction that is capable of being publicly communicated. But at the fame time, though rules and instructions cannot do all that is requifite, they may, however, do much that is of real ufe. They cannot, it is true, infpire genius; but they can

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LECT. direct and affift it. They cannot remedy barrenness; but they may correct redundancy. They point out proper models for imitation. They bring into view the chief beauties that ought to be studied, and the principal faults that ought to be avoided; and thereby tend to enlighten tafte, and to lead genius from unnatural deviations, into its proper channel. What would not avail for the production of great excellencies, may at least serve to prevent the commiffion of confiderable errors.

ALL that regards the study of eloquence and compofition, merits the higher attention upon this account, that it is intimately connected with the improvement of our intellectual powers. For I must be allowed to say, that when we are employed, after a proper manner, in the study of compofition, we are cultivating reason itself. True rhetoric and found logic are very nearly allied. The study of arranging and expreffing our thoughts with propriety, teaches to think, as well as to fpeak, accurately. By putting our fentiments into words, we always conceive them more distinctly. Every one who has the flightest acquaintance with compofition knows, that when he expreffes himself ill on any fubject, when his arrangement is loose, and his fentences become feeble, the defects of his ftyle can, almoft on every occafion, be traced

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back to his indiftinct conception of the fub- LECT. ject: fo clofe is the connection between thoughts and the words in which they are clothed.

THE study of compofition, important in itself at all times, has acquired additional importance from the taste and manners of the prefent age. It is an age wherein improvements, in every part of science, have been profecuted with ardour. To all the liberal arts much attention has been paid; and to none more than to the beauty of language, and the grace and elegance of every kind of writing. The public ear is become refined. It will not easily bear what is flovenly and incorrect. Every author muft afpire to fome merit in expreffion, as well as in sentiment, if he would not incur the danger of being neglected and despised.

I WILL not deny that the love of minute elegance, and attention to inferior ornaments of compofition, may at prefent have engroffed too great a degree of the public regard. It is indeed my opinion, that we lean to this extreme; often more careful of polishing style, than of ftoring it with thought. Yet hence arises a new reason for the study of just and proper compofition. If it be requifite not to be deficient in elegance or ornament in times

when

LECT. when they are in fuch high estimation, it is

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ftill more requifite to attain the power of dif tinguishing false ornament from true, in order to prevent our being carried away by that torrent of falfe and frivolous tafte, which never fails, when it is prevalent, to fweep along with it the raw and the ignorant. They who have never studied eloquence in its principles, nor have been trained to attend to the genuine and manly beauties of good writing, are always ready to be caught by the mere glare of language; and when they come to speak in public, or to compofe, have no other ftandard on which to form themselves, except what chances to be fashionable and popular, how corrupted foever, or erroneous, that may be,

BUT as there are many who have no fuch objects as either compofition or public speaking in view, let us next confider what advantages may be derived by them, from fuch studies as form the fubject of these Lectures. To them, rhetoric is not fo much a practical art as a fpeculative fcience; and the fame inftructions which affift others in compofing, will affift them in difcerning, and relifhing, the beauties of compofition. Whatever enables genius to execute well, will enable tafte to criticife juftly.

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WHEN We name criticising, prejudices may LECT perhaps arife, of the fame kind with those which I mentioned before with refpect to rhetoric. As rhetoric has been fometimes thought to fignify nothing more than the fcholaftic study of words and phrafes, and tropes, fo criticifm has been confidered as merely the art of finding faults; as the frigid application of certain technical terms, by means of which perfons are taught to cavil and cenfure in a learned manner. But this is the criticifm of pedants only. True criticifin is a liberal and humane art.

It is the offfpring of good fenfe and refined taste.

It

aims at acquiring a juft difcernment of the real merit of authors. It promotes a lively relish of their beauties, while it preferves us from that blind and implicit veneration which would confound their beauties and faults in our esteem. It teaches us, in a word, to admire and to blame with judgment, and not to follow the crowd blindly.

In an age when works of genius and literature are fo frequently the fubjects of difcourse, when every one erects himself into a judge, and when we can hardly mingle in polite fociety without bearing fome fhare in fuch difcuffions; ftudies of this kind, it is not to be doubted, will appear to derive part of their importance from the ufe to which they

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