to Jerusalem, it is said, “Paul had determined to sail by Ephesus." This sentence with a moderate stress on Ephesus, implies that the apostle meant to stop there; just as a common phrase, "the ship is going to Holland by Liverpool," implies that she will touch at the latter place.

Now what was the fact in the case of Paul? The historian says, "he hasted to be at Jerusalem, on the day of Pentecost." Therefore he could not afford the time it would require to visit his dear friends, the Ephesian church, and he chose to pursue his voyage without seeing them. But can the words be made to express this sense? Perfectly; and that with only an increase of stress on one particle." Paul had determined to sail by Ephesus."

Another example shows us a succession of small words raised to importance, by becoming peculiarly significant. In Shakspeare's Merchant of Venice, Bassanio had received a ring from his wife, with the strongest protestation that it should never part from his finger; but, in a moment of generous gratitude for the preservation of his friend's life, he forgot this promise, and gave the ring to the officer to whose kind interposition he ascribed that deliverance. With great mortification at the act, he afterwards made the following apology to his wife, an unemphatic pronunciation of which leaves it scarcely intelligible; while distinct emphasis on a few small words gives it precision and vivacity, thus:

the sentence affirm that the man whose ear Peter cut off was kinsman to the high priest, which was not the fact. But a stress upon his, makes this servant, kinsman to another man, who received the wound.

One more example may suffice, on this point. When our Saviour said to Peter;-"Lovest thou me more than these?"-he probably referred to the confident professions of his own attachment to Christ, which this apostle had presumed would remain unshaken, though that of his brethren should fail; but which professions he had wofully violated in the hour of trial. If this is the spirit of the question, it is a tender but severe admonition, which would be expressed by emphasis,thus; “Lovest thou me, more than these?" that is, more than thy brethren love me?

But respectable interpreters have. supposed the question to refer to Peter's affection merely, and to contrast two objects of that affection; and this would change the emphasis thus;-"Lovest thou me more than these?"-that is, more than thou lovest thy brethren ?—pp. 73-75.

On the most important point under Emphasis, the Rev. Professor has been forced to dissent from Walker. Walker lays down the universal proposition, that " Wherever we place emphasis, we suggest the idea of contradistinction;" in other words, that emphasis always implies antithesis. But this is shown to be plainly incorrect. Contrast, being a principal source of emotion, is a very important ground of emphasis, but it is not the sole ground.

There are other sources, besides antithetic relation, from which the mind receives strong and vivid impressions, which it is the office of vocal language to express. Thus exclamation, apostrophe, and bold figures in general, denoting high emotion, demand a coriespondent force in pronunciation; and that too in many cases where the emphatic force laid on a word is absolute, because the thought expressed by that word is forcible of itself, without any aid from contrast. Of this the reader

may be satisfied by noting such examples as these:

Up! comrades,-ùp !-Wo unto you, Pharisees!— Hènce!-home, you idle creatures,Angels and ministers of grace,-defend us. p. 77.

"The

Again, our author dissents from Walker in his theory of emphatic inflection. "The grand distinction," says Walker, "between the two emphatic inflections is ; falling infection affirms something in the emphasis, and denies what is opposed to it in the antithesis ; while the emphasis in the rising inflection, affirms something in the emphasis, without denying what is opposed to it in the antithesis." "The amount of more than twenty pages designed by Walker to illustrate this position," says the Professor "is simply this; When affirmation is opposed to negation, the emphatic word or clause which affirms, has the falling inflection, and that which denies, the rising." This, however, it is remarked, applies only to strong affirmation; in qualified af firmation, the affirmative clause takes the rising slide or circumflex. The general rule is "the falling inflection denotes positive affirmation, or enunciation of thought with energy; the rising either expresses negation, or qualified and conditional affirmation.". '-pp. 80-88.

Emphasis, however, sometimes extends to several words in a sentence so as to constitute an emphatic clause. The want of proper distinctions as to this species of emphasis in the opinion of our author, occasioned the dispute between Garrick and Johnson, respecting the seat of emphasis in the ninth commandment;

"Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour." Garrick laid the stress on shall, to express the authority of the precept: Johnson on not, to express its negative character. But clearly both are wrong, for in neither of these respects is this command to

In the chapter on modulation there are many valuable practical remarks. The term modulation is used to denote "that variety in managing the voice, which appears in the delivery of a good speaker." This subject is discussed under the heads of Faults of Modulation, their Remedies, Pitch of Voice, Quantity, Rhetorical Pause, Compass, Transition, Expression, Representation, and the Reading of Poetry. The faults of modulation are happily and graphically described, and the proper remedies suggested. To mark transition a notation is used, which is novel, but intelligible and of easy application. We believe no other writer has adopted a device of this particular kind except Wright, and his notation is very imperfect. Its utility is obvious to any one who has attempted to teach elocution. The ability to mark a piece with such visible signs as shall direct the pupil in regard to the slides which sense and feeling require, and as to the modulation which nature suggests, must greatly facilitate the study of elocution. The fault of a pupil cannot be remembered by the instructor till his declamation is concluded, or if they are recollected, cannot be so defined by him, as to render them intelligible

With the notation furnished by this book, we see not why all the considerable faults in the management of the voice may not be noted at the instant, and rendered intelligible to the eye of the pupil. Such a contrivance has long been a desideratum, but it is now furnished to a considerable degree by the modern improvement in this highly important science. We admit that it may be abused. The notation may be too frequent, and the stress laid upon it by an instructor may render his pupil a mere automaton. Almost the whole tribe of Walker's followers have erred egregiously in this respect. We have seen some school books issued lately from the American press, to which the remark is applicable. Every line was crowded with signs of the circumflex, and rising and falling slides. We judged that either the editors of the books had misapplied the new system, or that their own voices had an unequalled degree of flexibility. As we found ourselves not gifted with organs of speech to hit these inflections, and as we found our ear revolting when we unfortunately succeeded in expressing them, we concluded to pass them by, as we do the Greek accents, without suffering them to influence our pronunciation.

A few remarks are added to this chapter on reading hymns; and whoever has been tortured by the canting style in which hymns are frequently read from the pulpit, must wish that these remarks were more extended and aimed deeper at the root of the evil. All the faults are not noticed; some which are considerable are passed by in silence. Perhaps the Rev. Professor would have treated this subject more fully, had he not felt that it would be in some measure a departure from the general subject, to discuss particular faults in reading which are common in only one of the learned professions. We feel

anxious to see a juster taste prevail, not only in the delivery of discourses, but in all public reading from the sacred desk. "British writers," says our author, "have constantly complained of the dull, formal manner in which the Liturgy and the sacred Scriptures are read in their churches. And often, in the pulpits of our own country, the reading of the Bible is apparently so destitute, not of feeling and devotion merely, but of all just discrimination, as to remind one of the question put by Philip to the nobleman of Ethiopia; "Understandest thou what thou readest?" Our Psalms and Hymns we would have read with something of the feeling by which they were prompted; and as they are to be sung by the choir, to music of the first masters, we do not wish the preacher to chant them in his own extemporaneous tune, devoid alike of harmony and

sense.

While on the subject of tones, we beg the privilege of mentioning what we have often noticed with regret, relative to the modulation of voice frequently used in religious conversation. Some people, (and their number is not too small for some of our readers to be embraced in it,) however naturally they may speak on all other subjects, as soon as they begin to converse on religion, change their tones, and conduct their whole conversation in the most dull and unwelcome accents. A melancholy,heavy,unelastic, drooping mode of expression is used, as if religion was one of the most ungrateful of all subjects. Tones of gaiety and mirth are not compatible with a subject so serious, but certainly tones and emphasis of cheerfulness and kindness are most agreeable to the spirit of our religion. If we do not err, the hum-drum manner in which some Christians converse on this most delightful of all subjects, is one principal cause of the aversion which

most young people feel to religious conversation and society.

Dr. P.'s remarks on action, though not all new, are evidently the results, pretty extensively, of his own observation. That they may not be useless is our earnest wish, for though appropriate action is far less important than good thought and correct modulation and emphasis, it is not unimportant. "The tap of Cæsar's finger was enough to awe a senate." p. 116.

When we see a minister lying on his cushion to read his sermon, we feel an irresistible propensity to sleep. When we see one sweeping a circuit around him with his arms, as if they were the sails of a windmill, we are for a season too much attracted by the unnatural compass of the gesture, to regard the thought. Cressollius, a Jesuit, who wrote a valuable treatise on Elocution in Latin, thus describes a speaker whom he heard in his day." When he turned himself to the left, he spake a few words accompanied by a moderate gesture of the hand, then bending to the right, he acted the same part over again; then back again to the left, and presently to the right, at almost an equal interval of time he worked himself up to his usual gesture and his one kind of movement; you could compare him only to the blindfolded Babylonian oxen going forward and returning by the same path." "Some," says he, "hold their hands immoveable and turned to one side as if made of horn. I have seen some who exhibited the fuller's dance and expressed their wit, as the old poet says, with their feet." (See Austin's Chironomia, p. 9.) We wish there were nothing approaching this in preachers of the present day. Some of their faults are alluded to by our author, pp. 155-7, in the notes. Such is "the rapid, dodging cast of the eye from the notes to the hearers, and back again; implying a servile de

pendance on what is written, even in the most familiar declarations of the Bible." So, "that indefinite sweep of the eye, which passes from one side to another of an assembly, resting no where; and that tremulous, waving cast of the eye and winking of the eyelid, which is in direct contrast to an open, manly expression of the face. Such is the habit of fixing the eye on the floor of the aisle, or on a post or pannel, when it is raised from the notes, to avoid a direct look at the hearers." But most disgusting is the preacher who "assumes the gracefulness of a fine gentleman, as if he were practising the lessons of an assembly room." All affectation of manners, and all efforts at exquisite pronunciation we detest.

In man or woman, but far most in man, And most of all in man that ministers And serves the altar, in our souls we All affectation. "Tis our perfect scorn; Object of our implacable disgust.

loathe

This whole chapter on action, is happy in its manner, and cannot be read attentively without advantage.

The treatise is very properly accompanied with exercises, the first part of which is arranged for the purpose of illustrating the principles laid down in the work, and is marked with the notation adopted by the author. Fixing this notation is so much a matter of taste, that it is to be doubted whether all will agree with the Professor as to the reading in every passage, and whether he will not see fit hereafter to alter some of the marks he has affixed. Whoever has learned from experience the intrinsic difficulty of all works of this nature, unless he witnesses grievous errors of judgment, will be disposed to obey the maxim "de gustibus non disputandum."

In regard to the work as a whole, though some of its parts exhibit more marks of care than others, we

believe it to be executed with much good sense, and with a degree of perspicuity and simplicity not equalled in any of its kind. It was undertaken, as the author says in his preface, at the suggestion of others, and we trust it will be extensively adopted by instructors, especially in our colleges, as a classic on Elocution. In reply to letters of inquiry addressed to several of the Presidents of Colleges, and to other gentlemen, whether such a publication was deemed necessary, a concurrent opinion was expressed, that our seminaries of learning greatly need a work on elocution, different in many respects from any thing hitherto published; and a concurrent wish was expressed that the author should proceed in the preparation of such a work.

Since elocution, though old as an art, is in its infancy as a science, we may expect treatises still more perfect when men of talent shall apply themselves with diligence to the analysis of delivery. But whoever writes on this branch of education, we trust will imitate the author of this volume, if in nothing else, at least in his independence and moderation. Rules not founded in nature, will bring the whole science into contempt, or will increase the contempt which some exhibit towards it. In regard to all empirics, and of consequence towards most, (not all) of those itinerant elecutionists who constitute themselves professors of oratory, we feel an impatience which equals, if it does not exceed, that of the Roman Crassus. "I found," said he, "that their new masters could teach nothing but vanity and impudence, and that under their teaching, our youth were forgetting, instead of learning what is truly valuable. Wherefore, when I was censor, I banished them by an edict."

If this effort of Dr. Porter, does but tend to excite public attention to the strangely neglected branch

of elocution, he will be abundantly repaid for his trouble; and if we could say aught to excite interest in this subject, we feel that we should be conferring a blessing on the literary world, and, particularly on the community of preachers. We are well aware that some of our readers, to whose judgments we would pay proper deference, think all directions in elocution worse than useless. • Let a 6 man speak naturally,' say they, and let us have nothing artificial.' We entirely accord with this sentiment. But we would ask, How shall he speak naturally? As we understand the case, a great part of our public speakers are so afflicted with bad habits of elocution, that they never do speak naturally, except in conversation and extemporaneous address. The very business of the science of elocution is, to displace these habits by teaching such as are true to nature. It may be replied, that arbitrary rules, instead of removing all faults of elocution, only exchange one bad habit for another. But we contend for no arbitrary rules. We plead for those only founded on the principles which express sense and feeling in animated conversation, and thus give it harmony, variety, and interest. It may be replied that these principles will only harrass and constrain the speaker, who should endeavour to conform to them. We cannot assent to this opinion. Every day's experience contradicts it. No child was born with the ability to read. Reading is entirely an art, governed throughout by rules, and rendered easy only by long practice. We hesitate not to say, more rules are applied in enunciating a single sentence, than are involved in rhetorical elocution, in the strict sense of that term. these principles were not familiar, and then only did they produce hesitation and constraint. So is it in relation to the rules of elocution.

Once