wearying iteration. Beginning with a statement of his thought as a whole, he proceeded to develop it more particularly and slowly in the subsequent parts of his discourse; and because he thus adhered tenaciously to the one point he had in view, some critics hastily concluded that he had all the while been only amplifying some small thought with which he had started. But if he hurled but one idea at the audience, it was hurled with a giant's force, and was no pigmy thought, but "reminded one of the missiles thrown by the holy angels in their fight with Satan's legions, when they

'Main promontories flung, which in the air

Came shadowing, and oppressed whole legions arm'd.'"

The overwhelming effect of Chalmers's oratory is the more remarkable when we consider that he preached from manuscript only, and, except for a brief season, did not extemporize. At an early period in his career, Andrew Fuller, the Baptist preacher and theologian, heard him preach, and declared: "If that man would but throw away his papers in the pulpit, he might be King of Scotland." He threw away his papers, and again and again tried to extemporize; but every attempt ended in failure. It was not that he lacked nerve, memory, intellectual energy, or abundance of thought; on the contrary, he suffered from an overmastering fluency of mind, from mental plethora. He used to say of himself that he was like Rousseau, "slow but ardent," and compared himself to a bottle full of liquid; when suddenly turned up, it cannot flow at first, from its very fullness, and only bursts and splutters. He therefore wisely abandoned all further attempts to extemporize, and ever afterward read his sermons,a procedure which would seem fatal to the electric effects they

produced, did we not know from the examples of Newman Hall, George Thompson, Lord Brougham, and many other eloquent speakers, that a man may hold an audience with a manuscript as truly, if not as long and as spell-bound, as without one. In this matter no Procrustean rule can be made for all speakers; that is the best cat which catches the most mice, and that is the best way of preaching, in a particular case, which enables one to win the most souls. The secret of Chalmers's success under the disadvantages we have named, was the intensity and impetuosity of his temperament, the warm human feeling which possessed him, leading him to compose, not only his sermons, but his other writings not intended for oral delivery, with the constant sense of an assemblage of people before him.

The moment he took up his pen in the study, he throbbed and glowed and mentally thundered as if standing up before the listening multitude. He had always, we are told, this stimulus of the great orator, even in the privacy of the closet, and in the silence and solitariness of midnight study. "He wrote everything to be spoken; he wrote everything as if he were speaking it, at least in feeling, if not in actual sounds; he wrote everything with an audience glaring in his face. Hence his sermons have all the advantage, all the verve and palpitation, of direct extempore address. They have none of the chilliness of discourses written before, nor the lukewarmness of discourses served up after the delivery. From the peculiarity of which we have spoken, they have all the pith of preparation, and all the quick leap of impromptu." Not only did he write with this inspiration of the speaker, as if thousands were hanging upon his words, but he wrote with great rapidity, rarely pausing

to choose his words, though spending much time upon. the thought; and hence his discourses have "all the bounding liveliness of improvisation."

The manuscript, from which he poured forth his ideas with a force and fervor rarely equaled by an impromptu speaker, was never thought of by those who were thrilled by his oratory. An old woman is reported to have said of him, "Ah, it's fell reading, yon!" "I know not what it is," said the fastidious Jeffrey, after hearing him in 1816, "but there is something altogether remarkable about that man! It reminds me more of what one reads of as the effect of the eloquence of Demosthenes than anything I ever heard." The brilliant Canning, who went with Wilberforce, Huskisson, and Lord Binning to bear Chalmers, in London, in 1817, was melted to tears. Though disappointed at first, he said, as he left the church, "The tartan beats us all!" We are told that Professor Young, of Glasgow, scarcely ever heard Chalmers without weeping like a child; and upon one occasion, Dr. Hanna tells us, he was so electrified that he leaped up from his seat on the bench, and stood breathless and motionless, gazing at the preacher till the burst was over, the tears all the while rolling down his cheeks; and on another occasion, forgetful of time and place,― fancying himself, perhaps, in the theatre, he rose and loudly clapped his hands in the ecstasy of his delight.

But the most striking illustration of the great preacher's power is furnished by an incident which occurred in Rowland Hill's Chapel, London, as the great Scotchman was preaching there a little after his fame had traveled beyond the precincts of Scotland. His audience was numerous and principally of the higher circles. Upwards of

one hundred clergymen were present, to whom the front seats in the gallery were appropriated. In the midst of these sat Hill, in a state of great anxiety, arising from his hopes, and fearful lest Chalmers should not succeed before an audience so refined and critical. The doctor as usual began in his low, monotonous tone, and his broad provincial dialect was visibly disagreeable to the delicate ears of his metropolitan audience. Poor Hill was now upon the rack; but the man of God, having thrown his chain around the audience, took an unguarded moment to touch it with the electric fluid of his oratory, and in a moment every heart began to throb and every eye to fill. Knowing well how to take advantage of this bold stroke, he continued to ascend; and so majestic and rapid was his flight, that in a few minutes he attained an eminence so high that every imagination was enraptured. The rapid change from depression to elation which Hill experienced, was too much for him to bear. He felt so bewildered and intoxicated with joy, that unconsciously he started from his seat, and before his brethren could interfere, he struck the front of the gallery with his clinched fist, and roared out with a stentorian voice,-"Well done, Chalmers!"

CHAPTER XIV.

A PLEA FOR ORATORICAL CULTURE.

IN

N the preceding chapters of this work we have attempted to point out and illustrate the aim, power," and influence of the public speaker. To give to the noblest thoughts the noblest expression; to penetrate the souls of. men, and make them feel as if they were new creatures, conscious of new powers and loftier purposes; to make truth and justice, wisdom and virtue, patriotism and religion, holier and more majestic things than men had ever dreamed them to be before; to delight as well as to convince; to charm, to win, to arouse, to calm, to warn, to enlighten, and to persuade,-this is the function of the orator. In concluding this work, let us ask whether in view of the prodigious influence of his art, its cultivation should be neglected, as it comparatively is, both by individuals and in our schools and colleges? We say "prodigious" influence, for, after every allowance has been made for the supposed diminution of that influence in modern times, we still believe that there is no other accomplishment for which there is so constant a demand in the church, in the senate, at the bar, in the lecture-room, at the hustings, and elsewhere, or which raises its possessor to power with equal rapidity. Some of the most fiery themes of eloquence may have passed away with the occasions of tyranny, outrage, and oppression that created