too fond of shewing their powers of execution, and seldom play those simple tunes which can alone affect the minds of the simple and uninformed.

There has been much conversation on the subject of adorning St. Paul's cathedral with the productions of the pencil. Many artists, it is said, have offered to contribute the efforts of their ingenuity. Some scruples have arisen to impede the design. Inthis age they cannot be puritanical. I really think that judicious paintings would produce a desirable effect on the morals of the lower classes. But if painting is not to be admitted, there surely can be no objection to sculpture. Westminster-abbey is crowded with monuments; and I will venture to predict that our posterity will see St. Paul's equally. honoured. I hope the event will not take place so late as to exclude such artists as Bacon, or if painting is admitted, such as Reynolds*, West, and Romney.

With an union of architecture, poetry, music, and painting, we may exclaim with Bruyére: "Que de "magnificence et de dignité dans le culte divin!

que d'élévation dans les Pseaumes! que de ma❝jesté dans les chants! que de pompe dans les so"lemnités! tout édifie et tout annonce la présence "du Saint des Saints."

NO. CLII. ON THE PRESENT STATE OF PARLIAMENTARY ELOQUENCE.

IN taking a view of parliamentary eloquence, I mean to consider it as totally independent of party

* Since this was first written, Death has fuatched the pencil from the hand of Reynolds.

and politics, and solely as a subject of literary taste, It must be a peculiar narrowness of spirit which bestows or refuses applause to the productions of genius, because they are found to favour either a court or an opposition. I would allow an equal share of praise to equal genius, whether it appeared in a leader of the minority, or in the first minister of state.

The speeches from the throne are little more than the formalities of office. It would be unreasonable to expect in them the fire, the pathos, the argument of genuine and animated oratory. But they possess an air of dignity highly proper and characteristical. -They breathe a spirit of sincerity and paternal tenderness, which at once marks the judgment of the composer, and endears the speaker to his people. .There was one on the commencement of the war with America, which deserves to be selected as a very spirited and memorable harangue. It would have adorned the page of a Livy. "The resolu"tions of parliament," said his Majesty," breathed 66 a spirit of moderation and forbearance.-I have "acted with the same temper; anxious to prevent, "if it had been possible, the effusion of the blood "of my subjects, and the calamities which are inse

parable from a state of war; still hoping, that my "people in America would have discerned the trai"terous views of their leaders, and have been con"vinced, that to be a subject to Great Britain, with "all its consequences, is to be the freest member of 66 any civil society in the known world.

"The rebellious war now levied is become more "general, and is manifestly carried on for the pur66 pose of establishing an independent empire. I need

"not dwell on the fatal effects of the success of such "a plan. The object is too important, the spirit of "the British nation too high, the resources with "which God hath blessed her too numerous, to give "up so many colonies which she has planted with "great industry, nursed with great tenderness, en"couraged with many commercial advantages, and "protected and defended at much expence of blood " and treasure.-The constant employment of my "thoughts, and the most earnest wishes of my heart, "tend wholly to the safety and happiness of all my “people.”—The spirit of a great King, and the tender solicitude which speaks the true father of his people, render this speech truly excellent, and, indeed, its excellence was evinced by its effects; for soon after it was disseminated over the nation, the Américan war, which was once universally odious, bẹcame rather popular. Little did the composer of the above passage conceive, that in a few years the bigh spirit of the British nation would be reduced to the humiliating necessity of almost supplicating for peace the deluded people of America.

In an assembly, like the higher house, consisting of men, in whose education no expence has been spared, who are, or who ought to be, animated by their own exalted situation and the examples of an illustrious ancestry, one might reasonably expect to find frequent examples of distinguished eloquence. But it really would be difficult to name a single peer who has attracted notice or admiration for the classical elegance of his matter or his language. The law lords, relying on their professional knowledge, do, indeed, frequently make long and bold speeches;

but not often such as please an Attic or à Roman taste, or deserve the praise of pure and legitimate oratory, Of all the speeches spoken in the house, how few have ever been collected and preserved in libraries, as models of classical elegance! Passion and personal animosity have, indeed, produced many invectives, which gratify the spleen of party, and are for the time extolled beyond all the productions of preceding ingenuity. But is there extant a single volume of speeches, by the most famous among the orators of the upper house, which can be produced as a classical book, or stand in competition with the orations of Cicero ? I think it necessary to repeat, that my remarks have not the least reference to party. I am in search of an orator, to whom the epithet of classical may be justly applied. I regret that the fury of party on one side, and the meanness of servility on the other, have for the most part excluded that true taste, true grace, and true spirit, which is necessary to form a classical orator, from the harangues of an assembly, justly deemed the most august in Europe.

The House of Commons has always been esteem-ed a very distinguished theatre of modern eloquence. And there indeed, notwithstanding the same impediments which prevail among the peers, it is easy to produce many splendid examples. In the House of .Commons, men have been stimulated by the most powerful motives, by the hopes of rising; in the .House of Lords they have already risen. But though we join in the applause of common fame, yet let us ask, where are to be found the volumes of oratorical elegance? Have the speeches which have gained the

No. 152. praise of admiring kingdoms, been no where collected and recorded? Do we lock them up in our book-cases, and put them into the hands of our children as models for imitation, as lessons to form their young minds, and raise a succession of orators and patriots? No; the speeches are celebrated at first, and while they answer a temporary purpose. They are like vegetables of a night, or insects of a day. They have seldom that solidity of merit which can render the ore valuable when the stamp is effaced, and the occasion of it almost forgotten and quite disregarded; which can preserve the plate still saleable after the fashion is antiquated. Glorious was the eloquence of Chatham while a commoner. Nations shook at the thunder of his voice. But where are the harangues? are they preserved as illustrious models for the instruction of posterity? Instead of being engraven on brass, they are almost sunk into an oblivion, like the soldiers whose bones once whitened the plains of Germany. Yet I mean not to detract from his glories. Language can scarcely supply terms to express the weight of his authority, the magnitude of his mind and his character, and the efficacy with which he thought, decided, spoke, and acted. But let it not escape the reader's attention, that we are inquiring for a rival to the masterly and transcendent excellence of a Cicero and a Demosthenes. If such has of late appeared among us, the curiosity of this age would have preserved it; and if it be preserved, let the vo lume be openly produced, and the public will embrace it as an invaluable treasure.

The applause indeed bestowed on one orator, is