bution of the bones and muscles, their movements and attachments in the human frame. But even this is not enough; if the sculptor be unfamiliar with the theory of "equilibrium," he may spoil his work by representing the perpendicular from the centre of gravity as falling unnaturally. And the necessity for scientific knowledge in the painter is even more evident; it is the disregard of linear, and the lack of all aerial perspective, that constitutes the absurdity of Chinese pictures; yet perspective rests on strictly natural laws which science alone can interpret.

The artistic effects produced by an elocutionist, an orator, or an actor, represent purely objective and subjective phenomena; and they can be true representations only in so far as they conform to the natural laws of these phenomena. Before they can thus conform, the delineator of human feelings and passions must understand what are the laws and under what conditions they vary. For this reason, the study of psychology is of the utmost importance to the elocutionist; it will enable him to indicate by his inflections of voice, by intonation and by emphasis, his mental attitude toward certain thoughts and sentiments without digression to explain it and this is nearly the whole art of Elocution.

Every clergyman, orator, and actor, possesses at least a stock of empirical generalizations which guide him in his exposition of the matter in hand; but to have a general idea only of what we are to do and of how we are to express ourselves under given circumstances, is not sufficient; such meagre knowledge will not enable us to delineate different shades of thought or various and complex emotions. It is this sort of vague impression-or rather, quite definite ignorance-that gives us that large

class of persons who render all its passions with extreme violence, and after exhausting themselves (and their audience) imagine that they have done all that "elocution" can do. These persons are not confined to the stage; we have them in the pulpit, at the bar, in Congress, on the rostrum. They of the pulpit will declaim on the attributes of the Almighty, or the happiness of those who have found that peace which the Saviour promised, in as forcible tones, as fast "time," and with as energetic gesticulations, as they employ in denunciations of the sinner, or in depicting the sufferings of the lost. The lawyer who affects this style of delivery will throw as much emphasis into a description of the clothes his client wore on the night of the assault as into his execration of the assailant's villainy. And there is another description of public speaker, who has a fine voice, and who employs his full deep tones alike on all he utters, the deepest emotions, the simplest narrative, the most violent passions. He has a particular fondness for the "semitone," that plaintive minor key, symbolical of grief or melancholy. He reads the psalms of praise with the sad half tones that belong to penitence; making the voluntary and joyful offering of thanksgiving a lugubrious task which he feels very melancholy (for so his tone indicates) in performing. He uses emotional tones on sentences or sentiments that indicate emotion in no degree; or if he employs tones which have a natural relation to the ideas expressed, his reading will as frequently verge on the burlesque as on the grand; for "burlesque" is simply an inversion of natural laws-as when trivial or absurd sentiments are delivered in heroic tones and with impressive emphasis. When little or no emotion exists in idea, tones that are full and sonorous

should be used but sparingly, or not at all; as feeling rises they may be employed more freely, and only in their intensity where the climax of passion is reached.

Many people object to any special study of elocution for the reason that they do not expect to become professional readers or public speakers. Would they object to the study of literature because they cannot hope to become authors? Or to that of music because they would never dream of becoming a Beethoven, Mozart, or Gluck? Or to that of astronomy or any of the sciences because they can never aspire to the position of a Herschel or a Humboldt? Who most keenly enjoys a fine picture? Certainly he who has the most extended knowledge of what the picture represents-of those facts in nature or in life which he finds delineated therein, and on the accuracy of which he can pronounce. Why is it that the person of cultivated mind takes so much more pleasure in a noble poem than does one who is ignorant ? Is it not because a wider acquaintance with the subject, and the ability to compare its beauties with those charms similar, and yet different, possessed by other poems, causes him to see in the work many things of which the uneducated one is ignorant? So with elocution. knowledge of it not only enables us to interpret thought and emotions to others, but assists us very greatly in understanding them ourselves. The person who can read well is, even as a listener, very different from him who can not.

A

Still another fallacy, far too current even among intelligent people, is the idea that those who display the higher elocutionary accomplishments possess a "genius " which it would be vain to endeavor to acquire-the cultivation of which is beyond the reach of art. Such ideas

are born of ignorance; for so thinks the savage of the simplest computation in arithmetic, or the untutored boor of the wonders of the magic lantern. A thorough knowledge of the principles of any art will enable a determined student to approach perfection in it. If he possesses these principles in elocution, he may on them found his own style of reading or speaking, which may be natural and excellent, and yet very different from his neighbor's founded on the same principle.

The more important of these principles I shall endeavor to make plain in the following chapters. It will be observed that I do this rather by examples, and exercises, and illustrations, than by exposition. To the mere reader this will perhaps seem cumbrous, and even perplexing; but teachers will understand full well that it is the only efficient method of impressing new facts on the minds of the young, or of converting theoretical into practical knowledge.

F. T. G.