at all events, to be combated during the progress of infancy, or this fault will otherwise encrease so rapidly with their years, that it will be found almost impossible to eradicate it; as we frequently perceive young men, otherwise amiable, subject to this error. I have known some men who were so habituated to lying, that they scarcely ever uttered a truth, though apparently it would be most obvious for their purpose.

A sage has said, that we ought to prefer the company of a dog that we know, to that of a man whose language is unknown; and how far less sociable is false language than silence. If deceit, like truth, had only one countenance, we should then be upon a more equal footing, for we should precisely believe the very contrary to what the lyar advances, but he has unfortunately a hundred tropes and figures, and portrays as many shapes as the Proteus of the ancients :

Whose various forms assume to cheat the fight,
And with vain images of beasts affright.
With foamy tusks will seem a bristly bear,
Or imitate the lion's angry roar;

Break

Break out in crackling flames to shun thy snare,

Or hiss a dragon, or a tyger stare :

Or with a will thy caution to betray,

In fleeting streams attempt to slide away.
But then, the more he varies forms, beware
To train his fetters with a stricter care:
Till tiring all his arts, he turns again
To his true shape, in which he first was seen

Dryden's Virgil, Georgic 4°. 587 to 598.

ESSAY 9.

ON A READY OR SLOW MANNER OF

SPEAKING.

All the graces were never given to one person.

A s we observe in the gift of eloquence, that some have such a promptness and facility of speaking, or in other words ready wit, that they cannot be taken unawares, so others with a slower utterance, never speak but in a premeditated and elaborate manner. Now, as rules are given to the ladies to adopt only such exercises as are most graceful and advantageous, so, if I were permitted to lay down my opinion to lawyers and preachers upon the species of eloquence most suitable to each profession, I should say that the slow speaker would be moft

eligible

eligible for the pulpit, and the other for the bar. Because the preacher's employment allows sufficient leisure to prepare himself for his duty, and his discourse goes en in one uninterrupted train. While the nature of the lawyer's profession frequently compels him to enter the lists without due time for consideration, and the unexpected replies of his adversary throw him. off his bias, and he is immediately obliged to pursue a new field of argument.

Thus at the interview of Clement the Seventh and King Francis at Marseilles, Mr. Poyet, who had been trained from his infancy to the bar, and was in great, repute for eloquence, being appointed to harangue the Pope, and indulged with sufficient time to prepare himself, came to Paris the very day he was to speak. The Pope, however, apprehensive lest he might enter into some discourse which might offend the embassadors of other princes who accompanied him, wrote the substance of the speech, that seemed to him most suitable for the purpose; but unfortunately this speech was sor different from the one designed by Mr. Poyet, that his composition, consequently, remained ufelefs,

useless, and it was necessary that another should be immediately prepared, to which exertion feeling himself incapable, he was obliged to relinquish the appointment.

The pleader's part is certainly more difficult than that of the preacher; and yet, in my opinion, we find more passable lawyers than tolerable preachers, at least in France.

It seems that the nature of wit is to be prompt, and that of judgment to be more deliberate; but he who produces no effect for want of leisure to prepare himself, or he who does not profit by leisure to improve himself, are equally unsuitable to their prosession.

It is said that Severus Cassius spoke best extempore. That he owed more to fortune than diligence: when he was agitated, his stile improved, and that his opponents avoided irritating him, searing left his anger should increase his eloquence. I know by experience, that with a disposition naturally averse to study and deep thought, the ideas which slow gaily and freely may have some merit; when if sought for by the labour of the mind, they are worth nothing. We say of compositions, that