improve in the arts of peace and war. Such a gymnasium was also called a Palæstra. 2. PRAXIT ELES was one of the greatest sculptors of Greece. 3. LAOCOON is the name of one of the finest works of sculpture known. By whom it was wrought, it is not precisely known. It was found in 1506 by diggers in a vineyard. It is now at Rome. It represents the dying agonies of LAOCOON, who, it is said, was a priest of Neptune at Troy, and was killed, with his two sons, by two enormous serpents. 4. Ros'CIUS was a celebrated Roman actor. He died about 60 years before Christ. 5. SOPHOCLES was a distinguished dramatist of Athens. He lived 450 years before Christ. Among his other excellent dramas, is that of (EDIPUS. 6. Es'CHYLUS was a celebrated Grecian dramatist, who lived before SOPHOCLES. He has been styled "the father of tragedy." 7. EURIPIDES was also a Grecian dramatist of great celebrity, who lived at the same time with SOPHOCLES. 8. WHITEFIELD, an eminent preacher, was born in England in 1597. He visited the United States several times, and was distinguished for his elocutionary powers. ART IN ORATORY. 1. "NATURE is the Art of God." The symmetry, the beauty, the unity, the perfection which it reveals, attest not merely a divine origin, but a divine Artist. Man, whether we regard him in his relation to nature, or as an independent creation, beautifully illustrates and confirms this truth. In the full development of his being, spiritual and physical, we have the product of an art and an Artist, divine as the work of no other art or artist ever can be. The account we have receiv of it from its Author, should exalt, while it inspires us with awe, IN THE IMAGE OF GOD CREATED HE HIM." 66 2. That image of Divinity, defaced though it has been, bears many a trace of its Grand Original. Man, too, is an artist, a creator; finite it is true, but yet a creator. The hard, jagged, and shapeless rock, in his hand, will grow into forms of majesty, grace, and beauty, which kings will reverence. change "The blank canvas to a magic mirror, Making the absent present; and to shadows He can Give light, depth, substance, bloom,-yea, thought and motion." 3. Under his plastic power, columns rise,-cornice, frieze and architrave, roof and dome,-while within, curiously graven pillars sustain arches and vaults, fashioned together, which roll back anthems, that other men of powers no less transcendent, have created to thrill, dilate, and ravish the soul. 4. We have in the perfect oration, the proportions, the symmetry, the strength, and the imposing dignity of the architect- • ural ideal,-whether it be the simplicity, noble plainness, and chastened severity of the manly Doric,—the light airy elegance and matron grace of the Ionic,-the magnificence and luxuriant splendor of the rich Corinthian,-or the vastness and gloomy grandeur of the sublime Gothic. To what school of painting, too, can we not present a counterpart? Words are themselves the pictures of thought, and when selected and combined with the taste, skill, and spirit of a master, will rival the excellence of design and anatomical fidelity of the Florentine, the ease and expression of the Roman, or the light and shade and perfect coloring of the Venetian schools. 5. We can also find in the perfect orator, the ability to effect in substance all that can be effected by art in musical performance. The oratorio in itself may be admirable. Its full effect, however, as a work of art, must depend upon the execution; and here it may be aided immensely by instruments. But with such materials as are assumed for the orator, what music has he not created? How skillfully and effectively has he not played upon thousands of those thousand-stringed harps at once; alternately elevating and subduing, thrilling and soothing, rousing them to martial fury, or hushing them into unbreathing repose! 6. And how far does an orator, thus physically educated, surpass the highest achievement of the chisel! Aye, was not man the great prototype of the statuary? Was it not when he had fully developed all these powers, by the discipline and excitement of their public games, in the Gymnasia' and Palæstræ, in wrestling, running, and gladiatoral combat, that Phidias and Praxiteles' chose him as the model of grace and strength, attitude and expression? 7. With reference to expression, also, the perfect orator's superiority in point of variety, intensity, and force, might be shown from the same view. This, we are aware, is the glory of sculpture. And in the use of the human form, there really is the opportunity of exhibiting the working of any passion or emotion. The last choking pang, the maddening convulsion, the stagnating circulation, and paralytic death of Laocoon, are legible and audible. There in marble are the gaunt bones, the wrinkled skin, and the protruding veins of old age; there, too, the round finely articulated limbs, the free throbbing buoyancy and restless sporting of boyhood. 8. It is true, also, that in many of these productions we have, not merely a single passion represented, but often a whole act, perhaps a whole life. Yet if we carefully and constantly observe the living human face and figure in its most perfect exhibitions, "in form and moving how express and admirable!" In the ever-varying play of the features lighted up with joy, kindled into rage, haggard and hideous with despair, erect and nervous with indignant scorn, composed into the placid serenity of holy meditation, or dumb with thoughts that often lie too deep for tears," we shall feel, though we can not express the wonderful contrast. Not to mention the eloquence of a man's right arm, there are meanings which can not be spoken or painted in the. sparkling fiery glow,—the fixed riving gaze, the mellow loveliness, the fascinating side-glance, and sympathetic tear of that speechless but mighty coadjutor, -a cultivated eye. 66 9. They are not permanent, as in marble; many of them may be evanescent as an echo, but they are in the true orator no less effective. They are not the passion petrified, but the ministers of a soul struggling to give birth to a great truth, when language fails or falters. They are the wings of thought and emotion and passion. Roscius is said in a contest with Cicero to have expressed by action every thing which the orator expressed in words. The Edipus of Sophocles, we are told, was performed at Rome, during the reign of Augustus, entirely by pantomime, and so admirably as to draw tears from the whole assembly. 10. We know little comparatively of the colossal grandeur, the boldness, and originality of the creations of Eschylus"; the harmony, the humanity, and the perfect mastery of the Greek language, of Sophocles; the energy and passionate out-pourings of Milton's favorite Euripides. Nor can we perceive, but as it were afar off, the gigantic proportions of the great poet of man, England's "myriad-minded bard." Yet we confess that the power and productions of him "Whose resistless eloquence Wielded at will that fierce democracy, Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece To Macedon, and Artaxerxes' throne," to our own mind, far transcends them all; and if asked to point to the finest exhibition of intellectual sublimity in the world, we should select out of all others, DEMOSTHENES DELIV ERING THE ORATION ON THE CROWN. 11. It meets all the demands we have made of a perfect work of art. It is a pure creation of the soul. It has reality directly connected witli its origin and its end. It has the symmetrical proportions and masculine grandeur of Doric architecture; it is painted with the utmost regard to light and shade, and color and grouping. In the orator, also, our high ideal is found. Years of intensest study and cultivation had made the most musical of all things,-the human voice,—in him, we have reason to believe, almost perfect. 12. Dr. Franklin says of Whitefields, "his delivery was so improved by repetition, that every accent, every emphasis, every modulation of voice, was so perfectly tuned and well placed, that, without being interested in the subject, one could not help being pleased with the discourse, a pleasure much the same kind with that received from an excellent piece of music;" and Garrick says of him that he could make men weep or tremble by his varied utterances of the word, "Mesopotamia." 13. And can we imagine that the prince of orators, with the most polished and musical of all languages, would be less accomplished, would be deficient at all in this most essential. element? The estimate, too, which he placed upon action, every school-boy knows; and having constantly before him in that palace of art, the noblest and purest models of grace and ease of attitude, expression, action, and repose, he must here also have been no less perfect. Behold, what fire is in his eye, what fervor on his cheek That glorious burst of winged words!-how bound they from his tongue! The keen demand, -the clear reply,-the fine poetic image, The nice analogy the clenching fact, the metaphor bold and free,— The grasp of concentrated intellect wielding the omnipotence of truth.” LESSON LXV. EXPLANATORY NOTES.-I. ETRURIAN, or TUSCAN, is a word derived from ETRURIA, the name of a province of Italy, corresponding nearly with Tuscany, the river Tiber forming its southern and south-eastern boundary. It was the most enlightened country of Italy, and was in the hight of its glory at the time Rome was being built. 2. TIVOLI is the capital of a district, situated eighteen miles north-east of Rome, where the river Teverone precipitates itself 100 feet at one fall. It is remarkable for its beautiful situation and classical associations. 3. VIRGIL has been styled the prince of Latin poets. He was born seventy years before Christ. 4. CURULE means pertaining to a chariot. Among the Romans, the curule chair or seat was without a back, and was carried in a chariot, and occupied by public officers. 5. PHENIX is a fabulous fowl, represented to be the size of an eagle, which is said to rise again from its own ashes. 6. ÆGIS is a shield or defensive armor. In a figurative sense it means protection. RESTORATION OF THE WORKS OF ART TO ITALY. MRS. HEMANS. 1. LAND of departed fame! whose classic plains Have proudly echoed to immortal strains; Whose hallowed soil hath given the great and brave,- Home of the Arts! where glory's faded smile Majestic temple of the mighty dead! |