poetry and eloquence, yet it would be running into the opposite extreme to reject the aid of all rules, or to deem familiar explanations of the grand principles of composition unnecessary and injurious. What I contend for is, that an attentive perusal of good examples should always go before precepts, and that boys should be made feel the beauties of language, before we attempted to give them clear ideas of the principles on which those beauties depended, or of the combined efforts of nature and art which produced them. Such a procedure will render the study of Grammar, of Rhetoric, and even of Logic as easy and pleasant as it is now tiresome and forbidding. I shall here beg leave to introduce a few remarks on what appears to me essential in each of them, and on the best method of making them subservient to the formation of the accomplished orator.

CHAP. I.

OF GRAMMAR.

IT requires no small degree of courage to oppose the

established practice of Grammar-schools, those venerable seminaries of learning, to which the nation is indebted for many of its greatest ornaments. It may also be deemed ungrateful in me to find fault with the course of instruction, upon which my own little pretensions to learning are founded. But one must be partial to a culpable extreme, not to see and confess, that there are some practices continued in those schools, unavoidable perhaps in their original inftitution, but which the revolutions that have since taken place in literature render it highly necessary to reform. What I shall at present beg leave to specify is the custom of making boys enter upon Latin Grammar at the very opening of their scholastic career, a custom which (not to mention the great disadvantages that must arise from an early neglect of the mother-tongue, and from committing to memory at the most susceptible period of life words without ideas, and jargon without meaning) has been found inimical to the prevalence of all taste for any farther literary pursuits, which are thus rendered at the entrance peculiarly difficult and disgusting. The principles of language, it may be said, in whatever manner they are taught, cannot but appear somewhat dry and unentertaining to the young student: but even admitting this to be true, it must be allowed that his pro

gress

gress will be rendered infinitely pleasanter, and his improvement much more accelerated, by having those principles unfolded and exemplified in his native tongue, than in a language with which he is unacquainted.

The late Bishop of London [Dr. LowTH] has placed this matter in so striking a point of view, and supported the propriety of grounding boys in English Grammar, previously to any farther advances, by arguments which carry with them such irresistible conviction, that I cannot avoid transcribing a few of his remarks on a subject of so much importance.

"A good foundation in the general principles of Grammar is, in the first place, necessary for all those who are initiated in a learned education; and for all others likewise, who fhall have occasion to furnish themselves with the knowledge of modern languages. Universal Grammar cannot be taught abstractedly: it must be done with reference to some language already known, in which the terms are to be explained, and the rules exemplified. The learner is supposed to be unacquainted with all but his native tongue; and in what other, consistently with reason and common sense, can you go about to explain it to him? When he has a competent knowledge of the main principles of Grammar in general, exemplified in his own language, he then will apply himself with great advantage to the ftudy of any other. To enter at once upon the science of Grammar, and the study of a foreign language, is to encounter two difficulties together, each of which would be much lessened by being taken separately, and in its proper order. For these plain reasons, a competent grammatical knowledge of our own language is the true foundation upon which all literature, properly so called, ought to be raised. If this method were adopted in our schools; if children were firft taught the common' principles

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principles of Grammar, by some fhort and clear system of English Grammar, which, happily by its simplicity and facility, is perhaps fitter than any other for such a purpose, they would have some notion of what they were going about when they should enter into the Latin Grammar, and would hardly be engaged so many years as they now are, in that most irksome and difficult part of literature, with so much labor of the memory, and with so little as sistance of the understanding."

It should also be considered, that many boys destined for a commercial or a military life are sent to grammar schools for a few years only, during which short period, if they are not instructed in English, they seldom can cultivate it afterwards with success, and of course must remain shamefully incapable of expressing themselves with propriety in their mother tongue. This is a defect, for which no other accomplishment can make amends: yet, very little attention is paid to it, and we are every day struck with the force and justness of that remark of CıCERO'S, which Dr. Lowth chose for a motto to his English Grammar, viz. That a purity of style is certainly com mendable, though not so much for its intrinsic consequence, as because it is too generally neglected: in short, it is not so meritorious to speak our native tongue correctly, as it is disgraceful to speak it otherwise; nor is it so much the proper qualification of a good orator, as of every well-bred member of the community.

A few years ago, I had some conversation on this subject with a friend of mine, who was then preparing for the press a treatise of practical education, and who politely expressed some satisfaction at my manner of accounting for the general neglect of English Grammar. This appeared to me to arise in a great measure from the simple structure of our language, the natural order in which our

words

words follow one another, and the few changes they admit of in their last syllables, which induced many persons to suppose, that the utmost degree of correctness in speaking and writing it might be acquired by an intercourse with the polite world, and an attentive perusal of good books, without the trouble of Grammar rules, which they thought only gave an appearance of difficulty to an attainment in itself easy and pleasurable, To the prevalence of this notion, and the consequent defect of early culture, we must attribute the many blunders which disgrace the style of most persons with whom we converse, and have a still worse effect in many literary productions, otherwise not destitute of merit. We find the force of solid reasoning often weakened by slovenly expressions, and the beauty of a fine thought obscured by some wretched folecism. It should be remembered that the easy construction of a language, instead of justifying the neglect of its Grammar, serves only to render the smallest offences against it more glaring and unpardonable. Any fault is less entitled to indulgence in proportion to the little care with which it might have been avoided,

I took occasion, at the same time, to suggest to my friend another very prevalent mistake, that the study of Latin Grammar would supersede the neceffity of any particular attention to English Grammar. The general principles of all languages are indeed the fame, and the study of any one Grammar will therefore facilitate that of another; but every language has its peculiar forms of conftruction, its idioms, its niceties, which can only be known. by diftinct application; and as a proof of this, we often meet with good classical scholars, who, from their disregard of English Grammar, are frequently deficient in purity, precision, and correctness. Surely the first, as well as the greatest care ought to be bestowed upon an atain

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