When this revelation came, after the decline in eloquence with the loss of liberty that followed Cicero's age, a new spirit seized upon old forms. While Onintilian, the rhetorician, was gathering up the remains of Latin oratory, as Aristotle had done with Greek oratory, a provincial, Paul of Tarsus, was declaring Christianity at Bottle and Athens and in the provinces. Later, Athana sins took up its defense and propagation at Alex andria, Chrysostom at Antioch, Basil and the Gregories in other cities, while the Latin ler tullian at Carthage, Ambrose at Milan, and Leo at Rome exemplified the new eloquence, and founded a new empire upon the ruins of the old. This eloquence had a freedom and irregularity which could not he restrained within classic bounds, as the new wine could not be kept in old bottles; lint it was suited to the work it had 10 do, and it did it well.
When zeal took on a crusading temper another and wilder style of preaching was addressed to mobile multitudes, starting them toward Palestine by its harangues and keeping them moving by continual exhortation. Such was the oratory of Peter the Hermit. These pilgrimages from the West into the East being over. oratory subsided into the eccentricities of mediaeval preaching against which Dante inveighed, declaring that certain priests were bent only on amusing with jests and idle tales, so that their flocks went home fed on wind. The Exempla of Jacques do Vitry bear witness, also, to the me diawal, yet not wholly media.val, appetite for anecdotic sermons. Oratory was once more in fused with earnestness at the Reformation; its classic forms were recalled with the rise of great preachers like Bossuet: it reflected the stormy aspects of the French Revolution, and reappeared in its better phases in the parliamentary elo quence of Great Britain in the last half of the eighteenth century.
This was nearest to a repetition of the ancient periods of classical eloquence that has occurred. and one of the results of the revival of Greek learning. The education of deliberative orators like Pitt and Mansfield. Burke and Fox. was chiefly in the oratory of antiquity. From its best examples each gathered such features as were worth most to him: Pitt, simplicity of treat ment, luminousness of statement and illustra tion, enforced by impetuousness of delivery: "Mansfield. a statement of his ease better than most men's arguments. leading hearers step by step irresistibly to his conclusions; Burke, who combined the study of ancient classics with those of his own country, gaining from both the power Of common wont; effectively placed, and of the sonorous sentence when needed; Sheridan, more Asiatic in manner, as Fox was Attie—all of them, and others, too, having their counterpart in men who lived twenty centuries before, a group of statesmen-orators whose equals collectively and individually have appeared but once in history, and whose works remain as the second embodi ment of eloquence in the records of human speech.
It is not an idle boast to say that a third period is found in the century between 1765 and 1865 in our own land. Questions of colonial confederation, of independence, of self-govern ment under a constitution, of reserved and dele gated rights, of extension or extinction of slav ery, of war and reconstruction, formed a series of issues dctuanding political wisdom and in volving earnest discussion, which incidentally trained three generations of orators. Their model at first was British eloquence. The fathers read it and replied to it in a manner to compel the respect and praise of English statesmen. Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee. Drayton. and the Rutledges and their compeers in the South. and 'lames Otis, the Adamses, Hamilton, Jay, and their fellow patriots in the North, led the people in the war of ideas and words which preceded the strife of arms. In the Congress of the new nation three men came to the front in the early part of the nineteenth century, who retire seined as many sections of the country and styles of oratory. Of these Henry Clay was earliest and longest in legislative halls. Frank and bold in nature, honest and sincere in conviction, ardent and hopeful in temperament, he had a rare power of inspiring others with his own sentiments and expectations. His clear and positive views were expressed in lucid terms addressed to the under standing of the people with a freedom and un constraint that belonged to a new country, and on the floor of Congress his magnetic presence and flowing speech won the hearts of ninny who eoubd not agree with his political doctrines. Ile reached more of his countrymen in all sections than any other contemporary, standing as he did on middle ground geographically and politically. An extreme Southern position was held and de fended by Calhoun, a man of rigid logic. com manding more respect than enthusiasm, sincere. devoted. persistent ; calm and impressive in man ner, or vehement and fiery, but relentless in his inexorable demonstration of what he believed to he true. For the North of his day Daniel Weh ster stood and spoke. Though somewhat academie in his early manner. he found later the value of plain words with plain people and of the hest English with e‘Trybody. Having a strong grasp of legal principles at the bar and broad views of national questions in Congress, lie added per spicuity and energy. vigor of reasoning and fe licity of diction to a majesty of voice, presence, and personality which delighted, impressed, and awed assemblies beyond all that the printed pages of his speech can convey. History and tradition alone can prolong his fame.