Correct, by the fwect influence of Chriftian charity, the irregularities of our temper; and reftrain every tendency to ingratitude, and to ill-ufage of our parents, teachers, paftors, and mafters. Teach us to know the value of a good education, and to be thankful to thofe who labour in the improvement of our minds and morals. Give us grace to be reverent to our fuperiors, gentle to our equals or inferiors, and benevolent to all mankind. Elevate and enlarge our fentiments, and let all our conduct be regulated by right reafon, attended with Chriftian charity, and that peculiar generofity of mind, which becomes a liberal scholar and a fincere Chriftian. O Lord, bestow upon us whatever may be good for us, even though we should omit to pray for it; and avert whatever is hurtful, though in the blindness of our hearts we fhould defire it. Into thy hands we refign ourselves, as we retire to reft; hoping by thy mercy, to rife again with renewed fpirits, to go through the bufinefs of the morrow, and to prepare ourfelves for this life, and for a bleffed immorta lity; which we ardently hope to attain, through the merits and interceffion of thy Son, our Sa viour, Jefus Chrift our Lord. Amen. § 81. THE LORD's Pl ER Our Father, which art in heaven; Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And for give us our trefpaffes, as we forgive them that trefpafs against us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil : For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen. TASTE. Blair. thofe powers of tafte and imagination, which were intended to embellish his mind, and to § 2. Beneficial Effects of the Cultivation of fupply him with rational and useful entertainment. They open a field of investigation peculiar to themfelves. All that relates to beauty, harmony, grandeur, and elegance; all that can foothe the mind, gratify the fancy, or move the affections, belongs to their province. They prefent human nature under a different afpect from that which it affumes when viewed by other feiences. They bring to light various fprings of action, which, without their aid, might have paffed unobferved; and which, though of a delicate nature, frequently exert a powerful influence on feveral departments of human life. The cultivation of tafte is further recommended by the happy effects which it naturally tends to produce on human life. The moft bufy man, in the most active fphere, cannot be always occupied by bufinefs. Men of ferious profeffions cannot always be on the ftretch of ferious thought. Neither can the moft gay and flourishing fituations of fortune afford any man the power of filling all his hours with pleasure. Life muft always languish in the hands of the idle. It will frequently languifh even in the hands of the bufy, if they have not fome employment subSuch ftudies have alfo this peculiar advan- fidiary to that which forms their main purage, that they exercife our reafon without fuit. How then fhall thefe vacant spaces, fatiguing it. They lead to enquiries acute, thofe unemployed intervals, which, more or but not painful; profound, but not dry nor lefs, occur in the life of every one, be filled up abftrufe. They ftrew flowers in the path of How can we contrive to difpofe of them in fcience; and, while they keep the mind bent, any way that fhall be more agreeable in itself, or or more confonant to the dignity of the human mind, than in the entertainments of tafte, and the study of polite literature? He who is fo happy as to have acquired a relish for thefe, has always at hand an innocent and irreproachable amufement for his leisure hours, to fave him from the danger of many a pernicious paffion. He is not in hazard of being a burden to himself. He is not obliged to fly to low company, or to court the riot of loofe pleafures, in order to cure the tediousness of existence. Providence feems plainly to have pointed out this ufeful purpofe, to which the pleasures of tafte may be applied, by interpofing them in a middle ftation between the pleatures of fenfe, and thofe of pure intellect. We were not defigned to grovel always among objects fo low as the former; nor are we capable of dwelling conftantly in fo high a region as the latter. The pleafures of tafte refresh the mind after the toils of the intellect, and the labours of abstract ftudy; and they gradually raise it above the attachments of fenfe, and prepare it for the enjoyments of virtue. So confonant is this to experience, that, in the education of youth, no object has in every age appeared more important to wife men than to tincture them early with a relifh for the entertainments of tafte. The tranfition is commonly made with eafe from thefe to the difcharge of the higher and more important duties of life. Good hopes may be entertained of those whofe minds have this liberal and elegant turn. It is favourable to many virtues. Whereas to be entirely devoid of relifh for eloquence, poetry, or any of the fine arts, is juftly continued to be an unpromifing fymptom of youth; and raifes fufpicions of their being prone to low gratifications, or def tined to drudge in the more vulgar and illiberal purfuits of life. Blair. § 3. Improvement of TASTE connected with Improvement in VIRTUE. There are indeed few good difpofitions of any kind with which the improvement of tafte is not more or lefs connected. A cultivated tafte increases fenfibility to all the tender and humane paffions, by giving them frequent exercife; while it tends to weaken the more violent and fierce emotions. Ingenuas didiciffe fideliter artes Emollit mores, nec finit effe feros. The elevated fentiments and high examples which poetry, cloquence, and history are often bringing under our view, naturally tend to nourish in our minds public fpirit, the love of glory, contempt of external fortune, and the admiration of what is truly illuftrious and great. I will not go fo far as to fay, that the imthat they may always be expected to co-exist in provement of taste and virtue is the fame; or an equal degree. More powerful correctives than tafte can apply, are neceffary for reforming the corrupt propenfities which too frequently prevail among mankind. Elegant fpeculations are fometimes found to float on the furface of the mind, while bad paffions poffe's the interior regions of the heart. At the fame time this cannot but be admitted that the exercife of tafte is, in its native ten dency, moral and purifying. From reading the most admired productions of genius, whe ther in poetry or profe, almost every one rifes Thefe polish'd arts have humaniz'd mankind, Soften d the rude,and calm'd the boift'rous mind. tries have been noted for peculiarities of Style, futed to their different temper and genius. The caftern nations animated their Style with the moft ftrong and hyperbolical figures. The Athenians, a polished and acute people, formed a Style, accurate, clear, and neat. The Afiatics, gav and loofe in their manners, affected a Style florid and diffufe. The like fort of characteristical differences are commonly remarked in the Style of the French, the English, and the Spaniards. In giving the general characters of Style, it is ufual to talk of a nervous, a feeble, or a fpirited Style; which are plainly the characters of a writer's manner of thinking, as well as of expreffing with fome good imprethons left on his mind; and though thefe may not always be durable, they are at leaft to be ranked among the means of difpofing the heart to virtue. One thing is certain, and I fhall hereafter have occafion to illustrate it more fully, that, without poffeffing the virtuous affections in a ftrong degree, no man can attain eminence in the fublime parts of eloquence. He must feel what a good man feels, if he expects greatly to move or to intereft mankind. They are the ardent fentiments of honour, virtue, magBanimity, and public fpirit, that only can kindle that fire of genius, and call up into the mind those high ideas, which attract the admiration of ages; and if this fpirit be necef-himfelf: fo difficult it is to separate these two fary to produce the most diftinguished efforts of cloquence, it must be neceffary alfo to our relishing them with proper tafte and feeling. Blair. § 4. On STYLE. things from one another. Of the general characters of Style, I am afterwards to difcourfe; but it will be neceffary to begin with examining the more fimple qualities of it; from the affemblage of which its more complex denominations, in a great meafure, refult. in fuch a drefs, as, by pleafing and interefting them, fhall moft effectually strengthen the impreffions which we feck to make. When both thefe ends are answered, we certainly accomplith every purpofe for which we ufe Writing and Difcourfe. Ibid. It is not cafy to give a precife idea of what All the qualities of a good Style may be is meant by Style. The best definition I can ranged under two heads, Perfpicuity and Orgive of it is, the peculiar manner in which a nament. For all that can poffibly be required man expreffes his conceptions, by means of of Language is, to convey our ideas clearly Language. It is different from mere Lan-to the minds of others, and, at the fame time, rage or words. The words which an author employs, may be proper and faultlefs; and his Style may, nevertheless, have great faults; it may be dry, or ftiff, or feeble, or affected. Style has always fome reference to author's manner of thinking. It is a pictore of the ideas which rife in his mind, and of the manner in which they rife there; and hence, when we are examining an author's compofition, it is, in many cafes, extremely dificult to feparate the Style from the fentíment. No wonder thefe two fhould be fo intimately connected, as Style is nothing elfe, than that fort of expreffion which our thoughts of readily affume, Hence, different coun $5. On PERSPICUITY.. Perfpicuity, it will be readily admitted, is the fundamental quality of Style *; a quality "Nobis prima fit virtus, perfpicuitas, propria verba, rectus ordo, non in longum dilata conclufio; nihil neque defit, neque fuperfuat." QUINCTIL. lib. viii. fo effential in every kind of writing, that for the want of it nothing can atone. Without this, the richeft ornaments of Style only glimmer through the dark; and puzzle, inftead of pleafing, the reader. This, therefore, must be our firft object, to make our meaning clearly and fully understood, and understood without the leaft difficulty. "Ora"tio," fays Quinctilian, " debet negligen"ter quoque audicntibus effe aperta; ut in "animum audientis, ficut fol in oculos, etiamfi in cum non intendatur, occurrat. "Quare, non folum ut intelligere poffit, fed cannot think clearly. His ideas, indeed, may, very excufably, be on fome fubjects incomplete or inadequate; but ftill, as far as they go, they ought to be clear; and, where ever this is the cafe, Perfpicuity in expreffing them is always attainable. The obfcurity which reigns fo much among many metaphyfical writers, is, for the most part, owing to the indiftin&tnefs of their own conceptions. They fee the object but in a confused light; and, of courfe, can never exhibit it in a clear one to others. Perfpicuity in writing, is not to be confi ne omnino poffit non intelligere, curan-dered as merely a fort of negative virtue, or "dum." If we are obliged to follow a freedom from defect. It has higher merit: writer with much care, to paufe, and to read it is a degree of pofitive beauty. We are over his fentences a fecond time, in order to pleafed with an author, we confider him as comprehend them fully, he will never pleafe deferving praife, who frees us from all fatigue us long. Mankind are too indolent to relifh of fearching for his meaning; who carries us fo much labour. They may pretend to ad- through his fubject without any embarrassment mire the author's depth after they have dif- or confufion? whofe ftyle flows always like a covered his meaning; but they will feldom limpid ftream, where we fee to the very botbe inclined to take up his work a fecond Blair. time. Authors fometimes plead the difficulty of their fubject as an excufe for the want of Perfpicuity. But the excufe can rarely, if ever be admitted. For whatever man conceives clearly, that it is in his power, if he will be at the trouble, to put into diftinct propofitions, or to exprefs clearly to others: and upon no fubject ought any man to write, where he "Difcourfe ought always to be obvious, "even to the most careless and negligent hear "er; fo that the fenfe fhall ftrike his mind, as the light of the fun does our eyes, though "they are not directed upwards to it. We muft tudy, not only that every hearer may under"ftand us, but that it fhall be impoffible for ❝ him not to understand us.” tom. § 6. On PURITY and PROPRIETY, Purity and Propriety of Language, are often ufed indifcriminately for each other; and, indeed, they are very nearly allied. A diftinction however obtains between thein. Purity, is the ufe of fuch words, and fuch conftructions, as belong to the idiom of the Language which we fpeak; in oppofition to words and phrafes that are imported from other Languages, or that are obfolete or newcoined, or ufed without proper authority. Propriety is the selection of fuch words in the Language, as the best and most established ufage has appropriated to those ideas which we intend to exprefs by them. It implies the correct and happy application of them, according to that usage, in oppofition to vulga |