osed; and that our tolerablest speech was of the
nature of honest commonplace introduced where indispensable, which
only set up for being brief and true, and could not be mistaken for
excellent.

These are hard sayings for many a British reader, unconscious of any
damage, nay joyfully conscious to himself of much profit, from that side
of his possessions. Surely on this side, if on no other, matters stood
not ill with him? The ingenuous arts had softened his manners; the
parliamentary eloquences supplied him with a succedaneum for government,
the popular literatures with the finer sensibilities of the heart:
surely on this _wind_ward side of things the British reader was not ill
off?--Unhappy British reader!

In fact, the spiritual detriment we unconsciously suffer, in every
province of our affairs, from this our prostrate respect to power of
speech is incalculable. For indeed it is the natural consummation of
an epoch such as ours. Given a general insincerity of mind for several
generations, you will certainly find the Talker established in the
place of honor; and the Doer, hidden in the obscure crowd, with activity
lamed, or working sorrowfully forward on paths unworthy of him. All
men are devoutly prostrate, worshipping the eloquent talker; and no man
knows what a scandalous idol he is. Out of whom in the mildest
manner, like comfortable natural rest, comes mere asphyxia and death
everlasting! Probably there is not in Nature a more distracted phantasm
than your commonplace eloquent speaker, as he is found on platforms,
in parliaments, on Kentucky stumps, at tavern-dinners, in windy, empty,
insincere times like ours. The "excellent Stump-orator," as our admiring
Yankee friends define him, he who in any occurrent set of circumstances
can start forth, mount upon his "stump," his rostrum, tribune, place
in parliament, or other ready elevation, and pour forth from him
his appropriate "excellent speech," his interpretation of the said
circumstances, in such manner as poor windy mortals round him shall cry
bravo to,--he is not an artist I can much admire, as matters go! Alas,
he is in general merely the windiest mortal of them all; and is admired
for being so, into the bargain. Not a windy blockhead there who kept
silent but is better off than this excellent stump-orator. Better off,
for a great many reasons; for this reason, were there no other: the
silent one is not admired; the silent suspects, perhaps partly admits,
t