Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, Vol. 1 of 2 (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres, Vol. 1 of 2

Indeed, when the arts of speech and writing are mentioned, I am sensible that prejudices against them are apt to rise in the minds of many. A sort of art is immediately thought of, that'is ostenta tious and deceitful; the minute and trifling study of words alone; the pomp of expression the studied fallacies of rhetoric; ornament substituted in the room of use. We need not wonder, that, under such imputations, all study of discourse, as an art, should have suffered in the opinion of men of understanding; and I am far from denying, that rhetoric and criticism have sometimes been so ma naged as to tend to the corruption, rather than to the improvement, of good taste and true eloquence. But sure it is equally possible to apply the prin ciples of reason and good sense to this art, as to any other that is cultivated among men. If the following Lectures have any merit, it will consist in an endeavour to substitute the application of these principles in the place of artificial and scholastic rhetoric; in an endeavour to explode false orna ment, to direct attention more towards substance than show, to recommend good sense as the founa dation of all good composition, and simplicity an essential to all true ornament.

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