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speech itself; its opening, the order and relative force of the several arguments adduced, the skill displayed in evading or obviating objections, the pertinency of the illustrations, the facility and naturalness of the transitions from one topic to another, the closing remarks or peroration, and, throughout the whole, every grace and every elegance in the structure of individual sentences or passages.

The fourth rule is-Exercise your powers often in the practice of written composition.

"Writing," says Lord Bacon, "makes an accurate man," and this is the testimony of every scholar. The rule, however, which we are now commending, has several modes of application. If the student is acquainted with any language other than his vernacular, one of the easiest applications of the present rule is the translating of passages out of that foreign language into his own. Every sentence thus translated is an exercise, however brief, in English composition; a fact which accounts for the greater facility in the use of language, which boys have who have studied, even for comparatively short periods of time, the Latin and Greek languages, than is found in the possession of those who are without that advantage.

He, however, who knows no other than his native tongue, may adopt, with the greatest benefit, a custom, commended and adopted by Cicero and other great speakers in their youth, that of reading carefully a passage from some great oration or other literary composition, getting the substance of it fairly in the memory, and then putting it again into language the best you can command. There is, also, another way of reaching the result contemplated in this exercise, which the author of these observations has often found singularly efficient, in the prosecution of his duties as a practical educator. It is, simply to place before the learner a given passage from a writer of established reputation, and then to require him to express, in words other than those of the author, the same idea; that is, neither more nor less than what is found in the passage assigned. This is an admirable method of acquiring precision of style, on which depends, in great measure, every other excellence of composition.

But a higher application of the present

rule for the cultivation of skill in speaking is that which obliges the young orator to engage frequently in the practice of original composition. In this, if he would be proficient, he must study to bring into actual and appropriate use those essential principles and precepts which, under the imposing names of Grammar and Rhetoric, all terminate at last in justifying that brief definition of a good style-" proper words in proper places."

By the due application of this rule, whether in one or in all of the ways above indicated, the mind becomes habituated to close and accurate thinking, familiar with various forms of expression, and ready, when the occasion demands, to display its resources in fluent and forceful language.

The fifth and last general rule which we shall here give for acquiring superiority in extemporaneous speaking is-Be always diligent in the acquisition of knowledge.

The aim of this rule is especially to reach the case of those who, relying upon a certain natural readiness of utterance, are but too apt to fall into the deplorable habit of undertaking to speak without having anything in particular to say. He that fails from this cause, deserves to fail; for he equally deceives himself and his audience; mistaking sound for sense, and raising expectations which he is not able to satisfy. A glib tongue in an empty head is no common calamity.

There is no kind of knowledge, as before intimated, which may not be useful to the deliberative speaker. Such is the variety of the questions which he may find it necessary or desirable to discuss, that no mental treasures, however extensive or diversified, can exceed the limits of his actual wants.

It was no mere fancy that led the ancients to adopt the principle, that the genuine orator should be competently acquainted with every department of knowledge. Not that, even in their day, the orator could be expected to be a man of universal knowledge, in any such sense as includes and necessitates a minute and profound acquaintance with all the various and complicated branches of human learning. This, if not then, certainly now, would be quite out of human power; but there is an important sense in which this theory of universal culture is unquestionably true. Let the standard be

high, whatever may be our deficiencies in reaching it.

The perfect orator is, indeed, the rarest of human characters. It is seldom, in the lapse of ages, that all those qualities that must conspire to produce this character are found to unite in a single individual. In voice, in person, in genius, in knowledge, in fluency, in everything that can influence the eye, the ear, the heart, or the head, he must be pre-eminent.

Few, therefore, very few, can ever hope to attain to the glory of being perfect orators; but all, or nearly all, by persever

ing and judicious practice, may become ready and efficient speakers.

"But," as is well observed by an eminent writer,* "no man ought to place such confidence in his own abilities as to hope to rise to the highest pitch of reputation by his first efforts. For our extemporary powers of speaking must rise by degrees, from inconsiderable beginnings to perfection. And this can neither be acquired nor maintained without practice."-James N. McElligot, LL.D.

* Quinctillian.

THE TRUE TEST OF MERIT.

THE true test of competency will be the struggle, in which all earnest men engage, to attain eminence and success, whatever path of life they may pursue. It is then that you will find the value of the right training of the mind, and of real knowledge.

It is because of the results of intellectual exertion, and of the continued exercise of thought and of the reason, as opposed to the mere development of the retentive qualities, that even self-instruction is, on many accounts, preferable to a vicious education. We find that those who, as great writers, great inventors, and great thinkers, have chiefly contributed to the happiness, the instruction, and the civilization of the human race, have, for the most part, been men who have struggled against overwhelming difficulties, who have tried to rely entirely upon

themselves, have had to form their own characters, and to educate their own mindsin fact, they have been what are called selfinstructed men. I do not make this remark to undervalue the enormous advantages of education, but rather to encourage you to turn them to the best account. Let your continued endeavours be directed to uniting the acquisition of knowledge with the training of the mind. One hour's earnest thought at night, to digest the study of the day, and to seek its application to the ordinary affairs of public and private life, is worth hours of patient reading. It is the want of this proper training of the mind, and of this earnest thought-breeding sincerity, truthfulness, and self-reliance, which we may have to deplore in modern state education, and in its effects upon the national character.-Layard.

The Inquirer.

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

266. The Philosophy of Death.-In giving the requested" explanation of the mystic operation of death," it may first be remarked that death is not so mystical in its character as is generally supposed, neither is it so much an operation as it is the cessation or the obstruction of an operation. Death is simply the negation of life, which is positive; it is but the term where the far greater mystery of life ceases. Death arising from poison is either caused by the poison's action upon some vital organ, interrupting its functions, which are essential to life, or by its chemical or mechanical action upon the blood. In the case of arsenic, which is the only one instanced by "Hider," the

tissues are thereby hardened, and the blood becomes putrescent and disqualified for vital circulation. A complete revolution of the blood through the system is effected in 2 minutes; hence the rapidity of any poisonous action, whether it consists in arresting the progress of the blood, or in charging it with deleterious elements or conditions. When the deleterious blood, or the interruption thereof, reaches the brain, it is at that instant that conscious life becomes deranged or destroyed. Natural death, however, or death from old age, proceeds from the gradual consolidation and har dening up of the physical system, until it reaches a point that is incompatible with any further operation of the living principle, where the ossification of the vital organs has disqualified them

for action, where the requisite flexibility of the entire system has become exhausted, and where the channels that once freely conveyed the streams of life have become contracted and choked up, and their minute ramifications changed into solid fibres.-HALKET.

273. Hebrew Grammar and Dictionary.-Allow me to recommend to A. J. C., as a Hebrew grammar, "Schroderi Institutiones ad Fundamenta Linguæ Hebreæ," and for a lexicon, Lee's. If A. J. C. wishes merely to be a biblical student, to study the Old Testament in the original, "Buxtorfi Lexicon Hebraicum et Chaldaicum' will admirably serve his turn. I would warn the christian student from the books of Gesenius, who is a Neologian. The biblical student will find Alfred Ollivant's "Analysis of the Text of the History of Joseph" pre-eminently useful at the commencement of his labours. A critical knowledge of Greek may sometimes be useful, but is in no way necessary.-THRELKELD.

277. Geological Question.-The fossils found in the chalk cliffs at Margate and in other parts of the Isle of Thanet and south coast, having a globular, ovoid form, are varieties of the echinoderm, or sea-urchin, either spatangus or ananchytes ovata, galerites or nucleolites; the two former are found mostly in the chalk formations; the two latter mostly in the oolitic. The whole class possessed a highly organized integument, or covering, of many hundred calcareous plates, closely fitting together, and armed with moveable spines.

Till lately, it was thought that the chalk and intervening layers of flint were owing to calcareous and siliceous matters precipitated at the bottom of the ocean (which must have been of enormous depth and extent, as the chalk strata are in some places from 800 to 1,100 feet thick), and there deposited separately by the effect of chemical attraction. The chalk, however, examined microscopically, is found to consist, in great measure, of minute forameniferous shells, while the plates and nodules of flint are owing to sponges, round which there was probably an accretion of siliceons matter from the waters of deposit, and the chalk and flint which fill the cavities of shells and sea-urchins have a similar origin. "Flints," says Richardson, "are so constantly associated with organic substances, that it is scarcely possible to meet with one which does not contain a sponge, urchin, or shell, or the impression of one or more of these organisms." The iron pyrites balls, probably hardened amid the pressure of semi-fluid matters, and their internal appearance, is owing to their having crystallized in that position. The fossils of the chalk (and the rotalia and other minute organisms of the silex) are almost wholly marine, consisting of sponges, fucoids, corals, mollusks, star fishes, echinoderms, crustacea, fishes, and reptiles, which are not discovered in the tertiary strata, the species having all died out at the close of the cretaceous period; " and they form," says Richardson," the spoils of a primeval sea, which rivalled in extent the mighty oceans of the southern hemisphere at the present day, as the chalk group extends over portions of the British Islands, various parts of France, Germany, DenDark, Sweden, Russia, and North America."

The date of formation of the system can only be assigned relatively to the other systems which

compose the earth's crust, each one of which probably occupied several thousands of years, if not of centuries, in its completion. Professor Sedgwick, however, one of the most eminent geologists of this country, has demonstrated that the sum total of geological evidence is in favour of the earth's having had a beginning in time. On this subject the reader is referred to Lyell's "Principles of Geology," to Richardson's "Geology" (chap. iii.), to Hitchcock's "Religion of Geology" (lec. ii.), Miller's "Old Red Sandstone," and to Bakewell's "Elements." Suffice it to say here, that some of the most recent post-tertiary accumulations, lacustrine and fluviatile, and surfacechanges, as the formation of the Egyptian and other deltas, the channel cut by the Niagara Falls, &c., have been computed to have occupied several thousand years; and though the effects produced by these influences have been, within the historic period, quite insignificant, yet geolcgists think that the tremendous changes and gradations evidenced in the earth's crust have been produced by causes strictly analogous, only operating through cycles of ages proportionally vaster.

The following brief classification, compiled from Richardson, and from a remarkably clear and useful little "Introductory Text Book of Geology," by D. Page, which the learner would do well to carry constantly with him in his rambles, may enable the student to refer any particular systems or groups to their relative places in the earth's crust.

1. Post-tertiary strata contain alluvial deposits, peat-mosses, coral-reefs, raised beaches, beds of lakes and rivers, volcanic ejections, remains of existing plants and animals, and, in the most recent formations, traces of man.

2. Tertiary system.-"Drift," clays and stratified marls, limestones, and lignites above the chalk, sub-divided into the Pleistocene group, or boulder-drift, and marine and freshwater beds; the Pleiocene, as the mammaliferous crag of Norfolk and Suffolk, shelly beds of sand, clay, yellow loam, and layers of flinty shingle; the Miocene, or coralline crag, flaggy beds of limestone and greenish marl; and the Eocene, as the sandy clays and siliceous limestones of Hampshire and Isle of Wight, the Bagshot sands, London clay, the Bognor beds, &c. The Tertiary system occurs as above, and in Dorsetshire, Valley of the Thames (i. e., Middlesex, with part of Essex, Kent, Surrey, Sussex), Yorkshire, and part of Scotland. Remains of plants and animals, very nearly like existing species.

3. Cretaceous system.-Thick beds of chalk, the upper with numerous layers of flint, chalk marl, and the greensand strata, beds of siliceous green or ferruginous sands, with layers of chert and sandstone, local beds of gault, rocks of chalky limestone (Kentish rag), and fuller's earth. Occurs in parts of Sussex, Surrey, Kent, Hants, Dorset, Wilts, and, dipping under Thames Valley, occurs in Hertford, Bedford, Buckingham, Oxford, Norfolk, Lincoln, and York. Remains of marine plants and animals now extinct.

4. Oolitic system-comprises the Wealden strata between the chalk hills of Surrey and Sussex, Hastings sands, and Furbeck beds (limestone), the oolitic limestones (Portland stone), the Kimmeridge clay, Oxford clay, Bath oolite, Stonefield slate, and the lias, beds of bituminous shale

and laminated limestones. Runs from S.E. to N.W., through Dorset, Wilts, Berks, Gloucester, Oxford, Rutland, Northampton, Lincoln, and York; and the lias through Dorset, Wilts, Berks, Somerset, Gloucester, Warwick, Leicester, Nottingham, Lincoln, Yorkshire. Remains of plants and animals (chiefly huge reptilia) of extinct families.

5. New red sandstone.-Saliferous marls, magnesian limestone. Passes through Devon, Somerset, Warwick, Stafford, Nottingham, Lancashire, Cheshire, Cumberland. Magnesian limestone from Trent to Tyne, in Nottingham, Shropshire, York, Westmoreland, Durham. Few fossils of extinct species.

6. Carboniferous system. Coal measures, mountain limestone, and carboniferous slates. Coal distributed in local areas, chiefly in Somerset, Gloucester, North and South Wales, Worcester, Stafford, Warwick, Leicester, Derby, Nottingham, Lancashire, York, Cumberland, Durham, and Northumberland; in Scotland, those of Firth and Clyde. Superabundance of tropical vegetation in the coal measures; of marine shells and zoophytes in mountain limestone.

7. Old red sandstone, or Devonian.-Yellow

sandstone, red conglomerate, and gray flagstone. In Devon, Hereford, Monmouth, Shropshire; in Scotland at Caithness, Cromarty, &c. Remains chiefly of fishes; few plants.

8. Silurian system.-Ludlow, Wenlock, and Llandeilo series-gritty and slaty beds, sandstones and limestones, white freestone, and calcareous flags. Occurs in Gloucester, Worcester, Stafford, Hereford, Shropshire, Radnor, Montgomery, Caermarthen, Brecknock, Pembroke, and Monmouth. Fossils are zoophytes, radiata, mollusks, annelids, and crustacea, all marine. 9. Metamorphic, non-fossiliferous, or azoic system-consists of hard and crystalline rocks, with no vestiges of plants or animals; embraces the clay-slate, mica-schist, and gneiss groups. The gneiss, an aggregate of quartz, felspar, and mica; mica-schist, of mica and quartz; clayslate, a fine-grained, fissile, argillaceous rock, well known as roofing slates, &c., developed in Cumberland and Wales; and the mica-schist, gneiss, and granite in the Highlands and West Isles of Scotland, the North of Ireland, and "flank all the principal mountain chains in the world."-J. F. LEACHMAN, B.A., St. Loyes., Bedford.

The Young Student and Writer's Assistant.

GRAMMAR CLASS.

MODEL EXERCISE, No. XXIX.

Vide Vol. V., page 359.

I. From, a preposition gov. character in the objective case.

The, demons. adj. pron., qual. character. Character, noun, com., neut., sing., obj., gov. by from.

Of, prep. gov. agency in the obj. case.
The, as before, qual. agency.

Agency, noun, com., neut., sing., obj., gov. by of.

Which, rel. pron., agr. w. agency in gender, number, and person, obj. case, gov. by to employ. It, pers. pron., neut., sing., nom. case to pleased.

Pleased, verb act., ind., past, 3rd pers., sing., agr. w. it.

The, as before.

Almighty, an adjective, used here as a proper noun, masc., sing., 3rd, obj. c., gov. by pleased. To employ, verb act., infin., gov. by pleased. In, preposition, having for its object the suc ceeding clause.

Making, act. part. of the verb to make, gov. will in the obj. c. by in.

Known, pas. part., having to be understood. His, poss. adj. pron., mas., sing., 3rd, qual.

will.

Will, noun, com., neut., sing., 3rd obj., gov. by making.

To, prep. gov. mankind in the obj. c.

[blocks in formation]

While, adv. of time. Every, indef. adj.

Class, noun, com., neut., sing., nom. to have. Of, preposition.

Men, com. noun, inas., plu., obj. case, gov. by of.

Have, verb act., ind., pres., 3rd plu., and hence not agreeing with class, which it ought to do. Their, poss. adj. pron., com., plu., 3rd, qual. prejudices.

Prejudices, noun, com., neut., sing., obj., gov. by have.

Those, dem. adj. pron. qual. prejudices understood.

[blocks in formation]

Mankind, noun, coin., sing., obj. c., gov. by to. by in.

It, as before, nom. to seems.

Seems, verb neut., ind., 3rd, agr. w. it.

No, adv. of negation, qual. more.

Of, preposition.

The, as before.

Supreme, adj. qual. Ruler.

Employing the Mind and Improving it, and the Opposite Influence of Novel Reading and the Study of Sound Literature; by Mr. James, of Scorrier, on the Necessity of Effort in the Maintenance of the Society; by Mr. John Brown (a man of colour), who spoke with a considerable degree of animation on the advantages of Young Men's Societies, comparing them to a lookingglass, in which might be seen the character of the men of the future. Three of the members of the society then followed, expressing the personal

benefits they had received from its formation, and pointing out some of the best means of promoting its future extension and usefulness. Allusions were also made to the alleged charge of rivalry with the institution already in the town, which charge was shown to be groundless, as its pretensions were humbler, and its basis, as a christian though unsectarian society, is widely different. After a vote of thanks to the chairman and the ladies, the meeting was concluded.

Literature.

LIST OF NEW BOOKS,

ON EDUCATIONAL, LITERARY, AND SCIENTIFIC SUBJECTS.

Adams's (H. G.) Beautiful Shells, illust., ls.
Story of the Seasons, 1s. 6d.

Akerman's Remains of Pagan Saxondom, col.
plates, 60s.

Albite's French Genders Conquered, 1s. 6d.

-How to Speak French, 4th ed., 4s. 6d.
Allingham's (W.) Music Master, 3s. 6d.
Arago's Meteorological Essays, by Humboldt and
Sabine, 18s.

Aristotle on Vital Principle, trans., with Notes by
Dr. Collier, 8s. 6d.

Arnold's (W. D.) Palace at Westminster, 3s. 6d.
Bacon's Novum Organum, Latin, English Notes
by Kitchin, 9s. 6d.

Baker's (T.) Laws relating to Burials, with Notes, &c., 5s.

Bartlett's Brief History of the Christian Church, 2s. 6d.

Barrett's (Rev. W. G.) Geological Facts, 3s. 6d. Beecher's (Miss) Letters on Health and Happiness, 3s. 6d.

Bell's (A. M.) Letters and Sounds, 1s.

-English Poets, "Chaucer, vol. 6." 2s. 6d. -"Butler, vol. 1," 2s. 6d. Bennett's (J. G.) Memoirs, by a Journalist, 7s. 6d. Blackstone's Commentaries, abridged by Warren, 18s.

Bohn's Eccles. Lib.," Philo Judæus's Works, vol.
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Philo. Lib., "Thucydides, Analysis of," 5s.
"Kant's Critique, trans. by
Meiklejohn," 5s.
Scien.Lib.," Joyce's Scientific Dialogues,"

5s.
ology," &c., 58.

"Prout's Chemistry, MeteorStand. Lib., "Beaumont and Fletcher," 3s. 6d.

"Goethe's Wilhelm Meister,"3s.6d.
Extra Vol.," Heptameron of Margaret of
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-Brit. Class.," Gibbon's Rome, v. 7." 3s. 6d.
"Burke's Works, vol. 4," 3s. 6d.
Classical Lib., "Cicero on Oratory," 5s.
Booth's Essay on Existence and Attributes of
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Brougham's Works, "Sketches of Statesmen in
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Burchett's (R.) Practical Geometry, 5s.
Burlend's (E.) Catechism of English History, 9d.
Century (A) of Acrostics, 2s. 6d.

Chambers's Ed. Course, "Exercises and Pro-
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Drawing, 2 books," 2s. ea.

Chambers's Ed. Course," Medieval History,"3s 6d. "Burn's Isometrical "School German Dic

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Colquhoun's (J. C.) Short Sketches of some
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Constable's For. Mis., "Recollections of Russia,'
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Copland's (J.) Arithmetic of Fractions, Is.
Dallas's (E. W.) Elements of Plane Practical
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Dawson's (J. W.) Acadian Geology, illust., 10s.
Delassaux and Elliott's Street Architecture, steel
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Des Carrières French Idiomatical Phrases, 14th
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Doran's Queens of England under House of
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Douglas's (Fred.) My Bondage and My Freedom,
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Doyle's (M.) Village Lesson Book, 1s.
Dudevant's French and English

Idiomatic

Phrases and Dialogues, 2s. 6d.
Edison's Legitimate System of National Educa-
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Elwes's Concise English, French, and Italian
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Encyclopædia Met., "Phillips's (Rev. J.) Geo-
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Errors in Speaking and Writing Corrected, 6d. Galignani's Walk through the Exhibition of 1855, 3s. 6d.

Georg's Conversational Grammar of French Lan-
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Glen's Influence Exerted by the Mind over the
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Goodwin's Practical Grammar of the English
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Gosse's Manual of Marine Zoology for British
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Hallam's Constitutional History of England,
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Handbook for Travellers in Portugal, with Map, 7s. 6d.

Harris's (Dr. J.) Patriarchy, 10s.

Havet's (A.) Complete French Class-Book, 6s.
Herring's (R.) Paper and Paper Making, by
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Hicks's Wanderings by the Lochs and Streams
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Hooker and Arnott's British Flora, 7th ed., 14s. plain; 21s., col.

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