Trollope's "Last Chronicles of Barsetshire." (Eng., 19th cent.)
Winthrop's "Cecil Dreeme," "John Brent." (U. S., 19th cent.)
[243] Richardson's "Pamela" and "Clarissa Harlowe" are interesting, because they were the beginning of the English novel; but they are not nice or natural, and have no attractions except their historic position. (Eng., 1689-1761.)
Smollett's "Humphrey Clinker" is his strongest work. "Peregrine Pickle" is very witty, and "Adventures of an Atom" altogether a miserable book. Smollett possessed power, but his work is on a very low plane. (Eng., 18th cent.)
Boccaccio's "Decameron" is a series of splendidly told tales, from which Chaucer drew much besides his inspiration. The book is strong, but of very inferior moral tone.
ORATORY.
Great and successful oratory requires deep knowledge of the human mind and character, personal force, vivid imagination, control of language and temper, and a faculty of putting the greatest truths in such clear and simple and forceful form, that they may not only be grasped by untrained minds, but will break down the barriers of prejudice and interest, and fight their way to the throne of the will. Oratory is religion, science, philosophy, biography, history, wit, pathos, and poetry in action. This department of literature is therefore of the greatest value in the development of mind and heart, and of the power to influence and control our fellows. Especially read and study Demosthenes on the Crown, Burke's "Warren Hastings' Oration," Webster's "Reply to Hayne," Phillips' "Lovejoy" and "Toussaint L'Ouverture," and Lincoln's "Gettysburg," his debates with Douglas, and his great speeches in New York and the East before the War, in which fun, pathos, and logic were all welded together in such masterly shape that professors of oratory followed him about from city to city, studying him as a model of eloquence. There is a book called "Great Orations of Great Orators" that is very valuable, and there is a series of three volumes containing the best British orations (fifteen orators), and another similar series of American speeches (thirty-two orators).