Jesus Christ? If the blood of martyrs is heard crying out of heaven against the persecutors of the faith, how much more will the blood of the Redeemer be heard!"

Acts xx., 10-13. Matt. vii., 11; vi., 30. S., "Othello," act iv., scene i., lines 20, 21. "Henry IV.," part ii., act iv., scene iv., King's 5th speech, lines 13, 14.

The gradual growth and development of character may also be ranged under climax. For this, study Shakespeare. He differs from almost all other dramatists, in that his characters are not introduced as complete figures at first: they alter, grow, and develop under our eye-a high process; we had almost said, godlike.

CXXXIX. From the Greater to the Less. The movement of the mind from a greater thing to a less, the opposite of the foregoing, is very often most beautiful. Very noble uses can the most trivial things thus be put to; yes, the most trivial that you can think of; their very commonness making the illustration all the more distinct and pungent, as when the Volscian general speaks of Coriolanus:

"Breaking his oath and resolution, like
A twist of rotten silk."

And Coriolanus replies:

"Like an eagle in a dove-cote, I
Flutter'd your Volces in Corioli."

Again, we read:

"Holding Corioli in the name of Rome,

Even like a fawning greyhound in the leash.'

66

"Coriolanus," act i., scene vi., 5th speech of Marcius. "Julius Cæsar," act iv., scene i., lines 24-30. Measure for Measure," act iii., scene i., Isabella's 12th speech. "Winter's Tale," act ii., scene i., Leontes's 7th speech, line 4. "Henry V.," act ii., scene ii., King Henry's 8th speech, line 5. Search into this minutely. You will be amused and delighted to find to what noblest uses

Shakespeare can turn the commonest and meanest things. This is very striking; and is at once an encouragement and a humiliation-a humiliation, if you can not speak forcibly; yet, for your encouragement, the materials of powerful writing lie thick strewn around you, in the very homeliest objects you can look upon: in minnow or midge; in mouse or cheese-paring. God works with the tiniest things, and so can genius. If you use, in illustration, chiefly stars, oceans, avalanches, and such like, it begets the suspicion that your tendency is to rant and bombast. Shakespeare, the unsurpassed, proves to you that objects which common minds overlook or despise are invaluable to a man of genius. No remark more momentous than this can be urged upon you. Gather from Shakespeare a hundred cases of a noble use of common things. Why, even objects that are disgusting can be used in connection with themes the loftiest: Prov. xi., 22; xv., 17, 19; Isa. vii., 20; Psa. lii., 2; lxviii., 2.

When we name the intellect-arousing name of Christ, we are reminded how specially He used to think and feel in the mould of these two figures last mentionedas His work dictated; for He came to link the Greatest and the Holiest with man in man's weakest and most depraved condition; and the lowest with the most elevated. It was, besides implication and interrogation, a great law of Christ's intellect and heart, to use these two figures the greatest linked to the least, the least linked to the greatest. Think of it, how He compared the Deity to a hen! Why, perhaps half an hour before He saw a hen ill-used! Mark well how our Master's illustration, so far from degrading His subject, throws a tender sheen around the Deity which is unsurpassed; while, on the other hand, the domestic fowl obtains a deeper interest and a sweeter eloquence than even she previously had. At one touch of His intellect and of His heart, our Jesus threw a mild lustre over at once the

most sublime height and over scenes the most unpretending. There is something here far higher than genius, though there is that, too. Throughout Scripture a tender feeling is shown for dumb creatures-a feeling which must have reached its highest in Jesus. We go so far as to fancy that there was a benign intention and reference in Jesus's being born among cows and horses. What other of the world's greatest chiefs was born in a stall? Ponder this point, which is assuredly a new reflection.

And what sort of a follower of Jesus is he who, being a pulpit orator, scarcely ever makes use of this figure of the less to the greater, or of the greater to the meanest and less? Shame to such a man! These two figures deserve each a volume. Most momentous, they. In every sermon make use of them-though we believe they have never been enumerated before. They are invaluable; the more especially as they offer you instances by the thousand. Turn to the instances to which we have sent you in Shakespeare-be very careful to study them; and of this be sure, that you can make the noblest use of hundreds and hundreds of trivial, common, nay, ugly things, for the most splendid and triumphant ends sought for in the blessed Christian pulpit. Wisely will you do, to seek after this for your next twenty years.

Further, we implore you to turn to every passage we have pointed out. This book will be shorn of one half its value if you skip them by. We have spent much time and care in obtaining them. Turn to the passages. forced to admit that

in Shakespeare, and you will be you never half appreciated that most masterly writer before. So, too, our passages in P. L. and in Scripture will very richly reward you.

CHAPTER XX.

FIGURES OF RHETORIC.

PART FIFTEENTH.

Parallelism.-Numeration.-Sudden Address.-Surprisal. -Reservation.-Pause.-Double Meaning.-Mimesis, or Mimicry.-Archaism.- Concession.- Paramologia.— Concession.-Paramologia.Synchorosis, or Permission.-Prohibition.

CXL. PARALLELISM demands separate mention, as a very important form of climax, of especial value in the history of language, of poesy, and of religious thought; owing to its being the favorite model into which the grand, inspired Hebrew poesy throws itself: a model intrinsically nobler than the arrangement, merely musical, according to feet, as among the Greeks and Romans, or according to rhyme, as with us and the modern European nations. To study parallelism, open the Psalms, the Proverbs, the lyrics of Isaiah; for example, at the opening of the first Psalm, with its three distichs, in which shape our Bibles should arrange such verses:

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly;

Nor standeth in the way of sinners,

Nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful."

First, an example from Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, pupil of Tertullian, and martyr:

"When the battle comes, for His name and honor, maintain in words that constancy which utters confession, in torture that

confidence which joins battle; in death that patience which receives the crown."

Then one from Tertullian :

"If thou placest a wrong in God's hand, He is the avenger; if a loss, He is the restorer; if pain, He is a physician; if death, He is the resurrection."

This we take from his beautiful discourse on "Patience." While Chrysostom-whose name is so emphatic, "Golden Mouth"-is continually availing himself of parallels, he whom no one of the fathers surpasses in eloquence.

CXLI. Numeration next we mention; arranging under this head every specification of numbers for the sake of making a deeper or more graphic impression. This is very triumphant in Holy Writ; study the specimens to which we refer: Prov. ix., I; xxx., 21, 29; Solomon's Song v., 4; Matt. xviii., 12, 21, 22; xix., 28, 29. So in the "Eneid," ii., 126:

"Silent was he for twice five days."

It is plain in all such passages that rhetorical and not mere arithmetical effects are sought. It is evident that with some "the first red cent" plays no unimportant part, while others of equal refinement come down. on their foes "like a thousand of bricks." In the Scottish song, sixpence is of great influence, especially when located in a specified way:

"When I hae saxpence under my thoom,

I can get credit in ilka toon;

But when I am poor, they bid me gang by;
O poverty pairts guid companie!"

In another far-famed Scottish ballad, "Auld Robin Grey," by Lady Anne Bernard, we find this instance:

"Before he had been gane a twelvemonth and a day,
My faither brak his airm, our cow was stown away."

It was a remark of the elder Matthews that the Ameri