apologize;--he will seem for a moment to forget himself;--he will express his hearty good wishes for the deserving, and vent his execrations against notorious villainy;--and now and then he will descend imperceptibly to the most tender and insinuating familiarities. There are likewise Other beauties of composition which he will not fail to pursue;--such as brevity where the subject requires it;--a lively and pathetic description of important occurrences;--a passionate exaggeration of remarkable circumstances;--an earnestness of expression which implies more than is said;--a well-timed variety of humour;--and a happy imitation of different characters and dispositions. Assisted and adorned by such figures as these, which are very numerous, the force of Eloquence will appear in its brightest lustre. But even these, unless they are properly formed and regulated, by a skilful disposition of their constituent words, will never attain the merit we require;--a subject which I shall be obliged to treat of in the sequel, though I am restrained partly by the circumstances already mentioned, but much more so by the following. For I am sensible not only that there are some invidious people, to whom every improvement appears vain and superfluous; but that even those, who are well-wishers to my reputation, may think it beneath the dignity of a man whose public services have been so honourably distinguished by the Senate, and the whole body of the Roman people, to employ my pen so largely upon the art of Speaking. [Footnote: The long apology which our author is now going to make for bestowing his time in composing a treatise of Oratory, is in fact a very artful as well as an elegant digression; to relieve the dryness and intricacy of the abstract he has just given us of the figures of rhetoric, and of the subsequent account of the rules of prosaic harmony. He has also enlivened that account (which is a very long one) in the same manner, by interspersing it, at convenient distances, with fine examples, agreeable companions, and short historical digressions to elucidate the subject.] If, however, I was to return no other answer to the latter, but that I was unwilling to deny any thing to the request of Brutus, the apology must be unexceptionable; because I am only aiming at the satisfaction of an intimate friend, and a worthy man, who desires nothing of me but what is just and honourable.