But the admirers of modern oratory, the readers of Sheridan, Curran and Philips, will perhaps demand that definition of oratory which thus excludes their favorites from all competition with the orators of antiquity. We define it to be, the means of attaining, by the persuasion either of the feelings or reasons of men, an end which of ourselves, we cannot effect. This is the only point of view in which a statesman would use rhetoric as an instrument. The display of learning and the exhibition of the graces of composition and style, he leaves to the author in his closet who has time to bestow upon pursuits less exalted than his. The real orator, if he be the subject of a despot, will study the character of the man whom he sues, and mould his address in the form most persuasive to him who holds the power of which he would avail himself. If on the other hand the power which he seeks resides with the people, he will appeal to that temper and those dispositions which are common to the mass, and having selected the arguments and sentiments most persuasive to them, would never think of sacrificing one tittle of them to secure the reputation of an orator with the future generations who might read his effusions. Ridiculous as it may seem to the lovers of the gaudy imagery and polished periods of the Irish orators, we maintain that the speeches of Cromwell and of Vane, which seem so absurd to us now, in effecting their ends, accomplished the true object of rhetoric. They suited the temper of the times, they served to mould the progress of public opinion, and proved powerful instruments in directing the revolution. Profound observers of those times, they were too sagacious as statesmen to think of sacrificing the means of securing great public ends for the sake of pleasing the taste of posterity and acquiring the reputation of turning polished periods--a task in which, after all, the wretched Waller had excelled them.