Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/30

 celebrated passage in the "De Coronâ":—"Ὄὐκ ἔστιν, οὐκ ἔστιν, ὅπως ἡμάπτετε, ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, τὸν ὑπὲρ τῆς απάντων ἐλευθερίας καὶ σωτηρίας κίνδυνον ᾀράμενοι; ὀυ μὰ τὸυς ἐν Μαραθῶνι προκινδυνεύσθντας. —κ.τ.λ."

I have heard a successful candidate relate that a man who stood against him for Preston—a man famous for his power of coarse invective, and of whom Mr. Pitt, when he once met him in company, said, " A clever man, but too coarse,"—called some one he was inveighing against, "an aristocratic spitting-box." I think it was Lord Stanley he thus designated. This is the nearest approach that has come within my observation to the Greek oratory. The designation given by Demosthenes to Æschines—τὸν κατάπτυστον τουτονὶ—is very lamely and imperfectly reproduced by the words "this despicable fellow," in Mr. Kennedy's translation. The power of invective, that is of applying to an opponent the language of reproach, depreciation, and contempt, has always been reckoned one of the weapons of an orator. But there is a species of language which goes beyond this, and may be described as foul and abusive—language such as is used by the lowest ruffians. I do not remember in any English orator any specimens of