Page:The life and opinions of Tristram Shandy (Volume 1).pdf/123

 tainly irresistible;—both in his orations and disputations;—he was born an orator;—.—Persuasion hung upon his lips, and the elements of Logick and Rhetorick were so blended up in him,—and, withall, he had so shrewd guess at the weaknesses and passions of his respondent,—that might have stood up and said,—"This man is eloquent."—In short, whether he was on the weak or the strong side of the question, 'twas hazardous in either case to attack him:—And yet, 'tis strange, he had never read Cicero, nor Quintilian de Oratore, nor Isocrates, nor Aristotle, nor Longinus, amongst the antients;—nor Vossius, nor Skioppius, nor Ramus, nor Farnaby, amongst the moderns;—and what is more astonishing, he had never in his whole life the least light or spark of subtilty struck into his mind, by one single