As a speaker and as a writer he had the power to enlighten
and persuade, to move, to please, to charm, to astonish. He
united those decorations that beltHig to fine talents to that
penetration and judgment tiiat designate an acute and sdid
mind. Many of hig opinions have the authority of predic-
tions fulfilled and fulfillmg. He bad the ability of investiga^
rion, and, where it was necessary, did investigate with patient
attention, going through a series of observation and deduc-
tion, and tracing the links whidi connect one truth with an-
other. When the result of his researches was exhibited in
discourse, the steps of a logical process were in some mea-
snre concealed by the coloring of rhetoric. Minute calcula*
tions and dry details were employments, however, the least
adapted to his peculiar construction of mind. It was easy
and delightful for him to illustrate by a picture, but painful
and laborious to prove by a diagram. It was the prerog^
tive of his mind to discern by a glance, bo rapid as to seem
intuition, those truths which common capacities struggle hard
to apprehend ; and it was the part of his eloquence to dis-
play, expand, and enforce them.
His imagination was a distinguishing feature of his mind.
Prolific, grand, sportive, original, it gave him the command
of nature and ert, and enabled him to vary the disposition
and the dress of his ideas without end. Now it assembled
most pleasing images, adorned with all that is soft and bean-
tiful ; and now rose in the storm, wielding the elements and
flashing with the most awfiil splendors.
Very few men have produced more oiiginal combinations.
ty Google



]g LIF£ OF FISHER AMES.
