The mind of
Naville is mathematical and his objects moral. His strength lies in
_mathematicizing_ morals. As soon as it becomes a question of
development, metamorphosis, organization--as soon as he is brought into
contact with the mobile world of actual life, especially of the
spiritual life, he has no longer anything serviceable to say. Language
is for him a system of fixed signs; a man, a people, a book, are so many
geometrical figures of which we have only to discover the properties.
December 15th.--Naville's sixth lecture, an admirable one, because it
did nothing more than expound the Christian doctrine of eternal life. As
an extempore performance--marvelously exact, finished, clear and noble,
marked by a strong and disciplined eloquence. There was not a single
reservation to make in the name of criticism, history or philosophy. It
was all beautiful, noble, true and pure. It seems to me that Naville has
improved in the art of speech during these latter years. He has always
had a kind of dignified and didactic beauty, but he has now added to it
the contagious cordiality and warmth of feeling which complete the
orator; he moves the whole man, beginning with the intellect but
finishing with the heart. He is now very near to the true virile
eloquence, and possesses one species of it indeed very nearly in
perfection.
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