DIAL. II. CRITOM. Still methinks that fweet eafinefs you so much commend, falls not in fo naturally with our English tongue or humour. At least it is not fo great, as that elevated way of writing, that noble air which rifes up to the Sublime of Longinus. EUDOX. High-founding expreffions are no certain arguments of greatness of thoughts, nor is it a commendation to be great in difproportion. A ftudy'd grandeur of expreffion is very apt to lead too far, nor is it a lefs fault to be too high, than too low for the fubject. Believe me, Sir, you will find upon examination (and there is a great difference between examining and criticizing) you will find those pregnant fancies often have very odd productions, while the heat of their imagination presses them on fo violently that they are feldom exact. If they would take Horace's and Quintilian's advice, in keeping their works till the warmth of compofition is cooler, they wou'd make a confiderable change; and looking them over as readers rather than as authors, they would cut off several places, wherein they wou'd find, what I think Callicrates calls monftrofity of thought. Neque humilia neque fupra dignitatem elata. Arift. Rhet. lib. 3. cap. 2. Ut refrigerato inventionis amore, diligentius repetitos tanquam lector perpenderet. Quint. ad Tryph. CRITOM. As for that matter, there is no author fo accurate but might change feveral places, and cut others intirely off. Yet there muft, I suppose, be fome end of Accuracy as well as of Liberty ". To go to that rigour, nothing fhou'd be ever publifh'd because it may ftill be mended. Probably also, they wou'd make new faults in correcting the former; and the very anxiety of being exact, would make them most accurately flat. Whereas a certain unconftrain'd freedom, gives a mighty vigour, CLEAND. Imuft own I have that notion still hanging upon me, notwithstanding the change I find in these matters. And to tell you the truth, Eudoxus, I do not yet well conceive in what the exactness you so much require, nor in what that accuracy you complain is wanting, does confift. EUDOX. I have already given feveral hints, examples and authorities, that in part explain in what it does, and many of what it does not confist in. As indeed the moft perfect things can hardly be explain'd but by negatives. I will add now in fhort, that it con DIAL. Tamen in hac ipfa curâ eft aliquid fatis. Quint. lib. 8. Proæm. i Quod etiamfi idcircò fieret ut femper optimis uterentur, abominanda tamen hac infelicitas erat qua & curfum dicendi refrenat, & calorem cogitationis extinguit mora diffidentia. Ibid. II. II. Be DIAL. fifts in that equality of Style, which every where maintaining it felf with a juft proportion,feems neither studied nor neglected; and without any fcrupulous niceties in the difpofition of words, has ftill that order of them which makes the harmony of a period. They fhou'd neither be loofe, nor hamper'd as it were, or chain'd up to the laws of verfe *, as Cicero declares. Ariftotle gives the fame rule, and adds the reason why the Style fhou'd neither be metrical nor void of regular numbers. cause that, fays he', makes a Poem of your discourse, and appearing feigned, is less apt to perfuade; and moreover diftracts your thoughts while it fets you upon an attentive expectation of the like cadence. On the other fide, where there is no regard to numbers, the expreffions cannot properly be finifh'd. You may remember we were lately reading Ifocrates, and ob ferved that his numbers, though at first so fweet and melodious, began foon to displease, because too conftantly falling into the like rolling of found. On the contrary, a care Neque alligata fint certa aliquâ lege verfus, neque ita foluta ut vagentur. Cic. de Orat. 1. 3. p. med. 1 Formam elocutionis oportet neque metricam effe, neque numerorum expertem. Illud enim minus aptum ad perfuadendum, nam effe fictum videtur, & fimul avocat. Nam facit ut attendatur quando fimile redibit. Quod autem fine numero eft, fine termino eft. quamobrem numerum habere oportet ordtionem, non metrum. Alioquin poema erit neque tamen numeros exquifitos. Arift. Rhet. lib. 3. cap. 8. ..... lefs II. lefs jumbling of words together makes an DIAL. ungrateful noife and disorder. Then befides: words fhould come to the car with a full, but not with a frightful found. 'Tis true, fays Tully, harmony of Style cannot be tryed fo well by rules of art, as judged of by a kind of natural perception. Yet generally speaking, it is, as I may fay, nothing but the hurry of thought which makes the expreffion unequal. This cannot well choose but be congruous, when that is digefted. Where the Idea is accurate, the terms will be fo too; and wherever you find the words hobble, you may conclude the notion was lame; otherwife they wou'd both have had an equal and graceful pace. But befides this care of the harmony, a much greater is to be had in the other parts of a judicious accuracy in writing. I will touch upon them rather in another man's words than my own, both because he is counted a very good judge in these matters, and because I defpair of expreffing what I have meant hitherto by this accuracy, in better or equal terms. Give me leave then to read you a page or two I have here tranflated from Rapin's Inftructions for Hiftory. For what he applies there to writing of Hiftory, is methinks proportionably true in other kinds of writing. Non arte aliquâ perpenditur, fed quodam quafi naturali fenfu judicatur. Cic. fupra. " To DIAL. II. "To write fenfibly and judiciously, " fays he ", is to go on, directly to your point, in whatever matter, without "ftraying afide, or amufing your felf in the cr way: It is to deliver things with a kind " of wisdom and command, which aban"dons not it felf to the heat of imagina"tion or vivacity of wit: It is to know "how to fupprefs whatever is fuperfluous "in the expreffion, as are those adverbs "and epithets, which leffen things by ex aggerating of them: To leave nothing that "is idle, languifhing or useless: To cut "off generously whatever ought not to be faid, however beautiful it may feem: "To give always less to luftre than to fo"lidity: Not to fhew fire and heat, where "all fhou'd be cool and fedate: To examine "all your thoughts, and measure all your "words, by that exactness of fenfe and "difcretion, from which nothing escapes " which is not accurate and judicious: " "Tis, in fine, to be able to refift the "temptation we naturally have to fhew "our wit; as does that impertinent histo"rian, who in the defeat of the Parthians by the emperor Severus, makes Ofroës "retire to a grott, fhaded with the laurel and "the myrtle; and ftriving to be agreeable, "becomes ridiculous; which is the most Rapin Inftruct. pour l'Hift. §. 3. < flip... |