diculous it puts one in mind of a most curious device in Gothic paintings, that of making every figure explain itself by a written label issuing from its mouth. The description which a parasite, in the Eunuch of Terence,* gives of himself, makes a sprightly soliloquy; but it is not consistent with the rules of propriety; for no man, in his ordinary state of mind, and upon a familiar subject, ever thinks of talking aloud to himself. The same objection lies against a soliloquy in the Adelphi of the same author.† The soliloquy which makes the third scene, act third, of his Heicyra, is insufferable; for there Pamphilus, soberly and circumstantially, re. lates to himself an adventure which had happened to him a mo, ment before.

Corneille is not more happy in his soliloquies than in his dialogue. Take for a specimen the first scene of Cinna.

Racine also is extremely faulty in the same respect. His soliloquies are regular harangues, a chain completed in every link, without in. terruption or interval: that of Antiochus in Berenicet resembles a regular pleading, where the parties pro and con display their argu. ments at full length. The following soliloquies are equally faulty: Bajazet, act 3. sc. 7; Mithridate, act 3. sc. 4. and act 4. sc. 5; Iphigenia, act 4. sc. 8.

Soliloquies upon lively or interesting subjects, but without any turbulence of passion, may be carried on in a continued chain of thought. If, for example, the nature and sprightliness of the subject prompt a man to speak his thoughts in the form of a dialogue, the expression must be carried on without break or interruption, as in a dialogue between two persons: which justifies Falstaff's soliloquy upon honour.

What need I be so forward with Death, that calls not on me? Well, 'tis no matter, Honour pricks me on. But how if Honour prick me off, when I come on? how then? Can Honour set a leg? No; or an arm? No: ortake away the grief of a wound? No: Honour hath no skill in surgery then? No. What is Honour? A word-What is that word honour? Air; a trim reckoning.Who hath it? He that died a Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. Is it insensible then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No. Why? Detraction will not suffer it. Therefore I'll none of it; Honour is a mere scutcheon: and so ends my catechism.

First Part Henry IV. act 5. sc. 2.

And even without dialogue, a continued discourse may be justified, where a man reasons in a soliloquy upon an important subject; for if in such a case it be at all excusable to think aloud, it is ne. cessary that the reasoning be carried on in a chain; which justifies that admirable soliloquy in Hamlet upon life and immortality, being a serene meditation upon the most interesting of all subjects. And the same consideration will justify the soliloquy that introduces the 5th act of Addison's Cato.

The next class of the grosser errors which all writers ought to avoid, shall be of language elevated above the tone of the sentiment; of which take the following instances :

"Act 2. sc. 2.

+ Act 1. sc. 1.

Act 1. sc. 2.

Zara. Swift as occasion, I

Myself will fly; and earlier than the morn
Wake thee to freedom. Now 'tis late; and yet
Some news few minutes past arriv'd, which seem'd
To shake the temper of the King. Who knows
What racking cares disease a monarch's bed?
Or love, that late at night still lights his lamp,
And strikes his rays through dusk, and folded lids,
Forbidding rest may stretch his eyes awake,
And force their balls abroad at this dead hour.
I'll try.-Morning Bride, act 3. sc. 4.

The language here is undoubtedly too pompous and laboured for describing so simple a circumstance as absence of sleep. In the following passage, the tone of the language, warm and plaintive, is well suited to the passion, which is recent grief: but every one will be sensible, that in the last couplet save one, the tone is changed, and the mind suddenly elevated to be let fall as suddenly in the last couplet :

Il détest à jamais sa coupable victoire,

Il renonce à la cour, aux humains, à la gloire;
Et se fuïant lui-même, au milieu des deserts,
Il va cacher sa peine au bout de l'univers;
La, soit que le soleil rendit le jour au monde,
Soit qu'il finit sa course au vaste seine de l'onde,
Sa voix faisoit redire aux echos attendris.

Le nom, le triste nom, de son malheureux fils.

Henriade, chant. viii. 229.

Language too artificial, or too figurative for the gravity, dignity, or importance, of the occasion, may be put in a third class.

Chimene demanding justice against Rodrigue who killed her father, instead of a plain and pathetic expostulation, makes a speech stuffed with the most artificial flowers of rhetoric:

Sire, mon pere est mort, mes yeux ont vu son sang
Couler à gros bouillons de son généreux flanc;
Ce sang qui tant de fois garantit vos murailles,
Ce sang qui tant de fois vous gagna des batailles,
Ce sang qui, tout sorti, fume encore de courroux
De se voir répandu pour d'autres que pour vous,
Qu'au milieu des hazards n'osoit verser la guerre,
Rodrigue en votre cour vient d'en couvrir la terre.
J'ai couru sur le lieu sans force, et sans couleur :
Je l'ai trouvé sans vie. Excusez ma douleur,
Sire; la voix me manque à ce récit funeste,
Mes pleurs et mes soupirs vous diront mieux le reste.

And again,

Son flanc étoit ouvert, et, pour mieux m'emouvoir.
Son sang sur la poussiere écrivoit mon devoir;

On plûtôt sa valeur en cet état réduite

Me parloit par se plaie, et bâtoit ma pursuite,

Et pour se faire entendre au plus juste des Rois,

Par cette triste bouche elle empruntoit ma voix -Act 2. sc. 9.

Nothing can be contrived in language more averse to the tone of the passion than this florid speech: I should imagine it more apt to provoke laughter than to inspire concern or pity.

In a fourth class shall be given specimens of language too light or airy for a severe passion.

Imagery and figurative expressions are discordant, in the highest degree, with the agony of a mother, who is deprived of two hopeful sons by a brutal murder. Therefore the following passage is un

doubtedly in a bad taste.

Again,

Queen. Ah, my poor princes! ah, my tender babes!
My unblown flow'rs, new appearing sweets!

If yet your gentle souls fly in the air,

And be not fix'd in doom perpetual,

Hover about me with your airy wings,

And hear your mother's lamentation.-Richard III, aet 4.

K. Philip. You are as fond of grief as of your child.
Constance. Grief fills the room up of my absent child,

Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,

Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,

Stuffs out his vacant garment with his form;

Then have I reason to be fond of grief.-King John, act 3. sc. 6.

A thought that turns upon the expression instead of the subject, commonly called a play of words, being low and childish, is unworthy of any composition, whether gay or serious, that pretends to any degree of elevation: thoughts of this kind make a fifth class.

In the Amynta of Tasso* the lover falls into a mere play of words, demanding how he who had lost himself could find a mistress. And for the same reason, the following passage in Corneille has been generally condemned:

Chimene. Mon pere est mort, Elvire, et la premiere épée
Dont s'est armée, Rodrigue a sa trame coupée.
Pleurez, pleurez, mes yeux, et fondez-vous en eau,

La moitié de ma vie a mis l'autre au tombeau,

Et m'oblige à venger, après ce coup funeste,

Celle que je n'ai plus, sur celle qui me reste.-Cid, act 3. sc. 3.

To die is to be banish'd from myself:
And Sylvia is myself; banish'd from her,
Is self from self; a deadly banishment !

Two Gentlemen of Verona, act 3. sc. 3.

Countess. I pray thee, Lady, have a better cheer :

If thou engrosseth all the griefs as thine,

Thou robb'st me of a moiety.-All's Well that Ends Well, act 3. sc 3:

K. Henry. O my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows!
When that my care could not withhold thy riots,

What wilt thou do when riot is thy care?

Oh! thou wilt be a wilderness again,

Peopled with wolves, thy old inhabitants.

Second Part Henry IV. act 4. sc. 11.

Cruda Amarilla, che col nome ancora

D'amar, ahi lasso, amaramente insegni.-Pasto Fido, act 1. sc. 1.

Act 1, sc. 2.

Antony, speaking of Julius Cæsar :

world! thou wast the forest of this hart:
And this, indeed, O world, the heart of thee.
How like a deer, stricken by many princes,
Dost thou here lie!-Julius Cæsar, act 3. sc. 3.

Playing thus with the sound of words, which is still worse than a pun, is the meanest of all conceits. But Shakspeare, when he descends to a play of words, is not always in the wrong; for it is done sometimes to denote a peculiar character, as in the following passage:

1

K. Philip. What say'st thou, boy? look in the lady's face.
Lewis I do, my Lord, and in her eye I find

A wonder, or a wond'rous miracle;

The shadow of myself form'd in her eye;
Which being but the shadow of your son,

Becomes a sun, and makes your son a shadow.
I do protest, I never lov'd myself

Till now infixed I beheld myself

Drawn in the flatt'ring table of her eye.

Faulconbridge. Drawn in the flatt'ring table of her eye!
Hang'd in the frowning wrinkle of her brow!

And quarter'd in her heart! he doth espy

Himself Love's traitor: this is pity now,

That hang'd, and drawn, and quarter d. there should be
In such a love so vile a lout as he.-King John, act 2. sc. 5.

A jingle of words is the lowest species of that low wit; which is scarce sufferable in any case, and least of all in an heroic poem : and yet Milton, in some instances, has descended to that puerility: And brought into the world a world of woe.

-begirt th' Almighty throne

Beseeching or besieging

Which tempted our attempt

At one slight bound high overleap'd all bound.
With a shout

Loud as from numbers without number.

One should think it unnecessary to enter a caveat against an expression that has no meaning, or no distinct meaning; and yet somewhat of that kind may be found even among good writers. Such make a sixth class.

Sebastian. I beg no pity for this mould'ring clay,
For if you give it burial, there it takes

Possession of your earth:

If burnt and scatter'd in the air, the winds

That strew my dust, diffuse my royalty,

And spread me o'er your clime; for where one atom
Of mine shall light, know there Sebastian reigns.

Dryden, Don Sebastian King of Portugal, act 1.

Cleopatra. Now, what news, my Charmion?
Will he be kind? and will he not forsake me?
Am I to live or die? nay, do I live?
Or am I dead? for when he gave his answer,
Fate took the word, and then I liv'd or died.

Dryden, All for Love, act 2

If she be coy, and scorn my noble fire,

If her chill heart I cannot move;
Why, I'll enjoy the very love,

And make a mistress of my own desire.-Cowley, poem inscribed, The Request. His whole poem, inscribed, My Picture, is a jargon of the same kind.

Tis he, they cry, by whom

Not men, but war itself is overcome-Indian Queen.

Such empty expressions are finely ridiculed in the Rehearsal
Was't not unjust to ravish hence her breath,

And in life's stead to leave us nought but death.-Act 4. sc. 1.

CHAP. XVIII.

BEAUTY OF LANGUAGE.

Of all the fine arts, painting only and sculpture are in their na ture imitative. An ornamented field is not a copy, or imitation of nature, but nature itself embellished. Architecture is productive of originals, and copies not from nature. Sound and motion may in some measure be imitated by music; but, for the most part, music, like architecture, is productive of originals. Language copies not from nature, more than music or architecture; unless where, like music, it is imitative of sound or emotion. Thus, in the descrip tion of particular sounds, language sometimes, furnisheth words, which, besides their customary power of exciting ideas, resemble by their softness or harshness the sounds described; and there are words which, by the celerity or slowness of pronunciation, have some resemblance to the motion they signify. The imitative power of words goes one step farther: the loftiness of some words makes them proper symbols of lofty ideas; a rough subject is imitated by harsh-sounding words; and words of many syllables, pronounced slow and smooth, are expressive of grief and melancholy. Words have a separate effect on the mind, abstracting from their signification and from their imitative power: They are more or less agreeable to the ear by the fulness, sweetness, faintness, or roughness of their tones.

These are but faint beauties, being known to those only who have more than ordinary acuteness of perception. Language pos sesseth a beauty superior greatly in degree, of which we are emi nently sensible when a thought is communicated with perspicuity and sprightliness. This beauty of language, arising from its power of expressing thought, is apt to be confounded with the beauty of the thought itself; the beauty of thought transferred to the expres sion makes it appear more beautiful.* But these beauties, if we

Chap. 2. part 1. § 5. Demetrius Phalereus (of Elocution, § 75.) makes the same observation. We are apt, says that author, to confound the language with the subject, and if the latter be nervous, we judge the same of the former. But they are clearly distinguishable; and it is not uncommon to find subjects of great dignity dressed in mean language. Theopompus is celebrated for the force of his diction, but erroneously; his subject indeed has great force, but his style very little