"Non tumultus, non quies; sed quale magni metûs, et magnæ iræ, silentium est."-Tacitus.

177. Sometimes it hurries, forces, and subjugates the mind by the vigour, nervousness, and conciseness of its words and ideas which succeed each other with the rapidity of the thought. Sometimes it strikes, confounds, overthrows, and hurries away the mind by the vehemence and impetuosity of its movements, which rush like a torrent from the soul of the speaker, take forcible possession of the mind of the hearer, and hurry him away by the force and grandeur of its conceptions.

Ex. The sacred scriptures abound with examples of grandeur and sublimity, and should we attempt to quote all the passages that might be adduced from the sacred volume alone, we should never end. We may, however, point particularly to Psalms, ii., xvii., cxiii.; Isaiah, chap. xxiii., xxvii., xxviii., and passim ; Joel ii.; Amos ix.; Micah v., vii., etc.

Cicero, I. Catiline. Bossuet, Orais. fun. Reine d'Angleterre.

"Celui qui regne dans les cieux, et de qui relévent tous les empires, à qui seul appartient la gloire, la majestè, et l'independance, est aussi le seul qui se glorifie de faire la loi aux rois, et de leur donner, quand il lui plaît, de grandes et terribles leçons," etc.

'Gens

Duris ut ilex tonsa bipennibus
Nigræ feraci frondis in Algido,
Per damna, per cædes, ab ipso
Ducit opes animumque ferro.

*

Carthagini jam non ego nuntios
Mittam superbos: occidit, occidit

Spes omnis, et fortuna nostri

Nominis, Hasdrubale interempto."-Hor.

178. We see it in Demosthenes, launching the thunders of his eloquence against Philip of Macedon; we see it in the Roman orator, shaking the soul of Catiline and laying him prostrate in the dust; we see it in Bossuet, soaring with eagle-like flight above the tombs of kings and heroes, and revealing the nothingness of human greatness, or unrolling the chart of the revolutions of the world.

179. Without true sublimity in the thought, the image, or the sentiment, lofty expressions, and highsounding phrases are mere fustian and bombast.

180. Hence the sublime in style is merely a faithful representation of what is really so in objects.

Ex. "I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree. Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found."-Psalm xxxvii. 35, 36.

It is true that the last trait in the above description effaces the impression of the preceding one; but it does not thence follow that the image presented in the former is not sublime. I will even go farther, and do not hesitate to say that the last is only sublime on account of the grandeur of the preceding image. The suddenness of the fall of the wicked, the contrast between his past grandeur and the nothing to which he is reduced, would no longer have astonished us, if his greatness and pride had not been carried to the very highest point of arrogance. The first image, then, is really sublime, and the last is still more so, because it is the sublime carried to

the highest point of which the conception is capable. This is called by authors the sublime properly so called.

181. Moreover, as it is impossible to fix with precision the bounds within which or beyond which a subject ceases to be simple or sublime, and as between these extremes the degrees are infinite, so we cannot assign the limits which separate the temperate style from the simple, on the one hand and the sublime on the other, and distinguish precisely the almost infinite shades of resemblance in which they approach each other.

182. Often too the various things that come to be treated of in the same subject will require sometimes the simple, sometimes the temperate, and sometimes the sublime style; and hence it is their skilful combination and adaptation to the subject, with that harmonious and charming variety that is the result, which characterizes the master-pieces of genius, and assures to them immortality. "Is enim est eloquens," says Cicero, "qui et parva summissè, et media temperatè, et magna graviter potest dicere."

OF PARTICULAR PRINCIPLES,

OR,

OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF COMPOSITION.

183. Such are the general and fundamental principles which ought to direct genius and taste in

every composition; the writer, however, ought, besides, to be made acquainted with the particular principles which belong to each species of composition, and which he ought to follow in the composition of different kinds of works, according to the nature of the subject of which he treats, and the object or end he has in view.

All the possible kinds of composition may be reduced to five principal heads; the EPISTOLARY, the HISTORICAL, the DIDACTIC, the ORATORICAL, and the POETICAL.

PART I.

OF EPISTOLARY WRITING.

184. A LETTER is a conversation carried on in writing. The style, then, should be simple and easy. But the incorrectness, the obscurities, the long prosy details and useless repetition of words, the peculiar turns in the thought or in the expression, in short all those negligences which are quite excusable in conversation, are unpardonable in a letter, because we have leisure to think and to select our expressions. All imprudence, such as committing ourselves, compromising others, and the like, ought still more to be guarded against, because it cannot be repaired:-scripta manent.

185. The capital point in a letter is propriety or suitableness, which consists in never forgetting what we are ourselves, who are the persons to whom we speak, and those of whom we speak in our letters.

It is moreover essential to pay a scrupulous regard to etiquette.

186. Tact and sensibility, aided by practice, by experience, by intercourse with polished and well educated persons, and above all by the study of the best models of epistolary correspondence, such as Cicero, Pliny, Pope, Swift, Mad. de Sevignè, Fenelon, Balzac, etc., who are better guides than any rules that can be given to acquire this art, which indeed it must be allowed is very difficult to execute well, but yet at the same time is so necessary in the constant intercourse of life.

187. Since all possible subjects may be discussed in letters, the rules belonging to the different species of composition are applicable to them; for example, those of historical composition apply to epistolary narrations, recitals of news, etc.; those of the didactic kind, to those letters in which philosophical, moral and literary topics are subjects of discussion; and those of the oratorical to letters of business, of asking a favour, of returning thanks, of refusal, of reproach, of excuse, of congratulation, of condolence, of recommendation, etc. We must, however, whatever may be the subject on which we write, be careful never to depart from the simplicity and easy flow of expression which constitutes the distinctive characteristic of epistolary composition.