two equal hemistichs. For example, in the first lines of Boileau's Epistle to the King. Jeune et vaillant heros | dont la haute sagesse In this train all their verses proceed; the one half of the line always answering to the other, and the same chime returning incessantly on the ear without intermission or change; which is certainly a defect in their verse, and unfits it so very much for the freedom and dignity of heroic poetry. On the other hand, it is a distinguishing advantage of our English verse, that it allows the pause to be varied through four different syllables in the line. The pause may fall after the 4th, the 5th, the 6th, or the 7th syllable; and according as the pause is placed after one or other of these syllables, the melody of the verse is much changed, its air and cadence are diversified. By this means, uncommon richness and variety are added to English versification. When the pause falls earliest, that is, after the 4th syllable, the briskest melody is thereby formed, and the most spirited air given to the line. In the following lines of the Rape of the Lock, Mr Pope has, with exquisite propriety, suited the construction of the verse to the subject: On her white breast | a sparkling cross she wore, When the pause falls after the 5th syllable, which divides the line into two equal portions, the melody is sensibly altered. The verse loses that brisk and sprightly air which it had with the former pause, and becomes more smooth, gentle, and flowing. Eternal sunshine | of the spotless mind, Each prayer accepted | and each wish resign'd. When the pause proceeds to follow the 6th syllable, the tenor of the music becomes solemn and grave. The verse marches now with a more slow and measured pace than in either of the two former cases. The wrath of Peleus' son | the direful spring But the grave solemn cadence becomes still more sensible, when the pause falls after the 7th syllable, which is the nearest place to the end of the line that it can occupy. This kind of verse occurs the seldomest, but has a happy effect in diversifying the melody. It produces that slow Alexandrian air, which is finely suited to a close; and for this reason, such lines almost never occur together, but are used in finishing the couplet. And in the smooth description | murmur still. I have taken my examples from verses in rhyme; because in these our versification is subjected to the strictest law. As blank verse is of a freer kind, and naturally is read with less cadence or tone, the pauses in it, and the effect of them, are not always so sensible to the ear. It is constructed, however, entirely upon the same principles, with respect to the place of the pause. There are some, who, in order to exalt the variety and the power of our heroic verse, have maintained that it admits of musical pauses, not only after those four syllables where I assigned their place, but after any one syllable in the verse indifferently, where the sense directs it to be placed. This, in my opinion, is the same thing as to maintain that there is no pause at all belonging to the natural melody of the verse; since, according to this notion, the pause is formed entirely to the meaning, not by the music. But this I apprehend to be contrary both to the nature of versification, and to the experience of every good ear.* Those cer * In the Italian heroic verse employed by Tasso in his Gierusalemme, and Ariosto in his Orlando, the pauses are of the same varied nature with those which I have shewn to belong to English tainly are the happiest lines, wherein the pause, prompted by the melody, coincides in some degree with that of the sense, or at least does not tend to spoil or interrupt the meaning. Whereever any opposition between the music and the sense chances to take place, I observed before, in treating of pronunciation or delivery, that the proper method of reading these lines, is to read them according as the sense dictates, neglecting or slurring the cæsural pause, which renders the line less graceful indeed, but, however, does not entirely destroy its sound. Our blank verse possesses great advantages, and is indeed a noble, bold, and disencumbered species of versification. The principal defect in rhyme, is the full close which it forces upon the ear at the end of every couplet. Blank verse is freed from this, and allows the lines to run into each other with as great liberty as the Latin hexameter permits, perhaps with greater. Hence it versification, and fall after the same four syllables in the line. Marmontel, in his Poëtique Françoise, Vol. I. p. 269. takes notice that this construction of verse is common to the Italians and the English; and defends the uniformity of the French cæsural pause upon this ground, that the alteration of masculine and feminine rhymes, furnishes sufficient variety to the French poetry; whereas the change of movement, occasioned by the four different pauses in English and Italian verse, produces, according to him, too great diversity. On the head of pauses in English versification, see the Elements of Criticism, chap. 18. sect. 4. is particularly suited to subjects of dignity and force, which demand more free and manly numbers than rhyme. The constraint and strict regularity of rhyme, are unfavourable to the sublime, or to the highly pathetic strain. An epic poem, or a tragedy, would be fettered and degraded by it. It is best adapted to compositions of a temperate strain, where no particular vehemence is required in the sentiments, nor great sublimity in the style; such as pastorals, elegies, epistles, satires, &c. To these it communicates that degree of elevation which is proper for them; and without any other assistance sufficiently distinguishes the style from prose. He who should write such poems in blank verse, would render his work harsh and unpleasing. In order to support a poetical style, he would be obliged to affect a pomp of language, unsuitable to the subject. Though I join in opinion with those who think that rhyme finds its proper place in the middle, but not in the higher regions of poetry, I can by no means join in the invectives which some have poured out against it, as if it were a mere barbarous jingling of sounds, fit only for children, and owing to nothing but the corruption of taste in the monkish ages. Rhyme might indeed be barbarous in Latin or Greek verse, because these languages, by the sonorousness of their words, by their liberty of transposition and inversion, by their fixed quantities and musical pronunciation, |