ment of these words in a sentence. We know how much the Greeks and the Romans, in their most polished and flourishing times, cultivated their own Tongues. We know how much study both the French, and the Italians, have bestowed upon theirs. Whatever knowledge may be acquired by the study of other Languages, it can never be communicated with advantage, unless by such as can write and speak their own Language well. Let the matter of an author be ever so good and useful, his compositions will always suffer in the public esteem, if his expression be deficient in purity and propriety. At the same time, the attainment of a correct and elegant style, is an object which demands application and labour. If any imagine they can catch it merely by the ear, or acquire it by a slight perusal of some of our good authors, they will find themselves much disappointed. The many errors, even in point of grammar, the many offences against purity of Language, which are committed by writers who are far from being contemptible, demonstrate, that a careful study of the Language is previously requisite, in all who aim at writing it properly.*

LECTURE X.

STYLE. PERSPICUITY AND PRECISION.

HAVING finished the subject of Language, I now enter on the consideration of Style, and the rules that relate to it.

It is not easy to give a precise idea of what is meant by Style. The best definition I can give of it is, the peculiar manner in which a man expresses his conceptions, by means of Language. It is different from mere Language or words. The words which an author employs, may be proper and faultless; and his Style may, nevertheless, have great faults: it may be dry or stiff, or feeble, or affected. Style has always some reference to an author's manner of thinking. It is a picture of the ideas which rise in his mind, and of the manner in which they rise there; and, hence, when we are examining an author's composition, it is, in many cases, extremely difficult to separate the style from the sentiment. No wonder these two should be so intimately connected, as Style is nothing else than that sort of

On this subject, the reader ought to peruse Dr. Lowth's Short Introduction to English Grammar, with Critical Notes; which is the Grammatical performance of highest authority that has appeared in our time, and in which he will see, what I have said concerning the inaccuracies in Language of some of our best writers, fully verified. In Dr. Campbell's Philosophy of Rhetoric, he will likewise find many acute and ingenious observations, both on the English Language, and on Style in general. And Dr. Priestley's Rudiments of English Grammar will also be useful, by pointing out several of the errors into which writers are apt to fall.

Hence

expression which our thoughts most readily assume. different countries have been noted for peculiarities of Style, suited to their different temper and genius. The eastern nations animated their Style with the most strong and hyberbolical figures. The Athenians, a polished and acute people, formed a Style accurate, clear, and neat. The Asiatics, gay and loose in their manners, affected a Style florid and diffuse. The like sort of characteristical differences are commonly remarked in the Style of the French, the English, and the Spaniards. In giving the general characters of Style, it is usual to talk of a nervous, a feeble, or a spirited Style; which are plainly the characters of a writer's manner of thinking, as well as of expressing himself: so difficult it is to separate these two things from one another. Of the general characters of Style, I am afterwards to discourse; but it will be necessary to begin with examining the more simple qualities of it; from the assemblage of which, its more complex denominations, in a great measure, result.

All the qualities of a good Style may be ranged under two heads, Perspicuity and Ornament. For all that can possibly be required of Language, is, to convey our ideas clearly to the minds of others, and, at the same time, in such a dress, as, by pleasing and interesting them, shall most effectually strengthen the impressions which we seek to make. When both these ends are answered, we certainly accomplish every purpose for which we use Writing and Discourse.

Perspicuity, it will be readily admitted, is the fundamental quality of Style;* a quality so essential in every kind of Writing, that for the want of it, nothing can atone. Without this, the richest ornaments of Style only glimmer through the dark; and puzzle instead of pleasing the reader. This, therefore, must be our first object, to make our meaning clearly and fully understood, and understood without the least difficulty. "Oratio," says Quinctilian, "debet negligenter quoque audientibus esse aperta; ut in animum audientis, sicut sol in oculos, etiamsi in eum non intendatur, occurrat. Quare, non solum ut intelligere possit, sed ne omnino possit non intelligere curandum." If we are obliged to follow a writer with much care, to pause, and to read over his sentences a second time, in order to comprehend them fully, he will never please us long. Mankind are too indolent to relish so much labour. They may pretend to admire the author's depth, after they have discovered his meaning; but they will seldom be inclined to take up his work a second time. Authors sometimes plead the difficulty of their subject, as

"Nobis prima sit virtus, perspicuitas, propria verba, rectus ordo, non in longum dilata conclusio; nihil neque desit, neque superfluat." QUINCTIL. lib. viii. "Discourse ought always to be obvious, even to the most careless and negligent hearer, so that the sense shall strike his mind, as the light of the sun does our eyes, though they are not directed upwards to it. We must study, not only that every hearer may understand us, but that it shall be impossible for him not to understand us.'

an excuse for the want of Perspicuity. But the excuse can rarely, if ever, be admitted. For whatever a man conceives clearly, that it is in his power, if he will be at the trouble, to put into distinct propositions, or to express clearly to others: and upon no subject ought any man to write, where he cannot think clearly. His ideas, indeed, may, very excusably, be on some subjects incomplete or inadequate; but still, as far as they go, they ought to be clear; and wherever this is the case, Perspicuity, in expressing them, is always attainable. The obscurity which reigns so much among many metaphysical writers, is, for the most part, owing to the indistinctness of their own conceptions. They see the object but in a confused light; and, of course, can never exhibit it in a clear one to others.

Perspicuity in writing, is not to be considered as merely a sort of negative virtue, or freedom from defect. It has higher merit it is a degree of positive Beauty. We are pleased with an author, we consider him as deserving praise, who frees us from all fatigue of searching for his meaning; who carries us through his subject without any embarrassment or confusion; whose style flows always like a limpid stream, where we see to the very bottom.

The study of Perspicuity requires attention, first, to single words and phrases, and then to the construction of sentences. I begin with treating of the first, and shall confine myself to it in this Lecture.

Perspicuity, considered with respect to words and phrases, requires these three qualities in them; Purity, Propriety, and Precision.

Purity and Propriety of Language are often used indiscriminately for each other; and, indeed, they are very nearly allied. A distinction, however, obtains between them. Purity, is the use of such words, and such constructions, as belong to the idiom of the Language which we speak; in opposition to words and phrases that are imported from other Languages, or that are obsolete, or new-coined, or used without proper authority. Propriety, is the selection of such words in the Language, as the best and most established usage has appropriated to those ideas which we intend to express by them. It implies the correct and happy application of them, according to that usage, in opposition to vulgarisms, or low expressions; and to words and phrases, which would be less significant of the ideas that we mean to convey. Style may be pure, that is, it may all be strictly English, without Scotticisms or Gallicisms, or ungrammatical irregular expressions of any kind, and may, nevertheless, be deficient in Propriety. The words may be ill chosen; not adapted to the subject, not fully expressive of the author's sense. He has taken all his words and phrases from the general mass of English Language; but he has made his selection

among these words unhappily. Whereas, Style cannot be proper without being also pure and where both Purity and Propriety meet, besides making Style perspicuous, they also render it graceful. There is no standard, either of Purity or of Propriety, but the practice of the best writers and speakers in the country.

When I mentioned obsolete or new-coined words as incongruous with purity of Style, it will be easily understood, that some exceptions are to be made. On certain occasions, they may have grace. Poetry admits of greater latitude than prose, with respect to coining, or, at least, new-compounding words; yet, even here, this liberty should be used with a sparing hand. In prose, such innovations are more hazardous, and have a worse effect. They are apt to give Style an affected and conceited air; and should never be ventured upon, except by such, whose established reputation gives them some degree of dictatorial power over Language.

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The introduction of foreign and learned words, unless where necessity requires them, should always be avoided. Barren Languages may need such assistances: but ours is not one of these. Dean Swift, one of our most correct writers, valued himself much on using no words but such as were of native growth and his Language may, indeed, be considered as a standard of the strictest Purity and Propriety, in the choice of words. At present, we seem to be departing from this standard. A multitude of Latin words have, of late, been poured in upon us. On some occasions, they give an appearance of elevation and dignity to Style. But often, also, they render it stiff and forced: and, in general, a plain native Style, as it is more intelligible to all readers, so, by a proper management of words, it may be made equally strong and expressive with this Latinised English.

Let us now consider the import of Precision in Language, which, as it is the highest part of the quality denoted by perspicuity, merits a full explication; and the more, because distinct ideas are, perhaps, not commonly formed about it.

The exact import of Precision may be drawn from the etymology of the word. It comes from " præcidere," to cut off: it imports retrenching all superfluities, and pruning the expression so, as to exhibit neither more nor less than an exact copy of his idea who uses it. I observed before, that it is often difficult to separate the qualities of Style from the qualities of Thought; and it is found so in this instance, for, in order to write with Precision, though this be properly a quality of Style, one must possess a very considerable degree. of distinctness and accuracy in his manner of thinking.

The words, which a man uses to express his ideas, may be faulty in three respects: They may either not express that idea which the author intends, but some other which only resembles,

or is akin to it; or, they may express that idea, but not quite fully and completely; or they may express it together with something more than he intends. Precision stands opposed to all these three faults; but chiefly to the last. In an author's writing with Propriety, his being free from the two former faults seems implied. The words which he uses are proper; that is, they express that idea which he intends, and they express it fully; but to be Precise, signifies, that they express that idea, and no more. There is nothing in his words which introduces any foreign idea, any superfluous unseasonable accessory, so as to mix it confusedly with the principal object, and thereby to render our conception of that object loose and indistinct. This requires a writer to have, himself, a very clear apprehension of the object he means to represent to us; to have laid fast hold of it in his mind; and never to waver in any one view he takes of it: a perfection to which, indeed, few writers attain.

The use and importance of Precision, may be deduced from the nature of the human mind. It never can view, clearly and distinctly, above one object at a time. If it must look at two or three together, especially objects among which there is resemblance or connexion, it finds itself confused and embarrassed. It cannot clearly perceive in what they agree, and in what they differ. Thus, were any object, suppose some animal, to be presented to me, of whose structure I wanted to form a distinct notion, I would desire all its trappings to be taken off, I would require it to be brought before me by itself, and to stand alone, that there might be nothing to distract my attention. The same is the case with words. If when you would inform me of your meaning, you also tell me more than what conveys it; if you join foreign circumstances to the principal object; if, by unnecessarily varying the expression, you shift the point of view, and make me see sometimes the object itself, and sometimes another thing that is connected with it; you thereby oblige me to look on several objects at once, and I lose sight of the principal. You load the animal you are showing me, with so many trappings and collars, and bring so many of the same species before me, somewhat resembling, and yet somewhat differing, that I see none of them clearly.

This forms what is called a Loose Style; and is the proper opposite to Precision. It generally arises from using a superfluity of words. Feeble writers employ a multitude of words to make themselves understood, as they think, more distinctly; and they only confound the reader. They are sensible of not having caught the precise expression, to convey what they would signify; they do not, indeed, conceive their own meaning very precisely themselves; and, therefore, help it out, as they can, by this and the other word, which may, as they suppose, supply the defect, and bring you somewhat nearer to their idea: they are

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