never again to have rallied sufficiently to produce a single man of genius -not one solitary writer who acted as a power upon the national mind. Callimachus was nobody, and not decidedly Grecian. Theocritus, a man of real genius in a limited way, is a Grecian in that sense only according to which an Anglo-American is an Englishman. Besides, one swallow does not make a summer."-DE QUINCEY.

The proverb introduced at the close of this passage serves to give emphasis to the main proposition.

$224. APOPHTHEGM.

The apophthegm is a short, pithy sentence or maxim, and it contributes to emphasis by its conciseness and energy. A large proportion of those passages which are widely known. and quoted are of this description. Among English writers the following abound most in this:-Poets-Shakespeare, Milton, Pope;-Prose writers-Bacon, Sir Thomas Browne, Emerson. Among writers of the present day, George Eliot employs this figure very extensively. The following are examples:

"We are such stuff

As dreams are made on; and our little life
Is rounded by a sleep."-SHAKESPEARE.

"To be weak is miserable,

Doing or suffering."-MILTON.

“A little learning is a dangerous thing."-Pope.

"A crowd is not company; and faces are but a gallery of pictures; and talk but a tinkling cymbal, when there is no love.”—BACON.

"Many have ruled well who could not perhaps define a commonwealth; and they who understand not the globe of the earth command a great part of it. When natural logic prevails not, artificial too often faileth. When nature fills the sails, the vessel goes smoothly on; and when judgment is the pilot, the insurance need not be high. When industry builds upon nature, we may expect pyramids; when that foundation is wanting, the structure must be low."-SIR THOMAS BROWNE

§ 225. EPIGRAM.

The epigram may also be named among those figures which contribute to emphasis by making statements in an unusual or striking manner; but other qualities belong to it which form its chief characteristics, and it will receive full consideration in connection with the subject of the ridiculous.

CHAPTER X.

ENERGY.

$226. DEFINITION OF ENERGY.

THE word energy is used by Dr. Whately in a very comprehensive sense, namely, as expressive of that vital element in style which is here called persuasiveness. Such an extension of its meaning is, however, liable to objection; first, because it has a definite signification of its own; and, secondly, because there are certain qualities belonging to this present division of style which cannot be classified under such a head. This word is generally explained by such terms as "force," "vigor," or "strength," and energy in style may, therefore, be defined as strength of expression.

A general example of this quality may be found in the following passage from Emerson:

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips. Sew them up with packthread— do. Else, if you would be a man, speak what you think to-day in words as hard as cannon-balls, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks, in words as hard again—though it contradict everything you said to-day. 'Ah, then,' exclaim the aged ladies, 'you shall be sure to be misunderstood.' Misunderstood! It is a right fool's word."

§ 227. SIMPLICITY AS TENDING TO ENERGY.

The first requisite of energy is simplicity.

The strongest words are often the simplest: Thus, “die" is stronger than "expire," "live" than "exist," "rot" than "decay." Shakespeare says, in a passage of memorable force, "to lie in cold obstruction and to rot," and Byron expresses vehement scorn by the use of the same word: "Such clay as rots into the souls of those whom I survey." Pope caps a climax of contempt by means of the same word:

"Fixed like a plant on his peculiar spot,

To draw nutrition, propagate, and rot."

Simple words are so clear and so familiar that their meaning is unmistakable; their force also cannot be evaded; and when properly directed they strike home with resistless effect.

"A broken complexion," says Emerson, “a swinish look, all blab." No other words can have the force of "swinish" and "blab." It is a common saying that when a man feels strongly he expresses himself in "plain Saxon," which may be accepted as the testimony of the common mind to the superior energy of simple words. It is surprising how many of Shakespeare's most vigorous lines are marked by the presence of some simple word which takes the chief emphasis. The following will explain what is meant:

"Aye, there's the rub."

"O my offence is rank, it smells to heaven!"

'Enterprises of great pith and moment."

The force of simple speech is seen in proverbs and old "saws." It is also seen in the sayings of great men, and especially in the words attributed to that most energetic of statesmen, Bismarck, who flings his words at the world with a simplicity and a directness that is only equalled by his cynicism. "Blood and iron" is his policy. "Let Paris fry in her own fat" was his well-known remark when that city was encircled by its besiegers. Artificial words are best for innuendo, but simple words for direct and vigorous statement.

Such vigorous expressions abound in the speeches of Burke and in the writings of De Quincey, two authors whose style exhibits beyond all others the extremes of most elaborate splendor and homely simplicity; who were equally at home amid the pomps and sounding harmonies of rhythmical periods, or the plain and vigorous phraseology of the most common and familiar speech.

The following examples are from Burke :

"Of these two propositions I shall give such damaging proof that, however the contrary may be whispered in circles or bawled in the newspapers, they never more will dare to raise their voices in this house."

"But still it sticks in their throats."

"They wait until Carnot shall have snorted away the fumes of the indigested blood of his sovereign."

"All this is mighty well."

"We have not been drawn and trussed in order that we may be filled, like stuffed birds in a museum, with chaff and rags, and paltry blurred shreds of paper about the rights of man. . . . We have real hearts of flesh and blood beating in our bosoms."

§ 228. CONCISENESS AS TENDING TO ENERGY.

Conciseness is another requisite to energy. The intimate connection between these two qualities is admirably illustrated in the case of the Spartans, who cherished the habit of using as few words as possible, yet of making those words pregnant with meaning. Hence arose the terms "Spartan brevity," "laconic speech," "a laconic saying," which have always been synonymous with energetic brevity. This quality is exemplified in the pages of Thucydides, who never uses a superfluous word, and who was thus able to make his work what he desired it to be-in his own condensed statement, a ктñμa έç åɛí—an everlasting possession. The style of Tacitus is of the same kind, but more highly elaborated. Many of his sentences have the brevity and weight of maxims :

"They make a solitude, and call it peace."

"We should have lost our memory also with our voice, if it had been possible as well to forget as to keep silent."

"To woman it is given to weep, to man to remember."

No author, however, has surpassed Dante in this respect. His great poem is a storehouse of quotations; and he himself sought diligently to attain to the most pregnant brevity of speech, for he more than once refers to it in a pointed man

ner:

"There is no greater pain," he says, "than in sorrow to recall a happy time."

Tennyson has reproduced this:

"A sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier days."

At the end of the episode of Francesca da Rimini is the line"On that day we read in it no farther."

Here by metalepsis is the implied statement of their death. "I made a gibbet for myself with my own dwelling."

The speaker in the mystic wood of self-murderers here sums up, together with his own suicide, the utter ruin of his family.

"He listens well who marks the saying."

"It is good to know of some; of others it is well to be silent."

These lines explain themselves.

The stern judgment of an indignant patriot is passed upon Pope Celestine V. in the famous line:

"Chi fece per viltate il gran rifiuto."

"Who made through cowardice the grand refusal."

Allusion is made to his pusillanimity in refusing to retain the office of pope in a time of difficulty. In equally famous lines he passes his judgment upon those who have lived for themselves, were neither good nor bad, and therefore have no place either in heaven or hell:

"Misericordia e Giustizia gli sdegna;

Non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa."

'Mercy and justice both alike disdain them;
Take no account of them, but look and pass."

§ 229. RETRENCHMENT OF SUPERFLUOUS WORDS AND PHRASES. Where the aim is not merely perspicuity, but also an energetic conciseness, it is necessary to subject the style to close restraint, and divest it of all words or phrases that are superfluous. Where these are retained, the language may, indeed, be clear, but it is apt to be weak and ineffective. Each word should add something in itself; it should be actually needed, or else it is better elsewhere. "Obstat," says Quintilian, "quidquid non adjuvat."

The following passages are perfectly clear, but may be made more concise:

"Being content with deserving a triumph, he refused the honor of one." "Being" may be omitted.

"There is nothing which is more beneficial to a state than a healthy and vigilant public spirit."

"There is" and "which" may be omitted.