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78. In drawing comparisons, clearness is greatly promoted by using similar constructions in setting forth the agreements and differences, and excluding all unnecessary matter.

"The wise man is happy when he gains his own approbation, the fool when he recommends himself to the applause of others;" say rather "when he gains other people's."

Hume says of Shakespeare:—"There may remain a suspicion that we over-rate the greatness of his genius, in the same manner as bodies appear gigantic on account of their being disproportioned and mis-shapen." The correspondence of the parts would be improved thus:—"There may remain a suspicion that the greatness of his genius is over-rated by us, in the same manner as bodies appear,” " &c.

This will be illustrated again under the Balanced Sentence, and under the Paragraph.

79. It is essential to clearness that every word be employed in one of its well-understood meanings, and that the aptest terms should always be chosen. But this cannot be effected by any rules of Rhetoric; it belongs to the general cultivation of the mind. Some help may be obtained from Dictionaries.

In clearness, our later writers have vastly improved on those who preceded them. Even in the greatest authors of the Elizabethan period and the times immediately following, ambiguity is a frequent fault. Hobbes is perhaps the most remarkable exception to the general rule; yet even in his works are found ambiguities that no good writer at the present day would tolerate.

It may be doubted whether the ancient Greek and Roman authors attended much to this peculiar merit of style. Many of them certainly overlooked it.

STRENGTH.

80. Strength is that quality of style that elates us with the pleasurable feeling called the sense or senti

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ment of Power. The highest form of strength is the Suhlime.

Other names for the same quality are Energy, Vigor, Force, Nerve, Liveliness, Animation, Vivacity, Fervor, Loftiness, Brilliancy. Several of these have specific shades of meaning. Thus, Liveliness, or Animation, implies a certain rapidity in the flow. or cadence of the language, so as to render it more exciting. The poems of Sir Walter Scott exemplify this characteristic. Fervor supposes great intensity of passion in the writer, made apparent in the language. Loftiness scarcely differs from Sublimity. Brilliancy implies an ornate or figurative style well sustained.

Under the general term Vivacity, here given as a synonyme for Strength, Campbell comprehends every excellence of style as far as the feelings are concerned, excluding only the intellectual qualities. Whatever can give effect to composition, or stir up any of the powerful or agreeable emotions, is regarded by him as a mode of Vivacity. He discusses the choice, number, and arrangement of words, and various other points, as bearing on this general attribute.

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But the effects so embraced are various, and some of them strongly contrasted. Thus Sublimity is very different from Pathos, and is often opposed even to the comprehensive designation, Beauty; while something characteristic and peculiar is signified by Humor. It is, therefore, an object to arrive at an exact definition of these contrasted qualities.

Leaving the humorous out of view for the present, we may draw a distinction among the other effects, based on the difference between our Active and our Passive modes of pleasurable excitement. The one is represented by the emotion of Power— the sense of Might possessed or imagined; the other, by what is variously called Tender Feeling, Pathetic Emotion, Love, Affection. The first we propose to illustrate under the present head—Strength and Sublimity; the second will be found to embrace a large circle of objects generally characterized by Beauty as opposed to Sublimity, in which meaning it points to the more soothing and passive enjoyments of Fine Art.

81. I. The essential pleasure of Power is an elation or rebound from some state of weakness, impotence, constraint, or dread; and, like the re-action from any depressing condition, it imparts a grateful and hilarious glow to the mind.

The pleasure is felt most acutely in those moments when we ourselves pass from a lower to a higher grade of efficiency; as in recovering from sickness, in growing stronger physically or mentally, in acquiring wealth, and in being raised to a higher position of influence or command. In a stationary condition, the necessary contrast is supplied by the recollection of our own former inferiority, and by a comparison with those at present our inferiors.

82. II. We derive a pleasurable elation from witnessing manifestations of Power in other beings. This is an effect of Sympathy.

A thrill of pleasure may arise from the sight of great force exerted by others. We feel for the time as if ourselves raised to a higher pitch of energy. We enter (imperfectly and erroneously perhaps) into the feelings of the actor, and are sensibly elated by this transferred or imagined power. Hence the interest we take in superior force, whether bodily or mental, in eminent fortunes, and in the display of public authority and high command.

The same effect is due to the recital of deeds of superior might. The mind is kindled in this way by the prowess of individuals and by the force of multitudes, as portrayed in the annals of the world. The attitude of Socrates, on his trial and before his execution, as set forth by Plato, has always been regarded as sublime.

The production of great effects of any kind is the sign of energy; as, the moving of a huge mass, or the stopping of a mass in motion. When the agent appears to work without effort, the impression is greatly enhanced. It is a favorite stroke, in literature especially, to show great results from small

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beginnings and insignificant agencies; as when the son of a poor miner revolutionized the world. This is a motive to exaggeration or hyperbole, the charm of Romance and of fairyland.

83. The display of Anger or Indignation, if approved of by us, is sublime.

These passions are modes of power or energy, and, unless they stir us up to disapprobation and hostility, they give us the agreeable elation of power. In poetry, bursts of indignation are highly effective. The angry passions and exalted energies of combatants rouse the feeling of energy in the spectator.

In Gray's Welsh Bard we have an 'expression of indignation raised to the sublime.

84. An effect of Terror sometimes mixes with the Sublime, but it detracts from, instead of heightening, the pleasurable sentiment.

Terror is, in its nature, a cause of weakness and prostration. So far as an object of might excites dread, it gives pain and not pleasure. One of the tokens of power is wide-spread destruction and ruin; and, if we are ourselves exempted from the misery, we may enjoy the spectacle as a manifestation of energy. If, however, there is danger to any of our own interests, we are overwhelmed by fear, in place of being elated by sublimity.

The vast power exercised by the Mongol conquerors would be sublime, if their destructive fury did not excite horror and indignation.

Mere poetic and undefined terrors have little depressing effect, and the power that they suggest gives rise to the unmingled sublime. There is no real terror inspired by the. speech in Hamlet :—" 'Tis now the very witching time of night."

So, in Cowper, the lines

"While God performs, upon the trembling stage
Of his own works, his dreadful part alone,"

are sublime from the well-chosen circumstances for suggesting power," the trembling stage," the acting "alone," and the "dreadful" part; while the dread is too vague to bring home the sense of danger either to ourselves or to any definite persons or interests.

In Milton's "Sin and Death" the sublime reposes upon mere imagined terror.

85. III. A third form of the feeling is that arising when we view or contemplate the powers of Nature. Thus, in watching the ocean wave, the commotion of the tempest, the flow of rivers and the fall of cataracts, the mountains as they tower aloft, the volcano, and the Alpine glacier, we are elevated and pleased by the feeling of superior might.

Here also is a kind of sympathy. We look at such displays as if a being like ourselves, but vastly more powerful, were at work. The personifying impulse of the mind led, in former times, to a belief in actual spirits, of the human type, investing the sea, the river, and the hurricane. The belief has passed away, but the fiction is kept up, on account of the grateful elation attending it.

The mere magnitude and expanse of the outer world—the outspread landscape as seen from a commanding height, and the plenitude of space with the scattered orbs of heaven—fill the mind with a sense of vastness, which is a variety of the feeling of might.

Even the results of man's industry may be on such a scale as to impress us with the sentiment of superior power; as in the case of populous cities, vast buildings, extensive machinery, mighty fleets, the implements of modern warfare.

86. The mental elation, arising on the view of personages and objects of superior power, may be imparted through the mere description of them.

A writer may so describe a conquering army, an heroic struggle, a grand prospect, a terrific storm, as to produce an

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