Shall know their treasure; treasure, then, no more. Are there, (still more amazing!) who resist The rising thought? Who smother, in its birth, The glorious truth? Who struggle to be brutes? 5 Who through this bosom-barrier burst their way, And, with revers'd ambition, strive to sink? Who labour downwards, through th' opposing pow'r Of instinct, reason, and the world against them, To dismal hopes, and shelter in the shock 10 Of endless night? night darker than the grave's! With horrid zeal, and execrable arts, 15 (Than vital blood far dearer to the wise) EXERCISE 15. Young He ceas'd; and next him Moloch, scepter'd king Stood up; the strongest and fiercest Spirit That fought in Heav'n, now fiercer by despair: 20 His trust was with th' Eternal to be deem'd Equal in strength, and rather than be less, Car'd not to be at all; with that care lost Went all his fear: of God, or Hell, or worse, He reck'd not, and these words thereafter spake My sentence is for open wàr; of wiles, More unexpert, I boast not; them let those 25 66 Contrive who need, or when they need, not now; 40 Infernal thunder, and for lightning, see Black fire and horror, shot with equal rage Among his Angels, and his throne itself, Mix'd with Tartarean sulphur, and strange fire, His own invented torments. (6) But perhaps 5 The way seems difficult and steep, to scale With upright wing against a higher fóe. Let them bethink them, if the sleepy drench Of that forgetful lake benumb not still, That in our proper motion we ascend 10 Up to our native seat: descent and fall To us is adverse. Who but felt of late, When the fierce foe hung on our broken rear, Insulting, and pursued us through the deep, With what compulsion and laborious flight 15 We sunk thus low? Th' ascent is easy then. Th' event is fear'd; should we again provoke Our stronger, some worse way his wrath may find To our destruction, if there be in Hell Fear to be worse destroy'd. What can be worse 20 Than to dwell hère, driv'n out from blìss condemn'd In this abhorred deep to utter woe: Where pain of unextinguishable fire Must exercise us without hope of end The vassals of his anger, when the scourge 25 Inexorable, and the torturing hour, Calls us to penance? More destroy'd than thus, What fear we then? what doubt we to incense Milton. EXERCISE 16. I should be much for open war, O peers! As not behind in hate, if what was urg'd, Main reason to persuade immediate war, Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast Ominous conjecture on the whole success,5 When he, who most excels in fact of arms, In what he counsels, and in what excels, Mistrustful, grounds his courage on despair, And utter dissolution, as the scope Of all his aim, after some dire revenge. In the wide womb of uncreated night, EXERCISE 17. -Aside the Devil turn'd Milton. For envy, yet with jealous leer malign The happier Eden, shall enjoy their fill Of bliss on bliss; while I to Hèll am thrust, Where neither joy nor love, but fierce desire, (Amongst our other torments not the least,) Still unfulfilled, with pain of longing pines. 5 Yet let me not forget what I have gain'd From their own mouths: all is not theirs it seems; Can it be death? and do they only stand Their ruin! Hence I will excite their minds They taste and dìe; what likelier can ensue? A chance, but chance, may lead where I may meet 25 Some wand'ring spi'rit of Heav'n, by fountain side, Or in thick shade retir'd, from him to draw What further would be learn'd. Live while ye may, Yet happy pair; enjoy, till I return, Short pleasures for LONG WOES are to succeed." 30 (0) So saying, his proud step he scornful turn'd, But with sly circumspection, and began, Through wood, through waste, o'er hill, o'er dale his roam, Milton. EXERCISE 18. Page 27. bottom. Difference between the common and the intensive inflection. I place this here, rather than under Inflections, because, intensive slide so often stands connected with emphasis. The difficulty to be avoided may be seen sufficiently in an example or two. There is a general tendency to make the slide of the voice as great in degree, when there is little stress, as when there is much; whereas, in the former case, the slide should be gentle, and sometimes hardly perceptible. Common slide. To play with important trúths; to disturb the repose of established ténets; to subtilize objéctions; and elude proof, is too often the sport of youthful vánity, of which maturer experience commonly repènts. Were the miser's repentance upon the neglect of a good bárgain; his sorrow for being over-réached; his hope of improving a súm; and his fear of falling into wánt; directed to their proper óbjects, they would make so many Christian graces and virtues. Intensive slide. Consider, I beseech you, what was the part of a faithful citizen? of a prudent, an active, and an honest minister? Was he not to secure Euboea, as our defence against all attacks by séa? Was he not to make Beotia our barrier on the mídland side? The cities bordering on Peloponnesus our bulwark on thát quarter? Was he not to attend with due precaution to the importation of corn, that this trade might be protected, through all its progress, up to our own hárbours? Was he not to cover those districts which we commanded, by seasonable detachments, as the Proconesus, the Chersonesus, and Ténedos? To exert himself in the assémbly for this purpose, while with equal zeal he laboured to gain others to our interest and alliance, as Byzantium, Abydus, and Euboéa?-Was he not to cut off the best, and most important resources of our enemies, and to supply those in which our country was deféctive?-And all this you gained by my counsels, and my administration. EXERCISES ON MODULATION. The reader will be able from the following examples, to choose those which are appropriate to rotundity of voice, fulness, loudness, time, rhetorical pause, &c. To assist in cultivating the bottom of the voice, 1 have selected examples of sublime or solemn description, which admit of but little inflection; and some which contain the figure of simile. Where |