period an exalted air. And if

you transpose them into any other order, you will quickly be convinced, that Euripides excels more in fine composition than in fine sentiments. So in his description of 3 Dirce dragged along by the bull,

⚫ Zethus and Amphion tied their mother-in-law, Dirce, by the hair of her head to a wild bull, which image Euripides has represented in this passage. Langbaine observes, that there is ́a fine sculpture on this subject, by Taurisius, in the palace of Farnese at Rome, of which Baptista de Cavalleriis has given us a print in 1. iii. p. 3. antiq. statuarum urbis Roma.

There is a much greater Image than this in the Paradise Lost, B. vi. 644. with which this remark of Longinus on the sedate grandeur and judicious pauses will exactly square:

From their foundations loos'ning to and fro,
They pluck'd the seated hills, with all their load,
Rocks, waters, woods; and by the shaggy tops
Uplifting bore them in their hands.———

· So again in Book ii. ver. 557.—When the fallen spirits are engaged in deep and abstruse researches concerning fate, freewill, foreknowledge, the very structure of the words expresses the intricacy of the discourse; and the repetition of some of the words, with epithets of slow pronunciation, shews the difficulty of making advancements in such unfathomable points;

Others apart sat on a hill retir'd,

;

In thoughts more elevate, and reason'd high Of providence, forcknowledge, will, and fate Fix'd fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute; And found no end, in wandʼring mazes lost,

Whene'er the madd'ning creature rag'd about
And whirl'd his bulk around in awkward circles,
The dame, the oak, the rock, were dragg'd along.

The thought itself is noble, but is more ennobled, because the terms used in it are harmonious, and neither run too hastily off the ear, nor are, as it were, mechanically accelerated. They are disposed into due pauses, mutually supporting one another; these pauses are all of a slow and stately measure, sedately mounting to solid and substantial grandeur.

SECTION XLI.

NOTHING SO much debases Sublimity as broken and precipitate measures, such as 1 Pyrrhics, Trochecs, and Dichorees, that are fit for nothing but dances. Periods tuned in these numbers, are indeed neat and brisk, but devoid of passion; and their cadence being eternally the same, becomes very disagreeable. But what is still worse, as in songs, the notes divert the mind from the sense, and make us attentive only to the

1 A Pyrrhic is a foot of two short syllables; a Trochee of one long and one short; and a Dichorce is a double Trochce.

music; so these brisk and rhyming periods never raise in the audience any passion suitable to the subject, but only an attention to the run of the words. Hence, foreseeing the ́ places where they must necessarily rest, they have gestures answering,to every turn, can even beat the time, and tell beforehand, as exactly as in a dance, where the pause will be. In like manner, Periods forced into too narrow compass, and pent up in words of short and few syllables, or that are, as it were, nailed together in an awkward and clumsy manner, are always destitute of grandeur.

SECTION XLII.

CONTRACTION of Style is another great diminution of Sublimity. Grandeur requires room, and when under too much confinement, cannot move so freely as it ought.. I do not mean here Periods, that demand a proper conciseness; but, on the contrary, those that are curtailed and minced. Too much Contraction lays a restraint upon the sense, but Conciseness strengthens and adjusts it. And on the other side, it is evident, that when periods are spun out into a vast extent, their life

and spirit evaporate, and all their strength is lost, by being quite overstretched.

gan

SECTION XLIII.

Low and sordid words are terrible blemishes to fine sentiments. Those of Herodotus, in his description of a tempest, are divincly noble, but the terms in which they are expressed, very much tarnish and impair their lustre. Thus, when he says,* "The seas be1 to seeth," how does the uncouth sound of the word seeth, lessen the grandeur? And further, "The wind (says he) was tired out, and those who were wrecked in the storm, ended their lives very disagrecably." To be tired out, is a mean and vulgar term; and that disagreeably, a word highly disproportioned to the tragical event it is used to express.

* Herod. l. 7. c. 191.

"To seeth."] I have chosen this word rather than boil, which is not a blemished term in our language: and besides, seeth resembles more the Greek word eraone in the ill sound that it has upon the palate, which is the fault that Longinus finds with the word in Herodotus. Milton has something of the like sort which offends the ear, when we read in Book i. Azazel, "as his right," &c.

Theopompus, in like manner, after setting out splendidly in describing the Persian expedition into Egypt, has spoiled all, by the intermixture of some low and trivial words. "What city or what nation was there in all' Asia, which did not compliment the king with an embassy? What rarity was there, either of the produce of the earth, or the work of art, with which he was not presented? How many rich and gorgeous carpets, with vestments purple, white, and particoloured? How many tents of golden texture, suitably furnished with all necessaries? How many embroidered robes and sumptuous beds, besides an immense quantity of wrought silver and gold, cups and goblets, some of which you might see adorned with precious stones, and others embellished with most exquisite art and costly workmanship? Add to these innumerable sorts of arms, Grecian and Barbarian, beasts of burden beyond computation, and cattle fit to form the most luxurious repasts. And further, how many bushels of pickles and preserved fruits? How many

Theopompus was a Chian and a scholar of Isocrates, His genius was too hot and impetuous, which was the occasion of a remark of his master Isocrates, that "Ephorus always wanted a spur, but Theopompus a curb."

hampers, packs of paper, and books, and all things besides, that necessity or convenience could require? In a word, there was so great abundance of all sorts of flesh ready salted, that when put together, they swelled to prodigious heights, and were regarded by persons at a distance, as so many mountains or hillocks piled one upon another." He has here sunk from a proper elevation of his sense to a shameful lowness, at that very instant, when his subject required an enlargement. And besides, by his confused mixture of baskets, of pickles, and of packs, in the narrative of so grand preparations, he has shifted the scene, and presented us with a kitchen. If, upon making preparation for any grand expedition, any one should bring and throw down a parcel of hampers and packs, in the midst of massy goblets adorned with inestimable stones, or of silver embossed, and tents of golden stuffs, what an unseemly spectacle would such a gallimaufry present to the eye! It is the same with description, in which these low terms, unscasonably applied, become so many blemishes and flaws.

Now he might have satisfied himself with giving only a summary account of those mountains (as he says they were thought) of