guage must be previously taught, before man could become a rational creature; and none could teach him but God. Even the infidel Hobbes admits that "the first author of speech was God himself, that instructed Adam how to name such creatures as he presented to his sight.' They who consider language to be of mere human invention are, for the most part, obliged to proceed on suppositions of the original state of man totally inconsistent with the Mosaic history. Moreover, a single instance can not be produced, in the whole range of history, of any human creatures ever using articulate sounds as the signs of ideas, unless taught, either immediately and at once by God, or gradually by those who had been themselves instructed. But there have instances been discovered of persons who, possessing all the natu ral powers of mind and body, yet remained destitute of speech, from the want of an instructor. It may be added, that Adam is not the only instance which is recorded in Scripture of the instant communication of language. The diversity of tongues occasioning the confusion at Babel, and the miraculous gift of speech to the apostles on the day of Pentecost, may render a similar exercise of divine power in the case of our first parents more readily admissible.-See Magee on Atonement. CHAPTER II. CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF THE STYLE OF ADDISON. [This chapter is designed as a model for students in preparing written criticisms upon passages that may be selected from books by the teacher, or upon compositions written by members of the class in Rhetoric; in which criticisms, should be investigated and set forth those qualities of style which have been discussed in Chapters ix.-xxi., Part ii.] EXAMPLE. 1. "Our sight is the most perfect and most delightful of all our senses." CRITICISM. This is an excellent introductory sentence. It is clear, precise, and simple. The author lays down, in a few plain words, the proposition which he intends to illustrate in the rest of the paragraph. In this manner we should always set out. A first sentence should seldom be long, and neve intricate. EXAMPLE. 2. "It fills the mind with the largest variety of ideas, converses with its objects at the greatest distance, and continues the longest in action, without being tired, or satiated with its proper enjoyments.' CRITICISM. This sentence is remarkably harmonious and well con structed. It is perspicuous, and loaded with no super. fluous words; for the terms, tired or satiated, refer to different members of the period, and convey distinct ideas, the first, to continuance of action, the latter to enjoyment. Unity is preserved. It is our sight of which he speaks. This is the object carried through the sentence and presented in every member of it, by those verbs, fills, converses, continues, to each of which it is clearly the nominative. Those capital words are disposed of in the most proper places, and that uniformity is maintained in the construc. tion of the sentence which suits the unity of the object. Observe, too, the music of the period; consisting of three members, each of which grows and rises above the other m sound, till the sentence is conducted at last to a most melodious close. Enjoyments is a word of length and dignity, exceedingly proper for a close which is designed to be a musical one. The sound of the period thus arranged is just and proper with respect to the sense. It follows the order of nature. EXAMPLE. 3. "The sense of feeling can, indeed, give us a notion of extension, shape, and all other ideas that enter at the eye, except colors; but, at the same time it is very much straitened and confined in its operations to the number, bulk, and distance of its particular objects." CRITICISM. This sentence is neither clear nor elegant. Extension ind shape can with no propriety be called ideas; they are properties of matter. Nor is it accurate to speak of any sense giving us a notion of ideas; our senses give us the ideas themselves. The meaning would have been much more clear if the author had expressed himself thus :: "The sense of feeling, can, indeed, give us the idea of ex tension, figure, and all the other properties of matter whica. are perceived by the eye, except colors." The latter part of the sentence is still more embarrassed, for what meaning can we make of the sense of "feeling being confined in its operations to the number," &c.? Is not every sense equally confined to the number, bulk, and distance of its own objects? The epithet particular, applied to objects in the conclusion of the sentence, is redundant, and conveys no meaning whatever. It seems to have been used in place of peculiar, but these words, though often confounded, are of different import. Particular stands opposed to general; peculiar stands opposed to what is possessed in common with others. EXAMPLE. 4. "It is this sense which furnishes the imagination with its ideas; so that by the pleasures of the imagination or fancy (which I shall use promiscuously) I here mean such as arise from visible objects, either when we have them actually in our view, or when we call up their ideas into our minds by paintings, statues, descriptions, or any the like occasion." CRITICISM. In place of, "It is the sense which furnishes," the author might have said more shortly, "This sense furnishes." But the former mode is here more proper, when a proposition of importance is laid down, to which we seek to call attention. It is like pointing with the hand to the object of which we speak. The parenthesis is not clear. It should have been, terms which I shall use promiscuously; as the verb use relates not to the pleasures of the imagination, but to the terms of fancy and imagination, which he was to employ as synonymous. "Any the like occasion." To call a painting or statue an occasion is not a happy expression, nor is it very proper to speak of calling up ideas by occasions. The common phrase, “any such means," would have been more natural EXAMPLE. 5. There are few words in the English language which are employed in a more loose and uncircumscribed sense than those of the fancy and the imagination." CRITICISM. The sentence could have been improved by reading thus: Few words in the English language are employed in a more loose and uncircumscribed sense than fancy and imagination." The reasons for the alteration are obvious. EXAMPLE. 6. "My désign being, first of all, to discourse of those primary pleasures of the imagination which entirely proceed from such objects as are before our eyes; and, in the next place, to speak of those secondary pleasures of the imagination which flow from the ideas of visible objects, when the objects are not actually before the eye, but are called up into our memories, or formed into agreeable visions of things, that are either absent or fictitious." CRITICISM. It is a great rule in laying down the division of a subject, to study neatness and brevity as much as possible. The divisions are then more distinctly apprehended, and more easily remembered. This sentence is not happy in that respect, being clogged with a tedious phraseology. By sparing several words the style would have been made more neat and compact. EXAMPLE. 7. "A man of a polite imagination is let into a great many pleasures that the vulgar are not capable of receiving." CRITICISM. "Polite" is a term more commonly applied to manners or behavior than to the mind or imagination. Which The use of the word that for a relative pronoun, instead of which, is a usage too frequent with Mr. Addison. is more definite than that, being used only as a relative pronoun, while the latter is a word of many senses; sometimes a demonstrative pronoun, sometimes a conjunction. That may be used sometimes as a relative, as when we refer to persons and things as antecedents, or wish to avoid the ungrateful repetition of which in the same sentence. EXAMPLE. 8. "He can converse with a picture, and find ar agreeable companion in a statue. He meets with a secret refreshment in a description, and often feels a greater satisfaction in the prospect of fields and meadows than another does in the possession. It gives him, indeed, a kind of property in every thing he sees, and makes the most rude, uncultivated parts f nature administer to his pleasures; so that he looks pon the world, as it were, in another light, and disovers in it a multitude of charms that conceal themselves from the generality of mankind.” CRITICISM. All this is very beautiful. The illustration is happy. The style runs with the greatest ease and harmony. But there is some negligence. The first instance is in the sentence beginning with, "It gives him, indeed," &c. To this it there is no proper antecedent in the whole paragraph, and to find one we must look back to the third sentence before this. The phrase polite imagination is the only antecedent to which this it can refer; and even that is an improper antecedent, as it stands in the genitive (possessive) case, as the qualification only of a man. The other instance of negligence begins with,“ so that he looks upon the world, as it were, in another light." By another light the author means, a light different from that in which other men view the world, but this meaning.is conveyed very indistinctly to other minds. As it were is a phrase that should scarcely ever be used, and here there was no occasion for it. The whole of this last member, beginning with "so that he looks," &c., might with advantage be omitted altogether, as the ideas are conveyed in what goes before it. Dr. Blair has devoted four entire lectures to a critical examina tion of the style of Addison's Spectator, Nos. 411-414, which form an exceedingly valuable part of his work on Rhetoric. It would be well for teachers of the work in hand to write upon a blackboard, or (what is better) they night require their students to write upon slates or on paper, the passages from the Spectator, and then deliberately read to their classes the elaborate, judicious, and tasteful criticisms of Dr. Blair. Occasionally, however, it may be remarked, Dr. Blair's own language stands open to criti ciam. |