Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

May tell why heaven has made us as we are.-Pope.
10. In that soft season, when descending showers
Call forth the greens, and wake the rising flowers;
When opening buds salute the welcome day,
And earth, relenting, feels the genial ray;
As balmy sleep had charm'd my cares to rest
And love itself was banish'd from my breast,
A train of phantoms, in wild order rose,

And join'd, this intellectual scene compose.-Pope.

IV.-Examples of PARENTHESIS; or words interposed in Sentences.

1. HOUGH good sense is not in the number, nor always, it (as the most sensible of the poets has justly observed) fairly worth the seven. Melmoth.

2. An elevated genius, employed in little things, appears (to use the simile of Longinus) like the sun in his evening declination: he remits his splendor, but retains his, magnitude; and pleases more though he dazzles less.-Johnson.

3. The horror with which we entertain the thoughts of death (or indeed of any future evil) and the uncertainty of its approach, fill a melancholy mind with innumerable apprehensions and suspicions.-Spectator.

4. If envious people were to ask themselves, whether they would exchange their entire situations with the persons envied, (I mean their minds, passions, notions, as well as their persons, fortunes, dignities, &c.) I presume the self love, common to all human nature, would generally make them prefer their own condition. Shenstone.

5. Notwithstanding all the care of Cicero, history informs us that Marcus proved a mere blockhead; and that nature (who it seems was even with the son for her prodigality to the father) rendered him incapable of improving, by all the rules of eloquence, the precepts of philosophy, his own endeavors, and the most refined conversation in Athens.-Spectator.

6. The opera (in which action is joined with music, in order to entertain the eye at the same time with the ear) I must beg leave (with all due submission to the taste of the great) to cosider as a forced conjunction of two things, which nature does not allow to go together.-Burgh.

7. As to my own abilities in speaking (for I shall admit this charge, although experience has convinced me that what is called the power of eloquence depends, for the most part, upon the hearers, and that the characters of public speakers are determined by that degree of favor, which you vouchsafe to each) if long practice, I say, hath given me any proficiency in speaking, you have ever found it devoted to my country.-Demosthenes.

8. When Socrates' fetters were knocked off, (as was usual to be done on the day that the condemned person was to be ex

ecuted) being seated in the midst of his disciples, and laying one of his legs over the other, in a very unconcerned posture, he began to rub it, where it had been galled by the iron; and (whether it was to show the indifference with which he entertained the thoughts of his approaching death, or (after his usual manner) to take every occasion of philosophising upon some useful subject) he observed the pleasure of that sensation, which now arose in those very parts of his leg, that just before had been so much pained by fetters. Upon this he reflected upon the nature of pleasure and pain in general, and how constantly they succeeded one another.-Spectator.

1.

9. Let us (since life can little more supply Than just to look about us and to die)

Expatiate free, o'er all this scene of man :

A mighty maze! but not without a plan.-Pope.
10. His years are young, but his experience old:
His head unmellow'd, but his judgment ripe ;
And, in a word (for far behind his worth
Come all the praises that I now bestow)
He is complete in feature and in mind,
With all good grace to grace a gentleman.

Shakespeare's Two gentlemen of Verona.

V.-Examples of INTERROGATION; or Questioning. NE day, when the Moon was under an eclipse, she comMy dearest friend, said she, Why do you not shine upon me as you used to do? Do I not shine upon thee? said the Sun: I am very sure that I intend it. O no! replies the Moon! but I now perceive the reason. I see that dirty planet the Earth has got between us.-Dodsley's Fables.

2. Searching every kingdom for a man who has the least comfort in life, Where is he to be found? In the royal palace. What, his Majesty? Yes, especially if he be a despot.

Art of Thinking.

3. You have obliged a man; very well! What would you have more? Is not the consciousness of doing good a sufficient reward? Art of Thinking.

4. A certain passenger at sea had the curiosity to ask the pilot of the vessel, what death his father died of. What death? said the pilot. Why he perished at sea, as my grandfather did before him. And are you not afraid of trusting yourself to an element that has proved thus fatal to your family? Afraid! By no means: Is not your father dead? Yes, but he died in his bed. And why then, returned the pilot, are you not afraid of trusting yourself in your bed?-Art of Thinking.

5. Is it credible, is it possible, that the mighty soul of a Newton should share exactly the same fate with the vilest insect that crawls upon the ground? that, after having laid open the mysteries of nature, and pushed its discoveries almost to the very

boundaries of the universe, it should, on a sudden, have all its lights at once extinguished, and sink into everlasting darkness and insensibility?—Spectator.

6. Suppose a youth to have no prospect either of sitting in Parliament, of pleading at the bar, of appearing upon the stage, or in the pulpit; does it follow that he need bestow no pains in learning to speak properly his native language? Will he never have occasion to read, in a company of his friends, a copy of verses, a passage of a book or newspaper? Must he never read a discourse of Tillotson, or a chapter of the Whole Duty of Man for the instruction of his children and servants? Cicero justly observes, that address in speaking is highly ornamental, as well as useful, even in private life. The limbs are parts of the body much less noble than the tongue; yet no gentleman grudges a considerable expense, of time and money, to have his son taught to use them properly; which is very commendable. And is there no attention to be paid to the use of the tongue, the glory of man?-Burgh.

7. Does greatness secure persons of rank from infirmities, either of body or mind? Will the head-ache, the gout or fever spare a prince any more than a subject? When old age comes to lie heavy upon him, will his engineers relieve him of the load? Can his guards and sentinels, by doubling and trebling their numbers and their watchfulness, prevent the approach of death? Nay, if jealousy, or even ill humor disturb his happiness, will the cringes of his fawning attendants restore his tranquillity? What comfort has he in reflecting (if he can make the reflection) while the cholic, like Prometheus vulture, tears his bowels, that he is under a canopy of crimson velvet, fringed with gold? When the pangs of the gout or stone, extort from him screams of agony, do the titles of Highness or Majesty come sweetly into his ear? If he is agitated with rage, does the sound of Serene, or Most Christian, prevent his staring, reddening and gnashing his teeth like a madman? Would not a twinge of the toothach, or an affront from an inferior, make the mighty Cesar forget that he was the conqueror of the world?-Montaigne.

8. When will you, my countrymer, when will you rouse from your indolence, and bethink yourselves of what is to be done?When you are forced to it by some fatal disaster? When irresistible necessity drives you? What think you of the disgraces which are already come upon you? Is not the past sufficient to stimulate your activity? Or, do you wait for somewhat more forcible and urgent? How long will you amuse yourselves with inquiring of one another after news, as you ramble idly about the streets? What news so strange ever came to Athens, as that a Macedonian should subdue this state, and lord it over Greece-Demosthenes.

9. What is the blooming tincture of the skin,
To peace of mind and harmony within?
What the bright sparkling of the finest eye,

To the soft soothing of a calm reply?

Can comeliness of form, or shape or air,
With comeliness of word or deeds compare?
No:-Those at first th' unwary heart may gain;
But these, these only, can the heat retain.-Gay.
10. Wrong'd in my love all proffers I disdain:
Deceiv'd for once I trust not kings again.
Ye have my answer-What remains to do,
Your king, Ulysses, may consult with you.
What needs he the defence, this arm can make ?
Has he not walls no human force can shake?
Has he not fenc'd his guarded navy round
With piles, with ramparts, and a trench profound?
And will not these, the wonders he has done,

Repel the rage of Priam's single son?-Pope's Homer.

VI.-Examples of CLIMAK, or a gradual increase of

1.

CONS

Sense or Passion.

NONSULT your whole nature. Consider yourselves, not only as sensitive, but as rational beings; not only as rational, but social; not only as social, but immortal.-Blair.

2. Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate; and whom he did predestinate, them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he` also glorified.-St. Paul.

3. What hope is there remaining of liberty, if whatever is their pleasure, it is lawful for them to do; if what is lawful for them to do, they are able to do; if what they are able to do, they dare do; if what they dare do, they really execute; and if what they execute, is no way offensive to you.-Cicero.

4. Nothing is more pleasant to the fancy, than to enlarge itself by degrees in its contemplation of the various proportions which its several objects bear to each other; when it compares the body of a man to the bulk of the whole earth; the earth to the circle it describes round the sun; that circle to the sphere of the fixed stars; the sphere of the fixed stars to the circuit of the whole creation: the whole creation itself, to the infinite space that is every where diffused around it.-Spectator.

5. After we have practised good actions awhile, they become easy; and when they are easy, we begin to take pleasure in them; and when they please us, we do them frequently; and by frequency of acts a thing grows into a habit; and a confirmed habit is a second kind of nature; and so far as any thing is natural, so far it is necessary, and we can hardly do otherwise; nay, we do it many times when we do not think of it.-Tillotson.

6. It is pleasant to be virtuous and good, because that is to excel many others; it is pleasant to grow better, because that is to excel ourselves; it is pleasant to mortify and subdue our lusts, because that is victory; it is pleasant to command our ap

petites and passions, and to keep them in due order, within the bounds of reason and religion, because that is empire.-Tillotson.

7. Tully has a very beautiful gradation of thoughts to show how amiable virtue is. We love a righteous man, says he, who lives in the remotest parts of the earth, though we are altogether out of the reach of his virtue, and can receive from it no manner of benefit: nay, one who died several ages ago, raises a secret fondness and benevolence for him in our minds, when we read his story nay, what is still more, one who has been the enemy of our country, provided his wars were regulated by justice and bumanity.-Spectator.

8. As trees and plants necessarily arise from seeds, so are you, Antony, the seed of this most calamitous war. You mourn, O Romans, that three of our armies have been slaughtered-they were slaughtered by Antony: you lament the loss of your most illustrious citizens-they were torn from you by Antony; the authority of this order is deeply wounded-it is wounded by Antony; in short all the calamities we have ever since beheld, (and what calamitios have we not beheld?) have been entirely owing to Antory. As Helen was of Troy, so the bane, the minery, the destruction of this state is Antony.-Cicero.

9.

-Give me the cup.

And let the kettle to the trumpets speak,

The trumpets to the cannoneers within,

The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth,
Now the king drinks to Hamlet.-Trag. of Hamlet.
10. At thirty, man suspects himself a fool:

Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan:

At fifty chides his infamous delay,

Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve,

In all the magnanimity of thought,

Resolves, and re-resolves-then dies the same. -Young.

VII.-Examples of the principal Emotions and Passions ADMIRATION, CONTEMPT, JOY, GRIEF, COURAGE, FEAR, LOVE, HATRED, PITY, ANGER, REVENGE, and JEALOUSY.

1.

WH HAT a piece of work is nan! How noble in reason! How

infinite in faculties! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! Hamlet.

2. Away! No woman could descend so low.

A skipping, dancing, worthless tribe you are.

Fit only for yourselves, you herd together;

And when the circling glass warms your vain hearts,
You talk of beauties which you never saw,

And fancy raptures that you never knew.-Fair Penitent.
3. Let mirth go on; let pleasure know no pause,
But fill up every minute of this day.

'Tis yours, my children, sacred to your loves.
The glorious sun himself for you looks gay;

« AnteriorContinuar »