This construction leaves it doubtful whether the object introduced by way of simile, relate to the subsequent or to the preceding clause. Better thus: "The minister who, like a statue placed on a mighty pedestal, grows less by his elevation, will always have his jealousy strong about him."

Instead of being able to employ troops trained to skill in arms, and to military subordination, by regular discipline, monarchs were obliged to depend on such forces as their vassals conducted to their standard in consequence of their military tenures.-Robertson's View of Society.

Here the author's meaning is sufficiently obvious; yet, from the construction, we might conclude that a little regular discipline had been administered to monarchs, in order to make them depend on such forces as their vassals conducted to their standard. The sentence may be thus arranged: "Instead of being able to employ troops trained, by regular discipline, to skill in arms, and to military subordination, monarchs were obliged to depend on such forces as their vassals conducted to their standard in consequence of their military tenures."

We shall now endeavour, with clearness and precision, to describe the provinces once united under their sway.-Gibbon's History of the Roman Empire.

The following arrangement removes this ambiguity: "We shall now endeavour to describe with clearness and precision, the provinces once united under their sway."

In the course of a certain examination, which took place in the House of Commons in the year 1809, "Mr. Dennis Browne said, the witness had been ordered to withdraw from the bar, in consequence of being intoxicated, by the motion of an honourable member." This remark, as might have been expected, produced loud and general peals of laughter. The speaker intended to say that "in consequence of being intoxicated, the witness, by the motion of an honourable member, had been ordered to withdraw from the bar."

Perhaps it may be thought that some of the pre

ceding objections are too fastidious, and that the defect of perspicuity is easily supplied by accurate punctuation. It may indeed be granted that punctuation will sometimes remove an ambiguity; but it can never produce that peculiar beauty which is perceived when the sense is clearly and distinctly unfolded by means of a happy arrangement. Such influence does this beauty possess, that, by a natural transition of perception, it is communicated to the very sound of the words, so as apparently to improve the music of the period.

Having now considered the principal circumstances which contribute to perspicuity, and the various modes in which the laws relating to it may be transgressed, I shall conclude the subject by enquiring whether it be possible that this essential quality of style may be carried to excess.

It has been alleged that too much perspicuity has a tendency to cloy the reader, and that it becomes irksome by affording no opportunity of exertion to the rational powers of the mind. This objection arises from the error of confounding two dissimilar objects, the common-place and the clear, and thence very naturally their contraries, the new and the obscure. If we entertain our reader solely or chiefly with thoughts which are either trite or obvious, he will soon be filled with languor and disgust: we present no uncommon images or sentiments to his mind, we give him little or no information, and consequently afford neither exercise to his reason nor entertainment to his fancy. In what we read and what we hear, we always expect to find something with which we were formerly unacquainted; and when this expectation is disappointed, we discover nothing to repay our attention. We are soon disgusted with such a trifling minuteness of narration, of descrip. tion, or of argument, as an ordinary apprehension renders superfluous. The reason is, not that any thing is said with too much perspicuity, but that many things are said of which no person is ignorant. Reasons that are known to everyone, ought to be taken for granted: to express them is childish, and interrupts the narration.

The practice of collecting trite maxims and commonplace sentiments is finely ridiculed in an essay of Swift's; from which I shall select one passage: "All rivers go to the sea, but none return from it. Xerxes wept when he beheld his army; to consider that in less than an hundred years they would be all dead. Anacreon was choked with a grape-stone; and violent joy kills as well as violent grief. There is nothing constant in this world but inconstancy; yet Plato thought, that if Virtue would appear in the world in her own native dress, all men would be enamoured with her. But now, since interest governs the world, and men neglect the golden mean, Jupiter himself, if he came on earth, would be despised, unless it were as he did to Danaë, in a golden shower. For men, now-adays, worship the rising sun, and not the setting."*

It is futility in the thought, and not perspicuity in the language, which constitutes the fault of such composition as that to which I have alluded. There is as little hazard that a composition shall be faulty in the latter respect, as that a mirror shall be too faithful in reflecting the images of objects, or that the glasses of a telescope shall be too transparent. At the same time, it is not to be forgotten that, with inattentive readers, darkness frequently passes for depth. On the contrary, to be perspicuous, and to be superficial, are regarded by them as synonymous. But it is not surely to their absurd notions that our language ought to be adapted.

Before I dismiss this subject, it may however be proper to observe that every species of composition does not admit of an equal degree of perspicuity. In the sublime ode, for example, it is impossible, or at least very difficult, to reconcile the utmost perspicuity with that force and vivacity which are indispensably requisite in such compositions. But even in this case, though the genius of the higher species of lyric poetry may render obscurity to a certain degree excusable, nothing can ever constitute it a positive excellence.

Swift's Tritical Essay upon the Faculties of the Mind

UNITY IN THE STRUCTURE OF SENTENCES.

IN compositions of every description, a certain degree of unity is absolutely requisite. There must always be some leading principle to form a chain of connexion between the component parts. In single sentences, which are members of a composition, the same principle must also be predominant.

I. Matters that have no intimate connexion should never be crowded into one sentence. A sentence or period ought to express one entire thought or mental proposition; and different thoughts ought to be separated in the expression, by being placed in different periods. It is improper to connect in language things which are separated in reality. Of errors against this rule I shall produce a few examples.

Cato died in the full vigour of life, under fifty; he was naturally warm and affectionate in his temper; comprehensive, impartial, and strongly possessed with the love of mankind.-Ferguson's Hist. of the Roman Republic.

If the author was determined to connect the statement of Cato's death with an account of his character, he might have preserved the unity of the sentence by such an arrangement as the following; "Cato, who died in the full vigour of life, under the age of fifty, was naturally warm and affectionate in his temper.'

In this uneasy state, both of his public and private life, Cicero was oppressed by a new and cruel affliction, the death of his beloved Tullia; which happened soon after her divorce from Dolabella, whose manners and humours were entirely disagreeable to her.-Middleton's Life of Cicero.

The principal object in this sentence, is the death of Tullia, which was the cause of her father's affliction. The time when the event took place is, without any impropriety, pointed out in the course of the sentence; but the subjunction of Dolabella's character is foreign to the main object. It breaks the unity and compactness of the period, by presenting a new picture to the reader.

He is supposed to have fallen, by his father's death, into the hands of his uncle, a vintner, near Charing Cross, who sent him for some time to Dr. Busby, at Westminster; but, not intending to give him any education beyond that of the school, took him, when he was well advanced in literature, to his own house, where the earl of Dorset, celebrated for patronage of genius, found him by chance, as Burnet relates, reading Horace, and was so well pleased with his proficiency, that he undertook the care and cost of his academical education.-Johnson's Life of Prior.

This single sentence contains no inconsiderable number of the particulars which are known with regard to the personal history of Prior. He is conducted from the house of his father to that of his uncle; sent to Westminster school, where he makes considerable progress in literature; is taken from school, and remains at his uncle's; obtains the patronage of the earl of Dorset, who, if Burnet may be credited, found him reading Horace; and, last of all, is about to be sent to the university, under the protection of that nobleman.

The usual acceptation takes profit and pleasure for two different things, and not only calls the followers or votaries of them by several names of busy and idle men, but distinguishes the faculties of the mind that are conversant about them, calling the operations of the first wisdom, and of the other wit, which is a Saxon word, that is used to express what the Spaniards and Italians call ingenio, and the French esprit, both from the Latin; but I think wit more peculiarly signifies that of poetry, as may occur upon remarks on the Runic language.-Temple on Poetry.

Before the writer arrives at the close of this sentence, he seems to have forgotten the beginning.

It breaks the icy fetters of the main, where vast sea-monsters pierce through floating islands, with arms that can withstand the crystal rock; whilst others, who of themselves seem great as islands