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fort of independent existence, by interjecting a paufe between it and its fubftantive. I cannot therefore approve the following lines, nor any of the fort for ; to my taste they are harth and unpleasant.

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The fprites of fiery termagants inflame
The reit, his many-colour'drobe conceal'd
The fame, his ancient perfonage to deck
Ev'n here, where frozen || Chaltity retires
I fit, with fad | civility, I read

Back to my native || moderation flide
Or thall we ev'ry || decency confound

Time was, a fober | Englishman would knock
And place, on good || fecurity, his gold
Tafte, that eternal | wanderer, which flies
But ere the tenth | revolving day was run
First let the just equivalent be paid.

Go, threat thy earth-born | Myrinidons; but here
Hafte to the fierce | Achilles' tent (he cries)

All but the ever wakeful eyes of Jove

Your own refiftlefs | eloquence employ

I have upon this article multiplied examples, that in a cafe where I have the misfortune to diflike what paffes current in practice, every man upon the spot may judge by his own tafte. And to tafte I appeal; for though the foregoing reafoning appears to me jut, it is however too fubtile to afford conviction in oppofition to taste,

Confidering this matter fuperficially, one might be apt to imagine, that it must be the fame, whether the adjective go first, which is the natural order, or the fubftantive, which is indulged by the laws of inverfion. But we foon difcover this to be a mistake: colour, for example, cannot be conceived independent of the furface coloured; but a tree may be conceived, as growing in a certain fpot, as of a certain kind, and as fpreading its extended branches all around,

around, without ever thinking of its colour. In a word, a fubject may be confidered with fome of its qualities independent of others; though we cannot form an image of any fingle quality independent of the fubject. Thus then, though an adjective name d first be infeparable from the fubftantive, the propofition does not reciprocate: an image can be formed of the fubftantive independent of the adjective; and for that reafon they may be feparated by a paule, when the fubftantive takes the lead.

For thee the fates || feverely kind ordain

And curs'd with hearts | unknowing how to yield.

The verb and adverb are precisely in the fame condition with the fubftantive and adjective. An adverb, which modifies the action expreffed by the verb, is not feparable from the verb even in imagination and therefore I must also give up the follow ing lines;

And which it much | becomes you to forget
il
'Tis one thing madly | to difperfe my store.

But an action may be conceived with fome of its modifications, leaving out others; precisely as a fubject may be conceived with fome of its qualities, leaving out others and therefore, when by inverfion the verb is first introduced, it has no bad effect to interject a paufe between it and the adverb that follows. This may be done at the clofe of a line, where the pause is at least as full as that is which divides the line:

While yet he spoke, the Prince advancing drew
Nigh to the lodge,

The agent and its action come next, expreffed in grammar by the active fubftantive and its verb. Between

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tween thefe, placed in their natural order, there is no difficulty of interjecting a paufe: an active being is not always in motion, and therefore it is eafily feparable in idea from its action: when in a fentence the fubftantive takes the lead, we know not that action is to follow; and as reft muft precede the commencement of motion, this interval is a proper opportunity for a pause.

But when by inverfion the verb is placed firft, is it lawful to feparate it by a paufe from the active fubftantive? I anfwer, No: becaufe an action is not an idea feparable from the agent, more than a quality from the fubject to which it belongs. Two lines of the rft rate for beauty, have always appeared to me exceptionable, upon account of the paufe thus interjected between the verb and the confequent fubftantive; and I have now difcovered a reafon to fupport my take:

In thefe deep folitudes and awful cells,

Where heav'nly-penfive | Contemplation dwells,
And ever-mufing | Melancholy reigns.

The point of the greateft delicacy regards the active verb and the paffive fubftantive placed in their natural order. On the one hand, it will be obferved, that these words fignify things which are not feparable in idea. Killing cannot be conceived without a being that is put to death, nor painting without a furface upon which the colours are fpread. On the other hand, an action and the thing on which it is exerted, are not, like fubject and quality, united in one individual object: the active fubftantive is perfect diftinct from that which is paffive; and they are connected by one circumftance only, that the action of the former is exerted upon the latter. This makes it poflible to take the action to pieces, and to

confider

confider it firft with relation to the agent, and nex' with relation to the patient. But after all, fo inti mately connected are the parts of the thought, that it requires an effort to make a feparation even for a moment: the fubtilifing to fuch a degree is not agree able, especially in works of imagination. The beft poets, however, taking advantage of this fubtilty, fcruple not to feparate by a paufe an active verb from the thing upon which it is exerted. Such pauses in a long work may be indulged; but taken fingly, they certainly are not agreeable; and I appeal to the following examples:

The peer now fpreads the glitt'ring forfox wide
As ever fully'd | the fair race of liht

Repair'd to fearch the gloomy cave of Spleen
Nothing, to make Philofophy thy friend

Shou'd hence to make the well-drefs'd rabble ftare

Or erfs, to plun ler | provinces, the main

Thefe madmen ever hurt the church or state
How fhall we fill || a library with wit
What better teach a foreigner the tongue
Sure, if I fpare the minifter, no rules
Of honour bind me, not to maul his tools.

On the other hand, when the paffive fubftantive is by inverfion first named, there is no difficulty of interjecting a paufe between it and the verb, more than when the active fubftantive is firft named. The fame reafon holds in both, that though a verb cannot be feparated in idea from the fubftantive which governs it, and fcarcely from the fubftantive it governs; yet a fubftantive may always be conceived independent of the verb: when the paffive fubftantive is introduced before the verb, we know not that an action is to be exerted upon it; therefore we may reft till the action commences. For the fake of illuf tration take the following examples:

Shrines!

Shrines! where there vigils | pale-ey'd virgins keep
Soon as thy letters trembling I unclofe
No happier tafkthefe faded eyes pursue.

What is faid about the paufe, leads to a general obfervation, That the natural order of placing the active fubftantive and its verb, is more friendly to a pause than the inverted order; but that in all the other connections, inverfion affords a far better opportunity for a paufe. And hence one great advan tage of blank verfe over rhyme; its privilege of inverfion giving it a much greater choice of pauses than can be had in the natural order of arrange.

ment.

We now proceed to the flighter connections, which fhall be difcuffed in one general article. Words con. nected by conjunctions and prepofitions admit freely a paufe between them, which will be clear from the following inftances:

Affume what fexes || and what fhape they please
The light militia of the lower fky

Connecting particles were invented to unite in a period two fubftances fignifying things occafionally united in the thought, but which have no natural union: and between two things not only feparable in idea, but really diftinct, the mind, for the fake of melody cheerfully admits by a paufe a momentary difjunction of their occafional union.

One capital branch of the fubject is still upon hand, to which I am directed by what is juft now faid. It concerns thofe parts of fpeech which fingly reprefent no idea, and which become not fignificant till they be joined to other words. I mean conjunctions, prepofitions, articles and fuch like acceflories,

pafling

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