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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: On the Sublime
+
+Author: Longinus
+
+Commentator: Andrew Lang
+
+Translator: H. L. Havell
+
+Release Date: March 10, 2006 [EBook #17957]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE SUBLIME ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Louise Hope, Justin Kerk and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber’s Note:
+The printed text shows most sections (Roman numerals) as a continuous
+block, with chapter numbers in the margin. In this e-text, chapters
+are given as separate paragraphs determined by sentence breaks, with
+continuing quotation marks supplied where necessary.
+Except for footnotes, any brackets are from the original text.]
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+                      LONGINUS
+
+                  ON THE SUBLIME
+
+             Translated into English by
+
+                 H. L. HAVELL, B.A.
+   Formerly Scholar of University College, Oxford
+
+              with an Introduction by
+                    ANDREW LANG
+
+
+                       London
+                 MACMILLAN AND CO.
+                    and New York
+                        1890
+
+               _All rights reserved_
+
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+                         TO
+
+             S. H. BUTCHER, Esq., LL.D.
+
+ Professor of Greek in the University of Edinburgh
+   Formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
+         and of University College, Oxford
+
+                    This Attempt
+     to Present the Great Thoughts of Longinus
+                 in an English Form
+
+                    Is Dedicated
+
+       in Acknowledgment of the Kind Support
+  but for Which It Might Never Have Seen the Light
+            and of the Benefits of That
+        Instruction to Which It Largely Owes
+    Whatever of Scholarly Quality It May Possess
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE
+
+
+The text which has been followed in the present Translation is that
+of Jahn (Bonn, 1867), revised by Vahlen, and republished in 1884. In
+several instances it has been found necessary to diverge from Vahlen’s
+readings, such divergencies being duly pointed out in the Notes.
+
+One word as to the aim and scope of the present Translation. My object
+throughout has been to make Longinus speak in English, to preserve, as
+far as lay in my power, the noble fire and lofty tone of the original.
+How to effect this, without being betrayed into a loose paraphrase, was
+an exceedingly difficult problem. The style of Longinus is in a high
+degree original, occasionally running into strange eccentricities of
+language; and no one who has not made the attempt can realise the
+difficulty of giving anything like an adequate version of the more
+elaborate passages. These considerations I submit to those to whom I
+may seem at first sight to have handled my text too freely.
+
+My best thanks are due to Dr. Butcher, Professor of Greek in the
+University of Edinburgh, who from first to last has shown a lively
+interest in the present undertaking which I can never sufficiently
+acknowledge. He has read the Translation throughout, and acting on his
+suggestions I have been able in numerous instances to bring my version
+into a closer conformity with the original.
+
+I have also to acknowledge the kindness of the distinguished writer who
+has contributed the Introduction, and who, in spite of the heavy demands
+on his time, has lent his powerful support to help on the work of one
+who was personally unknown to him.
+
+In conclusion, I may be allowed to express a hope that the present
+attempt may contribute something to reawaken an interest in an unjustly
+neglected classic.
+
+
+
+
+ANALYSIS
+
+
+The Treatise on the Sublime may be divided into six Parts, as follows:--
+
+I.--cc. i, ii. The Work of Caecilius. Definition of the Sublime.
+  Whether Sublimity falls within the rules of Art.
+
+II.--cc. iii-v. [The beginning lost.] Vices of Style opposed to the
+  Sublime: Affectation, Bombast, False Sentiment, Frigid Conceits.
+  The cause of such defects.
+
+III.--cc. vi, vii. The true Sublime, what it is, and how
+  distinguishable.
+
+IV.--cc. viii-xl. Five Sources of the Sublime (how Sublimity is related
+  to Passion, c. viii, §§ 2-4).
+
+  (i.) Grandeur of Thought, cc. ix-xv.
+
+    _a._ As the natural outcome of nobility of soul. Examples (c. ix).
+
+    _b._ Choice of the most striking circumstances. Sappho’s Ode (c. x).
+
+    _c._ Amplification. Plato compared with Demosthenes, Demosthenes
+      with Cicero (cc. xi-xiii).
+
+    _d._ Imitation (cc. xiii, xiv).
+
+    _e._ Imagery (c. xv).
+
+  (ii.) Power of moving the Passions (omitted here, because dealt with
+    in a separate work).
+
+  (iii.) Figures of Speech (cc. xvi-xxix).
+
+    _a._ The Figure of Adjuration (c. xvi). The Art to conceal Art
+      (c. xvii).
+
+    _b._ Rhetorical Question (c. xviii).
+
+    _c._ Asyndeton (c. xix-xxi).
+
+    _d._ Hyperbaton (c. xxii).
+
+    _e._ Changes of Number, Person, Tense, etc. (cc. xxiii-xxvii).
+
+    _f._ Periphrasis (cc. xxviii, xxix).
+
+  (iv.) Graceful Expression (cc. xxx-xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+    _a._ Choice of Words (c. xxx).
+
+    _b._ Ornaments of Style (cc. xxxi, xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+      (α) On the use of Familiar Words (c. xxxi).
+
+      (β) Metaphors; accumulated; extract from the _Timaeus_; abuse
+        of Metaphors; certain tasteless conceits blamed in Plato
+        (c. xxxii).
+        [Hence arises a digression (cc. xxxiii-xxxvi) on the spirit
+        in which we should judge of the faults of great authors.
+        Demosthenes compared with Hyperides, Lysias with Plato.
+        Sublimity, however far from faultless, to be always preferred
+        to a tame correctness.]
+
+      (γ) Comparisons and Similes [lost] (c. xxxvii).
+
+      (δ) Hyperbole (c. xxxviii).
+
+  (v.) Dignity and Elevation of Structure (cc. xxxix, xl).
+
+    _a._ Modulation of Syllables (c. xxxix).
+
+    _b._ Composition (c. xl).
+
+V.--cc. xli-xliii. Vices of Style destructive to Sublimity.
+
+  (i.) Abuse of Rhythm           }
+
+  (ii.) Broken and Jerky Clauses } (cc. xli, xlii).
+
+  (iii.) Undue Prolixity         }
+
+  (iv.) Improper Use of Familiar Words. Anti-climax. Example from
+    Theopompus (c. xliii).
+
+VI.--Why this age is so barren of great authors--whether the cause is
+to be sought in a despotic form of government, or, as Longinus rather
+thinks, in the prevailing corruption of manners, and in the sordid and
+paltry views of life which almost universally prevail (c. xliv).
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+Boileau, in his introduction to his version of the ancient Treatise on
+the Sublime, says that he is making no valueless present to his age. Not
+valueless, to a generation which talks much about style and method in
+literature, should be this new rendering of the noble fragment, long
+attributed to Longinus, the Greek tutor and political adviser of
+Zenobia. There is, indeed, a modern English version by Spurden,[1] but
+that is now rare, and seldom comes into the market. Rare, too, is
+Vaucher’s critical essay (1854), which is unlucky, as the French and
+English books both contain valuable disquisitions on the age of the
+author of the Treatise. This excellent work has had curious fortunes. It
+is never quoted nor referred to by any extant classical writer, and,
+among the many books attributed by Suidas to Longinus, it is not
+mentioned. Decidedly the old world has left no more noble relic of
+criticism. Yet the date of the book is obscure, and it did not come into
+the hands of the learned in modern Europe till Robertelli and Manutius
+each published editions in 1544. From that time the Treatise has often
+been printed, edited, translated; but opinion still floats undecided
+about its origin and period. Does it belong to the age of Augustus, or
+to the age of Aurelian? Is the author the historical Longinus--the
+friend of Plotinus, the tutor of Porphyry, the victim of Aurelian,--or
+have we here a work by an unknown hand more than two centuries earlier?
+Manuscripts and traditions are here of little service. The oldest
+manuscript, that of Paris, is regarded as the parent of the rest. It is
+a small quarto of 414 pages, whereof 335 are occupied by the “Problems”
+of Aristotle. Several leaves have been lost, hence the fragmentary
+character of the essay. The Paris MS. has an index, first mentioning the
+“Problems,” and then ΔΙΟΝΥΣΙΟΥ Η ΛΟΓΓΙΝΟΥ ΠΕΡΙ ΥΨΟΥΣ, that is, “The
+work of Dionysius, or of Longinus, about the Sublime.”
+
+    [Footnote 1: Longmans, London, 1836.]
+
+On this showing the transcriber of the MS. considered its authorship
+dubious. Supposing that the author was Dionysius, which of the many
+writers of that name was he? Again, if he was Longinus, how far does his
+work tally with the characteristics ascribed to that late critic, and
+peculiar to his age?
+
+About this Longinus, while much is written, little is certainly known.
+Was he a descendant of a freedman of one of the Cassii Longini, or of an
+eastern family with a mixture of Greek and Roman blood? The author of
+the Treatise avows himself a Greek, and apologises, as a Greek, for
+attempting an estimate of Cicero. Longinus himself was the nephew and
+heir of Fronto, a Syrian rhetorician of Emesa. Whether Longinus was born
+there or not, and when he was born, are things uncertain. Porphyry, born
+in 233 A.D., was his pupil: granting that Longinus was twenty years
+Porphyry’s senior, he must have come into the world about 213 A.D. He
+travelled much, studied in many cities, and was the friend of the mystic
+Neoplatonists, Plotinus and Ammonius. The former called him “a
+philologist, not a philosopher.” Porphyry shows us Longinus at a supper
+where the plagiarisms of Greek writers are discussed--a topic dear to
+trivial or spiteful mediocrity. He is best known by his death. As the
+Greek secretary of Zenobia he inspired a haughty answer from the queen
+to Aurelian, who therefore put him to death. Many rhetorical and
+philosophic treatises are ascribed to him, whereof only fragments
+survive. Did he write the Treatise on the Sublime? Modern students
+prefer to believe that the famous essay is, if not by Plutarch, as some
+hold, at least by some author of his age, the age of the early Caesars.
+
+The arguments for depriving Longinus, Zenobia’s tutor, of the credit of
+the Treatise lie on the surface, and may be briefly stated. He addresses
+his work as a letter to a friend, probably a Roman pupil, Terentianus,
+with whom he has been reading a work on the Sublime by Caecilius. Now
+Caecilius, a voluminous critic, certainly lived not later than Plutarch,
+who speaks of him with a sneer. It is unlikely then that an author, two
+centuries later, would make the old book of Caecilius the starting-point
+of his own. He would probably have selected some recent or even
+contemporary rhetorician. Once more, the writer of the Treatise of the
+Sublime quotes no authors later than the Augustan period. Had he lived
+as late as the historical Longinus he would surely have sought examples
+of bad style, if not of good, from the works of the Silver Age. Perhaps
+he would hardly have resisted the malicious pleasure of censuring the
+failures among whom he lived. On the other hand, if he cites no late
+author, no classical author cites him, in spite of the excellence of his
+book. But we can hardly draw the inference that he was of late date from
+this purely negative evidence.
+
+Again, he describes, in a very interesting and earnest manner, the
+characteristics of his own period (Translation, pp. 82-86). Why, he is
+asked, has genius become so rare? There are many clever men, but scarce
+any highly exalted and wide-reaching genius. Has eloquence died with
+liberty? “We have learned the lesson of a benignant despotism, and have
+never tasted freedom.” The author answers that it is easy and
+characteristic of men to blame the present times. Genius may have been
+corrupted, not by a world-wide peace, but by love of gain and pleasure,
+passions so strong that “I fear, for such men as we are it is better to
+serve than to be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether
+against our neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and
+bring a deluge of calamity on the whole civilised world.” Melancholy
+words, and appropriate to our own age, when cleverness is almost
+universal, and genius rare indeed, and the choice between liberty and
+servitude hard to make, were the choice within our power.
+
+But these words assuredly apply closely to the peaceful period of
+Augustus, when Virgil and Horace “praising their tyrant sang,” not to
+the confused age of the historical Longinus. Much has been said of the
+allusion to “the Lawgiver of the Jews” as “no ordinary person,” but that
+remark might have been made by a heathen acquainted with the Septuagint,
+at either of the disputed dates. On the other hand, our author (Section
+XIII) quotes the critical ideas of “Ammonius and his school,” as to the
+debt of Plato to Homer. Now the historical Longinus was a friend of the
+Neoplatonist teacher (not writer), Ammonius Saccas. If we could be sure
+that the Ammonius of the Treatise was this Ammonius, the question would
+be settled in favour of the late date. Our author would be that Longinus
+who inspired Zenobia to resist Aurelian, and who perished under his
+revenge. But Ammonius is not a very uncommon name, and we have no reason
+to suppose that the Neoplatonist Ammonius busied himself with the
+literary criticism of Homer and Plato. There was, among others, an
+Egyptian Ammonius, the tutor of Plutarch.
+
+These are the mass of the arguments on both sides. M. Egger sums them up
+thus: “After carefully examining the tradition of the MSS., and the one
+very late testimony in favour of Longinus, I hesitated for long as to
+the date of this precious work. In 1854 M. Vaucher[2] inclined me to
+believe that Plutarch was the author.[3] All seems to concur towards the
+opinion that, if not Plutarch, at least one of his contemporaries wrote
+the most original Greek essay in its kind since the _Rhetoric_ and
+_Poetic_ of Aristotle.”[4]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Etude Critique sur la traité du Sublime et les ecrits
+    de Longin._ Geneva.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: See also M. Naudet, _Journal des Savants_, Mars 1838,
+    and M. Egger, in the same Journal, May 1884.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Egger, _Histoire de la Critique chez les Grecs_,
+    p. 426. Paris, 1887.]
+
+We may, on the whole, agree that the nobility of the author’s thought,
+his habit of quoting nothing more recent than the Augustan age, and his
+description of his own time, which seems so pertinent to that epoch,
+mark him as its child rather than as a great critic lost among the
+_somnia Pythagorea_ of the Neoplatonists. On the other hand, if the
+author be a man of high heart and courage, as he seems, so was that
+martyr of independence, Longinus. Not without scruple, then, can we
+deprive Zenobia’s tutor of the glory attached so long to his name.
+
+Whatever its date, and whoever its author may be, the Treatise is
+fragmentary. The lost parts may very probably contain the secret of its
+period and authorship. The writer, at the request of his friend,
+Terentianus, and dissatisfied with the essay of Caecilius, sets about
+examining the nature of the Sublime in poetry and oratory. To the latter
+he assigns, as is natural, much more literary importance than we do, in
+an age when there is so little oratory of literary merit, and so much
+popular rant. The subject of sublimity must naturally have attracted a
+writer whose own moral nature was pure and lofty, who was inclined to
+discover in moral qualities the true foundation of the highest literary
+merit. Even in his opening words he strikes the keynote of his own
+disposition, where he approves the saying that “the points in which we
+resemble the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth.” Earlier
+or later born, he must have lived in the midst of literary activity,
+curious, eager, occupied with petty questions and petty quarrels,
+concerned, as men in the best times are not very greatly concerned, with
+questions of technique and detail. Cut off from politics, people found
+in composition a field for their activity. We can readily fancy what
+literature becomes when not only its born children, but the minor
+busybodies whose natural place is politics, excluded from these, pour
+into the study of letters. Love of notoriety, vague activity, fantastic
+indolence, we may be sure, were working their will in the sacred close
+of the Muses. There were literary sets, jealousies, recitations of new
+poems; there was a world of amateurs, if there were no papers and
+paragraphs. To this world the author speaks like a voice from the older
+and graver age of Greece. If he lived late, we can imagine that he did
+not quote contemporaries, not because he did not know them, but because
+he estimated them correctly. He may have suffered, as we suffer, from
+critics who, of all the world’s literature, know only “the last thing
+out,” and who take that as a standard for the past, to them unfamiliar,
+and for the hidden future. As we are told that excellence is not of the
+great past, but of the present, not in the classical masters, but in
+modern Muscovites, Portuguese, or American young women, so the author of
+the Treatise may have been troubled by Asiatic eloquence, now long
+forgotten, by names of which not a shadow survives. He, on the other
+hand, has a right to be heard because he has practised a long
+familiarity with what is old and good. His mind has ever been in contact
+with masterpieces, as the mind of a critic should be, as the mind of a
+reviewer seldom is, for the reviewer has to hurry up and down inspecting
+new literary adventurers. Not among their experiments will he find a
+touchstone of excellence, a test of greatness, and that test will seldom
+be applied to contemporary performances. What is the test, after all, of
+the Sublime, by which our author means the truly great, the best and
+most passionate thoughts, nature’s high and rare inspirations, expressed
+in the best chosen words? He replies that “a just judgment of style is
+the final fruit of long experience.” “Much has he travelled in the
+realms of gold.”
+
+The word “style” has become a weariness to think upon; so much is said,
+so much is printed about the art of expression, about methods, tricks,
+and turns; so many people, without any long experience, set up to be
+judges of style, on the strength of having admired two or three modern
+and often rather fantastic writers. About our author, however, we know
+that his experience has been long, and of the best, that he does not
+speak from a hasty acquaintance with a few contemporary _précieux_ and
+_précieuses_. The bad writing of his time he traces, as much of our own
+may be traced, to “the pursuit of novelty in thought,” or rather in
+expression. “It is this that has turned the brain of nearly all our
+learned world to-day.” “Gardons nous d’écrire trop bien,” he might have
+said, “c’est la pire manière qu’il y’ait d’écrire.”[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: M. Anatole France.]
+
+The Sublime, with which he concerns himself, is “a certain loftiness and
+excellence of language,” which “takes the reader out of himself.... The
+Sublime, acting with an imperious and irresistible force, sways every
+reader whether he will or no.” In its own sphere the Sublime does what
+“natural magic” does in the poetical rendering of nature, and perhaps in
+the same scarcely-to-be-analysed fashion. Whether this art can be taught
+or not is a question which the author treats with modesty. Then, as now,
+people were denying (and not unjustly) that this art can be taught by
+rule. The author does not go so far as to say that Criticism, “unlike
+Justice, does little evil, and little good; that is, _if_ to entertain
+for a moment delicate and curious minds is to do little good.” He does
+not rate his business so low as that. He admits that the inspiration
+comes from genius, from nature. But “an author can only learn from art
+when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius.” Nature
+must “burst out with a kind of fine madness and divine inspiration.” The
+madness must be _fine_. How can art aid it to this end? By knowledge of,
+by sympathy and emulation with, “the great poets and prose writers of
+the past.” By these we may be inspired, as the Pythoness by Apollo. From
+the genius of the past “an effluence breathes upon us.” The writer is
+not to imitate, but to keep before him the perfection of what has been
+done by the greatest poets. He is to look on them as beacons; he is to
+keep them as exemplars or ideals. He is to place them as judges of his
+work. “How would Homer, how would Demosthenes, have been affected by
+what I have written?” This is practical counsel, and even the most
+florid modern author, after polishing a paragraph, may tear it up when
+he has asked himself, “What would Addison have said about this eloquence
+of mine, or Sainte Beuve, or Mr. Matthew Arnold?” In this way what we
+call inspiration, that is the performance of the heated mind, perhaps
+working at its best, perhaps overstraining itself, and overstating its
+idea, might really be regulated. But they are few who consider so
+closely, fewer perhaps they who have the heart to cut out their own fine
+or refined things. Again, our author suggests another criterion. We are,
+as in Lamb’s phrase, “to write for antiquity,” with the souls of poets
+dead and gone for our judges. But we are also to write for the future,
+asking with what feelings posterity will read us--if it reads us at all.
+This is a good discipline. We know by practice what will hit some
+contemporary tastes; we know the measure of smartness, say, or the
+delicate flippancy, or the sentence with “a dying fall.” But one should
+also know that these are fancies of the hour--these and the touch of
+archaism, and the spinster-like and artificial precision, which seem to
+be points in some styles of the moment. Such reflections as our author
+bids us make, with a little self-respect added, may render our work less
+popular and effective, and certainly are not likely to carry it down to
+remote posterity. But all such reflections, and action in accordance
+with what they teach, are elements of literary self-respect. It is hard
+to be conscientious, especially hard for him who writes much, and of
+necessity, and for bread. But conscience is never to be obeyed with
+ease, though the ease grows with the obedience. The book attributed to
+Longinus will not have missed its mark if it reminds us that, in
+literature at least, for conscience there is yet a place, possibly even
+a reward, though that is unessential. By virtue of reasonings like
+these, and by insisting that nobility of style is, as it were, the bloom
+on nobility of soul, the Treatise on the Sublime becomes a tonic work,
+wholesome to be read by young authors and old. “It is natural in us to
+feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and, conceiving a sort of
+generous exultation, to be filled with joy and pride, as though we had
+ourselves originated the ideas which we read.” Here speaks his natural
+disinterested greatness the author himself is here sublime, and teaches
+by example as well as precept, for few things are purer than a pure and
+ardent admiration. The critic is even confident enough to expect to find
+his own nobility in others, believing that what is truly Sublime “will
+always please, and please all readers.” And in this universal acceptance
+by the populace and the literate, by critics and creators, by young and
+old, he finds the true external canon of sublimity. The verdict lies not
+with contemporaries, but with the large public, not with the little set
+of dilettanti, but must be spoken by all. Such verdicts assign the crown
+to Shakespeare and Molière, to Homer and Cervantes; we should not
+clamorously anticipate this favourable judgment for Bryant or Emerson,
+nor for the greatest of our own contemporaries. Boileau so much
+misconceived these lofty ideas that he regarded “Longinus’s” judgment as
+solely that “of good sense,” and held that, in his time, “nothing was
+good or bad till he had spoken.” But there is far more than good sense,
+there is high poetic imagination and moral greatness, in the criticism
+of our author, who certainly would have rejected Boileau’s compliment
+when he selects Longinus as a literary dictator.
+
+Indeed we almost grudge our author’s choice of a subject. He who wrote
+that “it was not in nature’s plan for us, her children, to be base and
+ignoble; no, she brought us into life as into some great field of
+contest,” should have had another field of contest than literary
+criticism. It is almost a pity that we have to doubt the tradition,
+according to which our author was Longinus, and, being but a
+rhetorician, greatly dared and bravely died. Taking literature for his
+theme, he wanders away into grammar, into considerations of tropes and
+figures, plurals and singulars, trumpery mechanical pedantries, as we
+think now, to whom grammar is no longer, as of old, “a new invented
+game.” Moreover, he has to give examples of the faults opposed to
+sublimity, he has to dive into and search the bathos, to dally over
+examples of the bombastic, the over-wrought, the puerile. These faults
+are not the sins of “minds generous and aspiring,” and we have them with
+us always. The additions to Boileau’s preface (Paris, 1772) contain
+abundance of examples of faults from Voiture, Mascaron, Bossuet,
+selected by M. de St. Marc, who no doubt found abundance of
+entertainment in the chastising of these obvious affectations. It hardly
+seems the proper work for an author like him who wrote the Treatise on
+the Sublime. But it is tempting, even now, to give contemporary
+instances of skill in the Art of Sinking--modern cases of bombast,
+triviality, false rhetoric. “Speaking generally, it would seem that
+bombast is one of the hardest things to avoid in writing,” says an
+author who himself avoids it so well. Bombast is the voice of sham
+passion, the shadow of an insincere attitude. “Even the wretched phantom
+who still bore the imperial title stooped to pay this ignominious
+blackmail,” cries bombast in Macaulay’s _Lord Clive_. The picture of a
+phantom who is not only a phantom but wretched, stooping to pay
+blackmail which is not only blackmail but ignominious, may divert the
+reader and remind him that the faults of the past are the faults of the
+present. Again, “The desolate islands along the sea-coast, overgrown by
+noxious vegetation, and swarming with deer and tigers”--do, what does
+any one suppose, perform what forlorn part in the economy of the world?
+Why, they “supply the cultivated districts with abundance of salt.” It
+is as comic as--
+
+  “And thou Dalhousie, thou great God of War,
+  Lieutenant-Colonel to the Earl of Mar.”
+
+Bombast “transcends the Sublime,” and falls on the other side. Our
+author gives more examples of puerility. “Slips of this sort are made by
+those who, aiming at brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness,
+are landed in paltriness and silly affectation.” Some modern instances
+we had chosen; the field of choice is large and richly fertile in those
+blossoms. But the reader may be left to twine a garland of them for
+himself; to select from contemporaries were invidious, and might provoke
+retaliation. When our author censures Timaeus for saying that Alexander
+took less time to annex Asia than Isocrates spent in writing an oration,
+to bid the Greeks attack Persia, we know what he would have thought of
+Macaulay’s antithesis. He blames Xenophon for a poor pun, and Plato,
+less justly, for mere figurative badinage. It would be an easy task to
+ransack contemporaries, even great contemporaries, for similar failings,
+for pomposity, for the florid, for sentences like processions of
+intoxicated torch-bearers, for pedantic display of cheap erudition, for
+misplaced flippancy, for nice derangement of epitaphs wherein no
+adjective is used which is appropriate. With a library of cultivated
+American novelists and uncultivated English romancers at hand, with our
+own voluminous essays, and the essays and histories and “art criticisms”
+of our neighbours to draw from, no student need lack examples of what is
+wrong. He who writes, reflecting on his own innumerable sins, can but
+beat his breast, cry _Mea Culpa_, and resist the temptation to beat the
+breasts of his coevals. There are not many authors, there have never
+been many, who did not need to turn over the treatise of the Sublime by
+day and night.[6]
+
+    [Footnote 6: The examples of bombast used to be drawn as late as
+    Spurden’s translation (1836), from Lee, from _Troilus and Cressida_,
+    and _The Taming of the Shrew_. Cowley and Crashaw furnished
+    instances of conceits; Waller, Young, and Hayley of frigidity;
+    and Darwin of affectation.
+        “What beaux and beauties crowd the gaudy groves,
+        And woo and win their _vegetable loves_”--
+    a phrase adopted--“vapid vegetable loves”--by the Laureate in
+    “The Talking Oak.”]
+
+As a literary critic of Homer our author is most interesting even in his
+errors. He compares the poet of the _Odyssey_ to the sunset: the _Iliad_
+is noonday work, the _Odyssey_ is touched with the glow of evening--the
+softness and the shadows. “Old age naturally leans,” like childhood,
+“towards the fabulous.” The tide has flowed back, and left dim bulks of
+things on the long shadowy sands. Yet he makes an exception, oddly
+enough, in favour of the story of the Cyclops, which really is the most
+fabulous and crude of the fairy tales in the first and greatest of
+romances. The Slaying of the Wooers, that admirable fight, worthy of a
+saga, he thinks too improbable, and one of the “trifles into which
+second childhood is apt to be betrayed.” He fancies that the aged Homer
+had “lost his power of depicting the passions”; in fact, he is hardly a
+competent or sympathetic critic of the _Odyssey_. Perhaps he had lived
+among Romans till he lost his sense of humour; perhaps he never had any
+to lose. On the other hand, he preserved for us that inestimable and not
+to be translated fragment of Sappho--φαίνεταί μοι κῆνος ἴσος θεοῖσιν.
+
+It is curious to find him contrasting Apollonius Rhodius as faultless,
+with Homer as great but faulty. The “faultlessness” of Apollonius is not
+his merit, for he is often tedious, and he has little skill in
+selection; moreover, he is deliberately antiquarian, if not pedantic.
+His true merit is in his original and, as we think, modern telling of a
+love tale--pure, passionate, and tender, the first in known literature.
+Medea is often sublime, and always touching. But it is not on these
+merits that our author lingers; he loves only the highest literature,
+and, though he finds spots on the sun and faults in Homer, he condones
+them as oversights passed in the poet’s “contempt of little things.”
+
+Such for us to-day are the lessons of Longinus. He traces dignity and
+fire of style to dignity and fire of soul. He detects and denounces the
+very faults of which, in each other, all writers are conscious, and
+which he brings home to ourselves. He proclaims the essential merits of
+conviction, and of selection. He sets before us the noblest examples of
+the past, most welcome in a straining age which tries already to live in
+the future. He admonishes and he inspires. He knows the “marvellous
+power and enthralling charm of appropriate and striking words” without
+dropping into mere word-tasting. “Beautiful words are the very light of
+thought,” he says, but does not maunder about the “colour” of words, in
+the style of the decadence. And then he “leaves this generation to its
+fate,” and calmly turns himself to the work that lies nearest his hand.
+
+To us he is as much a moral as a literary teacher. We admire that Roman
+greatness of soul in a Greek, and the character of this unknown man, who
+carried the soul of a poet, the heart of a hero under the gown of a
+professor. He was one of those whom books cannot debilitate, nor a life
+of study incapacitate for the study of life.
+
+  A. L.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+1
+The treatise of Caecilius on the Sublime, when, as you remember, my dear
+Terentian, we examined it together, seemed to us to be beneath the
+dignity of the whole subject, to fail entirely in seizing the salient
+points, and to offer little profit (which should be the principal aim of
+every writer) for the trouble of its perusal. There are two things
+essential to a technical treatise: the first is to define the subject;
+the second (I mean second in order, as it is by much the first in
+importance) to point out how and by what methods we may become masters
+of it ourselves. And yet Caecilius, while wasting his efforts in a
+thousand illustrations of the nature of the Sublime, as though here we
+were quite in the dark, somehow passes by as immaterial the question how
+we might be able to exalt our own genius to a certain degree of progress
+in sublimity. However, perhaps it would be fairer to commend this
+writer’s intelligence and zeal in themselves, instead of blaming him for
+his omissions.
+
+2
+And since you have bidden me also to put together, if only for your
+entertainment, a few notes on the subject of the Sublime, let me see if
+there is anything in my speculations which promises advantage to men of
+affairs. In you, dear friend--such is my confidence in your abilities,
+and such the part which becomes you--I look for a sympathising and
+discerning[1] critic of the several parts of my treatise. For that was a
+just remark of his who pronounced that the points in which we resemble
+the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading φιλοφρονέστατα καὶ ἀληθέστατα.]
+
+3
+As I am addressing a person so accomplished in literature, I need only
+state, without enlarging further on the matter, that the Sublime,
+wherever it occurs, consists in a certain loftiness and excellence of
+language, and that it is by this, and this only, that the greatest poets
+and prose-writers have gained eminence, and won themselves a lasting
+place in the Temple of Fame.
+
+4
+A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes
+him out of himself. That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment,
+and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or
+not is usually in our own power; but the Sublime, acting with an
+imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or
+no. Skill in invention, lucid arrangement and disposition of facts, are
+appreciated not by one passage, or by two, but gradually manifest
+themselves in the general structure of a work; but a sublime thought, if
+happily timed, illumines[2] an entire subject with the vividness of a
+lightning-flash, and exhibits the whole power of the orator in a moment
+of time. Your own experience, I am sure, my dearest Terentian, would
+enable you to illustrate these and similar points of doctrine.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Reading διεφώτισεν.]
+
+
+II
+
+The first question which presents itself for solution is whether there
+is any art which can teach sublimity or loftiness in writing. For some
+hold generally that there is mere delusion in attempting to reduce such
+subjects to technical rules. “The Sublime,” they tell us, “is born in a
+man, and not to be acquired by instruction; genius is the only master
+who can teach it. The vigorous products of nature” (such is their view)
+“are weakened and in every respect debased, when robbed of their flesh
+and blood by frigid technicalities.”
+
+2
+But I maintain that the truth can be shown to stand otherwise in this
+matter. Let us look at the case in this way; Nature in her loftier and
+more passionate moods, while detesting all appearance of restraint, is
+not wont to show herself utterly wayward and reckless; and though in all
+cases the vital informing principle is derived from her, yet to
+determine the right degree and the right moment, and to contribute the
+precision of practice and experience, is the peculiar province of
+scientific method. The great passions, when left to their own blind and
+rash impulses without the control of reason, are in the same danger as a
+ship let drive at random without ballast. Often they need the spur, but
+sometimes also the curb.
+
+3
+The remark of Demosthenes with regard to human life in general,--that
+the greatest of all blessings is to be fortunate, but next to that and
+equal in importance is to be well advised,--for good fortune is utterly
+ruined by the absence of good counsel,--may be applied to literature, if
+we substitute genius for fortune, and art for counsel. Then, again (and
+this is the most important point of all), a writer can only learn from
+art when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Literally, “But the most important point of all is that
+    the actual fact that there are some parts of literature which are in
+    the power of natural genius alone, must be learnt from no other
+    source than from art.”]
+
+These are the considerations which I submit to the unfavourable critic
+of such useful studies. Perhaps they may induce him to alter his opinion
+as to the vanity and idleness of our present investigations.
+
+
+III
+
+  ... “And let them check the stove’s long tongues of fire:
+  For if I see one tenant of the hearth,
+  I’ll thrust within one curling torrent flame,
+  And bring that roof in ashes to the ground:
+  But now not yet is sung my noble lay.”[1]
+
+Such phrases cease to be tragic, and become burlesque,--I mean phrases
+like “curling torrent flames” and “vomiting to heaven,” and representing
+Boreas as a piper, and so on. Such expressions, and such images, produce
+an effect of confusion and obscurity, not of energy; and if each
+separately be examined under the light of criticism, what seemed
+terrible gradually sinks into absurdity. Since then, even in tragedy,
+where the natural dignity of the subject makes a swelling diction
+allowable, we cannot pardon a tasteless grandiloquence, how much more
+incongruous must it seem in sober prose!
+
+    [Footnote 1: Aeschylus in his lost _Oreithyia_.]
+
+2
+Hence we laugh at those fine words of Gorgias of Leontini, such as
+“Xerxes the Persian Zeus” and “vultures, those living tombs,” and at
+certain conceits of Callisthenes which are high-flown rather than
+sublime, and at some in Cleitarchus more ludicrous still--a writer whose
+frothy style tempts us to travesty Sophocles and say, “He blows a little
+pipe, and blows it ill.” The same faults may be observed in Amphicrates
+and Hegesias and Matris, who in their frequent moments (as they think)
+of inspiration, instead of playing the genius are simply playing the
+fool.
+
+3
+Speaking generally, it would seem that bombast is one of the hardest
+things to avoid in writing. For all those writers who are ambitious of a
+lofty style, through dread of being convicted of feebleness and poverty
+of language, slide by a natural gradation into the opposite extreme.
+“Who fails in great endeavour, nobly fails,” is their creed.
+
+4
+Now bulk, when hollow and affected, is always objectionable, whether in
+material bodies or in writings, and in danger of producing on us an
+impression of littleness: “nothing,” it is said, “is drier than a man
+with the dropsy.”
+
+The characteristic, then, of bombast is that it transcends the Sublime:
+but there is another fault diametrically opposed to grandeur: this is
+called puerility, and it is the failing of feeble and narrow
+minds,--indeed, the most ignoble of all vices in writing. By puerility
+we mean a pedantic habit of mind, which by over-elaboration ends in
+frigidity. Slips of this sort are made by those who, aiming at
+brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness, are landed in
+paltriness and silly affectation.
+
+5
+Closely associated with this is a third sort of vice, in dealing with
+the passions, which Theodorus used to call false sentiment, meaning by
+that an ill-timed and empty display of emotion, where no emotion is
+called for, or of greater emotion than the situation warrants. Thus we
+often see an author hurried by the tumult of his mind into tedious
+displays of mere personal feeling which has no connection with the
+subject. Yet how justly ridiculous must an author appear, whose most
+violent transports leave his readers quite cold! However, I will dismiss
+this subject, as I intend to devote a separate work to the treatment of
+the pathetic in writing.
+
+
+IV
+
+The last of the faults which I mentioned is frequently observed in
+Timaeus--I mean the fault of frigidity. In other respects he is an able
+writer, and sometimes not unsuccessful in the loftier style; a man of
+wide knowledge, and full of ingenuity; a most bitter critic of the
+failings of others--but unhappily blind to his own. In his eagerness to
+be always striking out new thoughts he frequently falls into the most
+childish absurdities.
+
+2
+I will only instance one or two passages, as most of them have been
+pointed out by Caecilius. Wishing to say something very fine about
+Alexander the Great he speaks of him as a man “who annexed the whole of
+Asia in fewer years than Isocrates spent in writing his panegyric
+oration in which he urges the Greeks to make war on Persia.” How strange
+is the comparison of the “great Emathian conqueror” with an Athenian
+rhetorician! By this mode of reasoning it is plain that the Spartans
+were very inferior to Isocrates in courage, since it took them thirty
+years to conquer Messene, while he finished the composition of this
+harangue in ten.
+
+3
+Observe, too, his language on the Athenians taken in Sicily. “They paid
+the penalty for their impious outrage on Hermes in mutilating his
+statues; and the chief agent in their destruction was one who was
+descended on his father’s side from the injured deity--Hermocrates, son
+of Hermon.” I wonder, my dearest Terentian, how he omitted to say of the
+tyrant Dionysius that for his impiety towards Zeus and Herakles he was
+deprived of his power by Dion and Herakleides.
+
+4
+Yet why speak of Timaeus, when even men like Xenophon and Plato--the
+very demi-gods of literature--though they had sat at the feet of
+Socrates, sometimes forgot themselves in the pursuit of such paltry
+conceits. The former, in his account of the Spartan Polity, has these
+words: “Their voice you would no more hear than if they were of marble,
+their gaze is as immovable as if they were cast in bronze; you would
+deem them more modest than the very maidens in their eyes.”[1] To speak
+of the pupils of the eye as “modest maidens” was a piece of absurdity
+becoming Amphicrates[2] rather than Xenophon. And then what a strange
+delusion to suppose that modesty is always without exception expressed
+in the eye! whereas it is commonly said that there is nothing by which
+an impudent fellow betrays his character so much as by the expression of
+his eyes. Thus Achilles addresses Agamemnon in the _Iliad_ as “drunkard,
+with eye of dog.”[3]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Xen. de Rep. Laced._ 3, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: C. iii. sect. 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ i. 225.]
+
+5
+Timaeus, however, with that want of judgment which characterises
+plagiarists, could not leave to Xenophon the possession of even this
+piece of frigidity. In relating how Agathocles carried off his cousin,
+who was wedded to another man, from the festival of the unveiling, he
+asks, “Who could have done such a deed, unless he had harlots instead of
+maidens in his eyes?”
+
+6
+And Plato himself, elsewhere so supreme a master of style, meaning to
+describe certain recording tablets, says, “They shall write, and deposit
+in the temples memorials of cypress wood”;[4] and again, “Then
+concerning walls, Megillus, I give my vote with Sparta that we should
+let them lie asleep within the ground, and not awaken them.”[5]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Plat. de Legg._ v. 741, C.]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Ib._ vi. 778, D.]
+
+7
+And Herodotus falls pretty much under the same censure, when he speaks
+of beautiful women as “tortures to the eye,”[6] though here there is
+some excuse, as the speakers in this passage are drunken barbarians.
+Still, even from dramatic motives, such errors in taste should not be
+permitted to deface the pages of an immortal work.
+
+    [Footnote 6: v. 18.]
+
+
+V
+
+Now all these glaring improprieties of language may be traced to one
+common root--the pursuit of novelty in thought. It is this that has
+turned the brain of nearly all the learned world of to-day. Human
+blessings and human ills commonly flow from the same source: and, to
+apply this principle to literature, those ornaments of style, those
+sublime and delightful images, which contribute to success, are the
+foundation and the origin, not only of excellence, but also of failure.
+It is thus with the figures called transitions, and hyperboles, and the
+use of plurals for singulars. I shall show presently the dangers which
+they seem to involve. Our next task, therefore, must be to propose and
+to settle the question how we may avoid the faults of style related to
+sublimity.
+
+
+VI
+
+Our best hope of doing this will be first of all to grasp some definite
+theory and criterion of the true Sublime. Nevertheless this is a hard
+matter; for a just judgment of style is the final fruit of long
+experience; still, I believe that the way I shall indicate will enable
+us to distinguish between the true and false Sublime, so far as it can
+be done by rule.
+
+
+VII
+
+It is proper to observe that in human life nothing is truly great which
+is despised by all elevated minds. For example, no man of sense can
+regard wealth, honour, glory, and power, or any of those things which
+are surrounded by a great external parade of pomp and circumstance, as
+the highest blessings, seeing that merely to despise such things is a
+blessing of no common order: certainly those who possess them are
+admired much less than those who, having the opportunity to acquire
+them, through greatness of soul neglect it. Now let us apply this
+principle to the Sublime in poetry or in prose; let us ask in all cases,
+is it merely a specious sublimity? is this gorgeous exterior a mere
+false and clumsy pageant, which if laid open will be found to conceal
+nothing but emptiness? for if so, a noble mind will scorn instead of
+admiring it.
+
+2
+It is natural to us to feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and
+conceiving a sort of generous exultation to be filled with joy and
+pride, as though we had ourselves originated the ideas which we read.
+
+3
+If then any work, on being repeatedly submitted to the judgment of an
+acute and cultivated critic, fails to dispose his mind to lofty ideas;
+if the thoughts which it suggests do not extend beyond what is actually
+expressed; and if, the longer you read it, the less you think of
+it,--there can be here no true sublimity, when the effect is not
+sustained beyond the mere act of perusal. But when a passage is pregnant
+in suggestion, when it is hard, nay impossible, to distract the
+attention from it, and when it takes a strong and lasting hold on the
+memory, then we may be sure that we have lighted on the true Sublime.
+
+4
+In general we may regard those words as truly noble and sublime which
+always please and please all readers. For when the same book always
+produces the same impression on all who read it, whatever be the
+difference in their pursuits, their manner of life, their aspirations,
+their ages, or their language, such a harmony of opposites gives
+irresistible authority to their favourable verdict.
+
+
+VIII
+
+I shall now proceed to enumerate the five principal sources, as we may
+call them, from which almost all sublimity is derived, assuming, of
+course, the preliminary gift on which all these five sources depend,
+namely, command of language. The first and the most important is
+(1) grandeur of thought, as I have pointed out elsewhere in my work on
+Xenophon. The second is (2) a vigorous and spirited treatment of the
+passions. These two conditions of sublimity depend mainly on natural
+endowments, whereas those which follow derive assistance from Art. The
+third is (3) a certain artifice in the employment of figures, which are
+of two kinds, figures of thought and figures of speech. The fourth is
+(4) dignified expression, which is sub-divided into (_a_) the proper
+choice of words, and (_b_) the use of metaphors and other ornaments
+of diction. The fifth cause of sublimity, which embraces all those
+preceding, is (5) majesty and elevation of structure. Let us consider
+what is involved in each of these five forms separately.
+
+I must first, however, remark that some of these five divisions are
+omitted by Caecilius; for instance, he says nothing about the passions.
+
+2
+Now if he made this omission from a belief that the Sublime and the
+Pathetic are one and the same thing, holding them to be always
+coexistent and interdependent, he is in error. Some passions are found
+which, so far from being lofty, are actually low, such as pity, grief,
+fear; and conversely, sublimity is often not in the least affecting, as
+we may see (among innumerable other instances) in those bold expressions
+of our great poet on the sons of Aloëus--
+
+                    “Highly they raged
+  To pile huge Ossa on the Olympian peak,
+  And Pelion with all his waving trees
+  On Ossa’s crest to raise, and climb the sky;”
+
+and the yet more tremendous climax--
+
+  “And now had they accomplished it.”
+
+3
+And in orators, in all passages dealing with panegyric, and in all the
+more imposing and declamatory places, dignity and sublimity play an
+indispensable part; but pathos is mostly absent. Hence the most pathetic
+orators have usually but little skill in panegyric, and conversely those
+who are powerful in panegyric generally fail in pathos.
+
+4
+If, on the other hand, Caecilius supposed that pathos never contributes
+to sublimity, and this is why he thought it alien to the subject, he is
+entirely deceived. For I would confidently pronounce that nothing is so
+conducive to sublimity as an appropriate display of genuine passion,
+which bursts out with a kind of “fine madness” and divine inspiration,
+and falls on our ears like the voice of a god.
+
+
+IX
+
+I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime the
+most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind.
+Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired,
+nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up
+our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble
+thoughts.
+
+2
+How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my
+writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul.
+Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is
+sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance,
+the silence of Ajax in the eleventh _Odyssey_[1] is great, and grander
+than anything he could have said.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Od._ xi. 543.]
+
+3
+It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question
+whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true
+eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and
+aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal
+thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the
+lasting reverence of mankind. It is only natural that their words should
+be full of sublimity whose thoughts are full of majesty.
+
+4
+Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was
+the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had
+observed, “Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied”; “And I, were
+I Parmenio”...
+
+The distance between heaven and earth[1]--a measure, one might say, not
+less appropriate to Homer’s genius than to the stature of his discord.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ iv. 442.]
+
+5
+How different is that touch of Hesiod’s in his description of sorrow--if
+the _Shield_ is really one of his works: “rheum from her nostrils
+flowed”[2]--an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now consider how
+Homer gives dignity to his divine persons--
+
+  “As far as lies his airy ken, who sits
+  On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea:
+  So far extends the heavenly coursers’ stride.”[3]
+
+He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world--a grand
+comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine
+steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no
+room in the world for another.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Scut. Herc._ 267.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ v. 770.]
+
+6
+Sublime also are the images in the “Battle of the Gods”--
+
+                      “A trumpet sound
+  Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height;
+  Then terror seized the monarch of the dead,
+  And springing from his throne he cried aloud
+  With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder
+  By Neptune’s mighty arm, forthwith reveal
+  To mortal and immortal eyes those halls
+  So drear and dank, which e’en the gods abhor.”[4]
+
+Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole
+world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is
+a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell,
+mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xxi. 388; xx. 61.]
+
+7
+A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken
+allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of
+decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels,
+revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric
+tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities,
+as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities--or rather,
+his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when we are
+unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods, according to
+him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.
+
+8
+Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are
+those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as
+something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which
+has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on Poseidon:--
+
+  “Mountain and wood and solitary peak,
+  The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy,
+  Trembled beneath the god’s immortal feet.
+  Over the waves he rode, and round him played,
+  Lured from the deeps, the ocean’s monstrous brood,
+  With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord:
+  The charmèd billows parted: on they flew.”[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Il._ xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.]
+
+9
+And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed
+an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression
+in the opening words of his “Laws”: “God said”--what?--“let there be
+light, and there was light: let there be land, and there was.”
+
+10
+I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage
+from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in
+illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic
+heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the
+ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries aloud--
+
+                “Almighty Sire,
+  Only from darkness save Achaia’s sons;
+  No more I ask, but give us back the day;
+  Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt.”[6]
+
+The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you
+observe, ask for his life--such a request would have been unworthy of
+his heroic soul--but finding himself paralysed by darkness, and
+prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes
+because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. “At
+least,” he thinks, “I shall find a warrior’s grave, even though Zeus
+himself should fight against me.”
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Il._ xvii. 645.]
+
+11
+In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of
+the struggle, and, in his own words, he
+
+      “Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire
+  Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side;
+  His lips drop foam.”[7]
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Il._ xv. 605.]
+
+12
+But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer’s mind. When
+we turn to the _Odyssey_ we find occasion to observe that a great
+poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age
+naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work
+was composed after the _Iliad_, in proof of which we may mention, among
+many other indications, the introduction in the _Odyssey_ of the sequel
+to the story of his heroes’ adventures at Troy, as so many additional
+episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of sorrow and
+mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if in
+fulfilment of some previous design. The _Odyssey_ is, in fact, a sort of
+epilogue to the _Iliad_--
+
+  “There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there,
+  And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor;
+  There lies my own dear son.”[8]
+
+    [Footnote 8: _Od._ iii. 109.]
+
+13
+And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the _Iliad_, which was
+written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the
+poem is founded on action and struggle, in the _Odyssey_ he generally
+prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence Homer in
+his _Odyssey_ may be compared to the setting sun: he is still as great
+as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is now pitched to
+a lower key than in the “Tale of Troy divine”: we begin to miss that
+high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that continuous
+current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that force of
+eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to Nature. Like
+the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores waste and
+bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and draws us away
+into the dim region of myth and legend.
+
+14
+In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the
+_Odyssey_, the story of the Cyclops,[9] and other striking passages. It
+is Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every
+one of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.
+
+My purpose in making this digression was, as I said, to point out into
+what trifles the second childhood of genius is too apt to be betrayed;
+such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are confined,[10] the
+tale of Odysseus’s comrades being changed by Circe into swine[11]
+(“whimpering porkers” Zoïlus called them), and how Zeus was fed like
+a nestling by the doves,[12] and how Odysseus passed ten nights on the
+shipwreck without food,[13] and the improbable incidents in the slaying
+of the suitors.[14] When Homer nods like this, we must be content to say
+that he dreams as Zeus might dream.
+
+    [Footnote 9: _Od._ ix. 182.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Od._ x. 17.]
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Od._ x. 237.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: _Od._ xii. 62.]
+
+    [Footnote 13: _Od._ xii. 447.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: _Od._ xxii. _passim_.]
+
+15
+Another reason for these remarks on the _Odyssey_ is that I wished to
+make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they have
+lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the
+delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and
+characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a
+sort of comedy of manners.
+
+
+X
+
+Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces to
+the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things there
+are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It
+necessarily follows, therefore, that one cause of sublimity is the
+choice of the most striking circumstances involved in whatever we are
+describing, and, further, the power of afterwards combining them into
+one animate whole. The reader is attracted partly by the selection of
+the incidents, partly by the skill which has welded them together. For
+instance, Sappho, in dealing with the passionate manifestations
+attending on the frenzy of lovers, always chooses her strokes from the
+signs which she has observed to be actually exhibited in such cases. But
+her peculiar excellence lies in the felicity with which she chooses and
+unites together the most striking and powerful features.
+
+2
+  “I deem that man divinely blest
+  Who sits, and, gazing on thy face,
+  Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips,
+      And marks thy lovely smile.
+  This, this it is that made my heart
+  So wildly flutter in my breast;
+  Whene’er I look on thee, my voice
+      Falters, and faints, and fails;
+  My tongue’s benumbed; a subtle fire
+  Through all my body inly steals;
+  Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim;
+      Strange murmurs drown my ears;
+  With dewy damps my limbs are chilled;
+  An icy shiver shakes my frame;
+  Paler than ashes grows my cheek;
+      And Death seems nigh at hand.”
+
+3
+Is it not wonderful how at the same moment soul, body, ears, tongue,
+eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to her as completely as if they
+were not her own? Observe too how her sensations contradict one
+another--she freezes, she burns, she raves, she reasons, and all at the
+same instant. And this description is designed to show that she is
+assailed, not by any particular emotion, but by a tumult of different
+emotions. All these tokens belong to the passion of love; but it is in
+the choice, as I said, of the most striking features, and in the
+combination of them into one picture, that the perfection of this Ode of
+Sappho’s lies. Similarly Homer in his descriptions of tempests always
+picks out the most terrific circumstances.
+
+4
+The poet of the “Arimaspeia” intended the following lines to be grand--
+
+  “Herein I find a wonder passing strange,
+    That men should make their dwelling on the deep,
+  Who far from land essaying bold to range
+    With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep;
+    Their eyes are fixed on heaven’s starry steep;
+  The ravening billows hunger for their lives;
+    And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep,
+  With suppliant hands to move heaven’s pity strives,
+  While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives.”
+
+All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the
+description. Now let us turn to Homer.
+
+5
+One passage will suffice to show the contrast.
+
+  “On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave,
+  Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds,
+  On a swift ship, and buries her in foam;
+  Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast,
+  And quakes the breathless seamen’s shuddering heart
+  In terror dire: death lours on every wave.”[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 624.]
+
+6
+Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought--
+
+  “But one frail timber shields them from their doom,”[2]--
+
+banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his
+description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying
+“shields them”; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether
+the “timber” be “frail” or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit
+to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on
+the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant
+death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of
+opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the
+scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting
+the anxiety of the sailors’ minds, and the diction being stamped, as it
+were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaenomena_, 299.]
+
+7
+Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly
+Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of
+Elatea[3]--“It was evening,” etc. Each of these authors fastidiously
+rejects whatever is not essential to the subject, and in putting
+together the most vivid features is careful to guard against the
+interposition of anything frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such
+blemishes mar the general effect, and give a patched and gaping
+appearance to the edifice of sublimity, which ought to be built up in a
+solid and uniform structure.
+
+    [Footnote 3: _De Cor._ 169.]
+
+
+XI
+
+Closely associated with the part of our subject we have just treated of
+is that excellence of writing which is called amplification, when a
+writer or pleader, whose theme admits of many successive starting-points
+and pauses, brings on one impressive point after another in a continuous
+and ascending scale.
+
+2
+Now whether this is employed in the treatment of a commonplace, or in
+the way of exaggeration, whether to place arguments or facts in a strong
+light, or in the disposition of actions, or of passions--for
+amplification takes a hundred different shapes--in all cases the orator
+must be cautioned that none of these methods is complete without the aid
+of sublimity,--unless, indeed, it be our object to excite pity, or to
+depreciate an opponent’s argument. In all other uses of amplification,
+if you subtract the element of sublimity you will take as it were the
+soul from the body. No sooner is the support of sublimity removed than
+the whole becomes lifeless, nerveless, and dull.
+
+3
+There is a difference, however, between the rules I am now giving and
+those just mentioned. Then I was speaking of the delineation and
+co-ordination of the principal circumstances. My next task, therefore,
+must be briefly to define this difference, and with it the general
+distinction between amplification and sublimity. Our whole discourse
+will thus gain in clearness.
+
+
+XII
+
+I must first remark that I am not satisfied with the definition of
+amplification generally given by authorities on rhetoric. They explain
+it to be a form of language which invests the subject with a certain
+grandeur. Yes, but this definition may be applied indifferently to
+sublimity, pathos, and the use of figurative language, since all these
+invest the discourse with some sort of grandeur. The difference seems to
+me to lie in this, that sublimity gives elevation to a subject, while
+amplification gives extension as well. Thus the sublime is often
+conveyed in a single thought,[1] but amplification can only subsist with
+a certain prolixity and diffusiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. i. 4. 26.]
+
+2
+The most general definition of amplification would explain it to consist
+in the gathering together of all the constituent parts and topics of a
+subject, emphasising the argument by repeated insistence, herein
+differing from proof, that whereas the object of proof is logical
+demonstration, ...
+
+Plato, like the sea, pours forth his riches in a copious and expansive
+flood.
+
+3
+Hence the style of the orator, who is the greater master of our
+emotions, is often, as it were, red-hot and ablaze with passion, whereas
+Plato, whose strength lay in a sort of weighty and sober magnificence,
+though never frigid, does not rival the thunders of Demosthenes.
+
+4
+And, if a Greek may be allowed to express an opinion on the subject of
+Latin literature, I think the same difference may be discerned in the
+grandeur of Cicero as compared with that of his Grecian rival. The
+sublimity of Demosthenes is generally sudden and abrupt: that of Cicero
+is equally diffused. Demosthenes is vehement, rapid, vigorous, terrible;
+he burns and sweeps away all before him; and hence we may liken him to a
+whirlwind or a thunderbolt: Cicero is like a widespread conflagration,
+which rolls over and feeds on all around it, whose fire is extensive and
+burns long, breaking out successively in different places, and finding
+its fuel now here, now there.
+
+5
+Such points, however, I resign to your more competent judgment.
+
+To resume, then, the high-strung sublimity of Demosthenes is appropriate
+to all cases where it is desired to exaggerate, or to rouse some
+vehement emotion, and generally when we want to carry away our audience
+with us. We must employ the diffusive style, on the other hand, when we
+wish to overpower them with a flood of language. It is suitable, for
+example, to familiar topics, and to perorations in most cases, and to
+digressions, and to all descriptive and declamatory passages, and in
+dealing with history or natural science, and in numerous other cases.
+
+
+XIII
+
+To return, however, to Plato: how grand he can be with all that gentle
+and noiseless flow of eloquence you will be reminded by this
+characteristic passage, which you have read in his _Republic_: “They,
+therefore, who have no knowledge of wisdom and virtue, whose lives are
+passed in feasting and similar joys, are borne downwards, as is but
+natural, and in this region they wander all their lives; but they never
+lifted up their eyes nor were borne upwards to the true world above, nor
+ever tasted of pleasure abiding and unalloyed; but like beasts they ever
+look downwards, and their heads are bent to the ground, or rather to the
+table; they feed full their bellies and their lusts, and longing ever
+more and more for such things they kick and gore one another with horns
+and hoofs of iron, and slay one another in their insatiable desires.”[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Rep._ ix. 586, A.]
+
+2
+We may learn from this author, if we would but observe his example, that
+there is yet another path besides those mentioned which leads to sublime
+heights. What path do I mean? The emulous imitation of the great poets
+and prose-writers of the past. On this mark, dear friend, let us keep
+our eyes ever steadfastly fixed. Many gather the divine impulse from
+another’s spirit, just as we are told that the Pythian priestess, when
+she takes her seat on the tripod, where there is said to be a rent in
+the ground breathing upwards a heavenly emanation, straightway conceives
+from that source the godlike gift of prophecy, and utters her inspired
+oracles; so likewise from the mighty genius of the great writers of
+antiquity there is carried into the souls of their rivals, as from a
+fount of inspiration, an effluence which breathes upon them until, even
+though their natural temper be but cold, they share the sublime
+enthusiasm of others.
+
+3
+Thus Homer’s name is associated with a numerous band of illustrious
+disciples--not only Herodotus, but Stesichorus before him, and the great
+Archilochus, and above all Plato, who from the great fountain-head of
+Homer’s genius drew into himself innumerable tributary streams. Perhaps
+it would have been necessary to illustrate this point, had not Ammonius
+and his school already classified and noted down the various examples.
+
+4
+Now what I am speaking of is not plagiarism, but resembles the process
+of copying from fair forms or statues or works of skilled labour. Nor in
+my opinion would so many fair flowers of imagery have bloomed among the
+philosophical dogmas of Plato, nor would he have risen so often to the
+language and topics of poetry, had he not engaged heart and soul in a
+contest for precedence with Homer, like a young champion entering the
+lists against a veteran. It may be that he showed too ambitious a spirit
+in venturing on such a duel; but nevertheless it was not without
+advantage to him: “for strife like this,” as Hesiod says, “is good for
+men.”[2] And where shall we find a more glorious arena or a nobler crown
+than here, where even defeat at the hands of our predecessors is not
+ignoble?
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Opp._ 29.]
+
+
+XIV
+
+Therefore it is good for us also, when we are labouring on some subject
+which demands a lofty and majestic style, to imagine to ourselves how
+Homer might have expressed this or that, or how Plato or Demosthenes
+would have clothed it with sublimity, or, in history, Thucydides. For by
+our fixing an eye of rivalry on those high examples they will become
+like beacons to guide us, and will perhaps lift up our souls to the
+fulness of the stature we conceive.
+
+2
+And it would be still better should we try to realise this further
+thought, How would Homer, had he been here, or how would Demosthenes,
+have listened to what I have written, or how would they have been
+affected by it? For what higher incentive to exertion could a writer
+have than to imagine such judges or such an audience of his works, and
+to give an account of his writings with heroes like these to criticise
+and look on?
+
+3
+Yet more inspiring would be the thought, With what feelings will future
+ages through all time read these my works? If this should awaken a fear
+in any writer that he will not be intelligible to his contemporaries it
+will necessarily follow that the conceptions of his mind will be crude,
+maimed, and abortive, and lacking that ripe perfection which alone can
+win the applause of ages to come.
+
+
+XV
+
+The dignity, grandeur, and energy of a style largely depend on a proper
+employment of images, a term which I prefer to that usually given.[1]
+The term image in its most general acceptation includes every thought,
+howsoever presented, which issues in speech. But the term is now
+generally confined to those cases when he who is speaking, by reason of
+the rapt and excited state of his feelings, imagines himself to see what
+he is talking about, and produces a similar illusion in his hearers.
+
+    [Footnote 1: εἰδωλοποιΐαι, “fictions of the imagination,” Hickie.]
+
+2
+Poets and orators both employ images, but with a very different object,
+as you are well aware. The poetical image is designed to astound; the
+oratorical image to give perspicuity. Both, however, seek to work on the
+emotions.
+
+  “Mother, I pray thee, set not thou upon me
+  Those maids with bloody face and serpent hair:
+  See, see, they come, they’re here, they spring upon me!”[2]
+
+And again--
+
+  “Ah, ah, she’ll slay me! whither shall I fly?”[3]
+
+The poet when he wrote like this saw the Erinyes with his own eyes, and
+he almost compels his readers to see them too.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Eur. _Orest._ 255.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Iph. Taur._ 291.]
+
+3
+Euripides found his chief delight in the labour of giving tragic
+expression to these two passions of madness and love, showing here a
+real mastery which I cannot think he exhibited elsewhere. Still, he is
+by no means diffident in venturing on other fields of the imagination.
+His genius was far from being of the highest order, but by taking pains
+he often raises himself to a tragic elevation. In his sublimer moments
+he generally reminds us of Homer’s description of the lion--
+
+  “With tail he lashes both his flanks and sides,
+  And spurs himself to battle.”[4]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xx. 170.]
+
+4
+Take, for instance, that passage in which Helios, in handing the reins
+to his son, says--
+
+  “Drive on, but shun the burning Libyan tract;
+  The hot dry air will let thine axle down:
+  Toward the seven Pleiades keep thy steadfast way.”
+
+And then--
+
+  “This said, his son undaunted snatched the reins,
+  Then smote the winged coursers’ sides: they bound
+  Forth on the void and cavernous vault of air.
+  His father mounts another steed, and rides
+  With warning voice guiding his son. ‘Drive there!
+  Turn, turn thy car this way.’”[5]
+
+May we not say that the spirit of the poet mounts the chariot with his
+hero, and accompanies the winged steeds in their perilous flight? Were
+it not so,--had not his imagination soared side by side with them in
+that celestial passage,--he would never have conceived so vivid an
+image. Similar is that passage in his “Cassandra,” beginning
+
+  “Ye Trojans, lovers of the steed.”[6]
+
+    [Footnote 5: Eur. _Phaet._]
+
+    [Footnote 6: Perhaps from the lost “Alexander” (Jahn).]
+
+5
+Aeschylus is especially bold in forming images suited to his heroic
+themes: as when he says of his “Seven against Thebes”--
+
+  “Seven mighty men, and valiant captains, slew
+  Over an iron-bound shield a bull, then dipped
+  Their fingers in the blood, and all invoked
+  Ares, Enyo, and death-dealing Flight
+  In witness of their oaths,”[7]
+
+and describes how they all mutually pledged themselves without flinching
+to die. Sometimes, however, his thoughts are unshapen, and as it were
+rough-hewn and rugged. Not observing this, Euripides, from too blind a
+rivalry, sometimes falls under the same censure.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Sept. c. Th._ 42.]
+
+6
+Aeschylus with a strange violence of language represents the palace of
+Lycurgus as _possessed_ at the appearance of Dionysus--
+
+  “The halls with rapture thrill, the roof’s inspired.”[8]
+
+Here Euripides, in borrowing the image, softens its extravagance[9]--
+
+  “And all the mountain felt the god.”[10]
+
+    [Footnote 8: Aesch. _Lycurg._]
+
+    [Footnote 9: Lit. “Giving it a different flavour,” as Arist. _Poet._
+    ἡδυσμένῳ λόγῳ χώρις ἑκάστῳ τῶν εἰδῶν, ii. 10.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Bacch._ 726.]
+
+7
+Sophocles has also shown himself a great master of the imagination in
+the scene in which the dying Oedipus prepares himself for burial in the
+midst of a tempest,[11] and where he tells how Achilles appeared to the
+Greeks over his tomb just as they were putting out to sea on their
+departure from Troy.[12] This last scene has also been delineated by
+Simonides with a vividness which leaves him inferior to none. But it
+would be an endless task to cite all possible examples.
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Oed. Col._ 1586.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: In his lost “Polyxena.”]
+
+8
+To return, then,[13] in poetry, as I observed, a certain mythical
+exaggeration is allowable, transcending altogether mere logical
+credence. But the chief beauties of an oratorical image are its energy
+and reality. Such digressions become offensive and monstrous when the
+language is cast in a poetical and fabulous mould, and runs into all
+sorts of impossibilities. Thus much may be learnt from the great orators
+of our own day, when they tell us in tragic tones that they see the
+Furies[14]--good people, can’t they understand that when Orestes cries
+out
+
+  “Off, off, I say! I know thee who thou art,
+  One of the fiends that haunt me: I feel thine arms
+  About me cast, to drag me down to hell,”[15]
+
+these are the hallucinations of a madman?
+
+    [Footnote 13: § 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: Comp. Petronius, _Satyricon_, ch. i. _passim_.]
+
+    [Footnote 15: _Orest._ 264.]
+
+9
+Wherein, then, lies the force of an oratorical image? Doubtless in
+adding energy and passion in a hundred different ways to a speech; but
+especially in this, that when it is mingled with the practical,
+argumentative parts of an oration, it does not merely convince the
+hearer, but enthralls him. Such is the effect of those words of
+Demosthenes:[16] “Supposing, now, at this moment a cry of alarm were
+heard outside the assize courts, and the news came that the prison was
+broken open and the prisoners escaped, is there any man here who is such
+a trifler that he would not run to the rescue at the top of his speed?
+But suppose some one came forward with the information that they had
+been set at liberty by the defendant, what then? Why, he would be
+lynched on the spot!”
+
+    [Footnote 16: _c. Timocrat._ 208.]
+
+10
+Compare also the way in which Hyperides excused himself, when he was
+proceeded against for bringing in a bill to liberate the slaves after
+Chaeronea. “This measure,” he said, “was not drawn up by any orator, but
+by the battle of Chaeronea.” This striking image, being thrown in by the
+speaker in the midst of his proofs, enables him by one bold stroke to
+carry all mere logical objection before him.
+
+11
+In all such cases our nature is drawn towards that which affects it most
+powerfully: hence an image lures us away from an argument: judgment is
+paralysed, matters of fact disappear from view, eclipsed by the superior
+blaze. Nor is it surprising that we should be thus affected; for when
+two forces are thus placed in juxtaposition, the stronger must always
+absorb into itself the weaker.
+
+12
+On sublimity of thought, and the manner in which it arises from native
+greatness of mind, from imitation, and from the employment of images,
+this brief outline must suffice.[17]
+
+    [Footnote 17: He passes over chs. x. xi.]
+
+
+XVI
+
+The subject which next claims our attention is that of figures of
+speech. I have already observed that figures, judiciously employed, play
+an important part in producing sublimity. It would be a tedious, or
+rather an endless task, to deal with every detail of this subject here;
+so in order to establish what I have laid down, I will just run over,
+without further preface, a few of those figures which are most effective
+in lending grandeur to language.
+
+2
+Demosthenes is defending his policy; his natural line of argument would
+have been: “You did not do wrong, men of Athens, to take upon yourselves
+the struggle for the liberties of Hellas. Of this you have home proofs.
+_They_ did not wrong who fought at Marathon, at Salamis, and Plataea.”
+Instead of this, in a sudden moment of supreme exaltation he bursts out
+like some inspired prophet with that famous appeal to the mighty dead:
+“Ye did not, could not have done wrong. I swear it by the men who faced
+the foe at Marathon!”[1] He employs the figure of adjuration, to which I
+will here give the name of Apostrophe. And what does he gain by it? He
+exalts the Athenian ancestors to the rank of divinities, showing that we
+ought to invoke those who have fallen for their country as gods; he
+fills the hearts of his judges with the heroic pride of the old warriors
+of Hellas; forsaking the beaten path of argument he rises to the
+loftiest altitude of grandeur and passion, and commands assent by the
+startling novelty of his appeal; he applies the healing charm of
+eloquence, and thus “ministers to the mind diseased” of his countrymen,
+until lifted by his brave words above their misfortunes they begin to
+feel that the disaster of Chaeronea is no less glorious than the
+victories of Marathon and Salamis. All this he effects by the use of one
+figure, and so carries his hearers away with him.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 208.]
+
+3
+It is said that the germ of this adjuration is found in Eupolis--
+
+  “By mine own fight, by Marathon, I say,
+  Who makes my heart to ache shall rue the day!”[2]
+
+But there is nothing grand in the mere employment of an oath. Its
+grandeur will depend on its being employed in the right place and the
+right manner, on the right occasion, and with the right motive. In
+Eupolis the oath is nothing beyond an oath; and the Athenians to whom it
+is addressed are still prosperous, and in need of no consolation.
+Moreover, the poet does not, like Demosthenes, swear by the departed
+heroes as deities, so as to engender in his audience a just conception
+of their valour, but diverges from the champions to the battle--a mere
+lifeless thing. But Demosthenes has so skilfully managed the oath that
+in addressing his countrymen after the defeat of Chaeronea he takes out
+of their minds all sense of disaster; and at the same time, while
+proving that no mistake has been made, he holds up an example, confirms
+his arguments by an oath, and makes his praise of the dead an incentive
+to the living.
+
+    [Footnote 2: In his (lost) “Demis.”]
+
+4
+And to rebut a possible objection which occurred to him--“Can you,
+Demosthenes, whose policy ended in defeat, swear by a victory?”--the
+orator proceeds to measure his language, choosing his very words so as
+to give no handle to opponents, thus showing us that even in our most
+inspired moments reason ought to hold the reins.[3] Let us mark his
+words: “Those who _faced the foe_ at Marathon; those who _fought in the
+sea-fights_ of Salamis and Artemisium; those who _stood in the ranks_ at
+Plataea.” Note that he nowhere says “those who _conquered_,” artfully
+suppressing any word which might hint at the successful issue of those
+battles, which would have spoilt the parallel with Chaeronea. And for
+the same reason he steals a march on his audience, adding immediately:
+“All of whom, Aeschines,--not those who were successful only,--were
+buried by the state at the public expense.”
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. “That even in the midst of the revels of Bacchus
+    we ought to remain sober.”]
+
+
+XVII
+
+There is one truth which my studies have led me to observe, which
+perhaps it would be worth while to set down briefly here. It is this,
+that by a natural law the Sublime, besides receiving an acquisition of
+strength from figures, in its turn lends support in a remarkable manner
+to them. To explain: the use of figures has a peculiar tendency to rouse
+a suspicion of dishonesty, and to create an impression of treachery,
+scheming, and false reasoning; especially if the person addressed be a
+judge, who is master of the situation, and still more in the case of a
+despot, a king, a military potentate, or any of those who sit in high
+places.[1] If a man feels that this artful speaker is treating him like
+a silly boy and trying to throw dust in his eyes, he at once grows
+irritated, and thinking that such false reasoning implies a contempt of
+his understanding, he perhaps flies into a rage and will not hear
+another word; or even if he masters his resentment, still he is utterly
+indisposed to yield to the persuasive power of eloquence. Hence it
+follows that a figure is then most effectual when it appears in
+disguise.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading with Cobet, καὶ πάντας τοὺς ἐν ὑπεροχαῖς.]
+
+2
+To allay, then, this distrust which attaches to the use of figures we
+must call in the powerful aid of sublimity and passion. For art, once
+associated with these great allies, will be overshadowed by their
+grandeur and beauty, and pass beyond the reach of all suspicion. To
+prove this I need only refer to the passage already quoted: “I swear it
+by the men,” etc. It is the very brilliancy of the orator’s figure which
+blinds us to the fact that it _is_ a figure. For as the fainter lustre
+of the stars is put out of sight by the all-encompassing rays of the
+sun, so when sublimity sheds its light all round the sophistries of
+rhetoric they become invisible.
+
+3
+A similar illusion is produced by the painter’s art. When light and
+shadow are represented in colour, though they lie on the same surface
+side by side, it is the light which meets the eye first, and appears not
+only more conspicuous but also much nearer. In the same manner passion
+and grandeur of language, lying nearer to our souls by reason both of a
+certain natural affinity and of their radiance, always strike our mental
+eye before we become conscious of the figure, throwing its artificial
+character into the shade and hiding it as it were in a veil.
+
+
+XVIII
+
+The figures of question and interrogation[1] also possess a specific
+quality which tends strongly to stir an audience and give energy to the
+speaker’s words. “Or tell me, do you want to run about asking one
+another, is there any news? what greater news could you have than that a
+man of Macedon is making himself master of Hellas? Is Philip dead? Not
+he. However, he is ill. But what is that to you? Even if anything
+happens to him you will soon raise up another Philip.”[2] Or this
+passage: “Shall we sail against Macedon? And where, asks one, shall we
+effect a landing? The war itself will show us where Philip’s weak places
+lie.”[2] Now if this had been put baldly it would have lost greatly in
+force. As we see it, it is full of the quick alternation of question and
+answer. The orator replies to himself as though he were meeting another
+man’s objections. And this figure not only raises the tone of his words
+but makes them more convincing.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phil._ i. 44.]
+
+2
+For an exhibition of feeling has then most effect on an audience when it
+appears to flow naturally from the occasion, not to have been laboured
+by the art of the speaker; and this device of questioning and replying
+to himself reproduces the moment of passion. For as a sudden question
+addressed to an individual will sometimes startle him into a reply which
+is an unguarded expression of his genuine sentiments, so the figure of
+question and interrogation blinds the judgment of an audience, and
+deceives them into a belief that what is really the result of labour in
+every detail has been struck out of the speaker by the inspiration of
+the moment.
+
+There is one passage in Herodotus which is generally credited with
+extraordinary sublimity....
+
+
+XIX
+
+... The removal of connecting particles gives a quick rush and “torrent
+rapture” to a passage, the writer appearing to be actually almost left
+behind by his own words. There is an example in Xenophon: “Clashing
+their shields together they pushed, they fought, they slew, they
+fell.”[1] And the words of Eurylochus in the _Odyssey_--
+
+  “We passed at thy command the woodland’s shade;
+  We found a stately hall built in a mountain glade.”[2]
+
+Words thus severed from one another without the intervention of stops
+give a lively impression of one who through distress of mind at once
+halts and hurries in his speech. And this is what Homer has expressed by
+using the figure _Asyndeton_.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Xen. _Hel._ iv. 3. 19.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ x. 251.]
+
+
+XX
+
+But nothing is so conducive to energy as a combination of different
+figures, when two or three uniting their resources mutually contribute
+to the vigour, the cogency, and the beauty of a speech. So Demosthenes
+in his speech against Meidias repeats the same words and breaks up his
+sentences in one lively descriptive passage: “He who receives a blow is
+hurt in many ways which he could not even describe to another, by
+gesture, by look, by tone.”
+
+2
+Then, to vary the movement of his speech, and prevent it from standing
+still (for stillness produces rest, but passion requires a certain
+disorder of language, imitating the agitation and commotion of the
+soul), he at once dashes off in another direction, breaking up his words
+again, and repeating them in a different form, “by gesture, by look, by
+tone--when insult, when hatred, is added to violence, when he is struck
+with the fist, when he is struck as a slave!” By such means the orator
+imitates the action of Meidias, dealing blow upon blow on the minds of
+his judges. Immediately after like a hurricane he makes a fresh attack:
+“When he is struck with the fist, when he is struck in the face; this is
+what moves, this is what maddens a man, unless he is inured to outrage;
+no one could describe all this so as to bring home to his hearers its
+bitterness.”[1] You see how he preserves, by continual variation, the
+intrinsic force of these repetitions and broken clauses, so that his
+order seems irregular, and conversely his irregularity acquires a
+certain measure of order.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Meid._ 72.]
+
+
+XXI
+
+Supposing we add the conjunctions, after the practice of Isocrates and
+his school: “Moreover, I must not omit to mention that he who strikes a
+blow may hurt in many ways, in the first place by gesture, in the second
+place by look, in the third and last place by his tone.” If you compare
+the words thus set down in logical sequence with the expressions of the
+“Meidias,” you will see that the rapidity and rugged abruptness of
+passion, when all is made regular by connecting links, will be smoothed
+away, and the whole point and fire of the passage will at once
+disappear.
+
+2
+For as, if you were to bind two runners together, they will forthwith be
+deprived of all liberty of movement, even so passion rebels against the
+trammels of conjunctions and other particles, because they curb its free
+rush and destroy the impression of mechanical impulse.
+
+
+XXII
+
+The figure hyperbaton belongs to the same class. By hyperbaton we mean a
+transposition of words or thoughts from their usual order, bearing
+unmistakably the characteristic stamp of violent mental agitation. In
+real life we often see a man under the influence of rage, or fear, or
+indignation, or beside himself with jealousy, or with some other out of
+the interminable list of human passions, begin a sentence, and then
+swerve aside into some inconsequent parenthesis, and then again double
+back to his original statement, being borne with quick turns by his
+distress, as though by a shifting wind, now this way, now that, and
+playing a thousand capricious variations on his words, his thoughts, and
+the natural order of his discourse. Now the figure hyperbaton is the
+means which is employed by the best writers to imitate these signs of
+natural emotion. For art is then perfect when it seems to be nature, and
+nature, again, is most effective when pervaded by the unseen presence of
+art. An illustration will be found in the speech of Dionysius of Phocaea
+in Herodotus: “A hair’s breadth now decides our destiny, Ionians,
+whether we shall live as freemen or as slaves--ay, as runaway slaves.
+Now, therefore, if you choose to endure a little hardship, you will be
+able at the cost of some present exertion to overcome your enemies.”[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: vi. 11.]
+
+2
+The regular sequence here would have been: “Ionians, now is the time for
+you to endure a little hardship; for a hair’s breadth will now decide
+our destiny.” But the Phocaean transposes the title “Ionians,” rushing
+at once to the subject of alarm, as though in the terror of the moment
+he had forgotten the usual address to his audience. Moreover, he inverts
+the logical order of his thoughts, and instead of beginning with the
+necessity for exertion, which is the point he wishes to urge upon them,
+he first gives them the reason for that necessity in the words, “a
+hair’s breadth now decides our destiny,” so that his words seem
+unpremeditated, and forced upon him by the crisis.
+
+3
+Thucydides surpasses all other writers in the bold use of this figure,
+even breaking up sentences which are by their nature absolutely one and
+indivisible. But nowhere do we find it so unsparingly employed as in
+Demosthenes, who though not so daring in his manner of using it as the
+elder writer is very happy in giving to his speeches by frequent
+transpositions the lively air of unstudied debate. Moreover, he drags,
+as it were, his audience with him into the perils of a long inverted
+clause.
+
+4
+He often begins to say something, then leaves the thought in suspense,
+meanwhile thrusting in between, in a position apparently foreign and
+unnatural, some extraneous matters, one upon another, and having thus
+made his hearers fear lest the whole discourse should break down, and
+forced them into eager sympathy with the danger of the speaker, when he
+is nearly at the end of a period he adds just at the right moment,
+_i.e._ when it is least expected, the point which they have been waiting
+for so long. And thus by the very boldness and hazard of his inversions
+he produces a much more astounding effect. I forbear to cite examples,
+as they are too numerous to require it.
+
+
+XXIII
+
+The juxtaposition of different cases, the enumeration of particulars,
+and the use of contrast and climax, all, as you know, add much vigour,
+and give beauty and great elevation and life to a style. The diction
+also gains greatly in diversity and movement by changes of case, time,
+person, number, and gender.
+
+2
+With regard to change of number: not only is the style improved by the
+use of those words which, though singular in form, are found on
+inspection to be plural in meaning, as in the lines--
+
+  “A countless host dispersed along the sand
+  With joyous cries the shoal of tunny hailed,”
+
+but it is more worthy of observation that plurals for singulars
+sometimes fall with a more impressive dignity, rousing the imagination
+by the mere sense of vast number.
+
+3
+Such is the effect of those words of Oedipus in Sophocles--
+
+              “Oh fatal, fatal ties!
+  Ye gave us birth, and we being born ye sowed
+  The self-same seed, and gave the world to view
+  Sons, brothers, sires, domestic murder foul,
+  Brides, mothers, wives.... Ay, ye laid bare
+  The blackest, deepest place where Shame can dwell.”[1]
+
+Here we have in either case but one person, first Oedipus, then Jocasta;
+but the expansion of number into the plural gives an impression of
+multiplied calamity. So in the following plurals--
+
+  “There came forth Hectors, and there came Sarpedons.”
+
+    [Footnote 1: _O. R._ 1403.]
+
+4
+And in those words of Plato’s (which we have already adduced elsewhere),
+referring to the Athenians: “We have no Pelopses or Cadmuses or
+Aegyptuses or Danauses, or any others out of all the mob of Hellenised
+barbarians, dwelling among us; no, this is the land of pure Greeks, with
+no mixture of foreign elements,”[2] etc. Such an accumulation of words
+in the plural number necessarily gives greater pomp and sound to a
+subject. But we must only have recourse to this device when the nature
+of our theme makes it allowable to amplify, to multiply, or to speak in
+the tones of exaggeration or passion. To overlay every sentence with
+ornament[3] is very pedantic.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Menex._ 245, D.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. “To hang bells everywhere,” a metaphor from
+    the bells which were attached to horses’ trappings on festive
+    occasions.]
+
+
+XXIV
+
+On the other hand, the contraction of plurals into singulars sometimes
+creates an appearance of great dignity; as in that phrase of
+Demosthenes: “Thereupon all Peloponnesus was divided.”[1] There is
+another in Herodotus: “When Phrynichus brought a drama on the stage
+entitled _The Taking of Miletus_, the whole theatre fell a
+weeping”--instead of “all the spectators.” This knitting together of a
+number of scattered particulars into one whole gives them an aspect of
+corporate life. And the beauty of both uses lies, I think, in their
+betokening emotion, by giving a sudden change of complexion to the
+circumstances,--whether a word which is strictly singular is
+unexpectedly changed into a plural,--or whether a number of isolated
+units are combined by the use of a single sonorous word under one head.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 18.]
+
+
+XXV
+
+When past events are introduced as happening in present time the
+narrative form is changed into a dramatic action. Such is that
+description in Xenophon: “A man who has fallen, and is being trampled
+under foot by Cyrus’s horse, strikes the belly of the animal with his
+scimitar; the horse starts aside and unseats Cyrus, and he falls.”
+Similarly in many passages of Thucydides.
+
+
+XXVI
+
+Equally dramatic is the interchange of persons, often making a reader
+fancy himself to be moving in the midst of the perils described--
+
+  “Unwearied, thou wouldst deem, with toil unspent,
+  They met in war; so furiously they fought.”[1]
+
+and that line in Aratus--
+
+  “Beware that month to tempt the surging sea.”[2]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 697.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaen._ 287.]
+
+2
+In the same way Herodotus: “Passing from the city of Elephantine you
+will sail upwards until you reach a level plain. You cross this region,
+and there entering another ship you will sail on for two days, and so
+reach a great city, whose name is Meroe.”[3] Observe how he takes us, as
+it were, by the hand, and leads us in spirit through these places,
+making us no longer readers, but spectators. Such a direct personal
+address always has the effect of placing the reader in the midst of the
+scene of action.
+
+    [Footnote 3: ii. 29.]
+
+3
+And by pointing your words to the individual reader, instead of to the
+readers generally, as in the line
+
+  “Thou had’st not known for whom Tydides fought,”[4]
+
+and thus exciting him by an appeal to himself, you will rouse interest,
+and fix attention, and make him a partaker in the action of the book.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ v. 85.]
+
+
+XXVII
+
+Sometimes, again, a writer in the midst of a narrative in the third
+person suddenly steps aside and makes a transition to the first. It is a
+kind of figure which strikes like a sudden outburst of passion. Thus
+Hector in the _Iliad_
+
+  “With mighty voice called to the men of Troy
+  To storm the ships, and leave the bloody spoils:
+  If any I behold with willing foot
+  Shunning the ships, and lingering on the plain,
+  That hour I will contrive his death.”[1]
+
+The poet then takes upon himself the narrative part, as being his proper
+business; but this abrupt threat he attributes, without a word of
+warning, to the enraged Trojan chief. To have interposed any such words
+as “Hector said so and so” would have had a frigid effect. As the lines
+stand the writer is left behind by his own words, and the transition is
+effected while he is preparing for it.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 346.]
+
+2
+Accordingly the proper use of this figure is in dealing with some urgent
+crisis which will not allow the writer to linger, but compels him to
+make a rapid change from one person to another. So in Hecataeus: “Now
+Ceyx took this in dudgeon, and straightway bade the children of Heracles
+to depart. ‘Behold, I can give you no help; lest, therefore, ye perish
+yourselves and bring hurt upon me also, get ye forth into some other
+land.’”
+
+3
+There is a different use of the change of persons in the speech of
+Demosthenes against Aristogeiton, which places before us the quick turns
+of violent emotion. “Is there none to be found among you,” he asks, “who
+even feels indignation at the outrageous conduct of a loathsome and
+shameless wretch who,--vilest of men, when you were debarred from
+freedom of speech, not by barriers or by doors, which might indeed be
+opened,”[2] etc. Thus in the midst of a half-expressed thought he makes
+a quick change of front, and having almost in his anger torn one word
+into two persons, “who, vilest of men,” etc., he then breaks off his
+address to Aristogeiton, and seems to leave him, nevertheless, by the
+passion of his utterance, rousing all the more the attention of the
+court.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _c. Aristog._ i. 27.]
+
+4
+The same feature may be observed in a speech of Penelope’s--
+
+  “Why com’st thou, Medon, from the wooers proud?
+  Com’st thou to bid the handmaids of my lord
+  To cease their tasks, and make for them good cheer?
+  Ill fare their wooing, and their gathering here!
+  Would God that here this hour they all might take
+  Their last, their latest meal! Who day by day
+  Make here your muster, to devour and waste
+  The substance of my son: have ye not heard
+  When children at your fathers’ knee the deeds
+  And prowess of your king?”[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Od._ iv. 681.]
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+None, I suppose, would dispute the fact that periphrasis tends much to
+sublimity. For, as in music the simple air is rendered more pleasing by
+the addition of harmony, so in language periphrasis often sounds in
+concord with a literal expression, adding much to the beauty of its
+tone,--provided always that it is not inflated and harsh, but agreeably
+blended.
+
+2
+To confirm this one passage from Plato will suffice--the opening words
+of his Funeral Oration: “In deed these men have now received from us
+their due, and that tribute paid they are now passing on their destined
+journey, with the State speeding them all and his own friends speeding
+each one of them on his way.”[1] Death, you see, he calls the “destined
+journey”; to receive the rites of burial is to be publicly “sped on your
+way” by the State. And these turns of language lend dignity in no common
+measure to the thought. He takes the words in their naked simplicity and
+handles them as a musician, investing them with melody,--harmonising
+them, as it were,--by the use of periphrasis.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Menex._ 236, D.]
+
+3
+So Xenophon: “Labour you regard as the guide to a pleasant life, and you
+have laid up in your souls the fairest and most soldier-like of all
+gifts: in praise is your delight, more than in anything else.”[2] By
+saying, instead of “you are ready to labour,” “you regard labour as the
+guide to a pleasant life,” and by similarly expanding the rest of that
+passage, he gives to his eulogy a much wider and loftier range of
+sentiment. Let us add that inimitable phrase in Herodotus: “Those
+Scythians who pillaged the temple were smitten from heaven by a female
+malady.”
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Cyrop._ i. 5. 12.]
+
+
+XXIX
+
+But this figure, more than any other, is very liable to abuse, and great
+restraint is required in employing it. It soon begins to carry an
+impression of feebleness, savours of vapid trifling, and arouses
+disgust. Hence Plato, who is very bold and not always happy in his use
+of figures, is much ridiculed for saying in his _Laws_ that “neither
+gold nor silver wealth must be allowed to establish itself in our
+State,”[1] suggesting, it is said, that if he had forbidden property in
+oxen or sheep he would certainly have spoken of it as “bovine and ovine
+wealth.”
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Legg._ vii. 801, B.]
+
+2
+Here we must quit this part of our subject, hoping, my dear friend
+Terentian, that your learned curiosity will be satisfied with this short
+excursion on the use of figures in their relation to the Sublime. All
+those which I have mentioned help to render a style more energetic and
+impassioned; and passion contributes as largely to sublimity as the
+delineation of character to amusement.
+
+
+XXX
+
+But since the thoughts conveyed by words and the expression of those
+thoughts are for the most part interwoven with one another, we will now
+add some considerations which have hitherto been overlooked on the
+subject of expression. To say that the choice of appropriate and
+striking words has a marvellous power and an enthralling charm for the
+reader, that this is the main object of pursuit with all orators and
+writers, that it is this, and this alone, which causes the works of
+literature to exhibit the glowing perfections of the finest statues,
+their grandeur, their beauty, their mellowness, their dignity, their
+energy, their power, and all their other graces, and that it is this
+which endows the facts with a vocal soul; to say all this would, I fear,
+be, to the initiated, an impertinence. Indeed, we may say with strict
+truth that beautiful words are the very light of thought.
+
+2
+I do not mean to say that imposing language is appropriate to every
+occasion. A trifling subject tricked out in grand and stately words
+would have the same effect as a huge tragic mask placed on the head of a
+little child. Only in poetry and ...
+
+
+XXXI
+
+... There is a genuine ring in that line of Anacreon’s--
+
+  “The Thracian filly I no longer heed.”
+
+The same merit belongs to that original phrase in Theophrastus; to me,
+at least, from the closeness of its analogy, it seems to have a peculiar
+expressiveness, though Caecilius censures it, without telling us why.
+“Philip,” says the historian, “showed a marvellous alacrity in _taking
+doses of trouble_.”[1] We see from this that the most homely language is
+sometimes far more vivid than the most ornamental, being recognised at
+once as the language of common life, and gaining immediate currency by
+its familiarity. In speaking, then, of Philip as “taking doses of
+trouble,” Theopompus has laid hold on a phrase which describes with
+peculiar vividness one who for the sake of advantage endured what was
+base and sordid with patience and cheerfulness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+The same may be observed of two passages in Herodotus: “Cleomenes having
+lost his wits, cut his own flesh into pieces with a short sword, until
+by gradually _mincing_ his whole body he destroyed himself”;[2] and
+“Pythes continued fighting on his ship until he was entirely _hacked to
+pieces_.”[3] Such terms come home at once to the vulgar reader, but
+their own vulgarity is redeemed by their expressiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 2: vi. 75.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: vii. 181.]
+
+
+XXXII
+
+Concerning the number of metaphors to be employed together Caecilius
+seems to give his vote with those critics who make a law that not more
+than two, or at the utmost three, should be combined in the same place.
+The use, however, must be determined by the occasion. Those outbursts of
+passion which drive onwards like a winter torrent draw with them as an
+indispensable accessory whole masses of metaphor. It is thus in that
+passage of Demosthenes (who here also is our safest guide):[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+“Those vile fawning wretches, each one of whom has lopped from his
+country her fairest members, who have toasted away their liberty, first
+to Philip, now to Alexander, who measure happiness by their belly and
+their vilest appetites, who have overthrown the old landmarks and
+standards of felicity among Greeks,--to be freemen, and to have no one
+for a master.”[2] Here the number of the metaphors is obscured by the
+orator’s indignation against the betrayers of his country.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _De Cor._ 296.]
+
+3
+And to effect this Aristotle and Theophrastus recommend the softening of
+harsh metaphors by the use of some such phrase as “So to say,” “As it
+were,” “If I may be permitted the expression,” “If so bold a term is
+allowable.” For thus to forestall criticism[3] mitigates, they assert,
+the boldness of the metaphors.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Reading ὑποτίμησις.]
+
+4
+And I will not deny that these have their use. Nevertheless I must
+repeat the remark which I made in the case of figures,[4] and maintain
+that there are native antidotes to the number and boldness of metaphors,
+in well-timed displays of strong feeling, and in unaffected sublimity,
+because these have an innate power by the dash of their movement of
+sweeping along and carrying all else before them. Or should we not
+rather say that they absolutely demand as indispensable the use of
+daring metaphors, and will not allow the hearer to pause and criticise
+the number of them, because he shares the passion of the speaker?
+
+    [Footnote 4: Ch. xvii.]
+
+5
+In the treatment, again, of familiar topics and in descriptive passages
+nothing gives such distinctness as a close and continuous series of
+metaphors. It is by this means that Xenophon has so finely delineated
+the anatomy of the human frame.[5] And there is a still more brilliant
+and life-like picture in Plato.[6] The human head he calls a _citadel_;
+the neck is an _isthmus_ set to divide it from the chest; to support it
+beneath are the vertebrae, turning like _hinges_; pleasure he describes
+as a _bait_ to tempt men to ill; the tongue is the _arbiter of tastes_.
+The heart is at once the _knot_ of the veins and the _source_ of the
+rapidly circulating blood, and is stationed in the _guard-room_ of the
+body. The ramifying blood-vessels he calls _alleys_. “And casting
+about,” he says, “for something to sustain the violent palpitation of
+the heart when it is alarmed by the approach of danger or agitated by
+passion, since at such times it is overheated, they (the gods) implanted
+in us the lungs, which are so fashioned that being soft and bloodless,
+and having cavities within, they act like a buffer, and when the heart
+boils with inward passion by yielding to its throbbing save it from
+injury.” He compares the seat of the desires to the _women’s quarters_,
+the seat of the passions to the _men’s quarters_, in a house. The
+spleen, again, is the _napkin_ of the internal organs, by whose
+excretions it is saturated from time to time, and swells to a great size
+with inward impurity. “After this,” he continues, “they shrouded the
+whole with flesh, throwing it forward, like a cushion, as a barrier
+against injuries from without.” The blood he terms the _pasture_ of the
+flesh. “To assist the process of nutrition,” he goes on, “they divided
+the body into ducts, cutting trenches like those in a garden, so that,
+the body being a system of narrow conduits, the current of the veins
+might flow as from a perennial fountain-head. And when the end is at
+hand,” he says, “the soul is cast loose from her moorings like a ship,
+and free to wander whither she will.”
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Memorab._ i. 4, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Timaeus_, 69, D; 74, A; 65, C; 72, G; 74, B, D; 80, E;
+    77, G; 78, E; 85, E.]
+
+6
+These, and a hundred similar fancies, follow one another in quick
+succession. But those which I have pointed out are sufficient to
+demonstrate how great is the natural power of figurative language, and
+how largely metaphors conduce to sublimity, and to illustrate the
+important part which they play in all impassioned and descriptive
+passages.
+
+7
+That the use of figurative language, as of all other beauties of style,
+has a constant tendency towards excess, is an obvious truth which I need
+not dwell upon. It is chiefly on this account that even Plato comes in
+for a large share of disparagement, because he is often carried away by
+a sort of frenzy of language into an intemperate use of violent
+metaphors and inflated allegory. “It is not easy to remark” (he says in
+one place) “that a city ought to be blended like a bowl, in which the
+mad wine boils when it is poured out, but being disciplined by another
+and a sober god in that fair society produces a good and temperate
+drink.”[7] Really, it is said, to speak of water as a “sober god,” and
+of the process of mixing as a “discipline,” is to talk like a poet, and
+no very _sober_ one either.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Legg._ vi. 773, G.]
+
+8
+It was such defects as these that the hostile critic[8] Caecilius made
+his ground of attack, when he had the boldness in his essay “On the
+Beauties of Lysias” to pronounce that writer superior in every respect
+to Plato. Now Caecilius was doubly unqualified for a judge: he loved
+Lysias better even than himself, and at the same time his hatred of
+Plato and all his works is greater even than his love for Lysias.
+Moreover, he is so blind a partisan that his very premises are open to
+dispute. He vaunts Lysias as a faultless and immaculate writer, while
+Plato is, according to him, full of blemishes. Now this is not the case:
+far from it.
+
+    [Footnote 8: Reading ὁ μισῶν αὐτόν, by a conjecture of the
+    translator.]
+
+
+XXXIII
+
+But supposing now that we assume the existence of a really unblemished
+and irreproachable writer. Is it not worth while to raise the whole
+question whether in poetry and prose we should prefer sublimity
+accompanied by some faults, or a style which never rising above moderate
+excellence never stumbles and never requires correction? and again,
+whether the first place in literature is justly to be assigned to the
+more numerous, or the loftier excellences? For these are questions
+proper to an inquiry on the Sublime, and urgently asking for settlement.
+
+2
+I know, then, that the largest intellects are far from being the most
+exact. A mind always intent on correctness is apt to be dissipated in
+trifles; but in great affluence of thought, as in vast material wealth,
+there must needs be an occasional neglect of detail. And is it not
+inevitably so? Is it not by risking nothing, by never aiming high, that
+a writer of low or middling powers keeps generally clear of faults and
+secure of blame? whereas the loftier walks of literature are by their
+very loftiness perilous?
+
+3
+I am well aware, again, that there is a law by which in all human
+productions the weak points catch the eye first, by which their faults
+remain indelibly stamped on the memory, while their beauties quickly
+fade away.
+
+4
+Yet, though I have myself noted not a few faulty passages in Homer and
+in other authors of the highest rank, and though I am far from being
+partial to their failings, nevertheless I would call them not so much
+wilful blunders as oversights which were allowed to pass unregarded
+through that contempt of little things, that “brave disorder,” which is
+natural to an exalted genius; and I still think that the greater
+excellences, though not everywhere equally sustained, ought always to be
+voted to the first place in literature, if for no other reason, for the
+mere grandeur of soul they evince. Let us take an instance: Apollonius
+in his _Argonautica_ has given us a poem actually faultless; and in his
+pastoral poetry Theocritus is eminently happy, except when he
+occasionally attempts another style. And what then? Would you rather be
+a Homer or an Apollonius?
+
+5
+Or take Eratosthenes and his _Erigone_; because that little work is
+without a flaw, is he therefore a greater poet than Archilochus, with
+all his disorderly profusion? greater than that impetuous, that
+god-gifted genius, which chafed against the restraints of law? or in
+lyric poetry would you choose to be a Bacchylides or a Pindar? in
+tragedy a Sophocles or (save the mark!) an Io of Chios? Yet Io and
+Bacchylides never stumble, their style is always neat, always pretty;
+while Pindar and Sophocles sometimes move onwards with a wide blaze of
+splendour, but often drop out of view in sudden and disastrous eclipse.
+Nevertheless no one in his senses would deny that a single play of
+Sophocles, the _Oedipus_, is of higher value than all the dramas of Io
+put together.
+
+
+XXXIV
+
+If the number and not the loftiness of an author’s merits is to be our
+standard of success, judged by this test we must admit that Hyperides is
+a far superior orator to Demosthenes. For in Hyperides there is a richer
+modulation, a greater variety of excellence. He is, we may say, in
+everything second-best, like the champion of the _pentathlon_, who,
+though in every contest he has to yield the prize to some other
+combatant, is superior to the unpractised in all five.
+
+2
+Not only has he rivalled the success of Demosthenes in everything but
+his manner of composition, but, as though that were not enough, he has
+taken in all the excellences and graces of Lysias as well. He knows when
+it is proper to speak with simplicity, and does not, like Demosthenes,
+continue the same key throughout. His touches of character are racy and
+sparkling, and full of a delicate flavour. Then how admirable is his
+wit, how polished his raillery! How well-bred he is, how dexterous in
+the use of irony! His jests are pointed, but without any of the
+grossness and vulgarity of the old Attic comedy. He is skilled in making
+light of an opponent’s argument, full of a well-aimed satire which
+amuses while it stings; and through all this there runs a pervading, may
+we not say, a matchless charm. He is most apt in moving compassion; his
+mythical digressions show a fluent ease, and he is perfect in bending
+his course and finding a way out of them without violence or effort.
+Thus when he tells the story of Leto he is really almost a poet; and his
+funeral oration shows a declamatory magnificence to which I hardly know
+a parallel.
+
+3
+Demosthenes, on the other hand, has no touches of character, none of the
+versatility, fluency, or declamatory skill of Hyperides. He is, in fact,
+almost entirely destitute of all those excellences which I have just
+enumerated. When he makes violent efforts to be humorous and witty, the
+only laughter he arouses is against himself; and the nearer he tries to
+get to the winning grace of Hyperides, the farther he recedes from it.
+Had he, for instance, attempted such a task as the little speech in
+defence of Phryne or Athenagoras, he would only have added to the
+reputation of his rival.
+
+4
+Nevertheless all the beauties of Hyperides, however numerous, cannot
+make him sublime. He never exhibits strong feeling, has little energy,
+rouses no emotion; certainly he never kindles terror in the breast of
+his readers. But Demosthenes followed a great master,[1] and drew his
+consummate excellences, his high-pitched eloquence, his living passion,
+his copiousness, his sagacity, his speed--that mastery and power which
+can never be approached--from the highest of sources. These mighty,
+these heaven-sent gifts (I dare not call them human), he made his own
+both one and all. Therefore, I say, by the noble qualities which he does
+possess he remains supreme above all rivals, and throws a cloud over his
+failings, silencing by his thunders and blinding by his lightnings the
+orators of all ages. Yes, it would be easier to meet the
+lightning-stroke with steady eye than to gaze unmoved when his
+impassioned eloquence is sending out flash after flash.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _I.e._ Thucydides. See the passage of Dionysius quoted
+    in the Note.]
+
+
+XXXV
+
+But in the case of Plato and Lysias there is, as I said, a further
+difference. Not only is Lysias vastly inferior to Plato in the degree of
+his merits, but in their number as well; and at the same time he is as
+far ahead of Plato in the number of his faults as he is behind in that
+of his merits.
+
+2
+What truth, then, was it that was present to those mighty spirits of the
+past, who, making whatever is greatest in writing their aim, thought it
+beneath them to be exact in every detail? Among many others especially
+this, that it was not in nature’s plan for us her chosen children to be
+creatures base and ignoble,--no, she brought us into life, and into the
+whole universe, as into some great field of contest, that we should be
+at once spectators and ambitious rivals of her mighty deeds, and from
+the first implanted in our souls an invincible yearning for all that is
+great, all that is diviner than ourselves.
+
+3
+Therefore even the whole world is not wide enough for the soaring range
+of human thought, but man’s mind often overleaps the very bounds of
+space.[1] When we survey the whole circle of life, and see it abounding
+everywhere in what is elegant, grand, and beautiful, we learn at once
+what is the true end of man’s being.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Lucretius on Epicurus: “Ergo vivida vis animi
+    pervicit, et extra Processit longe flammantia moenia mundi,” etc.]
+
+4
+And this is why nature prompts us to admire, not the clearness and
+usefulness of a little stream, but the Nile, the Danube, the Rhine, and
+far beyond all the Ocean; not to turn our wandering eyes from the
+heavenly fires, though often darkened, to the little flame kindled by
+human hands, however pure and steady its light; not to think that tiny
+lamp more wondrous than the caverns of Aetna, from whose raging depths
+are hurled up stones and whole masses of rock, and torrents sometimes
+come pouring from earth’s centre of pure and living fire.
+
+To sum the whole: whatever is useful or needful lies easily within man’s
+reach; but he keeps his homage for what is astounding.
+
+
+XXXVI
+
+How much more do these principles apply to the Sublime in literature,
+where grandeur is never, as it sometimes is in nature, dissociated from
+utility and advantage. Therefore all those who have achieved it, however
+far from faultless, are still more than mortal. When a writer uses any
+other resource he shows himself to be a man; but the Sublime lifts him
+near to the great spirit of the Deity. He who makes no slips must be
+satisfied with negative approbation, but he who is sublime commands
+positive reverence.
+
+2
+Why need I add that each one of those great writers often redeems all
+his errors by one grand and masterly stroke? But the strongest point of
+all is that, if you were to pick out all the blunders of Homer,
+Demosthenes, Plato, and all the greatest names in literature, and add
+them together, they would be found to bear a very small, or rather an
+infinitesimal proportion to the passages in which these supreme masters
+have attained absolute perfection. Therefore it is that all posterity,
+whose judgment envy herself cannot impeach, has brought and bestowed on
+them the crown of glory, has guarded their fame until this day against
+all attack, and is likely to preserve it
+
+  “As long as lofty trees shall grow,
+  And restless waters seaward flow.”
+
+3
+It has been urged by one writer that we should not prefer the huge
+disproportioned Colossus to the Doryphorus of Polycletus. But (to give
+one out of many possible answers) in art we admire exactness, in the
+works of nature magnificence; and it is from nature that man derives the
+faculty of speech. Whereas, then, in statuary we look for close
+resemblance to humanity, in literature we require something which
+transcends humanity.
+
+4
+Nevertheless (to reiterate the advice which we gave at the beginning of
+this essay), since that success which consists in avoidance of error is
+usually the gift of art, while high, though unequal excellence is the
+attribute of genius, it is proper on all occasions to call in art as an
+ally to nature. By the combined resources of these two we may hope to
+achieve perfection.
+
+Such are the conclusions which were forced upon me concerning the points
+at issue; but every one may consult his own taste.
+
+
+XXXVII
+
+To return, however, from this long digression; closely allied to
+metaphors are comparisons and similes, differing only in this * * *[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: The asterisks denote gaps in the original text.]
+
+
+XXXVIII
+
+Such absurdities as, “Unless you carry your brains next to the ground in
+your heels.”[1] Hence it is necessary to know where to draw the line;
+for if ever it is overstepped the effect of the hyperbole is spoilt,
+being in such cases relaxed by overstraining, and producing the very
+opposite to the effect desired.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Pseud. Dem. de Halon. 45.]
+
+2
+Isocrates, for instance, from an ambitious desire of lending everything
+a strong rhetorical colouring, shows himself in quite a childish light.
+Having in his Panegyrical Oration set himself to prove that the Athenian
+state has surpassed that of Sparta in her services to Hellas, he starts
+off at the very outset with these words: “Such is the power of language
+that it can extenuate what is great, and lend greatness to what is
+little, give freshness to what is antiquated, and describe what is
+recent so that it seems to be of the past.”[2] Come, Isocrates (it might
+be asked), is it thus that you are going to tamper with the facts about
+Sparta and Athens? This flourish about the power of language is like a
+signal hung out to warn his audience not to believe him.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Paneg. 8.]
+
+3
+We may repeat here what we said about figures, and say that the
+hyperbole is then most effective when it appears in disguise.[3] And
+this effect is produced when a writer, impelled by strong feeling,
+speaks in the accents of some tremendous crisis; as Thucydides does in
+describing the massacre in Sicily. “The Syracusans,” he says, “went down
+after them, and slew those especially who were in the river, and the
+water was at once defiled, yet still they went on drinking it, though
+mingled with mud and gore, most of them even fighting for it.”[4] The
+drinking of mud and gore, and even the fighting for it, is made credible
+by the awful horror of the scene described.
+
+    [Footnote 3: xvii. 1.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Thuc. vii. 84.]
+
+4
+Similarly Herodotus on those who fell at Thermopylae: “Here as they
+fought, those who still had them, with daggers, the rest with hands and
+teeth, the barbarians buried them under their javelins.”[5] That they
+fought with the teeth against heavy-armed assailants, and that they were
+buried with javelins, are perhaps hard sayings, but not incredible, for
+the reasons already explained. We can see that these circumstances have
+not been dragged in to produce a hyperbole, but that the hyperbole has
+grown naturally out of the circumstances.
+
+    [Footnote 5: vii. 225.]
+
+5
+For, as I am never tired of explaining, in actions and passions verging
+on frenzy there lies a kind of remission and palliation of any licence
+of language. Hence some comic extravagances, however improbable, gain
+credence by their humour, such as--
+
+  “He had a farm, a little farm, where space severely pinches;
+  ’Twas smaller than the last despatch from Sparta by some inches.”
+
+6
+For mirth is one of the passions, having its seat in pleasure. And
+hyperboles may be employed either to increase or to lessen--since
+exaggeration is common to both uses. Thus in extenuating an opponent’s
+argument we try to make it seem smaller than it is.
+
+
+XXXIX
+
+We have still left, my dear sir, the fifth of those sources which we set
+down at the outset as contributing to sublimity, that which consists in
+the mere arrangement of words in a certain order. Having already
+published two books dealing fully with this subject--so far at least as
+our investigations had carried us--it will be sufficient for the purpose
+of our present inquiry to add that harmony is an instrument which has a
+natural power, not only to win and to delight, but also in a remarkable
+degree to exalt the soul and sway the heart of man.
+
+2
+When we see that a flute kindles certain emotions in its hearers,
+rendering them almost beside themselves and full of an orgiastic frenzy,
+and that by starting some kind of rhythmical beat it compels him who
+listens to move in time and assimilate his gestures to the tune, even
+though he has no taste whatever for music; when we know that the sounds
+of a harp, which in themselves have no meaning, by the change of key, by
+the mutual relation of the notes, and their arrangement in symphony,
+often lay a wonderful spell on an audience--
+
+3
+though these are mere shadows and spurious imitations of persuasion,
+not, as I have said, genuine manifestations of human nature:--can we
+doubt that composition (being a kind of harmony of that language which
+nature has taught us, and which reaches, not our ears only, but our very
+souls), when it raises changing forms of words, of thoughts, of actions,
+of beauty, of melody, all of which are engrained in and akin to
+ourselves, and when by the blending of its manifold tones it brings home
+to the minds of those who stand by the feelings present to the speaker,
+and ever disposes the hearer to sympathise with those feelings, adding
+word to word, until it has raised a majestic and harmonious
+structure:--can we wonder if all this enchants us, wherever we meet with
+it, and filling us with the sense of pomp and dignity and sublimity, and
+whatever else it embraces, gains a complete mastery over our minds? It
+would be mere infatuation to join issue on truths so universally
+acknowledged, and established by experience beyond dispute.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading ἀλλ᾽ ἔοικε μανίᾳ, and putting a full stop at
+    πίστις.]
+
+4
+Now to give an instance: that is doubtless a sublime thought, indeed
+wonderfully fine, which Demosthenes applies to his decree: τοῦτο τὸ
+ψήφισμα τὸν τότε τῇ πόλει περιστάντα κίνδυνον παρελθεῖν ἐποίησεν ὥσπερ
+νέφος, “This decree caused the danger which then hung round our city to
+pass away like a cloud.” But the modulation is as perfect as the
+sentiment itself is weighty. It is uttered wholly in the dactylic
+measure, the noblest and most magnificent of all measures, and hence
+forming the chief constituent in the finest metre we know, the heroic.
+[And it is with great judgment that the words ὥσπερ νέφος are reserved
+till the end.[2]] Supposing we transpose them from their proper place
+and read, say τοῦτο τὸ ψήφισμα ὥσπερ νέφος ἐποίησε τὸν τότε κίνδυνον
+παρελθεῖν--nay, let us merely cut off one syllable, reading ἐποίησε
+παρελθεῖν ὡς νέφος--and you will understand how close is the unison
+between harmony and sublimity. In the passage before us the words ὥσπερ
+νέφος move first in a heavy measure, which is metrically equivalent to
+four short syllables: but on removing one syllable, and reading ὡς
+νέφος, the grandeur of movement is at once crippled by the abridgment.
+So conversely if you lengthen into ὡσπερεὶ νέφος, the meaning is still
+the same, but it does not strike the ear in the same manner, because by
+lingering over the final syllables you at once dissipate and relax the
+abrupt grandeur of the passage.
+
+    [Footnote 2: There is a break here in the text; but the context
+    indicates the sense of the words lost, which has accordingly been
+    supplied.]
+
+
+XL
+
+There is another method very efficient in exalting a style. As the
+different members of the body, none of which, if severed from its
+connection, has any intrinsic excellence, unite by their mutual
+combination to form a complete and perfect organism, so also the
+elements of a fine passage, by whose separation from one another its
+high quality is simultaneously dissipated and evaporates, when joined in
+one organic whole, and still further compacted by the bond of harmony,
+by the mere rounding of the period gain power of tone.
+
+2
+In fact, a clause may be said to derive its sublimity from the joint
+contributions of a number of particulars. And further (as we have shown
+at large elsewhere), many writers in prose and verse, though their
+natural powers were not high, were perhaps even low, and though the
+terms they employed were usually common and popular and conveying no
+impression of refinement, by the mere harmony of their composition have
+attained dignity and elevation, and avoided the appearance of meanness.
+Such among many others are Philistus, Aristophanes occasionally,
+Euripides almost always.
+
+3
+Thus when Heracles says, after the murder of his children,
+
+  “I’m full of woes, I have no room for more,”[1]
+
+the words are quite common, but they are made sublime by being cast in a
+fine mould. By changing their position you will see that the poetical
+quality of Euripides depends more on his arrangement than on his
+thoughts.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _H. F._ 1245.]
+
+4
+Compare his lines on Dirce dragged by the bull--
+
+                  “Whatever crossed his path,
+  Caught in his victim’s form, he seized, and dragging
+  Oak, woman, rock, now here, now there, he flies.”[2]
+
+The circumstance is noble in itself, but it gains in vigour because the
+language is disposed so as not to hurry the movement, not running, as it
+were, on wheels, because there is a distinct stress on each word, and
+the time is delayed, advancing slowly to a pitch of stately sublimity.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Antiope_ (Nauck, 222).]
+
+
+XLI
+
+Nothing so much degrades the tone of a style as an effeminate and
+hurried movement in the language, such as is produced by pyrrhics and
+trochees and dichorees falling in time together into a regular dance
+measure. Such abuse of rhythm is sure to savour of coxcombry and petty
+affectation, and grows tiresome in the highest degree by a monotonous
+sameness of tone.
+
+2
+But its worst effect is that, as those who listen to a ballad have their
+attention distracted from its subject and can think of nothing but the
+tune, so an over-rhythmical passage does not affect the hearer by the
+meaning of its words, but merely by their cadence, so that sometimes,
+knowing where the pause must come, they beat time with the speaker,
+striking the expected close like dancers before the stop is reached.
+Equally undignified is the splitting up of a sentence into a number of
+little words and short syllables crowded too closely together and forced
+into cohesion,--hammered, as it were, successively together,--after the
+manner of mortice and tenon.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: I must refer to Weiske’s Note, which I have followed,
+    for the probable interpretation of this extraordinary passage.]
+
+
+XLII
+
+Sublimity is further diminished by cramping the diction. Deformity
+instead of grandeur ensues from over-compression. Here I am not
+referring to a judicious compactness of phrase, but to a style which is
+dwarfed, and its force frittered away. To cut your words too short is to
+prune away their sense, but to be concise is to be direct. On the other
+hand, we know that a style becomes lifeless by over-extension, I mean by
+being relaxed to an unseasonable length.
+
+
+XLIII
+
+The use of mean words has also a strong tendency to degrade a lofty
+passage. Thus in that description of the storm in Herodotus the matter
+is admirable, but some of the words admitted are beneath the dignity of
+the subject; such, perhaps, as “the seas having _seethed_” because the
+ill-sounding phrase “having seethed” detracts much from its
+impressiveness: or when he says “the wind wore away,” and “those who
+clung round the wreck met with an unwelcome end.”[1] “Wore away” is
+ignoble and vulgar, and “unwelcome” inadequate to the extent of the
+disaster.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Hdt. vii. 188, 191, 13.]
+
+2
+Similarly Theopompus, after giving a fine picture of the Persian king’s
+descent against Egypt, has exposed the whole to censure by certain
+paltry expressions. “There was no city, no people of Asia, which did not
+send an embassy to the king; no product of the earth, no work of art,
+whether beautiful or precious, which was not among the gifts brought to
+him. Many and costly were the hangings and robes, some purple, some
+embroidered, some white; many the tents, of cloth of gold, furnished
+with all things useful; many the tapestries and couches of great price.
+Moreover, there was gold and silver plate richly wrought, goblets and
+bowls, some of which might be seen studded with gems, and others besides
+worked in relief with great skill and at vast expense. Besides these
+there were suits of armour in number past computation, partly Greek,
+partly foreign, endless trains of baggage animals and fat cattle for
+slaughter, many bushels of spices, many panniers and sacks and sheets of
+writing-paper; and all other necessaries in the same proportion. And
+there was salt meat of all kinds of beasts in immense quantity, heaped
+together to such a height as to show at a distance like mounds and hills
+thrown up one against another.”
+
+3
+He runs off from the grander parts of his subject to the meaner, and
+sinks where he ought to rise. Still worse, by his mixing up _panniers_
+and _spices_ and _bags_ with his wonderful recital of that vast and busy
+scene one would imagine that he was describing a kitchen. Let us suppose
+that in that show of magnificence some one had taken a set of wretched
+baskets and bags and placed them in the midst, among vessels of gold,
+jewelled bowls, silver plate, and tents and goblets of gold; how
+incongruous would have seemed the effect! Now just in the same way these
+petty words, introduced out of season, stand out like deformities and
+blots on the diction.
+
+4
+These details might have been given in one or two broad strokes, as when
+he speaks of mounds being heaped together. So in dealing with the other
+preparations he might have told us of “waggons and camels and a long
+train of baggage animals loaded with all kinds of supplies for the
+luxury and enjoyment of the table,” or have mentioned “piles of grain of
+every species, and of all the choicest delicacies required by the art of
+the cook or the taste of the epicure,” or (if he must needs be so very
+precise) he might have spoken of “whatever dainties are supplied by
+those who lay or those who dress the banquet.”
+
+5
+In our sublimer efforts we should never stoop to what is sordid and
+despicable, unless very hard pressed by some urgent necessity. If we
+would write becomingly, our utterance should be worthy of our theme. We
+should take a lesson from nature, who when she planned the human frame
+did not set our grosser parts, or the ducts for purging the body, in our
+face, but as far as she could concealed them, “diverting,” as Xenophon
+says, “those canals as far as possible from our senses,”[2] and thus
+shunning in any part to mar the beauty of the whole creature.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Mem._ i. 4. 6.]
+
+6
+However, it is not incumbent on us to specify and enumerate whatever
+diminishes a style. We have now pointed out the various means of giving
+it nobility and loftiness. It is clear, then, that whatever is contrary
+to these will generally degrade and deform it.
+
+
+XLIV
+
+There is still another point which remains to be cleared up, my dear
+Terentian, and on which I shall not hesitate to add some remarks, to
+gratify your inquiring spirit. It relates to a question which was
+recently put to me by a certain philosopher. “To me,” he said, “in
+common, I may say, with many others, it is a matter of wonder that in
+the present age, which produces many highly skilled in the arts Of
+popular persuasion, many of keen and active powers, many especially rich
+in every pleasing gift of language, the growth of highly exalted and
+wide-reaching genius has with a few rare exceptions almost entirely
+ceased. So universal is the dearth of eloquence which prevails
+throughout the world.
+
+2
+“Must we really,” he asked, “give credit to that oft-repeated assertion
+that democracy is the kind nurse of genius, and that high literary
+excellence has flourished with her prime and faded with her decay?
+Liberty, it is said, is all-powerful to feed the aspirations of high
+intellects, to hold out hope, and keep alive the flame of mutual rivalry
+and ambitious struggle for the highest place.
+
+3
+“Moreover, the prizes which are offered in every free state keep the
+spirits of her foremost orators whetted by perpetual exercise;[1] they
+are, as it were, ignited by friction, and naturally blaze forth freely
+because they are surrounded by freedom. But we of to-day,” he continued,
+“seem to have learnt in our childhood the lessons of a benignant
+despotism, to have been cradled in her habits and customs from the time
+when our minds were still tender, and never to have tasted the fairest
+and most fruitful fountain of eloquence, I mean liberty. Hence we
+develop nothing but a fine genius for flattery.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Pericles in Thuc. ii., ἆθλα γὰρ οἷς κεῖται ἀρετῆς
+    μέγιστα τοῖς δὲ καὶ ἄνδρες ἄριστα πολιτεύουσιν.]
+
+4
+“This is the reason why, though all other faculties are consistent with
+the servile condition, no slave ever became an orator; because in him
+there is a dumb spirit which will not be kept down: his soul is chained:
+he is like one who has learnt to be ever expecting a blow. For, as Homer
+says--
+
+5
+            “’The day of slavery
+  Takes half our manly worth away.’[2]
+
+“As, then (if what I have heard is credible), the cages in which those
+pigmies commonly called dwarfs are reared not only stop the growth of
+the imprisoned creature, but absolutely make him smaller by compressing
+every part of his body, so all despotism, however equitable, may be
+defined as a cage of the soul and a general prison.”
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ xvii. 322.]
+
+6
+My answer was as follows: “My dear friend, it is so easy, and so
+characteristic of human nature, always to find fault with the
+present.[3] Consider, now, whether the corruption of genius is to be
+attributed, not to a world-wide peace,[4] but rather to the war within
+us which knows no limit, which engages all our desires, yes, and still
+further to the bad passions which lay siege to us to-day, and make utter
+havoc and spoil of our lives. Are we not enslaved, nay, are not our
+careers completely shipwrecked, by love of gain, that fever which rages
+unappeased in us all, and love of pleasure?--one the most debasing, the
+other the most ignoble of the mind’s diseases.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Comp. Byron, “The good old times,--all times when old
+    are good.”]
+
+    [Footnote 4: A euphemism for “a world-wide tyranny.”]
+
+7
+“When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such
+high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches,
+can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up
+with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled is dogged by
+Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his footsteps: and
+as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she enters with him
+and makes her abode with him. And after a time they build their nests
+(to use a wise man’s words[5]) in that corner of life, and speedily set
+about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and Wantonness, no
+base-born children, but their very own. And if these also, the offspring
+of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime, quickly they engender in
+the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and Lawlessness, and
+Shamelessness.
+
+    [Footnote 5: Plato, _Rep._ ix. 573, E.]
+
+8
+“Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational[6] in
+him, and neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable
+results. He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report;
+by slow degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated
+all round; all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is
+despised.
+
+    [Footnote 6: Reading κἀνόητα.]
+
+9
+“If a judge who passes sentence for a bribe can never more give a free
+and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes
+a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how
+can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is
+controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men’s death and
+plan how to get a place in their wills, when we buy gain, from whatever
+source, each one of us, with our very souls in our slavish greed, how, I
+say, can we expect, in the midst of such a moral pestilence, that there
+is still left even one liberal and impartial critic, whose verdict will
+not be biassed by avarice in judging of those great works which live on
+through all time?
+
+10
+“Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to
+be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether against our
+neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge
+of calamity on the whole civilised world.“
+
+11
+I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is
+wasted by that indifference which with a few exceptions runs through the
+whole of life. If we ever shake off our apathy[7] and apply ourselves to
+work, it is always with a view to pleasure or applause, not for that
+solid advantage which is worthy to be striven for and held in honour.
+
+    [Footnote 7: Comp. Thuc. vi. 26. 2, for this sense of ἀναλαμβάνειν.]
+
+12
+We had better then leave this generation to its fate, and turn to what
+follows, which is the subject of the passions, to which we promised
+early in this treatise to devote a separate work.[8] They play an
+important part in literature generally, and especially in relation to
+the Sublime.
+
+    [Footnote 8: iii. 5.]
+
+
+
+
+NOTES ON LONGINUS
+
+[Transcriber’s Note:
+Citation format is as in the printed text. The last number in each
+group appears to refer to clauses in the original Greek; there is no
+correspondence with line numbers in the printed book.]
+
+
+I. 2. 10.
+There seems to be an antithesis implied in πολιτικοῖς τεθεωρηκέναι,
+referring to the well-known distinction between the πρακτικὸς βίος and
+the θεωρητικὸς βίος.
+
+4. 27.
+I have ventured to return to the original reading, διεφώτισεν, though
+all editors seem to have adopted the correction διεφόρησεν, on account,
+I suppose, of σκηπτοῦ. To _illumine_ a large subject, as a landscape is
+lighted up at night by a flash of lightning, is surely a far more vivid
+and intelligible expression than to _sweep away_ a subject.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. for the metaphor Goethe, _Dichtung und Wahrheit_,
+    B 8. “Wie vor einem Blitz erleuchteten sich uns alle Folgen dieses
+    herrlichen Gedankens.”]
+
+
+III. 2. 17.
+φορβειᾶς δ᾽ ἄτερ, lit. “without a cheek-strap,” which was worn by
+trumpeters to assist them in regulating their breath. The line is
+contracted from two of Sophocles’s, and Longinus’s point is that the
+extravagance of Cleitarchus is not that of a strong but ill-regulated
+nature, but the ludicrous straining after grandeur of a writer at once
+feeble and pretentious.
+
+Ruhnken gives an extract from some inedited “versus politici” of
+Tzetzes, in which are some amusing specimens of those felicities of
+language Longinus is here laughing at. Stones are the “bones,” rivers
+the “veins,” of the earth; the moon is “the sigma of the sky” (Ϲ the old
+form of Σ); sailors, “the ants of ocean”; the strap of a pedlar’s pack,
+“the girdle of his load”; pitch, “the ointment of doors,” and so on.
+
+
+IV. 4. 4.
+The play upon the double meaning of κόρα, (1) maiden, (2) pupil of the
+eye, can hardly be kept in English. It is worthy of remark that our text
+of Xenophon has ἐν τοῖς θαλάμοις, a perfectly natural expression. Such a
+variation would seem to point to a very early corruption of ancient
+manuscripts, or to extraordinary inaccuracy on the part of Longinus,
+who, indeed, elsewhere displays great looseness of citation, confusing
+together totally different passages.
+
+9.
+ἰταμόν. I can make nothing of this word. Various corrections have been
+suggested, but with little certainty.
+
+5. 10.
+ὡς φωρίου τινος ἐφαπτόμενος, literally, “as though he were laying hands
+on a piece of stolen property.” The point seems to be, that plagiarists,
+like other robbers, show no discrimination in their pilferings, seizing
+what comes first to hand.
+
+
+VIII. 1. 20.
+ἐδάφους. I have avoided the rather harsh confusion of metaphor which
+this word involves, taken in connection with πηγαί.
+
+
+IX. 2. 13.
+ἀπήχημα, properly an “echo,” a metaphor rather Greek than English.
+
+
+X. 2. 13.
+χλωροτέρα δὲ ποίας, lit. “more wan than grass”--of the sickly yellow hue
+which would appear on a dark Southern face under the influence of
+violent emotion.[2]
+
+    [Footnote 2: The notion of _yellowness_, as associated with grass,
+    is made intelligible by a passage in Longus, i. 17. 19. χλωρότερον
+    τὸ πρόσωπον ἦν πόας _θερινῆς_]
+
+3. 6.
+The words ἢ γάρ ... τέθνηκεν are omitted in the translation, being
+corrupt, and giving no satisfactory sense. Ruhnken corrects, ἀλογιστεῖ,
+φρονεῖ, προεῖται, ἢ π. ὀ. τ.
+
+18.
+σπλάγχνοισι κακῶς ἀναβαλλομένοισι Probably of sea-sickness; and so I
+find Ruhnken took it, quoting Plutarch, _T._ ii. 831: ἐμοῦντος τοῦ
+ἑτέρου, καὶ λέγοντος τὰ σπλάγχνα ἐκβάλλειν. An objection on the score of
+_taste_ would be out of place in criticising the laureate of the
+Arimaspi.
+
+
+X. 7. 2.
+τὰς ἐξοχὰς ἀριστίνδην ἐκκαθήραντες ἀριστίνδην ἐκκαθήραντες appears to be
+a condensed phrase for ἀριστίνδην ἐκλέξαντες και ἐκκαθήραντες. “Having
+chosen the most striking circumstances _par excellence_, and having
+relieved them of all superfluity,” would perhaps give the literal
+meaning. Longinus seems conscious of some strangeness in his language,
+making a quasi-apology in ὡς ἂν εἴποι τις.
+
+3.
+Partly with the help of Toup, we may emend this corrupt passage as
+follows: λυμαίνεται γὰρ ταῦτα τὸ ὅλον, ὡσανεὶ ψήγματα ἢ ἀραιώματα, τὰ
+ἐμποιοῦντα μέγεθος τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα σχέσει συντετειχισμένα. τὸ ὅλον here =
+“omnino.” To explain the process of corruption, τα would easily drop out
+after the final -τα in ἀραιώματα; συνοικονομούμενα is simply a
+corruption of συνοικοδομούμενα, which is itself a gloss on
+συντετειχισμένα, having afterwards crept into the text; μέγεθος became
+corrupted into μεγέθη through the error of some copyist, who wished to
+make it agree with ἐμποιοῦντα. The whole maybe translated: “Such
+[interpolations], like so many patches or rents, mar altogether the
+effect of those details which, by being built up in an uninterrupted
+series [τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα σχ. συντετ.], produce sublimity in a work.”
+
+
+XII. 4. 2.
+αὐτῷ; the sense seems clearly to require ἐν αὑτῷ.
+
+
+XIV. 3. 16.
+μὴ ... ὑπερήμερον Most of the editors insert οὐ before φθέγξαιτο, thus
+ruining the sense of this fine passage. Longinus has just said that a
+writer should always work with an eye to posterity. If (he adds) he
+thinks of nothing but the taste and judgment of his contemporaries, he
+will have no chance of “leaving something so written that the world will
+not willingly let it die.” A book, then, which is τοῦ ἰδίου βίου καὶ
+χρόνου ὑπερήμερος, is a book which is in advance of its own times. Such
+were the poems of Lucretius, of Milton, of Wordsworth.[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Compare the “Geflügelte Worte” in the Vorspiel to
+    Goethe’s _Faust_:
+      Was glänzt, ist für den Augenblick geboren,
+      Das Aechte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren.]
+
+
+XV. 5. 23.
+ποκοειδεῖς καὶ ἀμαλάκτους, lit. “like raw, undressed wool.”
+
+
+XVII. 1. 25.
+I construct the infinit. with ὕποπτον, though the ordinary
+interpretation joins τὸ διὰ σχημάτων πανουργεῖν: “proprium est _verborum
+lenociniis_ suspicionem movere” (Weiske).
+
+2. 8.
+παραληφθεῖσα. This word has given much trouble; but is it not simply a
+continuation of the metaphor implied in ἐπικουρία? παραλαμβάνειν τινα,
+in the sense of calling in an ally, is a common enough use. This would
+be clearer if we could read παραληφθεῖσι. I have omitted τοῦ πανουργεῖν
+in translating, as it seems to me to have evidently crept in from above
+(p. 33, l. 25). ἡ τοῦ πανουργεῖν τέχνη, “the art of playing the
+villain,” is surely, in Longinus’s own words, δεινὸν καὶ ἔκφυλον, “a
+startling novelty” of language.
+
+12.
+τῷ φωτὶ αὐτῷ. The words may remind us of Shelley’s “Like a poet _hidden
+in the light of thought_.”
+
+
+XVIII. 1. 24.
+The distinction between πεῦσις or πύσμα and ἐρότησις or ἐρώτημα is said
+to be that ἐρώτησις is a simple question, which can be answered yes or
+no; πεῦσις a fuller inquiry, requiring a fuller answer. _Aquila Romanus
+in libro de figuris sententiarum et elocutionis_, § 12 (Weiske).
+
+
+XXXI. 1. 11.
+ἀναγκοφαγῆσαι, properly of the fixed diet of athletes, which seems to
+have been excessive in quantity, and sometimes nauseous in quality. I do
+not know what will be thought of my rendering here; it is certainly not
+elegant, but it was necessary to provide some sort of equivalent to the
+Greek. “Swallow,” which the other translators give, is quite inadequate.
+We require a threefold combination--(1) To swallow (2) something nasty
+(3) for the sake of prospective advantage.
+
+
+XXXII. 1. 3.
+The text is in great confusion here. Following a hint in Vahlin’s
+critical note, I have transposed the words thus: ὁ καιρὸς δὲ τῆς χρείας
+ὁρός‧ ἔνθα τὰ πάθη χειμάρρου δίκην ἐλαύνεται, καὶ τὴν πολυπλήθειαν αὐτῶν
+ὡς ἀναγκαίαν ἐνταῦθα συνεφέλκεται‧ ὁ γὰρ Δ., ὁρὸς καὶ τῶν τοιούτων,
+ἄνθρωποι, φησίν, κ.τ.λ.
+
+8. 16.
+Some words have probably been lost here. The sense of πλήν, and the
+absence of antithesis to οὗτος μέν, point in this direction. The
+original reading may have been something of this sort: πλὴν οὗτος μὲν
+ὑπὸ φιλονέικίας _παρήγετο_‧ ἀλλ᾽ οὐδὲ τὰ θέματα τίθησιν ὁμολογούμενα,
+the sense being that, though we may allow something to the partiality of
+Caecilius, yet this does not excuse him from arguing on premises which
+are unsound.
+
+
+XXXIV. 4. 10.
+ὁ δὲ ἔνθεν ἑλών, κ.τ.λ. Probably the darkest place in the whole
+treatise. Toup cites a remarkable passage from Dionysius of
+Halicarnassus, from which we may perhaps conclude that Longinus is
+referring here to Thucydides, the traditional master of Demosthenes. _De
+Thucyd._ § 53, Ῥητόρων δὲ Δημοσθενὴς μόνος Θουκυδίδου ζηλωτὸς ἐγένετο
+κατὰ πολλά, καὶ προσέθηκε τοῖς πολιτικοῖς λόγοις, παρ᾽ ἐκείνου λαβών, ἃς
+οὔτε Ἀντιφῶν, οὔτε Λυσίας, οὔτε Ἰσοκράτης, οἱ πρωτεύσαντες τῶν τότε
+ῥητόρων, ἔσχον ἀρετάς, τὰ τάχη λέγω, καὶ τὰς συστροφάς, καὶ τοὺς τόνους,
+καὶ τὸ στρυφνόν, καὶ τὴν ἐξεγείρουσαν τὰ πάθη δεινότητα. So close a
+parallel can hardly be accidental.
+
+
+XXXV. 4. 5.
+Longinus probably had his eye on the splendid lines in Pindar’s _First
+Pythian_:
+
+  τᾶς [Αἴτνας] ἐρεύγονται μὲν ἀπλάτου πυρὸς ἁγνόταται
+  ἐκ μυχῶν παγαὶ, ποταμοὶ δ᾽
+  ἁμέραισιν μὲν προχέοντι ῥόον καπνοῦ--
+  αἴθων᾽‧ ἀλλ᾽ ἐν ὄρφναισιν πέτρας
+  φοίνισσα κυλινδομένα φλὸξ ἐς βαθεῖ-
+  αν φέρει πόντου πλάκα σὺν πατάγῳ ἁγνόταται αὐτοῦ μόνου,
+
+which I find has also been pointed out by Toup, who remarks that
+ἁγνόταται confirms the reading αὐτοῦ μόνου here, which has been
+suspected without reason.
+
+
+XXXVIII. 2. 7.
+Comp. Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A: Τισίαν δὲ Γοργίαν τε ἐάσομεν εὕδειν,
+οἵ πρὸ τῶν ἀληθῶν τὰ εἰκότα εἶδον ὡς τιμητέα μᾶλλον, τὰ τε αὖ σμικρὰ
+μέγαλα καὶ τὰ μέγαλα σμικρὰ ποιοῦσι φαίνεσθαι διὰ ῥώμην λόγου, καινά τε
+ἀρχαίως τά τ᾽ ἐναντία καινῶς, συντομίαν τε λόγων καὶ ἄπειρα μήκη περὶ
+πάντων ἀνεῦρον.
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX
+
+SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LESS KNOWN WRITERS
+MENTIONED IN THE TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+AMMONIUS.--Alexandrian grammarian, carried on the school of Aristarchus
+previously to the reign of Augustus. The allusion here is to a work on
+the passages in which Plato has imitated Homer. (Suidas, _s.v._; Schol.
+on Hom. Il. ix. 540, quoted by Jahn.)
+
+AMPHIKRATES.--Author of a book _On Famous Men_, referred to by
+Athenaeus, xiii. 576, G, and Diog. Laert. ii. 101. C. Muller, _Hist. Gr.
+Fragm._ iv. p. 300, considers him to be the Athenian rhetorician who,
+according to Plutarch (_Lucullus_, c. 22), retired to Seleucia, and
+closed his life at the Court of Kleopatra, daughter of Mithridates
+and wife of Tigranes (Pauly, _Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
+Alterthumswissenschaft_). Plutarch tells a story illustrative of his
+arrogance. Being asked by the Seleucians to open a school of rhetoric,
+he replied, “A dish is not large enough for a dolphin” (ὡς οὐδὲ λεκάνη
+δελφῖνα χωροίη), v. _Luculli_, c. 22, quoted by Pearce.
+
+ARISTEAS.--A name involved in a mist of fable. According to Suidas he
+was a contemporary of Kroesus, though Herodotus assigns to him a much
+remoter antiquity. The latter authority describes him as visiting the
+northern peoples of Europe and recording his travels in an epic poem,
+a fragment of which is given here by Longinus. The passage before us
+appears to be intended as the words of some Arimaspian, who, as
+belonging to a remote inland race, expresses his astonishment that any
+men could be found bold enough to commit themselves to the mercy of the
+sea, and tries to describe the terror of human beings placed in such a
+situation (Pearce ad. l.; Abicht on Hdt. iv. 12; Suidas, _s.v._)
+
+BAKCHYLIDES, nephew and pupil of the great Simonides, flourished about
+460 B.C. He followed his uncle to the Court of Hiero at Syracuse, and
+enjoyed the patronage of that despot. After Hiero’s death he returned to
+his home in Keos; but finding himself discontented with the mode of life
+pursued in a free Greek community, for which his experiences at Hiero’s
+Court may well have disqualified him, he retired to Peloponnesus, where
+he died. His works comprise specimens of almost every kind of lyric
+composition, as practised by the Greeks of his time. Horace is said to
+have imitated him in his _Prophecy of Nereus_, c. I. xv. (Pauly, as
+above). So far as we can judge from what remains of his works, he was
+distinguished rather by elegance than by force. A considerable fragment
+on the Blessings of Peace has been translated by Mr. J. A. Symonds in
+his work on the Greek poets. He is made the subject of a very bitter
+allusion by Pindar (Ol. ii. s. fin. c. Schol.) We may suppose that the
+stern and lofty spirit of Pindar had little sympathy with the “tearful”
+(Catullus, xxxviii.) strains of Simonides or his imitators.
+
+CAECILIUS, a native of Kale Akte in Sicily, and hence known as Caecilius
+Kalaktinus, lived in Rome at the time of Augustus. He is mentioned with
+distinction as a learned Greek rhetorician and grammarian, and was the
+author of numerous works, frequently referred to by Plutarch and other
+later writers. He may be regarded as one of the most distinguished Greek
+rhetoricians of his time. His works, all of which have perished,
+comprised, among many others, commentaries on Antipho and Lysias;
+several treatises on Demosthenes, among which is a dissertation on the
+genuine and spurious speeches, and another comparing that orator with
+Cicero; “On the Distinction between Athenian and Asiatic Eloquence”; and
+the work on the Sublime, referred to by Longinus (Pauly). The criticism
+of Longinus on the above work may be thus summed up: Caecilius is
+censured (1) as failing to rise to the dignity of his subject; (2) as
+missing the cardinal points; and (3) as failing in practical utility.
+He wastes his energy in tedious attempts to define the Sublime, but does
+not tell us how it is to be attained (I. i.) He is further blamed for
+omitting to deal with the Pathetic (VIII. i. _sqq._) He allows only two
+metaphors to be employed together in the same passage (XXXII. ii.) He
+extols Lysias as a far greater writer than Plato (_ib._ viii.), and is a
+bitter assailant of Plato’s style (_ib._) On the whole, he seems to have
+been a cold and uninspired critic, finding his chief pleasure in minute
+verbal details, and incapable of rising to an elevated and extensive
+view of his subject.
+
+ERATOSTHENES, a native of Cyrene, born in 275 B.C.; appointed by Ptolemy
+III. Euergetes as the successor of Kallimachus in the post of librarian
+in the great library of Alexandria. He was the teacher of Aristophanes
+of Byzantium, and his fame as a man of learning is testified by the
+various fanciful titles which were conferred on him, such as “The
+Pentathlete,” “The second Plato,” etc. His great work was a treatise on
+geography (Lübker).
+
+GORGIAS of Leontini, according to some authorities a pupil of
+Empedokles, came, when already advanced in years, as ambassador from his
+native city to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.) Here he attracted
+notice by a novel style of eloquence. Some time after he settled
+permanently in Greece, wandering from city to city, and acquiring wealth
+and fame by practising and teaching rhetoric. We find him last in
+Larissa, where he died at the age of a hundred in 375 B.C. As a teacher
+of eloquence Gorgias belongs to what is known as the Sicilian school,
+in which he followed the steps of his predecessors, Korax and Tisias. At
+the time when this school arose the Greek ear was still accustomed to
+the rhythm and beat of poetry, and the whole rhetorical system of the
+Gorgian school (compare the phrases γοργίεια σχήματα, γοργιάζειν) is
+built on a poetical plan (Lübker, _Reallexikon des classischen
+Alterthums_). Hermogenes, as quoted by Jahn, appears to classify him
+among the “hollow pedants” (ὑπόξυλοι σοφισταί), “who,” he says, “talk
+of vultures as ‘living tombs,’ to which they themselves would best be
+committed, and indulge in many other such frigid conceits.” (With the
+metaphor censured by Longinus compare Achilles Tatius, III. v. 50, ed.
+Didot.) See also Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A.
+
+HEGESIAS of Magnesia, rhetorician and historian, contemporary of Timaeus
+(300 B.C.) He belongs to the period of the decline of Greek learning,
+and Cicero treats him as the representative of the decline of taste. His
+style was harsh and broken in character, and a parody on the Old Attic.
+He wrote a life of Alexander the Great, of which Plutarch (_Alexander_,
+c. 3) gives the following specimen: “On the day of Alexander’s birth the
+temple of Artemis in Ephesus was burnt down, a coincidence which
+occasions Hegesias to utter a conceit frigid enough to extinguish the
+conflagration. ‘It was natural,’ he says, ‘that the temple should be
+burnt down, as Artemis was engaged with bringing Alexander into the
+world’” (Pauly, with the references).
+
+HEKATAEUS of Miletus, the logographer; born in 549 B.C., died soon after
+the battle of Plataea. He was the author of two works--(1) περίοδος γῆς;
+and (2) γενεηλογίαι. The _Periodos_ deals in two books, first with
+Europe, then with Asia and Libya. The quotation in the text is from his
+genealogies (Lübker).
+
+ION of Chios, poet, historian, and philosopher, highly distinguished
+among his contemporaries, and mentioned by Strabo among the celebrated
+men of the island. He won the tragic prize at Athens in 452 B.C., and
+Aristophanes (_Peace_, 421 B.C.) speaks of him as already dead. He was
+not less celebrated as an elegiac poet, and we still possess some
+specimens of his elegies, which are characterised by an Anacreontic
+spirit, a cheerful, joyous tone, and even by a certain degree of
+inspiration. He wrote also Skolia, Hymns, and Epigrams, and was a
+pretty voluminous writer in prose (Pauly). Compare the Scholiast on Ar.
+_Peace_, 801.
+
+KALLISTHENES of Olynthus, a near relative of Aristotle; born in 360, and
+educated by the philosopher as fellow-pupil with Alexander, afterwards
+the Great. He subsequently visited Athens, where he enjoyed the
+friendship of Theophrastus, and devoted himself to history and natural
+philosophy. He afterwards accompanied Alexander on his Asiatic
+expedition, but soon became obnoxious to the tyrant on account of his
+independent and manly bearing, which he carried even to the extreme of
+rudeness and arrogance. He at last excited the enmity of Alexander to
+such a degree that the latter took the opportunity afforded by the
+conspiracy of Hermolaus, in which Kallisthenes was accused of
+participating, to rid himself of his former school companion, whom he
+caused to be put to death. He was the author of various historical and
+scientific works. Of the latter two are mentioned--(1) _On the Nature of
+the Eye_; (2) _On the Nature of Plants_. Among his historical works are
+mentioned (1) the _Phocian War_ (read “Phocicum” for v. l. “Troikum” in
+Cic. _Epp. ad Div._ v. 12); (2) a _History of Greece_ in ten books; (3)
+τὰ Περσικά, apparently identical with the description of Alexander’s
+march, of which we still possess fragments. As an historian he seems to
+have displayed an undue love of recording signs and wonders. Polybius,
+however (vi. 45), classes him among the best historical writers. His
+style is said by Cicero (_de Or._ ii. 14) to approximate to the
+rhetorical (Pauly).
+
+KLEITARCHUS, a contemporary of Alexander, accompanied that monarch on
+his Asiatic expedition, and wrote a history of the same in twelve books,
+which must have included at least a short retrospect on the early
+history of Asia. His talents are spoken of in high terms, but his credit
+as an historian is held very light--“probatur ingenium, fides
+infamatur,” Quint. x. 1, 74. Cicero also (_de Leg._ i. 2) ranks him
+very low. That his credit as an historian was sacrificed to a childish
+credulity and a foolish love of fable and adventure is sufficiently
+testified by the pretty numerous fragments which still remain (Pauly).
+Demetrius Phalereus, quoted by Pearce, quotes a grandiloquent
+description of the wasp taken from Kleitarchus, “feeding on the
+mountainside, her home the hollow oak.”
+
+MATRIS, a native of Thebes, author of a panegyric on Herakles, whether
+in verse or prose is uncertain. In one passage Athenaeus speaks of him
+as an Athenian, but this must be a mistake. Toup restores a verse from
+an allusion in Diodorus Siculus (i. 24), which, if genuine, would agree
+well with the description given of him by Longinus: Ηρακλέα καλέεσκεν,
+ὅτι κλέος ἔσχε διὰ Ἥραν (see Toup ad Long. III. ii.)
+
+PHILISTUS of Syracuse, a relative of the elder Dionysius, whom he
+assisted with his wealth in his attack on the liberty of that city, and
+remained with him until 386 B.C., when he was banished by the jealous
+suspicions of the tyrant. He retired to Epirus, where he remained until
+Dionysius’s death. The younger Dionysius recalled him, wishing to employ
+him in the character of supporter against Dion. By his instrumentality
+it would seem that Dion and Plato were banished from Syracuse. He
+commanded the fleet in the struggle between Dion and Dionysius, and lost
+a battle, whereupon he was seized and put to death by the people. During
+his banishment he wrote his historical work, τὰ Σικελικά, divided into
+two parts and numbering eleven books. The first division embraced the
+history of Sicily from the earliest times down to the capture of
+Agrigentum (seven books), and the remaining four books dealt with the
+life of Dionysius the elder. He afterwards added a supplement in two
+books, giving an account of the younger Dionysius, which he did not,
+however, complete. He is described as an imitator, though at a great
+distance, of Thucydides, and hence was known as “the little Thucydides.”
+As an historian he is deficient in conscientiousness and candour; he
+appears as a partisan of Dionysius, and seeks to throw a veil over his
+discreditable actions. Still he belongs to the most important of the
+Greek historians (Lübker).
+
+THEODORUS of Gadara, a rhetorician in the first century after Christ;
+tutor of Tiberius, first in Rome, afterwards in Rhodes, from which
+town he called himself a Rhodian, and where Tiberius during his exile
+diligently attended his instruction. He was the author of various
+grammatical and other works, but his fame chiefly rested on his
+abilities as a teacher, in which capacity he seems to have had great
+influence (Pauly). He was the author of that famous description of
+Tiberius which is given by Suetonius (_Tib._ 57), πηλὸς αἵματι
+πεφυραμένος, “A clod kneaded together with blood.”[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: A remarkable parallel, if not actually an imitation,
+    occurs in Goethe’s _Faust_, “Du Spottgeburt von Dreck und Feuer.”]
+
+THEOPOMPUS, a native of Chios; born 380 B.C. He came to Athens while
+still a boy, and studied eloquence under Isokrates, who is said, in
+comparing him with another pupil, Ephorus, to have made use of the image
+which we find in Longinus, c. ii. “Theopompus,” he said, “needs the
+curb, Ephorus the spur” (Suidas, quoted by Jahn ad v.) He appeared
+with applause in various great cities as an advocate, but especially
+distinguished himself in the contest of eloquence instituted by
+Artemisia at the obsequies of her husband Mausolus, where he won the
+prize. He afterwards devoted himself to historical composition. His
+great work was a history of Greece, in which he takes up the thread of
+Thucydides’s narrative, and carries it on uninterruptedly in twelve
+books down to the battle of Knidus, seventeen years later. Here he broke
+off, and began a new work entitled _The Philippics_, in fifty-eight
+books. This work dealt with the history of Greece in the Macedonian
+period, but was padded out to a preposterous bulk by all kinds of
+digressions on mythological, historical, or social topics. Only a few
+fragments remain. He earned an ill name among ancient critics by the
+bitterness of his censures, his love of the marvellous, and the
+inordinate length of his digressions. His style is by some critics
+censured as feeble, and extolled by others as clear, nervous, and
+elevated (Lübker and Pauly).
+
+TIMAEUS, a native of Tauromenium in Sicily; born about 352 B.C. Being
+driven out of Sicily by Agathokles, he lived a retired life for fifty
+years in Athens, where he composed his History. Subsequently he returned
+to Sicily, and died at the age of ninety-six in 256 B.C. His chief work
+was a _History of Sicily_ from the earliest times down to the 129th
+Olympiad. It numbered sixty-eight books, and consisted of two principal
+divisions, whose limits cannot now be ascertained. In a separate work
+he handled the campaigns of Pyrrhus, and also wrote _Olympionikae_,
+probably dealing with chronological matters. Timaeus has been severely
+criticised and harshly condemned by the ancients, especially by
+Polybius, who denies him every faculty required by the historical writer
+(xii. 3-15, 23-28). And though Cicero differs from this judgment, yet it
+may be regarded as certain that Timaeus was better qualified for the
+task of learned compilation than for historical research, and held no
+distinguished place among the historians of Greece. His works have
+perished, only a few fragments remaining (Lübker).
+
+ZOILUS, a Greek rhetorician, native of Amphipolis in Macedonia, in the
+time probably of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247 B.C.), who is said by
+Vitruvius to have crucified him for his abuse of Homer. He won the name
+of Homeromastix, “the scourge of Homer,” and was also known as κύων
+ῥητορικός, “the dog of rhetoric,” on account of his biting sarcasm;
+and his name (as in the case of the English Dennis) came to be used to
+signify in general a carping and malicious critic. Suidas mentions two
+works of his, written with the object of injuring or destroying the fame
+of Homer--(1) _Nine Books against Homer_; and (2) _Censures on Homer_
+(Pauly).
+
+  [The facts contained in the above short notices are taken chiefly
+  from Lübker’s _Reallexikon des classischen Alterthums_, and the
+  very copious and elaborate _Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
+  Alterthumswissenschaft_, edited by Pauly. I have here to acknowledge
+  the kindness of Dr. Wollseiffen, Gymnasialdirektor in Crefeld, in
+  placing at my disposal the library of the Crefeld Gymnasium, but for
+  which these biographical notes, which were put together at the
+  suggestion of Mr. Lang, could not have been compiled.
+    CREFELD, _31st July 1890_.]
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_
+
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+
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+CLASSICAL LIBRARY.
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+Texts, Edited with Introductions and Notes, for the use of Advanced
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+Errata Noted by Transcriber:
+
+Elementary errors such as καί for καὶ are not noted. The spellings
+The spellings “Heracles” and “Herakles” each occur twice.
+
+certain tasteless conceits blamed in Plato
+  _so in original: “on Plato”?_
+
+I.2 And since...
+  _text shows chapter break in previous line, “writer’s ... instead”_
+
+... the very maidens in their eyes.”[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
+... χώρις ἑκάστῳ τῶν εἰδῶν
+  _text reads_ ἑκάσιῳ  [_alternate citation form: 1449b_]
+
+XXIII.4 And in those words ...
+  _text shows chapter break in following line, “already ... to the”_
+
+... a good and temperate drink.”[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
+XXXIX.3 though these are mere shadows...
+  _chapter break conjectural: no sentence-ends in English text_
+
+APPENDIX
+  _any punctuation anomalies, including missing full stops after
+  sentence-final parentheses, are as in the original_
+
+to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+the capture of Agrigentum (seven books)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
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diff --git a/17957-0.zip b/17957-0.zip
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: On the Sublime
+
+Author: Longinus
+
+Commentator: Andrew Lang
+
+Translator: H. L. Havell
+
+Release Date: March 10, 2006 [EBook #17957]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE SUBLIME ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Louise Hope, Justin Kerk and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+The printed text shows most sections (Roman numerals) as a continuous
+block, with chapter numbers in the margin. In this e-text, chapters
+are given as separate paragraphs determined by sentence breaks, with
+continuing quotation marks supplied where necessary.
+Except for footnotes, any brackets are from the original text.
+Greek has been transliterated and shown between +marks+.]
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+                      LONGINUS
+
+                  ON THE SUBLIME
+
+             Translated into English by
+
+                 H. L. HAVELL, B.A.
+   Formerly Scholar of University College, Oxford
+
+              with an Introduction by
+                    ANDREW LANG
+
+
+                       London
+                 MACMILLAN AND CO.
+                    and New York
+                        1890
+
+               _All rights reserved_
+
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+                         TO
+
+             S. H. BUTCHER, Esq., LL.D.
+
+ Professor of Greek in the University of Edinburgh
+   Formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
+         and of University College, Oxford
+
+                    This Attempt
+     to Present the Great Thoughts of Longinus
+                 in an English Form
+
+                    Is Dedicated
+
+       in Acknowledgment of the Kind Support
+  but for Which It Might Never Have Seen the Light
+            and of the Benefits of That
+        Instruction to Which It Largely Owes
+    Whatever of Scholarly Quality It May Possess
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE
+
+
+The text which has been followed in the present Translation is that
+of Jahn (Bonn, 1867), revised by Vahlen, and republished in 1884. In
+several instances it has been found necessary to diverge from Vahlen's
+readings, such divergencies being duly pointed out in the Notes.
+
+One word as to the aim and scope of the present Translation. My object
+throughout has been to make Longinus speak in English, to preserve, as
+far as lay in my power, the noble fire and lofty tone of the original.
+How to effect this, without being betrayed into a loose paraphrase, was
+an exceedingly difficult problem. The style of Longinus is in a high
+degree original, occasionally running into strange eccentricities of
+language; and no one who has not made the attempt can realise the
+difficulty of giving anything like an adequate version of the more
+elaborate passages. These considerations I submit to those to whom I
+may seem at first sight to have handled my text too freely.
+
+My best thanks are due to Dr. Butcher, Professor of Greek in the
+University of Edinburgh, who from first to last has shown a lively
+interest in the present undertaking which I can never sufficiently
+acknowledge. He has read the Translation throughout, and acting on his
+suggestions I have been able in numerous instances to bring my version
+into a closer conformity with the original.
+
+I have also to acknowledge the kindness of the distinguished writer who
+has contributed the Introduction, and who, in spite of the heavy demands
+on his time, has lent his powerful support to help on the work of one
+who was personally unknown to him.
+
+In conclusion, I may be allowed to express a hope that the present
+attempt may contribute something to reawaken an interest in an unjustly
+neglected classic.
+
+
+
+
+ANALYSIS
+
+
+The Treatise on the Sublime may be divided into six Parts, as follows:--
+
+I.--cc. i, ii. The Work of Caecilius. Definition of the Sublime.
+  Whether Sublimity falls within the rules of Art.
+
+II.--cc. iii-v. [The beginning lost.] Vices of Style opposed to the
+  Sublime: Affectation, Bombast, False Sentiment, Frigid Conceits.
+  The cause of such defects.
+
+III.--cc. vi, vii. The true Sublime, what it is, and how
+  distinguishable.
+
+IV.--cc. viii-xl. Five Sources of the Sublime (how Sublimity is related
+  to Passion, c. viii, �� 2-4).
+
+  (i.) Grandeur of Thought, cc. ix-xv.
+
+    _a._ As the natural outcome of nobility of soul. Examples (c. ix).
+
+    _b._ Choice of the most striking circumstances. Sappho's Ode (c. x).
+
+    _c._ Amplification. Plato compared with Demosthenes, Demosthenes
+      with Cicero (cc. xi-xiii).
+
+    _d._ Imitation (cc. xiii, xiv).
+
+    _e._ Imagery (c. xv).
+
+  (ii.) Power of moving the Passions (omitted here, because dealt with
+    in a separate work).
+
+  (iii.) Figures of Speech (cc. xvi-xxix).
+
+    _a._ The Figure of Adjuration (c. xvi). The Art to conceal Art
+      (c. xvii).
+
+    _b._ Rhetorical Question (c. xviii).
+
+    _c._ Asyndeton (c. xix-xxi).
+
+    _d._ Hyperbaton (c. xxii).
+
+    _e._ Changes of Number, Person, Tense, etc. (cc. xxiii-xxvii).
+
+    _f._ Periphrasis (cc. xxviii, xxix).
+
+  (iv.) Graceful Expression (cc. xxx-xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+    _a._ Choice of Words (c. xxx).
+
+    _b._ Ornaments of Style (cc. xxxi, xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+      (+a+) On the use of Familiar Words (c. xxxi).
+
+      (+b+) Metaphors; accumulated; extract from the
+        _Timaeus_; abuse of Metaphors; certain tasteless conceits blamed
+        in Plato (c. xxxii).
+        [Hence arises a digression (cc. xxxiii-xxxvi) on the spirit
+        in which we should judge of the faults of great authors.
+        Demosthenes compared with Hyperides, Lysias with Plato.
+        Sublimity, however far from faultless, to be always preferred
+        to a tame correctness.]
+
+      (+g+) Comparisons and Similes [lost] (c. xxxvii).
+
+      (+d+) Hyperbole (c. xxxviii).
+
+  (v.) Dignity and Elevation of Structure (cc. xxxix, xl).
+
+    _a._ Modulation of Syllables (c. xxxix).
+
+    _b._ Composition (c. xl).
+
+V.--cc. xli-xliii. Vices of Style destructive to Sublimity.
+
+  (i.) Abuse of Rhythm           }
+
+  (ii.) Broken and Jerky Clauses } (cc. xli, xlii).
+
+  (iii.) Undue Prolixity         }
+
+  (iv.) Improper Use of Familiar Words. Anti-climax. Example from
+    Theopompus (c. xliii).
+
+VI.--Why this age is so barren of great authors--whether the cause is
+to be sought in a despotic form of government, or, as Longinus rather
+thinks, in the prevailing corruption of manners, and in the sordid and
+paltry views of life which almost universally prevail (c. xliv).
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+Boileau, in his introduction to his version of the ancient Treatise on
+the Sublime, says that he is making no valueless present to his age. Not
+valueless, to a generation which talks much about style and method in
+literature, should be this new rendering of the noble fragment, long
+attributed to Longinus, the Greek tutor and political adviser of
+Zenobia. There is, indeed, a modern English version by Spurden,[1] but
+that is now rare, and seldom comes into the market. Rare, too, is
+Vaucher's critical essay (1854), which is unlucky, as the French and
+English books both contain valuable disquisitions on the age of the
+author of the Treatise. This excellent work has had curious fortunes. It
+is never quoted nor referred to by any extant classical writer, and,
+among the many books attributed by Suidas to Longinus, it is not
+mentioned. Decidedly the old world has left no more noble relic of
+criticism. Yet the date of the book is obscure, and it did not come into
+the hands of the learned in modern Europe till Robertelli and Manutius
+each published editions in 1544. From that time the Treatise has often
+been printed, edited, translated; but opinion still floats undecided
+about its origin and period. Does it belong to the age of Augustus, or
+to the age of Aurelian? Is the author the historical Longinus--the
+friend of Plotinus, the tutor of Porphyry, the victim of Aurelian,--or
+have we here a work by an unknown hand more than two centuries earlier?
+Manuscripts and traditions are here of little service. The oldest
+manuscript, that of Paris, is regarded as the parent of the rest. It is
+a small quarto of 414 pages, whereof 335 are occupied by the "Problems"
+of Aristotle. Several leaves have been lost, hence the fragmentary
+character of the essay. The Paris MS. has an index, first mentioning the
+"Problems," and then +DIONUSIOU � LONGINOU PERI UPSOUS+, that is, "The
+work of Dionysius, or of Longinus, about the Sublime."
+
+    [Footnote 1: Longmans, London, 1836.]
+
+On this showing the transcriber of the MS. considered its authorship
+dubious. Supposing that the author was Dionysius, which of the many
+writers of that name was he? Again, if he was Longinus, how far does his
+work tally with the characteristics ascribed to that late critic, and
+peculiar to his age?
+
+About this Longinus, while much is written, little is certainly known.
+Was he a descendant of a freedman of one of the Cassii Longini, or of an
+eastern family with a mixture of Greek and Roman blood? The author of
+the Treatise avows himself a Greek, and apologises, as a Greek, for
+attempting an estimate of Cicero. Longinus himself was the nephew and
+heir of Fronto, a Syrian rhetorician of Emesa. Whether Longinus was born
+there or not, and when he was born, are things uncertain. Porphyry, born
+in 233 A.D., was his pupil: granting that Longinus was twenty years
+Porphyry's senior, he must have come into the world about 213 A.D. He
+travelled much, studied in many cities, and was the friend of the mystic
+Neoplatonists, Plotinus and Ammonius. The former called him "a
+philologist, not a philosopher." Porphyry shows us Longinus at a supper
+where the plagiarisms of Greek writers are discussed--a topic dear to
+trivial or spiteful mediocrity. He is best known by his death. As the
+Greek secretary of Zenobia he inspired a haughty answer from the queen
+to Aurelian, who therefore put him to death. Many rhetorical and
+philosophic treatises are ascribed to him, whereof only fragments
+survive. Did he write the Treatise on the Sublime? Modern students
+prefer to believe that the famous essay is, if not by Plutarch, as some
+hold, at least by some author of his age, the age of the early Caesars.
+
+The arguments for depriving Longinus, Zenobia's tutor, of the credit of
+the Treatise lie on the surface, and may be briefly stated. He addresses
+his work as a letter to a friend, probably a Roman pupil, Terentianus,
+with whom he has been reading a work on the Sublime by Caecilius. Now
+Caecilius, a voluminous critic, certainly lived not later than Plutarch,
+who speaks of him with a sneer. It is unlikely then that an author, two
+centuries later, would make the old book of Caecilius the starting-point
+of his own. He would probably have selected some recent or even
+contemporary rhetorician. Once more, the writer of the Treatise of the
+Sublime quotes no authors later than the Augustan period. Had he lived
+as late as the historical Longinus he would surely have sought examples
+of bad style, if not of good, from the works of the Silver Age. Perhaps
+he would hardly have resisted the malicious pleasure of censuring the
+failures among whom he lived. On the other hand, if he cites no late
+author, no classical author cites him, in spite of the excellence of his
+book. But we can hardly draw the inference that he was of late date from
+this purely negative evidence.
+
+Again, he describes, in a very interesting and earnest manner, the
+characteristics of his own period (Translation, pp. 82-86). Why, he is
+asked, has genius become so rare? There are many clever men, but scarce
+any highly exalted and wide-reaching genius. Has eloquence died with
+liberty? "We have learned the lesson of a benignant despotism, and have
+never tasted freedom." The author answers that it is easy and
+characteristic of men to blame the present times. Genius may have been
+corrupted, not by a world-wide peace, but by love of gain and pleasure,
+passions so strong that "I fear, for such men as we are it is better to
+serve than to be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether
+against our neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and
+bring a deluge of calamity on the whole civilised world." Melancholy
+words, and appropriate to our own age, when cleverness is almost
+universal, and genius rare indeed, and the choice between liberty and
+servitude hard to make, were the choice within our power.
+
+But these words assuredly apply closely to the peaceful period of
+Augustus, when Virgil and Horace "praising their tyrant sang," not to
+the confused age of the historical Longinus. Much has been said of the
+allusion to "the Lawgiver of the Jews" as "no ordinary person," but that
+remark might have been made by a heathen acquainted with the Septuagint,
+at either of the disputed dates. On the other hand, our author (Section
+XIII) quotes the critical ideas of "Ammonius and his school," as to the
+debt of Plato to Homer. Now the historical Longinus was a friend of the
+Neoplatonist teacher (not writer), Ammonius Saccas. If we could be sure
+that the Ammonius of the Treatise was this Ammonius, the question would
+be settled in favour of the late date. Our author would be that Longinus
+who inspired Zenobia to resist Aurelian, and who perished under his
+revenge. But Ammonius is not a very uncommon name, and we have no reason
+to suppose that the Neoplatonist Ammonius busied himself with the
+literary criticism of Homer and Plato. There was, among others, an
+Egyptian Ammonius, the tutor of Plutarch.
+
+These are the mass of the arguments on both sides. M. Egger sums them up
+thus: "After carefully examining the tradition of the MSS., and the one
+very late testimony in favour of Longinus, I hesitated for long as to
+the date of this precious work. In 1854 M. Vaucher[2] inclined me to
+believe that Plutarch was the author.[3] All seems to concur towards the
+opinion that, if not Plutarch, at least one of his contemporaries wrote
+the most original Greek essay in its kind since the _Rhetoric_ and
+_Poetic_ of Aristotle."[4]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Etude Critique sur la trait� du Sublime et les ecrits
+    de Longin._ Geneva.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: See also M. Naudet, _Journal des Savants_, Mars 1838,
+    and M. Egger, in the same Journal, May 1884.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Egger, _Histoire de la Critique chez les Grecs_,
+    p. 426. Paris, 1887.]
+
+We may, on the whole, agree that the nobility of the author's thought,
+his habit of quoting nothing more recent than the Augustan age, and his
+description of his own time, which seems so pertinent to that epoch,
+mark him as its child rather than as a great critic lost among the
+_somnia Pythagorea_ of the Neoplatonists. On the other hand, if the
+author be a man of high heart and courage, as he seems, so was that
+martyr of independence, Longinus. Not without scruple, then, can we
+deprive Zenobia's tutor of the glory attached so long to his name.
+
+Whatever its date, and whoever its author may be, the Treatise is
+fragmentary. The lost parts may very probably contain the secret of its
+period and authorship. The writer, at the request of his friend,
+Terentianus, and dissatisfied with the essay of Caecilius, sets about
+examining the nature of the Sublime in poetry and oratory. To the latter
+he assigns, as is natural, much more literary importance than we do, in
+an age when there is so little oratory of literary merit, and so much
+popular rant. The subject of sublimity must naturally have attracted a
+writer whose own moral nature was pure and lofty, who was inclined to
+discover in moral qualities the true foundation of the highest literary
+merit. Even in his opening words he strikes the keynote of his own
+disposition, where he approves the saying that "the points in which we
+resemble the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth." Earlier
+or later born, he must have lived in the midst of literary activity,
+curious, eager, occupied with petty questions and petty quarrels,
+concerned, as men in the best times are not very greatly concerned, with
+questions of technique and detail. Cut off from politics, people found
+in composition a field for their activity. We can readily fancy what
+literature becomes when not only its born children, but the minor
+busybodies whose natural place is politics, excluded from these, pour
+into the study of letters. Love of notoriety, vague activity, fantastic
+indolence, we may be sure, were working their will in the sacred close
+of the Muses. There were literary sets, jealousies, recitations of new
+poems; there was a world of amateurs, if there were no papers and
+paragraphs. To this world the author speaks like a voice from the older
+and graver age of Greece. If he lived late, we can imagine that he did
+not quote contemporaries, not because he did not know them, but because
+he estimated them correctly. He may have suffered, as we suffer, from
+critics who, of all the world's literature, know only "the last thing
+out," and who take that as a standard for the past, to them unfamiliar,
+and for the hidden future. As we are told that excellence is not of the
+great past, but of the present, not in the classical masters, but in
+modern Muscovites, Portuguese, or American young women, so the author of
+the Treatise may have been troubled by Asiatic eloquence, now long
+forgotten, by names of which not a shadow survives. He, on the other
+hand, has a right to be heard because he has practised a long
+familiarity with what is old and good. His mind has ever been in contact
+with masterpieces, as the mind of a critic should be, as the mind of a
+reviewer seldom is, for the reviewer has to hurry up and down inspecting
+new literary adventurers. Not among their experiments will he find a
+touchstone of excellence, a test of greatness, and that test will seldom
+be applied to contemporary performances. What is the test, after all, of
+the Sublime, by which our author means the truly great, the best and
+most passionate thoughts, nature's high and rare inspirations, expressed
+in the best chosen words? He replies that "a just judgment of style is
+the final fruit of long experience." "Much has he travelled in the
+realms of gold."
+
+The word "style" has become a weariness to think upon; so much is said,
+so much is printed about the art of expression, about methods, tricks,
+and turns; so many people, without any long experience, set up to be
+judges of style, on the strength of having admired two or three modern
+and often rather fantastic writers. About our author, however, we know
+that his experience has been long, and of the best, that he does not
+speak from a hasty acquaintance with a few contemporary _pr�cieux_ and
+_pr�cieuses_. The bad writing of his time he traces, as much of our own
+may be traced, to "the pursuit of novelty in thought," or rather in
+expression. "It is this that has turned the brain of nearly all our
+learned world to-day." "Gardons nous d'�crire trop bien," he might have
+said, "c'est la pire mani�re qu'il y'ait d'�crire."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: M. Anatole France.]
+
+The Sublime, with which he concerns himself, is "a certain loftiness and
+excellence of language," which "takes the reader out of himself.... The
+Sublime, acting with an imperious and irresistible force, sways every
+reader whether he will or no." In its own sphere the Sublime does what
+"natural magic" does in the poetical rendering of nature, and perhaps in
+the same scarcely-to-be-analysed fashion. Whether this art can be taught
+or not is a question which the author treats with modesty. Then, as now,
+people were denying (and not unjustly) that this art can be taught by
+rule. The author does not go so far as to say that Criticism, "unlike
+Justice, does little evil, and little good; that is, _if_ to entertain
+for a moment delicate and curious minds is to do little good." He does
+not rate his business so low as that. He admits that the inspiration
+comes from genius, from nature. But "an author can only learn from art
+when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius." Nature
+must "burst out with a kind of fine madness and divine inspiration." The
+madness must be _fine_. How can art aid it to this end? By knowledge of,
+by sympathy and emulation with, "the great poets and prose writers of
+the past." By these we may be inspired, as the Pythoness by Apollo. From
+the genius of the past "an effluence breathes upon us." The writer is
+not to imitate, but to keep before him the perfection of what has been
+done by the greatest poets. He is to look on them as beacons; he is to
+keep them as exemplars or ideals. He is to place them as judges of his
+work. "How would Homer, how would Demosthenes, have been affected by
+what I have written?" This is practical counsel, and even the most
+florid modern author, after polishing a paragraph, may tear it up when
+he has asked himself, "What would Addison have said about this eloquence
+of mine, or Sainte Beuve, or Mr. Matthew Arnold?" In this way what we
+call inspiration, that is the performance of the heated mind, perhaps
+working at its best, perhaps overstraining itself, and overstating its
+idea, might really be regulated. But they are few who consider so
+closely, fewer perhaps they who have the heart to cut out their own fine
+or refined things. Again, our author suggests another criterion. We are,
+as in Lamb's phrase, "to write for antiquity," with the souls of poets
+dead and gone for our judges. But we are also to write for the future,
+asking with what feelings posterity will read us--if it reads us at all.
+This is a good discipline. We know by practice what will hit some
+contemporary tastes; we know the measure of smartness, say, or the
+delicate flippancy, or the sentence with "a dying fall." But one should
+also know that these are fancies of the hour--these and the touch of
+archaism, and the spinster-like and artificial precision, which seem to
+be points in some styles of the moment. Such reflections as our author
+bids us make, with a little self-respect added, may render our work less
+popular and effective, and certainly are not likely to carry it down to
+remote posterity. But all such reflections, and action in accordance
+with what they teach, are elements of literary self-respect. It is hard
+to be conscientious, especially hard for him who writes much, and of
+necessity, and for bread. But conscience is never to be obeyed with
+ease, though the ease grows with the obedience. The book attributed to
+Longinus will not have missed its mark if it reminds us that, in
+literature at least, for conscience there is yet a place, possibly even
+a reward, though that is unessential. By virtue of reasonings like
+these, and by insisting that nobility of style is, as it were, the bloom
+on nobility of soul, the Treatise on the Sublime becomes a tonic work,
+wholesome to be read by young authors and old. "It is natural in us to
+feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and, conceiving a sort of
+generous exultation, to be filled with joy and pride, as though we had
+ourselves originated the ideas which we read." Here speaks his natural
+disinterested greatness the author himself is here sublime, and teaches
+by example as well as precept, for few things are purer than a pure and
+ardent admiration. The critic is even confident enough to expect to find
+his own nobility in others, believing that what is truly Sublime "will
+always please, and please all readers." And in this universal acceptance
+by the populace and the literate, by critics and creators, by young and
+old, he finds the true external canon of sublimity. The verdict lies not
+with contemporaries, but with the large public, not with the little set
+of dilettanti, but must be spoken by all. Such verdicts assign the crown
+to Shakespeare and Moli�re, to Homer and Cervantes; we should not
+clamorously anticipate this favourable judgment for Bryant or Emerson,
+nor for the greatest of our own contemporaries. Boileau so much
+misconceived these lofty ideas that he regarded "Longinus's" judgment as
+solely that "of good sense," and held that, in his time, "nothing was
+good or bad till he had spoken." But there is far more than good sense,
+there is high poetic imagination and moral greatness, in the criticism
+of our author, who certainly would have rejected Boileau's compliment
+when he selects Longinus as a literary dictator.
+
+Indeed we almost grudge our author's choice of a subject. He who wrote
+that "it was not in nature's plan for us, her children, to be base and
+ignoble; no, she brought us into life as into some great field of
+contest," should have had another field of contest than literary
+criticism. It is almost a pity that we have to doubt the tradition,
+according to which our author was Longinus, and, being but a
+rhetorician, greatly dared and bravely died. Taking literature for his
+theme, he wanders away into grammar, into considerations of tropes and
+figures, plurals and singulars, trumpery mechanical pedantries, as we
+think now, to whom grammar is no longer, as of old, "a new invented
+game." Moreover, he has to give examples of the faults opposed to
+sublimity, he has to dive into and search the bathos, to dally over
+examples of the bombastic, the over-wrought, the puerile. These faults
+are not the sins of "minds generous and aspiring," and we have them with
+us always. The additions to Boileau's preface (Paris, 1772) contain
+abundance of examples of faults from Voiture, Mascaron, Bossuet,
+selected by M. de St. Marc, who no doubt found abundance of
+entertainment in the chastising of these obvious affectations. It hardly
+seems the proper work for an author like him who wrote the Treatise on
+the Sublime. But it is tempting, even now, to give contemporary
+instances of skill in the Art of Sinking--modern cases of bombast,
+triviality, false rhetoric. "Speaking generally, it would seem that
+bombast is one of the hardest things to avoid in writing," says an
+author who himself avoids it so well. Bombast is the voice of sham
+passion, the shadow of an insincere attitude. "Even the wretched phantom
+who still bore the imperial title stooped to pay this ignominious
+blackmail," cries bombast in Macaulay's _Lord Clive_. The picture of a
+phantom who is not only a phantom but wretched, stooping to pay
+blackmail which is not only blackmail but ignominious, may divert the
+reader and remind him that the faults of the past are the faults of the
+present. Again, "The desolate islands along the sea-coast, overgrown by
+noxious vegetation, and swarming with deer and tigers"--do, what does
+any one suppose, perform what forlorn part in the economy of the world?
+Why, they "supply the cultivated districts with abundance of salt." It
+is as comic as--
+
+  "And thou Dalhousie, thou great God of War,
+  Lieutenant-Colonel to the Earl of Mar."
+
+Bombast "transcends the Sublime," and falls on the other side. Our
+author gives more examples of puerility. "Slips of this sort are made by
+those who, aiming at brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness,
+are landed in paltriness and silly affectation." Some modern instances
+we had chosen; the field of choice is large and richly fertile in those
+blossoms. But the reader may be left to twine a garland of them for
+himself; to select from contemporaries were invidious, and might provoke
+retaliation. When our author censures Timaeus for saying that Alexander
+took less time to annex Asia than Isocrates spent in writing an oration,
+to bid the Greeks attack Persia, we know what he would have thought of
+Macaulay's antithesis. He blames Xenophon for a poor pun, and Plato,
+less justly, for mere figurative badinage. It would be an easy task to
+ransack contemporaries, even great contemporaries, for similar failings,
+for pomposity, for the florid, for sentences like processions of
+intoxicated torch-bearers, for pedantic display of cheap erudition, for
+misplaced flippancy, for nice derangement of epitaphs wherein no
+adjective is used which is appropriate. With a library of cultivated
+American novelists and uncultivated English romancers at hand, with our
+own voluminous essays, and the essays and histories and "art criticisms"
+of our neighbours to draw from, no student need lack examples of what is
+wrong. He who writes, reflecting on his own innumerable sins, can but
+beat his breast, cry _Mea Culpa_, and resist the temptation to beat the
+breasts of his coevals. There are not many authors, there have never
+been many, who did not need to turn over the treatise of the Sublime by
+day and night.[6]
+
+    [Footnote 6: The examples of bombast used to be drawn as late as
+    Spurden's translation (1836), from Lee, from _Troilus and Cressida_,
+    and _The Taming of the Shrew_. Cowley and Crashaw furnished
+    instances of conceits; Waller, Young, and Hayley of frigidity;
+    and Darwin of affectation.
+        "What beaux and beauties crowd the gaudy groves,
+        And woo and win their _vegetable loves_"--
+    a phrase adopted--"vapid vegetable loves"--by the Laureate in
+    "The Talking Oak."]
+
+As a literary critic of Homer our author is most interesting even in his
+errors. He compares the poet of the _Odyssey_ to the sunset: the _Iliad_
+is noonday work, the _Odyssey_ is touched with the glow of evening--the
+softness and the shadows. "Old age naturally leans," like childhood,
+"towards the fabulous." The tide has flowed back, and left dim bulks of
+things on the long shadowy sands. Yet he makes an exception, oddly
+enough, in favour of the story of the Cyclops, which really is the most
+fabulous and crude of the fairy tales in the first and greatest of
+romances. The Slaying of the Wooers, that admirable fight, worthy of a
+saga, he thinks too improbable, and one of the "trifles into which
+second childhood is apt to be betrayed." He fancies that the aged Homer
+had "lost his power of depicting the passions"; in fact, he is hardly a
+competent or sympathetic critic of the _Odyssey_. Perhaps he had lived
+among Romans till he lost his sense of humour; perhaps he never had any
+to lose. On the other hand, he preserved for us that inestimable and not
+to be translated fragment of Sappho--+phainetai moi k�nos isos
+theoisin+.
+
+It is curious to find him contrasting Apollonius Rhodius as faultless,
+with Homer as great but faulty. The "faultlessness" of Apollonius is
+not his merit, for he is often tedious, and he has little skill in
+selection; moreover, he is deliberately antiquarian, if not pedantic.
+His true merit is in his original and, as we think, modern telling of a
+love tale--pure, passionate, and tender, the first in known literature.
+Medea is often sublime, and always touching. But it is not on these
+merits that our author lingers; he loves only the highest literature,
+and, though he finds spots on the sun and faults in Homer, he condones
+them as oversights passed in the poet's "contempt of little things."
+
+Such for us to-day are the lessons of Longinus. He traces dignity and
+fire of style to dignity and fire of soul. He detects and denounces the
+very faults of which, in each other, all writers are conscious, and
+which he brings home to ourselves. He proclaims the essential merits of
+conviction, and of selection. He sets before us the noblest examples of
+the past, most welcome in a straining age which tries already to live in
+the future. He admonishes and he inspires. He knows the "marvellous
+power and enthralling charm of appropriate and striking words" without
+dropping into mere word-tasting. "Beautiful words are the very light of
+thought," he says, but does not maunder about the "colour" of words, in
+the style of the decadence. And then he "leaves this generation to its
+fate," and calmly turns himself to the work that lies nearest his hand.
+
+To us he is as much a moral as a literary teacher. We admire that Roman
+greatness of soul in a Greek, and the character of this unknown man, who
+carried the soul of a poet, the heart of a hero under the gown of a
+professor. He was one of those whom books cannot debilitate, nor a life
+of study incapacitate for the study of life.
+
+  A. L.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+1
+The treatise of Caecilius on the Sublime, when, as you remember, my dear
+Terentian, we examined it together, seemed to us to be beneath the
+dignity of the whole subject, to fail entirely in seizing the salient
+points, and to offer little profit (which should be the principal aim of
+every writer) for the trouble of its perusal. There are two things
+essential to a technical treatise: the first is to define the subject;
+the second (I mean second in order, as it is by much the first in
+importance) to point out how and by what methods we may become masters
+of it ourselves. And yet Caecilius, while wasting his efforts in a
+thousand illustrations of the nature of the Sublime, as though here we
+were quite in the dark, somehow passes by as immaterial the question how
+we might be able to exalt our own genius to a certain degree of progress
+in sublimity. However, perhaps it would be fairer to commend this
+writer's intelligence and zeal in themselves, instead of blaming him for
+his omissions.
+
+2
+And since you have bidden me also to put together, if only for your
+entertainment, a few notes on the subject of the Sublime, let me see if
+there is anything in my speculations which promises advantage to men of
+affairs. In you, dear friend--such is my confidence in your abilities,
+and such the part which becomes you--I look for a sympathising and
+discerning[1] critic of the several parts of my treatise. For that was a
+just remark of his who pronounced that the points in which we resemble
+the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading +philophronestata kai al�thestata+.]
+
+3
+As I am addressing a person so accomplished in literature, I need only
+state, without enlarging further on the matter, that the Sublime,
+wherever it occurs, consists in a certain loftiness and excellence of
+language, and that it is by this, and this only, that the greatest poets
+and prose-writers have gained eminence, and won themselves a lasting
+place in the Temple of Fame.
+
+4
+A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes
+him out of himself. That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment,
+and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or
+not is usually in our own power; but the Sublime, acting with an
+imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or
+no. Skill in invention, lucid arrangement and disposition of facts, are
+appreciated not by one passage, or by two, but gradually manifest
+themselves in the general structure of a work; but a sublime thought, if
+happily timed, illumines[2] an entire subject with the vividness of a
+lightning-flash, and exhibits the whole power of the orator in a moment
+of time. Your own experience, I am sure, my dearest Terentian, would
+enable you to illustrate these and similar points of doctrine.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Reading +dieph�tisen+.]
+
+
+II
+
+The first question which presents itself for solution is whether there
+is any art which can teach sublimity or loftiness in writing. For some
+hold generally that there is mere delusion in attempting to reduce such
+subjects to technical rules. "The Sublime," they tell us, "is born in a
+man, and not to be acquired by instruction; genius is the only master
+who can teach it. The vigorous products of nature" (such is their view)
+"are weakened and in every respect debased, when robbed of their flesh
+and blood by frigid technicalities."
+
+2
+But I maintain that the truth can be shown to stand otherwise in this
+matter. Let us look at the case in this way; Nature in her loftier and
+more passionate moods, while detesting all appearance of restraint, is
+not wont to show herself utterly wayward and reckless; and though in all
+cases the vital informing principle is derived from her, yet to
+determine the right degree and the right moment, and to contribute the
+precision of practice and experience, is the peculiar province of
+scientific method. The great passions, when left to their own blind and
+rash impulses without the control of reason, are in the same danger as a
+ship let drive at random without ballast. Often they need the spur, but
+sometimes also the curb.
+
+3
+The remark of Demosthenes with regard to human life in general,--that
+the greatest of all blessings is to be fortunate, but next to that and
+equal in importance is to be well advised,--for good fortune is utterly
+ruined by the absence of good counsel,--may be applied to literature, if
+we substitute genius for fortune, and art for counsel. Then, again (and
+this is the most important point of all), a writer can only learn from
+art when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Literally, "But the most important point of all is that
+    the actual fact that there are some parts of literature which are in
+    the power of natural genius alone, must be learnt from no other
+    source than from art."]
+
+These are the considerations which I submit to the unfavourable critic
+of such useful studies. Perhaps they may induce him to alter his opinion
+as to the vanity and idleness of our present investigations.
+
+
+III
+
+  ... "And let them check the stove's long tongues of fire:
+  For if I see one tenant of the hearth,
+  I'll thrust within one curling torrent flame,
+  And bring that roof in ashes to the ground:
+  But now not yet is sung my noble lay."[1]
+
+Such phrases cease to be tragic, and become burlesque,--I mean phrases
+like "curling torrent flames" and "vomiting to heaven," and representing
+Boreas as a piper, and so on. Such expressions, and such images, produce
+an effect of confusion and obscurity, not of energy; and if each
+separately be examined under the light of criticism, what seemed
+terrible gradually sinks into absurdity. Since then, even in tragedy,
+where the natural dignity of the subject makes a swelling diction
+allowable, we cannot pardon a tasteless grandiloquence, how much more
+incongruous must it seem in sober prose!
+
+    [Footnote 1: Aeschylus in his lost _Oreithyia_.]
+
+2
+Hence we laugh at those fine words of Gorgias of Leontini, such as
+"Xerxes the Persian Zeus" and "vultures, those living tombs," and at
+certain conceits of Callisthenes which are high-flown rather than
+sublime, and at some in Cleitarchus more ludicrous still--a writer whose
+frothy style tempts us to travesty Sophocles and say, "He blows a little
+pipe, and blows it ill." The same faults may be observed in Amphicrates
+and Hegesias and Matris, who in their frequent moments (as they think)
+of inspiration, instead of playing the genius are simply playing the
+fool.
+
+3
+Speaking generally, it would seem that bombast is one of the hardest
+things to avoid in writing. For all those writers who are ambitious of a
+lofty style, through dread of being convicted of feebleness and poverty
+of language, slide by a natural gradation into the opposite extreme.
+"Who fails in great endeavour, nobly fails," is their creed.
+
+4
+Now bulk, when hollow and affected, is always objectionable, whether in
+material bodies or in writings, and in danger of producing on us an
+impression of littleness: "nothing," it is said, "is drier than a man
+with the dropsy."
+
+The characteristic, then, of bombast is that it transcends the Sublime:
+but there is another fault diametrically opposed to grandeur: this is
+called puerility, and it is the failing of feeble and narrow
+minds,--indeed, the most ignoble of all vices in writing. By puerility
+we mean a pedantic habit of mind, which by over-elaboration ends in
+frigidity. Slips of this sort are made by those who, aiming at
+brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness, are landed in
+paltriness and silly affectation.
+
+5
+Closely associated with this is a third sort of vice, in dealing with
+the passions, which Theodorus used to call false sentiment, meaning by
+that an ill-timed and empty display of emotion, where no emotion is
+called for, or of greater emotion than the situation warrants. Thus we
+often see an author hurried by the tumult of his mind into tedious
+displays of mere personal feeling which has no connection with the
+subject. Yet how justly ridiculous must an author appear, whose most
+violent transports leave his readers quite cold! However, I will dismiss
+this subject, as I intend to devote a separate work to the treatment of
+the pathetic in writing.
+
+
+IV
+
+The last of the faults which I mentioned is frequently observed in
+Timaeus--I mean the fault of frigidity. In other respects he is an able
+writer, and sometimes not unsuccessful in the loftier style; a man of
+wide knowledge, and full of ingenuity; a most bitter critic of the
+failings of others--but unhappily blind to his own. In his eagerness to
+be always striking out new thoughts he frequently falls into the most
+childish absurdities.
+
+2
+I will only instance one or two passages, as most of them have been
+pointed out by Caecilius. Wishing to say something very fine about
+Alexander the Great he speaks of him as a man "who annexed the whole of
+Asia in fewer years than Isocrates spent in writing his panegyric
+oration in which he urges the Greeks to make war on Persia." How strange
+is the comparison of the "great Emathian conqueror" with an Athenian
+rhetorician! By this mode of reasoning it is plain that the Spartans
+were very inferior to Isocrates in courage, since it took them thirty
+years to conquer Messene, while he finished the composition of this
+harangue in ten.
+
+3
+Observe, too, his language on the Athenians taken in Sicily. "They paid
+the penalty for their impious outrage on Hermes in mutilating his
+statues; and the chief agent in their destruction was one who was
+descended on his father's side from the injured deity--Hermocrates, son
+of Hermon." I wonder, my dearest Terentian, how he omitted to say of the
+tyrant Dionysius that for his impiety towards Zeus and Herakles he was
+deprived of his power by Dion and Herakleides.
+
+4
+Yet why speak of Timaeus, when even men like Xenophon and Plato--the
+very demi-gods of literature--though they had sat at the feet of
+Socrates, sometimes forgot themselves in the pursuit of such paltry
+conceits. The former, in his account of the Spartan Polity, has these
+words: "Their voice you would no more hear than if they were of marble,
+their gaze is as immovable as if they were cast in bronze; you would
+deem them more modest than the very maidens in their eyes."[1] To speak
+of the pupils of the eye as "modest maidens" was a piece of absurdity
+becoming Amphicrates[2] rather than Xenophon. And then what a strange
+delusion to suppose that modesty is always without exception expressed
+in the eye! whereas it is commonly said that there is nothing by which
+an impudent fellow betrays his character so much as by the expression of
+his eyes. Thus Achilles addresses Agamemnon in the _Iliad_ as "drunkard,
+with eye of dog."[3]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Xen. de Rep. Laced._ 3, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: C. iii. sect. 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ i. 225.]
+
+5
+Timaeus, however, with that want of judgment which characterises
+plagiarists, could not leave to Xenophon the possession of even this
+piece of frigidity. In relating how Agathocles carried off his cousin,
+who was wedded to another man, from the festival of the unveiling, he
+asks, "Who could have done such a deed, unless he had harlots instead of
+maidens in his eyes?"
+
+6
+And Plato himself, elsewhere so supreme a master of style, meaning to
+describe certain recording tablets, says, "They shall write, and deposit
+in the temples memorials of cypress wood";[4] and again, "Then
+concerning walls, Megillus, I give my vote with Sparta that we should
+let them lie asleep within the ground, and not awaken them."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Plat. de Legg._ v. 741, C.]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Ib._ vi. 778, D.]
+
+7
+And Herodotus falls pretty much under the same censure, when he speaks
+of beautiful women as "tortures to the eye,"[6] though here there is
+some excuse, as the speakers in this passage are drunken barbarians.
+Still, even from dramatic motives, such errors in taste should not be
+permitted to deface the pages of an immortal work.
+
+    [Footnote 6: v. 18.]
+
+
+V
+
+Now all these glaring improprieties of language may be traced to one
+common root--the pursuit of novelty in thought. It is this that has
+turned the brain of nearly all the learned world of to-day. Human
+blessings and human ills commonly flow from the same source: and, to
+apply this principle to literature, those ornaments of style, those
+sublime and delightful images, which contribute to success, are the
+foundation and the origin, not only of excellence, but also of failure.
+It is thus with the figures called transitions, and hyperboles, and the
+use of plurals for singulars. I shall show presently the dangers which
+they seem to involve. Our next task, therefore, must be to propose and
+to settle the question how we may avoid the faults of style related to
+sublimity.
+
+
+VI
+
+Our best hope of doing this will be first of all to grasp some definite
+theory and criterion of the true Sublime. Nevertheless this is a hard
+matter; for a just judgment of style is the final fruit of long
+experience; still, I believe that the way I shall indicate will enable
+us to distinguish between the true and false Sublime, so far as it can
+be done by rule.
+
+
+VII
+
+It is proper to observe that in human life nothing is truly great which
+is despised by all elevated minds. For example, no man of sense can
+regard wealth, honour, glory, and power, or any of those things which
+are surrounded by a great external parade of pomp and circumstance, as
+the highest blessings, seeing that merely to despise such things is a
+blessing of no common order: certainly those who possess them are
+admired much less than those who, having the opportunity to acquire
+them, through greatness of soul neglect it. Now let us apply this
+principle to the Sublime in poetry or in prose; let us ask in all cases,
+is it merely a specious sublimity? is this gorgeous exterior a mere
+false and clumsy pageant, which if laid open will be found to conceal
+nothing but emptiness? for if so, a noble mind will scorn instead of
+admiring it.
+
+2
+It is natural to us to feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and
+conceiving a sort of generous exultation to be filled with joy and
+pride, as though we had ourselves originated the ideas which we read.
+
+3
+If then any work, on being repeatedly submitted to the judgment of an
+acute and cultivated critic, fails to dispose his mind to lofty ideas;
+if the thoughts which it suggests do not extend beyond what is actually
+expressed; and if, the longer you read it, the less you think of
+it,--there can be here no true sublimity, when the effect is not
+sustained beyond the mere act of perusal. But when a passage is pregnant
+in suggestion, when it is hard, nay impossible, to distract the
+attention from it, and when it takes a strong and lasting hold on the
+memory, then we may be sure that we have lighted on the true Sublime.
+
+4
+In general we may regard those words as truly noble and sublime which
+always please and please all readers. For when the same book always
+produces the same impression on all who read it, whatever be the
+difference in their pursuits, their manner of life, their aspirations,
+their ages, or their language, such a harmony of opposites gives
+irresistible authority to their favourable verdict.
+
+
+VIII
+
+I shall now proceed to enumerate the five principal sources, as we may
+call them, from which almost all sublimity is derived, assuming, of
+course, the preliminary gift on which all these five sources depend,
+namely, command of language. The first and the most important is (1)
+grandeur of thought, as I have pointed out elsewhere in my work on
+Xenophon. The second is (2) a vigorous and spirited treatment of the
+passions. These two conditions of sublimity depend mainly on natural
+endowments, whereas those which follow derive assistance from Art. The
+third is (3) a certain artifice in the employment of figures, which are
+of two kinds, figures of thought and figures of speech. The fourth is
+(4) dignified expression, which is sub-divided into (_a_) the proper
+choice of words, and (_b_) the use of metaphors and other ornaments of
+diction. The fifth cause of sublimity, which embraces all those
+preceding, is (5) majesty and elevation of structure. Let us consider
+what is involved in each of these five forms separately.
+
+I must first, however, remark that some of these five divisions are
+omitted by Caecilius; for instance, he says nothing about the passions.
+
+2
+Now if he made this omission from a belief that the Sublime and the
+Pathetic are one and the same thing, holding them to be always
+coexistent and interdependent, he is in error. Some passions are found
+which, so far from being lofty, are actually low, such as pity, grief,
+fear; and conversely, sublimity is often not in the least affecting, as
+we may see (among innumerable other instances) in those bold expressions
+of our great poet on the sons of Alo�us--
+
+                    "Highly they raged
+  To pile huge Ossa on the Olympian peak,
+  And Pelion with all his waving trees
+  On Ossa's crest to raise, and climb the sky;"
+
+and the yet more tremendous climax--
+
+  "And now had they accomplished it."
+
+3
+And in orators, in all passages dealing with panegyric, and in all the
+more imposing and declamatory places, dignity and sublimity play an
+indispensable part; but pathos is mostly absent. Hence the most pathetic
+orators have usually but little skill in panegyric, and conversely those
+who are powerful in panegyric generally fail in pathos.
+
+4
+If, on the other hand, Caecilius supposed that pathos never contributes
+to sublimity, and this is why he thought it alien to the subject, he is
+entirely deceived. For I would confidently pronounce that nothing is so
+conducive to sublimity as an appropriate display of genuine passion,
+which bursts out with a kind of "fine madness" and divine inspiration,
+and falls on our ears like the voice of a god.
+
+
+IX
+
+I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime the
+most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind.
+Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired,
+nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up
+our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble
+thoughts.
+
+2
+How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my
+writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul.
+Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is
+sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance,
+the silence of Ajax in the eleventh _Odyssey_[1] is great, and grander
+than anything he could have said.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Od._ xi. 543.]
+
+3
+It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question
+whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true
+eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and
+aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal
+thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the
+lasting reverence of mankind. It is only natural that their words should
+be full of sublimity whose thoughts are full of majesty.
+
+4
+Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was
+the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had
+observed, "Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied"; "And I, were
+I Parmenio"...
+
+The distance between heaven and earth[1]--a measure, one might say, not
+less appropriate to Homer's genius than to the stature of his discord.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ iv. 442.]
+
+5
+How different is that touch of Hesiod's in his description of sorrow--if
+the _Shield_ is really one of his works: "rheum from her nostrils
+flowed"[2]--an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now consider how
+Homer gives dignity to his divine persons--
+
+  "As far as lies his airy ken, who sits
+  On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea:
+  So far extends the heavenly coursers' stride."[3]
+
+He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world--a grand
+comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine
+steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no
+room in the world for another.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Scut. Herc._ 267.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ v. 770.]
+
+6
+Sublime also are the images in the "Battle of the Gods"--
+
+                      "A trumpet sound
+  Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height;
+  Then terror seized the monarch of the dead,
+  And springing from his throne he cried aloud
+  With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder
+  By Neptune's mighty arm, forthwith reveal
+  To mortal and immortal eyes those halls
+  So drear and dank, which e'en the gods abhor."[4]
+
+Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole
+world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is
+a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell,
+mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xxi. 388; xx. 61.]
+
+7
+A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken
+allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of
+decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels,
+revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric
+tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities,
+as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities--or rather,
+his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when we are
+unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods, according to
+him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.
+
+8
+Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are
+those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as
+something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which
+has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on Poseidon:--
+
+  "Mountain and wood and solitary peak,
+  The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy,
+  Trembled beneath the god's immortal feet.
+  Over the waves he rode, and round him played,
+  Lured from the deeps, the ocean's monstrous brood,
+  With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord:
+  The charm�d billows parted: on they flew."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Il._ xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.]
+
+9
+And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed
+an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression
+in the opening words of his "Laws": "God said"--what?--"let there be
+light, and there was light: let there be land, and there was."
+
+10
+I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage
+from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in
+illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic
+heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the
+ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries aloud--
+
+                "Almighty Sire,
+  Only from darkness save Achaia's sons;
+  No more I ask, but give us back the day;
+  Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt."[6]
+
+The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you
+observe, ask for his life--such a request would have been unworthy of
+his heroic soul--but finding himself paralysed by darkness, and
+prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes
+because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. "At
+least," he thinks, "I shall find a warrior's grave, even though Zeus
+himself should fight against me."
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Il._ xvii. 645.]
+
+11
+In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of
+the struggle, and, in his own words, he
+
+      "Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire
+  Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side;
+  His lips drop foam."[7]
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Il._ xv. 605.]
+
+12
+But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer's mind. When
+we turn to the _Odyssey_ we find occasion to observe that a great
+poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age
+naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work
+was composed after the _Iliad_, in proof of which we may mention, among
+many other indications, the introduction in the _Odyssey_ of the sequel
+to the story of his heroes' adventures at Troy, as so many additional
+episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of sorrow and
+mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if in
+fulfilment of some previous design. The _Odyssey_ is, in fact, a sort of
+epilogue to the _Iliad_--
+
+  "There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there,
+  And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor;
+  There lies my own dear son."[8]
+
+    [Footnote 8: _Od._ iii. 109.]
+
+13
+And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the _Iliad_, which was
+written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the
+poem is founded on action and struggle, in the _Odyssey_ he generally
+prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence Homer in
+his _Odyssey_ may be compared to the setting sun: he is still as great
+as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is now pitched to
+a lower key than in the "Tale of Troy divine": we begin to miss that
+high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that continuous
+current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that force of
+eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to Nature. Like
+the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores waste and
+bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and draws us away
+into the dim region of myth and legend.
+
+14
+In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the
+_Odyssey_, the story of the Cyclops,[9] and other striking passages. It
+is Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every
+one of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.
+
+My purpose in making this digression was, as I said, to point out into
+what trifles the second childhood of genius is too apt to be betrayed;
+such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are confined,[10] the
+tale of Odysseus's comrades being changed by Circe into swine[11]
+("whimpering porkers" Zo�lus called them), and how Zeus was fed like
+a nestling by the doves,[12] and how Odysseus passed ten nights on the
+shipwreck without food,[13] and the improbable incidents in the slaying
+of the suitors.[14] When Homer nods like this, we must be content to say
+that he dreams as Zeus might dream.
+
+    [Footnote 9: _Od._ ix. 182.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Od._ x. 17.]
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Od._ x. 237.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: _Od._ xii. 62.]
+
+    [Footnote 13: _Od._ xii. 447.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: _Od._ xxii. _passim_.]
+
+15
+Another reason for these remarks on the _Odyssey_ is that I wished to
+make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they have
+lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the
+delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and
+characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a
+sort of comedy of manners.
+
+
+X
+
+Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces to
+the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things there
+are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It
+necessarily follows, therefore, that one cause of sublimity is the
+choice of the most striking circumstances involved in whatever we are
+describing, and, further, the power of afterwards combining them into
+one animate whole. The reader is attracted partly by the selection of
+the incidents, partly by the skill which has welded them together. For
+instance, Sappho, in dealing with the passionate manifestations
+attending on the frenzy of lovers, always chooses her strokes from the
+signs which she has observed to be actually exhibited in such cases. But
+her peculiar excellence lies in the felicity with which she chooses and
+unites together the most striking and powerful features.
+
+2
+  "I deem that man divinely blest
+  Who sits, and, gazing on thy face,
+  Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips,
+      And marks thy lovely smile.
+  This, this it is that made my heart
+  So wildly flutter in my breast;
+  Whene'er I look on thee, my voice
+      Falters, and faints, and fails;
+  My tongue's benumbed; a subtle fire
+  Through all my body inly steals;
+  Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim;
+      Strange murmurs drown my ears;
+  With dewy damps my limbs are chilled;
+  An icy shiver shakes my frame;
+  Paler than ashes grows my cheek;
+      And Death seems nigh at hand."
+
+3
+Is it not wonderful how at the same moment soul, body, ears, tongue,
+eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to her as completely as if they
+were not her own? Observe too how her sensations contradict one
+another--she freezes, she burns, she raves, she reasons, and all at the
+same instant. And this description is designed to show that she is
+assailed, not by any particular emotion, but by a tumult of different
+emotions. All these tokens belong to the passion of love; but it is in
+the choice, as I said, of the most striking features, and in the
+combination of them into one picture, that the perfection of this Ode of
+Sappho's lies. Similarly Homer in his descriptions of tempests always
+picks out the most terrific circumstances.
+
+4
+The poet of the "Arimaspeia" intended the following lines to be grand--
+
+  "Herein I find a wonder passing strange,
+    That men should make their dwelling on the deep,
+  Who far from land essaying bold to range
+    With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep;
+    Their eyes are fixed on heaven's starry steep;
+  The ravening billows hunger for their lives;
+    And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep,
+  With suppliant hands to move heaven's pity strives,
+  While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives."
+
+All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the
+description. Now let us turn to Homer.
+
+5
+One passage will suffice to show the contrast.
+
+  "On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave,
+  Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds,
+  On a swift ship, and buries her in foam;
+  Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast,
+  And quakes the breathless seamen's shuddering heart
+  In terror dire: death lours on every wave."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 624.]
+
+6
+Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought--
+
+  "But one frail timber shields them from their doom,"[2]--
+
+banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his
+description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying
+"shields them"; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether
+the "timber" be "frail" or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit
+to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on
+the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant
+death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of
+opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the
+scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting
+the anxiety of the sailors' minds, and the diction being stamped, as it
+were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaenomena_, 299.]
+
+7
+Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly
+Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of
+Elatea[3]--"It was evening," etc. Each of these authors fastidiously
+rejects whatever is not essential to the subject, and in putting
+together the most vivid features is careful to guard against the
+interposition of anything frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such
+blemishes mar the general effect, and give a patched and gaping
+appearance to the edifice of sublimity, which ought to be built up in a
+solid and uniform structure.
+
+    [Footnote 3: _De Cor._ 169.]
+
+
+XI
+
+Closely associated with the part of our subject we have just treated of
+is that excellence of writing which is called amplification, when a
+writer or pleader, whose theme admits of many successive starting-points
+and pauses, brings on one impressive point after another in a continuous
+and ascending scale.
+
+2
+Now whether this is employed in the treatment of a commonplace, or in
+the way of exaggeration, whether to place arguments or facts in a strong
+light, or in the disposition of actions, or of passions--for
+amplification takes a hundred different shapes--in all cases the orator
+must be cautioned that none of these methods is complete without the aid
+of sublimity,--unless, indeed, it be our object to excite pity, or to
+depreciate an opponent's argument. In all other uses of amplification,
+if you subtract the element of sublimity you will take as it were the
+soul from the body. No sooner is the support of sublimity removed than
+the whole becomes lifeless, nerveless, and dull.
+
+3
+There is a difference, however, between the rules I am now giving and
+those just mentioned. Then I was speaking of the delineation and
+co-ordination of the principal circumstances. My next task, therefore,
+must be briefly to define this difference, and with it the general
+distinction between amplification and sublimity. Our whole discourse
+will thus gain in clearness.
+
+
+XII
+
+I must first remark that I am not satisfied with the definition of
+amplification generally given by authorities on rhetoric. They explain
+it to be a form of language which invests the subject with a certain
+grandeur. Yes, but this definition may be applied indifferently to
+sublimity, pathos, and the use of figurative language, since all these
+invest the discourse with some sort of grandeur. The difference seems to
+me to lie in this, that sublimity gives elevation to a subject, while
+amplification gives extension as well. Thus the sublime is often
+conveyed in a single thought,[1] but amplification can only subsist with
+a certain prolixity and diffusiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. i. 4. 26.]
+
+2
+The most general definition of amplification would explain it to consist
+in the gathering together of all the constituent parts and topics of a
+subject, emphasising the argument by repeated insistence, herein
+differing from proof, that whereas the object of proof is logical
+demonstration, ...
+
+Plato, like the sea, pours forth his riches in a copious and expansive
+flood.
+
+3
+Hence the style of the orator, who is the greater master of our
+emotions, is often, as it were, red-hot and ablaze with passion, whereas
+Plato, whose strength lay in a sort of weighty and sober magnificence,
+though never frigid, does not rival the thunders of Demosthenes.
+
+4
+And, if a Greek may be allowed to express an opinion on the subject of
+Latin literature, I think the same difference may be discerned in the
+grandeur of Cicero as compared with that of his Grecian rival. The
+sublimity of Demosthenes is generally sudden and abrupt: that of Cicero
+is equally diffused. Demosthenes is vehement, rapid, vigorous, terrible;
+he burns and sweeps away all before him; and hence we may liken him to a
+whirlwind or a thunderbolt: Cicero is like a widespread conflagration,
+which rolls over and feeds on all around it, whose fire is extensive and
+burns long, breaking out successively in different places, and finding
+its fuel now here, now there.
+
+5
+Such points, however, I resign to your more competent judgment.
+
+To resume, then, the high-strung sublimity of Demosthenes is appropriate
+to all cases where it is desired to exaggerate, or to rouse some
+vehement emotion, and generally when we want to carry away our audience
+with us. We must employ the diffusive style, on the other hand, when we
+wish to overpower them with a flood of language. It is suitable, for
+example, to familiar topics, and to perorations in most cases, and to
+digressions, and to all descriptive and declamatory passages, and in
+dealing with history or natural science, and in numerous other cases.
+
+
+XIII
+
+To return, however, to Plato: how grand he can be with all that
+gentle and noiseless flow of eloquence you will be reminded by this
+characteristic passage, which you have read in his _Republic_: "They,
+therefore, who have no knowledge of wisdom and virtue, whose lives are
+passed in feasting and similar joys, are borne downwards, as is but
+natural, and in this region they wander all their lives; but they never
+lifted up their eyes nor were borne upwards to the true world above, nor
+ever tasted of pleasure abiding and unalloyed; but like beasts they ever
+look downwards, and their heads are bent to the ground, or rather to the
+table; they feed full their bellies and their lusts, and longing ever
+more and more for such things they kick and gore one another with horns
+and hoofs of iron, and slay one another in their insatiable desires."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Rep._ ix. 586, A.]
+
+2
+We may learn from this author, if we would but observe his example, that
+there is yet another path besides those mentioned which leads to sublime
+heights. What path do I mean? The emulous imitation of the great poets
+and prose-writers of the past. On this mark, dear friend, let us keep
+our eyes ever steadfastly fixed. Many gather the divine impulse from
+another's spirit, just as we are told that the Pythian priestess, when
+she takes her seat on the tripod, where there is said to be a rent in
+the ground breathing upwards a heavenly emanation, straightway conceives
+from that source the godlike gift of prophecy, and utters her inspired
+oracles; so likewise from the mighty genius of the great writers of
+antiquity there is carried into the souls of their rivals, as from a
+fount of inspiration, an effluence which breathes upon them until, even
+though their natural temper be but cold, they share the sublime
+enthusiasm of others.
+
+3
+Thus Homer's name is associated with a numerous band of illustrious
+disciples--not only Herodotus, but Stesichorus before him, and the great
+Archilochus, and above all Plato, who from the great fountain-head of
+Homer's genius drew into himself innumerable tributary streams. Perhaps
+it would have been necessary to illustrate this point, had not Ammonius
+and his school already classified and noted down the various examples.
+
+4
+Now what I am speaking of is not plagiarism, but resembles the process
+of copying from fair forms or statues or works of skilled labour. Nor in
+my opinion would so many fair flowers of imagery have bloomed among the
+philosophical dogmas of Plato, nor would he have risen so often to the
+language and topics of poetry, had he not engaged heart and soul in a
+contest for precedence with Homer, like a young champion entering the
+lists against a veteran. It may be that he showed too ambitious a spirit
+in venturing on such a duel; but nevertheless it was not without
+advantage to him: "for strife like this," as Hesiod says, "is good for
+men."[2] And where shall we find a more glorious arena or a nobler crown
+than here, where even defeat at the hands of our predecessors is not
+ignoble?
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Opp._ 29.]
+
+
+XIV
+
+Therefore it is good for us also, when we are labouring on some subject
+which demands a lofty and majestic style, to imagine to ourselves how
+Homer might have expressed this or that, or how Plato or Demosthenes
+would have clothed it with sublimity, or, in history, Thucydides. For by
+our fixing an eye of rivalry on those high examples they will become
+like beacons to guide us, and will perhaps lift up our souls to the
+fulness of the stature we conceive.
+
+2
+And it would be still better should we try to realise this further
+thought, How would Homer, had he been here, or how would Demosthenes,
+have listened to what I have written, or how would they have been
+affected by it? For what higher incentive to exertion could a writer
+have than to imagine such judges or such an audience of his works, and
+to give an account of his writings with heroes like these to criticise
+and look on?
+
+3
+Yet more inspiring would be the thought, With what feelings will future
+ages through all time read these my works? If this should awaken a fear
+in any writer that he will not be intelligible to his contemporaries it
+will necessarily follow that the conceptions of his mind will be crude,
+maimed, and abortive, and lacking that ripe perfection which alone can
+win the applause of ages to come.
+
+
+XV
+
+The dignity, grandeur, and energy of a style largely depend on a proper
+employment of images, a term which I prefer to that usually given.[1]
+The term image in its most general acceptation includes every thought,
+howsoever presented, which issues in speech. But the term is now
+generally confined to those cases when he who is speaking, by reason of
+the rapt and excited state of his feelings, imagines himself to see what
+he is talking about, and produces a similar illusion in his hearers.
+
+    [Footnote 1: +eid�lopoi�ai+, "fictions of the imagination," Hickie.]
+
+2
+Poets and orators both employ images, but with a very different object,
+as you are well aware. The poetical image is designed to astound; the
+oratorical image to give perspicuity. Both, however, seek to work on the
+emotions.
+
+  "Mother, I pray thee, set not thou upon me
+  Those maids with bloody face and serpent hair:
+  See, see, they come, they're here, they spring upon me!"[2]
+
+And again--
+
+  "Ah, ah, she'll slay me! whither shall I fly?"[3]
+
+The poet when he wrote like this saw the Erinyes with his own eyes, and
+he almost compels his readers to see them too.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Eur. _Orest._ 255.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Iph. Taur._ 291.]
+
+3
+Euripides found his chief delight in the labour of giving tragic
+expression to these two passions of madness and love, showing here a
+real mastery which I cannot think he exhibited elsewhere. Still, he is
+by no means diffident in venturing on other fields of the imagination.
+His genius was far from being of the highest order, but by taking pains
+he often raises himself to a tragic elevation. In his sublimer moments
+he generally reminds us of Homer's description of the lion--
+
+  "With tail he lashes both his flanks and sides,
+  And spurs himself to battle."[4]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xx. 170.]
+
+4
+Take, for instance, that passage in which Helios, in handing the reins
+to his son, says--
+
+  "Drive on, but shun the burning Libyan tract;
+  The hot dry air will let thine axle down:
+  Toward the seven Pleiades keep thy steadfast way."
+
+And then--
+
+  "This said, his son undaunted snatched the reins,
+  Then smote the winged coursers' sides: they bound
+  Forth on the void and cavernous vault of air.
+  His father mounts another steed, and rides
+  With warning voice guiding his son. 'Drive there!
+  Turn, turn thy car this way.'"[5]
+
+May we not say that the spirit of the poet mounts the chariot with his
+hero, and accompanies the winged steeds in their perilous flight? Were
+it not so,--had not his imagination soared side by side with them in
+that celestial passage,--he would never have conceived so vivid an
+image. Similar is that passage in his "Cassandra," beginning
+
+  "Ye Trojans, lovers of the steed."[6]
+
+    [Footnote 5: Eur. _Phaet._]
+
+    [Footnote 6: Perhaps from the lost "Alexander" (Jahn).]
+
+5
+Aeschylus is especially bold in forming images suited to his heroic
+themes: as when he says of his "Seven against Thebes"--
+
+  "Seven mighty men, and valiant captains, slew
+  Over an iron-bound shield a bull, then dipped
+  Their fingers in the blood, and all invoked
+  Ares, Enyo, and death-dealing Flight
+  In witness of their oaths,"[7]
+
+and describes how they all mutually pledged themselves without flinching
+to die. Sometimes, however, his thoughts are unshapen, and as it were
+rough-hewn and rugged. Not observing this, Euripides, from too blind a
+rivalry, sometimes falls under the same censure.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Sept. c. Th._ 42.]
+
+6
+Aeschylus with a strange violence of language represents the palace of
+Lycurgus as _possessed_ at the appearance of Dionysus--
+
+  "The halls with rapture thrill, the roof's inspired."[8]
+
+Here Euripides, in borrowing the image, softens its extravagance[9]--
+
+  "And all the mountain felt the god."[10]
+
+    [Footnote 8: Aesch. _Lycurg._]
+
+    [Footnote 9: Lit. "Giving it a different flavour," as Arist. _Poet._
+    +h�dusmen� log� ch�ris hekast� t�n eid�n+, ii. 10.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Bacch._ 726.]
+
+7
+Sophocles has also shown himself a great master of the imagination in
+the scene in which the dying Oedipus prepares himself for burial in the
+midst of a tempest,[11] and where he tells how Achilles appeared to the
+Greeks over his tomb just as they were putting out to sea on their
+departure from Troy.[12] This last scene has also been delineated by
+Simonides with a vividness which leaves him inferior to none. But it
+would be an endless task to cite all possible examples.
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Oed. Col._ 1586.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: In his lost "Polyxena."]
+
+8
+To return, then,[13] in poetry, as I observed, a certain mythical
+exaggeration is allowable, transcending altogether mere logical
+credence. But the chief beauties of an oratorical image are its energy
+and reality. Such digressions become offensive and monstrous when the
+language is cast in a poetical and fabulous mould, and runs into all
+sorts of impossibilities. Thus much may be learnt from the great orators
+of our own day, when they tell us in tragic tones that they see the
+Furies[14]--good people, can't they understand that when Orestes cries
+out
+
+  "Off, off, I say! I know thee who thou art,
+  One of the fiends that haunt me: I feel thine arms
+  About me cast, to drag me down to hell,"[15]
+
+these are the hallucinations of a madman?
+
+    [Footnote 13: � 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: Comp. Petronius, _Satyricon_, ch. i. _passim_.]
+
+    [Footnote 15: _Orest._ 264.]
+
+9
+Wherein, then, lies the force of an oratorical image? Doubtless in
+adding energy and passion in a hundred different ways to a speech; but
+especially in this, that when it is mingled with the practical,
+argumentative parts of an oration, it does not merely convince the
+hearer, but enthralls him. Such is the effect of those words of
+Demosthenes:[16] "Supposing, now, at this moment a cry of alarm were
+heard outside the assize courts, and the news came that the prison was
+broken open and the prisoners escaped, is there any man here who is such
+a trifler that he would not run to the rescue at the top of his speed?
+But suppose some one came forward with the information that they had
+been set at liberty by the defendant, what then? Why, he would be
+lynched on the spot!"
+
+    [Footnote 16: _c. Timocrat._ 208.]
+
+10
+Compare also the way in which Hyperides excused himself, when he was
+proceeded against for bringing in a bill to liberate the slaves after
+Chaeronea. "This measure," he said, "was not drawn up by any orator, but
+by the battle of Chaeronea." This striking image, being thrown in by the
+speaker in the midst of his proofs, enables him by one bold stroke to
+carry all mere logical objection before him.
+
+11
+In all such cases our nature is drawn towards that which affects it most
+powerfully: hence an image lures us away from an argument: judgment is
+paralysed, matters of fact disappear from view, eclipsed by the superior
+blaze. Nor is it surprising that we should be thus affected; for when
+two forces are thus placed in juxtaposition, the stronger must always
+absorb into itself the weaker.
+
+12
+On sublimity of thought, and the manner in which it arises from native
+greatness of mind, from imitation, and from the employment of images,
+this brief outline must suffice.[17]
+
+    [Footnote 17: He passes over chs. x. xi.]
+
+
+XVI
+
+The subject which next claims our attention is that of figures of
+speech. I have already observed that figures, judiciously employed, play
+an important part in producing sublimity. It would be a tedious, or
+rather an endless task, to deal with every detail of this subject here;
+so in order to establish what I have laid down, I will just run over,
+without further preface, a few of those figures which are most effective
+in lending grandeur to language.
+
+2
+Demosthenes is defending his policy; his natural line of argument would
+have been: "You did not do wrong, men of Athens, to take upon yourselves
+the struggle for the liberties of Hellas. Of this you have home proofs.
+_They_ did not wrong who fought at Marathon, at Salamis, and Plataea."
+Instead of this, in a sudden moment of supreme exaltation he bursts out
+like some inspired prophet with that famous appeal to the mighty dead:
+"Ye did not, could not have done wrong. I swear it by the men who faced
+the foe at Marathon!"[1] He employs the figure of adjuration, to which I
+will here give the name of Apostrophe. And what does he gain by it? He
+exalts the Athenian ancestors to the rank of divinities, showing that we
+ought to invoke those who have fallen for their country as gods; he
+fills the hearts of his judges with the heroic pride of the old warriors
+of Hellas; forsaking the beaten path of argument he rises to the
+loftiest altitude of grandeur and passion, and commands assent by the
+startling novelty of his appeal; he applies the healing charm of
+eloquence, and thus "ministers to the mind diseased" of his countrymen,
+until lifted by his brave words above their misfortunes they begin to
+feel that the disaster of Chaeronea is no less glorious than the
+victories of Marathon and Salamis. All this he effects by the use of one
+figure, and so carries his hearers away with him.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 208.]
+
+3
+It is said that the germ of this adjuration is found in Eupolis--
+
+  "By mine own fight, by Marathon, I say,
+  Who makes my heart to ache shall rue the day!"[2]
+
+But there is nothing grand in the mere employment of an oath. Its
+grandeur will depend on its being employed in the right place and the
+right manner, on the right occasion, and with the right motive. In
+Eupolis the oath is nothing beyond an oath; and the Athenians to whom it
+is addressed are still prosperous, and in need of no consolation.
+Moreover, the poet does not, like Demosthenes, swear by the departed
+heroes as deities, so as to engender in his audience a just conception
+of their valour, but diverges from the champions to the battle--a mere
+lifeless thing. But Demosthenes has so skilfully managed the oath that
+in addressing his countrymen after the defeat of Chaeronea he takes out
+of their minds all sense of disaster; and at the same time, while
+proving that no mistake has been made, he holds up an example, confirms
+his arguments by an oath, and makes his praise of the dead an incentive
+to the living.
+
+    [Footnote 2: In his (lost) "Demis."]
+
+4
+And to rebut a possible objection which occurred to him--"Can you,
+Demosthenes, whose policy ended in defeat, swear by a victory?"--the
+orator proceeds to measure his language, choosing his very words so as
+to give no handle to opponents, thus showing us that even in our most
+inspired moments reason ought to hold the reins.[3] Let us mark his
+words: "Those who _faced the foe_ at Marathon; those who _fought in the
+sea-fights_ of Salamis and Artemisium; those who _stood in the ranks_ at
+Plataea." Note that he nowhere says "those who _conquered_," artfully
+suppressing any word which might hint at the successful issue of those
+battles, which would have spoilt the parallel with Chaeronea. And for
+the same reason he steals a march on his audience, adding immediately:
+"All of whom, Aeschines,--not those who were successful only,--were
+buried by the state at the public expense."
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. "That even in the midst of the revels of Bacchus
+    we ought to remain sober."]
+
+
+XVII
+
+There is one truth which my studies have led me to observe, which
+perhaps it would be worth while to set down briefly here. It is this,
+that by a natural law the Sublime, besides receiving an acquisition of
+strength from figures, in its turn lends support in a remarkable manner
+to them. To explain: the use of figures has a peculiar tendency to rouse
+a suspicion of dishonesty, and to create an impression of treachery,
+scheming, and false reasoning; especially if the person addressed be a
+judge, who is master of the situation, and still more in the case of a
+despot, a king, a military potentate, or any of those who sit in high
+places.[1] If a man feels that this artful speaker is treating him like
+a silly boy and trying to throw dust in his eyes, he at once grows
+irritated, and thinking that such false reasoning implies a contempt of
+his understanding, he perhaps flies into a rage and will not hear
+another word; or even if he masters his resentment, still he is utterly
+indisposed to yield to the persuasive power of eloquence. Hence it
+follows that a figure is then most effectual when it appears in
+disguise.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading with Cobet, +kai pantas tous en huperochais+.]
+
+2
+To allay, then, this distrust which attaches to the use of figures we
+must call in the powerful aid of sublimity and passion. For art, once
+associated with these great allies, will be overshadowed by their
+grandeur and beauty, and pass beyond the reach of all suspicion. To
+prove this I need only refer to the passage already quoted: "I swear it
+by the men," etc. It is the very brilliancy of the orator's figure which
+blinds us to the fact that it _is_ a figure. For as the fainter lustre
+of the stars is put out of sight by the all-encompassing rays of the
+sun, so when sublimity sheds its light all round the sophistries of
+rhetoric they become invisible.
+
+3
+A similar illusion is produced by the painter's art. When light and
+shadow are represented in colour, though they lie on the same surface
+side by side, it is the light which meets the eye first, and appears not
+only more conspicuous but also much nearer. In the same manner passion
+and grandeur of language, lying nearer to our souls by reason both of a
+certain natural affinity and of their radiance, always strike our mental
+eye before we become conscious of the figure, throwing its artificial
+character into the shade and hiding it as it were in a veil.
+
+
+XVIII
+
+The figures of question and interrogation[1] also possess a specific
+quality which tends strongly to stir an audience and give energy to the
+speaker's words. "Or tell me, do you want to run about asking one
+another, is there any news? what greater news could you have than that a
+man of Macedon is making himself master of Hellas? Is Philip dead? Not
+he. However, he is ill. But what is that to you? Even if anything
+happens to him you will soon raise up another Philip."[2] Or this
+passage: "Shall we sail against Macedon? And where, asks one, shall we
+effect a landing? The war itself will show us where Philip's weak places
+lie."[2] Now if this had been put baldly it would have lost greatly in
+force. As we see it, it is full of the quick alternation of question and
+answer. The orator replies to himself as though he were meeting another
+man's objections. And this figure not only raises the tone of his words
+but makes them more convincing.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phil._ i. 44.]
+
+2
+For an exhibition of feeling has then most effect on an audience when it
+appears to flow naturally from the occasion, not to have been laboured
+by the art of the speaker; and this device of questioning and replying
+to himself reproduces the moment of passion. For as a sudden question
+addressed to an individual will sometimes startle him into a reply which
+is an unguarded expression of his genuine sentiments, so the figure of
+question and interrogation blinds the judgment of an audience, and
+deceives them into a belief that what is really the result of labour in
+every detail has been struck out of the speaker by the inspiration of
+the moment.
+
+There is one passage in Herodotus which is generally credited with
+extraordinary sublimity....
+
+
+XIX
+
+... The removal of connecting particles gives a quick rush and "torrent
+rapture" to a passage, the writer appearing to be actually almost left
+behind by his own words. There is an example in Xenophon: "Clashing
+their shields together they pushed, they fought, they slew, they
+fell."[1] And the words of Eurylochus in the _Odyssey_--
+
+  "We passed at thy command the woodland's shade;
+  We found a stately hall built in a mountain glade."[2]
+
+Words thus severed from one another without the intervention of stops
+give a lively impression of one who through distress of mind at once
+halts and hurries in his speech. And this is what Homer has expressed by
+using the figure _Asyndeton_.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Xen. _Hel._ iv. 3. 19.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ x. 251.]
+
+
+XX
+
+But nothing is so conducive to energy as a combination of different
+figures, when two or three uniting their resources mutually contribute
+to the vigour, the cogency, and the beauty of a speech. So Demosthenes
+in his speech against Meidias repeats the same words and breaks up his
+sentences in one lively descriptive passage: "He who receives a blow is
+hurt in many ways which he could not even describe to another, by
+gesture, by look, by tone."
+
+2
+Then, to vary the movement of his speech, and prevent it from standing
+still (for stillness produces rest, but passion requires a certain
+disorder of language, imitating the agitation and commotion of the
+soul), he at once dashes off in another direction, breaking up his words
+again, and repeating them in a different form, "by gesture, by look, by
+tone--when insult, when hatred, is added to violence, when he is struck
+with the fist, when he is struck as a slave!" By such means the orator
+imitates the action of Meidias, dealing blow upon blow on the minds of
+his judges. Immediately after like a hurricane he makes a fresh attack:
+"When he is struck with the fist, when he is struck in the face; this is
+what moves, this is what maddens a man, unless he is inured to outrage;
+no one could describe all this so as to bring home to his hearers its
+bitterness."[1] You see how he preserves, by continual variation, the
+intrinsic force of these repetitions and broken clauses, so that his
+order seems irregular, and conversely his irregularity acquires a
+certain measure of order.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Meid._ 72.]
+
+
+XXI
+
+Supposing we add the conjunctions, after the practice of Isocrates and
+his school: "Moreover, I must not omit to mention that he who strikes a
+blow may hurt in many ways, in the first place by gesture, in the second
+place by look, in the third and last place by his tone." If you compare
+the words thus set down in logical sequence with the expressions of the
+"Meidias," you will see that the rapidity and rugged abruptness of
+passion, when all is made regular by connecting links, will be smoothed
+away, and the whole point and fire of the passage will at once
+disappear.
+
+2
+For as, if you were to bind two runners together, they will forthwith be
+deprived of all liberty of movement, even so passion rebels against the
+trammels of conjunctions and other particles, because they curb its free
+rush and destroy the impression of mechanical impulse.
+
+
+XXII
+
+The figure hyperbaton belongs to the same class. By hyperbaton we mean a
+transposition of words or thoughts from their usual order, bearing
+unmistakably the characteristic stamp of violent mental agitation. In
+real life we often see a man under the influence of rage, or fear, or
+indignation, or beside himself with jealousy, or with some other out of
+the interminable list of human passions, begin a sentence, and then
+swerve aside into some inconsequent parenthesis, and then again double
+back to his original statement, being borne with quick turns by his
+distress, as though by a shifting wind, now this way, now that, and
+playing a thousand capricious variations on his words, his thoughts, and
+the natural order of his discourse. Now the figure hyperbaton is the
+means which is employed by the best writers to imitate these signs of
+natural emotion. For art is then perfect when it seems to be nature, and
+nature, again, is most effective when pervaded by the unseen presence of
+art. An illustration will be found in the speech of Dionysius of Phocaea
+in Herodotus: "A hair's breadth now decides our destiny, Ionians,
+whether we shall live as freemen or as slaves--ay, as runaway slaves.
+Now, therefore, if you choose to endure a little hardship, you will be
+able at the cost of some present exertion to overcome your enemies."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: vi. 11.]
+
+2
+The regular sequence here would have been: "Ionians, now is the time for
+you to endure a little hardship; for a hair's breadth will now decide
+our destiny." But the Phocaean transposes the title "Ionians," rushing
+at once to the subject of alarm, as though in the terror of the moment
+he had forgotten the usual address to his audience. Moreover, he inverts
+the logical order of his thoughts, and instead of beginning with the
+necessity for exertion, which is the point he wishes to urge upon them,
+he first gives them the reason for that necessity in the words, "a
+hair's breadth now decides our destiny," so that his words seem
+unpremeditated, and forced upon him by the crisis.
+
+3
+Thucydides surpasses all other writers in the bold use of this figure,
+even breaking up sentences which are by their nature absolutely one and
+indivisible. But nowhere do we find it so unsparingly employed as in
+Demosthenes, who though not so daring in his manner of using it as the
+elder writer is very happy in giving to his speeches by frequent
+transpositions the lively air of unstudied debate. Moreover, he drags,
+as it were, his audience with him into the perils of a long inverted
+clause.
+
+4
+He often begins to say something, then leaves the thought in suspense,
+meanwhile thrusting in between, in a position apparently foreign and
+unnatural, some extraneous matters, one upon another, and having thus
+made his hearers fear lest the whole discourse should break down, and
+forced them into eager sympathy with the danger of the speaker, when he
+is nearly at the end of a period he adds just at the right moment,
+_i.e._ when it is least expected, the point which they have been waiting
+for so long. And thus by the very boldness and hazard of his inversions
+he produces a much more astounding effect. I forbear to cite examples,
+as they are too numerous to require it.
+
+
+XXIII
+
+The juxtaposition of different cases, the enumeration of particulars,
+and the use of contrast and climax, all, as you know, add much vigour,
+and give beauty and great elevation and life to a style. The diction
+also gains greatly in diversity and movement by changes of case, time,
+person, number, and gender.
+
+2
+With regard to change of number: not only is the style improved by the
+use of those words which, though singular in form, are found on
+inspection to be plural in meaning, as in the lines--
+
+  "A countless host dispersed along the sand
+  With joyous cries the shoal of tunny hailed,"
+
+but it is more worthy of observation that plurals for singulars
+sometimes fall with a more impressive dignity, rousing the imagination
+by the mere sense of vast number.
+
+3
+Such is the effect of those words of Oedipus in Sophocles--
+
+              "Oh fatal, fatal ties!
+  Ye gave us birth, and we being born ye sowed
+  The self-same seed, and gave the world to view
+  Sons, brothers, sires, domestic murder foul,
+  Brides, mothers, wives.... Ay, ye laid bare
+  The blackest, deepest place where Shame can dwell."[1]
+
+Here we have in either case but one person, first Oedipus, then Jocasta;
+but the expansion of number into the plural gives an impression of
+multiplied calamity. So in the following plurals--
+
+  "There came forth Hectors, and there came Sarpedons."
+
+    [Footnote 1: _O. R._ 1403.]
+
+4
+And in those words of Plato's (which we have already adduced elsewhere),
+referring to the Athenians: "We have no Pelopses or Cadmuses or
+Aegyptuses or Danauses, or any others out of all the mob of Hellenised
+barbarians, dwelling among us; no, this is the land of pure Greeks, with
+no mixture of foreign elements,"[2] etc. Such an accumulation of words
+in the plural number necessarily gives greater pomp and sound to a
+subject. But we must only have recourse to this device when the nature
+of our theme makes it allowable to amplify, to multiply, or to speak in
+the tones of exaggeration or passion. To overlay every sentence with
+ornament[3] is very pedantic.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Menex._ 245, D.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. "To hang bells everywhere," a metaphor from
+    the bells which were attached to horses' trappings on festive
+    occasions.]
+
+
+XXIV
+
+On the other hand, the contraction of plurals into singulars sometimes
+creates an appearance of great dignity; as in that phrase of
+Demosthenes: "Thereupon all Peloponnesus was divided."[1] There is
+another in Herodotus: "When Phrynichus brought a drama on the stage
+entitled _The Taking of Miletus_, the whole theatre fell a
+weeping"--instead of "all the spectators." This knitting together of a
+number of scattered particulars into one whole gives them an aspect of
+corporate life. And the beauty of both uses lies, I think, in their
+betokening emotion, by giving a sudden change of complexion to the
+circumstances,--whether a word which is strictly singular is
+unexpectedly changed into a plural,--or whether a number of isolated
+units are combined by the use of a single sonorous word under one head.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 18.]
+
+
+XXV
+
+When past events are introduced as happening in present time the
+narrative form is changed into a dramatic action. Such is that
+description in Xenophon: "A man who has fallen, and is being trampled
+under foot by Cyrus's horse, strikes the belly of the animal with his
+scimitar; the horse starts aside and unseats Cyrus, and he falls."
+Similarly in many passages of Thucydides.
+
+
+XXVI
+
+Equally dramatic is the interchange of persons, often making a reader
+fancy himself to be moving in the midst of the perils described--
+
+  "Unwearied, thou wouldst deem, with toil unspent,
+  They met in war; so furiously they fought."[1]
+
+and that line in Aratus--
+
+  "Beware that month to tempt the surging sea."[2]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 697.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaen._ 287.]
+
+2
+In the same way Herodotus: "Passing from the city of Elephantine you
+will sail upwards until you reach a level plain. You cross this region,
+and there entering another ship you will sail on for two days, and so
+reach a great city, whose name is Meroe."[3] Observe how he takes us, as
+it were, by the hand, and leads us in spirit through these places,
+making us no longer readers, but spectators. Such a direct personal
+address always has the effect of placing the reader in the midst of the
+scene of action.
+
+    [Footnote 3: ii. 29.]
+
+3
+And by pointing your words to the individual reader, instead of to the
+readers generally, as in the line
+
+  "Thou had'st not known for whom Tydides fought,"[4]
+
+and thus exciting him by an appeal to himself, you will rouse interest,
+and fix attention, and make him a partaker in the action of the book.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ v. 85.]
+
+
+XXVII
+
+Sometimes, again, a writer in the midst of a narrative in the third
+person suddenly steps aside and makes a transition to the first. It is a
+kind of figure which strikes like a sudden outburst of passion. Thus
+Hector in the _Iliad_
+
+  "With mighty voice called to the men of Troy
+  To storm the ships, and leave the bloody spoils:
+  If any I behold with willing foot
+  Shunning the ships, and lingering on the plain,
+  That hour I will contrive his death."[1]
+
+The poet then takes upon himself the narrative part, as being his proper
+business; but this abrupt threat he attributes, without a word of
+warning, to the enraged Trojan chief. To have interposed any such words
+as "Hector said so and so" would have had a frigid effect. As the lines
+stand the writer is left behind by his own words, and the transition is
+effected while he is preparing for it.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 346.]
+
+2
+Accordingly the proper use of this figure is in dealing with some urgent
+crisis which will not allow the writer to linger, but compels him to
+make a rapid change from one person to another. So in Hecataeus: "Now
+Ceyx took this in dudgeon, and straightway bade the children of Heracles
+to depart. 'Behold, I can give you no help; lest, therefore, ye perish
+yourselves and bring hurt upon me also, get ye forth into some other
+land.'"
+
+3
+There is a different use of the change of persons in the speech of
+Demosthenes against Aristogeiton, which places before us the quick turns
+of violent emotion. "Is there none to be found among you," he asks, "who
+even feels indignation at the outrageous conduct of a loathsome and
+shameless wretch who,--vilest of men, when you were debarred from
+freedom of speech, not by barriers or by doors, which might indeed be
+opened,"[2] etc. Thus in the midst of a half-expressed thought he makes
+a quick change of front, and having almost in his anger torn one word
+into two persons, "who, vilest of men," etc., he then breaks off his
+address to Aristogeiton, and seems to leave him, nevertheless, by the
+passion of his utterance, rousing all the more the attention of the
+court.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _c. Aristog._ i. 27.]
+
+4
+The same feature may be observed in a speech of Penelope's--
+
+  "Why com'st thou, Medon, from the wooers proud?
+  Com'st thou to bid the handmaids of my lord
+  To cease their tasks, and make for them good cheer?
+  Ill fare their wooing, and their gathering here!
+  Would God that here this hour they all might take
+  Their last, their latest meal! Who day by day
+  Make here your muster, to devour and waste
+  The substance of my son: have ye not heard
+  When children at your fathers' knee the deeds
+  And prowess of your king?"[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Od._ iv. 681.]
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+None, I suppose, would dispute the fact that periphrasis tends much to
+sublimity. For, as in music the simple air is rendered more pleasing by
+the addition of harmony, so in language periphrasis often sounds in
+concord with a literal expression, adding much to the beauty of its
+tone,--provided always that it is not inflated and harsh, but agreeably
+blended.
+
+2
+To confirm this one passage from Plato will suffice--the opening words
+of his Funeral Oration: "In deed these men have now received from us
+their due, and that tribute paid they are now passing on their destined
+journey, with the State speeding them all and his own friends speeding
+each one of them on his way."[1] Death, you see, he calls the "destined
+journey"; to receive the rites of burial is to be publicly "sped on your
+way" by the State. And these turns of language lend dignity in no common
+measure to the thought. He takes the words in their naked simplicity and
+handles them as a musician, investing them with melody,--harmonising
+them, as it were,--by the use of periphrasis.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Menex._ 236, D.]
+
+3
+So Xenophon: "Labour you regard as the guide to a pleasant life, and you
+have laid up in your souls the fairest and most soldier-like of all
+gifts: in praise is your delight, more than in anything else."[2] By
+saying, instead of "you are ready to labour," "you regard labour as the
+guide to a pleasant life," and by similarly expanding the rest of that
+passage, he gives to his eulogy a much wider and loftier range of
+sentiment. Let us add that inimitable phrase in Herodotus: "Those
+Scythians who pillaged the temple were smitten from heaven by a female
+malady."
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Cyrop._ i. 5. 12.]
+
+
+XXIX
+
+But this figure, more than any other, is very liable to abuse, and great
+restraint is required in employing it. It soon begins to carry an
+impression of feebleness, savours of vapid trifling, and arouses
+disgust. Hence Plato, who is very bold and not always happy in his use
+of figures, is much ridiculed for saying in his _Laws_ that "neither
+gold nor silver wealth must be allowed to establish itself in our
+State,"[1] suggesting, it is said, that if he had forbidden property in
+oxen or sheep he would certainly have spoken of it as "bovine and ovine
+wealth."
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Legg._ vii. 801, B.]
+
+2
+Here we must quit this part of our subject, hoping, my dear friend
+Terentian, that your learned curiosity will be satisfied with this short
+excursion on the use of figures in their relation to the Sublime. All
+those which I have mentioned help to render a style more energetic and
+impassioned; and passion contributes as largely to sublimity as the
+delineation of character to amusement.
+
+
+XXX
+
+But since the thoughts conveyed by words and the expression of those
+thoughts are for the most part interwoven with one another, we will now
+add some considerations which have hitherto been overlooked on the
+subject of expression. To say that the choice of appropriate and
+striking words has a marvellous power and an enthralling charm for the
+reader, that this is the main object of pursuit with all orators and
+writers, that it is this, and this alone, which causes the works of
+literature to exhibit the glowing perfections of the finest statues,
+their grandeur, their beauty, their mellowness, their dignity, their
+energy, their power, and all their other graces, and that it is this
+which endows the facts with a vocal soul; to say all this would, I fear,
+be, to the initiated, an impertinence. Indeed, we may say with strict
+truth that beautiful words are the very light of thought.
+
+2
+I do not mean to say that imposing language is appropriate to every
+occasion. A trifling subject tricked out in grand and stately words
+would have the same effect as a huge tragic mask placed on the head of a
+little child. Only in poetry and ...
+
+
+XXXI
+
+... There is a genuine ring in that line of Anacreon's--
+
+  "The Thracian filly I no longer heed."
+
+The same merit belongs to that original phrase in Theophrastus; to me,
+at least, from the closeness of its analogy, it seems to have a peculiar
+expressiveness, though Caecilius censures it, without telling us why.
+"Philip," says the historian, "showed a marvellous alacrity in _taking
+doses of trouble_."[1] We see from this that the most homely language is
+sometimes far more vivid than the most ornamental, being recognised at
+once as the language of common life, and gaining immediate currency by
+its familiarity. In speaking, then, of Philip as "taking doses of
+trouble," Theopompus has laid hold on a phrase which describes with
+peculiar vividness one who for the sake of advantage endured what was
+base and sordid with patience and cheerfulness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+The same may be observed of two passages in Herodotus: "Cleomenes having
+lost his wits, cut his own flesh into pieces with a short sword, until
+by gradually _mincing_ his whole body he destroyed himself";[2] and
+"Pythes continued fighting on his ship until he was entirely _hacked to
+pieces_."[3] Such terms come home at once to the vulgar reader, but
+their own vulgarity is redeemed by their expressiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 2: vi. 75.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: vii. 181.]
+
+
+XXXII
+
+Concerning the number of metaphors to be employed together Caecilius
+seems to give his vote with those critics who make a law that not more
+than two, or at the utmost three, should be combined in the same place.
+The use, however, must be determined by the occasion. Those outbursts of
+passion which drive onwards like a winter torrent draw with them as an
+indispensable accessory whole masses of metaphor. It is thus in that
+passage of Demosthenes (who here also is our safest guide):[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+"Those vile fawning wretches, each one of whom has lopped from his
+country her fairest members, who have toasted away their liberty, first
+to Philip, now to Alexander, who measure happiness by their belly and
+their vilest appetites, who have overthrown the old landmarks and
+standards of felicity among Greeks,--to be freemen, and to have no one
+for a master."[2] Here the number of the metaphors is obscured by the
+orator's indignation against the betrayers of his country.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _De Cor._ 296.]
+
+3
+And to effect this Aristotle and Theophrastus recommend the softening of
+harsh metaphors by the use of some such phrase as "So to say," "As it
+were," "If I may be permitted the expression," "If so bold a term is
+allowable." For thus to forestall criticism[3] mitigates, they assert,
+the boldness of the metaphors.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Reading +hupotim�sis+.]
+
+4
+And I will not deny that these have their use. Nevertheless I must
+repeat the remark which I made in the case of figures,[4] and maintain
+that there are native antidotes to the number and boldness of metaphors,
+in well-timed displays of strong feeling, and in unaffected sublimity,
+because these have an innate power by the dash of their movement of
+sweeping along and carrying all else before them. Or should we not
+rather say that they absolutely demand as indispensable the use of
+daring metaphors, and will not allow the hearer to pause and criticise
+the number of them, because he shares the passion of the speaker?
+
+    [Footnote 4: Ch. xvii.]
+
+5
+In the treatment, again, of familiar topics and in descriptive passages
+nothing gives such distinctness as a close and continuous series of
+metaphors. It is by this means that Xenophon has so finely delineated
+the anatomy of the human frame.[5] And there is a still more brilliant
+and life-like picture in Plato.[6] The human head he calls a _citadel_;
+the neck is an _isthmus_ set to divide it from the chest; to support it
+beneath are the vertebrae, turning like _hinges_; pleasure he describes
+as a _bait_ to tempt men to ill; the tongue is the _arbiter of tastes_.
+The heart is at once the _knot_ of the veins and the _source_ of the
+rapidly circulating blood, and is stationed in the _guard-room_ of the
+body. The ramifying blood-vessels he calls _alleys_. "And casting
+about," he says, "for something to sustain the violent palpitation of
+the heart when it is alarmed by the approach of danger or agitated by
+passion, since at such times it is overheated, they (the gods) implanted
+in us the lungs, which are so fashioned that being soft and bloodless,
+and having cavities within, they act like a buffer, and when the heart
+boils with inward passion by yielding to its throbbing save it from
+injury." He compares the seat of the desires to the _women's quarters_,
+the seat of the passions to the _men's quarters_, in a house. The
+spleen, again, is the _napkin_ of the internal organs, by whose
+excretions it is saturated from time to time, and swells to a great size
+with inward impurity. "After this," he continues, "they shrouded the
+whole with flesh, throwing it forward, like a cushion, as a barrier
+against injuries from without." The blood he terms the _pasture_ of the
+flesh. "To assist the process of nutrition," he goes on, "they divided
+the body into ducts, cutting trenches like those in a garden, so that,
+the body being a system of narrow conduits, the current of the veins
+might flow as from a perennial fountain-head. And when the end is at
+hand," he says, "the soul is cast loose from her moorings like a ship,
+and free to wander whither she will."
+
+6
+These, and a hundred similar fancies, follow one another in quick
+succession. But those which I have pointed out are sufficient to
+demonstrate how great is the natural power of figurative language, and
+how largely metaphors conduce to sublimity, and to illustrate the
+important part which they play in all impassioned and descriptive
+passages.
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Memorab._ i. 4, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Timaeus_, 69, D; 74, A; 65, C; 72, G; 74, B, D; 80, E;
+    77, G; 78, E; 85, E.]
+
+7
+That the use of figurative language, as of all other beauties of style,
+has a constant tendency towards excess, is an obvious truth which I need
+not dwell upon. It is chiefly on this account that even Plato comes in
+for a large share of disparagement, because he is often carried away by
+a sort of frenzy of language into an intemperate use of violent
+metaphors and inflated allegory. "It is not easy to remark" (he says in
+one place) "that a city ought to be blended like a bowl, in which the
+mad wine boils when it is poured out, but being disciplined by another
+and a sober god in that fair society produces a good and temperate
+drink."[7] Really, it is said, to speak of water as a "sober god," and
+of the process of mixing as a "discipline," is to talk like a poet, and
+no very _sober_ one either.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Legg._ vi. 773, G.]
+
+8
+It was such defects as these that the hostile critic[8] Caecilius made
+his ground of attack, when he had the boldness in his essay "On the
+Beauties of Lysias" to pronounce that writer superior in every respect
+to Plato. Now Caecilius was doubly unqualified for a judge: he loved
+Lysias better even than himself, and at the same time his hatred of
+Plato and all his works is greater even than his love for Lysias.
+Moreover, he is so blind a partisan that his very premises are open to
+dispute. He vaunts Lysias as a faultless and immaculate writer, while
+Plato is, according to him, full of blemishes. Now this is not the case:
+far from it.
+
+    [Footnote 8: Reading +ho mis�n auton+, by a conjecture of the
+    translator.]
+
+
+XXXIII
+
+But supposing now that we assume the existence of a really unblemished
+and irreproachable writer. Is it not worth while to raise the whole
+question whether in poetry and prose we should prefer sublimity
+accompanied by some faults, or a style which never rising above moderate
+excellence never stumbles and never requires correction? and again,
+whether the first place in literature is justly to be assigned to the
+more numerous, or the loftier excellences? For these are questions
+proper to an inquiry on the Sublime, and urgently asking for settlement.
+
+2
+I know, then, that the largest intellects are far from being the most
+exact. A mind always intent on correctness is apt to be dissipated in
+trifles; but in great affluence of thought, as in vast material wealth,
+there must needs be an occasional neglect of detail. And is it not
+inevitably so? Is it not by risking nothing, by never aiming high, that
+a writer of low or middling powers keeps generally clear of faults and
+secure of blame? whereas the loftier walks of literature are by their
+very loftiness perilous?
+
+3
+I am well aware, again, that there is a law by which in all human
+productions the weak points catch the eye first, by which their faults
+remain indelibly stamped on the memory, while their beauties quickly
+fade away.
+
+4
+Yet, though I have myself noted not a few faulty passages in Homer and
+in other authors of the highest rank, and though I am far from being
+partial to their failings, nevertheless I would call them not so much
+wilful blunders as oversights which were allowed to pass unregarded
+through that contempt of little things, that "brave disorder," which is
+natural to an exalted genius; and I still think that the greater
+excellences, though not everywhere equally sustained, ought always to be
+voted to the first place in literature, if for no other reason, for the
+mere grandeur of soul they evince. Let us take an instance: Apollonius
+in his _Argonautica_ has given us a poem actually faultless; and in his
+pastoral poetry Theocritus is eminently happy, except when he
+occasionally attempts another style. And what then? Would you rather be
+a Homer or an Apollonius?
+
+5
+Or take Eratosthenes and his _Erigone_; because that little work is
+without a flaw, is he therefore a greater poet than Archilochus, with
+all his disorderly profusion? greater than that impetuous, that
+god-gifted genius, which chafed against the restraints of law? or in
+lyric poetry would you choose to be a Bacchylides or a Pindar? in
+tragedy a Sophocles or (save the mark!) an Io of Chios? Yet Io and
+Bacchylides never stumble, their style is always neat, always pretty;
+while Pindar and Sophocles sometimes move onwards with a wide blaze of
+splendour, but often drop out of view in sudden and disastrous eclipse.
+Nevertheless no one in his senses would deny that a single play of
+Sophocles, the _Oedipus_, is of higher value than all the dramas of Io
+put together.
+
+
+XXXIV
+
+If the number and not the loftiness of an author's merits is to be our
+standard of success, judged by this test we must admit that Hyperides is
+a far superior orator to Demosthenes. For in Hyperides there is a richer
+modulation, a greater variety of excellence. He is, we may say, in
+everything second-best, like the champion of the _pentathlon_, who,
+though in every contest he has to yield the prize to some other
+combatant, is superior to the unpractised in all five.
+
+2
+Not only has he rivalled the success of Demosthenes in everything but
+his manner of composition, but, as though that were not enough, he has
+taken in all the excellences and graces of Lysias as well. He knows when
+it is proper to speak with simplicity, and does not, like Demosthenes,
+continue the same key throughout. His touches of character are racy and
+sparkling, and full of a delicate flavour. Then how admirable is his
+wit, how polished his raillery! How well-bred he is, how dexterous in
+the use of irony! His jests are pointed, but without any of the
+grossness and vulgarity of the old Attic comedy. He is skilled in making
+light of an opponent's argument, full of a well-aimed satire which
+amuses while it stings; and through all this there runs a pervading, may
+we not say, a matchless charm. He is most apt in moving compassion; his
+mythical digressions show a fluent ease, and he is perfect in bending
+his course and finding a way out of them without violence or effort.
+Thus when he tells the story of Leto he is really almost a poet; and his
+funeral oration shows a declamatory magnificence to which I hardly know
+a parallel.
+
+3
+Demosthenes, on the other hand, has no touches of character, none of the
+versatility, fluency, or declamatory skill of Hyperides. He is, in fact,
+almost entirely destitute of all those excellences which I have just
+enumerated. When he makes violent efforts to be humorous and witty, the
+only laughter he arouses is against himself; and the nearer he tries to
+get to the winning grace of Hyperides, the farther he recedes from it.
+Had he, for instance, attempted such a task as the little speech in
+defence of Phryne or Athenagoras, he would only have added to the
+reputation of his rival.
+
+4
+Nevertheless all the beauties of Hyperides, however numerous, cannot
+make him sublime. He never exhibits strong feeling, has little energy,
+rouses no emotion; certainly he never kindles terror in the breast of
+his readers. But Demosthenes followed a great master,[1] and drew his
+consummate excellences, his high-pitched eloquence, his living passion,
+his copiousness, his sagacity, his speed--that mastery and power which
+can never be approached--from the highest of sources. These mighty,
+these heaven-sent gifts (I dare not call them human), he made his own
+both one and all. Therefore, I say, by the noble qualities which he does
+possess he remains supreme above all rivals, and throws a cloud over his
+failings, silencing by his thunders and blinding by his lightnings the
+orators of all ages. Yes, it would be easier to meet the
+lightning-stroke with steady eye than to gaze unmoved when his
+impassioned eloquence is sending out flash after flash.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _I.e._ Thucydides. See the passage of Dionysius quoted
+    in the Note.]
+
+
+XXXV
+
+But in the case of Plato and Lysias there is, as I said, a further
+difference. Not only is Lysias vastly inferior to Plato in the degree of
+his merits, but in their number as well; and at the same time he is as
+far ahead of Plato in the number of his faults as he is behind in that
+of his merits.
+
+2
+What truth, then, was it that was present to those mighty spirits of the
+past, who, making whatever is greatest in writing their aim, thought it
+beneath them to be exact in every detail? Among many others especially
+this, that it was not in nature's plan for us her chosen children to be
+creatures base and ignoble,--no, she brought us into life, and into the
+whole universe, as into some great field of contest, that we should be
+at once spectators and ambitious rivals of her mighty deeds, and from
+the first implanted in our souls an invincible yearning for all that is
+great, all that is diviner than ourselves.
+
+3
+Therefore even the whole world is not wide enough for the soaring range
+of human thought, but man's mind often overleaps the very bounds of
+space.[1] When we survey the whole circle of life, and see it abounding
+everywhere in what is elegant, grand, and beautiful, we learn at once
+what is the true end of man's being.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Lucretius on Epicurus: "Ergo vivida vis animi
+    pervicit, et extra Processit longe flammantia moenia mundi," etc.]
+
+4
+And this is why nature prompts us to admire, not the clearness and
+usefulness of a little stream, but the Nile, the Danube, the Rhine, and
+far beyond all the Ocean; not to turn our wandering eyes from the
+heavenly fires, though often darkened, to the little flame kindled by
+human hands, however pure and steady its light; not to think that tiny
+lamp more wondrous than the caverns of Aetna, from whose raging depths
+are hurled up stones and whole masses of rock, and torrents sometimes
+come pouring from earth's centre of pure and living fire.
+
+To sum the whole: whatever is useful or needful lies easily within man's
+reach; but he keeps his homage for what is astounding.
+
+
+XXXVI
+
+How much more do these principles apply to the Sublime in literature,
+where grandeur is never, as it sometimes is in nature, dissociated from
+utility and advantage. Therefore all those who have achieved it, however
+far from faultless, are still more than mortal. When a writer uses any
+other resource he shows himself to be a man; but the Sublime lifts him
+near to the great spirit of the Deity. He who makes no slips must be
+satisfied with negative approbation, but he who is sublime commands
+positive reverence.
+
+2
+Why need I add that each one of those great writers often redeems all
+his errors by one grand and masterly stroke? But the strongest point of
+all is that, if you were to pick out all the blunders of Homer,
+Demosthenes, Plato, and all the greatest names in literature, and add
+them together, they would be found to bear a very small, or rather an
+infinitesimal proportion to the passages in which these supreme masters
+have attained absolute perfection. Therefore it is that all posterity,
+whose judgment envy herself cannot impeach, has brought and bestowed on
+them the crown of glory, has guarded their fame until this day against
+all attack, and is likely to preserve it
+
+  "As long as lofty trees shall grow,
+  And restless waters seaward flow."
+
+3
+It has been urged by one writer that we should not prefer the huge
+disproportioned Colossus to the Doryphorus of Polycletus. But (to give
+one out of many possible answers) in art we admire exactness, in the
+works of nature magnificence; and it is from nature that man derives the
+faculty of speech. Whereas, then, in statuary we look for close
+resemblance to humanity, in literature we require something which
+transcends humanity.
+
+4
+Nevertheless (to reiterate the advice which we gave at the beginning of
+this essay), since that success which consists in avoidance of error is
+usually the gift of art, while high, though unequal excellence is the
+attribute of genius, it is proper on all occasions to call in art as an
+ally to nature. By the combined resources of these two we may hope to
+achieve perfection.
+
+Such are the conclusions which were forced upon me concerning the points
+at issue; but every one may consult his own taste.
+
+
+XXXVII
+
+To return, however, from this long digression; closely allied to
+metaphors are comparisons and similes, differing only in this * * *[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: The asterisks denote gaps in the original text.]
+
+
+XXXVIII
+
+Such absurdities as, "Unless you carry your brains next to the ground in
+your heels."[1] Hence it is necessary to know where to draw the line;
+for if ever it is overstepped the effect of the hyperbole is spoilt,
+being in such cases relaxed by overstraining, and producing the very
+opposite to the effect desired.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Pseud. Dem. de Halon. 45.]
+
+2
+Isocrates, for instance, from an ambitious desire of lending everything
+a strong rhetorical colouring, shows himself in quite a childish light.
+Having in his Panegyrical Oration set himself to prove that the Athenian
+state has surpassed that of Sparta in her services to Hellas, he starts
+off at the very outset with these words: "Such is the power of language
+that it can extenuate what is great, and lend greatness to what is
+little, give freshness to what is antiquated, and describe what is
+recent so that it seems to be of the past."[2] Come, Isocrates (it might
+be asked), is it thus that you are going to tamper with the facts about
+Sparta and Athens? This flourish about the power of language is like a
+signal hung out to warn his audience not to believe him.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Paneg. 8.]
+
+3
+We may repeat here what we said about figures, and say that the
+hyperbole is then most effective when it appears in disguise.[3] And
+this effect is produced when a writer, impelled by strong feeling,
+speaks in the accents of some tremendous crisis; as Thucydides does in
+describing the massacre in Sicily. "The Syracusans," he says, "went down
+after them, and slew those especially who were in the river, and the
+water was at once defiled, yet still they went on drinking it, though
+mingled with mud and gore, most of them even fighting for it."[4] The
+drinking of mud and gore, and even the fighting for it, is made credible
+by the awful horror of the scene described.
+
+    [Footnote 3: xvii. 1.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Thuc. vii. 84.]
+
+4
+Similarly Herodotus on those who fell at Thermopylae: "Here as they
+fought, those who still had them, with daggers, the rest with hands and
+teeth, the barbarians buried them under their javelins."[5] That they
+fought with the teeth against heavy-armed assailants, and that they were
+buried with javelins, are perhaps hard sayings, but not incredible, for
+the reasons already explained. We can see that these circumstances have
+not been dragged in to produce a hyperbole, but that the hyperbole has
+grown naturally out of the circumstances.
+
+    [Footnote 5: vii. 225.]
+
+5
+For, as I am never tired of explaining, in actions and passions verging
+on frenzy there lies a kind of remission and palliation of any licence
+of language. Hence some comic extravagances, however improbable, gain
+credence by their humour, such as--
+
+  "He had a farm, a little farm, where space severely pinches;
+  'Twas smaller than the last despatch from Sparta by some inches."
+
+6
+For mirth is one of the passions, having its seat in pleasure. And
+hyperboles may be employed either to increase or to lessen--since
+exaggeration is common to both uses. Thus in extenuating an opponent's
+argument we try to make it seem smaller than it is.
+
+
+XXXIX
+
+We have still left, my dear sir, the fifth of those sources which we set
+down at the outset as contributing to sublimity, that which consists in
+the mere arrangement of words in a certain order. Having already
+published two books dealing fully with this subject--so far at least as
+our investigations had carried us--it will be sufficient for the purpose
+of our present inquiry to add that harmony is an instrument which has a
+natural power, not only to win and to delight, but also in a remarkable
+degree to exalt the soul and sway the heart of man.
+
+2
+When we see that a flute kindles certain emotions in its hearers,
+rendering them almost beside themselves and full of an orgiastic frenzy,
+and that by starting some kind of rhythmical beat it compels him who
+listens to move in time and assimilate his gestures to the tune, even
+though he has no taste whatever for music; when we know that the sounds
+of a harp, which in themselves have no meaning, by the change of key, by
+the mutual relation of the notes, and their arrangement in symphony,
+often lay a wonderful spell on an audience--
+
+3
+though these are mere shadows and spurious imitations of persuasion,
+not, as I have said, genuine manifestations of human nature:--can we
+doubt that composition (being a kind of harmony of that language which
+nature has taught us, and which reaches, not our ears only, but our very
+souls), when it raises changing forms of words, of thoughts, of actions,
+of beauty, of melody, all of which are engrained in and akin to
+ourselves, and when by the blending of its manifold tones it brings home
+to the minds of those who stand by the feelings present to the speaker,
+and ever disposes the hearer to sympathise with those feelings, adding
+word to word, until it has raised a majestic and harmonious
+structure:--can we wonder if all this enchants us, wherever we meet with
+it, and filling us with the sense of pomp and dignity and sublimity, and
+whatever else it embraces, gains a complete mastery over our minds? It
+would be mere infatuation to join issue on truths so universally
+acknowledged, and established by experience beyond dispute.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading +all' eoike mania+, and putting a full stop at
+    +pistis+.]
+
+4
+Now to give an instance: that is doubtless a sublime thought, indeed
+wonderfully fine, which Demosthenes applies to his decree: +touto to
+ps�phisma ton tote t� polei peristanta kindunon parelthein epoi�sen
+h�sper nephos+, "This decree caused the danger which then hung round our
+city to pass away like a cloud." But the modulation is as perfect as the
+sentiment itself is weighty. It is uttered wholly in the dactylic
+measure, the noblest and most magnificent of all measures, and hence
+forming the chief constituent in the finest metre we know, the heroic.
+[And it is with great judgment that the words +h�sper nephos+ are
+reserved till the end.[2]] Supposing we transpose them from their proper
+place and read, say +touto to ps�phisma h�sper nephos epoi�se ton tote
+kindunon parelthein+--nay, let us merely cut off one syllable, reading
++epoi�se parelthein h�s nephos+--and you will understand how close is
+the unison between harmony and sublimity. In the passage before us the
+words +h�sper nephos+ move first in a heavy measure, which is metrically
+equivalent to four short syllables: but on removing one syllable, and
+reading +h�s nephos+, the grandeur of movement is at once crippled by
+the abridgment. So conversely if you lengthen into +h�sperei nephos+,
+the meaning is still the same, but it does not strike the ear in the
+same manner, because by lingering over the final syllables you at once
+dissipate and relax the abrupt grandeur of the passage.
+
+    [Footnote 2: There is a break here in the text; but the context
+    indicates the sense of the words lost, which has accordingly been
+    supplied.]
+
+
+XL
+
+There is another method very efficient in exalting a style. As the
+different members of the body, none of which, if severed from its
+connection, has any intrinsic excellence, unite by their mutual
+combination to form a complete and perfect organism, so also the
+elements of a fine passage, by whose separation from one another its
+high quality is simultaneously dissipated and evaporates, when joined in
+one organic whole, and still further compacted by the bond of harmony,
+by the mere rounding of the period gain power of tone.
+
+2
+In fact, a clause may be said to derive its sublimity from the joint
+contributions of a number of particulars. And further (as we have shown
+at large elsewhere), many writers in prose and verse, though their
+natural powers were not high, were perhaps even low, and though the
+terms they employed were usually common and popular and conveying no
+impression of refinement, by the mere harmony of their composition have
+attained dignity and elevation, and avoided the appearance of meanness.
+Such among many others are Philistus, Aristophanes occasionally,
+Euripides almost always.
+
+3
+Thus when Heracles says, after the murder of his children,
+
+  "I'm full of woes, I have no room for more,"[1]
+
+the words are quite common, but they are made sublime by being cast in a
+fine mould. By changing their position you will see that the poetical
+quality of Euripides depends more on his arrangement than on his
+thoughts.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _H. F._ 1245.]
+
+4
+Compare his lines on Dirce dragged by the bull--
+
+                  "Whatever crossed his path,
+  Caught in his victim's form, he seized, and dragging
+  Oak, woman, rock, now here, now there, he flies."[2]
+
+The circumstance is noble in itself, but it gains in vigour because the
+language is disposed so as not to hurry the movement, not running, as it
+were, on wheels, because there is a distinct stress on each word, and
+the time is delayed, advancing slowly to a pitch of stately sublimity.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Antiope_ (Nauck, 222).]
+
+
+XLI
+
+Nothing so much degrades the tone of a style as an effeminate and
+hurried movement in the language, such as is produced by pyrrhics and
+trochees and dichorees falling in time together into a regular dance
+measure. Such abuse of rhythm is sure to savour of coxcombry and petty
+affectation, and grows tiresome in the highest degree by a monotonous
+sameness of tone.
+
+2
+But its worst effect is that, as those who listen to a ballad have their
+attention distracted from its subject and can think of nothing but the
+tune, so an over-rhythmical passage does not affect the hearer by the
+meaning of its words, but merely by their cadence, so that sometimes,
+knowing where the pause must come, they beat time with the speaker,
+striking the expected close like dancers before the stop is reached.
+Equally undignified is the splitting up of a sentence into a number of
+little words and short syllables crowded too closely together and forced
+into cohesion,--hammered, as it were, successively together,--after the
+manner of mortice and tenon.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: I must refer to Weiske's Note, which I have followed,
+    for the probable interpretation of this extraordinary passage.]
+
+
+XLII
+
+Sublimity is further diminished by cramping the diction. Deformity
+instead of grandeur ensues from over-compression. Here I am not
+referring to a judicious compactness of phrase, but to a style which is
+dwarfed, and its force frittered away. To cut your words too short is to
+prune away their sense, but to be concise is to be direct. On the other
+hand, we know that a style becomes lifeless by over-extension, I mean by
+being relaxed to an unseasonable length.
+
+
+XLIII
+
+The use of mean words has also a strong tendency to degrade a lofty
+passage. Thus in that description of the storm in Herodotus the matter
+is admirable, but some of the words admitted are beneath the dignity of
+the subject; such, perhaps, as "the seas having _seethed_" because the
+ill-sounding phrase "having seethed" detracts much from its
+impressiveness: or when he says "the wind wore away," and "those who
+clung round the wreck met with an unwelcome end."[1] "Wore away" is
+ignoble and vulgar, and "unwelcome" inadequate to the extent of the
+disaster.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Hdt. vii. 188, 191, 13.]
+
+2
+Similarly Theopompus, after giving a fine picture of the Persian king's
+descent against Egypt, has exposed the whole to censure by certain
+paltry expressions. "There was no city, no people of Asia, which did not
+send an embassy to the king; no product of the earth, no work of art,
+whether beautiful or precious, which was not among the gifts brought to
+him. Many and costly were the hangings and robes, some purple, some
+embroidered, some white; many the tents, of cloth of gold, furnished
+with all things useful; many the tapestries and couches of great price.
+Moreover, there was gold and silver plate richly wrought, goblets and
+bowls, some of which might be seen studded with gems, and others besides
+worked in relief with great skill and at vast expense. Besides these
+there were suits of armour in number past computation, partly Greek,
+partly foreign, endless trains of baggage animals and fat cattle for
+slaughter, many bushels of spices, many panniers and sacks and sheets of
+writing-paper; and all other necessaries in the same proportion. And
+there was salt meat of all kinds of beasts in immense quantity, heaped
+together to such a height as to show at a distance like mounds and hills
+thrown up one against another."
+
+3
+He runs off from the grander parts of his subject to the meaner, and
+sinks where he ought to rise. Still worse, by his mixing up _panniers_
+and _spices_ and _bags_ with his wonderful recital of that vast and busy
+scene one would imagine that he was describing a kitchen. Let us suppose
+that in that show of magnificence some one had taken a set of wretched
+baskets and bags and placed them in the midst, among vessels of gold,
+jewelled bowls, silver plate, and tents and goblets of gold; how
+incongruous would have seemed the effect! Now just in the same way these
+petty words, introduced out of season, stand out like deformities and
+blots on the diction.
+
+4
+These details might have been given in one or two broad strokes, as when
+he speaks of mounds being heaped together. So in dealing with the other
+preparations he might have told us of "waggons and camels and a long
+train of baggage animals loaded with all kinds of supplies for the
+luxury and enjoyment of the table," or have mentioned "piles of grain of
+every species, and of all the choicest delicacies required by the art of
+the cook or the taste of the epicure," or (if he must needs be so very
+precise) he might have spoken of "whatever dainties are supplied by
+those who lay or those who dress the banquet."
+
+5
+In our sublimer efforts we should never stoop to what is sordid and
+despicable, unless very hard pressed by some urgent necessity. If we
+would write becomingly, our utterance should be worthy of our theme. We
+should take a lesson from nature, who when she planned the human frame
+did not set our grosser parts, or the ducts for purging the body, in our
+face, but as far as she could concealed them, "diverting," as Xenophon
+says, "those canals as far as possible from our senses,"[2] and thus
+shunning in any part to mar the beauty of the whole creature.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Mem._ i. 4. 6.]
+
+6
+However, it is not incumbent on us to specify and enumerate whatever
+diminishes a style. We have now pointed out the various means of giving
+it nobility and loftiness. It is clear, then, that whatever is contrary
+to these will generally degrade and deform it.
+
+
+XLIV
+
+There is still another point which remains to be cleared up, my dear
+Terentian, and on which I shall not hesitate to add some remarks, to
+gratify your inquiring spirit. It relates to a question which was
+recently put to me by a certain philosopher. "To me," he said, "in
+common, I may say, with many others, it is a matter of wonder that in
+the present age, which produces many highly skilled in the arts Of
+popular persuasion, many of keen and active powers, many especially rich
+in every pleasing gift of language, the growth of highly exalted and
+wide-reaching genius has with a few rare exceptions almost entirely
+ceased. So universal is the dearth of eloquence which prevails
+throughout the world.
+
+2
+"Must we really," he asked, "give credit to that oft-repeated assertion
+that democracy is the kind nurse of genius, and that high literary
+excellence has flourished with her prime and faded with her decay?
+Liberty, it is said, is all-powerful to feed the aspirations of high
+intellects, to hold out hope, and keep alive the flame of mutual rivalry
+and ambitious struggle for the highest place.
+
+3
+"Moreover, the prizes which are offered in every free state keep the
+spirits of her foremost orators whetted by perpetual exercise;[1] they
+are, as it were, ignited by friction, and naturally blaze forth freely
+because they are surrounded by freedom. But we of to-day," he continued,
+"seem to have learnt in our childhood the lessons of a benignant
+despotism, to have been cradled in her habits and customs from the time
+when our minds were still tender, and never to have tasted the fairest
+and most fruitful fountain of eloquence, I mean liberty. Hence we
+develop nothing but a fine genius for flattery.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Pericles in Thuc. ii., +athla gar hois keitai
+    aret�s megista tois de kai andres arista politeuousin+.]
+
+4
+"This is the reason why, though all other faculties are consistent with
+the servile condition, no slave ever became an orator; because in him
+there is a dumb spirit which will not be kept down: his soul is chained:
+he is like one who has learnt to be ever expecting a blow. For, as Homer
+says--
+
+5
+            "'The day of slavery
+  Takes half our manly worth away.'[2]
+
+"As, then (if what I have heard is credible), the cages in which those
+pigmies commonly called dwarfs are reared not only stop the growth of
+the imprisoned creature, but absolutely make him smaller by compressing
+every part of his body, so all despotism, however equitable, may be
+defined as a cage of the soul and a general prison."
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ xvii. 322.]
+
+6
+My answer was as follows: "My dear friend, it is so easy, and so
+characteristic of human nature, always to find fault with the
+present.[3] Consider, now, whether the corruption of genius is to be
+attributed, not to a world-wide peace,[4] but rather to the war within
+us which knows no limit, which engages all our desires, yes, and still
+further to the bad passions which lay siege to us to-day, and make utter
+havoc and spoil of our lives. Are we not enslaved, nay, are not our
+careers completely shipwrecked, by love of gain, that fever which rages
+unappeased in us all, and love of pleasure?--one the most debasing, the
+other the most ignoble of the mind's diseases.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Comp. Byron, "The good old times,--all times when old
+    are good."]
+
+    [Footnote 4: A euphemism for "a world-wide tyranny."]
+
+7
+"When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such
+high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches,
+can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up
+with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled is dogged by
+Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his footsteps: and
+as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she enters with him
+and makes her abode with him. And after a time they build their nests
+(to use a wise man's words[5]) in that corner of life, and speedily set
+about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and Wantonness, no
+base-born children, but their very own. And if these also, the offspring
+of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime, quickly they engender in
+the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and Lawlessness, and
+Shamelessness.
+
+    [Footnote 5: Plato, _Rep._ ix. 573, E.]
+
+8
+"Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational[6] in
+him, and neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable
+results. He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report;
+by slow degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated
+all round; all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is
+despised.
+
+    [Footnote 6: Reading +kano�ta+.]
+
+9
+"If a judge who passes sentence for a bribe can never more give a free
+and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes
+a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how
+can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is
+controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men's death and
+plan how to get a place in their wills, when we buy gain, from whatever
+source, each one of us, with our very souls in our slavish greed, how, I
+say, can we expect, in the midst of such a moral pestilence, that there
+is still left even one liberal and impartial critic, whose verdict will
+not be biassed by avarice in judging of those great works which live on
+through all time?
+
+10
+"Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to
+be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether against our
+neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge
+of calamity on the whole civilised world."
+
+11
+I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is
+wasted by that indifference which with a few exceptions runs through the
+whole of life. If we ever shake off our apathy[7] and apply ourselves to
+work, it is always with a view to pleasure or applause, not for that
+solid advantage which is worthy to be striven for and held in honour.
+
+    [Footnote 7: Comp. Thuc. vi. 26. 2, for this sense of
+    +analambanein+.]
+
+12
+We had better then leave this generation to its fate, and turn to what
+follows, which is the subject of the passions, to which we promised
+early in this treatise to devote a separate work.[8] They play an
+important part in literature generally, and especially in relation to
+the Sublime.
+
+    [Footnote 8: iii. 5.]
+
+
+
+
+NOTES ON LONGINUS
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+Citation format is as in the printed text. The last number in each
+group appears to refer to clauses in the original Greek; there is no
+correspondence with line numbers in the printed book.]
+
+
+I. 2. 10. There seems to be an antithesis implied in +politikois
+tethe�r�kenai+, referring to the well-known distinction between the
++praktikos bios+ and the +the�r�tikos bios+.
+
+4. 27. I have ventured to return to the original reading, +dieph�tisen+,
+though all editors seem to have adopted the correction +diephor�sen+, on
+account, I suppose, of +sk�ptou+. To _illumine_ a large subject, as a
+landscape is lighted up at night by a flash of lightning, is surely a
+far more vivid and intelligible expression than to _sweep away_ a
+subject.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. for the metaphor Goethe, _Dichtung und Wahrheit_,
+    B 8. "Wie vor einem Blitz erleuchteten sich uns alle Folgen dieses
+    herrlichen Gedankens."]
+
+
+III. 2. 17. +phorbeias d' ater+, lit. "without a cheek-strap," which was
+worn by trumpeters to assist them in regulating their breath. The line
+is contracted from two of Sophocles's, and Longinus's point is that the
+extravagance of Cleitarchus is not that of a strong but ill-regulated
+nature, but the ludicrous straining after grandeur of a writer at once
+feeble and pretentious.
+
+Ruhnken gives an extract from some inedited "versus politici" of
+Tzetzes, in which are some amusing specimens of those felicities of
+language Longinus is here laughing at. Stones are the "bones," rivers
+the "veins," of the earth; the moon is "the sigma of the sky" (+(lunate
+Sigma)+ the old form of +(Sigma)+); sailors, "the ants of ocean"; the
+strap of a pedlar's pack, "the girdle of his load"; pitch, "the ointment
+of doors," and so on.
+
+
+IV. 4. 4. The play upon the double meaning of +kora+, (1) maiden, (2)
+pupil of the eye, can hardly be kept in English. It is worthy of remark
+that our text of Xenophon has +en tois thalamois+, a perfectly natural
+expression. Such a variation would seem to point to a very early
+corruption of ancient manuscripts, or to extraordinary inaccuracy on the
+part of Longinus, who, indeed, elsewhere displays great looseness of
+citation, confusing together totally different passages.
+
+9. +itamon+. I can make nothing of this word. Various corrections have
+been suggested, but with little certainty.
+
+5. 10. +h�s ph�riou tinos ephaptomenos+, literally, "as though he were
+laying hands on a piece of stolen property." The point seems to be, that
+plagiarists, like other robbers, show no discrimination in their
+pilferings, seizing what comes first to hand.
+
+
+VIII. 1. 20. +edaphous+. I have avoided the rather harsh confusion of
+metaphor which this word involves, taken in connection with +p�gai+.
+
+
+IX. 2. 13. +ap�ch�ma+, properly an "echo," a metaphor rather Greek than
+English.
+
+
+X. 2. 13. +chl�rotera de poias+, lit. "more wan than grass"--of the
+sickly yellow hue which would appear on a dark Southern face under the
+influence of violent emotion.[2]
+
+    [Footnote 2: The notion of _yellowness_, as associated with grass,
+    is made intelligible by a passage in Longus, i. 17. 19. +chl�roteron
+    to pros�pon �n poas _therin�s_.+]
+
+3. 6. The words +� gar ... tethn�ken+ are omitted in the translation,
+being corrupt, and giving no satisfactory sense. Ruhnken corrects,
++alogistei, phronei, ptoeitai, � p. o. t.+
+
+18. +splanchnoisi kak�s anaballomenoisi.+ Probably of sea-sickness; and
+so I find Ruhnken took it, quoting Plutarch, _T._ ii. 831: +emountos tou
+heterou, kai legontos ta splanchna ekballein+. An objection on the score
+of _taste_ would be out of place in criticising the laureate of the
+Arimaspi.
+
+
+X. 7. 2. +tas exochas aristind�n ekkath�rantes.+ +aristind�n
+ekkath�rantes+ appears to be a condensed phrase for +aristind�n
+eklexantes kai ekkath�rantes+. "Having chosen the most striking
+circumstances _par excellence_, and having relieved them of all
+superfluity," would perhaps give the literal meaning. Longinus seems
+conscious of some strangeness in his language, making a quasi-apology in
++h�s an eipoi tis+.
+
+3. Partly with the help of Toup, we may emend this corrupt passage as
+follows: +lumainetai gar tauta to holon, h�sanei ps�gmata � arai�mata,
+ta empoiounta megethos t� pros all�la schesei sunteteichismena+. +to
+holon+ here = "omnino." To explain the process of corruption, +ta+ would
+easily drop out after the final +-ta+ in +arai�mata+; +sunoikonomoumena+
+is simply a corruption of +sunoikodomoumena+, which is itself a gloss on
++sunteteichismena+, having afterwards crept into the text; +megethos+
+became corrupted into +megeth�+ through the error of some copyist, who
+wished to make it agree with +empoiounta+. The whole maybe translated:
+"Such [interpolations], like so many patches or rents, mar altogether
+the effect of those details which, by being built up in an uninterrupted
+series [+t� pros all�la sch. suntet.+], produce sublimity in a work."
+
+
+XII. 4. 2. +en aut�+; the sense seems clearly to require +en haut�+.
+
+
+XIV. 3. 16. +m� ... huper�meron.+ Most of the editors insert +ou+ before
++phthenxaito+, thus ruining the sense of this fine passage. Longinus has
+just said that a writer should always work with an eye to posterity. If
+(he adds) he thinks of nothing but the taste and judgment of his
+contemporaries, he will have no chance of "leaving something so written
+that the world will not willingly let it die." A book, then, which is
++tou idiou biou kai chronou huper�meros+, is a book which is in advance
+of its own times. Such were the poems of Lucretius, of Milton, of
+Wordsworth.[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Compare the "Gefl�gelte Worte" in the Vorspiel to
+    Goethe's _Faust_:
+      Was gl�nzt, ist f�r den Augenblick geboren,
+      Das Aechte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren. ]
+
+
+XV. 5. 23. +pokoeideis kai amalaktous+, lit. "like raw, undressed wool."
+
+
+XVII. 1. 25. I construct the infinit. with +hupopton+, though the
+ordinary interpretation joins +to dia sch�mat�n panourgein+: "proprium
+est _verborum lenociniis_ suspicionem movere" (Weiske).
+
+2. 8. +paral�phtheisa+. This word has given much trouble; but is it not
+simply a continuation of the metaphor implied in +epikouria+?
++paralambanein tina+, in the sense of calling in an ally, is a common
+enough use. This would be clearer if we could read +paral�phtheisi+. I
+have omitted +tou panourgein+ in translating, as it seems to me to have
+evidently crept in from above (p. 33, l. 25). +h� tou panourgein
+techn�+, "the art of playing the villain," is surely, in Longinus's own
+words, +deinon kai ekphulon+, "a startling novelty" of language.
+
+12. +t� ph�ti aut�+. The words may remind us of Shelley's "Like a poet
+_hidden in the light of thought_."
+
+
+XVIII. 1. 24. The distinction between +peusis+ or +pusma+ and +er�t�sis+
+or +er�t�ma+ is said to be that +er�t�sis+ is a simple question, which
+can be answered yes or no; +peusis+ a fuller inquiry, requiring a fuller
+answer. _Aquila Romanus in libro de figuris sententiarum et
+elocutionis_, � 12 (Weiske).
+
+
+XXXI. 1. 11. +anankophag�sai+, properly of the fixed diet of athletes,
+which seems to have been excessive in quantity, and sometimes nauseous
+in quality. I do not know what will be thought of my rendering here; it
+is certainly not elegant, but it was necessary to provide some sort of
+equivalent to the Greek. "Swallow," which the other translators give, is
+quite inadequate. We require a threefold combination--(1) To swallow (2)
+something nasty (3) for the sake of prospective advantage.
+
+
+XXXII. 1. 3. The text is in great confusion here. Following a hint in
+Vahlin's critical note, I have transposed the words thus: +ho kairos de
+t�s chreias horos; entha ta path� cheimarrou dik�n elaunetai, kai t�n
+polupl�theian aut�n h�s anankaian entautha sunephelketai; ho gar D.,
+horos kai t�n toiout�n, anthr�poi, ph�sin, k.t.l.+
+
+8. 16. Some words have probably been lost here. The sense of +pl�n+, and
+the absence of antithesis to +houtos men+, point in this direction. The
+original reading may have been something of this sort: +pl�n houtos men
+hupo philoneikias _par�geto_; all' oude ta themata tith�sin
+homologoumena+, the sense being that, though we may allow something to
+the partiality of Caecilius, yet this does not excuse him from arguing
+on premises which are unsound.
+
+
+XXXIV. 4. 10. +ho de enthen hel�n, k.t.l.+ Probably the darkest place in
+the whole treatise. Toup cites a remarkable passage from Dionysius of
+Halicarnassus, from which we may perhaps conclude that Longinus is
+referring here to Thucydides, the traditional master of Demosthenes. _De
+Thucyd._ � 53, +Rh�tor�n de D�mosthen�s monos Thoukudidou z�l�tos
+egeneto kata polla, kai proseth�ke tois politikois logois, par' ekeinou
+lab�n, has oute Antiph�n, oute Lusias, oute Isokrat�s, hoi pr�teusantes
+t�n tote rh�tor�n, eschon aretas, ta tach� leg�, kai tas sustrophas, kai
+tous tonous, kai to struphnon, kai t�n exegeirousan ta path� deinot�ta.+
+So close a parallel can hardly be accidental.
+
+
+XXXV. 4. 5. Longinus probably had his eye on the splendid lines in
+Pindar's _First Pythian_:
+
+  +tas [Aitnas] ereugontai men aplatou puros hagnotatai
+  ek much�n pagai, potamoi d'
+  hameraisin men procheonti rhoon kapnou--
+  aith�n'; all' en orphnaisin petras
+  phoinissa kulindomena phlox es bathei-
+  an pherei pontou plaka sun patag�+,
+
+which I find has also been pointed out by Toup, who remarks that
++hagnotatai+ confirms the reading +autou monou+ here, which has been
+suspected without reason.
+
+
+XXXVIII. 2. 7. Comp. Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A: +Tisian de Gorgian te
+easomen heudein, hoi pro t�n al�th�n ta eikota eidon h�s tim�tea mallon,
+ta te au smikra megala kai ta megala smikra poiousi phainesthai dia
+rh�m�n logou, kaina te archai�s ta t' enantia kain�s, suntomian te log�n
+kai apeira m�k� peri pant�n aneuron.+
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX
+
+SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LESS KNOWN WRITERS
+MENTIONED IN THE TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+AMMONIUS.--Alexandrian grammarian, carried on the school of Aristarchus
+previously to the reign of Augustus. The allusion here is to a work on
+the passages in which Plato has imitated Homer. (Suidas, _s.v._; Schol.
+on Hom. Il. ix. 540, quoted by Jahn.)
+
+AMPHIKRATES.--Author of a book _On Famous Men_, referred to by
+Athenaeus, xiii. 576, G, and Diog. Laert. ii. 101. C. Muller, _Hist. Gr.
+Fragm._ iv. p. 300, considers him to be the Athenian rhetorician who,
+according to Plutarch (_Lucullus_, c. 22), retired to Seleucia, and
+closed his life at the Court of Kleopatra, daughter of Mithridates and
+wife of Tigranes (Pauly, _Real-Encyclop�die der classischen
+Alterthumswissenschaft_). Plutarch tells a story illustrative of his
+arrogance. Being asked by the Seleucians to open a school of rhetoric,
+he replied, "A dish is not large enough for a dolphin" (+h�s oude lekan�
+delphina ch�roi�+), v. _Luculli_, c. 22, quoted by Pearce.
+
+ARISTEAS.--A name involved in a mist of fable. According to Suidas he
+was a contemporary of Kroesus, though Herodotus assigns to him a much
+remoter antiquity. The latter authority describes him as visiting the
+northern peoples of Europe and recording his travels in an epic poem, a
+fragment of which is given here by Longinus. The passage before us
+appears to be intended as the words of some Arimaspian, who, as
+belonging to a remote inland race, expresses his astonishment that any
+men could be found bold enough to commit themselves to the mercy of the
+sea, and tries to describe the terror of human beings placed in such a
+situation (Pearce ad. l.; Abicht on Hdt. iv. 12; Suidas, _s.v._)
+
+BAKCHYLIDES, nephew and pupil of the great Simonides, flourished about
+460 B.C. He followed his uncle to the Court of Hiero at Syracuse, and
+enjoyed the patronage of that despot. After Hiero's death he returned to
+his home in Keos; but finding himself discontented with the mode of life
+pursued in a free Greek community, for which his experiences at Hiero's
+Court may well have disqualified him, he retired to Peloponnesus, where
+he died. His works comprise specimens of almost every kind of lyric
+composition, as practised by the Greeks of his time. Horace is said to
+have imitated him in his _Prophecy of Nereus_, c. I. xv. (Pauly, as
+above). So far as we can judge from what remains of his works, he was
+distinguished rather by elegance than by force. A considerable fragment
+on the Blessings of Peace has been translated by Mr. J. A. Symonds in
+his work on the Greek poets. He is made the subject of a very bitter
+allusion by Pindar (Ol. ii. s. fin. c. Schol.) We may suppose that the
+stern and lofty spirit of Pindar had little sympathy with the "tearful"
+(Catullus, xxxviii.) strains of Simonides or his imitators.
+
+CAECILIUS, a native of Kale Akte in Sicily, and hence known as Caecilius
+Kalaktinus, lived in Rome at the time of Augustus. He is mentioned with
+distinction as a learned Greek rhetorician and grammarian, and was the
+author of numerous works, frequently referred to by Plutarch and other
+later writers. He may be regarded as one of the most distinguished Greek
+rhetoricians of his time. His works, all of which have perished,
+comprised, among many others, commentaries on Antipho and Lysias;
+several treatises on Demosthenes, among which is a dissertation on the
+genuine and spurious speeches, and another comparing that orator with
+Cicero; "On the Distinction between Athenian and Asiatic Eloquence"; and
+the work on the Sublime, referred to by Longinus (Pauly). The criticism
+of Longinus on the above work may be thus summed up: Caecilius is
+censured (1) as failing to rise to the dignity of his subject; (2) as
+missing the cardinal points; and (3) as failing in practical utility. He
+wastes his energy in tedious attempts to define the Sublime, but does
+not tell us how it is to be attained (I. i.) He is further blamed for
+omitting to deal with the Pathetic (VIII. i. _sqq._) He allows only two
+metaphors to be employed together in the same passage (XXXII. ii.) He
+extols Lysias as a far greater writer than Plato (_ib._ viii.), and is a
+bitter assailant of Plato's style (_ib._) On the whole, he seems to have
+been a cold and uninspired critic, finding his chief pleasure in minute
+verbal details, and incapable of rising to an elevated and extensive
+view of his subject.
+
+ERATOSTHENES, a native of Cyrene, born in 275 B.C.; appointed by Ptolemy
+III. Euergetes as the successor of Kallimachus in the post of librarian
+in the great library of Alexandria. He was the teacher of Aristophanes
+of Byzantium, and his fame as a man of learning is testified by the
+various fanciful titles which were conferred on him, such as "The
+Pentathlete," "The second Plato," etc. His great work was a treatise on
+geography (L�bker).
+
+GORGIAS of Leontini, according to some authorities a pupil of
+Empedokles, came, when already advanced in years, as ambassador from his
+native city to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.) Here he attracted
+notice by a novel style of eloquence. Some time after he settled
+permanently in Greece, wandering from city to city, and acquiring wealth
+and fame by practising and teaching rhetoric. We find him last in
+Larissa, where he died at the age of a hundred in 375 B.C. As a teacher
+of eloquence Gorgias belongs to what is known as the Sicilian school, in
+which he followed the steps of his predecessors, Korax and Tisias. At
+the time when this school arose the Greek ear was still accustomed to
+the rhythm and beat of poetry, and the whole rhetorical system of the
+Gorgian school (compare the phrases +gorgieia sch�mata+, +gorgiazein+)
+is built on a poetical plan (L�bker, _Reallexikon des classischen
+Alterthums_). Hermogenes, as quoted by Jahn, appears to classify him
+among the "hollow pedants" (+hupoxuloi sophistai+), "who," he says,
+"talk of vultures as 'living tombs,' to which they themselves would best
+be committed, and indulge in many other such frigid conceits." (With the
+metaphor censured by Longinus compare Achilles Tatius, III. v. 50, ed.
+Didot.) See also Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A.
+
+HEGESIAS of Magnesia, rhetorician and historian, contemporary of Timaeus
+(300 B.C.) He belongs to the period of the decline of Greek learning,
+and Cicero treats him as the representative of the decline of taste. His
+style was harsh and broken in character, and a parody on the Old Attic.
+He wrote a life of Alexander the Great, of which Plutarch (_Alexander_,
+c. 3) gives the following specimen: "On the day of Alexander's birth the
+temple of Artemis in Ephesus was burnt down, a coincidence which
+occasions Hegesias to utter a conceit frigid enough to extinguish the
+conflagration. 'It was natural,' he says, 'that the temple should be
+burnt down, as Artemis was engaged with bringing Alexander into the
+world'" (Pauly, with the references).
+
+HEKATAEUS of Miletus, the logographer; born in 549 B.C., died soon after
+the battle of Plataea. He was the author of two works--(1) +periodos
+g�s+; and (2) +gene�logiai+. The _Periodos_ deals in two books, first
+with Europe, then with Asia and Libya. The quotation in the text is from
+his genealogies (L�bker).
+
+ION of Chios, poet, historian, and philosopher, highly distinguished
+among his contemporaries, and mentioned by Strabo among the celebrated
+men of the island. He won the tragic prize at Athens in 452 B.C., and
+Aristophanes (_Peace_, 421 B.C.) speaks of him as already dead. He was
+not less celebrated as an elegiac poet, and we still possess some
+specimens of his elegies, which are characterised by an Anacreontic
+spirit, a cheerful, joyous tone, and even by a certain degree of
+inspiration. He wrote also Skolia, Hymns, and Epigrams, and was a pretty
+voluminous writer in prose (Pauly). Compare the Scholiast on Ar.
+_Peace_, 801.
+
+KALLISTHENES of Olynthus, a near relative of Aristotle; born in 360, and
+educated by the philosopher as fellow-pupil with Alexander, afterwards
+the Great. He subsequently visited Athens, where he enjoyed the
+friendship of Theophrastus, and devoted himself to history and natural
+philosophy. He afterwards accompanied Alexander on his Asiatic
+expedition, but soon became obnoxious to the tyrant on account of his
+independent and manly bearing, which he carried even to the extreme of
+rudeness and arrogance. He at last excited the enmity of Alexander to
+such a degree that the latter took the opportunity afforded by the
+conspiracy of Hermolaus, in which Kallisthenes was accused of
+participating, to rid himself of his former school companion, whom he
+caused to be put to death. He was the author of various historical and
+scientific works. Of the latter two are mentioned--(1) _On the Nature of
+the Eye_; (2) _On the Nature of Plants_. Among his historical works are
+mentioned (1) the _Phocian War_ (read "Phocicum" for v. l. "Troikum" in
+Cic. _Epp. ad Div._ v. 12); (2) a _History of Greece_ in ten books; (3)
++ta Persika+, apparently identical with the description of Alexander's
+march, of which we still possess fragments. As an historian he seems to
+have displayed an undue love of recording signs and wonders. Polybius,
+however (vi. 45), classes him among the best historical writers. His
+style is said by Cicero (_de Or._ ii. 14) to approximate to the
+rhetorical (Pauly).
+
+KLEITARCHUS, a contemporary of Alexander, accompanied that monarch on
+his Asiatic expedition, and wrote a history of the same in twelve books,
+which must have included at least a short retrospect on the early
+history of Asia. His talents are spoken of in high terms, but his credit
+as an historian is held very light--"probatur ingenium, fides
+infamatur," Quint. x. 1, 74. Cicero also (_de Leg._ i. 2) ranks him very
+low. That his credit as an historian was sacrificed to a childish
+credulity and a foolish love of fable and adventure is sufficiently
+testified by the pretty numerous fragments which still remain (Pauly).
+Demetrius Phalereus, quoted by Pearce, quotes a grandiloquent
+description of the wasp taken from Kleitarchus, "feeding on the
+mountainside, her home the hollow oak."
+
+MATRIS, a native of Thebes, author of a panegyric on Herakles, whether
+in verse or prose is uncertain. In one passage Athenaeus speaks of him
+as an Athenian, but this must be a mistake. Toup restores a verse from
+an allusion in Diodorus Siculus (i. 24), which, if genuine, would agree
+well with the description given of him by Longinus: +�raklea kaleesken,
+hoti kleos esche dia H�ran+ (see Toup ad Long. III. ii.)
+
+PHILISTUS of Syracuse, a relative of the elder Dionysius, whom he
+assisted with his wealth in his attack on the liberty of that city, and
+remained with him until 386 B.C., when he was banished by the jealous
+suspicions of the tyrant. He retired to Epirus, where he remained until
+Dionysius's death. The younger Dionysius recalled him, wishing to employ
+him in the character of supporter against Dion. By his instrumentality
+it would seem that Dion and Plato were banished from Syracuse. He
+commanded the fleet in the struggle between Dion and Dionysius, and lost
+a battle, whereupon he was seized and put to death by the people. During
+his banishment he wrote his historical work, +ta Sikelika+, divided into
+two parts and numbering eleven books. The first division embraced the
+history of Sicily from the earliest times down to the capture of
+Agrigentum (seven books), and the remaining four books dealt with the
+life of Dionysius the elder. He afterwards added a supplement in two
+books, giving an account of the younger Dionysius, which he did not,
+however, complete. He is described as an imitator, though at a great
+distance, of Thucydides, and hence was known as "the little Thucydides."
+As an historian he is deficient in conscientiousness and candour; he
+appears as a partisan of Dionysius, and seeks to throw a veil over his
+discreditable actions. Still he belongs to the most important of the
+Greek historians (L�bker).
+
+THEODORUS of Gadara, a rhetorician in the first century after Christ;
+tutor of Tiberius, first in Rome, afterwards in Rhodes, from which town
+he called himself a Rhodian, and where Tiberius during his exile
+diligently attended his instruction. He was the author of various
+grammatical and other works, but his fame chiefly rested on his
+abilities as a teacher, in which capacity he seems to have had great
+influence (Pauly). He was the author of that famous description of
+Tiberius which is given by Suetonius (_Tib._ 57), +p�los haimati
+pephuramenos+, "A clod kneaded together with blood."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: A remarkable parallel, if not actually an imitation,
+    occurs in Goethe's _Faust_, "Du Spottgeburt von Dreck und Feuer."]
+
+THEOPOMPUS, a native of Chios; born 380 B.C. He came to Athens while
+still a boy, and studied eloquence under Isokrates, who is said, in
+comparing him with another pupil, Ephorus, to have made use of the image
+which we find in Longinus, c. ii. "Theopompus," he said, "needs the
+curb, Ephorus the spur" (Suidas, quoted by Jahn ad v.) He appeared with
+applause in various great cities as an advocate, but especially
+distinguished himself in the contest of eloquence instituted by
+Artemisia at the obsequies of her husband Mausolus, where he won the
+prize. He afterwards devoted himself to historical composition. His
+great work was a history of Greece, in which he takes up the thread of
+Thucydides's narrative, and carries it on uninterruptedly in twelve
+books down to the battle of Knidus, seventeen years later. Here he broke
+off, and began a new work entitled _The Philippics_, in fifty-eight
+books. This work dealt with the history of Greece in the Macedonian
+period, but was padded out to a preposterous bulk by all kinds of
+digressions on mythological, historical, or social topics. Only a few
+fragments remain. He earned an ill name among ancient critics by the
+bitterness of his censures, his love of the marvellous, and the
+inordinate length of his digressions. His style is by some critics
+censured as feeble, and extolled by others as clear, nervous, and
+elevated (L�bker and Pauly).
+
+TIMAEUS, a native of Tauromenium in Sicily; born about 352 B.C. Being
+driven out of Sicily by Agathokles, he lived a retired life for fifty
+years in Athens, where he composed his History. Subsequently he returned
+to Sicily, and died at the age of ninety-six in 256 B.C. His chief work
+was a _History of Sicily_ from the earliest times down to the 129th
+Olympiad. It numbered sixty-eight books, and consisted of two principal
+divisions, whose limits cannot now be ascertained. In a separate work he
+handled the campaigns of Pyrrhus, and also wrote _Olympionikae_,
+probably dealing with chronological matters. Timaeus has been severely
+criticised and harshly condemned by the ancients, especially by
+Polybius, who denies him every faculty required by the historical writer
+(xii. 3-15, 23-28). And though Cicero differs from this judgment, yet it
+may be regarded as certain that Timaeus was better qualified for the
+task of learned compilation than for historical research, and held no
+distinguished place among the historians of Greece. His works have
+perished, only a few fragments remaining (L�bker).
+
+ZOILUS, a Greek rhetorician, native of Amphipolis in Macedonia, in the
+time probably of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247 B.C.), who is said by
+Vitruvius to have crucified him for his abuse of Homer. He won the name
+of Homeromastix, "the scourge of Homer," and was also known as +ku�n
+rh�torikos+, "the dog of rhetoric," on account of his biting sarcasm;
+and his name (as in the case of the English Dennis) came to be used to
+signify in general a carping and malicious critic. Suidas mentions two
+works of his, written with the object of injuring or destroying the fame
+of Homer--(1) _Nine Books against Homer_; and (2) _Censures on Homer_
+(Pauly).
+
+  [The facts contained in the above short notices are taken chiefly
+  from L�bker's _Reallexikon des classischen Alterthums_, and the
+  very copious and elaborate _Real-Encyclop�die der classischen
+  Alterthumswissenschaft_, edited by Pauly. I have here to acknowledge
+  the kindness of Dr. Wollseiffen, Gymnasialdirektor in Crefeld, in
+  placing at my disposal the library of the Crefeld Gymnasium, but for
+  which these biographical notes, which were put together at the
+  suggestion of Mr. Lang, could not have been compiled.
+    CREFELD, _31st July 1890_.]
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_
+
+
+
+
+CLASSICAL LIBRARY.
+
+Texts, Edited with Introductions and Notes, for the use of Advanced
+Students; Commentaries and Translations.
+
+
+�SCHYLUS.--THE SUPPLICES. A Revised Text, with Translation. By T. G.
+  TUCKER, M.A., Professor of Classical Philology in the University of
+  Melbourne.    8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+THE SEVEN AGAINST THEBES. With Translation. By A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.,
+  Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.    8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+AGAMEMNON. With Translation. By A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.    8vo.    12s.
+
+AGAMEMNON, CHOEPHOROE, AND EUMENIDES. By A. O. PRICKARD, M.A., Fellow
+  and Tutor of New College, Oxford.    8vo.    [_In preparation._
+
+
+ARISTOTLE.--THE METAPHYSICS. BOOK I. Translated by a Cambridge
+  Graduate.    8vo.    5s.
+
+THE POLITICS. Translated by Rev. J. E. C. WELLDON, M.A., Headmaster of
+  Harrow.    Cr. 8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+THE RHETORIC. Translated by the same.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+AN INTRODUCTION TO ARISTOTLE'S RHETORIC. With Analysis, Notes, and
+  Appendices. By E. M. COPE, Fellow and late Tutor of Trinity College,
+  Cambridge.    8vo.    14s.
+
+THE ETHICS. Translated by Rev. J. E. C. WELLDON, M.A.    Cr. 8vo.
+                                                 [_In preparation._
+
+THE SOPHISTICI ELENCHI. With Translation. By E. POSTE, M.A., Fellow of
+  Oriel College, Oxford.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+
+ATTIC ORATORS.--FROM ANTIPHON TO ISAEOS. By R. C. JEBB, Litt.D.,
+  Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Cambridge.    2 vols.
+  8vo.    25s.
+
+
+BABRIUS.--With Lexicon. By Rev. W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D.,
+  Headmaster of Westminster.    8vo.    12s. 6d.
+
+
+CICERO.--THE ACADEMICA. By J. S. REID, Litt.D., Fellow of Caius
+  College, Cambridge.    8vo.    15s.
+
+THE ACADEMICS. Translated by the same.    8vo.    5s. 6d.
+
+SELECT LETTERS. After the Edition of ALBERT WATSON, M.A. Translated by
+  G. E. JEANS, M.A., Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford.    Cr. 8vo.
+  10s. 6d.
+
+
+EURIPIDES.--MEDEA. Edited by A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.    8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+IPHIGENIA IN AULIS. Edited by E. B. ENGLAND, M.A.    8vo.
+                                                      [_In the Press._
+
+
+HERODOTUS.--BOOKS I.-III. THE ANCIENT EMPIRES OF THE EAST. Edited by
+  A. H. SAYCE, Deputy-Professor of Comparative Philology, Oxford.
+  8vo.    16s.
+
+BOOKS IV.-IX. Edited by R. W. MACAN, M.A., Lecturer in Ancient History
+  at Brasenose College, Oxford.    8vo.             [_In preparation._
+
+THE HISTORY. Translated by G. C. MACAULAY, M.A.    2 vols.    Cr. 8vo.
+  18s.
+
+
+HOMER.--THE ILIAD. By WALTER LEAF, Litt.D.    8vo.    Books I.-XII.
+  14s.    Books XIII.-XXIV. 14s.
+
+THE ILIAD. Translated into English Prose by ANDREW LANG, M.A., WALTER
+  LEAF, Litt.D., and ERNEST MYERS, M.A.    Cr. 8vo.    12s. 6d.
+
+THE ODYSSEY. Done into English by S. H. BUTCHER, M.A., Professor of
+  Greek in the University of Edinburgh, and ANDREW LANG, M.A.
+  Cr. 8vo.    6s.
+
+
+HORACE.--STUDIES, LITERARY AND HISTORICAL, IN THE ODES OF HORACE. By
+  A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+
+JUVENAL.--THIRTEEN SATIRES OF JUVENAL. By JOHN E. B. MAYOR, M.A.,
+  Professor of Latin in the University of Cambridge.    Cr. 8vo.
+  2 vols. 10s. 6d. each.    Vol. I. 10s. 6d.    Vol. II. 10s. 6d.
+
+THIRTEEN SATIRES. Translated by ALEX. LEEPER, M.A., LL.D., Warden of
+  Trinity College, Melbourne.    Cr. 8vo.    3s. 6d.
+
+
+KTESIAS.--THE FRAGMENTS OF THE PERSIKA OF KTESIAS. By JOHN GILMORE,
+  M.A.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+
+LIVY.--BOOKS XXI.-XXV. Translated by A. J. CHURCH, M.A., and W. J.
+  BRODRIBB, M.A.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+PAUSANIAS.--DESCRIPTION OF GREECE. Translated with Commentary by
+  J. G. FRAZER, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.
+                                                    [_In preparation._
+
+
+PHRYNICHUS.--THE NEW PHRYNICHUS; being a Revised Text of the Ecloga of
+  the Grammarian Phrynichus. With Introduction and Commentary by Rev.
+  W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D., Headmaster of Westminster.    8vo.
+  18s.
+
+
+PINDAR.--THE EXTANT ODES OF PINDAR. Translated by ERNEST MYERS, M.A.
+  Cr. 8vo.    5s.
+
+THE NEMEAN ODES. By J. B. BURY, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College,
+  Dublin.    8vo.                                     [_In the Press._
+
+
+PLATO.--PH�DO. By R. D. ARCHER-HIND, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College,
+  Cambridge.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+PH�DO. By W. D. GEDDES, LL.D., Principal of the University of
+  Aberdeen.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+TIMAEUS. With Translation. By R. D. ARCHER-HIND, M.A.    8vo.    16s.
+
+THE REPUBLIC OF PLATO. Translated by J. LL. DAVIES, M.A., and D. J.
+  VAUGHAN, M.A.    18mo.    4s. 6d.
+
+EUTHYPHRO, APOLOGY, CRITO, AND PH�DO. Translated by F. J. CHURCH.
+  18mo.    4s. 6d.
+
+PH�DRUS, LYSIS, AND PROTAGORAS. Translated by J. WRIGHT, M.A.    18mo.
+  4s. 6d.
+
+
+PLAUTUS.--THE MOSTELLARIA. By WILLIAM RAMSAY, M.A. Edited by G. G.
+  RAMSAY, M.A., Professor of Humanity in the University of Glasgow.
+  8vo.    14s.
+
+
+PLINY.--CORRESPONDENCE WITH TRAJAN. C. Plinii Caecilii Secundi
+  Epistul� ad Traianum Imperatorem cum Eiusdem Responsis. By E. G.
+  HARDY, M.A.    8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+
+POLYBIUS.--THE HISTORIES OF POLYBIUS. Translated by E. S. SHUCKBURGH,
+  M.A.    2 vols.    Cr. 8vo.    24s.
+
+
+TACITUS.--THE ANNALS. By G. O. HOLBROOKE, M.A., Professor of Latin in
+  Trinity College, Hartford, U.S.A. With Maps.    8vo.    16s.
+
+THE ANNALS. Translated by A. J. CHURCH, M.A., and W. J. BRODRIBB, M.A.
+  With Maps.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+THE HISTORIES. By Rev. W. A. SPOONER, M.A., Fellow of New College,
+  Oxford.    8vo.                                     [_In the Press._
+
+THE HISTORY. Translated by A. J. CHURCH, M.A., and W. J. BRODRIBB,
+  M.A. With Map.    Cr. 8vo.    6s.
+
+THE AGRICOLA AND GERMANY, WITH THE DIALOGUE ON ORATORY. Translated by
+  A. J. CHURCH, M.A., and W. J. BRODRIBB, M.A. With Maps.    Cr. 8vo.
+  4s. 6d.
+
+
+THEOCRITUS, BION, AND MOSCHUS. Translated by A. LANG, M.A.    18mo.
+  4s. 6d.
+
+    [*] Also an Edition on Large Paper.    Cr. 8vo.    9s.
+
+
+THUCYDIDES.--BOOK IV. A Revision of the Text, Illustrating the
+  Principal Causes of Corruption in the Manuscripts of this Author.
+  By Rev. W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D., Headmaster of Westminster.
+  8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+VIRGIL.--THE �NEID. Translated by J. W. MACKAIL, M.A., Fellow of
+  Balliol College, Oxford.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+XENOPHON.--Translated by H. G. DAKYNS, M.A. In four vols. Vol. I.,
+  containing "The Anabasis" and Books I. and II. of "The Hellenica."
+  Cr. 8vo.    10s. 6d.                       [Vol. II. _in the Press._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+           *       *       *       *
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Errata Noted by Transcriber:
+
+The spellings "Heracles" and "Herakles" each occur twice.
+
+certain tasteless conceits blamed / in Plato
+  _so in original: "on Plato"?_
+
+I.2 And since...
+  _text shows chapter break in previous line, "writer's ... instead"_
+
+... the very maidens in their eyes."[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
++... ch�ris hekast� t�n eid�n+
+  _text reads_ hekasi�  [_alternate citation form: 1449b_]
+
+XXIII.4 And in those words ...
+  _text shows chapter break in following line, "already ... to the"_
+
+... a good and temperate drink."[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
+XXXIX.3 though these are mere shadows...
+  _chapter break conjectural: no sentence-ends in English text_
+
+APPENDIX
+  _any punctuation anomalies, including missing full stops after
+  sentence-final parentheses, are as in the original_
+
+to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+the capture of Agrigentum (seven books)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: On the Sublime
+
+Author: Longinus
+
+Commentator: Andrew Lang
+
+Translator: H. L. Havell
+
+Release Date: March 10, 2006 [EBook #17957]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE SUBLIME ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Louise Hope, Justin Kerk and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
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+</pre>
+
+
+<div class = "mynote">
+Transcriber’s Note:<br>
+<br>
+This e-text contains accented Greek:
+<div class = "indent1 nospace">
+Λογγίνου περὶ Ὕψους</div>
+If characters do not display properly, you may have an incompatible
+browser or unavailable fonts. First, make sure that the browser’s
+“character set” or “file encoding” is set to Unicode (UTF-8). You may
+also need to change your browser’s default font.<br>
+A few typographical errors have been corrected. They have been
+marked in the text with <ins class = "correction" title =
+"like this">mouse-hover popups</ins>. Transliterations of Greek text
+are given similarly <span title = "hôs">ὥς</span>.
+</div>
+
+<hr>
+
+<h1>LONGINUS</h1>
+
+<h1>ON THE SUBLIME</h1>
+
+<br>
+
+<h5>TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY</h5>
+<h4>H.&nbsp;L. HAVELL, B.A.</h4>
+<h6>FORMERLY SCHOLAR OF UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, OXFORD</h6>
+
+<h5>WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY</h5>
+<h4>ANDREW LANG</h4>
+
+<br>
+<br>
+
+<h4><b>London</b></h4>
+<h5 class = "nospace">MACMILLAN AND CO.</h5>
+<h6 class = "nospace">AND NEW YORK</h6>
+<h5 class = "nospace">1890</h5>
+<h6 class = "nospace"><i>All rights reserved</i></h6>
+
+<hr class = "mid">
+
+<h5>TO</h5>
+<h4>S.H. BUTCHER, <span class = "smallcaps">Esq.</span>, LL.D.</h4>
+<h6>PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH<br>
+FORMERLY FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE<br>
+AND OF UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, OXFORD</h6>
+<h5>THIS ATTEMPT<br>
+TO PRESENT THE GREAT THOUGHTS OF LONGINUS<br>
+IN AN ENGLISH FORM<br>
+IS DEDICATED<br>
+IN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF THE KIND SUPPORT<br>
+BUT FOR WHICH IT MIGHT NEVER HAVE SEEN THE LIGHT<br>
+AND OF THE BENEFITS OF THAT<br>
+INSTRUCTION TO WHICH IT LARGELY OWES<br>
+WHATEVER OF SCHOLARLY QUALITY IT MAY POSSESS</h5>
+
+<hr class = "mid">
+
+<span class = "pagenum">vii</span>
+<h4 class = "chapter">TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE</h4>
+
+
+<p><span class = "firstword">The</span>
+text which has been followed in the present Translation is that of Jahn
+(Bonn, 1867), revised by Vahlen, and republished in 1884. In several
+instances it has been found necessary to diverge from Vahlen’s readings,
+such divergencies being duly pointed out in the Notes.</p>
+
+<p>One word as to the aim and scope of the present Translation. My
+object throughout has been to make Longinus speak in English, to
+preserve, as far as lay in my power, the noble fire and lofty tone of
+the original. How to effect this, without being betrayed into a loose
+paraphrase, was an exceedingly difficult problem. The style of Longinus
+is in a high degree original, occasionally running into strange
+eccentricities of language; and no one who has not made the attempt can
+realise the difficulty of giving anything like an adequate version of
+the more elaborate passages. These considerations I submit to those to
+whom I may seem at first sight to have handled my text too freely.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "pagenum">viii</span>
+My best thanks are due to Dr. Butcher, Professor of Greek in the
+University of Edinburgh, who from first to last has shown a lively
+interest in the present undertaking which I can never sufficiently
+acknowledge. He has read the Translation throughout, and acting on his
+suggestions I have been able in numerous instances to bring my version
+into a closer conformity with the original.</p>
+
+<p>I have also to acknowledge the kindness of the distinguished writer
+who has contributed the Introduction, and who, in spite of the heavy
+demands on his time, has lent his powerful support to help on the work
+of one who was personally unknown to him.</p>
+
+<p>In conclusion, I may be allowed to express a hope that the present
+attempt may contribute something to reawaken an interest in an unjustly
+neglected classic.</p>
+
+
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">ix</span>
+<h4 class = "chapter">ANALYSIS</h4>
+
+
+<p><span class = "firstword">The</span>
+Treatise on the Sublime may be divided into six Parts, as
+follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>I.&mdash;cc. i, ii. The Work of Caecilius. Definition of the Sublime.
+Whether Sublimity falls within the rules of&nbsp;Art.</p>
+
+<p>II.&mdash;cc. iii-v. [The beginning lost.] Vices of Style opposed to
+the Sublime: Affectation, Bombast, False Sentiment, Frigid Conceits. The
+cause of such defects.</p>
+
+<p>III.&mdash;cc. vi, vii. The true Sublime, what it is, and how
+distinguishable.</p>
+
+<p>IV.&mdash;cc. viii-xl. Five Sources of the Sublime (how Sublimity is
+related to Passion, c. viii, §§ 2-4).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(i.) Grandeur of Thought, cc. ix-xv.</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>a.</i> As the natural outcome of nobility of soul. Examples
+(c&nbsp;ix).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>b.</i> Choice of the most striking circumstances. Sappho’s Ode
+(c.&nbsp;x).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>c.</i> Amplification. Plato compared with Demosthenes, Demosthenes
+with Cicero (cc. xi-xiii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>d.</i> Imitation (cc. xiii, xiv).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>e.</i> Imagery (c. xv).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+<span class = "pagenum">x</span>
+(ii.) Power of moving the Passions (omitted here, because dealt with in
+a separate work).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(iii.) Figures of Speech (cc. xvi-xxix).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>a.</i> The Figure of Adjuration (c. xvi). The Art to conceal Art (c.
+xvii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>b.</i> Rhetorical Question (c. xviii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>c.</i> Asyndeton (c. xix-xxi).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>d.</i> Hyperbaton (c. xxii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>e.</i> Changes of Number, Person, Tense, etc. (cc. xxiii-xxvii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>f.</i> Periphrasis (cc. xxviii, xxix).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(iv.) Graceful Expression (cc. xxx-xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>a.</i> Choice of Words (c. xxx).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>b.</i> Ornaments of Style (cc. xxxi, xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging3">
+(α) On the use of Familiar Words (c. xxxi).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging3">
+(β) Metaphors; accumulated; extract from the <i>Timaeus</i>; abuse of
+Metaphors; certain tasteless conceits blamed in Plato (c. xxxii).<br>
+[Hence arises a digression (cc. xxxiii-xxxvi) on the spirit in which we
+should judge of the faults of great authors. Demosthenes compared with
+Hyperides, Lysias with Plato. Sublimity, however far from faultless, to
+be always preferred to a tame correctness.]</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging3">
+(γ) Comparisons and Similes [lost] (c. xxxvii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging3">
+(δ) Hyperbole (c. xxxviii).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(v.) Dignity and Elevation of Structure (cc. xxxix,&nbsp;xl).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>a.</i> Modulation of Syllables (c. xxxix).</p>
+
+<p class = "hanging2">
+<i>b.</i> Composition (c. xl).</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "pagenum">xi</span>
+V.&mdash;cc. xli-xliii. Vices of Style destructive to Sublimity.</p>
+
+<table class = "analysis">
+<tr>
+<td>
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(i.) Abuse of Rhythm</p>
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(ii.) Broken and Jerky Clauses&nbsp;</p>
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(iii.) Undue Prolixity</p>
+</td>
+<td class = "middle">
+(cc. xli, xlii).</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class = "hanging1">
+(iv.) Improper Use of Familiar Words. Anti-climax. Example from
+Theopompus (c. xliii).</p>
+
+<p>
+VI.&mdash;Why this age is so barren of great authors&mdash;whether the
+cause is to be sought in a despotic form of government, or, as Longinus
+rather thinks, in the prevailing corruption of manners, and in the
+sordid and paltry views of life which almost universally prevail (c.
+xliv).</p>
+
+
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">xiii</span>
+<h4 class = "chapter">INTRODUCTION</h4>
+
+<h5>TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME</h5>
+
+
+<p><span class = "firstword">Boileau,</span>
+in his introduction to his version of the ancient Treatise on the
+Sublime, says that he is making no valueless present to his age. Not
+valueless, to a generation which talks much about style and method in
+literature, should be this new rendering of the noble fragment, long
+attributed to Longinus, the Greek tutor and political adviser of
+Zenobia. There is, indeed, a modern English version by Spurden,<a class
+= "tag" name = "tag_i1" href = "#note_i1">I.1</a> but that is now rare,
+and seldom comes into the market. Rare, too, is Vaucher’s critical essay
+(1854), which is unlucky, as the French and English books both contain
+valuable disquisitions on the age of the author of the Treatise. This
+excellent work has had curious fortunes. It is never quoted nor referred
+to by any extant classical writer, and, among the many books attributed
+by Suidas to Longinus, it is not mentioned.
+<span class = "pagenum">xiv</span>
+Decidedly the old world has left no more noble relic of criticism. Yet
+the date of the book is obscure, and it did not come into the hands of
+the learned in modern Europe till Robertelli and Manutius each published
+editions in 1544. From that time the Treatise has often been printed,
+edited, translated; but opinion still floats undecided about its origin
+and period. Does it belong to the age of Augustus, or to the age of
+Aurelian? Is the author the historical Longinus&mdash;the friend of
+Plotinus, the tutor of Porphyry, the victim of Aurelian,&mdash;or have
+we here a work by an unknown hand more than two centuries earlier?
+Manuscripts and traditions are here of little service. The oldest
+manuscript, that of Paris, is regarded as the parent of the rest. It is
+a small quarto of 414 pages, whereof 335 are occupied by the “Problems”
+of Aristotle. Several leaves have been lost, hence the fragmentary
+character of the essay. The Paris MS. has an index, first mentioning the
+“Problems,” and then <span title =
+"DIONUSIOU Ê LONGINOU PERI HUPSOUS">ΔΙΟΝΥΣΙΟΥ Η ΛΟΓΓΙΝΟΥ ΠΕΡΙ
+ΥΨΟΥΣ</span>, that is, “The work of Dionysius, or of Longinus, about the
+Sublime.”</p>
+
+<p>On this showing the transcriber of the MS. considered its authorship
+dubious. Supposing that the author was Dionysius, which of the many
+writers of that name was he? Again, if he was Longinus, how far does his
+work tally with the
+<span class = "pagenum">xv</span>
+characteristics ascribed to that late critic, and peculiar to
+his&nbsp;age?</p>
+
+<p>About this Longinus, while much is written, little is certainly
+known. Was he a descendant of a freedman of one of the Cassii Longini,
+or of an eastern family with a mixture of Greek and Roman blood? The
+author of the Treatise avows himself a Greek, and apologises, as a
+Greek, for attempting an estimate of Cicero. Longinus himself was the
+nephew and heir of Fronto, a Syrian rhetorician of Emesa. Whether
+Longinus was born there or not, and when he was born, are things
+uncertain. Porphyry, born in 233 <span class = "smallroman">A.D.</span>,
+was his pupil: granting that Longinus was twenty years Porphyry’s
+senior, he must have come into the world about 213 <span class =
+"smallroman">A.D.</span> He travelled much, studied in many cities, and
+was the friend of the mystic Neoplatonists, Plotinus and Ammonius. The
+former called him “a philologist, not a philosopher.” Porphyry shows us
+Longinus at a supper where the plagiarisms of Greek writers are
+discussed&mdash;a topic dear to trivial or spiteful mediocrity. He is
+best known by his death. As the Greek secretary of Zenobia he inspired a
+haughty answer from the queen to Aurelian, who therefore put him to
+death. Many rhetorical and philosophic treatises are ascribed to him,
+whereof only fragments survive. Did he write the Treatise on the
+Sublime? Modern students prefer to believe that the famous
+<span class = "pagenum">xvi</span>
+essay is, if not by Plutarch, as some hold, at least by some author of
+his age, the age of the early Caesars.</p>
+
+<p>The arguments for depriving Longinus, Zenobia’s tutor, of the credit
+of the Treatise lie on the surface, and may be briefly stated. He
+addresses his work as a letter to a friend, probably a Roman pupil,
+Terentianus, with whom he has been reading a work on the Sublime by
+Caecilius. Now Caecilius, a voluminous critic, certainly lived not later
+than Plutarch, who speaks of him with a sneer. It is unlikely then that
+an author, two centuries later, would make the old book of Caecilius the
+starting-point of his own. He would probably have selected some recent
+or even contemporary rhetorician. Once more, the writer of the Treatise
+of the Sublime quotes no authors later than the Augustan period. Had he
+lived as late as the historical Longinus he would surely have sought
+examples of bad style, if not of good, from the works of the Silver Age.
+Perhaps he would hardly have resisted the malicious pleasure of
+censuring the failures among whom he lived. On the other hand, if he
+cites no late author, no classical author cites him, in spite of the
+excellence of his book. But we can hardly draw the inference that he was
+of late date from this purely negative evidence.</p>
+
+<p>Again, he describes, in a very interesting and
+<span class = "pagenum">xvii</span>
+earnest manner, the characteristics of his own period (Translation, pp.
+82-86). Why, he is asked, has genius become so rare? There are many
+clever men, but scarce any highly exalted and wide-reaching genius. Has
+eloquence died with liberty? “We have learned the lesson of a benignant
+despotism, and have never tasted freedom.” The author answers that it is
+easy and characteristic of men to blame the present times. Genius may
+have been corrupted, not by a world-wide peace, but by love of gain and
+pleasure, passions so strong that “I fear, for such men as we are it is
+better to serve than to be free. If our appetites were let loose
+altogether against our neighbours, they would be like wild beasts
+uncaged, and bring a deluge of calamity on the whole civilised world.”
+Melancholy words, and appropriate to our own age, when cleverness is
+almost universal, and genius rare indeed, and the choice between liberty
+and servitude hard to make, were the choice within our power.</p>
+
+<p>But these words assuredly apply closely to the peaceful period of
+Augustus, when Virgil and Horace “praising their tyrant sang,” not to
+the confused age of the historical Longinus. Much has been said of the
+allusion to “the Lawgiver of the Jews” as “no ordinary person,” but that
+remark might have been made by a heathen acquainted with the Septuagint,
+at either of the disputed dates.
+<span class = "pagenum">xviii</span>
+On the other hand, our author (Section XIII) quotes the critical ideas
+of “Ammonius and his school,” as to the debt of Plato to Homer. Now the
+historical Longinus was a friend of the Neoplatonist teacher (not
+writer), Ammonius Saccas. If we could be sure that the Ammonius of the
+Treatise was this Ammonius, the question would be settled in favour of
+the late date. Our author would be that Longinus who inspired Zenobia to
+resist Aurelian, and who perished under his revenge. But Ammonius is not
+a very uncommon name, and we have no reason to suppose that the
+Neoplatonist Ammonius busied himself with the literary criticism of
+Homer and Plato. There was, among others, an Egyptian Ammonius, the
+tutor of Plutarch.</p>
+
+<p>These are the mass of the arguments on both sides. M. Egger sums them
+up thus: “After carefully examining the tradition of the MSS., and the
+one very late testimony in favour of Longinus, I hesitated for long as
+to the date of this precious work. In 1854 M. Vaucher<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_i2" href = "#note_i2">I.2</a> inclined me to believe that
+Plutarch was the author.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_i3" href =
+"#note_i3">I.3</a> All seems to concur towards the opinion that, if not
+Plutarch, at least one of his contemporaries wrote the most
+<span class = "pagenum">xix</span>
+original Greek essay in its kind since the <i>Rhetoric</i> and
+<i>Poetic</i> of Aristotle.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_i4" href =
+"#note_i4">I.4</a></p>
+
+<p>We may, on the whole, agree that the nobility of the author’s
+thought, his habit of quoting nothing more recent than the Augustan age,
+and his description of his own time, which seems so pertinent to that
+epoch, mark him as its child rather than as a great critic lost among
+the <i>somnia Pythagorea</i> of the Neoplatonists. On the other hand, if
+the author be a man of high heart and courage, as he seems, so was that
+martyr of independence, Longinus. Not without scruple, then, can we
+deprive Zenobia’s tutor of the glory attached so long to his name.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever its date, and whoever its author may be, the Treatise is
+fragmentary. The lost parts may very probably contain the secret of its
+period and authorship. The writer, at the request of his friend,
+Terentianus, and dissatisfied with the essay of Caecilius, sets about
+examining the nature of the Sublime in poetry and oratory. To the latter
+he assigns, as is natural, much more literary importance than we do, in
+an age when there is so little oratory of literary merit, and so much
+popular rant. The subject of sublimity must naturally have attracted a
+writer whose own moral nature was
+<span class = "pagenum">xx</span>
+pure and lofty, who was inclined to discover in moral qualities the true
+foundation of the highest literary merit. Even in his opening words he
+strikes the keynote of his own disposition, where he approves the saying
+that “the points in which we resemble the divine nature are benevolence
+and love of truth.” Earlier or later born, he must have lived in the
+midst of literary activity, curious, eager, occupied with petty
+questions and petty quarrels, concerned, as men in the best times are
+not very greatly concerned, with questions of technique and detail. Cut
+off from politics, people found in composition a field for their
+activity. We can readily fancy what literature becomes when not only its
+born children, but the minor busybodies whose natural place is politics,
+excluded from these, pour into the study of letters. Love of notoriety,
+vague activity, fantastic indolence, we may be sure, were working their
+will in the sacred close of the Muses. There were literary sets,
+jealousies, recitations of new poems; there was a world of amateurs, if
+there were no papers and paragraphs. To this world the author speaks
+like a voice from the older and graver age of Greece. If he lived late,
+we can imagine that he did not quote contemporaries, not because he did
+not know them, but because he estimated them correctly. He may have
+suffered, as we suffer, from critics who, of all the world’s literature,
+know only
+<span class = "pagenum">xxi</span>
+“the last thing out,” and who take that as a standard for the past, to
+them unfamiliar, and for the hidden future. As we are told that
+excellence is not of the great past, but of the present, not in the
+classical masters, but in modern Muscovites, Portuguese, or American
+young women, so the author of the Treatise may have been troubled by
+Asiatic eloquence, now long forgotten, by names of which not a shadow
+survives. He, on the other hand, has a right to be heard because he has
+practised a long familiarity with what is old and good. His mind has
+ever been in contact with masterpieces, as the mind of a critic should
+be, as the mind of a reviewer seldom is, for the reviewer has to hurry
+up and down inspecting new literary adventurers. Not among their
+experiments will he find a touchstone of excellence, a test of
+greatness, and that test will seldom be applied to contemporary
+performances. What is the test, after all, of the Sublime, by which our
+author means the truly great, the best and most passionate thoughts,
+nature’s high and rare inspirations, expressed in the best chosen words?
+He replies that “a just judgment of style is the final fruit of long
+experience.” “Much has he travelled in the realms of gold.”</p>
+
+<p>The word “style” has become a weariness to think upon; so much is
+said, so much is printed about the art of expression, about methods,
+tricks, and
+<span class = "pagenum">xxii</span>
+turns; so many people, without any long experience, set up to be judges
+of style, on the strength of having admired two or three modern and
+often rather fantastic writers. About our author, however, we know that
+his experience has been long, and of the best, that he does not speak
+from a hasty acquaintance with a few contemporary <i>précieux</i> and
+<i>précieuses</i>. The bad writing of his time he traces, as much of our
+own may be traced, to “the pursuit of novelty in thought,” or rather in
+expression. “It is this that has turned the brain of nearly all our
+learned world to-day.” “Gardons nous d’écrire trop bien,” he might have
+said, “c’est la pire manière qu’il y’ait d’écrire.”<a class = "tag" name
+= "tag_i5" href = "#note_i5">I.5</a></p>
+
+<p>The Sublime, with which he concerns himself, is “a certain loftiness
+and excellence of language,” which “takes the reader out of himself....
+The Sublime, acting with an imperious and irresistible force, sways
+every reader whether he will or no.” In its own sphere the Sublime does
+what “natural magic” does in the poetical rendering of nature, and
+perhaps in the same scarcely-to-be-analysed fashion. Whether this art
+can be taught or not is a question which the author treats with modesty.
+Then, as now, people were denying (and not unjustly) that this art can
+be taught by rule. The author does not go so far as to say that
+Criticism, “unlike
+<span class = "pagenum">xxiii</span>
+Justice, does little evil, and little good; that is, <i>if</i> to
+entertain for a moment delicate and curious minds is to do little good.”
+He does not rate his business so low as that. He admits that the
+inspiration comes from genius, from nature. But “an author can only
+learn from art when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his
+genius.” Nature must “burst out with a kind of fine madness and divine
+inspiration.” The madness must be <i>fine</i>. How can art aid it to
+this end? By knowledge of, by sympathy and emulation with, “the great
+poets and prose writers of the past.” By these we may be inspired, as
+the Pythoness by Apollo. From the genius of the past “an effluence
+breathes upon us.” The writer is not to imitate, but to keep before him
+the perfection of what has been done by the greatest poets. He is to
+look on them as beacons; he is to keep them as exemplars or ideals. He
+is to place them as judges of his work. “How would Homer, how would
+Demosthenes, have been affected by what I have written?” This is
+practical counsel, and even the most florid modern author, after
+polishing a paragraph, may tear it up when he has asked himself, “What
+would Addison have said about this eloquence of mine, or Sainte Beuve,
+or Mr. Matthew Arnold?” In this way what we call inspiration, that is
+the performance of the heated mind, perhaps working at its best, perhaps
+overstraining
+<span class = "pagenum">xxiv</span>
+itself, and overstating its idea, might really be regulated. But they
+are few who consider so closely, fewer perhaps they who have the heart
+to cut out their own fine or refined things. Again, our author suggests
+another criterion. We are, as in Lamb’s phrase, “to write for
+antiquity,” with the souls of poets dead and gone for our judges. But we
+are also to write for the future, asking with what feelings posterity
+will read us&mdash;if it reads us at all. This is a good discipline. We
+know by practice what will hit some contemporary tastes; we know the
+measure of smartness, say, or the delicate flippancy, or the sentence
+with “a dying fall.” But one should also know that these are fancies of
+the hour&mdash;these and the touch of archaism, and the spinster-like
+and artificial precision, which seem to be points in some styles of the
+moment. Such reflections as our author bids us make, with a little
+self-respect added, may render our work less popular and effective, and
+certainly are not likely to carry it down to remote posterity. But all
+such reflections, and action in accordance with what they teach, are
+elements of literary self-respect. It is hard to be conscientious,
+especially hard for him who writes much, and of necessity, and for
+bread. But conscience is never to be obeyed with ease, though the ease
+grows with the obedience. The book attributed to Longinus will not have
+missed
+<span class = "pagenum">xxv</span>
+its mark if it reminds us that, in literature at least, for conscience
+there is yet a place, possibly even a reward, though that is
+unessential. By virtue of reasonings like these, and by insisting that
+nobility of style is, as it were, the bloom on nobility of soul, the
+Treatise on the Sublime becomes a tonic work, wholesome to be read by
+young authors and old. “It is natural in us to feel our souls lifted up
+by the true Sublime, and, conceiving a sort of generous exultation, to
+be filled with joy and pride, as though we had ourselves originated the
+ideas which we read.” Here speaks his natural disinterested greatness
+the author himself is here sublime, and teaches by example as well as
+precept, for few things are purer than a pure and ardent admiration. The
+critic is even confident enough to expect to find his own nobility in
+others, believing that what is truly Sublime “will always please, and
+please all readers.” And in this universal acceptance by the populace
+and the literate, by critics and creators, by young and old, he finds
+the true external canon of sublimity. The verdict lies not with
+contemporaries, but with the large public, not with the little set of
+dilettanti, but must be spoken by all. Such verdicts assign the crown to
+Shakespeare and Molière, to Homer and Cervantes; we should not
+clamorously anticipate this favourable judgment for Bryant or Emerson,
+nor for the greatest of our own contemporaries.
+<span class = "pagenum">xxvi</span>
+Boileau so much misconceived these lofty ideas that he regarded
+“Longinus’s” judgment as solely that “of good sense,” and held that, in
+his time, “nothing was good or bad till he had spoken.” But there is far
+more than good sense, there is high poetic imagination and moral
+greatness, in the criticism of our author, who certainly would have
+rejected Boileau’s compliment when he selects Longinus as a literary
+dictator.</p>
+
+<p>Indeed we almost grudge our author’s choice of a subject. He who
+wrote that “it was not in nature’s plan for us, her children, to be base
+and ignoble; no, she brought us into life as into some great field of
+contest,” should have had another field of contest than literary
+criticism. It is almost a pity that we have to doubt the tradition,
+according to which our author was Longinus, and, being but a
+rhetorician, greatly dared and bravely died. Taking literature for his
+theme, he wanders away into grammar, into considerations of tropes and
+figures, plurals and singulars, trumpery mechanical pedantries, as we
+think now, to whom grammar is no longer, as of old, “a new invented
+game.” Moreover, he has to give examples of the faults opposed to
+sublimity, he has to dive into and search the bathos, to dally over
+examples of the bombastic, the over-wrought, the puerile. These faults
+are not the sins of “minds generous and aspiring,” and we have them with
+us
+<span class = "pagenum">xxvii</span>
+always. The additions to Boileau’s preface (Paris, 1772) contain
+abundance of examples of faults from Voiture, Mascaron, Bossuet,
+selected by M. de St. Marc, who no doubt found abundance of
+entertainment in the chastising of these obvious affectations. It hardly
+seems the proper work for an author like him who wrote the Treatise on
+the Sublime. But it is tempting, even now, to give contemporary
+instances of skill in the Art of Sinking&mdash;modern cases of bombast,
+triviality, false rhetoric. “Speaking generally, it would seem that
+bombast is one of the hardest things to avoid in writing,” says an
+author who himself avoids it so well. Bombast is the voice of sham
+passion, the shadow of an insincere attitude. “Even the wretched phantom
+who still bore the imperial title stooped to pay this ignominious
+blackmail,” cries bombast in Macaulay’s <i>Lord Clive</i>. The picture
+of a phantom who is not only a phantom but wretched, stooping to pay
+blackmail which is not only blackmail but ignominious, may divert the
+reader and remind him that the faults of the past are the faults of the
+present. Again, “The desolate islands along the sea-coast, overgrown by
+noxious vegetation, and swarming with deer and tigers”&mdash;do, what
+does any one suppose, perform what forlorn part in the economy of the
+world? Why, they “supply the cultivated districts with abundance of
+salt.” It is as comic as&mdash;</p>
+
+<span class = "pagenum">xxviii</span>
+<div class = "verse">
+“And thou Dalhousie, thou great God of War,<br>
+Lieutenant-Colonel to the Earl of Mar.”
+</div>
+
+<p>Bombast “transcends the Sublime,” and falls on the other side. Our
+author gives more examples of puerility. “Slips of this sort are made by
+those who, aiming at brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness,
+are landed in paltriness and silly affectation.” Some modern instances
+we had chosen; the field of choice is large and richly fertile in those
+blossoms. But the reader may be left to twine a garland of them for
+himself; to select from contemporaries were invidious, and might provoke
+retaliation. When our author censures Timaeus for saying that Alexander
+took less time to annex Asia than Isocrates spent in writing an oration,
+to bid the Greeks attack Persia, we know what he would have thought of
+Macaulay’s antithesis. He blames Xenophon for a poor pun, and Plato,
+less justly, for mere figurative badinage. It would be an easy task to
+ransack contemporaries, even great contemporaries, for similar failings,
+for pomposity, for the florid, for sentences like processions of
+intoxicated torch-bearers, for pedantic display of cheap erudition, for
+misplaced flippancy, for nice derangement of epitaphs wherein no
+adjective is used which is appropriate. With a library of cultivated
+American novelists and uncultivated English romancers at hand, with our
+own voluminous
+<span class = "pagenum">xxix</span>
+essays, and the essays and histories and “art criticisms” of our
+neighbours to draw from, no student need lack examples of what is wrong.
+He who writes, reflecting on his own innumerable sins, can but beat his
+breast, cry <i>Mea Culpa</i>, and resist the temptation to beat the
+breasts of his coevals. There are not many authors, there have never
+been many, who did not need to turn over the treatise of the Sublime by
+day and night.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_i6" href =
+"#note_i6">I.6</a></p>
+
+<p>As a literary critic of Homer our author is most interesting even in
+his errors. He compares the poet of the <i>Odyssey</i> to the sunset:
+the <i>Iliad</i> is noonday work, the <i>Odyssey</i> is touched with the
+glow of evening&mdash;the softness and the shadows. “Old age naturally
+leans,” like childhood, “towards the fabulous.” The tide has flowed
+back, and left dim bulks of things on the long shadowy sands. Yet he
+makes an exception, oddly enough, in favour of the story of the Cyclops,
+which really is the most fabulous and crude of the fairy tales in the
+first and greatest of romances. The Slaying of the Wooers,
+<span class = "pagenum">xxx</span>
+that admirable fight, worthy of a saga, he thinks too improbable, and
+one of the “trifles into which second childhood is apt to be betrayed.”
+He fancies that the aged Homer had “lost his power of depicting the
+passions”; in fact, he is hardly a competent or sympathetic critic of
+the <i>Odyssey</i>. Perhaps he had lived among Romans till he lost his
+sense of humour; perhaps he never had any to lose. On the other hand, he
+preserved for us that inestimable and not to be translated fragment of
+Sappho&mdash;<span title =
+"phainetai moi kênos isos theoisin">φαίνεταί μοι κῆνος ἴσος
+θεοῖσιν</span>.</p>
+
+<p>It is curious to find him contrasting Apollonius Rhodius as
+faultless, with Homer as great but faulty. The “faultlessness” of
+Apollonius is not his merit, for he is often tedious, and he has little
+skill in selection; moreover, he is deliberately antiquarian, if not
+pedantic. His true merit is in his original and, as we think, modern
+telling of a love tale&mdash;pure, passionate, and tender, the first in
+known literature. Medea is often sublime, and always touching. But it is
+not on these merits that our author lingers; he loves only the highest
+literature, and, though he finds spots on the sun and faults in Homer,
+he condones them as oversights passed in the poet’s “contempt of little
+things.”</p>
+
+<p>Such for us to-day are the lessons of Longinus. He traces dignity and
+fire of style to dignity and fire of soul. He detects and denounces the
+very
+<span class = "pagenum">xxxi</span>
+faults of which, in each other, all writers are conscious, and which he
+brings home to ourselves. He proclaims the essential merits of
+conviction, and of selection. He sets before us the noblest examples of
+the past, most welcome in a straining age which tries already to live in
+the future. He admonishes and he inspires. He knows the “marvellous
+power and enthralling charm of appropriate and striking words” without
+dropping into mere word-tasting. “Beautiful words are the very light of
+thought,” he says, but does not maunder about the “colour” of words, in
+the style of the decadence. And then he “leaves this generation to its
+fate,” and calmly turns himself to the work that lies nearest his
+hand.</p>
+
+<p>To us he is as much a moral as a literary teacher. We admire that
+Roman greatness of soul in a Greek, and the character of this unknown
+man, who carried the soul of a poet, the heart of a hero under the gown
+of a professor. He was one of those whom books cannot debilitate, nor a
+life of study incapacitate for the study of life.</p>
+
+<p class = "indent2">
+A.&nbsp;L.</p>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i1" href = "#tag_i1">I.1.</a>
+Longmans, London, 1836.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i2" href = "#tag_i2">I.2.</a>
+<i>Etude Critique sur la traité du Sublime et les ecrits de Longin.</i>
+Geneva.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i3" href = "#tag_i3">I.3.</a>
+See also M. Naudet, <i>Journal des Savants</i>, Mars 1838, and M. Egger,
+in the same Journal, May 1884.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i4" href = "#tag_i4">I.4.</a>
+Egger, <i>Histoire de la Critique chez les Grecs</i>, p. 426. Paris,
+1887.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i5" href = "#tag_i5">I.5.</a>
+M. Anatole France.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_i6" href = "#tag_i6">I.6.</a>
+The examples of bombast used to be drawn as late as Spurden’s
+translation (1836), from Lee, from <i>Troilus and Cressida</i>, and
+<i>The Taming of the Shrew</i>. Cowley and Crashaw furnished instances
+of conceits; Waller, Young, and Hayley of frigidity; and Darwin of
+affectation.
+<div class = "footnote poem">
+“What beaux and beauties crowd the gaudy groves,<br>
+And woo and win their <i>vegetable loves</i>”&mdash;
+</div>
+a phrase adopted&mdash;“vapid vegetable loves”&mdash;by the Laureate in
+“The Talking Oak.”</div>
+
+<hr>
+
+<span class = "pagenum">1</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapI_1">I</a></h5>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">1</span>
+<span class = "firstword">The</span>
+treatise of Caecilius on the Sublime, when, as you remember, my dear
+Terentian, we examined it together, seemed to us to be beneath the
+dignity of the whole subject, to fail entirely in seizing the salient
+points, and to offer little profit (which should be the principal aim of
+every writer) for the trouble of its perusal. There are two things
+essential to a technical treatise: the first is to define the subject;
+the second (I mean second in order, as it is by much the first in
+importance) to point out how and by what methods we may become masters
+of it ourselves. And yet Caecilius, while wasting his efforts in a
+thousand illustrations of the nature of the Sublime, as though here we
+were quite in the dark, somehow passes by as immaterial the question how
+we might be able to exalt our own genius to a certain degree of progress
+in sublimity. However, perhaps it would be fairer to commend this
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapI_2"> </a>
+writer’s intelligence and zeal in themselves, instead of blaming him for
+his omissions. And since you
+<span class = "pagenum">2</span>
+have bidden me also to put together, if only for your entertainment, a
+few notes on the subject of the Sublime, let me see if there is anything
+in my speculations which promises advantage to men of affairs. In you,
+dear friend&mdash;such is my confidence in your abilities, and such the
+part which becomes you&mdash;I look for a sympathising and discerning<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_1" href = "#note_1">1</a> critic of the
+several parts of my treatise. For that was a just remark of his who
+pronounced that the points in which we resemble the divine nature are
+benevolence and love of truth.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapI_3"> </a>
+As I am addressing a person so accomplished in literature, I need only
+state, without enlarging further on the matter, that the Sublime,
+wherever it occurs, consists in a certain loftiness and excellence of
+language, and that it is by this, and this only, that the greatest poets
+and prose-writers have gained eminence, and won themselves a lasting
+place in the Temple of Fame.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapI_4"> </a>
+A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes
+him out of himself. That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment,
+and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or
+not is usually in our own power; but the Sublime, acting with an
+imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or
+no. Skill in invention, lucid arrangement and disposition of facts,
+<span class = "pagenum">3</span>
+are appreciated not by one passage, or by two, but gradually manifest
+themselves in the general structure of a work; but a sublime thought, if
+happily timed, illumines<a class = "tag" name = "tag_2" href =
+"#note_2">2</a> an entire subject with the vividness of a
+lightning-flash, and exhibits the whole power of the orator in a moment
+of time. Your own experience, I am sure, my dearest Terentian, would
+enable you to illustrate these and similar points of doctrine.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapII_1">II</a></h5>
+
+<p>The first question which presents itself for solution is whether
+there is any art which can teach sublimity or loftiness in writing. For
+some hold generally that there is mere delusion in attempting to reduce
+such subjects to technical rules. “The Sublime,” they tell us, “is born
+in a man, and not to be acquired by instruction; genius is the only
+master who can teach it. The vigorous products of nature” (such is their
+view) “are weakened and in every respect debased, when robbed of their
+flesh and blood by frigid technicalities.”
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapII_2"> </a>
+But I maintain that the truth can be shown to stand otherwise in this
+matter. Let us look at the case in this way; Nature in her loftier and
+more passionate moods, while detesting all appearance of restraint, is
+not
+<span class = "pagenum">4</span>
+wont to show herself utterly wayward and reckless; and though in all
+cases the vital informing principle is derived from her, yet to
+determine the right degree and the right moment, and to contribute the
+precision of practice and experience, is the peculiar province of
+scientific method. The great passions, when left to their own blind and
+rash impulses without the control of reason, are in the same danger as a
+ship let drive at random without ballast. Often they need the spur, but
+sometimes also the curb.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapII_3"> </a>
+The remark of Demosthenes with regard to human life in
+general,&mdash;that the greatest of all blessings is to be fortunate,
+but next to that and equal in importance is to be well
+advised,&mdash;for good fortune is utterly ruined by the absence of good
+counsel,&mdash;may be applied to literature, if we substitute genius for
+fortune, and art for counsel. Then, again (and this is the most
+important point of all), a writer can only learn from art when he is to
+abandon himself to the direction of his genius.<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_3" href = "#note_3">3</a></p>
+
+<p>These are the considerations which I submit to the unfavourable
+critic of such useful studies. Perhaps they may induce him to alter his
+opinion as to the vanity and idleness of our present investigations.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">5</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapIII_1">III</a></h5>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+... “And let them check the stove’s long tongues of fire:<br>
+For if I see one tenant of the hearth,<br>
+I’ll thrust within one curling torrent flame,<br>
+And bring that roof in ashes to the ground:<br>
+But now not yet is sung my noble lay.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_4"
+href = "#note_4">4</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+Such phrases cease to be tragic, and become burlesque,&mdash;I mean
+phrases like “curling torrent flames” and “vomiting to heaven,” and
+representing Boreas as a piper, and so on. Such expressions, and such
+images, produce an effect of confusion and obscurity, not of energy; and
+if each separately be examined under the light of criticism, what seemed
+terrible gradually sinks into absurdity. Since then, even in tragedy,
+where the natural dignity of the subject makes a swelling diction
+allowable, we cannot pardon a tasteless grandiloquence, how much more
+incongruous must it seem in sober prose!
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapIII_2"> </a>
+Hence we laugh at those fine words of Gorgias of Leontini, such as
+“Xerxes the Persian Zeus” and “vultures, those living tombs,” and at
+certain conceits of Callisthenes which are high-flown rather than
+sublime, and at some in Cleitarchus more ludicrous still&mdash;a writer
+whose frothy style tempts us to travesty Sophocles and say, “He blows a
+little pipe,
+<span class = "pagenum">6</span>
+and blows it ill.” The same faults may be observed in Amphicrates and
+Hegesias and Matris, who in their frequent moments (as they think) of
+inspiration, instead of playing the genius are simply playing the
+fool.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapIII_3"> </a>
+Speaking generally, it would seem that bombast is one of the hardest
+things to avoid in writing. For all those writers who are ambitious of a
+lofty style, through dread of being convicted of feebleness and poverty
+of language, slide by a natural gradation into the opposite extreme.
+“Who fails in great endeavour, nobly fails,” is their creed.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapIII_4"> </a>
+Now bulk, when hollow and affected, is always objectionable, whether in
+material bodies or in writings, and in danger of producing on us an
+impression of littleness: “nothing,” it is said, “is drier than a man
+with the dropsy.”</p>
+
+<p>The characteristic, then, of bombast is that it transcends the
+Sublime: but there is another fault diametrically opposed to grandeur:
+this is called puerility, and it is the failing of feeble and narrow
+minds,&mdash;indeed, the most ignoble of all vices in writing. By
+puerility we mean a pedantic habit of mind, which by over-elaboration
+ends in frigidity. Slips of this sort are made by those who, aiming at
+brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness, are landed in
+paltriness and silly affectation.
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapIII_5"> </a>
+Closely associated with this is a third sort of vice, in dealing
+<span class = "pagenum">7</span>
+with the passions, which Theodorus used to call false sentiment, meaning
+by that an ill-timed and empty display of emotion, where no emotion is
+called for, or of greater emotion than the situation warrants. Thus we
+often see an author hurried by the tumult of his mind into tedious
+displays of mere personal feeling which has no connection with the
+subject. Yet how justly ridiculous must an author appear, whose most
+violent transports leave his readers quite cold! However, I will dismiss
+this subject, as I intend to devote a separate work to the treatment of
+the pathetic in writing.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapIV_1">IV</a></h5>
+
+<p>The last of the faults which I mentioned is frequently observed in
+Timaeus&mdash;I mean the fault of frigidity. In other respects he is an
+able writer, and sometimes not unsuccessful in the loftier style; a man
+of wide knowledge, and full of ingenuity; a most bitter critic of the
+failings of others&mdash;but unhappily blind to his own. In his
+eagerness to be always striking out new thoughts he frequently falls
+into the most childish absurdities.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_2"> </a>
+I will only instance one or two passages, as most of them have been
+pointed out by Caecilius. Wishing to say something very fine about
+Alexander the Great he
+<span class = "pagenum">8</span>
+speaks of him as a man “who annexed the whole of Asia in fewer years
+than Isocrates spent in writing his panegyric oration in which he urges
+the Greeks to make war on Persia.” How strange is the comparison of the
+“great Emathian conqueror” with an Athenian rhetorician! By this mode of
+reasoning it is plain that the Spartans were very inferior to Isocrates
+in courage, since it took them thirty years to conquer Messene, while he
+finished the composition of this harangue in ten.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_3"> </a>
+Observe, too, his language on the Athenians taken in Sicily. “They paid
+the penalty for their impious outrage on Hermes in mutilating his
+statues; and the chief agent in their destruction was one who was
+descended on his father’s side from the injured deity&mdash;Hermocrates,
+son of Hermon.” I wonder, my dearest Terentian, how he omitted to say of
+the tyrant Dionysius that for his impiety towards Zeus and <ins class =
+"correction" title = "spelling variation in original">Herakles</ins> he
+was deprived of his power by Dion and Herakleides.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_4"> </a>
+Yet why speak of Timaeus, when even men like Xenophon and
+Plato&mdash;the very demi-gods of literature&mdash;though they had sat
+at the feet of Socrates, sometimes forgot themselves in the pursuit of
+such paltry conceits. The former, in his account of the Spartan Polity,
+has these words: “Their voice you would no more hear than if they were
+of marble, their gaze is as immovable as if they were cast in bronze;
+you would deem them
+<span class = "pagenum">9</span>
+more modest than the very maidens in their eyes<ins class = "correction"
+title = "close quote missing in original">.”</ins><a class = "tag" name
+= "tag_5" href = "#note_5">5</a> To speak of the pupils of the eye as
+“modest maidens” was a piece of absurdity becoming Amphicrates<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_6" href = "#note_6">6</a> rather than Xenophon. And
+then what a strange delusion to suppose that modesty is always without
+exception expressed in the eye! whereas it is commonly said that there
+is nothing by which an impudent fellow betrays his character so much as
+by the expression of his eyes. Thus Achilles addresses Agamemnon in the
+<i>Iliad</i> as “drunkard, with eye of dog.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_7" href = "#note_7">7</a>
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_5"> </a>
+Timaeus, however, with that want of judgment which characterises
+plagiarists, could not leave to Xenophon the possession of even this
+piece of frigidity. In relating how Agathocles carried off his cousin,
+who was wedded to another man, from the festival of the unveiling, he
+asks, “Who could have done such a deed, unless he had harlots instead of
+maidens in his eyes?”
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_6"> </a>
+And Plato himself, elsewhere so supreme a master of style, meaning to
+describe certain recording tablets, says, “They shall write, and deposit
+in the temples memorials of cypress wood”;<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_8" href = "#note_8">8</a> and again, “Then concerning walls,
+Megillus, I give my vote with Sparta that we should let them lie asleep
+within the ground, and not awaken them.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_9"
+href = "#note_9">9</a>
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapIV_7"> </a>
+And Herodotus falls pretty much under the same censure,
+<span class = "pagenum">10</span>
+when he speaks of beautiful women as “tortures to the eye,”<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_10" href = "#note_10">10</a> though here there is some
+excuse, as the speakers in this passage are drunken barbarians. Still,
+even from dramatic motives, such errors in taste should not be permitted
+to deface the pages of an immortal work.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapV_1">V</a></h5>
+
+<p>Now all these glaring improprieties of language may be traced to one
+common root&mdash;the pursuit of novelty in thought. It is this that has
+turned the brain of nearly all the learned world of to-day. Human
+blessings and human ills commonly flow from the same source: and, to
+apply this principle to literature, those ornaments of style, those
+sublime and delightful images, which contribute to success, are the
+foundation and the origin, not only of excellence, but also of failure.
+It is thus with the figures called transitions, and hyperboles, and the
+use of plurals for singulars. I shall show presently the dangers which
+they seem to involve. Our next task, therefore, must be to propose and
+to settle the question how we may avoid the faults of style related to
+sublimity.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">11</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapVI_1">VI</a></h5>
+
+<p>Our best hope of doing this will be first of all to grasp some
+definite theory and criterion of the true Sublime. Nevertheless this is
+a hard matter; for a just judgment of style is the final fruit of long
+experience; still, I believe that the way I shall indicate will enable
+us to distinguish between the true and false Sublime, so far as it can
+be done by rule.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapVII_1">VII</a></h5>
+
+<p>It is proper to observe that in human life nothing is truly great
+which is despised by all elevated minds. For example, no man of sense
+can regard wealth, honour, glory, and power, or any of those things
+which are surrounded by a great external parade of pomp and
+circumstance, as the highest blessings, seeing that merely to despise
+such things is a blessing of no common order: certainly those who
+possess them are admired much less than those who, having the
+opportunity to acquire them, through greatness of soul neglect it. Now
+let us apply this principle to the Sublime in poetry or in prose; let us
+ask in all cases, is it merely a specious sublimity? is this gorgeous
+exterior a mere false and clumsy pageant,
+<span class = "pagenum">12</span>
+which if laid open will be found to conceal nothing but emptiness? for
+if so, a noble mind will scorn instead of admiring it.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapVII_2"> </a>
+It is natural to us to feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and
+conceiving a sort of generous exultation to be filled with joy and
+pride, as though we had ourselves originated the ideas which we read.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapVII_3"> </a>
+If then any work, on being repeatedly submitted to the judgment of an
+acute and cultivated critic, fails to dispose his mind to lofty ideas;
+if the thoughts which it suggests do not extend beyond what is actually
+expressed; and if, the longer you read it, the less you think of
+it,&mdash;there can be here no true sublimity, when the effect is not
+sustained beyond the mere act of perusal. But when a passage is pregnant
+in suggestion, when it is hard, nay impossible, to distract the
+attention from it, and when it takes a strong and lasting hold on the
+memory, then we may be sure that we have lighted on the true Sublime.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapVII_4"> </a>
+In general we may regard those words as truly noble and sublime which
+always please and please all readers. For when the same book always
+produces the same impression on all who read it, whatever be the
+difference in their pursuits, their manner of life, their aspirations,
+their ages, or their language, such a harmony of opposites gives
+irresistible authority to their favourable verdict.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">13</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapVIII_1">VIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>I shall now proceed to enumerate the five principal sources, as we
+may call them, from which almost all sublimity is derived, assuming, of
+course, the preliminary gift on which all these five sources depend,
+namely, command of language. The first and the most important is (1)
+grandeur of thought, as I have pointed out elsewhere in my work on
+Xenophon. The second is (2) a vigorous and spirited treatment of the
+passions. These two conditions of sublimity depend mainly on natural
+endowments, whereas those which follow derive assistance from Art. The
+third is (3) a certain artifice in the employment of figures, which are
+of two kinds, figures of thought and figures of speech. The fourth is
+(4) dignified expression, which is sub-divided into (<i>a</i>) the
+proper choice of words, and (<i>b</i>) the use of metaphors and other
+ornaments of diction. The fifth cause of sublimity, which embraces all
+those preceding, is (5) majesty and elevation of structure. Let us
+consider what is involved in each of these five forms separately.</p>
+
+<p>I must first, however, remark that some of these five divisions are
+omitted by Caecilius; for instance, he says nothing about the passions.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapVIII_2"> </a>
+Now if he made this omission from a belief that the Sublime
+<span class = "pagenum">14</span>
+and the Pathetic are one and the same thing, holding them to be always
+coexistent and interdependent, he is in error. Some passions are found
+which, so far from being lofty, are actually low, such as pity, grief,
+fear; and conversely, sublimity is often not in the least affecting, as
+we may see (among innumerable other instances) in those bold expressions
+of our great poet on the sons of Aloëus&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent3">
+“Highly they raged</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+To pile huge Ossa on the Olympian peak,<br>
+And Pelion with all his waving trees<br>
+On Ossa’s crest to raise, and climb the sky;”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+and the yet more tremendous climax&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“And now had they accomplished it.”
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapVIII_3"> </a>
+And in orators, in all passages dealing with panegyric, and in all the
+more imposing and declamatory places, dignity and sublimity play an
+indispensable part; but pathos is mostly absent. Hence the most pathetic
+orators have usually but little skill in panegyric, and conversely those
+who are powerful in panegyric generally fail in pathos.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapVIII_4"> </a>
+If, on the other hand, Caecilius supposed that pathos never contributes
+to sublimity, and this is why he thought it alien to the subject, he is
+entirely deceived. For I would confidently pronounce that nothing is so
+conducive to sublimity as an appropriate display of genuine passion,
+which bursts out with a kind of “fine
+<span class = "pagenum">15</span>
+madness” and divine inspiration, and falls on our ears like the voice of
+a god.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapIX_1">IX</a></h5>
+
+<p>I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime
+the most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind.
+Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired,
+nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up
+our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble
+thoughts.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_2"> </a>
+How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my
+writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul.
+Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is
+sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance,
+the silence of Ajax in the eleventh <i>Odyssey</i><a class = "tag" name
+= "tag_11" href = "#note_11">11</a> is great, and grander than anything
+he could have said.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_3"> </a>
+It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question
+whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true
+eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and
+aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal
+thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the
+lasting reverence of mankind.
+<span class = "pagenum">16</span>
+It is only natural that their words should be full of sublimity whose
+thoughts are full of majesty.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_4"> </a>
+Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was
+the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had
+observed, “Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied”; “And I, were
+I Parmenio”...</p>
+
+<p>The distance between heaven and earth<a class = "tag" name = "tag_12"
+href = "#note_12">12</a>&mdash;a measure, one might say, not less
+appropriate to Homer’s genius than to the stature of his discord.
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_5"> </a>
+How different is that touch of Hesiod’s in his description of
+sorrow&mdash;if the <i>Shield</i> is really one of his works: “rheum
+from her nostrils flowed”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_13" href =
+"#note_13">13</a>&mdash;an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now
+consider how Homer gives dignity to his divine persons&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“As far as lies his airy ken, who sits<br>
+On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea:<br>
+So far extends the heavenly coursers’ stride.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_14" href = "#note_14">14</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world&mdash;a grand
+comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine
+steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no
+room in the world for another.
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_6"> </a>
+Sublime also are the images in the “Battle of the Gods”&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent4">
+“A trumpet sound</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height;<br>
+Then terror seized the monarch of the dead,<br>
+<span class = "pagenum">17</span>
+And springing from his throne he cried aloud<br>
+With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder<br>
+By Neptune’s mighty arm, forthwith reveal<br>
+To mortal and immortal eyes those halls<br>
+So drear and dank, which e’en the gods abhor.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_15" href = "#note_15">15</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole
+world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is
+a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell,
+mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_7"> </a>
+A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken
+allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of
+decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels,
+revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric
+tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities,
+as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities&mdash;or
+rather, his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when
+we are unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods,
+according to him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.
+<span class = "chapnum">8</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_8"> </a>
+Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are
+those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as
+something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which
+has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on
+Poseidon:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+<span class = "pagenum">18</span>
+“Mountain and wood and solitary peak,<br>
+The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy,<br>
+Trembled beneath the god’s immortal feet.<br>
+Over the waves he rode, and round him played,<br>
+Lured from the deeps, the ocean’s monstrous brood,<br>
+With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord:<br>
+The charmèd billows parted: on they flew.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_16" href = "#note_16">16</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">9</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_9"> </a>
+And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed
+an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression
+in the opening words of his “Laws”: “God said”&mdash;what?&mdash;“let
+there be light, and there was light: let there be land, and there
+was.”</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">10</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_10"> </a>
+I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage
+from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in
+illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic
+heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the
+ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries
+aloud&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent4">
+“Almighty Sire,</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Only from darkness save Achaia’s sons;<br>
+No more I ask, but give us back the day;<br>
+Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_17" href = "#note_17">17</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you
+observe, ask for his life&mdash;such a request would have been unworthy
+of his heroic soul&mdash;but finding himself paralysed by darkness,
+<span class = "pagenum">19</span>
+and prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes
+because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. “At
+least,” he thinks, “I shall find a warrior’s grave, even though Zeus
+himself should fight against me.”
+<span class = "chapnum">11</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_11"> </a>
+In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of
+the struggle, and, in his own words, he</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent1">
+“Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side;<br>
+His lips drop foam.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_18" href =
+"#note_18">18</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">12</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_12"> </a>
+But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer’s mind. When
+we turn to the <i>Odyssey</i> we find occasion to observe that a great
+poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age
+naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work
+was composed after the <i>Iliad</i>, in proof of which we may mention,
+among many other indications, the introduction in the <i>Odyssey</i> of
+the sequel to the story of his heroes’ adventures at Troy, as so many
+additional episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of
+sorrow and mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if
+in fulfilment of some previous design. The <i>Odyssey</i> is, in fact, a
+sort of epilogue to the <i>Iliad</i>&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+<span class = "pagenum">20</span>
+“There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there,<br>
+And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor;<br>
+There lies my own dear son.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_19" href =
+"#note_19">19</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">13</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_13"> </a>
+And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the <i>Iliad</i>, which
+was written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the
+poem is founded on action and struggle, in the <i>Odyssey</i> he
+generally prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence
+Homer in his <i>Odyssey</i> may be compared to the setting sun: he is
+still as great as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is
+now pitched to a lower key than in the “Tale of Troy divine”: we begin
+to miss that high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that
+continuous current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that
+force of eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to
+Nature. Like the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores
+waste and bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and
+draws us away into the dim region of myth and legend.
+<span class = "chapnum">14</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_14"> </a>
+In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the
+<i>Odyssey</i>, the story of the Cyclops,<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_20" href = "#note_20">20</a> and other striking passages. It is
+Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every one
+of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.</p>
+
+<p>My purpose in making this digression was, as I
+<span class = "pagenum">21</span>
+said, to point out into what trifles the second childhood of genius is
+too apt to be betrayed; such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are
+confined,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_21" href = "#note_21">21</a> the
+tale of Odysseus’s comrades being changed by Circe into swine<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_22" href = "#note_22">22</a> (“whimpering porkers”
+Zoïlus called them), and how Zeus was fed like a nestling by the
+doves,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_23" href = "#note_23">23</a> and how
+Odysseus passed ten nights on the shipwreck without food,<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_24" href = "#note_24">24</a> and the improbable
+incidents in the slaying of the suitors.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_25"
+href = "#note_25">25</a> When Homer nods like this, we must be content
+to say that he dreams as Zeus might dream.
+<span class = "chapnum">15</span>
+<a name = "chapIX_15"> </a>
+Another reason for these remarks on the <i>Odyssey</i> is that I wished
+to make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they
+have lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the
+delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and
+characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a
+sort of comedy of manners.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapX_1">X</a></h5>
+
+<p>Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces
+to the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things
+there are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It
+necessarily follows, therefore, that
+<span class = "pagenum">22</span>
+one cause of sublimity is the choice of the most striking circumstances
+involved in whatever we are describing, and, further, the power of
+afterwards combining them into one animate whole. The reader is
+attracted partly by the selection of the incidents, partly by the skill
+which has welded them together. For instance, Sappho, in dealing with
+the passionate manifestations attending on the frenzy of lovers, always
+chooses her strokes from the signs which she has observed to be actually
+exhibited in such cases. But her peculiar excellence lies in the
+felicity with which she chooses and unites together the most striking
+and powerful features.</p>
+
+<div class = "verse space">
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapX_2"> </a>
+“I deem that man divinely blest<br>
+Who sits, and, gazing on thy face,<br>
+Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips,</div>
+<div class = "verse indent1 nospace">
+And marks thy lovely smile.</div>
+<div class = "verse">
+This, this it is that made my heart<br>
+So wildly flutter in my breast;<br>
+Whene’er I look on thee, my voice</div>
+<div class = "verse indent1 nospace">
+Falters, and faints, and fails;</div>
+<div class = "verse">
+My tongue’s benumbed; a subtle fire<br>
+Through all my body inly steals;<br>
+Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim;</div>
+<div class = "verse indent1 nospace">
+Strange murmurs drown my ears;</div>
+<div class = "verse">
+With dewy damps my limbs are chilled;<br>
+An icy shiver shakes my frame;<br>
+Paler than ashes grows my cheek;</div>
+<div class = "verse indent1 nospace">
+And Death seems nigh at hand.”
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapX_3"> </a>
+Is it not wonderful how at the same moment
+<span class = "pagenum">23</span>
+soul, body, ears, tongue, eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to
+her as completely as if they were not her own? Observe too how her
+sensations contradict one another&mdash;she freezes, she burns, she
+raves, she reasons, and all at the same instant. And this description is
+designed to show that she is assailed, not by any particular emotion,
+but by a tumult of different emotions. All these tokens belong to the
+passion of love; but it is in the choice, as I said, of the most
+striking features, and in the combination of them into one picture, that
+the perfection of this Ode of Sappho’s lies. Similarly Homer in his
+descriptions of tempests always picks out the most terrific
+circumstances.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapX_4"> </a>
+The poet of the “Arimaspeia” intended the following lines to be
+grand&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "versepair">
+“Herein I find a wonder passing strange,<br>
+That men should make their dwelling on the deep,</div>
+<div class = "versepair nospace">
+Who far from land essaying bold to range<br>
+With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep;<br>
+Their eyes are fixed on heaven’s starry steep;</div>
+<div class = "versepair nospace">
+The ravening billows hunger for their lives;<br>
+And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep,</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+With suppliant hands to move heaven’s pity strives,<br>
+While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives.”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the
+description. Now let us turn to Homer.
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapX_5"> </a>
+One passage will suffice to show the contrast.</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+<span class = "pagenum">24</span>
+“On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave,<br>
+Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds,<br>
+On a swift ship, and buries her in foam;<br>
+Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast,<br>
+And quakes the breathless seamen’s shuddering heart<br>
+In terror dire: death lours on every wave.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_26" href = "#note_26">26</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapX_6"> </a>
+Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“But one frail timber shields them from their doom,”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_27" href = "#note_27">27</a>&mdash;
+</div>
+
+<p>
+banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his
+description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying
+“shields them”; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether
+the “timber” be “frail” or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit
+to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on
+the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant
+death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of
+opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the
+scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting
+the anxiety of the sailors’ minds, and the diction being stamped, as it
+were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapX_7"> </a>
+Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly
+Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of
+Elatea<a class = "tag" name = "tag_28" href =
+"#note_28">28</a>&mdash;“It was evening,”
+<span class = "pagenum">25</span>
+etc. Each of these authors fastidiously rejects whatever is not
+essential to the subject, and in putting together the most vivid
+features is careful to guard against the interposition of anything
+frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such blemishes mar the general
+effect, and give a patched and gaping appearance to the edifice of
+sublimity, which ought to be built up in a solid and uniform
+structure.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXI_1">XI</a></h5>
+
+<p>Closely associated with the part of our subject we have just treated
+of is that excellence of writing which is called amplification, when a
+writer or pleader, whose theme admits of many successive starting-points
+and pauses, brings on one impressive point after another in a continuous
+and ascending scale.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXI_2"> </a>
+Now whether this is employed in the treatment of a commonplace, or in
+the way of exaggeration, whether to place arguments or facts in a strong
+light, or in the disposition of actions, or of passions&mdash;for
+amplification takes a hundred different shapes&mdash;in all cases the
+orator must be cautioned that none of these methods is complete without
+the aid of sublimity,&mdash;unless, indeed, it be our object to excite
+pity, or to depreciate an opponent’s argument. In all other uses of
+amplification, if you subtract the element of sublimity you will take as
+it were the
+<span class = "pagenum">26</span>
+soul from the body. No sooner is the support of sublimity removed than
+the whole becomes lifeless, nerveless, and dull.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXI_3"> </a>
+There is a difference, however, between the rules I am now giving and
+those just mentioned. Then I was speaking of the delineation and
+co-ordination of the principal circumstances. My next task, therefore,
+must be briefly to define this difference, and with it the general
+distinction between amplification and sublimity. Our whole discourse
+will thus gain in clearness.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXII_1">XII</a></h5>
+
+<p>I must first remark that I am not satisfied with the definition of
+amplification generally given by authorities on rhetoric. They explain
+it to be a form of language which invests the subject with a certain
+grandeur. Yes, but this definition may be applied indifferently to
+sublimity, pathos, and the use of figurative language, since all these
+invest the discourse with some sort of grandeur. The difference seems to
+me to lie in this, that sublimity gives elevation to a subject, while
+amplification gives extension as well. Thus the sublime is often
+conveyed in a single thought,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_29" href =
+"#note_29">29</a> but amplification can only subsist with a certain
+prolixity and diffusiveness.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXII_2"> </a>
+The most general definition of amplification would
+<span class = "pagenum">27</span>
+explain it to consist in the gathering together of all the constituent
+parts and topics of a subject, emphasising the argument by repeated
+insistence, herein differing from proof, that whereas the object of
+proof is logical demonstration, ...</p>
+
+<p>Plato, like the sea, pours forth his riches in a copious and
+expansive flood.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXII_3"> </a>
+Hence the style of the orator, who is the greater master of our
+emotions, is often, as it were, red-hot and ablaze with passion, whereas
+Plato, whose strength lay in a sort of weighty and sober magnificence,
+though never frigid, does not rival the thunders of Demosthenes.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXII_4"> </a>
+And, if a Greek may be allowed to express an opinion on the subject of
+Latin literature, I think the same difference may be discerned in the
+grandeur of Cicero as compared with that of his Grecian rival. The
+sublimity of Demosthenes is generally sudden and abrupt: that of Cicero
+is equally diffused. Demosthenes is vehement, rapid, vigorous, terrible;
+he burns and sweeps away all before him; and hence we may liken him to a
+whirlwind or a thunderbolt: Cicero is like a widespread conflagration,
+which rolls over and feeds on all around it, whose fire is extensive and
+burns long, breaking out successively in different places, and finding
+its fuel now here, now there.
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXII_5"> </a>
+Such points, however, I resign to your more competent judgment.</p>
+
+<p>To resume, then, the high-strung sublimity of
+<span class = "pagenum">28</span>
+Demosthenes is appropriate to all cases where it is desired to
+exaggerate, or to rouse some vehement emotion, and generally when we
+want to carry away our audience with us. We must employ the diffusive
+style, on the other hand, when we wish to overpower them with a flood of
+language. It is suitable, for example, to familiar topics, and to
+perorations in most cases, and to digressions, and to all descriptive
+and declamatory passages, and in dealing with history or natural
+science, and in numerous other cases.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXIII_1">XIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>To return, however, to Plato: how grand he can be with all that
+gentle and noiseless flow of eloquence you will be reminded by this
+characteristic passage, which you have read in his <i>Republic</i>:
+“They, therefore, who have no knowledge of wisdom and virtue, whose
+lives are passed in feasting and similar joys, are borne downwards, as
+is but natural, and in this region they wander all their lives; but they
+never lifted up their eyes nor were borne upwards to the true world
+above, nor ever tasted of pleasure abiding and unalloyed; but like
+beasts they ever look downwards, and their heads are bent to the ground,
+or rather to the table; they feed full their bellies and their lusts,
+and longing ever more and more for such things they kick and gore one
+another
+<span class = "pagenum">29</span>
+with horns and hoofs of iron, and slay one another in their insatiable
+desires.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_30" href = "#note_30">30</a></p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXIII_2"> </a>
+We may learn from this author, if we would but observe his example, that
+there is yet another path besides those mentioned which leads to sublime
+heights. What path do I mean? The emulous imitation of the great poets
+and prose-writers of the past. On this mark, dear friend, let us keep
+our eyes ever steadfastly fixed. Many gather the divine impulse from
+another’s spirit, just as we are told that the Pythian priestess, when
+she takes her seat on the tripod, where there is said to be a rent in
+the ground breathing upwards a heavenly emanation, straightway conceives
+from that source the godlike gift of prophecy, and utters her inspired
+oracles; so likewise from the mighty genius of the great writers of
+antiquity there is carried into the souls of their rivals, as from a
+fount of inspiration, an effluence which breathes upon them until, even
+though their natural temper be but cold, they share the sublime
+enthusiasm of others.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXIII_3"> </a>
+Thus Homer’s name is associated with a numerous band of illustrious
+disciples&mdash;not only Herodotus, but Stesichorus before him, and the
+great Archilochus, and above all Plato, who from the great fountain-head
+of Homer’s genius drew into himself innumerable tributary streams.
+Perhaps it would have been necessary to illustrate
+<span class = "pagenum">30</span>
+this point, had not Ammonius and his school already classified and noted
+down the various examples.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXIII_4"> </a>
+Now what I am speaking of is not plagiarism, but resembles the process
+of copying from fair forms or statues or works of skilled labour. Nor in
+my opinion would so many fair flowers of imagery have bloomed among the
+philosophical dogmas of Plato, nor would he have risen so often to the
+language and topics of poetry, had he not engaged heart and soul in a
+contest for precedence with Homer, like a young champion entering the
+lists against a veteran. It may be that he showed too ambitious a spirit
+in venturing on such a duel; but nevertheless it was not without
+advantage to him: “for strife like this,” as Hesiod says, “is good for
+men.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_31" href = "#note_31">31</a> And where
+shall we find a more glorious arena or a nobler crown than here, where
+even defeat at the hands of our predecessors is not ignoble?</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXIV_1">XIV</a></h5>
+
+<p>Therefore it is good for us also, when we are labouring on some
+subject which demands a lofty and majestic style, to imagine to
+ourselves how Homer might have expressed this or that, or how Plato or
+Demosthenes would have clothed it with
+<span class = "pagenum">31</span>
+sublimity, or, in history, Thucydides. For by our fixing an eye of
+rivalry on those high examples they will become like beacons to guide
+us, and will perhaps lift up our souls to the fulness of the stature we
+conceive.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXIV_2"> </a>
+And it would be still better should we try to realise this further
+thought, How would Homer, had he been here, or how would Demosthenes,
+have listened to what I have written, or how would they have been
+affected by it? For what higher incentive to exertion could a writer
+have than to imagine such judges or such an audience of his works, and
+to give an account of his writings with heroes like these to criticise
+and look on?
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXIV_3"> </a>
+Yet more inspiring would be the thought, With what feelings will future
+ages through all time read these my works? If this should awaken a fear
+in any writer that he will not be intelligible to his contemporaries it
+will necessarily follow that the conceptions of his mind will be crude,
+maimed, and abortive, and lacking that ripe perfection which alone can
+win the applause of ages to come.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXV_1">XV</a></h5>
+
+<p>The dignity, grandeur, and energy of a style largely depend on a
+proper employment of images, a term which I prefer to that usually
+given.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_32" href = "#note_32">32</a> The
+<span class = "pagenum">32</span>
+term image in its most general acceptation includes every thought,
+howsoever presented, which issues in speech. But the term is now
+generally confined to those cases when he who is speaking, by reason of
+the rapt and excited state of his feelings, imagines himself to see what
+he is talking about, and produces a similar illusion in his hearers.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_2"> </a>
+Poets and orators both employ images, but with a very different object,
+as you are well aware. The poetical image is designed to astound; the
+oratorical image to give perspicuity. Both, however, seek to work on the
+emotions.</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Mother, I pray thee, set not thou upon me<br>
+Those maids with bloody face and serpent hair:<br>
+See, see, they come, they’re here, they spring upon me!”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_33" href = "#note_33">33</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+And again&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Ah, ah, she’ll slay me! whither shall I fly?”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_34" href = "#note_34">34</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+The poet when he wrote like this saw the Erinyes with his own eyes, and
+he almost compels his readers to see them too.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_3"> </a>
+Euripides found his chief delight in the labour of giving tragic
+expression to these two passions of madness and love, showing here a
+real mastery which I cannot think he exhibited elsewhere. Still, he is
+by no means diffident in venturing on other fields of the imagination.
+His genius was far from being of the highest order, but
+<span class = "pagenum">33</span>
+by taking pains he often raises himself to a tragic elevation. In his
+sublimer moments he generally reminds us of Homer’s description of the
+lion&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“With tail he lashes both his flanks and sides,<br>
+And spurs himself to battle.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_35" href =
+"#note_35">35</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_4"> </a>
+Take, for instance, that passage in which Helios, in handing the reins
+to his son, says&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Drive on, but shun the burning Libyan tract;<br>
+The hot dry air will let thine axle down:<br>
+Toward the seven Pleiades keep thy steadfast way.”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+And then&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“This said, his son undaunted snatched the reins,<br>
+Then smote the winged coursers’ sides: they bound<br>
+Forth on the void and cavernous vault of air.<br>
+His father mounts another steed, and rides<br>
+With warning voice guiding his son. ‘Drive there!<br>
+Turn, turn thy car this way.’”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_36" href =
+"#note_36">36</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+May we not say that the spirit of the poet mounts the chariot with his
+hero, and accompanies the winged steeds in their perilous flight? Were
+it not so,&mdash;had not his imagination soared side by side with them
+in that celestial passage,&mdash;he would never have conceived so vivid
+an image. Similar is that passage in his “Cassandra,” beginning</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Ye Trojans, lovers of the steed.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_37" href
+= "#note_37">37</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_5"> </a>
+Aeschylus is especially bold in forming images
+<span class = "pagenum">34</span>
+suited to his heroic themes: as when he says of his “Seven against
+Thebes”&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Seven mighty men, and valiant captains, slew<br>
+Over an iron-bound shield a bull, then dipped<br>
+Their fingers in the blood, and all invoked<br>
+Ares, Enyo, and death-dealing Flight<br>
+In witness of their oaths,”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_38" href =
+"#note_38">38</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+and describes how they all mutually pledged themselves without flinching
+to die. Sometimes, however, his thoughts are unshapen, and as it were
+rough-hewn and rugged. Not observing this, Euripides, from too blind a
+rivalry, sometimes falls under the same censure.
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_6"> </a>
+Aeschylus with a strange violence of language represents the palace of
+Lycurgus as <i>possessed</i> at the appearance of Dionysus&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“The halls with rapture thrill, the roof’s inspired.”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_39" href = "#note_39">39</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+Here Euripides, in borrowing the image, softens its extravagance<a class
+= "tag" name = "tag_40" href = "#note_40">40</a>&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“And all the mountain felt the god.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_41"
+href = "#note_41">41</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_7"> </a>
+Sophocles has also shown himself a great master of the imagination in
+the scene in which the dying Oedipus prepares himself for burial in the
+midst of a tempest,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_42" href =
+"#note_42">42</a> and where he tells how Achilles appeared to the Greeks
+over his tomb just as they were
+<span class = "pagenum">35</span>
+putting out to sea on their departure from Troy.<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_43" href = "#note_43">43</a> This last scene has also been
+delineated by Simonides with a vividness which leaves him inferior to
+none. But it would be an endless task to cite all possible examples.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">8</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_8"> </a>
+To return, then,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_44" href =
+"#note_44">44</a> in poetry, as I observed, a certain mythical
+exaggeration is allowable, transcending altogether mere logical
+credence. But the chief beauties of an oratorical image are its energy
+and reality. Such digressions become offensive and monstrous when the
+language is cast in a poetical and fabulous mould, and runs into all
+sorts of impossibilities. Thus much may be learnt from the great orators
+of our own day, when they tell us in tragic tones that they see the
+Furies<a class = "tag" name = "tag_45" href =
+"#note_45">45</a>&mdash;good people, can’t they understand that when
+Orestes cries out</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Off, off, I say! I know thee who thou art,<br>
+One of the fiends that haunt me: I feel thine arms<br>
+About me cast, to drag me down to hell,”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_46"
+href = "#note_46">46</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+these are the hallucinations of a madman?</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">9</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_9"> </a>
+Wherein, then, lies the force of an oratorical image? Doubtless in
+adding energy and passion in a hundred different ways to a speech; but
+especially in this, that when it is mingled with the practical,
+argumentative parts of an oration, it does not merely
+<span class = "pagenum">36</span>
+convince the hearer, but enthralls him. Such is the effect of those
+words of Demosthenes:<a class = "tag" name = "tag_47" href =
+"#note_47">47</a> “Supposing, now, at this moment a cry of alarm were
+heard outside the assize courts, and the news came that the prison was
+broken open and the prisoners escaped, is there any man here who is such
+a trifler that he would not run to the rescue at the top of his speed?
+But suppose some one came forward with the information that they had
+been set at liberty by the defendant, what then? Why, he would be
+lynched on the spot!”
+<span class = "chapnum">10</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_10"> </a>
+Compare also the way in which Hyperides excused himself, when he was
+proceeded against for bringing in a bill to liberate the slaves after
+Chaeronea. “This measure,” he said, “was not drawn up by any orator, but
+by the battle of Chaeronea.” This striking image, being thrown in by the
+speaker in the midst of his proofs, enables him by one bold stroke to
+carry all mere logical objection before him.
+<span class = "chapnum">11</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_11"> </a>
+In all such cases our nature is drawn towards that which affects it most
+powerfully: hence an image lures us away from an argument: judgment is
+paralysed, matters of fact disappear from view, eclipsed by the superior
+blaze. Nor is it surprising that we should be thus affected; for when
+two forces are thus placed in juxtaposition, the stronger must always
+absorb into itself the weaker.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "pagenum">37</span>
+<span class = "chapnum">12</span>
+<a name = "chapXV_12"> </a>
+On sublimity of thought, and the manner in which it arises from native
+greatness of mind, from imitation, and from the employment of images,
+this brief outline must suffice.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_48" href =
+"#note_48">48</a></p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXVI_1">XVI</a></h5>
+
+<p>The subject which next claims our attention is that of figures of
+speech. I have already observed that figures, judiciously employed, play
+an important part in producing sublimity. It would be a tedious, or
+rather an endless task, to deal with every detail of this subject here;
+so in order to establish what I have laid down, I will just run over,
+without further preface, a few of those figures which are most effective
+in lending grandeur to language.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXVI_2"> </a>
+Demosthenes is defending his policy; his natural line of argument would
+have been: “You did not do wrong, men of Athens, to take upon yourselves
+the struggle for the liberties of Hellas. Of this you have home proofs.
+<i>They</i> did not wrong who fought at Marathon, at Salamis, and
+Plataea.” Instead of this, in a sudden moment of supreme exaltation he
+bursts out like some inspired prophet with that famous appeal to the
+mighty dead: “Ye did not, could not have done wrong. I swear it by the
+<span class = "pagenum">38</span>
+men who faced the foe at Marathon!”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_49" href
+= "#note_49">49</a> He employs the figure of adjuration, to which I will
+here give the name of Apostrophe. And what does he gain by it? He exalts
+the Athenian ancestors to the rank of divinities, showing that we ought
+to invoke those who have fallen for their country as gods; he fills the
+hearts of his judges with the heroic pride of the old warriors of
+Hellas; forsaking the beaten path of argument he rises to the loftiest
+altitude of grandeur and passion, and commands assent by the startling
+novelty of his appeal; he applies the healing charm of eloquence, and
+thus “ministers to the mind diseased” of his countrymen, until lifted by
+his brave words above their misfortunes they begin to feel that the
+disaster of Chaeronea is no less glorious than the victories of Marathon
+and Salamis. All this he effects by the use of one figure, and so
+carries his hearers away with him.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXVI_3"> </a>
+It is said that the germ of this adjuration is found in
+Eupolis&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“By mine own fight, by Marathon, I say,<br>
+Who makes my heart to ache shall rue the day!”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_50" href = "#note_50">50</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+But there is nothing grand in the mere employment of an oath. Its
+grandeur will depend on its being employed in the right place and the
+right manner, on the right occasion, and with the right motive. In
+Eupolis the oath is nothing beyond an oath; and
+<span class = "pagenum">39</span>
+the Athenians to whom it is addressed are still prosperous, and in need
+of no consolation. Moreover, the poet does not, like Demosthenes, swear
+by the departed heroes as deities, so as to engender in his audience a
+just conception of their valour, but diverges from the champions to the
+battle&mdash;a mere lifeless thing. But Demosthenes has so skilfully
+managed the oath that in addressing his countrymen after the defeat of
+Chaeronea he takes out of their minds all sense of disaster; and at the
+same time, while proving that no mistake has been made, he holds up an
+example, confirms his arguments by an oath, and makes his praise of the
+dead an incentive to the living.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXVI_4"> </a>
+And to rebut a possible objection which occurred to him&mdash;“Can you,
+Demosthenes, whose policy ended in defeat, swear by a
+victory?”&mdash;the orator proceeds to measure his language, choosing
+his very words so as to give no handle to opponents, thus showing us
+that even in our most inspired moments reason ought to hold the reins.<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_51" href = "#note_51">51</a> Let us mark his
+words: “Those who <i>faced the foe</i> at Marathon; those who <i>fought
+in the sea-fights</i> of Salamis and Artemisium; those who <i>stood in
+the ranks</i> at Plataea.” Note that he nowhere says “those who
+<i>conquered</i>,” artfully suppressing any word which might hint at the
+successful issue of those
+<span class = "pagenum">40</span>
+battles, which would have spoilt the parallel with Chaeronea. And for
+the same reason he steals a march on his audience, adding immediately:
+“All of whom, Aeschines,&mdash;not those who were successful
+only,&mdash;were buried by the state at the public expense.”</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXVII_1">XVII</a></h5>
+
+<p>There is one truth which my studies have led me to observe, which
+perhaps it would be worth while to set down briefly here. It is this,
+that by a natural law the Sublime, besides receiving an acquisition of
+strength from figures, in its turn lends support in a remarkable manner
+to them. To explain: the use of figures has a peculiar tendency to rouse
+a suspicion of dishonesty, and to create an impression of treachery,
+scheming, and false reasoning; especially if the person addressed be a
+judge, who is master of the situation, and still more in the case of a
+despot, a king, a military potentate, or any of those who sit in high
+places.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_52" href = "#note_52">52</a> If a
+man feels that this artful speaker is treating him like a silly boy and
+trying to throw dust in his eyes, he at once grows irritated, and
+thinking that such false reasoning implies a contempt of his
+understanding, he perhaps flies into a rage and will not hear another
+<span class = "pagenum">41</span>
+word; or even if he masters his resentment, still he is utterly
+indisposed to yield to the persuasive power of eloquence. Hence it
+follows that a figure is then most effectual when it appears in
+disguise.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXVII_2"> </a>
+To allay, then, this distrust which attaches to the use of figures we
+must call in the powerful aid of sublimity and passion. For art, once
+associated with these great allies, will be overshadowed by their
+grandeur and beauty, and pass beyond the reach of all suspicion. To
+prove this I need only refer to the passage already quoted: “I swear it
+by the men,” etc. It is the very brilliancy of the orator’s figure which
+blinds us to the fact that it <i>is</i> a figure. For as the fainter
+lustre of the stars is put out of sight by the all-encompassing rays of
+the sun, so when sublimity sheds its light all round the sophistries of
+rhetoric they become invisible.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXVII_3"> </a>
+A similar illusion is produced by the painter’s art. When light and
+shadow are represented in colour, though they lie on the same surface
+side by side, it is the light which meets the eye first, and appears not
+only more conspicuous but also much nearer. In the same manner passion
+and grandeur of language, lying nearer to our souls by reason both of a
+certain natural affinity and of their radiance, always strike our mental
+eye before we become conscious of the figure, throwing its artificial
+character into the shade and hiding it as it were in a veil.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">42</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXVIII_1">XVIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>The figures of question and interrogation<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_53" href = "#note_53">53</a> also possess a specific quality which
+tends strongly to stir an audience and give energy to the speaker’s
+words. “Or tell me, do you want to run about asking one another, is
+there any news? what greater news could you have than that a man of
+Macedon is making himself master of Hellas? Is Philip dead? Not he.
+However, he is ill. But what is that to you? Even if anything happens to
+him you will soon raise up another Philip.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_54" href = "#note_54">54</a> Or this passage: “Shall we sail
+against Macedon? And where, asks one, shall we effect a landing? The war
+itself will show us where Philip’s weak places lie.”<a class = "tag"
+href = "#note_54">54</a> Now if this had been put baldly
+it would have lost greatly in force. As we see it, it is full of the
+quick alternation of question and answer. The orator replies to himself
+as though he were meeting another man’s objections. And this figure not
+only raises the tone of his words but makes them more convincing.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXVIII_2"> </a>
+For an exhibition of feeling has then most effect on an audience when it
+appears to flow naturally from the occasion, not to have been laboured
+by the art of the speaker; and this device of questioning and replying
+to himself reproduces
+<span class = "pagenum">43</span>
+the moment of passion. For as a sudden question addressed to an
+individual will sometimes startle him into a reply which is an unguarded
+expression of his genuine sentiments, so the figure of question and
+interrogation blinds the judgment of an audience, and deceives them into
+a belief that what is really the result of labour in every detail has
+been struck out of the speaker by the inspiration of the moment.</p>
+
+<p>There is one passage in Herodotus which is generally credited with
+extraordinary sublimity....</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXIX_1">XIX</a></h5>
+
+<p>... The removal of connecting particles gives a quick rush and
+“torrent rapture” to a passage, the writer appearing to be actually
+almost left behind by his own words. There is an example in Xenophon:
+“Clashing their shields together they pushed, they fought, they slew,
+they fell.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_55" href = "#note_55">55</a> And
+the words of Eurylochus in the <i>Odyssey</i>&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“We passed at thy command the woodland’s shade;<br>
+We found a stately hall built in a mountain glade.”<a class = "tag" name
+= "tag_56" href = "#note_56">56</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+Words thus severed from one another without the intervention of stops
+give a lively impression of one who through distress of mind at once
+halts and
+<span class = "pagenum">44</span>
+hurries in his speech. And this is what Homer has expressed by using the
+figure <i>Asyndeton</i>.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXX_1">XX</a></h5>
+
+<p>But nothing is so conducive to energy as a combination of different
+figures, when two or three uniting their resources mutually contribute
+to the vigour, the cogency, and the beauty of a speech. So Demosthenes
+in his speech against Meidias repeats the same words and breaks up his
+sentences in one lively descriptive passage: “He who receives a blow is
+hurt in many ways which he could not even describe to another, by
+gesture, by look, by tone.”
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXX_2"> </a>
+Then, to vary the movement of his speech, and prevent it from standing
+still (for stillness produces rest, but passion requires a certain
+disorder of language, imitating the agitation and commotion of the
+soul), he at once dashes off in another direction, breaking up his words
+again, and repeating them in a different form, “by gesture, by look, by
+tone&mdash;when insult, when hatred, is added to violence, when he is
+struck with the fist, when he is struck as a slave!” By such means the
+orator imitates the action of Meidias, dealing blow upon blow on the
+minds of his judges. Immediately after like a hurricane he makes a fresh
+attack: “When he is struck with the fist, when he is struck in the face;
+this is what moves, this is what
+<span class = "pagenum">45</span>
+maddens a man, unless he is inured to outrage; no one could describe all
+this so as to bring home to his hearers its bitterness.”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_57" href = "#note_57">57</a> You see how he preserves, by
+continual variation, the intrinsic force of these repetitions and broken
+clauses, so that his order seems irregular, and conversely his
+irregularity acquires a certain measure of order.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXI_1">XXI</a></h5>
+
+<p>Supposing we add the conjunctions, after the practice of Isocrates
+and his school: “Moreover, I must not omit to mention that he who
+strikes a blow may hurt in many ways, in the first place by gesture, in
+the second place by look, in the third and last place by his tone.” If
+you compare the words thus set down in logical sequence with the
+expressions of the “Meidias,” you will see that the rapidity and rugged
+abruptness of passion, when all is made regular by connecting links,
+will be smoothed away, and the whole point and fire of the passage will
+at once disappear.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXI_2"> </a>
+For as, if you were to bind two runners together, they will forthwith be
+deprived of all liberty of movement, even so passion rebels against the
+trammels of conjunctions and other particles, because they curb its free
+rush and destroy the impression of mechanical impulse.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">46</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXII_1">XXII</a></h5>
+
+<p>The figure hyperbaton belongs to the same class. By hyperbaton we
+mean a transposition of words or thoughts from their usual order,
+bearing unmistakably the characteristic stamp of violent mental
+agitation. In real life we often see a man under the influence of rage,
+or fear, or indignation, or beside himself with jealousy, or with some
+other out of the interminable list of human passions, begin a sentence,
+and then swerve aside into some inconsequent parenthesis, and then again
+double back to his original statement, being borne with quick turns by
+his distress, as though by a shifting wind, now this way, now that, and
+playing a thousand capricious variations on his words, his thoughts, and
+the natural order of his discourse. Now the figure hyperbaton is the
+means which is employed by the best writers to imitate these signs of
+natural emotion. For art is then perfect when it seems to be nature, and
+nature, again, is most effective when pervaded by the unseen presence of
+art. An illustration will be found in the speech of Dionysius of Phocaea
+in Herodotus: “A hair’s breadth now decides our destiny, Ionians,
+whether we shall live as freemen or as slaves&mdash;ay, as runaway
+slaves. Now, therefore, if you choose to endure a little hardship, you
+will be
+<span class = "pagenum">47</span>
+able at the cost of some present exertion to overcome your
+enemies.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_58" href = "#note_58">58</a>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXII_2"> </a>
+The regular sequence here would have been: “Ionians, now is the time for
+you to endure a little hardship; for a hair’s breadth will now decide
+our destiny.” But the Phocaean transposes the title “Ionians,” rushing
+at once to the subject of alarm, as though in the terror of the moment
+he had forgotten the usual address to his audience. Moreover, he inverts
+the logical order of his thoughts, and instead of beginning with the
+necessity for exertion, which is the point he wishes to urge upon them,
+he first gives them the reason for that necessity in the words, “a
+hair’s breadth now decides our destiny,” so that his words seem
+unpremeditated, and forced upon him by the crisis.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXII_3"> </a>
+Thucydides surpasses all other writers in the bold use of this figure,
+even breaking up sentences which are by their nature absolutely one and
+indivisible. But nowhere do we find it so unsparingly employed as in
+Demosthenes, who though not so daring in his manner of using it as the
+elder writer is very happy in giving to his speeches by frequent
+transpositions the lively air of unstudied debate. Moreover, he drags,
+as it were, his audience with him into the perils of a long inverted
+clause.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXII_4"> </a>
+He often begins to say something, then leaves the thought in suspense,
+meanwhile thrusting in between,
+<span class = "pagenum">48</span>
+in a position apparently foreign and unnatural, some extraneous matters,
+one upon another, and having thus made his hearers fear lest the whole
+discourse should break down, and forced them into eager sympathy with
+the danger of the speaker, when he is nearly at the end of a period he
+adds just at the right moment, <i>i.e.</i> when it is least expected,
+the point which they have been waiting for so long. And thus by the very
+boldness and hazard of his inversions he produces a much more astounding
+effect. I forbear to cite examples, as they are too numerous to
+require&nbsp;it.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXIII_1">XXIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>The juxtaposition of different cases, the enumeration of particulars,
+and the use of contrast and climax, all, as you know, add much vigour,
+and give beauty and great elevation and life to a style. The diction
+also gains greatly in diversity and movement by changes of case, time,
+person, number, and gender.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXIII_2"> </a>
+With regard to change of number: not only is the style improved by the
+use of those words which, though singular in form, are found on
+inspection to be plural in meaning, as in the lines&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“A countless host dispersed along the sand<br>
+With joyous cries the shoal of tunny hailed,”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+but it is more worthy of observation that plurals
+<span class = "pagenum">49</span>
+for singulars sometimes fall with a more impressive dignity, rousing the
+imagination by the mere sense of vast number.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXIII_3"> </a>
+Such is the effect of those words of Oedipus in Sophocles&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent3">
+“Oh fatal, fatal ties!</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Ye gave us birth, and we being born ye sowed<br>
+The self-same seed, and gave the world to view<br>
+Sons, brothers, sires, domestic murder foul,<br>
+Brides, mothers, wives.... Ay, ye laid bare<br>
+The blackest, deepest place where Shame can dwell.”<a class = "tag" name
+= "tag_59" href = "#note_59">59</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+Here we have in either case but one person, first Oedipus, then Jocasta;
+but the expansion of number into the plural gives an impression of
+multiplied calamity. So in the following plurals&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“There came forth Hectors, and there came Sarpedons.”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+And in those words of Plato’s (which we have
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXIII_4"> </a>
+already adduced elsewhere), referring to the Athenians: “We have no
+Pelopses or Cadmuses or Aegyptuses or Danauses, or any others out of all
+the mob of Hellenised barbarians, dwelling among us; no, this is the
+land of pure Greeks, with no mixture of foreign elements,”<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_60" href = "#note_60">60</a> etc. Such an accumulation
+of words in the plural number necessarily gives greater pomp and sound
+to a subject. But we must only have recourse to this device when the
+nature of our theme makes it allowable to amplify, to multiply, or to
+speak in the tones of exaggeration or
+<span class = "pagenum">50</span>
+passion. To overlay every sentence with ornament<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_61" href = "#note_61">61</a> is very pedantic.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXIV_1">XXIV</a></h5>
+
+<p>On the other hand, the contraction of plurals into singulars
+sometimes creates an appearance of great dignity; as in that phrase of
+Demosthenes: “Thereupon all Peloponnesus was divided.”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_62" href = "#note_62">62</a> There is another in Herodotus:
+“When Phrynichus brought a drama on the stage entitled <i>The Taking of
+Miletus</i>, the whole theatre fell a weeping”&mdash;instead of “all the
+spectators.” This knitting together of a number of scattered particulars
+into one whole gives them an aspect of corporate life. And the beauty of
+both uses lies, I think, in their betokening emotion, by giving a sudden
+change of complexion to the circumstances,&mdash;whether a word which is
+strictly singular is unexpectedly changed into a plural,&mdash;or
+whether a number of isolated units are combined by the use of a single
+sonorous word under one head.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXV_1">XXV</a></h5>
+
+<p>When past events are introduced as happening in present time the
+narrative form is changed into
+<span class = "pagenum">51</span>
+a dramatic action. Such is that description in Xenophon: “A man who has
+fallen, and is being trampled under foot by Cyrus’s horse, strikes the
+belly of the animal with his scimitar; the horse starts aside and
+unseats Cyrus, and he falls.” Similarly in many passages of
+Thucydides.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXVI_1">XXVI</a></h5>
+
+<p>Equally dramatic is the interchange of persons, often making a reader
+fancy himself to be moving in the midst of the perils
+described&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Unwearied, thou wouldst deem, with toil unspent,<br>
+They met in war; so furiously they fought.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_63" href = "#note_63">63</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+and that line in Aratus&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Beware that month to tempt the surging sea.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_64" href = "#note_64">64</a>
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVI_2"> </a>
+In the same way Herodotus: “Passing from the city of Elephantine you
+will sail upwards until you reach a level plain. You cross this region,
+and there entering another ship you will sail on for two days, and so
+reach a great city, whose name is Meroe.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_65" href = "#note_65">65</a> Observe how he takes us, as it were,
+by the hand, and leads us in spirit through these places, making us no
+longer readers, but spectators. Such a direct personal address always
+has the effect of placing the reader in the midst of the scene of
+<span class = "pagenum">52</span>
+action.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVI_3"> </a>
+And by pointing your words to the individual reader, instead of to the
+readers generally, as in the line</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“Thou had’st not known for whom Tydides fought,”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_66" href = "#note_66">66</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+and thus exciting him by an appeal to himself, you will rouse interest,
+and fix attention, and make him a partaker in the action of the
+book.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXVII_1">XXVII</a></h5>
+
+<p>Sometimes, again, a writer in the midst of a narrative in the third
+person suddenly steps aside and makes a transition to the first. It is a
+kind of figure which strikes like a sudden outburst of passion. Thus
+Hector in the <i>Iliad</i></p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“With mighty voice called to the men of Troy<br>
+To storm the ships, and leave the bloody spoils:<br>
+If any I behold with willing foot<br>
+Shunning the ships, and lingering on the plain,<br>
+That hour I will contrive his death.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_67"
+href = "#note_67">67</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+The poet then takes upon himself the narrative part, as being his proper
+business; but this abrupt threat he attributes, without a word of
+warning, to the enraged Trojan chief. To have interposed any such words
+as “Hector said so and so” would have had a frigid effect. As the lines
+stand the writer is left behind by his own words, and the transition is
+<span class = "pagenum">53</span>
+effected while he is preparing for it.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVII_2"> </a>
+Accordingly the proper use of this figure is in dealing with some urgent
+crisis which will not allow the writer to linger, but compels him to
+make a rapid change from one person to another. So in Hecataeus: “Now
+Ceyx took this in dudgeon, and straightway bade the children of <ins
+class = "correction" title =
+"spelling variation in original">Heracles</ins>
+to depart. ‘Behold, I can give you no help;
+lest, therefore, ye perish yourselves and bring hurt upon me also, get
+ye forth into some other land.’”
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVII_3"> </a>
+There is a different use of the change of persons in the speech of
+Demosthenes against Aristogeiton, which places before us the quick turns
+of violent emotion. “Is there none to be found among you,” he asks, “who
+even feels indignation at the outrageous conduct of a loathsome and
+shameless wretch who,&mdash;vilest of men, when you were debarred from
+freedom of speech, not by barriers or by doors, which might indeed be
+opened,”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_68" href = "#note_68">68</a> etc.
+Thus in the midst of a half-expressed thought he makes a quick change of
+front, and having almost in his anger torn one word into two persons,
+“who, vilest of men,” etc., he then breaks off his address to
+Aristogeiton, and seems to leave him, nevertheless, by the passion of
+his utterance, rousing all the more the attention of the court.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVII_4"> </a>
+The same feature may be observed in a speech of Penelope’s&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+<span class = "pagenum">54</span>
+“Why com’st thou, Medon, from the wooers proud?<br>
+Com’st thou to bid the handmaids of my lord<br>
+To cease their tasks, and make for them good cheer?<br>
+Ill fare their wooing, and their gathering here!<br>
+Would God that here this hour they all might take<br>
+Their last, their latest meal! Who day by day<br>
+Make here your muster, to devour and waste<br>
+The substance of my son: have ye not heard<br>
+When children at your fathers’ knee the deeds<br>
+And prowess of your king?”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_69" href =
+"#note_69">69</a>
+</div>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXVIII_1">XXVIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>None, I suppose, would dispute the fact that periphrasis tends much
+to sublimity. For, as in music the simple air is rendered more pleasing
+by the addition of harmony, so in language periphrasis often sounds in
+concord with a literal expression, adding much to the beauty of its
+tone,&mdash;provided always that it is not inflated and harsh, but
+agreeably blended.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVIII_2"> </a>
+To confirm this one passage from Plato will suffice&mdash;the opening
+words of his Funeral Oration: “In deed these men have now received from
+us their due, and that tribute paid they are now passing on their
+destined journey, with the State speeding them all and his own friends
+speeding each one of them on his way.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_70"
+href = "#note_70">70</a> Death, you see, he calls the “destined
+journey”; to receive the
+<span class = "pagenum">55</span>
+rites of burial is to be publicly “sped on your way” by the State. And
+these turns of language lend dignity in no common measure to the
+thought. He takes the words in their naked simplicity and handles them
+as a musician, investing them with melody,&mdash;harmonising them, as it
+were,&mdash;by the use of periphrasis.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXVIII_3"> </a>
+So Xenophon: “Labour you regard as the guide to a pleasant life, and you
+have laid up in your souls the fairest and most soldier-like of all
+gifts: in praise is your delight, more than in anything else.”<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_71" href = "#note_71">71</a> By saying, instead of
+“you are ready to labour,” “you regard labour as the guide to a pleasant
+life,” and by similarly expanding the rest of that passage, he gives to
+his eulogy a much wider and loftier range of sentiment. Let us add that
+inimitable phrase in Herodotus: “Those Scythians who pillaged the temple
+were smitten from heaven by a female malady.”</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXIX_1">XXIX</a></h5>
+
+<p>But this figure, more than any other, is very liable to abuse, and
+great restraint is required in employing it. It soon begins to carry an
+impression of feebleness, savours of vapid trifling, and arouses
+disgust. Hence Plato, who is very bold and not always happy in his use
+of figures, is much ridiculed
+<span class = "pagenum">56</span>
+for saying in his <i>Laws</i> that “neither gold nor silver wealth must
+be allowed to establish itself in our State,”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_72" href = "#note_72">72</a> suggesting, it is said, that if he had
+forbidden property in oxen or sheep he would certainly have spoken of it
+as “bovine and ovine wealth.”</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXIX_2"> </a>
+Here we must quit this part of our subject, hoping, my dear friend
+Terentian, that your learned curiosity will be satisfied with this short
+excursion on the use of figures in their relation to the Sublime. All
+those which I have mentioned help to render a style more energetic and
+impassioned; and passion contributes as largely to sublimity as the
+delineation of character to amusement.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXX_1">XXX</a></h5>
+
+<p>But since the thoughts conveyed by words and the expression of those
+thoughts are for the most part interwoven with one another, we will now
+add some considerations which have hitherto been overlooked on the
+subject of expression. To say that the choice of appropriate and
+striking words has a marvellous power and an enthralling charm for the
+reader, that this is the main object of pursuit with all orators and
+writers, that it is this, and this alone, which causes the works of
+literature to exhibit the glowing perfections of the finest statues,
+their grandeur,
+<span class = "pagenum">57</span>
+their beauty, their mellowness, their dignity, their energy, their
+power, and all their other graces, and that it is this which endows the
+facts with a vocal soul; to say all this would, I fear, be, to the
+initiated, an impertinence. Indeed, we may say with strict truth that
+beautiful words are the very light of thought.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXX_2"> </a>
+I do not mean to say that imposing language is appropriate to every
+occasion. A trifling subject tricked out in grand and stately words
+would have the same effect as a huge tragic mask placed on the head of a
+little child. Only in poetry and ...</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXI_1">XXXI</a></h5>
+
+<p>... There is a genuine ring in that line of Anacreon’s&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“The Thracian filly I no longer heed.”
+</div>
+
+<p>
+The same merit belongs to that original phrase in Theophrastus; to me,
+at least, from the closeness of its analogy, it seems to have a peculiar
+expressiveness, though Caecilius censures it, without telling us why.
+“Philip,” says the historian, “showed a marvellous alacrity in <i>taking
+doses of trouble</i>.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_73" href =
+"#note_73">73</a> We see from this that the most homely language is
+sometimes far more vivid than the most ornamental, being recognised at
+once as the language of common life, and gaining immediate currency by
+its familiarity.
+<span class = "pagenum">58</span>
+In speaking, then, of Philip as “taking doses of trouble,” Theopompus
+has laid hold on a phrase which describes with peculiar vividness one
+who for the sake of advantage endured what was base and sordid with
+patience and cheerfulness.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXI_2"> </a>
+The same may be observed of two passages in Herodotus: “Cleomenes having
+lost his wits, cut his own flesh into pieces with a short sword, until
+by gradually <i>mincing</i> his whole body he destroyed himself”;<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_74" href = "#note_74">74</a> and “Pythes
+continued fighting on his ship until he was entirely <i>hacked to
+pieces</i>.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_75" href = "#note_75">75</a>
+Such terms come home at once to the vulgar reader, but their own
+vulgarity is redeemed by their expressiveness.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXII_1">XXXII</a></h5>
+
+<p>Concerning the number of metaphors to be employed together Caecilius
+seems to give his vote with those critics who make a law that not more
+than two, or at the utmost three, should be combined in the same place.
+The use, however, must be determined by the occasion. Those outbursts of
+passion which drive onwards like a winter torrent draw with them as an
+indispensable accessory whole masses of metaphor. It is thus in that
+passage of Demosthenes (who here also is our safest guide):<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_76" href = "#note_76">76</a>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_2"> </a>
+“Those vile fawning wretches, each one of whom has lopped from
+<span class = "pagenum">59</span>
+his country her fairest members, who have toasted away their liberty,
+first to Philip, now to Alexander, who measure happiness by their belly
+and their vilest appetites, who have overthrown the old landmarks and
+standards of felicity among Greeks,&mdash;to be freemen, and to have no
+one for a master.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_77" href =
+"#note_77">77</a> Here the number of the metaphors is obscured by the
+orator’s indignation against the betrayers of his country.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_3"> </a>
+And to effect this Aristotle and Theophrastus recommend the softening of
+harsh metaphors by the use of some such phrase as “So to say,” “As it
+were,” “If I may be permitted the expression,” “If so bold a term is
+allowable.” For thus to forestall criticism<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_78" href = "#note_78">78</a> mitigates, they assert, the boldness
+of the metaphors.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_4"> </a>
+And I will not deny that these have their use. Nevertheless I must
+repeat the remark which I made in the case of figures,<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_79" href = "#note_79">79</a> and maintain that there are
+native antidotes to the number and boldness of metaphors, in well-timed
+displays of strong feeling, and in unaffected sublimity, because these
+have an innate power by the dash of their movement of sweeping along and
+carrying all else before them. Or should we not rather say that they
+absolutely demand as indispensable the use of daring metaphors, and will
+not allow the hearer to pause and criticise the number of them, because
+he shares the passion of the speaker?</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "pagenum">60</span>
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_5"> </a>
+In the treatment, again, of familiar topics and in descriptive passages
+nothing gives such distinctness as a close and continuous series of
+metaphors. It is by this means that Xenophon has so finely delineated
+the anatomy of the human frame.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_80" href =
+"#note_80">80</a> And there is a still more brilliant and life-like
+picture in Plato.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_81" href =
+"#note_81">81</a> The human head he calls a <i>citadel</i>; the neck is
+an <i>isthmus</i> set to divide it from the chest; to support it beneath
+are the vertebrae, turning like <i>hinges</i>; pleasure he describes as
+a <i>bait</i> to tempt men to ill; the tongue is the <i>arbiter of
+tastes</i>. The heart is at once the <i>knot</i> of the veins and the
+<i>source</i> of the rapidly circulating blood, and is stationed in the
+<i>guard-room</i> of the body. The ramifying blood-vessels he calls
+<i>alleys</i>. “And casting about,” he says, “for something to sustain
+the violent palpitation of the heart when it is alarmed by the approach
+of danger or agitated by passion, since at such times it is overheated,
+they (the gods) implanted in us the lungs, which are so fashioned that
+being soft and bloodless, and having cavities within, they act like a
+buffer, and when the heart boils with inward passion by yielding to its
+throbbing save it from injury.” He compares the seat of the desires to
+the <i>women’s quarters</i>, the seat of the passions to the <i>men’s
+quarters</i>, in a house. The spleen, again, is the
+<span class = "pagenum">61</span>
+<i>napkin</i> of the internal organs, by whose excretions it is
+saturated from time to time, and swells to a great size with inward
+impurity. “After this,” he continues, “they shrouded the whole with
+flesh, throwing it forward, like a cushion, as a barrier against
+injuries from without.” The blood he terms the <i>pasture</i> of the
+flesh. “To assist the process of nutrition,” he goes on, “they divided
+the body into ducts, cutting trenches like those in a garden, so that,
+the body being a system of narrow conduits, the current of the veins
+might flow as from a perennial fountain-head. And when the end is at
+hand,” he says, “the soul is cast loose from her moorings like a ship,
+and free to wander whither she will.”
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_6"> </a>
+These, and a hundred similar fancies, follow one another in quick
+succession. But those which I have pointed out are sufficient to
+demonstrate how great is the natural power of figurative language, and
+how largely metaphors conduce to sublimity, and to illustrate the
+important part which they play in all impassioned and descriptive
+passages.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_7"> </a>
+That the use of figurative language, as of all other beauties of style,
+has a constant tendency towards excess, is an obvious truth which I need
+not dwell upon. It is chiefly on this account that even Plato comes in
+for a large share of disparagement, because he is often carried away by
+a sort of
+<span class = "pagenum">62</span>
+frenzy of language into an intemperate use of violent metaphors and
+inflated allegory. “It is not easy to remark” (he says in one place)
+“that a city ought to be blended like a bowl, in which the mad wine
+boils when it is poured out, but being disciplined by another and a
+sober god in that fair society produces a good and temperate drink<ins
+class = "correction" title =
+"close quote missing in original">.”</ins><a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_82" href = "#note_82">82</a>
+Really, it is said, to speak of water as a “sober
+god,” and of the process of mixing as a “discipline,” is to talk like a
+poet, and no very <i>sober</i> one either.
+<span class = "chapnum">8</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXII_8"> </a>
+It was such defects as these that the hostile critic<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_83" href = "#note_83">83</a> Caecilius made his ground of
+attack, when he had the boldness in his essay “On the Beauties of
+Lysias” to pronounce that writer superior in every respect to Plato. Now
+Caecilius was doubly unqualified for a judge: he loved Lysias better
+even than himself, and at the same time his hatred of Plato and all his
+works is greater even than his love for Lysias. Moreover, he is so blind
+a partisan that his very premises are open to dispute. He vaunts Lysias
+as a faultless and immaculate writer, while Plato is, according to him,
+full of blemishes. Now this is not the case: far from&nbsp;it.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">63</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXIII_1">XXXIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>But supposing now that we assume the existence of a really
+unblemished and irreproachable writer. Is it not worth while to raise
+the whole question whether in poetry and prose we should prefer
+sublimity accompanied by some faults, or a style which never rising
+above moderate excellence never stumbles and never requires correction?
+and again, whether the first place in literature is justly to be
+assigned to the more numerous, or the loftier excellences? For these are
+questions proper to an inquiry on the Sublime, and urgently asking for
+settlement.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIII_2"> </a>
+I know, then, that the largest intellects are far from being the most
+exact. A mind always intent on correctness is apt to be dissipated in
+trifles; but in great affluence of thought, as in vast material wealth,
+there must needs be an occasional neglect of detail. And is it not
+inevitably so? Is it not by risking nothing, by never aiming high, that
+a writer of low or middling powers keeps generally clear of faults and
+secure of blame? whereas the loftier walks of literature are by their
+very loftiness perilous?
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIII_3"> </a>
+I am well aware, again, that there is a law by which in all human
+productions the weak points catch the eye first, by which their faults
+<span class = "pagenum">64</span>
+remain indelibly stamped on the memory, while their beauties quickly
+fade away.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIII_4"> </a>
+Yet, though I have myself noted not a few faulty passages in Homer and
+in other authors of the highest rank, and though I am far from being
+partial to their failings, nevertheless I would call them not so much
+wilful blunders as oversights which were allowed to pass unregarded
+through that contempt of little things, that “brave disorder,” which is
+natural to an exalted genius; and I still think that the greater
+excellences, though not everywhere equally sustained, ought always to be
+voted to the first place in literature, if for no other reason, for the
+mere grandeur of soul they evince. Let us take an instance: Apollonius
+in his <i>Argonautica</i> has given us a poem actually faultless; and in
+his pastoral poetry Theocritus is eminently happy, except when he
+occasionally attempts another style. And what then? Would you rather be
+a Homer or an Apollonius?
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIII_5"> </a>
+Or take Eratosthenes and his <i>Erigone</i>; because that little work is
+without a flaw, is he therefore a greater poet than Archilochus, with
+all his disorderly profusion? greater than that impetuous, that
+god-gifted genius, which chafed against the restraints of law? or in
+lyric poetry would you choose to be a Bacchylides or a Pindar? in
+tragedy a Sophocles or (save the mark!) an Io of Chios? Yet Io and
+Bacchylides never stumble, their style is
+<span class = "pagenum">65</span>
+always neat, always pretty; while Pindar and Sophocles sometimes move
+onwards with a wide blaze of splendour, but often drop out of view in
+sudden and disastrous eclipse. Nevertheless no one in his senses would
+deny that a single play of Sophocles, the <i>Oedipus</i>, is of higher
+value than all the dramas of Io put together.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXIV_1">XXXIV</a></h5>
+
+<p>If the number and not the loftiness of an author’s merits is to be
+our standard of success, judged by this test we must admit that
+Hyperides is a far superior orator to Demosthenes. For in Hyperides
+there is a richer modulation, a greater variety of excellence. He is, we
+may say, in everything second-best, like the champion of the
+<i>pentathlon</i>, who, though in every contest he has to yield the
+prize to some other combatant, is superior to the unpractised in all
+five.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIV_2"> </a>
+Not only has he rivalled the success of Demosthenes in everything but
+his manner of composition, but, as though that were not enough, he has
+taken in all the excellences and graces of Lysias as well. He knows when
+it is proper to speak with simplicity, and does not, like Demosthenes,
+continue the same key throughout. His touches of character are racy and
+sparkling, and full of a delicate flavour. Then how admirable
+<span class = "pagenum">66</span>
+is his wit, how polished his raillery! How well-bred he is, how
+dexterous in the use of irony! His jests are pointed, but without any of
+the grossness and vulgarity of the old Attic comedy. He is skilled in
+making light of an opponent’s argument, full of a well-aimed satire
+which amuses while it stings; and through all this there runs a
+pervading, may we not say, a matchless charm. He is most apt in moving
+compassion; his mythical digressions show a fluent ease, and he is
+perfect in bending his course and finding a way out of them without
+violence or effort. Thus when he tells the story of Leto he is really
+almost a poet; and his funeral oration shows a declamatory magnificence
+to which I hardly know a parallel.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIV_3"> </a>
+Demosthenes, on the other hand, has no touches of character, none of the
+versatility, fluency, or declamatory skill of Hyperides. He is, in fact,
+almost entirely destitute of all those excellences which I have just
+enumerated. When he makes violent efforts to be humorous and witty, the
+only laughter he arouses is against himself; and the nearer he tries to
+get to the winning grace of Hyperides, the farther he recedes from it.
+Had he, for instance, attempted such a task as the little speech in
+defence of Phryne or Athenagoras, he would only have added to the
+reputation of his rival.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIV_4"> </a>
+Nevertheless all the beauties of Hyperides, however numerous, cannot
+make him sublime. He never
+<span class = "pagenum">67</span>
+exhibits strong feeling, has little energy, rouses no emotion; certainly
+he never kindles terror in the breast of his readers. But Demosthenes
+followed a great master,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_84" href =
+"#note_84">84</a> and drew his consummate excellences, his high-pitched
+eloquence, his living passion, his copiousness, his sagacity, his
+speed&mdash;that mastery and power which can never be
+approached&mdash;from the highest of sources. These mighty, these
+heaven-sent gifts (I dare not call them human), he made his own both one
+and all. Therefore, I say, by the noble qualities which he does possess
+he remains supreme above all rivals, and throws a cloud over his
+failings, silencing by his thunders and blinding by his lightnings the
+orators of all ages. Yes, it would be easier to meet the
+lightning-stroke with steady eye than to gaze unmoved when his
+impassioned eloquence is sending out flash after flash.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXV_1">XXXV</a></h5>
+
+<p>But in the case of Plato and Lysias there is, as I said, a further
+difference. Not only is Lysias vastly inferior to Plato in the degree of
+his merits, but in their number as well; and at the same time he is as
+far ahead of Plato in the number of his faults as he is behind in that
+of his merits.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "pagenum">68</span>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXV_2"> </a>
+What truth, then, was it that was present to those mighty spirits of the
+past, who, making whatever is greatest in writing their aim, thought it
+beneath them to be exact in every detail? Among many others especially
+this, that it was not in nature’s plan for us her chosen children to be
+creatures base and ignoble,&mdash;no, she brought us into life, and into
+the whole universe, as into some great field of contest, that we should
+be at once spectators and ambitious rivals of her mighty deeds, and from
+the first implanted in our souls an invincible yearning for all that is
+great, all that is diviner than ourselves.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXV_3"> </a>
+Therefore even the whole world is not wide enough for the soaring range
+of human thought, but man’s mind often overleaps the very bounds of
+space.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_85" href = "#note_85">85</a> When we
+survey the whole circle of life, and see it abounding everywhere in what
+is elegant, grand, and beautiful, we learn at once what is the true end
+of man’s being.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXV_4"> </a>
+And this is why nature prompts us to admire, not the clearness and
+usefulness of a little stream, but the Nile, the Danube, the Rhine, and
+far beyond all the Ocean; not to turn our wandering eyes from the
+heavenly fires, though often darkened, to the little flame kindled by
+human hands, however pure and steady its light; not to think that tiny
+lamp more wondrous than
+<span class = "pagenum">69</span>
+the caverns of Aetna, from whose raging depths are hurled up stones and
+whole masses of rock, and torrents sometimes come pouring from earth’s
+centre of pure and living fire.</p>
+
+<p>To sum the whole: whatever is useful or needful lies easily within
+man’s reach; but he keeps his homage for what is astounding.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXVI_1">XXXVI</a></h5>
+
+<p>How much more do these principles apply to the Sublime in literature,
+where grandeur is never, as it sometimes is in nature, dissociated from
+utility and advantage. Therefore all those who have achieved it, however
+far from faultless, are still more than mortal. When a writer uses any
+other resource he shows himself to be a man; but the Sublime lifts him
+near to the great spirit of the Deity. He who makes no slips must be
+satisfied with negative approbation, but he who is sublime commands
+positive reverence.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVI_2"> </a>
+Why need I add that each one of those great writers often redeems all
+his errors by one grand and masterly stroke? But the strongest point of
+all is that, if you were to pick out all the blunders of Homer,
+Demosthenes, Plato, and all the greatest names in literature, and add
+them together, they would be found to bear a very small, or rather an
+infinitesimal proportion to the passages in which
+<span class = "pagenum">70</span>
+these supreme masters have attained absolute perfection. Therefore it is
+that all posterity, whose judgment envy herself cannot impeach, has
+brought and bestowed on them the crown of glory, has guarded their fame
+until this day against all attack, and is likely to preserve it</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“As long as lofty trees shall grow,<br>
+And restless waters seaward flow.”
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVI_3"> </a>
+It has been urged by one writer that we should not prefer the huge
+disproportioned Colossus to the Doryphorus of Polycletus. But (to give
+one out of many possible answers) in art we admire exactness, in the
+works of nature magnificence; and it is from nature that man derives the
+faculty of speech. Whereas, then, in statuary we look for close
+resemblance to humanity, in literature we require something which
+transcends humanity.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVI_4"> </a>
+Nevertheless (to reiterate the advice which we gave at the beginning of
+this essay), since that success which consists in avoidance of error is
+usually the gift of art, while high, though unequal excellence is the
+attribute of genius, it is proper on all occasions to call in art as an
+ally to nature. By the combined resources of these two we may hope to
+achieve perfection.</p>
+
+<p>Such are the conclusions which were forced upon me concerning the
+points at issue; but every one may consult his own taste.</p>
+
+
+<span class = "pagenum">71</span>
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXVII_1">XXXVII</a></h5>
+
+<p>To return, however, from this long digression; closely allied to
+metaphors are comparisons and similes, differing only in this * * *<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_86" href = "#note_86">86</a></p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXVIII_1">XXXVIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>Such absurdities as, “Unless you carry your brains next to the ground
+in your heels.”<a class = "tag" name = "tag_87" href = "#note_87">87</a>
+Hence it is necessary to know where to draw the line; for if ever it is
+overstepped the effect of the hyperbole is spoilt, being in such cases
+relaxed by overstraining, and producing the very opposite to the effect
+desired.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVIII_2"> </a>
+Isocrates, for instance, from an ambitious desire of lending everything
+a strong rhetorical colouring, shows himself in quite a childish light.
+Having in his Panegyrical Oration set himself to prove that the Athenian
+state has surpassed that of Sparta in her services to Hellas, he starts
+off at the very outset with these words: “Such is the power of language
+that it can extenuate what is great, and lend greatness to what is
+little, give freshness to what is antiquated, and describe what is
+recent so that it seems to be of the past.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_88" href = "#note_88">88</a> Come, Isocrates (it might be asked),
+is
+<span class = "pagenum">72</span>
+it thus that you are going to tamper with the facts about Sparta and
+Athens? This flourish about the power of language is like a signal hung
+out to warn his audience not to believe him.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVIII_3"> </a>
+We may repeat here what we said about figures, and say that the
+hyperbole is then most effective when it appears in disguise.<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_89" href = "#note_89">89</a> And this effect is
+produced when a writer, impelled by strong feeling, speaks in the
+accents of some tremendous crisis; as Thucydides does in describing the
+massacre in Sicily. “The Syracusans,” he says, “went down after them,
+and slew those especially who were in the river, and the water was at
+once defiled, yet still they went on drinking it, though mingled with
+mud and gore, most of them even fighting for it.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_90" href = "#note_90">90</a> The drinking of mud and gore, and even
+the fighting for it, is made credible by the awful horror of the scene
+described.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVIII_4"> </a>
+Similarly Herodotus on those who fell at Thermopylae: “Here as they
+fought, those who still had them, with daggers, the rest with hands and
+teeth, the barbarians buried them under their javelins.”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_91" href = "#note_91">91</a> That they fought with the teeth
+against heavy-armed assailants, and that they were buried with javelins,
+are perhaps hard sayings, but not incredible, for the reasons already
+explained. We can see that these circumstances have not been dragged in
+to produce a hyperbole, but that the hyperbole has grown naturally out
+of the circumstances.
+<span class = "pagenum">73</span>
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVIII_5"> </a>
+For, as I am never tired of explaining, in actions and passions verging
+on frenzy there lies a kind of remission and palliation of any licence
+of language. Hence some comic extravagances, however improbable, gain
+credence by their humour, such as&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“He had a farm, a little farm, where space severely pinches;<br>
+’Twas smaller than the last despatch from Sparta by some inches.”
+</div>
+
+<p class = "space">
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXVIII_6"> </a>
+For mirth is one of the passions, having its seat in pleasure. And
+hyperboles may be employed either to increase or to lessen&mdash;since
+exaggeration is common to both uses. Thus in extenuating an opponent’s
+argument we try to make it seem smaller than it&nbsp;is.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXXXIX_1">XXXIX</a></h5>
+
+<p>We have still left, my dear sir, the fifth of those sources which we
+set down at the outset as contributing to sublimity, that which consists
+in the mere arrangement of words in a certain order. Having already
+published two books dealing fully with this subject&mdash;so far at
+least as our investigations had carried us&mdash;it will be sufficient
+for the purpose of our present inquiry to add that harmony is an
+instrument which has a natural power, not only to win and to delight,
+but also in a remarkable degree
+<span class = "pagenum">74</span>
+to exalt the soul and sway the heart of man.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIX_2"> </a>
+When we see that a flute kindles certain emotions in its hearers,
+rendering them almost beside themselves and full of an orgiastic frenzy,
+and that by starting some kind of rhythmical beat it compels him who
+listens to move in time and assimilate his gestures to the tune, even
+though he has no taste whatever for music; when we know that the sounds
+of a harp, which in themselves have no meaning, by the change of key, by
+the mutual relation of the notes, and their arrangement in symphony,
+often lay a wonderful spell on an audience&mdash;
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIX_3"> </a>
+though these are mere shadows and spurious imitations of persuasion,
+not, as I have said, genuine manifestations of human nature:&mdash; can
+we doubt that composition (being a kind of harmony of that language
+which nature has taught us, and which reaches, not our ears only, but
+our very souls), when it raises changing forms of words, of thoughts, of
+actions, of beauty, of melody, all of which are engrained in and akin to
+ourselves, and when by the blending of its manifold tones it brings home
+to the minds of those who stand by the feelings present to the speaker,
+and ever disposes the hearer to sympathise with those feelings, adding
+word to word, until it has raised a majestic and harmonious
+structure:&mdash;can we wonder if all this enchants us, wherever we meet
+with it, and filling us with the sense of pomp and dignity and
+sublimity, and whatever else it
+<span class = "pagenum">75</span>
+embraces, gains a complete mastery over our minds? It would be mere
+infatuation to join issue on truths so universally acknowledged, and
+established by experience beyond dispute.<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_92" href = "#note_92">92</a></p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXXXIX_4"> </a>
+Now to give an instance: that is doubtless a sublime thought, indeed
+wonderfully fine, which Demosthenes applies to his decree: <span title =
+"touto to psêphisma ton tote tê polei peristanta kindunon parelthein
+epoiêsen hôsper nephos">τοῦτο τὸ ψήφισμα τὸν τότε τῇ πόλει περιστάντα
+κίνδυνον παρελθεῖν ἐποίησεν ὥσπερ νέφος</span>, “This decree caused the
+danger which then hung round our city to pass away like a cloud.” But
+the modulation is as perfect as the sentiment itself is weighty. It is
+uttered wholly in the dactylic measure, the noblest and most magnificent
+of all measures, and hence forming the chief constituent in the finest
+metre we know, the heroic. [And it is with great judgment that the words
+<span title = "hôsper nephos">ὥσπερ νέφος</span> are reserved till the
+end.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_93" href = "#note_93">93</a>] Supposing
+we transpose them from their proper place and read, say <span title =
+"touto to psêphisma hôsper nephos epoiêse ton tote kindunon
+parelthein">τοῦτο τὸ ψήφισμα ὥσπερ νέφος ἐποίησε τὸν τότε κίνδυνον
+παρελθεῖν</span>&mdash;nay, let us merely cut off one syllable, reading
+<span title = "epoiêse parelthein hôs nephos">ἐποίησε παρελθεῖν ὡς
+νέφος</span>&mdash;and you will understand how close is the unison
+between harmony and sublimity. In the passage before us the words <span
+title = "hôsper nephos">ὥσπερ νέφος</span> move first in a heavy
+measure, which is metrically equivalent to four short syllables: but on
+removing
+<span class = "pagenum">76</span>
+one syllable, and reading <span title = "hôs nephos">ὡς νέφος</span>,
+the grandeur of movement is at once crippled by the abridgment. So
+conversely if you lengthen into <span title = "hôsperei nephos">ὡσπερεὶ
+νέφος</span>, the meaning is still the same, but it does not strike the
+ear in the same manner, because by lingering over the final syllables
+you at once dissipate and relax the abrupt grandeur of the passage.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXL_1">XL</a></h5>
+
+<p>There is another method very efficient in exalting a style. As the
+different members of the body, none of which, if severed from its
+connection, has any intrinsic excellence, unite by their mutual
+combination to form a complete and perfect organism, so also the
+elements of a fine passage, by whose separation from one another its
+high quality is simultaneously dissipated and evaporates, when joined in
+one organic whole, and still further compacted by the bond of harmony,
+by the mere rounding of the period gain power of tone.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXL_2"> </a>
+In fact, a clause may be said to derive its sublimity from the joint
+contributions of a number of particulars. And further (as we have shown
+at large elsewhere), many writers in prose and verse, though their
+natural powers were not high, were perhaps even low, and though the
+terms they employed were usually common and popular and conveying no
+<span class = "pagenum">77</span>
+impression of refinement, by the mere harmony of their composition have
+attained dignity and elevation, and avoided the appearance of meanness.
+Such among many others are Philistus, Aristophanes occasionally,
+Euripides almost always.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXL_3"> </a>
+Thus when <ins class = "correction" title =
+"spelling variation in original">Heracles</ins> says,
+after the murder of his children,</p>
+
+<div class = "verse">
+“I’m full of woes, I have no room for more,”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_94" href = "#note_94">94</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+the words are quite common, but they are made sublime by being cast in a
+fine mould. By changing their position you will see that the poetical
+quality of Euripides depends more on his arrangement than on his
+thoughts.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXL_4"> </a>
+Compare his lines on Dirce dragged by the bull&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent4">
+“Whatever crossed his path,</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Caught in his victim’s form, he seized, and dragging<br>
+Oak, woman, rock, now here, now there, he flies.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_95" href = "#note_95">95</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+The circumstance is noble in itself, but it gains in vigour because the
+language is disposed so as not to hurry the movement, not running, as it
+were, on wheels, because there is a distinct stress on each word, and
+the time is delayed, advancing slowly to a pitch of stately
+sublimity.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXLI_1">XLI</a></h5>
+
+<p>Nothing so much degrades the tone of a style as an effeminate and
+hurried movement in the language,
+<span class = "pagenum">78</span>
+such as is produced by pyrrhics and trochees and dichorees falling in
+time together into a regular dance measure. Such abuse of rhythm is sure
+to savour of coxcombry and petty affectation, and grows tiresome in the
+highest degree by a monotonous sameness of tone.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXLI_2"> </a>
+But its worst effect is that, as those who listen to a ballad have their
+attention distracted from its subject and can think of nothing but the
+tune, so an over-rhythmical passage does not affect the hearer by the
+meaning of its words, but merely by their cadence, so that sometimes,
+knowing where the pause must come, they beat time with the speaker,
+striking the expected close like dancers before the stop is reached.
+Equally undignified is the splitting up of a sentence into a number of
+little words and short syllables crowded too closely together and forced
+into cohesion,&mdash;hammered, as it were, successively
+together,&mdash;after the manner of mortice and tenon.<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_96" href = "#note_96">96</a></p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXLII_1">XLII</a></h5>
+
+<p>Sublimity is further diminished by cramping the diction. Deformity
+instead of grandeur ensues from over-compression. Here I am not
+referring to a judicious compactness of phrase, but to a style
+<span class = "pagenum">79</span>
+which is dwarfed, and its force frittered away. To cut your words too
+short is to prune away their sense, but to be concise is to be direct.
+On the other hand, we know that a style becomes lifeless by
+over-extension, I mean by being relaxed to an unseasonable length.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXLIII_1">XLIII</a></h5>
+
+<p>The use of mean words has also a strong tendency to degrade a lofty
+passage. Thus in that description of the storm in Herodotus the matter
+is admirable, but some of the words admitted are beneath the dignity of
+the subject; such, perhaps, as “the seas having <i>seethed</i>” because
+the ill-sounding phrase “having seethed” detracts much from its
+impressiveness: or when he says “the wind wore away,” and “those who
+clung round the wreck met with an unwelcome end.”<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_97" href = "#note_97">97</a> “Wore away” is ignoble and vulgar, and
+“unwelcome” inadequate to the extent of the disaster.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIII_2"> </a>
+Similarly Theopompus, after giving a fine picture of the Persian king’s
+descent against Egypt, has exposed the whole to censure by certain
+paltry expressions. “There was no city, no people of Asia, which did not
+send an embassy to the king; no product of the earth, no work of art,
+whether beautiful
+<span class = "pagenum">80</span>
+or precious, which was not among the gifts brought to him. Many and
+costly were the hangings and robes, some purple, some embroidered, some
+white; many the tents, of cloth of gold, furnished with all things
+useful; many the tapestries and couches of great price. Moreover, there
+was gold and silver plate richly wrought, goblets and bowls, some of
+which might be seen studded with gems, and others besides worked in
+relief with great skill and at vast expense. Besides these there were
+suits of armour in number past computation, partly Greek, partly
+foreign, endless trains of baggage animals and fat cattle for slaughter,
+many bushels of spices, many panniers and sacks and sheets of
+writing-paper; and all other necessaries in the same proportion. And
+there was salt meat of all kinds of beasts in immense quantity, heaped
+together to such a height as to show at a distance like mounds and hills
+thrown up one against another.”
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIII_3"> </a>
+He runs off from the grander parts of his subject to the meaner, and
+sinks where he ought to rise. Still worse, by his mixing up
+<i>panniers</i> and <i>spices</i> and <i>bags</i> with his wonderful
+recital of that vast and busy scene one would imagine that he was
+describing a kitchen. Let us suppose that in that show of magnificence
+some one had taken a set of wretched baskets and bags and placed them in
+the midst, among vessels of gold,
+<span class = "pagenum">81</span>
+jewelled bowls, silver plate, and tents and goblets of gold; how
+incongruous would have seemed the effect! Now just in the same way these
+petty words, introduced out of season, stand out like deformities and
+blots on the diction.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIII_4"> </a>
+These details might have been given in one or two broad strokes, as when
+he speaks of mounds being heaped together. So in dealing with the other
+preparations he might have told us of “waggons and camels and a long
+train of baggage animals loaded with all kinds of supplies for the
+luxury and enjoyment of the table,” or have mentioned “piles of grain of
+every species, and of all the choicest delicacies required by the art of
+the cook or the taste of the epicure,” or (if he must needs be so very
+precise) he might have spoken of “whatever dainties are supplied by
+those who lay or those who dress the banquet.”
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIII_5"> </a>
+In our sublimer efforts we should never stoop to what is sordid and
+despicable, unless very hard pressed by some urgent necessity. If we
+would write becomingly, our utterance should be worthy of our theme. We
+should take a lesson from nature, who when she planned the human frame
+did not set our grosser parts, or the ducts for purging the body, in our
+face, but as far as she could concealed them, “diverting,” as Xenophon
+says, “those canals as far as possible from our senses,”<a class = "tag"
+name = "tag_98" href = "#note_98">98</a> and thus shunning
+<span class = "pagenum">82</span>
+in any part to mar the beauty of the whole creature.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIII_6"> </a>
+However, it is not incumbent on us to specify and enumerate whatever
+diminishes a style. We have now pointed out the various means of giving
+it nobility and loftiness. It is clear, then, that whatever is contrary
+to these will generally degrade and deform&nbsp;it.</p>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter"><a name = "chapXLIV_1">XLIV</a></h5>
+
+<p>There is still another point which remains to be cleared up, my dear
+Terentian, and on which I shall not hesitate to add some remarks, to
+gratify your inquiring spirit. It relates to a question which was
+recently put to me by a certain philosopher. “To me,” he said, “in
+common, I may say, with many others, it is a matter of wonder that in
+the present age, which produces many highly skilled in the arts Of
+popular persuasion, many of keen and active powers, many especially rich
+in every pleasing gift of language, the growth of highly exalted and
+wide-reaching genius has with a few rare exceptions almost entirely
+ceased. So universal is the dearth of eloquence which prevails
+throughout the world.
+<span class = "chapnum">2</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_2"> </a>
+Must we really,” he asked, “give credit to that oft-repeated assertion
+that democracy is the kind nurse of genius, and that high literary
+excellence has
+<span class = "pagenum">83</span>
+flourished with her prime and faded with her decay? Liberty, it is said,
+is all-powerful to feed the aspirations of high intellects, to hold out
+hope, and keep alive the flame of mutual rivalry and ambitious struggle
+for the highest place.
+<span class = "chapnum">3</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_3"> </a>
+Moreover, the prizes which are offered in every free state keep the
+spirits of her foremost orators whetted by perpetual exercise;<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_99" href = "#note_99">99</a> they are, as it were,
+ignited by friction, and naturally blaze forth freely because they are
+surrounded by freedom. But we of to-day,” he continued, “seem to have
+learnt in our childhood the lessons of a benignant despotism, to have
+been cradled in her habits and customs from the time when our minds were
+still tender, and never to have tasted the fairest and most fruitful
+fountain of eloquence, I mean liberty. Hence we develop nothing but a
+fine genius for flattery.
+<span class = "chapnum">4</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_4"> </a>
+This is the reason why, though all other faculties are consistent with
+the servile condition, no slave ever became an orator; because in him
+there is a dumb spirit which will not be kept down: his soul is chained:
+he is like one who has learnt to be ever expecting a blow. For, as Homer
+says&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class = "verse indent2 space">
+<span class = "chapnum">5</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_5"> </a>
+“’The day of slavery</div>
+<div class = "verse nospace">
+Takes half our manly worth away.’<a class = "tag" name = "tag_100" href
+= "#note_100">100</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>
+“As, then (if what I have heard is credible), the cages
+<span class = "pagenum">84</span>
+in which those pigmies commonly called dwarfs are reared not only stop
+the growth of the imprisoned creature, but absolutely make him smaller
+by compressing every part of his body, so all despotism, however
+equitable, may be defined as a cage of the soul and a general
+prison.”</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">6</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_6"> </a>
+My answer was as follows: “My dear friend, it is so easy, and so
+characteristic of human nature, always to find fault with the present.<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_101" href = "#note_101">101</a> Consider, now,
+whether the corruption of genius is to be attributed, not to a
+world-wide peace,<a class = "tag" name = "tag_102" href =
+"#note_102">102</a> but rather to the war within us which knows no
+limit, which engages all our desires, yes, and still further to the bad
+passions which lay siege to us to-day, and make utter havoc and spoil of
+our lives. Are we not enslaved, nay, are not our careers completely
+shipwrecked, by love of gain, that fever which rages unappeased in us
+all, and love of pleasure?&mdash;one the most debasing, the other the
+most ignoble of the mind’s diseases.
+<span class = "chapnum">7</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_7"> </a>
+When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such
+high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches,
+can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up
+with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled
+<span class = "pagenum">85</span>
+is dogged by Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his
+footsteps: and as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she
+enters with him and makes her abode with him. And after a time they
+build their nests (to use a wise man’s words<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_103" href = "#note_103">103</a>) in that corner of life, and
+speedily set about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and
+Wantonness, no base-born children, but their very own. And if these
+also, the offspring of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime,
+quickly they engender in the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and
+Lawlessness, and Shamelessness.
+<span class = "chapnum">8</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_8"> </a>
+Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational<a
+class = "tag" name = "tag_104" href = "#note_104">104</a> in him, and
+neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable results.
+He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report; by slow
+degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated all round;
+all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is despised.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">9</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_9"> </a>
+“If a judge who passes sentence for a bribe can never more give a free
+and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes
+a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how
+can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is
+controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men’s death and
+plan how to get a place in their wills, when
+<span class = "pagenum">86</span>
+we buy gain, from whatever source, each one of us, with our very souls
+in our slavish greed, how, I say, can we expect, in the midst of such a
+moral pestilence, that there is still left even one liberal and
+impartial critic, whose verdict will not be biassed by avarice in
+judging of those great works which live on through all time?
+<span class = "chapnum">10</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_10"> </a>
+Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to
+be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether against our
+neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge
+of calamity on the whole civilised world.“</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">11</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_11"> </a>
+I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is
+wasted by that indifference which with a few exceptions runs through the
+whole of life. If we ever shake off our apathy<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_105" href = "#note_105">105</a> and apply ourselves to work, it is
+always with a view to pleasure or applause, not for that solid advantage
+which is worthy to be striven for and held in honour.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "chapnum">12</span>
+<a name = "chapXLIV_12"> </a>
+We had better then leave this generation to its fate, and turn to what
+follows, which is the subject of the passions, to which we promised
+early in this treatise to devote a separate work.<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_106" href = "#note_106">106</a> They play an important part in
+literature generally, and especially in relation to the Sublime.</p>
+
+<hr class = "mid">
+
+<h5>FOOTNOTES</h5>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_1" href = "#tag_1">1.</a>
+Reading <span title = "philophronestata kai alêthestata">φιλοφρονέστατα
+<ins class = "correction" title = "text reads ‘καί’">καὶ</ins>
+ἀληθέστατα</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_2" href = "#tag_2">2.</a>
+Reading <span title = "diephôtisen">διεφώτισεν</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_3" href = "#tag_3">3.</a>
+Literally, “But the most important point of all is that the actual fact
+that there are some parts of literature which are in the power of
+natural genius alone, must be learnt from no other source than from
+art.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_4" href = "#tag_4">4.</a>
+Aeschylus in his lost <i>Oreithyia</i>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_5" href = "#tag_5">5.</a>
+<i>Xen. de Rep. Laced.</i> 3, 5.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_6" href = "#tag_6">6.</a>
+C. iii. sect. 2.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_7" href = "#tag_7">7.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> i. 225.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_8" href = "#tag_8">8.</a>
+<i>Plat. de Legg.</i> v. 741, C.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_9" href = "#tag_9">9.</a>
+<i>Ib.</i> vi. 778, D.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_10" href = "#tag_10">10.</a>
+v. 18.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_11" href = "#tag_11">11.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> xi. 543.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_12" href = "#tag_12">12.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> iv. 442.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_13" href = "#tag_13">13.</a>
+<i>Scut. Herc.</i> 267.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_14" href = "#tag_14">14.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> v. 770.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_15" href = "#tag_15">15.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xxi. 388; xx. 61.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_16" href = "#tag_16">16.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_17" href = "#tag_17">17.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xvii. 645.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_18" href = "#tag_18">18.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xv. 605.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_19" href = "#tag_19">19.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> iii. 109.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_20" href = "#tag_20">20.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> ix. 182.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_21" href = "#tag_21">21.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> x. 17.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_22" href = "#tag_22">22.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> x. 237.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_23" href = "#tag_23">23.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> xii. 62.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_24" href = "#tag_24">24.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> xii. 447.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_25" href = "#tag_25">25.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> xxii. <i>passim</i>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_26" href = "#tag_26">26.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xv. 624.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_27" href = "#tag_27">27.</a>
+<i>Phaenomena</i>, 299.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_28" href = "#tag_28">28.</a>
+<i>De Cor.</i> 169.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_29" href = "#tag_29">29.</a>
+Comp. i. 4. 26.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_30" href = "#tag_30">30.</a>
+<i>Rep.</i> ix. 586, A.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_31" href = "#tag_31">31.</a>
+<i>Opp.</i> 29.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_32" href = "#tag_32">32.</a>
+<span title = "eidôlopoiïai">εἰδωλοποιΐαι</span>, “fictions of the
+imagination,” Hickie.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_33" href = "#tag_33">33.</a>
+Eur. <i>Orest.</i> 255.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_34" href = "#tag_34">34.</a>
+<i>Iph. Taur.</i> 291.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_35" href = "#tag_35">35.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xx. 170.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_36" href = "#tag_36">36.</a>
+Eur. <i>Phaet.</i></div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_37" href = "#tag_37">37.</a>
+Perhaps from the lost “Alexander” (Jahn).</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_38" href = "#tag_38">38.</a>
+<i>Sept. c. Th.</i> 42.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_39" href = "#tag_39">39.</a>
+Aesch. <i>Lycurg.</i></div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_40" href = "#tag_40">40.</a>
+Lit. “Giving it a different flavour,” as Arist. <i>Poet.</i> <span title
+= "hêdusmenô logô chôris hekastô tôn eidôn">ἡδυσμένῳ λόγῳ χώρις
+<ins class = "correction" title =
+"text reads ‘ἑκάσιῳ (hekasiô)’">ἑκάστῳ</ins> τῶν εἰδῶν</span>,
+<ins class = "correction" title =
+"alternative citation form: 1449b">ii. 10</ins>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_41" href = "#tag_41">41.</a>
+<i>Bacch.</i> 726.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_42" href = "#tag_42">42.</a>
+<i>Oed. Col.</i> 1586.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_43" href = "#tag_43">43.</a>
+In his lost “Polyxena.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_44" href = "#tag_44">44.</a>
+§ 2.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_45" href = "#tag_45">45.</a>
+Comp. Petronius, <i>Satyricon</i>, ch. i. <i>passim</i>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_46" href = "#tag_46">46.</a>
+<i>Orest.</i> 264.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_47" href = "#tag_47">47.</a>
+<i>c. Timocrat.</i> 208.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_48" href = "#tag_48">48.</a>
+He passes over chs. x. xi.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_49" href = "#tag_49">49.</a>
+<i>De Cor.</i> 208.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_50" href = "#tag_50">50.</a>
+In his (lost) “Demis.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_51" href = "#tag_51">51.</a>
+Lit. “That even in the midst of the revels of Bacchus we ought to remain
+sober.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_52" href = "#tag_52">52.</a>
+Reading with Cobet, <span title = "kai pantas tous en huperochais"><ins
+class = "correction" title = "text reads ‘καί’">καὶ</ins> πάντας τοὺς ἐν
+ὑπεροχαῖς</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_53" href = "#tag_53">53.</a>
+See Note.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_54" href = "#tag_54">54.</a>
+<i>Phil.</i> i. 44.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_55" href = "#tag_55">55.</a>
+Xen. <i>Hel.</i> iv. 3. 19.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_56" href = "#tag_56">56.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> x. 251.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_57" href = "#tag_57">57.</a>
+<i>Meid.</i> 72.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_58" href = "#tag_58">58.</a>
+vi. 11.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_59" href = "#tag_59">59.</a>
+<i>O.&nbsp;R.</i> 1403.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_60" href = "#tag_60">60.</a>
+<i>Menex.</i> 245, D.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_61" href = "#tag_61">61.</a>
+Lit. “To hang bells everywhere,” a metaphor from the bells which were
+attached to horses’ trappings on festive occasions.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_62" href = "#tag_62">62.</a>
+<i>De Cor.</i> 18.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_63" href = "#tag_63">63.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xv. 697.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_64" href = "#tag_64">64.</a>
+<i>Phaen.</i> 287.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_65" href = "#tag_65">65.</a>
+ii. 29.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_66" href = "#tag_66">66.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> v. 85.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_67" href = "#tag_67">67.</a>
+<i>Il.</i> xv. 346.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_68" href = "#tag_68">68.</a>
+<i>c. Aristog.</i> i. 27.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_69" href = "#tag_69">69.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> iv. 681.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_70" href = "#tag_70">70.</a>
+<i>Menex.</i> 236, D.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_71" href = "#tag_71">71.</a>
+<i>Cyrop.</i> i. 5. 12.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_72" href = "#tag_72">72.</a>
+<i>De Legg.</i> vii. 801, B.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_73" href = "#tag_73">73.</a>
+See Note.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_74" href = "#tag_74">74.</a>
+vi. 75.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_75" href = "#tag_75">75.</a>
+vii. 181.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_76" href = "#tag_76">76.</a>
+See Note.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_77" href = "#tag_77">77.</a>
+<i>De Cor.</i> 296.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_78" href = "#tag_78">78.</a>
+Reading <span title = "hupotimêsis">ὑποτίμησις</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_79" href = "#tag_79">79.</a>
+Ch. xvii.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_80" href = "#tag_80">80.</a>
+<i>Memorab.</i> i. 4, 5.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_81" href = "#tag_81">81.</a>
+<i>Timaeus</i>, 69, D; 74, A; 65, C; 72, G; 74, B, D; 80, E; 77, G; 78,
+E; 85, E.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_82" href = "#tag_82">82.</a>
+<i>Legg.</i> vi. 773, G.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_83" href = "#tag_83">83.</a>
+Reading <span title = "ho misôn auton">ὁ μισῶν αὐτόν</span>, by a
+conjecture of the translator.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_84" href = "#tag_84">84.</a>
+<i>I.e.</i> Thucydides. See the passage of Dionysius quoted in the
+Note.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_85" href = "#tag_85">85.</a>
+Comp. Lucretius on Epicurus: “Ergo vivida vis animi pervicit, et extra
+Processit longe flammantia moenia mundi,”&nbsp;etc.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_86" href = "#tag_86">86.</a>
+The asterisks denote gaps in the original text.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_87" href = "#tag_87">87.</a>
+Pseud. Dem. de Halon. 45.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_88" href = "#tag_88">88.</a>
+Paneg. 8.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_89" href = "#tag_89">89.</a>
+xvii. 1.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_90" href = "#tag_90">90.</a>
+Thuc. vii. 84.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_91" href = "#tag_91">91.</a>
+vii. 225.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_92" href = "#tag_92">92.</a>
+Reading <span title = "all’ eoike mania">ἀλλ᾽ ἔοικε μανίᾳ</span>, and
+putting a full stop at <span title = "pistis">πίστις</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_93" href = "#tag_93">93.</a>
+There is a break here in the text; but the context indicates the sense
+of the words lost, which has accordingly been supplied.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_94" href = "#tag_94">94.</a>
+<i>H.&nbsp;F.</i> 1245.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_95" href = "#tag_95">95.</a>
+<i>Antiope</i> (Nauck, 222).</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_96" href = "#tag_96">96.</a>
+I must refer to Weiske’s Note, which I have followed, for the probable
+interpretation of this extraordinary passage.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_97" href = "#tag_97">97.</a>
+Hdt. vii. 188, 191, 13.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_98" href = "#tag_98">98.</a>
+<i>Mem.</i> i. 4. 6.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_99" href = "#tag_99">99.</a>
+Comp. Pericles in Thuc. ii., <span title =
+"athla gar hois keitai aretês megista tois de kai andres arista politeuousin">ἆθλα
+γὰρ οἷς κεῖται ἀρετῆς μέγιστα τοῖς δὲ καὶ ἄνδρες ἄριστα
+πολιτεύουσιν</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_100" href = "#tag_100">100.</a>
+<i>Od.</i> xvii. 322.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_101" href = "#tag_101">101.</a>
+Comp. Byron, “The good old times,&mdash;all times when old are
+good.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_102" href = "#tag_102">102.</a>
+A euphemism for “a world-wide tyranny.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_103" href = "#tag_103">103.</a>
+Plato, <i>Rep.</i> ix. 573, E.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_104" href = "#tag_104">104.</a>
+Reading <span title = "kanoêta">κἀνόητα</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_105" href = "#tag_105">105.</a>
+Comp. Thuc. vi. 26. 2, for this sense of <span title =
+"analambanein">ἀναλαμβάνειν</span>.</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_106" href = "#tag_106">106.</a>
+iii. 5.</div>
+
+<hr>
+
+<span class = "pagenum">87</span>
+<h4 class = "chapter"><a name = "notes">NOTES ON LONGINUS</a></h4>
+
+<div class = "mynote">
+The last number of each note does not refer to line number in the
+printed text. It may refer to lines or clauses in the original Greek.
+</div>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapI_2">I. 2. 10.</a>
+<span class = "firstword">There</span>
+seems to be an antithesis implied in <span title =
+"politikois tetheôrêkenai">πολιτικοῖς τεθεωρηκέναι</span>, referring to
+the well-known distinction between the <span title =
+"praktikos bios">πρακτικὸς βίος</span> and the <span title =
+"theôrêtikos bios">θεωρητικὸς βίος</span>.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapI_4">4. 27.</a>
+I have ventured to return to the original reading, <span title
+= "diephôtisen">διεφώτισεν</span>, though all editors seem to have
+adopted the correction <span title = "diephorêsen">διεφόρησεν</span>, on
+account, I suppose, of <span title = "skêptou">σκηπτοῦ</span>. To
+<i>illumine</i> a large subject, as a landscape is lighted up at night
+by a flash of lightning, is surely a far more vivid and intelligible
+expression than to <i>sweep away</i> a subject.<a class = "tag" name =
+"tag_n1" href = "#note_n1">N.1</a></p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapIII_2">III. 2. 17.</a>
+<span title = "phorbeias d’ ater">φορβειᾶς δ᾽
+ἄτερ</span>, lit. “without a cheek-strap,” which was worn by trumpeters
+to assist them in regulating their breath. The line is contracted from
+two of Sophocles’s, and Longinus’s point is that the extravagance of
+Cleitarchus is not that of a strong but ill-regulated nature, but the
+ludicrous straining after grandeur of a writer at once feeble and
+pretentious.</p>
+
+<p>Ruhnken gives an extract from some inedited “versus politici” of
+Tzetzes, in which are some amusing specimens of those felicities of
+language Longinus is here laughing at. Stones are the “bones,” rivers
+the “veins,” of the earth; the moon is “the sigma of the sky”
+(<span title = "(lunate Sigma)">Ϲ</span> the old form of
+<span title = "(Sigma)">Σ</span>);
+<span class = "pagenum">88</span>
+sailors, “the ants of ocean”; the strap of a pedlar’s pack, “the girdle
+of his load”; pitch, “the ointment of doors,” and so&nbsp;on.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapIV_4">IV. 4. 4.</a>
+The play upon the double meaning of <span title =
+"kora">κόρα</span>, (1) maiden, (2) pupil of the eye, can hardly be kept
+in English. It is worthy of remark that our text of Xenophon has <span
+title = "en tois thalamois">ἐν τοῖς θαλάμοις</span>, a perfectly natural
+expression. Such a variation would seem to point to a very early
+corruption of ancient manuscripts, or to extraordinary inaccuracy on the
+part of Longinus, who, indeed, elsewhere displays great looseness of
+citation, confusing together totally different passages.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapIV_4">9.</a>
+<span title = "itamon">ἰταμόν</span>. I can make nothing of this
+word. Various corrections have been suggested, but with little
+certainty.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapIV_5">5. 10.</a>
+<span title = "hôs phôriou tinos ephaptomenos">ὡς φωρίου τινος
+ἐφαπτόμενος</span>, literally, “as though he were laying hands on a
+piece of stolen property.” The point seems to be, that plagiarists, like
+other robbers, show no discrimination in their pilferings, seizing what
+comes first to hand.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapVIII_1">VIII. 1. 20.</a>
+<span title = "edaphous">ἐδάφους</span>. I have avoided
+the rather harsh confusion of metaphor which this word involves, taken
+in connection with <span title = "pêgai">πηγαί</span>.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapIX_2">IX. 2. 13.</a>
+<span title = "apêchêma">ἀπήχημα</span>, properly an
+“echo,” a metaphor rather Greek than English.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapX_2">X. 2. 13.</a>
+<span title = "chlôrotera de poias">χλωροτέρα δὲ
+ποίας</span>, lit. “more wan than grass”&mdash;of the sickly yellow hue
+which would appear on a dark Southern face under the influence of
+violent emotion.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_n2" href =
+"#note_n2">N.2</a></p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapX_3">3. 6.</a>
+The words <span title = "ê gar ... tethnêken">ἢ γάρ ...
+τέθνηκεν</span> are omitted in the translation, being corrupt, and
+giving no satisfactory sense. Ruhnken corrects, <span title =
+"alogistei, phronei, ptoeitai, ê p. o. t.">ἀλογιστεῖ, φρονεῖ, προεῖται,
+ἢ π. ὀ. τ.</span></p>
+
+<p>
+<span class = "pagenum">89</span>
+<a href = "#chapX_3">18.</a>
+<span title = "splanchnoisi kakôs anaballomenoisi.">σπλάγχνοισι
+κακῶς ἀναβαλλομένοισι</span> Probably of sea-sickness; and so I find
+Ruhnken took it, quoting Plutarch, <i>T.</i> ii. 831: <span title =
+"emountos tou heterou, kai legontos ta splanchna ekballein">ἐμοῦντος τοῦ
+ἑτέρου, καὶ λέγοντος τὰ σπλάγχνα ἐκβάλλειν</span>. An objection on the
+score of <i>taste</i> would be out of place in criticising the laureate
+of the Arimaspi.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapX_7">X. 7. 2.</a>
+<span title = "tas exochas aristindên ekkathêrantes.">τὰς
+ἐξοχὰς ἀριστίνδην ἐκκαθήραντες</span> <span title =
+"aristindên ekkathêrantes">ἀριστίνδην ἐκκαθήραντες</span>
+appears to be a condensed
+phrase for <span title =
+"aristindên eklexantes kai ekkathêrantes">ἀριστίνδην
+ἐκλέξαντες και ἐκκαθήραντες</span>. “Having
+chosen the most striking circumstances <i>par excellence</i>, and having
+relieved them of all superfluity,” would perhaps give the literal
+meaning. Longinus seems conscious of some strangeness in his language,
+making a quasi-apology in <span title = "hôs an eipoi tis">ὡς ἂν εἴποι
+τις</span>.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapX_7">3.</a>
+Partly with the help of Toup, we may emend this corrupt passage as
+follows: <span title = "lumainetai gar tauta to holon">λυμαίνεται γὰρ
+ταῦτα τὸ ὅλον</span>, <span title =
+"hôsanei psêgmata ê araiômata">ὡσανεὶ ψήγματα ἢ ἀραιώματα</span>,
+<span title =
+"ta empoiounta megethos tê pros allêla schesei sunteteichismena">τὰ
+ἐμποιοῦντα μέγεθος τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα σχέσει συντετειχισμένα</span>. <span
+title = "to holon">τὸ ὅλον</span> here = “omnino.” To explain the
+process of corruption, <span title = "ta">τα</span> would easily drop
+out after the final <span title = "-ta">-<span title =
+"araiômata">τα</span> in ἀραιώματα</span>; <span title =
+"sunoikonomoumena">συνοικονομούμενα</span> is simply a corruption of
+<span title = "sunoikodomoumena">συνοικοδομούμενα</span>, which is
+itself a gloss on <span title =
+"sunteteichismena">συντετειχισμένα</span>, having afterwards crept into
+the text; <span title = "megethos">μέγεθος</span> became corrupted into
+<span title = "megethê">μεγέθη</span> through the error of some copyist,
+who wished to make it agree with <span title =
+"empoiounta">ἐμποιοῦντα</span>. The whole maybe translated: “Such
+[interpolations], like so many patches or rents, mar altogether the
+effect of those details which, by being built up in an uninterrupted
+series [<span title = "tê pros allêla sch. suntet.">τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα σχ.
+συντετ.</span>], produce sublimity in a work.”</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXII_4">XII. 4. 2.</a>
+<span title = "en autô">αὐτῷ</span>; the sense seems
+clearly to require <span title = "en hautô">ἐν αὑτῷ</span>.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXIV_3">XIV. 3. 16.</a>
+<span title = "mê ... huperêmeron.">μὴ ...
+ὑπερήμερον</span> Most of the editors insert <span title =
+"ou">οὐ</span> before <span title = "phthenxaito">φθέγξαιτο</span>, thus
+ruining the sense of this fine
+<span class = "pagenum">90</span>
+passage. Longinus has just said that a writer should always work with an
+eye to posterity. If (he adds) he thinks of nothing but the taste and
+judgment of his contemporaries, he will have no chance of “leaving
+something so written that the world will not willingly let it die.”
+A book, then, which is <span title =
+"tou idiou biou kai chronou huperêmeros">τοῦ
+ἰδίου βίου καὶ χρόνου ὑπερήμερος</span>, is a book
+which is in advance of its own times. Such were the poems of Lucretius,
+of Milton, of Wordsworth.<a class = "tag" name = "tag_n3" href =
+"#note_n3">N.3</a></p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXV_5">XV. 5. 23.</a>
+<span title = "pokoeideis kai amalaktous">ποκοειδεῖς καὶ
+ἀμαλάκτους</span>, lit. “like raw, undressed wool.”</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXVII_1">XVII. 1. 25.</a>
+I construct the infinit. with <span title =
+"hupopton">ὕποπτον</span>, though the ordinary interpretation joins
+<span title = "to dia schêmatôn panourgein">τὸ διὰ σχημάτων
+πανουργεῖν</span>: “proprium est <i>verborum lenociniis</i> suspicionem
+movere” (Weiske).</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXVII_2">2. 8.</a>
+<span title = "paralêphtheisa">παραληφθεῖσα</span>. This word
+has given much trouble; but is it not simply a continuation of the
+metaphor implied in <span title = "epikouria">ἐπικουρία</span>? <span
+title = "paralambanein tina">παραλαμβάνειν τινα</span>, in the sense of
+calling in an ally, is a common enough use. This would be clearer if we
+could read <span title = "paralêphtheisi">παραληφθεῖσι</span>. I have
+omitted <span title = "tou panourgein">τοῦ πανουργεῖν</span> in
+translating, as it seems to me to have evidently crept in from above (p.
+33, l. 25). <span title = "hê tou panourgein technê">ἡ τοῦ πανουργεῖν
+τέχνη</span>, “the art of playing the villain,” is surely, in Longinus’s
+own words, <span title = "deinon kai ekphulon">δεινὸν καὶ
+ἔκφυλον</span>, “a startling novelty” of language.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXVII_2">12.</a>
+<span title = "tô phôti autô">τῷ φωτὶ αὐτῷ</span>. The words may
+remind us of Shelley’s “Like a poet <i>hidden in the light of
+thought</i>.”</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXVIII_1">XVIII. 1. 24.</a>
+The distinction between <span title =
+"peusis">πεῦσις</span> or <span title = "pusma">πύσμα</span> and <span
+title = "erôtêsis">ἐρότησις</span> or <span title =
+"erôtêma">ἐρώτημα</span> is said to be that <span title =
+"erôtêsis">ἐρώτησις</span> is a
+<span class = "pagenum">91</span>
+simple question, which can be answered yes or no; <span title =
+"peusis">πεῦσις</span> a fuller inquiry, requiring a fuller answer.
+<i>Aquila Romanus in libro de figuris sententiarum et elocutionis</i>, §
+12 (Weiske).</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXI_1">XXXI. 1. 11.</a>
+<span title = "anankophagêsai">ἀναγκοφαγῆσαι</span>,
+properly of the fixed diet of athletes, which seems to have been
+excessive in quantity, and sometimes nauseous in quality. I do not know
+what will be thought of my rendering here; it is certainly not elegant,
+but it was necessary to provide some sort of equivalent to the Greek.
+“Swallow,” which the other translators give, is quite inadequate. We
+require a threefold combination&mdash;(1) To swallow (2) something nasty
+(3) for the sake of prospective advantage.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXII_1">XXXII. 1. 3.</a>
+The text is in great confusion here. Following a hint in
+Vahlin’s critical note, I have transposed the words thus: <span title =
+"ho kairos de tês chreias horos;">ὁ καιρὸς δὲ τῆς χρείας ὁρός‧</span>
+<span title = "entha ta pathê cheimarrou dikên elaunetai">ἔνθα τὰ πάθη
+χειμάρρου δίκην ἐλαύνεται</span>, <span title =
+"kai tên poluplêtheian autôn hôs anankaian entautha sunephelketai">καὶ
+τὴν πολυπλήθειαν αὐτῶν ὡς ἀναγκαίαν ἐνταῦθα συνεφέλκεται‧</span>
+<span title = "ho gar D., horos kai tôn toioutôn">ὁ γὰρ Δ.,
+ὁρὸς καὶ τῶν τοιούτων,</span>
+<span title = "anthrôpoi, phêsin, k.t.l.">ἄνθρωποι, φησίν,
+κ.τ.λ.</span></p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXII_8">8. 16.</a>
+Some words have probably been lost here. The sense of <span
+title = "plên">πλήν</span>, and the absence of antithesis to <span title
+= "houtos men">οὗτος μέν</span>, point in this direction. The original
+reading may have been something of this sort: <span title =
+"plên houtos men hupo philoneikias parêgeto;">πλὴν οὗτος μὲν ὑπὸ φιλονέικίας
+<span class = "extended">παρήγετο</span>‧</span>
+<span title = "all’ oude ta themata tithêsin homologoumena">ἀλλ᾽
+οὐδὲ τὰ θέματα τίθησιν ὁμολογούμενα</span>, the sense being that,
+though we may allow something to the partiality of Caecilius, yet this
+does not excuse him from arguing on premises which are unsound.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXIV_4">XXXIV. 4. 10.</a>
+<span title = "ho de enthen helôn, k.t.l.">ὁ δὲ ἔνθεν
+ἑλών, κ.τ.λ.</span> Probably the darkest place in the whole treatise.
+Toup cites a remarkable passage from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, from
+which we may perhaps conclude that Longinus is referring here to
+Thucydides, the traditional master of Demosthenes. <i>De Thucyd.</i> §
+53, <span title =
+"Rhêtorôn de Dêmosthenês monos Thoukudidou zêlôtos egeneto kata
+polla">Ῥητόρων δὲ Δημοσθενὴς μόνος Θουκυδίδου ζηλωτὸς ἐγένετο κατὰ
+πολλά</span>,
+<span title = "kai prosethêke tois politikois logois">καὶ προσέθηκε τοῖς
+πολιτικοῖς
+<span class = "pagenum">92</span>
+λόγοις</span>, <span title =
+"par’ ekeinou labôn, has oute Antiphôn, oute Lusias, oute Isokratês">παρ᾽
+ἐκείνου λαβών, ἃς οὔτε Ἀντιφῶν, οὔτε Λυσίας, οὔτε Ἰσοκράτης</span>,
+<span title =
+"hoi prôteusantes tôn tote rhêtorôn, eschon aretas, ta tachê legô">οἱ
+πρωτεύσαντες τῶν τότε ῥητόρων, ἔσχον ἀρετάς, τὰ τάχη λέγω</span>,
+<span title =
+"kai tas sustrophas, kai tous tonous, kai to struphnon">καὶ τὰς
+συστροφάς, καὶ τοὺς τόνους, καὶ τὸ στρυφνόν</span>,
+<span title = "kai tên exegeirousan ta pathê deinotêta.">καὶ τὴν
+ἐξεγείρουσαν τὰ πάθη δεινότητα.</span> So close a parallel can hardly be
+accidental.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXV_4">XXXV. 4. 5.</a>
+Longinus probably had his eye on the splendid lines in
+Pindar’s <i>First Pythian</i>:</p>
+
+<div class = "verse"><span title =
+"tas {Aitnas} ereugontai men aplatou puros hagnotatai">τᾶς [Αἴτνας]
+ἐρεύγονται μὲν ἀπλάτου πυρὸς ἁγνόταται</span><br>
+<span title = "ek muchôn pagai, potamoi d’">ἐκ μυχῶν παγαὶ,
+ποταμοὶ δ᾽</span><br>
+<span title = "hameraisin men procheonti rhoon kapnou--aithôn’">ἁμέραισιν
+μὲν προχέοντι ῥόον καπνοῦ&mdash;αἴθων᾽‧</span> <span title =
+"all’ en orphnaisin petras">ἀλλ᾽ ἐν ὄρφναισιν πέτρας</span><br>
+<span title = "phoinissa kulindomena phlox es bathei-|an">φοίνισσα
+κυλινδομένα φλὸξ ἐς βαθεῖ-<br>
+αν</span> <span title = "pherei pontou plaka sun patagô">φέρει πόντου
+πλάκα σὺν πατάγῳ ἁγνόταται αὐτοῦ μόνου</span>,</div>
+<p class = "nospace">
+which I find has also been pointed out by Toup, who remarks that <span
+title = "hagnotatai">ἁγνόταται</span> confirms the reading <span title =
+"autou monou">αὐτοῦ μόνου</span> here, which has been suspected without
+reason.</p>
+
+<p><a href = "#chapXXXVIII_2">XXXVIII. 2. 7.</a>
+Comp. Plato, <i>Phaedrus</i>, 267, A: <span title =
+"Tisian de Gorgian te easomen heudein">Τισίαν δὲ Γοργίαν τε ἐάσομεν
+εὕδειν</span>, <span title =
+"hoi pro tôn alêthôn ta eikota eidon hôs timêtea mallon">οἵ πρὸ τῶν
+ἀληθῶν τὰ εἰκότα εἶδον ὡς τιμητέα μᾶλλον</span>,
+<span title =
+"ta te au smikra megala kai ta megala smikra poiousi phainesthai dia rhômên logou">τὰ
+τε αὖ σμικρὰ μέγαλα καὶ τὰ μέγαλα σμικρὰ ποιοῦσι
+φαίνεσθαι διὰ ῥώμην λόγου</span>, <span title =
+"kaina te archaiôs ta t’ enantia kainôs">καινά τε ἀρχαίως
+τά τ᾽ ἐναντία καινῶς</span>, <span title =
+"suntomian te logôn kai apeira mêkê peri pantôn aneuron.">συντομίαν
+τε λόγων καὶ ἄπειρα μήκη περὶ πάντων ἀνεῦρον.</span></p>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_n1" href = "#tag_n1">N.1.</a>
+Comp. for the metaphor Goethe, <i>Dichtung und Wahrheit</i>, B 8. “Wie
+vor einem Blitz erleuchteten sich uns alle Folgen dieses herrlichen
+Gedankens.”</div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_n2" href = "#tag_n2">N.2.</a>
+The notion of <i>yellowness</i>, as associated with grass, is made
+intelligible by a passage in Longus, i. 17. 19. <span title =
+"chlôroteron to prosôpon ên poas <i>therinês</i>.">χλωρότερον τὸ
+πρόσωπον ἦν πόας <span class = "extended">θερινῆς</span></span></div>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_n3" href = "#tag_n3">N.3.</a>
+Compare the “Geflügelte Worte” in the Vorspiel to Goethe’s <i>Faust</i>:
+<div class = "footnote poem">
+Was glänzt, ist für den Augenblick geboren,<br>
+Das Aechte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren.</div>
+</div>
+
+<hr>
+
+<span class = "pagenum">93</span>
+<h4 class = "chapter"><a name = "appendix">APPENDIX</a></h4>
+
+<h5>SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LESS KNOWN WRITERS<br>
+MENTIONED IN THE TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME</h5>
+
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Ammonius.</span>&mdash;Alexandrian
+grammarian, carried on the school of Aristarchus previously to the reign
+of Augustus. The allusion here is to a work on the passages in which
+Plato has imitated Homer. (Suidas, <i>s.v.</i>; Schol. on Hom. Il. ix.
+540, quoted by Jahn.)</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Amphikrates.</span>&mdash;Author of a book
+<i>On Famous Men</i>, referred to by Athenaeus, xiii. 576, G, and Diog.
+Laert. ii. 101. C. Muller, <i>Hist. Gr. Fragm.</i> iv. p. 300, considers
+him to be the Athenian rhetorician who, according to Plutarch
+(<i>Lucullus</i>, c. 22), retired to Seleucia, and closed his life at
+the Court of Kleopatra, daughter of Mithridates and wife of Tigranes
+(Pauly, <i>Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
+Alterthumswissenschaft</i>). Plutarch tells a story illustrative of his
+arrogance. Being asked by the Seleucians to open a school of rhetoric,
+he replied, “A dish is not large enough for a dolphin” (<span title =
+"hôs oude lekanê delphina chôroiê">ὡς οὐδὲ λεκάνη δελφῖνα
+χωροίη</span>), v. <i>Luculli</i>, c. 22, quoted by Pearce.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Aristeas.</span>&mdash;A name involved in a
+mist of fable. According to Suidas he was a contemporary of Kroesus,
+though Herodotus assigns to him a much remoter antiquity. The latter
+authority describes him as visiting the northern peoples of Europe and
+recording his travels in an epic poem,
+<span class = "pagenum">94</span>
+a fragment of which is given here by Longinus. The passage before us
+appears to be intended as the words of some Arimaspian, who, as
+belonging to a remote inland race, expresses his astonishment that any
+men could be found bold enough to commit themselves to the mercy of the
+sea, and tries to describe the terror of human beings placed in such a
+situation (Pearce ad. l.; Abicht on Hdt. iv. 12; Suidas,
+<i>s.v.</i>)</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Bakchylides</span>, nephew and pupil of the
+great Simonides, flourished about 460 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span> He followed his uncle to the Court of Hiero at
+Syracuse, and enjoyed the patronage of that despot. After Hiero’s death
+he returned to his home in Keos; but finding himself discontented with
+the mode of life pursued in a free Greek community, for which his
+experiences at Hiero’s Court may well have disqualified him, he retired
+to Peloponnesus, where he died. His works comprise specimens of almost
+every kind of lyric composition, as practised by the Greeks of his time.
+Horace is said to have imitated him in his <i>Prophecy of Nereus</i>, c.
+I. xv. (Pauly, as above). So far as we can judge from what remains of
+his works, he was distinguished rather by elegance than by force. A
+considerable fragment on the Blessings of Peace has been translated by
+Mr. J.&nbsp;A. Symonds in his work on the Greek poets. He is made the
+subject of a very bitter allusion by Pindar (Ol. ii. s. fin. c. Schol.)
+We may suppose that the stern and lofty spirit of Pindar had little
+sympathy with the “tearful” (Catullus, xxxviii.) strains of Simonides or
+his imitators.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Caecilius</span>, a native of Kale Akte in
+Sicily, and hence known as Caecilius Kalaktinus, lived in Rome at the
+time of Augustus. He is mentioned with distinction as a learned Greek
+rhetorician and grammarian, and was the author of numerous works,
+frequently referred to by Plutarch and other later writers. He may be
+regarded as one of the most
+<span class = "pagenum">95</span>
+distinguished Greek rhetoricians of his time. His works, all of which
+have perished, comprised, among many others, commentaries on Antipho and
+Lysias; several treatises on Demosthenes, among which is a dissertation
+on the genuine and spurious speeches, and another comparing that orator
+with Cicero; “On the Distinction between Athenian and Asiatic
+Eloquence”; and the work on the Sublime, referred to by Longinus
+(Pauly). The criticism of Longinus on the above work may be thus summed
+up: Caecilius is censured (1) as failing to rise to the dignity of his
+subject; (2) as missing the cardinal points; and (3) as failing in
+practical utility. He wastes his energy in tedious attempts to define
+the Sublime, but does not tell us how it is to be attained (I. i.) He is
+further blamed for omitting to deal with the Pathetic (VIII. i.
+<i>sqq.</i>) He allows only two metaphors to be employed together in the
+same passage (XXXII. ii.) He extols Lysias as a far greater writer than
+Plato (<i>ib.</i> viii.), and is a bitter assailant of Plato’s style
+(<i>ib.</i>) On the whole, he seems to have been a cold and uninspired
+critic, finding his chief pleasure in minute verbal details, and
+incapable of rising to an elevated and extensive view of his
+subject.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Eratosthenes</span>, a native of Cyrene,
+born in 275 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span>; appointed by Ptolemy
+III. Euergetes as the successor of Kallimachus in the post of librarian
+in the great library of Alexandria. He was the teacher of Aristophanes
+of Byzantium, and his fame as a man of learning is testified by the
+various fanciful titles which were conferred on him, such as “The
+Pentathlete,” “The second Plato,” etc. His great work was a treatise on
+geography (Lübker).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Gorgias</span> of Leontini, according to
+some authorities a pupil of Empedokles, came, when already advanced in
+years, as ambassador from his native city to ask help against Syracuse
+<ins class = "correction" title =
+"open parenthesis missing in original">(427
+<span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span>)</ins> Here he attracted notice
+by a novel style of eloquence. Some time after he settled permanently in
+<span class = "pagenum">96</span>
+Greece, wandering from city to city, and acquiring wealth and fame by
+practising and teaching rhetoric. We find him last in Larissa, where he
+died at the age of a hundred in 375 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span> As a teacher of eloquence Gorgias belongs to
+what is known as the Sicilian school, in which he followed the steps of
+his predecessors, Korax and Tisias. At the time when this school arose
+the Greek ear was still accustomed to the rhythm and beat of poetry, and
+the whole rhetorical system of the Gorgian school (compare the phrases
+<span title = "gorgieia schêmata">γοργίεια σχήματα</span>, <span title =
+"gorgiazein">γοργιάζειν</span>) is built on a poetical plan (Lübker,
+<i>Reallexikon des classischen Alterthums</i>). Hermogenes, as quoted by
+Jahn, appears to classify him among the “hollow pedants” (<span title =
+"hupoxuloi sophistai">ὑπόξυλοι σοφισταί</span>), “who,” he says, “talk
+of vultures as ‘living tombs,’ to which they themselves would best be
+committed, and indulge in many other such frigid conceits.” (With the
+metaphor censured by Longinus compare Achilles Tatius, III. v. 50, ed.
+Didot.) See also Plato, <i>Phaedrus</i>, 267,&nbsp;A.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Hegesias</span> of Magnesia, rhetorician
+and historian, contemporary of Timaeus (300 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span>) He belongs to the period of the decline of
+Greek learning, and Cicero treats him as the representative of the
+decline of taste. His style was harsh and broken in character, and a
+parody on the Old Attic. He wrote a life of Alexander the Great, of
+which Plutarch (<i>Alexander</i>, c. 3) gives the following specimen:
+“On the day of Alexander’s birth the temple of Artemis in Ephesus was
+burnt down, a coincidence which occasions Hegesias to utter a conceit
+frigid enough to extinguish the conflagration. ‘It was natural,’ he
+says, ‘that the temple should be burnt down, as Artemis was engaged with
+bringing Alexander into the world’” (Pauly, with the references).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Hekataeus</span> of Miletus, the
+logographer; born in 549 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span>, died
+soon after the battle of Plataea. He was the author of two
+works&mdash;(1) <span title = "periodos gês">περίοδος γῆς</span>; and
+(2) <span title = "geneêlogiai">γενεηλογίαι</span>. The <i>Periodos</i>
+deals in two books, first with Europe, then with
+<span class = "pagenum">97</span>
+Asia and Libya. The quotation in the text is from his genealogies
+(Lübker).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Ion</span> of Chios, poet, historian, and
+philosopher, highly distinguished among his contemporaries, and
+mentioned by Strabo among the celebrated men of the island. He won the
+tragic prize at Athens in 452 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span>,
+and Aristophanes (<i>Peace</i>, 421 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span>) speaks of him as already dead. He was not less
+celebrated as an elegiac poet, and we still possess some specimens of
+his elegies, which are characterised by an Anacreontic spirit, a
+cheerful, joyous tone, and even by a certain degree of inspiration. He
+wrote also Skolia, Hymns, and Epigrams, and was a pretty voluminous
+writer in prose (Pauly). Compare the Scholiast on Ar.
+<i>Peace</i>,&nbsp;801.</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Kallisthenes</span> of Olynthus, a near
+relative of Aristotle; born in 360, and educated by the philosopher as
+fellow-pupil with Alexander, afterwards the Great. He subsequently
+visited Athens, where he enjoyed the friendship of Theophrastus, and
+devoted himself to history and natural philosophy. He afterwards
+accompanied Alexander on his Asiatic expedition, but soon became
+obnoxious to the tyrant on account of his independent and manly bearing,
+which he carried even to the extreme of rudeness and arrogance. He at
+last excited the enmity of Alexander to such a degree that the latter
+took the opportunity afforded by the conspiracy of Hermolaus, in which
+Kallisthenes was accused of participating, to rid himself of his former
+school companion, whom he caused to be put to death. He was the author
+of various historical and scientific works. Of the latter two are
+mentioned&mdash;(1) <i>On the Nature of the Eye</i>; (2) <i>On the
+Nature of Plants</i>. Among his historical works are mentioned (1) the
+<i>Phocian War</i> (read “Phocicum” for v. l. “Troikum” in Cic. <i>Epp.
+ad Div.</i> v. 12); (2) a <i>History of Greece</i> in ten books; (3)
+<span title = "ta Persika">τὰ Περσικά</span>, apparently identical with
+the description of Alexander’s march, of which we still possess
+fragments. As
+<span class = "pagenum">98</span>
+an historian he seems to have displayed an undue love of recording signs
+and wonders. Polybius, however (vi. 45), classes him among the best
+historical writers. His style is said by Cicero (<i>de Or.</i> ii. 14)
+to approximate to the rhetorical (Pauly).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Kleitarchus</span>, a contemporary of
+Alexander, accompanied that monarch on his Asiatic expedition, and wrote
+a history of the same in twelve books, which must have included at least
+a short retrospect on the early history of Asia. His talents are spoken
+of in high terms, but his credit as an historian is held very
+light&mdash;“probatur ingenium, fides infamatur,” Quint. x. 1, 74.
+Cicero also (<i>de Leg.</i> i. 2) ranks him very low. That his credit as
+an historian was sacrificed to a childish credulity and a foolish love
+of fable and adventure is sufficiently testified by the pretty numerous
+fragments which still remain (Pauly). Demetrius Phalereus, quoted by
+Pearce, quotes a grandiloquent description of the wasp taken from
+Kleitarchus, “feeding on the mountainside, her home the hollow oak.”</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Matris</span>, a native of Thebes,
+author of a panegyric on <ins class = "correction" title =
+"spelling variation in original">Herakles</ins>,
+whether in verse or prose is uncertain. In one
+passage Athenaeus speaks of him as an Athenian, but this must be a
+mistake. Toup restores a verse from an allusion in Diodorus Siculus
+(i.&nbsp;24), which, if genuine, would agree well with the description
+given of him by Longinus: <span title =
+"Êraklea kaleesken, hoti kleos esche dia Hêran">Ηρακλέα καλέεσκεν,
+ὅτι κλέος ἔσχε διὰ Ἥραν</span> (see Toup ad Long. III.&nbsp;ii.)</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Philistus</span> of Syracuse, a relative of
+the elder Dionysius, whom he assisted with his wealth in his attack on
+the liberty of that city, and remained with him until 386 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span>, when he was banished by the jealous suspicions
+of the tyrant. He retired to Epirus, where he remained until Dionysius’s
+death. The younger Dionysius recalled him, wishing to employ him in the
+character of supporter against Dion. By
+<span class = "pagenum">99</span>
+his instrumentality it would seem that Dion and Plato were banished from
+Syracuse. He commanded the fleet in the struggle between Dion and
+Dionysius, and lost a battle, whereupon he was seized and put to death
+by the people. During his banishment he wrote his historical work, <span
+title = "ta Sikelika">τὰ Σικελικά</span>, divided into two parts and
+numbering eleven books. The first division embraced the history of
+Sicily from the earliest times down to the capture of Agrigentum <ins
+class = "correction" title =
+"open parenthesis missing in original">(seven books)</ins>,
+and the remaining four books dealt with
+the life of Dionysius the elder. He afterwards added a supplement in two
+books, giving an account of the younger Dionysius, which he did not,
+however, complete. He is described as an imitator, though at a great
+distance, of Thucydides, and hence was known as “the little Thucydides.”
+As an historian he is deficient in conscientiousness and candour; he
+appears as a partisan of Dionysius, and seeks to throw a veil over his
+discreditable actions. Still he belongs to the most important of the
+Greek historians (Lübker).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Theodorus</span> of Gadara, a rhetorician
+in the first century after Christ; tutor of Tiberius, first in Rome,
+afterwards in Rhodes, from which town he called himself a Rhodian, and
+where Tiberius during his exile diligently attended his instruction. He
+was the author of various grammatical and other works, but his fame
+chiefly rested on his abilities as a teacher, in which capacity he seems
+to have had great influence (Pauly). He was the author of that famous
+description of Tiberius which is given by Suetonius (<i>Tib.</i> 57),
+<span title = "pêlos haimati pephuramenos">πηλὸς αἵματι
+πεφυραμένος</span>, “A clod kneaded together with blood.”<a class =
+"tag" name = "tag_a1" href = "#note_a1">A.1</a></p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Theopompus</span>, a native of Chios; born
+380 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span> He came to Athens while still
+a boy, and studied eloquence under Isokrates, who is said, in comparing
+him with another pupil, Ephorus, to have made use of the image which we
+find in
+<span class = "pagenum">100</span>
+Longinus, c. ii. “Theopompus,” he said, “needs the curb, Ephorus the
+spur” (Suidas, quoted by Jahn ad v.) He appeared with applause in
+various great cities as an advocate, but especially distinguished
+himself in the contest of eloquence instituted by Artemisia at the
+obsequies of her husband Mausolus, where he won the prize. He afterwards
+devoted himself to historical composition. His great work was a history
+of Greece, in which he takes up the thread of Thucydides’s narrative,
+and carries it on uninterruptedly in twelve books down to the battle of
+Knidus, seventeen years later. Here he broke off, and began a new work
+entitled <i>The Philippics</i>, in fifty-eight books. This work dealt
+with the history of Greece in the Macedonian period, but was padded out
+to a preposterous bulk by all kinds of digressions on mythological,
+historical, or social topics. Only a few fragments remain. He earned an
+ill name among ancient critics by the bitterness of his censures, his
+love of the marvellous, and the inordinate length of his digressions.
+His style is by some critics censured as feeble, and extolled by others
+as clear, nervous, and elevated (Lübker and Pauly).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Timaeus</span>, a native of Tauromenium in
+Sicily; born about 352 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span> Being
+driven out of Sicily by Agathokles, he lived a retired life for fifty
+years in Athens, where he composed his History. Subsequently he returned
+to Sicily, and died at the age of ninety-six in 256 <span class =
+"smallroman">B.C.</span> His chief work was a <i>History of Sicily</i>
+from the earliest times down to the 129th Olympiad. It numbered
+sixty-eight books, and consisted of two principal divisions, whose
+limits cannot now be ascertained. In a separate work he handled the
+campaigns of Pyrrhus, and also wrote <i>Olympionikae</i>, probably
+dealing with chronological matters. Timaeus has been severely criticised
+and harshly condemned by the ancients, especially by Polybius, who
+denies him every faculty required by the historical writer (xii. 3-15,
+23-28). And though Cicero
+<span class = "pagenum">101</span>
+differs from this judgment, yet it may be regarded as certain that
+Timaeus was better qualified for the task of learned compilation than
+for historical research, and held no distinguished place among the
+historians of Greece. His works have perished, only a few fragments
+remaining (Lübker).</p>
+
+<p><span class = "smallcaps">Zoilus</span>, a Greek rhetorician, native
+of Amphipolis in Macedonia, in the time probably of Ptolemy Philadelphus
+(285-247 <span class = "smallroman">B.C.</span>), who is said by
+Vitruvius to have crucified him for his abuse of Homer. He won the name
+of Homeromastix, “the scourge of Homer,” and was also known as <span
+title = "kuôn rhêtorikos">κύων ῥητορικός</span>, “the dog of rhetoric,”
+on account of his biting sarcasm; and his name (as in the case of the
+English Dennis) came to be used to signify in general a carping and
+malicious critic. Suidas mentions two works of his, written with the
+object of injuring or destroying the fame of Homer&mdash;(1) <i>Nine
+Books against Homer</i>; and (2) <i>Censures on Homer</i> (Pauly).</p>
+
+<p>[The facts contained in the above short notices are taken chiefly
+from Lübker’s <i>Reallexikon des classischen Alterthums</i>, and the
+very copious and elaborate <i>Real-Encyclopädie der classischen
+Alterthumswissenschaft</i>, edited by Pauly. I have here to acknowledge
+the kindness of Dr. Wollseiffen, Gymnasialdirektor in Crefeld, in
+placing at my disposal the library of the Crefeld Gymnasium, but for
+which these biographical notes, which were put together at the
+suggestion of Mr. Lang, could not have been compiled. <span class =
+"smallcaps">Crefeld</span>, <i>31st July 1890</i>.]</p>
+
+<div class = "footnote"><a name = "note_a1" href = "#tag_a1">A.1.</a>
+A remarkable parallel, if not actually an imitation, occurs in Goethe’s
+<i>Faust</i>, “Du Spottgeburt von Dreck und Feuer.”</div>
+
+
+<h5 class = "chapter">THE END</h5>
+
+<h6><i>Printed by</i> <span class = "smallcaps">R. &amp; R.
+Clark</span>, <i>Edinburgh</i></h6>
+
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+<h5><b>CLASSICAL LIBRARY.</b></h5>
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+By <span class = "smallcaps">T.&nbsp;G. Tucker</span>, M.A., Professor
+of Classical Philology in the University of Melbourne.
+<span class = "indent1">8vo.</span>
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+
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+<span class = "indent1">[<i>In&nbsp;preparation.</i></span></p>
+
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+<span class = "indent1">[<i>In&nbsp;the&nbsp;Press.</i></span></p>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: On the Sublime
+
+Author: Longinus
+
+Commentator: Andrew Lang
+
+Translator: H. L. Havell
+
+Release Date: March 10, 2006 [EBook #17957]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ON THE SUBLIME ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Louise Hope, Justin Kerk and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+The printed text shows most sections (Roman numerals) as a continuous
+block, with chapter numbers in the margin. In this e-text, chapters
+are given as separate paragraphs determined by sentence breaks, with
+continuing quotation marks supplied where necessary.
+Except for footnotes, any brackets are from the original text.
+Greek has been transliterated and shown between +marks+.]
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+                      LONGINUS
+
+                  ON THE SUBLIME
+
+             Translated into English by
+
+                 H. L. HAVELL, B.A.
+   Formerly Scholar of University College, Oxford
+
+              with an Introduction by
+                    ANDREW LANG
+
+
+                       London
+                 MACMILLAN AND CO.
+                    and New York
+                        1890
+
+               _All rights reserved_
+
+
+         *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+                         TO
+
+             S. H. BUTCHER, Esq., LL.D.
+
+ Professor of Greek in the University of Edinburgh
+   Formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
+         and of University College, Oxford
+
+                    This Attempt
+     to Present the Great Thoughts of Longinus
+                 in an English Form
+
+                    Is Dedicated
+
+       in Acknowledgment of the Kind Support
+  but for Which It Might Never Have Seen the Light
+            and of the Benefits of That
+        Instruction to Which It Largely Owes
+    Whatever of Scholarly Quality It May Possess
+
+
+
+
+TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE
+
+
+The text which has been followed in the present Translation is that
+of Jahn (Bonn, 1867), revised by Vahlen, and republished in 1884. In
+several instances it has been found necessary to diverge from Vahlen's
+readings, such divergencies being duly pointed out in the Notes.
+
+One word as to the aim and scope of the present Translation. My object
+throughout has been to make Longinus speak in English, to preserve, as
+far as lay in my power, the noble fire and lofty tone of the original.
+How to effect this, without being betrayed into a loose paraphrase, was
+an exceedingly difficult problem. The style of Longinus is in a high
+degree original, occasionally running into strange eccentricities of
+language; and no one who has not made the attempt can realise the
+difficulty of giving anything like an adequate version of the more
+elaborate passages. These considerations I submit to those to whom I
+may seem at first sight to have handled my text too freely.
+
+My best thanks are due to Dr. Butcher, Professor of Greek in the
+University of Edinburgh, who from first to last has shown a lively
+interest in the present undertaking which I can never sufficiently
+acknowledge. He has read the Translation throughout, and acting on his
+suggestions I have been able in numerous instances to bring my version
+into a closer conformity with the original.
+
+I have also to acknowledge the kindness of the distinguished writer who
+has contributed the Introduction, and who, in spite of the heavy demands
+on his time, has lent his powerful support to help on the work of one
+who was personally unknown to him.
+
+In conclusion, I may be allowed to express a hope that the present
+attempt may contribute something to reawaken an interest in an unjustly
+neglected classic.
+
+
+
+
+ANALYSIS
+
+
+The Treatise on the Sublime may be divided into six Parts, as follows:--
+
+I.--cc. i, ii. The Work of Caecilius. Definition of the Sublime.
+  Whether Sublimity falls within the rules of Art.
+
+II.--cc. iii-v. [The beginning lost.] Vices of Style opposed to the
+  Sublime: Affectation, Bombast, False Sentiment, Frigid Conceits.
+  The cause of such defects.
+
+III.--cc. vi, vii. The true Sublime, what it is, and how
+  distinguishable.
+
+IV.--cc. viii-xl. Five Sources of the Sublime (how Sublimity is related
+  to Passion, c. viii, Sec.Sec. 2-4).
+
+  (i.) Grandeur of Thought, cc. ix-xv.
+
+    _a._ As the natural outcome of nobility of soul. Examples (c. ix).
+
+    _b._ Choice of the most striking circumstances. Sappho's Ode (c. x).
+
+    _c._ Amplification. Plato compared with Demosthenes, Demosthenes
+      with Cicero (cc. xi-xiii).
+
+    _d._ Imitation (cc. xiii, xiv).
+
+    _e._ Imagery (c. xv).
+
+  (ii.) Power of moving the Passions (omitted here, because dealt with
+    in a separate work).
+
+  (iii.) Figures of Speech (cc. xvi-xxix).
+
+    _a._ The Figure of Adjuration (c. xvi). The Art to conceal Art
+      (c. xvii).
+
+    _b._ Rhetorical Question (c. xviii).
+
+    _c._ Asyndeton (c. xix-xxi).
+
+    _d._ Hyperbaton (c. xxii).
+
+    _e._ Changes of Number, Person, Tense, etc. (cc. xxiii-xxvii).
+
+    _f._ Periphrasis (cc. xxviii, xxix).
+
+  (iv.) Graceful Expression (cc. xxx-xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+    _a._ Choice of Words (c. xxx).
+
+    _b._ Ornaments of Style (cc. xxxi, xxxii and xxxvii, xxxviii).
+
+      (+a+) On the use of Familiar Words (c. xxxi).
+
+      (+b+) Metaphors; accumulated; extract from the
+        _Timaeus_; abuse of Metaphors; certain tasteless conceits blamed
+        in Plato (c. xxxii).
+        [Hence arises a digression (cc. xxxiii-xxxvi) on the spirit
+        in which we should judge of the faults of great authors.
+        Demosthenes compared with Hyperides, Lysias with Plato.
+        Sublimity, however far from faultless, to be always preferred
+        to a tame correctness.]
+
+      (+g+) Comparisons and Similes [lost] (c. xxxvii).
+
+      (+d+) Hyperbole (c. xxxviii).
+
+  (v.) Dignity and Elevation of Structure (cc. xxxix, xl).
+
+    _a._ Modulation of Syllables (c. xxxix).
+
+    _b._ Composition (c. xl).
+
+V.--cc. xli-xliii. Vices of Style destructive to Sublimity.
+
+  (i.) Abuse of Rhythm           }
+
+  (ii.) Broken and Jerky Clauses } (cc. xli, xlii).
+
+  (iii.) Undue Prolixity         }
+
+  (iv.) Improper Use of Familiar Words. Anti-climax. Example from
+    Theopompus (c. xliii).
+
+VI.--Why this age is so barren of great authors--whether the cause is
+to be sought in a despotic form of government, or, as Longinus rather
+thinks, in the prevailing corruption of manners, and in the sordid and
+paltry views of life which almost universally prevail (c. xliv).
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+Boileau, in his introduction to his version of the ancient Treatise on
+the Sublime, says that he is making no valueless present to his age. Not
+valueless, to a generation which talks much about style and method in
+literature, should be this new rendering of the noble fragment, long
+attributed to Longinus, the Greek tutor and political adviser of
+Zenobia. There is, indeed, a modern English version by Spurden,[1] but
+that is now rare, and seldom comes into the market. Rare, too, is
+Vaucher's critical essay (1854), which is unlucky, as the French and
+English books both contain valuable disquisitions on the age of the
+author of the Treatise. This excellent work has had curious fortunes. It
+is never quoted nor referred to by any extant classical writer, and,
+among the many books attributed by Suidas to Longinus, it is not
+mentioned. Decidedly the old world has left no more noble relic of
+criticism. Yet the date of the book is obscure, and it did not come into
+the hands of the learned in modern Europe till Robertelli and Manutius
+each published editions in 1544. From that time the Treatise has often
+been printed, edited, translated; but opinion still floats undecided
+about its origin and period. Does it belong to the age of Augustus, or
+to the age of Aurelian? Is the author the historical Longinus--the
+friend of Plotinus, the tutor of Porphyry, the victim of Aurelian,--or
+have we here a work by an unknown hand more than two centuries earlier?
+Manuscripts and traditions are here of little service. The oldest
+manuscript, that of Paris, is regarded as the parent of the rest. It is
+a small quarto of 414 pages, whereof 335 are occupied by the "Problems"
+of Aristotle. Several leaves have been lost, hence the fragmentary
+character of the essay. The Paris MS. has an index, first mentioning the
+"Problems," and then +DIONUSIOU E LONGINOU PERI UPSOUS+, that is, "The
+work of Dionysius, or of Longinus, about the Sublime."
+
+    [Footnote 1: Longmans, London, 1836.]
+
+On this showing the transcriber of the MS. considered its authorship
+dubious. Supposing that the author was Dionysius, which of the many
+writers of that name was he? Again, if he was Longinus, how far does his
+work tally with the characteristics ascribed to that late critic, and
+peculiar to his age?
+
+About this Longinus, while much is written, little is certainly known.
+Was he a descendant of a freedman of one of the Cassii Longini, or of an
+eastern family with a mixture of Greek and Roman blood? The author of
+the Treatise avows himself a Greek, and apologises, as a Greek, for
+attempting an estimate of Cicero. Longinus himself was the nephew and
+heir of Fronto, a Syrian rhetorician of Emesa. Whether Longinus was born
+there or not, and when he was born, are things uncertain. Porphyry, born
+in 233 A.D., was his pupil: granting that Longinus was twenty years
+Porphyry's senior, he must have come into the world about 213 A.D. He
+travelled much, studied in many cities, and was the friend of the mystic
+Neoplatonists, Plotinus and Ammonius. The former called him "a
+philologist, not a philosopher." Porphyry shows us Longinus at a supper
+where the plagiarisms of Greek writers are discussed--a topic dear to
+trivial or spiteful mediocrity. He is best known by his death. As the
+Greek secretary of Zenobia he inspired a haughty answer from the queen
+to Aurelian, who therefore put him to death. Many rhetorical and
+philosophic treatises are ascribed to him, whereof only fragments
+survive. Did he write the Treatise on the Sublime? Modern students
+prefer to believe that the famous essay is, if not by Plutarch, as some
+hold, at least by some author of his age, the age of the early Caesars.
+
+The arguments for depriving Longinus, Zenobia's tutor, of the credit of
+the Treatise lie on the surface, and may be briefly stated. He addresses
+his work as a letter to a friend, probably a Roman pupil, Terentianus,
+with whom he has been reading a work on the Sublime by Caecilius. Now
+Caecilius, a voluminous critic, certainly lived not later than Plutarch,
+who speaks of him with a sneer. It is unlikely then that an author, two
+centuries later, would make the old book of Caecilius the starting-point
+of his own. He would probably have selected some recent or even
+contemporary rhetorician. Once more, the writer of the Treatise of the
+Sublime quotes no authors later than the Augustan period. Had he lived
+as late as the historical Longinus he would surely have sought examples
+of bad style, if not of good, from the works of the Silver Age. Perhaps
+he would hardly have resisted the malicious pleasure of censuring the
+failures among whom he lived. On the other hand, if he cites no late
+author, no classical author cites him, in spite of the excellence of his
+book. But we can hardly draw the inference that he was of late date from
+this purely negative evidence.
+
+Again, he describes, in a very interesting and earnest manner, the
+characteristics of his own period (Translation, pp. 82-86). Why, he is
+asked, has genius become so rare? There are many clever men, but scarce
+any highly exalted and wide-reaching genius. Has eloquence died with
+liberty? "We have learned the lesson of a benignant despotism, and have
+never tasted freedom." The author answers that it is easy and
+characteristic of men to blame the present times. Genius may have been
+corrupted, not by a world-wide peace, but by love of gain and pleasure,
+passions so strong that "I fear, for such men as we are it is better to
+serve than to be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether
+against our neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and
+bring a deluge of calamity on the whole civilised world." Melancholy
+words, and appropriate to our own age, when cleverness is almost
+universal, and genius rare indeed, and the choice between liberty and
+servitude hard to make, were the choice within our power.
+
+But these words assuredly apply closely to the peaceful period of
+Augustus, when Virgil and Horace "praising their tyrant sang," not to
+the confused age of the historical Longinus. Much has been said of the
+allusion to "the Lawgiver of the Jews" as "no ordinary person," but that
+remark might have been made by a heathen acquainted with the Septuagint,
+at either of the disputed dates. On the other hand, our author (Section
+XIII) quotes the critical ideas of "Ammonius and his school," as to the
+debt of Plato to Homer. Now the historical Longinus was a friend of the
+Neoplatonist teacher (not writer), Ammonius Saccas. If we could be sure
+that the Ammonius of the Treatise was this Ammonius, the question would
+be settled in favour of the late date. Our author would be that Longinus
+who inspired Zenobia to resist Aurelian, and who perished under his
+revenge. But Ammonius is not a very uncommon name, and we have no reason
+to suppose that the Neoplatonist Ammonius busied himself with the
+literary criticism of Homer and Plato. There was, among others, an
+Egyptian Ammonius, the tutor of Plutarch.
+
+These are the mass of the arguments on both sides. M. Egger sums them up
+thus: "After carefully examining the tradition of the MSS., and the one
+very late testimony in favour of Longinus, I hesitated for long as to
+the date of this precious work. In 1854 M. Vaucher[2] inclined me to
+believe that Plutarch was the author.[3] All seems to concur towards the
+opinion that, if not Plutarch, at least one of his contemporaries wrote
+the most original Greek essay in its kind since the _Rhetoric_ and
+_Poetic_ of Aristotle."[4]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Etude Critique sur la traite du Sublime et les ecrits
+    de Longin._ Geneva.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: See also M. Naudet, _Journal des Savants_, Mars 1838,
+    and M. Egger, in the same Journal, May 1884.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Egger, _Histoire de la Critique chez les Grecs_,
+    p. 426. Paris, 1887.]
+
+We may, on the whole, agree that the nobility of the author's thought,
+his habit of quoting nothing more recent than the Augustan age, and his
+description of his own time, which seems so pertinent to that epoch,
+mark him as its child rather than as a great critic lost among the
+_somnia Pythagorea_ of the Neoplatonists. On the other hand, if the
+author be a man of high heart and courage, as he seems, so was that
+martyr of independence, Longinus. Not without scruple, then, can we
+deprive Zenobia's tutor of the glory attached so long to his name.
+
+Whatever its date, and whoever its author may be, the Treatise is
+fragmentary. The lost parts may very probably contain the secret of its
+period and authorship. The writer, at the request of his friend,
+Terentianus, and dissatisfied with the essay of Caecilius, sets about
+examining the nature of the Sublime in poetry and oratory. To the latter
+he assigns, as is natural, much more literary importance than we do, in
+an age when there is so little oratory of literary merit, and so much
+popular rant. The subject of sublimity must naturally have attracted a
+writer whose own moral nature was pure and lofty, who was inclined to
+discover in moral qualities the true foundation of the highest literary
+merit. Even in his opening words he strikes the keynote of his own
+disposition, where he approves the saying that "the points in which we
+resemble the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth." Earlier
+or later born, he must have lived in the midst of literary activity,
+curious, eager, occupied with petty questions and petty quarrels,
+concerned, as men in the best times are not very greatly concerned, with
+questions of technique and detail. Cut off from politics, people found
+in composition a field for their activity. We can readily fancy what
+literature becomes when not only its born children, but the minor
+busybodies whose natural place is politics, excluded from these, pour
+into the study of letters. Love of notoriety, vague activity, fantastic
+indolence, we may be sure, were working their will in the sacred close
+of the Muses. There were literary sets, jealousies, recitations of new
+poems; there was a world of amateurs, if there were no papers and
+paragraphs. To this world the author speaks like a voice from the older
+and graver age of Greece. If he lived late, we can imagine that he did
+not quote contemporaries, not because he did not know them, but because
+he estimated them correctly. He may have suffered, as we suffer, from
+critics who, of all the world's literature, know only "the last thing
+out," and who take that as a standard for the past, to them unfamiliar,
+and for the hidden future. As we are told that excellence is not of the
+great past, but of the present, not in the classical masters, but in
+modern Muscovites, Portuguese, or American young women, so the author of
+the Treatise may have been troubled by Asiatic eloquence, now long
+forgotten, by names of which not a shadow survives. He, on the other
+hand, has a right to be heard because he has practised a long
+familiarity with what is old and good. His mind has ever been in contact
+with masterpieces, as the mind of a critic should be, as the mind of a
+reviewer seldom is, for the reviewer has to hurry up and down inspecting
+new literary adventurers. Not among their experiments will he find a
+touchstone of excellence, a test of greatness, and that test will seldom
+be applied to contemporary performances. What is the test, after all, of
+the Sublime, by which our author means the truly great, the best and
+most passionate thoughts, nature's high and rare inspirations, expressed
+in the best chosen words? He replies that "a just judgment of style is
+the final fruit of long experience." "Much has he travelled in the
+realms of gold."
+
+The word "style" has become a weariness to think upon; so much is said,
+so much is printed about the art of expression, about methods, tricks,
+and turns; so many people, without any long experience, set up to be
+judges of style, on the strength of having admired two or three modern
+and often rather fantastic writers. About our author, however, we know
+that his experience has been long, and of the best, that he does not
+speak from a hasty acquaintance with a few contemporary _precieux_ and
+_precieuses_. The bad writing of his time he traces, as much of our own
+may be traced, to "the pursuit of novelty in thought," or rather in
+expression. "It is this that has turned the brain of nearly all our
+learned world to-day." "Gardons nous d'ecrire trop bien," he might have
+said, "c'est la pire maniere qu'il y'ait d'ecrire."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: M. Anatole France.]
+
+The Sublime, with which he concerns himself, is "a certain loftiness and
+excellence of language," which "takes the reader out of himself.... The
+Sublime, acting with an imperious and irresistible force, sways every
+reader whether he will or no." In its own sphere the Sublime does what
+"natural magic" does in the poetical rendering of nature, and perhaps in
+the same scarcely-to-be-analysed fashion. Whether this art can be taught
+or not is a question which the author treats with modesty. Then, as now,
+people were denying (and not unjustly) that this art can be taught by
+rule. The author does not go so far as to say that Criticism, "unlike
+Justice, does little evil, and little good; that is, _if_ to entertain
+for a moment delicate and curious minds is to do little good." He does
+not rate his business so low as that. He admits that the inspiration
+comes from genius, from nature. But "an author can only learn from art
+when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius." Nature
+must "burst out with a kind of fine madness and divine inspiration." The
+madness must be _fine_. How can art aid it to this end? By knowledge of,
+by sympathy and emulation with, "the great poets and prose writers of
+the past." By these we may be inspired, as the Pythoness by Apollo. From
+the genius of the past "an effluence breathes upon us." The writer is
+not to imitate, but to keep before him the perfection of what has been
+done by the greatest poets. He is to look on them as beacons; he is to
+keep them as exemplars or ideals. He is to place them as judges of his
+work. "How would Homer, how would Demosthenes, have been affected by
+what I have written?" This is practical counsel, and even the most
+florid modern author, after polishing a paragraph, may tear it up when
+he has asked himself, "What would Addison have said about this eloquence
+of mine, or Sainte Beuve, or Mr. Matthew Arnold?" In this way what we
+call inspiration, that is the performance of the heated mind, perhaps
+working at its best, perhaps overstraining itself, and overstating its
+idea, might really be regulated. But they are few who consider so
+closely, fewer perhaps they who have the heart to cut out their own fine
+or refined things. Again, our author suggests another criterion. We are,
+as in Lamb's phrase, "to write for antiquity," with the souls of poets
+dead and gone for our judges. But we are also to write for the future,
+asking with what feelings posterity will read us--if it reads us at all.
+This is a good discipline. We know by practice what will hit some
+contemporary tastes; we know the measure of smartness, say, or the
+delicate flippancy, or the sentence with "a dying fall." But one should
+also know that these are fancies of the hour--these and the touch of
+archaism, and the spinster-like and artificial precision, which seem to
+be points in some styles of the moment. Such reflections as our author
+bids us make, with a little self-respect added, may render our work less
+popular and effective, and certainly are not likely to carry it down to
+remote posterity. But all such reflections, and action in accordance
+with what they teach, are elements of literary self-respect. It is hard
+to be conscientious, especially hard for him who writes much, and of
+necessity, and for bread. But conscience is never to be obeyed with
+ease, though the ease grows with the obedience. The book attributed to
+Longinus will not have missed its mark if it reminds us that, in
+literature at least, for conscience there is yet a place, possibly even
+a reward, though that is unessential. By virtue of reasonings like
+these, and by insisting that nobility of style is, as it were, the bloom
+on nobility of soul, the Treatise on the Sublime becomes a tonic work,
+wholesome to be read by young authors and old. "It is natural in us to
+feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and, conceiving a sort of
+generous exultation, to be filled with joy and pride, as though we had
+ourselves originated the ideas which we read." Here speaks his natural
+disinterested greatness the author himself is here sublime, and teaches
+by example as well as precept, for few things are purer than a pure and
+ardent admiration. The critic is even confident enough to expect to find
+his own nobility in others, believing that what is truly Sublime "will
+always please, and please all readers." And in this universal acceptance
+by the populace and the literate, by critics and creators, by young and
+old, he finds the true external canon of sublimity. The verdict lies not
+with contemporaries, but with the large public, not with the little set
+of dilettanti, but must be spoken by all. Such verdicts assign the crown
+to Shakespeare and Moliere, to Homer and Cervantes; we should not
+clamorously anticipate this favourable judgment for Bryant or Emerson,
+nor for the greatest of our own contemporaries. Boileau so much
+misconceived these lofty ideas that he regarded "Longinus's" judgment as
+solely that "of good sense," and held that, in his time, "nothing was
+good or bad till he had spoken." But there is far more than good sense,
+there is high poetic imagination and moral greatness, in the criticism
+of our author, who certainly would have rejected Boileau's compliment
+when he selects Longinus as a literary dictator.
+
+Indeed we almost grudge our author's choice of a subject. He who wrote
+that "it was not in nature's plan for us, her children, to be base and
+ignoble; no, she brought us into life as into some great field of
+contest," should have had another field of contest than literary
+criticism. It is almost a pity that we have to doubt the tradition,
+according to which our author was Longinus, and, being but a
+rhetorician, greatly dared and bravely died. Taking literature for his
+theme, he wanders away into grammar, into considerations of tropes and
+figures, plurals and singulars, trumpery mechanical pedantries, as we
+think now, to whom grammar is no longer, as of old, "a new invented
+game." Moreover, he has to give examples of the faults opposed to
+sublimity, he has to dive into and search the bathos, to dally over
+examples of the bombastic, the over-wrought, the puerile. These faults
+are not the sins of "minds generous and aspiring," and we have them with
+us always. The additions to Boileau's preface (Paris, 1772) contain
+abundance of examples of faults from Voiture, Mascaron, Bossuet,
+selected by M. de St. Marc, who no doubt found abundance of
+entertainment in the chastising of these obvious affectations. It hardly
+seems the proper work for an author like him who wrote the Treatise on
+the Sublime. But it is tempting, even now, to give contemporary
+instances of skill in the Art of Sinking--modern cases of bombast,
+triviality, false rhetoric. "Speaking generally, it would seem that
+bombast is one of the hardest things to avoid in writing," says an
+author who himself avoids it so well. Bombast is the voice of sham
+passion, the shadow of an insincere attitude. "Even the wretched phantom
+who still bore the imperial title stooped to pay this ignominious
+blackmail," cries bombast in Macaulay's _Lord Clive_. The picture of a
+phantom who is not only a phantom but wretched, stooping to pay
+blackmail which is not only blackmail but ignominious, may divert the
+reader and remind him that the faults of the past are the faults of the
+present. Again, "The desolate islands along the sea-coast, overgrown by
+noxious vegetation, and swarming with deer and tigers"--do, what does
+any one suppose, perform what forlorn part in the economy of the world?
+Why, they "supply the cultivated districts with abundance of salt." It
+is as comic as--
+
+  "And thou Dalhousie, thou great God of War,
+  Lieutenant-Colonel to the Earl of Mar."
+
+Bombast "transcends the Sublime," and falls on the other side. Our
+author gives more examples of puerility. "Slips of this sort are made by
+those who, aiming at brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness,
+are landed in paltriness and silly affectation." Some modern instances
+we had chosen; the field of choice is large and richly fertile in those
+blossoms. But the reader may be left to twine a garland of them for
+himself; to select from contemporaries were invidious, and might provoke
+retaliation. When our author censures Timaeus for saying that Alexander
+took less time to annex Asia than Isocrates spent in writing an oration,
+to bid the Greeks attack Persia, we know what he would have thought of
+Macaulay's antithesis. He blames Xenophon for a poor pun, and Plato,
+less justly, for mere figurative badinage. It would be an easy task to
+ransack contemporaries, even great contemporaries, for similar failings,
+for pomposity, for the florid, for sentences like processions of
+intoxicated torch-bearers, for pedantic display of cheap erudition, for
+misplaced flippancy, for nice derangement of epitaphs wherein no
+adjective is used which is appropriate. With a library of cultivated
+American novelists and uncultivated English romancers at hand, with our
+own voluminous essays, and the essays and histories and "art criticisms"
+of our neighbours to draw from, no student need lack examples of what is
+wrong. He who writes, reflecting on his own innumerable sins, can but
+beat his breast, cry _Mea Culpa_, and resist the temptation to beat the
+breasts of his coevals. There are not many authors, there have never
+been many, who did not need to turn over the treatise of the Sublime by
+day and night.[6]
+
+    [Footnote 6: The examples of bombast used to be drawn as late as
+    Spurden's translation (1836), from Lee, from _Troilus and Cressida_,
+    and _The Taming of the Shrew_. Cowley and Crashaw furnished
+    instances of conceits; Waller, Young, and Hayley of frigidity;
+    and Darwin of affectation.
+        "What beaux and beauties crowd the gaudy groves,
+        And woo and win their _vegetable loves_"--
+    a phrase adopted--"vapid vegetable loves"--by the Laureate in
+    "The Talking Oak."]
+
+As a literary critic of Homer our author is most interesting even in his
+errors. He compares the poet of the _Odyssey_ to the sunset: the _Iliad_
+is noonday work, the _Odyssey_ is touched with the glow of evening--the
+softness and the shadows. "Old age naturally leans," like childhood,
+"towards the fabulous." The tide has flowed back, and left dim bulks of
+things on the long shadowy sands. Yet he makes an exception, oddly
+enough, in favour of the story of the Cyclops, which really is the most
+fabulous and crude of the fairy tales in the first and greatest of
+romances. The Slaying of the Wooers, that admirable fight, worthy of a
+saga, he thinks too improbable, and one of the "trifles into which
+second childhood is apt to be betrayed." He fancies that the aged Homer
+had "lost his power of depicting the passions"; in fact, he is hardly a
+competent or sympathetic critic of the _Odyssey_. Perhaps he had lived
+among Romans till he lost his sense of humour; perhaps he never had any
+to lose. On the other hand, he preserved for us that inestimable and not
+to be translated fragment of Sappho--+phainetai moi kenos isos
+theoisin+.
+
+It is curious to find him contrasting Apollonius Rhodius as faultless,
+with Homer as great but faulty. The "faultlessness" of Apollonius is
+not his merit, for he is often tedious, and he has little skill in
+selection; moreover, he is deliberately antiquarian, if not pedantic.
+His true merit is in his original and, as we think, modern telling of a
+love tale--pure, passionate, and tender, the first in known literature.
+Medea is often sublime, and always touching. But it is not on these
+merits that our author lingers; he loves only the highest literature,
+and, though he finds spots on the sun and faults in Homer, he condones
+them as oversights passed in the poet's "contempt of little things."
+
+Such for us to-day are the lessons of Longinus. He traces dignity and
+fire of style to dignity and fire of soul. He detects and denounces the
+very faults of which, in each other, all writers are conscious, and
+which he brings home to ourselves. He proclaims the essential merits of
+conviction, and of selection. He sets before us the noblest examples of
+the past, most welcome in a straining age which tries already to live in
+the future. He admonishes and he inspires. He knows the "marvellous
+power and enthralling charm of appropriate and striking words" without
+dropping into mere word-tasting. "Beautiful words are the very light of
+thought," he says, but does not maunder about the "colour" of words, in
+the style of the decadence. And then he "leaves this generation to its
+fate," and calmly turns himself to the work that lies nearest his hand.
+
+To us he is as much a moral as a literary teacher. We admire that Roman
+greatness of soul in a Greek, and the character of this unknown man, who
+carried the soul of a poet, the heart of a hero under the gown of a
+professor. He was one of those whom books cannot debilitate, nor a life
+of study incapacitate for the study of life.
+
+  A. L.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+1
+The treatise of Caecilius on the Sublime, when, as you remember, my dear
+Terentian, we examined it together, seemed to us to be beneath the
+dignity of the whole subject, to fail entirely in seizing the salient
+points, and to offer little profit (which should be the principal aim of
+every writer) for the trouble of its perusal. There are two things
+essential to a technical treatise: the first is to define the subject;
+the second (I mean second in order, as it is by much the first in
+importance) to point out how and by what methods we may become masters
+of it ourselves. And yet Caecilius, while wasting his efforts in a
+thousand illustrations of the nature of the Sublime, as though here we
+were quite in the dark, somehow passes by as immaterial the question how
+we might be able to exalt our own genius to a certain degree of progress
+in sublimity. However, perhaps it would be fairer to commend this
+writer's intelligence and zeal in themselves, instead of blaming him for
+his omissions.
+
+2
+And since you have bidden me also to put together, if only for your
+entertainment, a few notes on the subject of the Sublime, let me see if
+there is anything in my speculations which promises advantage to men of
+affairs. In you, dear friend--such is my confidence in your abilities,
+and such the part which becomes you--I look for a sympathising and
+discerning[1] critic of the several parts of my treatise. For that was a
+just remark of his who pronounced that the points in which we resemble
+the divine nature are benevolence and love of truth.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading +philophronestata kai alethestata+.]
+
+3
+As I am addressing a person so accomplished in literature, I need only
+state, without enlarging further on the matter, that the Sublime,
+wherever it occurs, consists in a certain loftiness and excellence of
+language, and that it is by this, and this only, that the greatest poets
+and prose-writers have gained eminence, and won themselves a lasting
+place in the Temple of Fame.
+
+4
+A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes
+him out of himself. That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment,
+and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or
+not is usually in our own power; but the Sublime, acting with an
+imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or
+no. Skill in invention, lucid arrangement and disposition of facts, are
+appreciated not by one passage, or by two, but gradually manifest
+themselves in the general structure of a work; but a sublime thought, if
+happily timed, illumines[2] an entire subject with the vividness of a
+lightning-flash, and exhibits the whole power of the orator in a moment
+of time. Your own experience, I am sure, my dearest Terentian, would
+enable you to illustrate these and similar points of doctrine.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Reading +diephotisen+.]
+
+
+II
+
+The first question which presents itself for solution is whether there
+is any art which can teach sublimity or loftiness in writing. For some
+hold generally that there is mere delusion in attempting to reduce such
+subjects to technical rules. "The Sublime," they tell us, "is born in a
+man, and not to be acquired by instruction; genius is the only master
+who can teach it. The vigorous products of nature" (such is their view)
+"are weakened and in every respect debased, when robbed of their flesh
+and blood by frigid technicalities."
+
+2
+But I maintain that the truth can be shown to stand otherwise in this
+matter. Let us look at the case in this way; Nature in her loftier and
+more passionate moods, while detesting all appearance of restraint, is
+not wont to show herself utterly wayward and reckless; and though in all
+cases the vital informing principle is derived from her, yet to
+determine the right degree and the right moment, and to contribute the
+precision of practice and experience, is the peculiar province of
+scientific method. The great passions, when left to their own blind and
+rash impulses without the control of reason, are in the same danger as a
+ship let drive at random without ballast. Often they need the spur, but
+sometimes also the curb.
+
+3
+The remark of Demosthenes with regard to human life in general,--that
+the greatest of all blessings is to be fortunate, but next to that and
+equal in importance is to be well advised,--for good fortune is utterly
+ruined by the absence of good counsel,--may be applied to literature, if
+we substitute genius for fortune, and art for counsel. Then, again (and
+this is the most important point of all), a writer can only learn from
+art when he is to abandon himself to the direction of his genius.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Literally, "But the most important point of all is that
+    the actual fact that there are some parts of literature which are in
+    the power of natural genius alone, must be learnt from no other
+    source than from art."]
+
+These are the considerations which I submit to the unfavourable critic
+of such useful studies. Perhaps they may induce him to alter his opinion
+as to the vanity and idleness of our present investigations.
+
+
+III
+
+  ... "And let them check the stove's long tongues of fire:
+  For if I see one tenant of the hearth,
+  I'll thrust within one curling torrent flame,
+  And bring that roof in ashes to the ground:
+  But now not yet is sung my noble lay."[1]
+
+Such phrases cease to be tragic, and become burlesque,--I mean phrases
+like "curling torrent flames" and "vomiting to heaven," and representing
+Boreas as a piper, and so on. Such expressions, and such images, produce
+an effect of confusion and obscurity, not of energy; and if each
+separately be examined under the light of criticism, what seemed
+terrible gradually sinks into absurdity. Since then, even in tragedy,
+where the natural dignity of the subject makes a swelling diction
+allowable, we cannot pardon a tasteless grandiloquence, how much more
+incongruous must it seem in sober prose!
+
+    [Footnote 1: Aeschylus in his lost _Oreithyia_.]
+
+2
+Hence we laugh at those fine words of Gorgias of Leontini, such as
+"Xerxes the Persian Zeus" and "vultures, those living tombs," and at
+certain conceits of Callisthenes which are high-flown rather than
+sublime, and at some in Cleitarchus more ludicrous still--a writer whose
+frothy style tempts us to travesty Sophocles and say, "He blows a little
+pipe, and blows it ill." The same faults may be observed in Amphicrates
+and Hegesias and Matris, who in their frequent moments (as they think)
+of inspiration, instead of playing the genius are simply playing the
+fool.
+
+3
+Speaking generally, it would seem that bombast is one of the hardest
+things to avoid in writing. For all those writers who are ambitious of a
+lofty style, through dread of being convicted of feebleness and poverty
+of language, slide by a natural gradation into the opposite extreme.
+"Who fails in great endeavour, nobly fails," is their creed.
+
+4
+Now bulk, when hollow and affected, is always objectionable, whether in
+material bodies or in writings, and in danger of producing on us an
+impression of littleness: "nothing," it is said, "is drier than a man
+with the dropsy."
+
+The characteristic, then, of bombast is that it transcends the Sublime:
+but there is another fault diametrically opposed to grandeur: this is
+called puerility, and it is the failing of feeble and narrow
+minds,--indeed, the most ignoble of all vices in writing. By puerility
+we mean a pedantic habit of mind, which by over-elaboration ends in
+frigidity. Slips of this sort are made by those who, aiming at
+brilliancy, polish, and especially attractiveness, are landed in
+paltriness and silly affectation.
+
+5
+Closely associated with this is a third sort of vice, in dealing with
+the passions, which Theodorus used to call false sentiment, meaning by
+that an ill-timed and empty display of emotion, where no emotion is
+called for, or of greater emotion than the situation warrants. Thus we
+often see an author hurried by the tumult of his mind into tedious
+displays of mere personal feeling which has no connection with the
+subject. Yet how justly ridiculous must an author appear, whose most
+violent transports leave his readers quite cold! However, I will dismiss
+this subject, as I intend to devote a separate work to the treatment of
+the pathetic in writing.
+
+
+IV
+
+The last of the faults which I mentioned is frequently observed in
+Timaeus--I mean the fault of frigidity. In other respects he is an able
+writer, and sometimes not unsuccessful in the loftier style; a man of
+wide knowledge, and full of ingenuity; a most bitter critic of the
+failings of others--but unhappily blind to his own. In his eagerness to
+be always striking out new thoughts he frequently falls into the most
+childish absurdities.
+
+2
+I will only instance one or two passages, as most of them have been
+pointed out by Caecilius. Wishing to say something very fine about
+Alexander the Great he speaks of him as a man "who annexed the whole of
+Asia in fewer years than Isocrates spent in writing his panegyric
+oration in which he urges the Greeks to make war on Persia." How strange
+is the comparison of the "great Emathian conqueror" with an Athenian
+rhetorician! By this mode of reasoning it is plain that the Spartans
+were very inferior to Isocrates in courage, since it took them thirty
+years to conquer Messene, while he finished the composition of this
+harangue in ten.
+
+3
+Observe, too, his language on the Athenians taken in Sicily. "They paid
+the penalty for their impious outrage on Hermes in mutilating his
+statues; and the chief agent in their destruction was one who was
+descended on his father's side from the injured deity--Hermocrates, son
+of Hermon." I wonder, my dearest Terentian, how he omitted to say of the
+tyrant Dionysius that for his impiety towards Zeus and Herakles he was
+deprived of his power by Dion and Herakleides.
+
+4
+Yet why speak of Timaeus, when even men like Xenophon and Plato--the
+very demi-gods of literature--though they had sat at the feet of
+Socrates, sometimes forgot themselves in the pursuit of such paltry
+conceits. The former, in his account of the Spartan Polity, has these
+words: "Their voice you would no more hear than if they were of marble,
+their gaze is as immovable as if they were cast in bronze; you would
+deem them more modest than the very maidens in their eyes."[1] To speak
+of the pupils of the eye as "modest maidens" was a piece of absurdity
+becoming Amphicrates[2] rather than Xenophon. And then what a strange
+delusion to suppose that modesty is always without exception expressed
+in the eye! whereas it is commonly said that there is nothing by which
+an impudent fellow betrays his character so much as by the expression of
+his eyes. Thus Achilles addresses Agamemnon in the _Iliad_ as "drunkard,
+with eye of dog."[3]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Xen. de Rep. Laced._ 3, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: C. iii. sect. 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ i. 225.]
+
+5
+Timaeus, however, with that want of judgment which characterises
+plagiarists, could not leave to Xenophon the possession of even this
+piece of frigidity. In relating how Agathocles carried off his cousin,
+who was wedded to another man, from the festival of the unveiling, he
+asks, "Who could have done such a deed, unless he had harlots instead of
+maidens in his eyes?"
+
+6
+And Plato himself, elsewhere so supreme a master of style, meaning to
+describe certain recording tablets, says, "They shall write, and deposit
+in the temples memorials of cypress wood";[4] and again, "Then
+concerning walls, Megillus, I give my vote with Sparta that we should
+let them lie asleep within the ground, and not awaken them."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Plat. de Legg._ v. 741, C.]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Ib._ vi. 778, D.]
+
+7
+And Herodotus falls pretty much under the same censure, when he speaks
+of beautiful women as "tortures to the eye,"[6] though here there is
+some excuse, as the speakers in this passage are drunken barbarians.
+Still, even from dramatic motives, such errors in taste should not be
+permitted to deface the pages of an immortal work.
+
+    [Footnote 6: v. 18.]
+
+
+V
+
+Now all these glaring improprieties of language may be traced to one
+common root--the pursuit of novelty in thought. It is this that has
+turned the brain of nearly all the learned world of to-day. Human
+blessings and human ills commonly flow from the same source: and, to
+apply this principle to literature, those ornaments of style, those
+sublime and delightful images, which contribute to success, are the
+foundation and the origin, not only of excellence, but also of failure.
+It is thus with the figures called transitions, and hyperboles, and the
+use of plurals for singulars. I shall show presently the dangers which
+they seem to involve. Our next task, therefore, must be to propose and
+to settle the question how we may avoid the faults of style related to
+sublimity.
+
+
+VI
+
+Our best hope of doing this will be first of all to grasp some definite
+theory and criterion of the true Sublime. Nevertheless this is a hard
+matter; for a just judgment of style is the final fruit of long
+experience; still, I believe that the way I shall indicate will enable
+us to distinguish between the true and false Sublime, so far as it can
+be done by rule.
+
+
+VII
+
+It is proper to observe that in human life nothing is truly great which
+is despised by all elevated minds. For example, no man of sense can
+regard wealth, honour, glory, and power, or any of those things which
+are surrounded by a great external parade of pomp and circumstance, as
+the highest blessings, seeing that merely to despise such things is a
+blessing of no common order: certainly those who possess them are
+admired much less than those who, having the opportunity to acquire
+them, through greatness of soul neglect it. Now let us apply this
+principle to the Sublime in poetry or in prose; let us ask in all cases,
+is it merely a specious sublimity? is this gorgeous exterior a mere
+false and clumsy pageant, which if laid open will be found to conceal
+nothing but emptiness? for if so, a noble mind will scorn instead of
+admiring it.
+
+2
+It is natural to us to feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and
+conceiving a sort of generous exultation to be filled with joy and
+pride, as though we had ourselves originated the ideas which we read.
+
+3
+If then any work, on being repeatedly submitted to the judgment of an
+acute and cultivated critic, fails to dispose his mind to lofty ideas;
+if the thoughts which it suggests do not extend beyond what is actually
+expressed; and if, the longer you read it, the less you think of
+it,--there can be here no true sublimity, when the effect is not
+sustained beyond the mere act of perusal. But when a passage is pregnant
+in suggestion, when it is hard, nay impossible, to distract the
+attention from it, and when it takes a strong and lasting hold on the
+memory, then we may be sure that we have lighted on the true Sublime.
+
+4
+In general we may regard those words as truly noble and sublime which
+always please and please all readers. For when the same book always
+produces the same impression on all who read it, whatever be the
+difference in their pursuits, their manner of life, their aspirations,
+their ages, or their language, such a harmony of opposites gives
+irresistible authority to their favourable verdict.
+
+
+VIII
+
+I shall now proceed to enumerate the five principal sources, as we may
+call them, from which almost all sublimity is derived, assuming, of
+course, the preliminary gift on which all these five sources depend,
+namely, command of language. The first and the most important is (1)
+grandeur of thought, as I have pointed out elsewhere in my work on
+Xenophon. The second is (2) a vigorous and spirited treatment of the
+passions. These two conditions of sublimity depend mainly on natural
+endowments, whereas those which follow derive assistance from Art. The
+third is (3) a certain artifice in the employment of figures, which are
+of two kinds, figures of thought and figures of speech. The fourth is
+(4) dignified expression, which is sub-divided into (_a_) the proper
+choice of words, and (_b_) the use of metaphors and other ornaments of
+diction. The fifth cause of sublimity, which embraces all those
+preceding, is (5) majesty and elevation of structure. Let us consider
+what is involved in each of these five forms separately.
+
+I must first, however, remark that some of these five divisions are
+omitted by Caecilius; for instance, he says nothing about the passions.
+
+2
+Now if he made this omission from a belief that the Sublime and the
+Pathetic are one and the same thing, holding them to be always
+coexistent and interdependent, he is in error. Some passions are found
+which, so far from being lofty, are actually low, such as pity, grief,
+fear; and conversely, sublimity is often not in the least affecting, as
+we may see (among innumerable other instances) in those bold expressions
+of our great poet on the sons of Aloeus--
+
+                    "Highly they raged
+  To pile huge Ossa on the Olympian peak,
+  And Pelion with all his waving trees
+  On Ossa's crest to raise, and climb the sky;"
+
+and the yet more tremendous climax--
+
+  "And now had they accomplished it."
+
+3
+And in orators, in all passages dealing with panegyric, and in all the
+more imposing and declamatory places, dignity and sublimity play an
+indispensable part; but pathos is mostly absent. Hence the most pathetic
+orators have usually but little skill in panegyric, and conversely those
+who are powerful in panegyric generally fail in pathos.
+
+4
+If, on the other hand, Caecilius supposed that pathos never contributes
+to sublimity, and this is why he thought it alien to the subject, he is
+entirely deceived. For I would confidently pronounce that nothing is so
+conducive to sublimity as an appropriate display of genuine passion,
+which bursts out with a kind of "fine madness" and divine inspiration,
+and falls on our ears like the voice of a god.
+
+
+IX
+
+I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime the
+most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind.
+Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired,
+nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up
+our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble
+thoughts.
+
+2
+How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my
+writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul.
+Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is
+sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance,
+the silence of Ajax in the eleventh _Odyssey_[1] is great, and grander
+than anything he could have said.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Od._ xi. 543.]
+
+3
+It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question
+whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true
+eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and
+aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal
+thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the
+lasting reverence of mankind. It is only natural that their words should
+be full of sublimity whose thoughts are full of majesty.
+
+4
+Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was
+the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had
+observed, "Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied"; "And I, were
+I Parmenio"...
+
+The distance between heaven and earth[1]--a measure, one might say, not
+less appropriate to Homer's genius than to the stature of his discord.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ iv. 442.]
+
+5
+How different is that touch of Hesiod's in his description of sorrow--if
+the _Shield_ is really one of his works: "rheum from her nostrils
+flowed"[2]--an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now consider how
+Homer gives dignity to his divine persons--
+
+  "As far as lies his airy ken, who sits
+  On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea:
+  So far extends the heavenly coursers' stride."[3]
+
+He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world--a grand
+comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine
+steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no
+room in the world for another.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Scut. Herc._ 267.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Il._ v. 770.]
+
+6
+Sublime also are the images in the "Battle of the Gods"--
+
+                      "A trumpet sound
+  Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height;
+  Then terror seized the monarch of the dead,
+  And springing from his throne he cried aloud
+  With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder
+  By Neptune's mighty arm, forthwith reveal
+  To mortal and immortal eyes those halls
+  So drear and dank, which e'en the gods abhor."[4]
+
+Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole
+world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is
+a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell,
+mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xxi. 388; xx. 61.]
+
+7
+A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken
+allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of
+decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels,
+revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric
+tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities,
+as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities--or rather,
+his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when we are
+unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods, according to
+him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.
+
+8
+Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are
+those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as
+something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which
+has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on Poseidon:--
+
+  "Mountain and wood and solitary peak,
+  The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy,
+  Trembled beneath the god's immortal feet.
+  Over the waves he rode, and round him played,
+  Lured from the deeps, the ocean's monstrous brood,
+  With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord:
+  The charmed billows parted: on they flew."[5]
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Il._ xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.]
+
+9
+And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed
+an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression
+in the opening words of his "Laws": "God said"--what?--"let there be
+light, and there was light: let there be land, and there was."
+
+10
+I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage
+from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in
+illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic
+heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the
+ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries aloud--
+
+                "Almighty Sire,
+  Only from darkness save Achaia's sons;
+  No more I ask, but give us back the day;
+  Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt."[6]
+
+The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you
+observe, ask for his life--such a request would have been unworthy of
+his heroic soul--but finding himself paralysed by darkness, and
+prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes
+because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. "At
+least," he thinks, "I shall find a warrior's grave, even though Zeus
+himself should fight against me."
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Il._ xvii. 645.]
+
+11
+In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of
+the struggle, and, in his own words, he
+
+      "Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire
+  Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side;
+  His lips drop foam."[7]
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Il._ xv. 605.]
+
+12
+But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer's mind. When
+we turn to the _Odyssey_ we find occasion to observe that a great
+poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age
+naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work
+was composed after the _Iliad_, in proof of which we may mention, among
+many other indications, the introduction in the _Odyssey_ of the sequel
+to the story of his heroes' adventures at Troy, as so many additional
+episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of sorrow and
+mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if in
+fulfilment of some previous design. The _Odyssey_ is, in fact, a sort of
+epilogue to the _Iliad_--
+
+  "There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there,
+  And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor;
+  There lies my own dear son."[8]
+
+    [Footnote 8: _Od._ iii. 109.]
+
+13
+And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the _Iliad_, which was
+written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the
+poem is founded on action and struggle, in the _Odyssey_ he generally
+prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence Homer in
+his _Odyssey_ may be compared to the setting sun: he is still as great
+as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is now pitched to
+a lower key than in the "Tale of Troy divine": we begin to miss that
+high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that continuous
+current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that force of
+eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to Nature. Like
+the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores waste and
+bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and draws us away
+into the dim region of myth and legend.
+
+14
+In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the
+_Odyssey_, the story of the Cyclops,[9] and other striking passages. It
+is Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every
+one of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.
+
+My purpose in making this digression was, as I said, to point out into
+what trifles the second childhood of genius is too apt to be betrayed;
+such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are confined,[10] the
+tale of Odysseus's comrades being changed by Circe into swine[11]
+("whimpering porkers" Zoilus called them), and how Zeus was fed like
+a nestling by the doves,[12] and how Odysseus passed ten nights on the
+shipwreck without food,[13] and the improbable incidents in the slaying
+of the suitors.[14] When Homer nods like this, we must be content to say
+that he dreams as Zeus might dream.
+
+    [Footnote 9: _Od._ ix. 182.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Od._ x. 17.]
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Od._ x. 237.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: _Od._ xii. 62.]
+
+    [Footnote 13: _Od._ xii. 447.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: _Od._ xxii. _passim_.]
+
+15
+Another reason for these remarks on the _Odyssey_ is that I wished to
+make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they have
+lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the
+delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and
+characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a
+sort of comedy of manners.
+
+
+X
+
+Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces to
+the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things there
+are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It
+necessarily follows, therefore, that one cause of sublimity is the
+choice of the most striking circumstances involved in whatever we are
+describing, and, further, the power of afterwards combining them into
+one animate whole. The reader is attracted partly by the selection of
+the incidents, partly by the skill which has welded them together. For
+instance, Sappho, in dealing with the passionate manifestations
+attending on the frenzy of lovers, always chooses her strokes from the
+signs which she has observed to be actually exhibited in such cases. But
+her peculiar excellence lies in the felicity with which she chooses and
+unites together the most striking and powerful features.
+
+2
+  "I deem that man divinely blest
+  Who sits, and, gazing on thy face,
+  Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips,
+      And marks thy lovely smile.
+  This, this it is that made my heart
+  So wildly flutter in my breast;
+  Whene'er I look on thee, my voice
+      Falters, and faints, and fails;
+  My tongue's benumbed; a subtle fire
+  Through all my body inly steals;
+  Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim;
+      Strange murmurs drown my ears;
+  With dewy damps my limbs are chilled;
+  An icy shiver shakes my frame;
+  Paler than ashes grows my cheek;
+      And Death seems nigh at hand."
+
+3
+Is it not wonderful how at the same moment soul, body, ears, tongue,
+eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to her as completely as if they
+were not her own? Observe too how her sensations contradict one
+another--she freezes, she burns, she raves, she reasons, and all at the
+same instant. And this description is designed to show that she is
+assailed, not by any particular emotion, but by a tumult of different
+emotions. All these tokens belong to the passion of love; but it is in
+the choice, as I said, of the most striking features, and in the
+combination of them into one picture, that the perfection of this Ode of
+Sappho's lies. Similarly Homer in his descriptions of tempests always
+picks out the most terrific circumstances.
+
+4
+The poet of the "Arimaspeia" intended the following lines to be grand--
+
+  "Herein I find a wonder passing strange,
+    That men should make their dwelling on the deep,
+  Who far from land essaying bold to range
+    With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep;
+    Their eyes are fixed on heaven's starry steep;
+  The ravening billows hunger for their lives;
+    And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep,
+  With suppliant hands to move heaven's pity strives,
+  While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives."
+
+All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the
+description. Now let us turn to Homer.
+
+5
+One passage will suffice to show the contrast.
+
+  "On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave,
+  Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds,
+  On a swift ship, and buries her in foam;
+  Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast,
+  And quakes the breathless seamen's shuddering heart
+  In terror dire: death lours on every wave."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 624.]
+
+6
+Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought--
+
+  "But one frail timber shields them from their doom,"[2]--
+
+banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his
+description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying
+"shields them"; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether
+the "timber" be "frail" or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit
+to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on
+the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant
+death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of
+opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the
+scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting
+the anxiety of the sailors' minds, and the diction being stamped, as it
+were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaenomena_, 299.]
+
+7
+Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly
+Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of
+Elatea[3]--"It was evening," etc. Each of these authors fastidiously
+rejects whatever is not essential to the subject, and in putting
+together the most vivid features is careful to guard against the
+interposition of anything frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such
+blemishes mar the general effect, and give a patched and gaping
+appearance to the edifice of sublimity, which ought to be built up in a
+solid and uniform structure.
+
+    [Footnote 3: _De Cor._ 169.]
+
+
+XI
+
+Closely associated with the part of our subject we have just treated of
+is that excellence of writing which is called amplification, when a
+writer or pleader, whose theme admits of many successive starting-points
+and pauses, brings on one impressive point after another in a continuous
+and ascending scale.
+
+2
+Now whether this is employed in the treatment of a commonplace, or in
+the way of exaggeration, whether to place arguments or facts in a strong
+light, or in the disposition of actions, or of passions--for
+amplification takes a hundred different shapes--in all cases the orator
+must be cautioned that none of these methods is complete without the aid
+of sublimity,--unless, indeed, it be our object to excite pity, or to
+depreciate an opponent's argument. In all other uses of amplification,
+if you subtract the element of sublimity you will take as it were the
+soul from the body. No sooner is the support of sublimity removed than
+the whole becomes lifeless, nerveless, and dull.
+
+3
+There is a difference, however, between the rules I am now giving and
+those just mentioned. Then I was speaking of the delineation and
+co-ordination of the principal circumstances. My next task, therefore,
+must be briefly to define this difference, and with it the general
+distinction between amplification and sublimity. Our whole discourse
+will thus gain in clearness.
+
+
+XII
+
+I must first remark that I am not satisfied with the definition of
+amplification generally given by authorities on rhetoric. They explain
+it to be a form of language which invests the subject with a certain
+grandeur. Yes, but this definition may be applied indifferently to
+sublimity, pathos, and the use of figurative language, since all these
+invest the discourse with some sort of grandeur. The difference seems to
+me to lie in this, that sublimity gives elevation to a subject, while
+amplification gives extension as well. Thus the sublime is often
+conveyed in a single thought,[1] but amplification can only subsist with
+a certain prolixity and diffusiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. i. 4. 26.]
+
+2
+The most general definition of amplification would explain it to consist
+in the gathering together of all the constituent parts and topics of a
+subject, emphasising the argument by repeated insistence, herein
+differing from proof, that whereas the object of proof is logical
+demonstration, ...
+
+Plato, like the sea, pours forth his riches in a copious and expansive
+flood.
+
+3
+Hence the style of the orator, who is the greater master of our
+emotions, is often, as it were, red-hot and ablaze with passion, whereas
+Plato, whose strength lay in a sort of weighty and sober magnificence,
+though never frigid, does not rival the thunders of Demosthenes.
+
+4
+And, if a Greek may be allowed to express an opinion on the subject of
+Latin literature, I think the same difference may be discerned in the
+grandeur of Cicero as compared with that of his Grecian rival. The
+sublimity of Demosthenes is generally sudden and abrupt: that of Cicero
+is equally diffused. Demosthenes is vehement, rapid, vigorous, terrible;
+he burns and sweeps away all before him; and hence we may liken him to a
+whirlwind or a thunderbolt: Cicero is like a widespread conflagration,
+which rolls over and feeds on all around it, whose fire is extensive and
+burns long, breaking out successively in different places, and finding
+its fuel now here, now there.
+
+5
+Such points, however, I resign to your more competent judgment.
+
+To resume, then, the high-strung sublimity of Demosthenes is appropriate
+to all cases where it is desired to exaggerate, or to rouse some
+vehement emotion, and generally when we want to carry away our audience
+with us. We must employ the diffusive style, on the other hand, when we
+wish to overpower them with a flood of language. It is suitable, for
+example, to familiar topics, and to perorations in most cases, and to
+digressions, and to all descriptive and declamatory passages, and in
+dealing with history or natural science, and in numerous other cases.
+
+
+XIII
+
+To return, however, to Plato: how grand he can be with all that
+gentle and noiseless flow of eloquence you will be reminded by this
+characteristic passage, which you have read in his _Republic_: "They,
+therefore, who have no knowledge of wisdom and virtue, whose lives are
+passed in feasting and similar joys, are borne downwards, as is but
+natural, and in this region they wander all their lives; but they never
+lifted up their eyes nor were borne upwards to the true world above, nor
+ever tasted of pleasure abiding and unalloyed; but like beasts they ever
+look downwards, and their heads are bent to the ground, or rather to the
+table; they feed full their bellies and their lusts, and longing ever
+more and more for such things they kick and gore one another with horns
+and hoofs of iron, and slay one another in their insatiable desires."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Rep._ ix. 586, A.]
+
+2
+We may learn from this author, if we would but observe his example, that
+there is yet another path besides those mentioned which leads to sublime
+heights. What path do I mean? The emulous imitation of the great poets
+and prose-writers of the past. On this mark, dear friend, let us keep
+our eyes ever steadfastly fixed. Many gather the divine impulse from
+another's spirit, just as we are told that the Pythian priestess, when
+she takes her seat on the tripod, where there is said to be a rent in
+the ground breathing upwards a heavenly emanation, straightway conceives
+from that source the godlike gift of prophecy, and utters her inspired
+oracles; so likewise from the mighty genius of the great writers of
+antiquity there is carried into the souls of their rivals, as from a
+fount of inspiration, an effluence which breathes upon them until, even
+though their natural temper be but cold, they share the sublime
+enthusiasm of others.
+
+3
+Thus Homer's name is associated with a numerous band of illustrious
+disciples--not only Herodotus, but Stesichorus before him, and the great
+Archilochus, and above all Plato, who from the great fountain-head of
+Homer's genius drew into himself innumerable tributary streams. Perhaps
+it would have been necessary to illustrate this point, had not Ammonius
+and his school already classified and noted down the various examples.
+
+4
+Now what I am speaking of is not plagiarism, but resembles the process
+of copying from fair forms or statues or works of skilled labour. Nor in
+my opinion would so many fair flowers of imagery have bloomed among the
+philosophical dogmas of Plato, nor would he have risen so often to the
+language and topics of poetry, had he not engaged heart and soul in a
+contest for precedence with Homer, like a young champion entering the
+lists against a veteran. It may be that he showed too ambitious a spirit
+in venturing on such a duel; but nevertheless it was not without
+advantage to him: "for strife like this," as Hesiod says, "is good for
+men."[2] And where shall we find a more glorious arena or a nobler crown
+than here, where even defeat at the hands of our predecessors is not
+ignoble?
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Opp._ 29.]
+
+
+XIV
+
+Therefore it is good for us also, when we are labouring on some subject
+which demands a lofty and majestic style, to imagine to ourselves how
+Homer might have expressed this or that, or how Plato or Demosthenes
+would have clothed it with sublimity, or, in history, Thucydides. For by
+our fixing an eye of rivalry on those high examples they will become
+like beacons to guide us, and will perhaps lift up our souls to the
+fulness of the stature we conceive.
+
+2
+And it would be still better should we try to realise this further
+thought, How would Homer, had he been here, or how would Demosthenes,
+have listened to what I have written, or how would they have been
+affected by it? For what higher incentive to exertion could a writer
+have than to imagine such judges or such an audience of his works, and
+to give an account of his writings with heroes like these to criticise
+and look on?
+
+3
+Yet more inspiring would be the thought, With what feelings will future
+ages through all time read these my works? If this should awaken a fear
+in any writer that he will not be intelligible to his contemporaries it
+will necessarily follow that the conceptions of his mind will be crude,
+maimed, and abortive, and lacking that ripe perfection which alone can
+win the applause of ages to come.
+
+
+XV
+
+The dignity, grandeur, and energy of a style largely depend on a proper
+employment of images, a term which I prefer to that usually given.[1]
+The term image in its most general acceptation includes every thought,
+howsoever presented, which issues in speech. But the term is now
+generally confined to those cases when he who is speaking, by reason of
+the rapt and excited state of his feelings, imagines himself to see what
+he is talking about, and produces a similar illusion in his hearers.
+
+    [Footnote 1: +eidolopoiiai+, "fictions of the imagination," Hickie.]
+
+2
+Poets and orators both employ images, but with a very different object,
+as you are well aware. The poetical image is designed to astound; the
+oratorical image to give perspicuity. Both, however, seek to work on the
+emotions.
+
+  "Mother, I pray thee, set not thou upon me
+  Those maids with bloody face and serpent hair:
+  See, see, they come, they're here, they spring upon me!"[2]
+
+And again--
+
+  "Ah, ah, she'll slay me! whither shall I fly?"[3]
+
+The poet when he wrote like this saw the Erinyes with his own eyes, and
+he almost compels his readers to see them too.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Eur. _Orest._ 255.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Iph. Taur._ 291.]
+
+3
+Euripides found his chief delight in the labour of giving tragic
+expression to these two passions of madness and love, showing here a
+real mastery which I cannot think he exhibited elsewhere. Still, he is
+by no means diffident in venturing on other fields of the imagination.
+His genius was far from being of the highest order, but by taking pains
+he often raises himself to a tragic elevation. In his sublimer moments
+he generally reminds us of Homer's description of the lion--
+
+  "With tail he lashes both his flanks and sides,
+  And spurs himself to battle."[4]
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ xx. 170.]
+
+4
+Take, for instance, that passage in which Helios, in handing the reins
+to his son, says--
+
+  "Drive on, but shun the burning Libyan tract;
+  The hot dry air will let thine axle down:
+  Toward the seven Pleiades keep thy steadfast way."
+
+And then--
+
+  "This said, his son undaunted snatched the reins,
+  Then smote the winged coursers' sides: they bound
+  Forth on the void and cavernous vault of air.
+  His father mounts another steed, and rides
+  With warning voice guiding his son. 'Drive there!
+  Turn, turn thy car this way.'"[5]
+
+May we not say that the spirit of the poet mounts the chariot with his
+hero, and accompanies the winged steeds in their perilous flight? Were
+it not so,--had not his imagination soared side by side with them in
+that celestial passage,--he would never have conceived so vivid an
+image. Similar is that passage in his "Cassandra," beginning
+
+  "Ye Trojans, lovers of the steed."[6]
+
+    [Footnote 5: Eur. _Phaet._]
+
+    [Footnote 6: Perhaps from the lost "Alexander" (Jahn).]
+
+5
+Aeschylus is especially bold in forming images suited to his heroic
+themes: as when he says of his "Seven against Thebes"--
+
+  "Seven mighty men, and valiant captains, slew
+  Over an iron-bound shield a bull, then dipped
+  Their fingers in the blood, and all invoked
+  Ares, Enyo, and death-dealing Flight
+  In witness of their oaths,"[7]
+
+and describes how they all mutually pledged themselves without flinching
+to die. Sometimes, however, his thoughts are unshapen, and as it were
+rough-hewn and rugged. Not observing this, Euripides, from too blind a
+rivalry, sometimes falls under the same censure.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Sept. c. Th._ 42.]
+
+6
+Aeschylus with a strange violence of language represents the palace of
+Lycurgus as _possessed_ at the appearance of Dionysus--
+
+  "The halls with rapture thrill, the roof's inspired."[8]
+
+Here Euripides, in borrowing the image, softens its extravagance[9]--
+
+  "And all the mountain felt the god."[10]
+
+    [Footnote 8: Aesch. _Lycurg._]
+
+    [Footnote 9: Lit. "Giving it a different flavour," as Arist. _Poet._
+    +hedusmeno logo choris hekasto ton eidon+, ii. 10.]
+
+    [Footnote 10: _Bacch._ 726.]
+
+7
+Sophocles has also shown himself a great master of the imagination in
+the scene in which the dying Oedipus prepares himself for burial in the
+midst of a tempest,[11] and where he tells how Achilles appeared to the
+Greeks over his tomb just as they were putting out to sea on their
+departure from Troy.[12] This last scene has also been delineated by
+Simonides with a vividness which leaves him inferior to none. But it
+would be an endless task to cite all possible examples.
+
+    [Footnote 11: _Oed. Col._ 1586.]
+
+    [Footnote 12: In his lost "Polyxena."]
+
+8
+To return, then,[13] in poetry, as I observed, a certain mythical
+exaggeration is allowable, transcending altogether mere logical
+credence. But the chief beauties of an oratorical image are its energy
+and reality. Such digressions become offensive and monstrous when the
+language is cast in a poetical and fabulous mould, and runs into all
+sorts of impossibilities. Thus much may be learnt from the great orators
+of our own day, when they tell us in tragic tones that they see the
+Furies[14]--good people, can't they understand that when Orestes cries
+out
+
+  "Off, off, I say! I know thee who thou art,
+  One of the fiends that haunt me: I feel thine arms
+  About me cast, to drag me down to hell,"[15]
+
+these are the hallucinations of a madman?
+
+    [Footnote 13: Sec. 2.]
+
+    [Footnote 14: Comp. Petronius, _Satyricon_, ch. i. _passim_.]
+
+    [Footnote 15: _Orest._ 264.]
+
+9
+Wherein, then, lies the force of an oratorical image? Doubtless in
+adding energy and passion in a hundred different ways to a speech; but
+especially in this, that when it is mingled with the practical,
+argumentative parts of an oration, it does not merely convince the
+hearer, but enthralls him. Such is the effect of those words of
+Demosthenes:[16] "Supposing, now, at this moment a cry of alarm were
+heard outside the assize courts, and the news came that the prison was
+broken open and the prisoners escaped, is there any man here who is such
+a trifler that he would not run to the rescue at the top of his speed?
+But suppose some one came forward with the information that they had
+been set at liberty by the defendant, what then? Why, he would be
+lynched on the spot!"
+
+    [Footnote 16: _c. Timocrat._ 208.]
+
+10
+Compare also the way in which Hyperides excused himself, when he was
+proceeded against for bringing in a bill to liberate the slaves after
+Chaeronea. "This measure," he said, "was not drawn up by any orator, but
+by the battle of Chaeronea." This striking image, being thrown in by the
+speaker in the midst of his proofs, enables him by one bold stroke to
+carry all mere logical objection before him.
+
+11
+In all such cases our nature is drawn towards that which affects it most
+powerfully: hence an image lures us away from an argument: judgment is
+paralysed, matters of fact disappear from view, eclipsed by the superior
+blaze. Nor is it surprising that we should be thus affected; for when
+two forces are thus placed in juxtaposition, the stronger must always
+absorb into itself the weaker.
+
+12
+On sublimity of thought, and the manner in which it arises from native
+greatness of mind, from imitation, and from the employment of images,
+this brief outline must suffice.[17]
+
+    [Footnote 17: He passes over chs. x. xi.]
+
+
+XVI
+
+The subject which next claims our attention is that of figures of
+speech. I have already observed that figures, judiciously employed, play
+an important part in producing sublimity. It would be a tedious, or
+rather an endless task, to deal with every detail of this subject here;
+so in order to establish what I have laid down, I will just run over,
+without further preface, a few of those figures which are most effective
+in lending grandeur to language.
+
+2
+Demosthenes is defending his policy; his natural line of argument would
+have been: "You did not do wrong, men of Athens, to take upon yourselves
+the struggle for the liberties of Hellas. Of this you have home proofs.
+_They_ did not wrong who fought at Marathon, at Salamis, and Plataea."
+Instead of this, in a sudden moment of supreme exaltation he bursts out
+like some inspired prophet with that famous appeal to the mighty dead:
+"Ye did not, could not have done wrong. I swear it by the men who faced
+the foe at Marathon!"[1] He employs the figure of adjuration, to which I
+will here give the name of Apostrophe. And what does he gain by it? He
+exalts the Athenian ancestors to the rank of divinities, showing that we
+ought to invoke those who have fallen for their country as gods; he
+fills the hearts of his judges with the heroic pride of the old warriors
+of Hellas; forsaking the beaten path of argument he rises to the
+loftiest altitude of grandeur and passion, and commands assent by the
+startling novelty of his appeal; he applies the healing charm of
+eloquence, and thus "ministers to the mind diseased" of his countrymen,
+until lifted by his brave words above their misfortunes they begin to
+feel that the disaster of Chaeronea is no less glorious than the
+victories of Marathon and Salamis. All this he effects by the use of one
+figure, and so carries his hearers away with him.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 208.]
+
+3
+It is said that the germ of this adjuration is found in Eupolis--
+
+  "By mine own fight, by Marathon, I say,
+  Who makes my heart to ache shall rue the day!"[2]
+
+But there is nothing grand in the mere employment of an oath. Its
+grandeur will depend on its being employed in the right place and the
+right manner, on the right occasion, and with the right motive. In
+Eupolis the oath is nothing beyond an oath; and the Athenians to whom it
+is addressed are still prosperous, and in need of no consolation.
+Moreover, the poet does not, like Demosthenes, swear by the departed
+heroes as deities, so as to engender in his audience a just conception
+of their valour, but diverges from the champions to the battle--a mere
+lifeless thing. But Demosthenes has so skilfully managed the oath that
+in addressing his countrymen after the defeat of Chaeronea he takes out
+of their minds all sense of disaster; and at the same time, while
+proving that no mistake has been made, he holds up an example, confirms
+his arguments by an oath, and makes his praise of the dead an incentive
+to the living.
+
+    [Footnote 2: In his (lost) "Demis."]
+
+4
+And to rebut a possible objection which occurred to him--"Can you,
+Demosthenes, whose policy ended in defeat, swear by a victory?"--the
+orator proceeds to measure his language, choosing his very words so as
+to give no handle to opponents, thus showing us that even in our most
+inspired moments reason ought to hold the reins.[3] Let us mark his
+words: "Those who _faced the foe_ at Marathon; those who _fought in the
+sea-fights_ of Salamis and Artemisium; those who _stood in the ranks_ at
+Plataea." Note that he nowhere says "those who _conquered_," artfully
+suppressing any word which might hint at the successful issue of those
+battles, which would have spoilt the parallel with Chaeronea. And for
+the same reason he steals a march on his audience, adding immediately:
+"All of whom, Aeschines,--not those who were successful only,--were
+buried by the state at the public expense."
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. "That even in the midst of the revels of Bacchus
+    we ought to remain sober."]
+
+
+XVII
+
+There is one truth which my studies have led me to observe, which
+perhaps it would be worth while to set down briefly here. It is this,
+that by a natural law the Sublime, besides receiving an acquisition of
+strength from figures, in its turn lends support in a remarkable manner
+to them. To explain: the use of figures has a peculiar tendency to rouse
+a suspicion of dishonesty, and to create an impression of treachery,
+scheming, and false reasoning; especially if the person addressed be a
+judge, who is master of the situation, and still more in the case of a
+despot, a king, a military potentate, or any of those who sit in high
+places.[1] If a man feels that this artful speaker is treating him like
+a silly boy and trying to throw dust in his eyes, he at once grows
+irritated, and thinking that such false reasoning implies a contempt of
+his understanding, he perhaps flies into a rage and will not hear
+another word; or even if he masters his resentment, still he is utterly
+indisposed to yield to the persuasive power of eloquence. Hence it
+follows that a figure is then most effectual when it appears in
+disguise.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading with Cobet, +kai pantas tous en huperochais+.]
+
+2
+To allay, then, this distrust which attaches to the use of figures we
+must call in the powerful aid of sublimity and passion. For art, once
+associated with these great allies, will be overshadowed by their
+grandeur and beauty, and pass beyond the reach of all suspicion. To
+prove this I need only refer to the passage already quoted: "I swear it
+by the men," etc. It is the very brilliancy of the orator's figure which
+blinds us to the fact that it _is_ a figure. For as the fainter lustre
+of the stars is put out of sight by the all-encompassing rays of the
+sun, so when sublimity sheds its light all round the sophistries of
+rhetoric they become invisible.
+
+3
+A similar illusion is produced by the painter's art. When light and
+shadow are represented in colour, though they lie on the same surface
+side by side, it is the light which meets the eye first, and appears not
+only more conspicuous but also much nearer. In the same manner passion
+and grandeur of language, lying nearer to our souls by reason both of a
+certain natural affinity and of their radiance, always strike our mental
+eye before we become conscious of the figure, throwing its artificial
+character into the shade and hiding it as it were in a veil.
+
+
+XVIII
+
+The figures of question and interrogation[1] also possess a specific
+quality which tends strongly to stir an audience and give energy to the
+speaker's words. "Or tell me, do you want to run about asking one
+another, is there any news? what greater news could you have than that a
+man of Macedon is making himself master of Hellas? Is Philip dead? Not
+he. However, he is ill. But what is that to you? Even if anything
+happens to him you will soon raise up another Philip."[2] Or this
+passage: "Shall we sail against Macedon? And where, asks one, shall we
+effect a landing? The war itself will show us where Philip's weak places
+lie."[2] Now if this had been put baldly it would have lost greatly in
+force. As we see it, it is full of the quick alternation of question and
+answer. The orator replies to himself as though he were meeting another
+man's objections. And this figure not only raises the tone of his words
+but makes them more convincing.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phil._ i. 44.]
+
+2
+For an exhibition of feeling has then most effect on an audience when it
+appears to flow naturally from the occasion, not to have been laboured
+by the art of the speaker; and this device of questioning and replying
+to himself reproduces the moment of passion. For as a sudden question
+addressed to an individual will sometimes startle him into a reply which
+is an unguarded expression of his genuine sentiments, so the figure of
+question and interrogation blinds the judgment of an audience, and
+deceives them into a belief that what is really the result of labour in
+every detail has been struck out of the speaker by the inspiration of
+the moment.
+
+There is one passage in Herodotus which is generally credited with
+extraordinary sublimity....
+
+
+XIX
+
+... The removal of connecting particles gives a quick rush and "torrent
+rapture" to a passage, the writer appearing to be actually almost left
+behind by his own words. There is an example in Xenophon: "Clashing
+their shields together they pushed, they fought, they slew, they
+fell."[1] And the words of Eurylochus in the _Odyssey_--
+
+  "We passed at thy command the woodland's shade;
+  We found a stately hall built in a mountain glade."[2]
+
+Words thus severed from one another without the intervention of stops
+give a lively impression of one who through distress of mind at once
+halts and hurries in his speech. And this is what Homer has expressed by
+using the figure _Asyndeton_.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Xen. _Hel._ iv. 3. 19.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ x. 251.]
+
+
+XX
+
+But nothing is so conducive to energy as a combination of different
+figures, when two or three uniting their resources mutually contribute
+to the vigour, the cogency, and the beauty of a speech. So Demosthenes
+in his speech against Meidias repeats the same words and breaks up his
+sentences in one lively descriptive passage: "He who receives a blow is
+hurt in many ways which he could not even describe to another, by
+gesture, by look, by tone."
+
+2
+Then, to vary the movement of his speech, and prevent it from standing
+still (for stillness produces rest, but passion requires a certain
+disorder of language, imitating the agitation and commotion of the
+soul), he at once dashes off in another direction, breaking up his words
+again, and repeating them in a different form, "by gesture, by look, by
+tone--when insult, when hatred, is added to violence, when he is struck
+with the fist, when he is struck as a slave!" By such means the orator
+imitates the action of Meidias, dealing blow upon blow on the minds of
+his judges. Immediately after like a hurricane he makes a fresh attack:
+"When he is struck with the fist, when he is struck in the face; this is
+what moves, this is what maddens a man, unless he is inured to outrage;
+no one could describe all this so as to bring home to his hearers its
+bitterness."[1] You see how he preserves, by continual variation, the
+intrinsic force of these repetitions and broken clauses, so that his
+order seems irregular, and conversely his irregularity acquires a
+certain measure of order.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Meid._ 72.]
+
+
+XXI
+
+Supposing we add the conjunctions, after the practice of Isocrates and
+his school: "Moreover, I must not omit to mention that he who strikes a
+blow may hurt in many ways, in the first place by gesture, in the second
+place by look, in the third and last place by his tone." If you compare
+the words thus set down in logical sequence with the expressions of the
+"Meidias," you will see that the rapidity and rugged abruptness of
+passion, when all is made regular by connecting links, will be smoothed
+away, and the whole point and fire of the passage will at once
+disappear.
+
+2
+For as, if you were to bind two runners together, they will forthwith be
+deprived of all liberty of movement, even so passion rebels against the
+trammels of conjunctions and other particles, because they curb its free
+rush and destroy the impression of mechanical impulse.
+
+
+XXII
+
+The figure hyperbaton belongs to the same class. By hyperbaton we mean a
+transposition of words or thoughts from their usual order, bearing
+unmistakably the characteristic stamp of violent mental agitation. In
+real life we often see a man under the influence of rage, or fear, or
+indignation, or beside himself with jealousy, or with some other out of
+the interminable list of human passions, begin a sentence, and then
+swerve aside into some inconsequent parenthesis, and then again double
+back to his original statement, being borne with quick turns by his
+distress, as though by a shifting wind, now this way, now that, and
+playing a thousand capricious variations on his words, his thoughts, and
+the natural order of his discourse. Now the figure hyperbaton is the
+means which is employed by the best writers to imitate these signs of
+natural emotion. For art is then perfect when it seems to be nature, and
+nature, again, is most effective when pervaded by the unseen presence of
+art. An illustration will be found in the speech of Dionysius of Phocaea
+in Herodotus: "A hair's breadth now decides our destiny, Ionians,
+whether we shall live as freemen or as slaves--ay, as runaway slaves.
+Now, therefore, if you choose to endure a little hardship, you will be
+able at the cost of some present exertion to overcome your enemies."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: vi. 11.]
+
+2
+The regular sequence here would have been: "Ionians, now is the time for
+you to endure a little hardship; for a hair's breadth will now decide
+our destiny." But the Phocaean transposes the title "Ionians," rushing
+at once to the subject of alarm, as though in the terror of the moment
+he had forgotten the usual address to his audience. Moreover, he inverts
+the logical order of his thoughts, and instead of beginning with the
+necessity for exertion, which is the point he wishes to urge upon them,
+he first gives them the reason for that necessity in the words, "a
+hair's breadth now decides our destiny," so that his words seem
+unpremeditated, and forced upon him by the crisis.
+
+3
+Thucydides surpasses all other writers in the bold use of this figure,
+even breaking up sentences which are by their nature absolutely one and
+indivisible. But nowhere do we find it so unsparingly employed as in
+Demosthenes, who though not so daring in his manner of using it as the
+elder writer is very happy in giving to his speeches by frequent
+transpositions the lively air of unstudied debate. Moreover, he drags,
+as it were, his audience with him into the perils of a long inverted
+clause.
+
+4
+He often begins to say something, then leaves the thought in suspense,
+meanwhile thrusting in between, in a position apparently foreign and
+unnatural, some extraneous matters, one upon another, and having thus
+made his hearers fear lest the whole discourse should break down, and
+forced them into eager sympathy with the danger of the speaker, when he
+is nearly at the end of a period he adds just at the right moment,
+_i.e._ when it is least expected, the point which they have been waiting
+for so long. And thus by the very boldness and hazard of his inversions
+he produces a much more astounding effect. I forbear to cite examples,
+as they are too numerous to require it.
+
+
+XXIII
+
+The juxtaposition of different cases, the enumeration of particulars,
+and the use of contrast and climax, all, as you know, add much vigour,
+and give beauty and great elevation and life to a style. The diction
+also gains greatly in diversity and movement by changes of case, time,
+person, number, and gender.
+
+2
+With regard to change of number: not only is the style improved by the
+use of those words which, though singular in form, are found on
+inspection to be plural in meaning, as in the lines--
+
+  "A countless host dispersed along the sand
+  With joyous cries the shoal of tunny hailed,"
+
+but it is more worthy of observation that plurals for singulars
+sometimes fall with a more impressive dignity, rousing the imagination
+by the mere sense of vast number.
+
+3
+Such is the effect of those words of Oedipus in Sophocles--
+
+              "Oh fatal, fatal ties!
+  Ye gave us birth, and we being born ye sowed
+  The self-same seed, and gave the world to view
+  Sons, brothers, sires, domestic murder foul,
+  Brides, mothers, wives.... Ay, ye laid bare
+  The blackest, deepest place where Shame can dwell."[1]
+
+Here we have in either case but one person, first Oedipus, then Jocasta;
+but the expansion of number into the plural gives an impression of
+multiplied calamity. So in the following plurals--
+
+  "There came forth Hectors, and there came Sarpedons."
+
+    [Footnote 1: _O. R._ 1403.]
+
+4
+And in those words of Plato's (which we have already adduced elsewhere),
+referring to the Athenians: "We have no Pelopses or Cadmuses or
+Aegyptuses or Danauses, or any others out of all the mob of Hellenised
+barbarians, dwelling among us; no, this is the land of pure Greeks, with
+no mixture of foreign elements,"[2] etc. Such an accumulation of words
+in the plural number necessarily gives greater pomp and sound to a
+subject. But we must only have recourse to this device when the nature
+of our theme makes it allowable to amplify, to multiply, or to speak in
+the tones of exaggeration or passion. To overlay every sentence with
+ornament[3] is very pedantic.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Menex._ 245, D.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Lit. "To hang bells everywhere," a metaphor from
+    the bells which were attached to horses' trappings on festive
+    occasions.]
+
+
+XXIV
+
+On the other hand, the contraction of plurals into singulars sometimes
+creates an appearance of great dignity; as in that phrase of
+Demosthenes: "Thereupon all Peloponnesus was divided."[1] There is
+another in Herodotus: "When Phrynichus brought a drama on the stage
+entitled _The Taking of Miletus_, the whole theatre fell a
+weeping"--instead of "all the spectators." This knitting together of a
+number of scattered particulars into one whole gives them an aspect of
+corporate life. And the beauty of both uses lies, I think, in their
+betokening emotion, by giving a sudden change of complexion to the
+circumstances,--whether a word which is strictly singular is
+unexpectedly changed into a plural,--or whether a number of isolated
+units are combined by the use of a single sonorous word under one head.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Cor._ 18.]
+
+
+XXV
+
+When past events are introduced as happening in present time the
+narrative form is changed into a dramatic action. Such is that
+description in Xenophon: "A man who has fallen, and is being trampled
+under foot by Cyrus's horse, strikes the belly of the animal with his
+scimitar; the horse starts aside and unseats Cyrus, and he falls."
+Similarly in many passages of Thucydides.
+
+
+XXVI
+
+Equally dramatic is the interchange of persons, often making a reader
+fancy himself to be moving in the midst of the perils described--
+
+  "Unwearied, thou wouldst deem, with toil unspent,
+  They met in war; so furiously they fought."[1]
+
+and that line in Aratus--
+
+  "Beware that month to tempt the surging sea."[2]
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 697.]
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Phaen._ 287.]
+
+2
+In the same way Herodotus: "Passing from the city of Elephantine you
+will sail upwards until you reach a level plain. You cross this region,
+and there entering another ship you will sail on for two days, and so
+reach a great city, whose name is Meroe."[3] Observe how he takes us, as
+it were, by the hand, and leads us in spirit through these places,
+making us no longer readers, but spectators. Such a direct personal
+address always has the effect of placing the reader in the midst of the
+scene of action.
+
+    [Footnote 3: ii. 29.]
+
+3
+And by pointing your words to the individual reader, instead of to the
+readers generally, as in the line
+
+  "Thou had'st not known for whom Tydides fought,"[4]
+
+and thus exciting him by an appeal to himself, you will rouse interest,
+and fix attention, and make him a partaker in the action of the book.
+
+    [Footnote 4: _Il._ v. 85.]
+
+
+XXVII
+
+Sometimes, again, a writer in the midst of a narrative in the third
+person suddenly steps aside and makes a transition to the first. It is a
+kind of figure which strikes like a sudden outburst of passion. Thus
+Hector in the _Iliad_
+
+  "With mighty voice called to the men of Troy
+  To storm the ships, and leave the bloody spoils:
+  If any I behold with willing foot
+  Shunning the ships, and lingering on the plain,
+  That hour I will contrive his death."[1]
+
+The poet then takes upon himself the narrative part, as being his proper
+business; but this abrupt threat he attributes, without a word of
+warning, to the enraged Trojan chief. To have interposed any such words
+as "Hector said so and so" would have had a frigid effect. As the lines
+stand the writer is left behind by his own words, and the transition is
+effected while he is preparing for it.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 346.]
+
+2
+Accordingly the proper use of this figure is in dealing with some urgent
+crisis which will not allow the writer to linger, but compels him to
+make a rapid change from one person to another. So in Hecataeus: "Now
+Ceyx took this in dudgeon, and straightway bade the children of Heracles
+to depart. 'Behold, I can give you no help; lest, therefore, ye perish
+yourselves and bring hurt upon me also, get ye forth into some other
+land.'"
+
+3
+There is a different use of the change of persons in the speech of
+Demosthenes against Aristogeiton, which places before us the quick turns
+of violent emotion. "Is there none to be found among you," he asks, "who
+even feels indignation at the outrageous conduct of a loathsome and
+shameless wretch who,--vilest of men, when you were debarred from
+freedom of speech, not by barriers or by doors, which might indeed be
+opened,"[2] etc. Thus in the midst of a half-expressed thought he makes
+a quick change of front, and having almost in his anger torn one word
+into two persons, "who, vilest of men," etc., he then breaks off his
+address to Aristogeiton, and seems to leave him, nevertheless, by the
+passion of his utterance, rousing all the more the attention of the
+court.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _c. Aristog._ i. 27.]
+
+4
+The same feature may be observed in a speech of Penelope's--
+
+  "Why com'st thou, Medon, from the wooers proud?
+  Com'st thou to bid the handmaids of my lord
+  To cease their tasks, and make for them good cheer?
+  Ill fare their wooing, and their gathering here!
+  Would God that here this hour they all might take
+  Their last, their latest meal! Who day by day
+  Make here your muster, to devour and waste
+  The substance of my son: have ye not heard
+  When children at your fathers' knee the deeds
+  And prowess of your king?"[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: _Od._ iv. 681.]
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+None, I suppose, would dispute the fact that periphrasis tends much to
+sublimity. For, as in music the simple air is rendered more pleasing by
+the addition of harmony, so in language periphrasis often sounds in
+concord with a literal expression, adding much to the beauty of its
+tone,--provided always that it is not inflated and harsh, but agreeably
+blended.
+
+2
+To confirm this one passage from Plato will suffice--the opening words
+of his Funeral Oration: "In deed these men have now received from us
+their due, and that tribute paid they are now passing on their destined
+journey, with the State speeding them all and his own friends speeding
+each one of them on his way."[1] Death, you see, he calls the "destined
+journey"; to receive the rites of burial is to be publicly "sped on your
+way" by the State. And these turns of language lend dignity in no common
+measure to the thought. He takes the words in their naked simplicity and
+handles them as a musician, investing them with melody,--harmonising
+them, as it were,--by the use of periphrasis.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _Menex._ 236, D.]
+
+3
+So Xenophon: "Labour you regard as the guide to a pleasant life, and you
+have laid up in your souls the fairest and most soldier-like of all
+gifts: in praise is your delight, more than in anything else."[2] By
+saying, instead of "you are ready to labour," "you regard labour as the
+guide to a pleasant life," and by similarly expanding the rest of that
+passage, he gives to his eulogy a much wider and loftier range of
+sentiment. Let us add that inimitable phrase in Herodotus: "Those
+Scythians who pillaged the temple were smitten from heaven by a female
+malady."
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Cyrop._ i. 5. 12.]
+
+
+XXIX
+
+But this figure, more than any other, is very liable to abuse, and great
+restraint is required in employing it. It soon begins to carry an
+impression of feebleness, savours of vapid trifling, and arouses
+disgust. Hence Plato, who is very bold and not always happy in his use
+of figures, is much ridiculed for saying in his _Laws_ that "neither
+gold nor silver wealth must be allowed to establish itself in our
+State,"[1] suggesting, it is said, that if he had forbidden property in
+oxen or sheep he would certainly have spoken of it as "bovine and ovine
+wealth."
+
+    [Footnote 1: _De Legg._ vii. 801, B.]
+
+2
+Here we must quit this part of our subject, hoping, my dear friend
+Terentian, that your learned curiosity will be satisfied with this short
+excursion on the use of figures in their relation to the Sublime. All
+those which I have mentioned help to render a style more energetic and
+impassioned; and passion contributes as largely to sublimity as the
+delineation of character to amusement.
+
+
+XXX
+
+But since the thoughts conveyed by words and the expression of those
+thoughts are for the most part interwoven with one another, we will now
+add some considerations which have hitherto been overlooked on the
+subject of expression. To say that the choice of appropriate and
+striking words has a marvellous power and an enthralling charm for the
+reader, that this is the main object of pursuit with all orators and
+writers, that it is this, and this alone, which causes the works of
+literature to exhibit the glowing perfections of the finest statues,
+their grandeur, their beauty, their mellowness, their dignity, their
+energy, their power, and all their other graces, and that it is this
+which endows the facts with a vocal soul; to say all this would, I fear,
+be, to the initiated, an impertinence. Indeed, we may say with strict
+truth that beautiful words are the very light of thought.
+
+2
+I do not mean to say that imposing language is appropriate to every
+occasion. A trifling subject tricked out in grand and stately words
+would have the same effect as a huge tragic mask placed on the head of a
+little child. Only in poetry and ...
+
+
+XXXI
+
+... There is a genuine ring in that line of Anacreon's--
+
+  "The Thracian filly I no longer heed."
+
+The same merit belongs to that original phrase in Theophrastus; to me,
+at least, from the closeness of its analogy, it seems to have a peculiar
+expressiveness, though Caecilius censures it, without telling us why.
+"Philip," says the historian, "showed a marvellous alacrity in _taking
+doses of trouble_."[1] We see from this that the most homely language is
+sometimes far more vivid than the most ornamental, being recognised at
+once as the language of common life, and gaining immediate currency by
+its familiarity. In speaking, then, of Philip as "taking doses of
+trouble," Theopompus has laid hold on a phrase which describes with
+peculiar vividness one who for the sake of advantage endured what was
+base and sordid with patience and cheerfulness.
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+The same may be observed of two passages in Herodotus: "Cleomenes having
+lost his wits, cut his own flesh into pieces with a short sword, until
+by gradually _mincing_ his whole body he destroyed himself";[2] and
+"Pythes continued fighting on his ship until he was entirely _hacked to
+pieces_."[3] Such terms come home at once to the vulgar reader, but
+their own vulgarity is redeemed by their expressiveness.
+
+    [Footnote 2: vi. 75.]
+
+    [Footnote 3: vii. 181.]
+
+
+XXXII
+
+Concerning the number of metaphors to be employed together Caecilius
+seems to give his vote with those critics who make a law that not more
+than two, or at the utmost three, should be combined in the same place.
+The use, however, must be determined by the occasion. Those outbursts of
+passion which drive onwards like a winter torrent draw with them as an
+indispensable accessory whole masses of metaphor. It is thus in that
+passage of Demosthenes (who here also is our safest guide):[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: See Note.]
+
+2
+"Those vile fawning wretches, each one of whom has lopped from his
+country her fairest members, who have toasted away their liberty, first
+to Philip, now to Alexander, who measure happiness by their belly and
+their vilest appetites, who have overthrown the old landmarks and
+standards of felicity among Greeks,--to be freemen, and to have no one
+for a master."[2] Here the number of the metaphors is obscured by the
+orator's indignation against the betrayers of his country.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _De Cor._ 296.]
+
+3
+And to effect this Aristotle and Theophrastus recommend the softening of
+harsh metaphors by the use of some such phrase as "So to say," "As it
+were," "If I may be permitted the expression," "If so bold a term is
+allowable." For thus to forestall criticism[3] mitigates, they assert,
+the boldness of the metaphors.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Reading +hupotimesis+.]
+
+4
+And I will not deny that these have their use. Nevertheless I must
+repeat the remark which I made in the case of figures,[4] and maintain
+that there are native antidotes to the number and boldness of metaphors,
+in well-timed displays of strong feeling, and in unaffected sublimity,
+because these have an innate power by the dash of their movement of
+sweeping along and carrying all else before them. Or should we not
+rather say that they absolutely demand as indispensable the use of
+daring metaphors, and will not allow the hearer to pause and criticise
+the number of them, because he shares the passion of the speaker?
+
+    [Footnote 4: Ch. xvii.]
+
+5
+In the treatment, again, of familiar topics and in descriptive passages
+nothing gives such distinctness as a close and continuous series of
+metaphors. It is by this means that Xenophon has so finely delineated
+the anatomy of the human frame.[5] And there is a still more brilliant
+and life-like picture in Plato.[6] The human head he calls a _citadel_;
+the neck is an _isthmus_ set to divide it from the chest; to support it
+beneath are the vertebrae, turning like _hinges_; pleasure he describes
+as a _bait_ to tempt men to ill; the tongue is the _arbiter of tastes_.
+The heart is at once the _knot_ of the veins and the _source_ of the
+rapidly circulating blood, and is stationed in the _guard-room_ of the
+body. The ramifying blood-vessels he calls _alleys_. "And casting
+about," he says, "for something to sustain the violent palpitation of
+the heart when it is alarmed by the approach of danger or agitated by
+passion, since at such times it is overheated, they (the gods) implanted
+in us the lungs, which are so fashioned that being soft and bloodless,
+and having cavities within, they act like a buffer, and when the heart
+boils with inward passion by yielding to its throbbing save it from
+injury." He compares the seat of the desires to the _women's quarters_,
+the seat of the passions to the _men's quarters_, in a house. The
+spleen, again, is the _napkin_ of the internal organs, by whose
+excretions it is saturated from time to time, and swells to a great size
+with inward impurity. "After this," he continues, "they shrouded the
+whole with flesh, throwing it forward, like a cushion, as a barrier
+against injuries from without." The blood he terms the _pasture_ of the
+flesh. "To assist the process of nutrition," he goes on, "they divided
+the body into ducts, cutting trenches like those in a garden, so that,
+the body being a system of narrow conduits, the current of the veins
+might flow as from a perennial fountain-head. And when the end is at
+hand," he says, "the soul is cast loose from her moorings like a ship,
+and free to wander whither she will."
+
+6
+These, and a hundred similar fancies, follow one another in quick
+succession. But those which I have pointed out are sufficient to
+demonstrate how great is the natural power of figurative language, and
+how largely metaphors conduce to sublimity, and to illustrate the
+important part which they play in all impassioned and descriptive
+passages.
+
+    [Footnote 5: _Memorab._ i. 4, 5.]
+
+    [Footnote 6: _Timaeus_, 69, D; 74, A; 65, C; 72, G; 74, B, D; 80, E;
+    77, G; 78, E; 85, E.]
+
+7
+That the use of figurative language, as of all other beauties of style,
+has a constant tendency towards excess, is an obvious truth which I need
+not dwell upon. It is chiefly on this account that even Plato comes in
+for a large share of disparagement, because he is often carried away by
+a sort of frenzy of language into an intemperate use of violent
+metaphors and inflated allegory. "It is not easy to remark" (he says in
+one place) "that a city ought to be blended like a bowl, in which the
+mad wine boils when it is poured out, but being disciplined by another
+and a sober god in that fair society produces a good and temperate
+drink."[7] Really, it is said, to speak of water as a "sober god," and
+of the process of mixing as a "discipline," is to talk like a poet, and
+no very _sober_ one either.
+
+    [Footnote 7: _Legg._ vi. 773, G.]
+
+8
+It was such defects as these that the hostile critic[8] Caecilius made
+his ground of attack, when he had the boldness in his essay "On the
+Beauties of Lysias" to pronounce that writer superior in every respect
+to Plato. Now Caecilius was doubly unqualified for a judge: he loved
+Lysias better even than himself, and at the same time his hatred of
+Plato and all his works is greater even than his love for Lysias.
+Moreover, he is so blind a partisan that his very premises are open to
+dispute. He vaunts Lysias as a faultless and immaculate writer, while
+Plato is, according to him, full of blemishes. Now this is not the case:
+far from it.
+
+    [Footnote 8: Reading +ho mison auton+, by a conjecture of the
+    translator.]
+
+
+XXXIII
+
+But supposing now that we assume the existence of a really unblemished
+and irreproachable writer. Is it not worth while to raise the whole
+question whether in poetry and prose we should prefer sublimity
+accompanied by some faults, or a style which never rising above moderate
+excellence never stumbles and never requires correction? and again,
+whether the first place in literature is justly to be assigned to the
+more numerous, or the loftier excellences? For these are questions
+proper to an inquiry on the Sublime, and urgently asking for settlement.
+
+2
+I know, then, that the largest intellects are far from being the most
+exact. A mind always intent on correctness is apt to be dissipated in
+trifles; but in great affluence of thought, as in vast material wealth,
+there must needs be an occasional neglect of detail. And is it not
+inevitably so? Is it not by risking nothing, by never aiming high, that
+a writer of low or middling powers keeps generally clear of faults and
+secure of blame? whereas the loftier walks of literature are by their
+very loftiness perilous?
+
+3
+I am well aware, again, that there is a law by which in all human
+productions the weak points catch the eye first, by which their faults
+remain indelibly stamped on the memory, while their beauties quickly
+fade away.
+
+4
+Yet, though I have myself noted not a few faulty passages in Homer and
+in other authors of the highest rank, and though I am far from being
+partial to their failings, nevertheless I would call them not so much
+wilful blunders as oversights which were allowed to pass unregarded
+through that contempt of little things, that "brave disorder," which is
+natural to an exalted genius; and I still think that the greater
+excellences, though not everywhere equally sustained, ought always to be
+voted to the first place in literature, if for no other reason, for the
+mere grandeur of soul they evince. Let us take an instance: Apollonius
+in his _Argonautica_ has given us a poem actually faultless; and in his
+pastoral poetry Theocritus is eminently happy, except when he
+occasionally attempts another style. And what then? Would you rather be
+a Homer or an Apollonius?
+
+5
+Or take Eratosthenes and his _Erigone_; because that little work is
+without a flaw, is he therefore a greater poet than Archilochus, with
+all his disorderly profusion? greater than that impetuous, that
+god-gifted genius, which chafed against the restraints of law? or in
+lyric poetry would you choose to be a Bacchylides or a Pindar? in
+tragedy a Sophocles or (save the mark!) an Io of Chios? Yet Io and
+Bacchylides never stumble, their style is always neat, always pretty;
+while Pindar and Sophocles sometimes move onwards with a wide blaze of
+splendour, but often drop out of view in sudden and disastrous eclipse.
+Nevertheless no one in his senses would deny that a single play of
+Sophocles, the _Oedipus_, is of higher value than all the dramas of Io
+put together.
+
+
+XXXIV
+
+If the number and not the loftiness of an author's merits is to be our
+standard of success, judged by this test we must admit that Hyperides is
+a far superior orator to Demosthenes. For in Hyperides there is a richer
+modulation, a greater variety of excellence. He is, we may say, in
+everything second-best, like the champion of the _pentathlon_, who,
+though in every contest he has to yield the prize to some other
+combatant, is superior to the unpractised in all five.
+
+2
+Not only has he rivalled the success of Demosthenes in everything but
+his manner of composition, but, as though that were not enough, he has
+taken in all the excellences and graces of Lysias as well. He knows when
+it is proper to speak with simplicity, and does not, like Demosthenes,
+continue the same key throughout. His touches of character are racy and
+sparkling, and full of a delicate flavour. Then how admirable is his
+wit, how polished his raillery! How well-bred he is, how dexterous in
+the use of irony! His jests are pointed, but without any of the
+grossness and vulgarity of the old Attic comedy. He is skilled in making
+light of an opponent's argument, full of a well-aimed satire which
+amuses while it stings; and through all this there runs a pervading, may
+we not say, a matchless charm. He is most apt in moving compassion; his
+mythical digressions show a fluent ease, and he is perfect in bending
+his course and finding a way out of them without violence or effort.
+Thus when he tells the story of Leto he is really almost a poet; and his
+funeral oration shows a declamatory magnificence to which I hardly know
+a parallel.
+
+3
+Demosthenes, on the other hand, has no touches of character, none of the
+versatility, fluency, or declamatory skill of Hyperides. He is, in fact,
+almost entirely destitute of all those excellences which I have just
+enumerated. When he makes violent efforts to be humorous and witty, the
+only laughter he arouses is against himself; and the nearer he tries to
+get to the winning grace of Hyperides, the farther he recedes from it.
+Had he, for instance, attempted such a task as the little speech in
+defence of Phryne or Athenagoras, he would only have added to the
+reputation of his rival.
+
+4
+Nevertheless all the beauties of Hyperides, however numerous, cannot
+make him sublime. He never exhibits strong feeling, has little energy,
+rouses no emotion; certainly he never kindles terror in the breast of
+his readers. But Demosthenes followed a great master,[1] and drew his
+consummate excellences, his high-pitched eloquence, his living passion,
+his copiousness, his sagacity, his speed--that mastery and power which
+can never be approached--from the highest of sources. These mighty,
+these heaven-sent gifts (I dare not call them human), he made his own
+both one and all. Therefore, I say, by the noble qualities which he does
+possess he remains supreme above all rivals, and throws a cloud over his
+failings, silencing by his thunders and blinding by his lightnings the
+orators of all ages. Yes, it would be easier to meet the
+lightning-stroke with steady eye than to gaze unmoved when his
+impassioned eloquence is sending out flash after flash.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _I.e._ Thucydides. See the passage of Dionysius quoted
+    in the Note.]
+
+
+XXXV
+
+But in the case of Plato and Lysias there is, as I said, a further
+difference. Not only is Lysias vastly inferior to Plato in the degree of
+his merits, but in their number as well; and at the same time he is as
+far ahead of Plato in the number of his faults as he is behind in that
+of his merits.
+
+2
+What truth, then, was it that was present to those mighty spirits of the
+past, who, making whatever is greatest in writing their aim, thought it
+beneath them to be exact in every detail? Among many others especially
+this, that it was not in nature's plan for us her chosen children to be
+creatures base and ignoble,--no, she brought us into life, and into the
+whole universe, as into some great field of contest, that we should be
+at once spectators and ambitious rivals of her mighty deeds, and from
+the first implanted in our souls an invincible yearning for all that is
+great, all that is diviner than ourselves.
+
+3
+Therefore even the whole world is not wide enough for the soaring range
+of human thought, but man's mind often overleaps the very bounds of
+space.[1] When we survey the whole circle of life, and see it abounding
+everywhere in what is elegant, grand, and beautiful, we learn at once
+what is the true end of man's being.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Lucretius on Epicurus: "Ergo vivida vis animi
+    pervicit, et extra Processit longe flammantia moenia mundi," etc.]
+
+4
+And this is why nature prompts us to admire, not the clearness and
+usefulness of a little stream, but the Nile, the Danube, the Rhine, and
+far beyond all the Ocean; not to turn our wandering eyes from the
+heavenly fires, though often darkened, to the little flame kindled by
+human hands, however pure and steady its light; not to think that tiny
+lamp more wondrous than the caverns of Aetna, from whose raging depths
+are hurled up stones and whole masses of rock, and torrents sometimes
+come pouring from earth's centre of pure and living fire.
+
+To sum the whole: whatever is useful or needful lies easily within man's
+reach; but he keeps his homage for what is astounding.
+
+
+XXXVI
+
+How much more do these principles apply to the Sublime in literature,
+where grandeur is never, as it sometimes is in nature, dissociated from
+utility and advantage. Therefore all those who have achieved it, however
+far from faultless, are still more than mortal. When a writer uses any
+other resource he shows himself to be a man; but the Sublime lifts him
+near to the great spirit of the Deity. He who makes no slips must be
+satisfied with negative approbation, but he who is sublime commands
+positive reverence.
+
+2
+Why need I add that each one of those great writers often redeems all
+his errors by one grand and masterly stroke? But the strongest point of
+all is that, if you were to pick out all the blunders of Homer,
+Demosthenes, Plato, and all the greatest names in literature, and add
+them together, they would be found to bear a very small, or rather an
+infinitesimal proportion to the passages in which these supreme masters
+have attained absolute perfection. Therefore it is that all posterity,
+whose judgment envy herself cannot impeach, has brought and bestowed on
+them the crown of glory, has guarded their fame until this day against
+all attack, and is likely to preserve it
+
+  "As long as lofty trees shall grow,
+  And restless waters seaward flow."
+
+3
+It has been urged by one writer that we should not prefer the huge
+disproportioned Colossus to the Doryphorus of Polycletus. But (to give
+one out of many possible answers) in art we admire exactness, in the
+works of nature magnificence; and it is from nature that man derives the
+faculty of speech. Whereas, then, in statuary we look for close
+resemblance to humanity, in literature we require something which
+transcends humanity.
+
+4
+Nevertheless (to reiterate the advice which we gave at the beginning of
+this essay), since that success which consists in avoidance of error is
+usually the gift of art, while high, though unequal excellence is the
+attribute of genius, it is proper on all occasions to call in art as an
+ally to nature. By the combined resources of these two we may hope to
+achieve perfection.
+
+Such are the conclusions which were forced upon me concerning the points
+at issue; but every one may consult his own taste.
+
+
+XXXVII
+
+To return, however, from this long digression; closely allied to
+metaphors are comparisons and similes, differing only in this * * *[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: The asterisks denote gaps in the original text.]
+
+
+XXXVIII
+
+Such absurdities as, "Unless you carry your brains next to the ground in
+your heels."[1] Hence it is necessary to know where to draw the line;
+for if ever it is overstepped the effect of the hyperbole is spoilt,
+being in such cases relaxed by overstraining, and producing the very
+opposite to the effect desired.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Pseud. Dem. de Halon. 45.]
+
+2
+Isocrates, for instance, from an ambitious desire of lending everything
+a strong rhetorical colouring, shows himself in quite a childish light.
+Having in his Panegyrical Oration set himself to prove that the Athenian
+state has surpassed that of Sparta in her services to Hellas, he starts
+off at the very outset with these words: "Such is the power of language
+that it can extenuate what is great, and lend greatness to what is
+little, give freshness to what is antiquated, and describe what is
+recent so that it seems to be of the past."[2] Come, Isocrates (it might
+be asked), is it thus that you are going to tamper with the facts about
+Sparta and Athens? This flourish about the power of language is like a
+signal hung out to warn his audience not to believe him.
+
+    [Footnote 2: Paneg. 8.]
+
+3
+We may repeat here what we said about figures, and say that the
+hyperbole is then most effective when it appears in disguise.[3] And
+this effect is produced when a writer, impelled by strong feeling,
+speaks in the accents of some tremendous crisis; as Thucydides does in
+describing the massacre in Sicily. "The Syracusans," he says, "went down
+after them, and slew those especially who were in the river, and the
+water was at once defiled, yet still they went on drinking it, though
+mingled with mud and gore, most of them even fighting for it."[4] The
+drinking of mud and gore, and even the fighting for it, is made credible
+by the awful horror of the scene described.
+
+    [Footnote 3: xvii. 1.]
+
+    [Footnote 4: Thuc. vii. 84.]
+
+4
+Similarly Herodotus on those who fell at Thermopylae: "Here as they
+fought, those who still had them, with daggers, the rest with hands and
+teeth, the barbarians buried them under their javelins."[5] That they
+fought with the teeth against heavy-armed assailants, and that they were
+buried with javelins, are perhaps hard sayings, but not incredible, for
+the reasons already explained. We can see that these circumstances have
+not been dragged in to produce a hyperbole, but that the hyperbole has
+grown naturally out of the circumstances.
+
+    [Footnote 5: vii. 225.]
+
+5
+For, as I am never tired of explaining, in actions and passions verging
+on frenzy there lies a kind of remission and palliation of any licence
+of language. Hence some comic extravagances, however improbable, gain
+credence by their humour, such as--
+
+  "He had a farm, a little farm, where space severely pinches;
+  'Twas smaller than the last despatch from Sparta by some inches."
+
+6
+For mirth is one of the passions, having its seat in pleasure. And
+hyperboles may be employed either to increase or to lessen--since
+exaggeration is common to both uses. Thus in extenuating an opponent's
+argument we try to make it seem smaller than it is.
+
+
+XXXIX
+
+We have still left, my dear sir, the fifth of those sources which we set
+down at the outset as contributing to sublimity, that which consists in
+the mere arrangement of words in a certain order. Having already
+published two books dealing fully with this subject--so far at least as
+our investigations had carried us--it will be sufficient for the purpose
+of our present inquiry to add that harmony is an instrument which has a
+natural power, not only to win and to delight, but also in a remarkable
+degree to exalt the soul and sway the heart of man.
+
+2
+When we see that a flute kindles certain emotions in its hearers,
+rendering them almost beside themselves and full of an orgiastic frenzy,
+and that by starting some kind of rhythmical beat it compels him who
+listens to move in time and assimilate his gestures to the tune, even
+though he has no taste whatever for music; when we know that the sounds
+of a harp, which in themselves have no meaning, by the change of key, by
+the mutual relation of the notes, and their arrangement in symphony,
+often lay a wonderful spell on an audience--
+
+3
+though these are mere shadows and spurious imitations of persuasion,
+not, as I have said, genuine manifestations of human nature:--can we
+doubt that composition (being a kind of harmony of that language which
+nature has taught us, and which reaches, not our ears only, but our very
+souls), when it raises changing forms of words, of thoughts, of actions,
+of beauty, of melody, all of which are engrained in and akin to
+ourselves, and when by the blending of its manifold tones it brings home
+to the minds of those who stand by the feelings present to the speaker,
+and ever disposes the hearer to sympathise with those feelings, adding
+word to word, until it has raised a majestic and harmonious
+structure:--can we wonder if all this enchants us, wherever we meet with
+it, and filling us with the sense of pomp and dignity and sublimity, and
+whatever else it embraces, gains a complete mastery over our minds? It
+would be mere infatuation to join issue on truths so universally
+acknowledged, and established by experience beyond dispute.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Reading +all' eoike mania+, and putting a full stop at
+    +pistis+.]
+
+4
+Now to give an instance: that is doubtless a sublime thought, indeed
+wonderfully fine, which Demosthenes applies to his decree: +touto to
+psephisma ton tote te polei peristanta kindunon parelthein epoiesen
+hosper nephos+, "This decree caused the danger which then hung round our
+city to pass away like a cloud." But the modulation is as perfect as the
+sentiment itself is weighty. It is uttered wholly in the dactylic
+measure, the noblest and most magnificent of all measures, and hence
+forming the chief constituent in the finest metre we know, the heroic.
+[And it is with great judgment that the words +hosper nephos+ are
+reserved till the end.[2]] Supposing we transpose them from their proper
+place and read, say +touto to psephisma hosper nephos epoiese ton tote
+kindunon parelthein+--nay, let us merely cut off one syllable, reading
++epoiese parelthein hos nephos+--and you will understand how close is
+the unison between harmony and sublimity. In the passage before us the
+words +hosper nephos+ move first in a heavy measure, which is metrically
+equivalent to four short syllables: but on removing one syllable, and
+reading +hos nephos+, the grandeur of movement is at once crippled by
+the abridgment. So conversely if you lengthen into +hosperei nephos+,
+the meaning is still the same, but it does not strike the ear in the
+same manner, because by lingering over the final syllables you at once
+dissipate and relax the abrupt grandeur of the passage.
+
+    [Footnote 2: There is a break here in the text; but the context
+    indicates the sense of the words lost, which has accordingly been
+    supplied.]
+
+
+XL
+
+There is another method very efficient in exalting a style. As the
+different members of the body, none of which, if severed from its
+connection, has any intrinsic excellence, unite by their mutual
+combination to form a complete and perfect organism, so also the
+elements of a fine passage, by whose separation from one another its
+high quality is simultaneously dissipated and evaporates, when joined in
+one organic whole, and still further compacted by the bond of harmony,
+by the mere rounding of the period gain power of tone.
+
+2
+In fact, a clause may be said to derive its sublimity from the joint
+contributions of a number of particulars. And further (as we have shown
+at large elsewhere), many writers in prose and verse, though their
+natural powers were not high, were perhaps even low, and though the
+terms they employed were usually common and popular and conveying no
+impression of refinement, by the mere harmony of their composition have
+attained dignity and elevation, and avoided the appearance of meanness.
+Such among many others are Philistus, Aristophanes occasionally,
+Euripides almost always.
+
+3
+Thus when Heracles says, after the murder of his children,
+
+  "I'm full of woes, I have no room for more,"[1]
+
+the words are quite common, but they are made sublime by being cast in a
+fine mould. By changing their position you will see that the poetical
+quality of Euripides depends more on his arrangement than on his
+thoughts.
+
+    [Footnote 1: _H. F._ 1245.]
+
+4
+Compare his lines on Dirce dragged by the bull--
+
+                  "Whatever crossed his path,
+  Caught in his victim's form, he seized, and dragging
+  Oak, woman, rock, now here, now there, he flies."[2]
+
+The circumstance is noble in itself, but it gains in vigour because the
+language is disposed so as not to hurry the movement, not running, as it
+were, on wheels, because there is a distinct stress on each word, and
+the time is delayed, advancing slowly to a pitch of stately sublimity.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Antiope_ (Nauck, 222).]
+
+
+XLI
+
+Nothing so much degrades the tone of a style as an effeminate and
+hurried movement in the language, such as is produced by pyrrhics and
+trochees and dichorees falling in time together into a regular dance
+measure. Such abuse of rhythm is sure to savour of coxcombry and petty
+affectation, and grows tiresome in the highest degree by a monotonous
+sameness of tone.
+
+2
+But its worst effect is that, as those who listen to a ballad have their
+attention distracted from its subject and can think of nothing but the
+tune, so an over-rhythmical passage does not affect the hearer by the
+meaning of its words, but merely by their cadence, so that sometimes,
+knowing where the pause must come, they beat time with the speaker,
+striking the expected close like dancers before the stop is reached.
+Equally undignified is the splitting up of a sentence into a number of
+little words and short syllables crowded too closely together and forced
+into cohesion,--hammered, as it were, successively together,--after the
+manner of mortice and tenon.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: I must refer to Weiske's Note, which I have followed,
+    for the probable interpretation of this extraordinary passage.]
+
+
+XLII
+
+Sublimity is further diminished by cramping the diction. Deformity
+instead of grandeur ensues from over-compression. Here I am not
+referring to a judicious compactness of phrase, but to a style which is
+dwarfed, and its force frittered away. To cut your words too short is to
+prune away their sense, but to be concise is to be direct. On the other
+hand, we know that a style becomes lifeless by over-extension, I mean by
+being relaxed to an unseasonable length.
+
+
+XLIII
+
+The use of mean words has also a strong tendency to degrade a lofty
+passage. Thus in that description of the storm in Herodotus the matter
+is admirable, but some of the words admitted are beneath the dignity of
+the subject; such, perhaps, as "the seas having _seethed_" because the
+ill-sounding phrase "having seethed" detracts much from its
+impressiveness: or when he says "the wind wore away," and "those who
+clung round the wreck met with an unwelcome end."[1] "Wore away" is
+ignoble and vulgar, and "unwelcome" inadequate to the extent of the
+disaster.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Hdt. vii. 188, 191, 13.]
+
+2
+Similarly Theopompus, after giving a fine picture of the Persian king's
+descent against Egypt, has exposed the whole to censure by certain
+paltry expressions. "There was no city, no people of Asia, which did not
+send an embassy to the king; no product of the earth, no work of art,
+whether beautiful or precious, which was not among the gifts brought to
+him. Many and costly were the hangings and robes, some purple, some
+embroidered, some white; many the tents, of cloth of gold, furnished
+with all things useful; many the tapestries and couches of great price.
+Moreover, there was gold and silver plate richly wrought, goblets and
+bowls, some of which might be seen studded with gems, and others besides
+worked in relief with great skill and at vast expense. Besides these
+there were suits of armour in number past computation, partly Greek,
+partly foreign, endless trains of baggage animals and fat cattle for
+slaughter, many bushels of spices, many panniers and sacks and sheets of
+writing-paper; and all other necessaries in the same proportion. And
+there was salt meat of all kinds of beasts in immense quantity, heaped
+together to such a height as to show at a distance like mounds and hills
+thrown up one against another."
+
+3
+He runs off from the grander parts of his subject to the meaner, and
+sinks where he ought to rise. Still worse, by his mixing up _panniers_
+and _spices_ and _bags_ with his wonderful recital of that vast and busy
+scene one would imagine that he was describing a kitchen. Let us suppose
+that in that show of magnificence some one had taken a set of wretched
+baskets and bags and placed them in the midst, among vessels of gold,
+jewelled bowls, silver plate, and tents and goblets of gold; how
+incongruous would have seemed the effect! Now just in the same way these
+petty words, introduced out of season, stand out like deformities and
+blots on the diction.
+
+4
+These details might have been given in one or two broad strokes, as when
+he speaks of mounds being heaped together. So in dealing with the other
+preparations he might have told us of "waggons and camels and a long
+train of baggage animals loaded with all kinds of supplies for the
+luxury and enjoyment of the table," or have mentioned "piles of grain of
+every species, and of all the choicest delicacies required by the art of
+the cook or the taste of the epicure," or (if he must needs be so very
+precise) he might have spoken of "whatever dainties are supplied by
+those who lay or those who dress the banquet."
+
+5
+In our sublimer efforts we should never stoop to what is sordid and
+despicable, unless very hard pressed by some urgent necessity. If we
+would write becomingly, our utterance should be worthy of our theme. We
+should take a lesson from nature, who when she planned the human frame
+did not set our grosser parts, or the ducts for purging the body, in our
+face, but as far as she could concealed them, "diverting," as Xenophon
+says, "those canals as far as possible from our senses,"[2] and thus
+shunning in any part to mar the beauty of the whole creature.
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Mem._ i. 4. 6.]
+
+6
+However, it is not incumbent on us to specify and enumerate whatever
+diminishes a style. We have now pointed out the various means of giving
+it nobility and loftiness. It is clear, then, that whatever is contrary
+to these will generally degrade and deform it.
+
+
+XLIV
+
+There is still another point which remains to be cleared up, my dear
+Terentian, and on which I shall not hesitate to add some remarks, to
+gratify your inquiring spirit. It relates to a question which was
+recently put to me by a certain philosopher. "To me," he said, "in
+common, I may say, with many others, it is a matter of wonder that in
+the present age, which produces many highly skilled in the arts Of
+popular persuasion, many of keen and active powers, many especially rich
+in every pleasing gift of language, the growth of highly exalted and
+wide-reaching genius has with a few rare exceptions almost entirely
+ceased. So universal is the dearth of eloquence which prevails
+throughout the world.
+
+2
+"Must we really," he asked, "give credit to that oft-repeated assertion
+that democracy is the kind nurse of genius, and that high literary
+excellence has flourished with her prime and faded with her decay?
+Liberty, it is said, is all-powerful to feed the aspirations of high
+intellects, to hold out hope, and keep alive the flame of mutual rivalry
+and ambitious struggle for the highest place.
+
+3
+"Moreover, the prizes which are offered in every free state keep the
+spirits of her foremost orators whetted by perpetual exercise;[1] they
+are, as it were, ignited by friction, and naturally blaze forth freely
+because they are surrounded by freedom. But we of to-day," he continued,
+"seem to have learnt in our childhood the lessons of a benignant
+despotism, to have been cradled in her habits and customs from the time
+when our minds were still tender, and never to have tasted the fairest
+and most fruitful fountain of eloquence, I mean liberty. Hence we
+develop nothing but a fine genius for flattery.
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. Pericles in Thuc. ii., +athla gar hois keitai
+    aretes megista tois de kai andres arista politeuousin+.]
+
+4
+"This is the reason why, though all other faculties are consistent with
+the servile condition, no slave ever became an orator; because in him
+there is a dumb spirit which will not be kept down: his soul is chained:
+he is like one who has learnt to be ever expecting a blow. For, as Homer
+says--
+
+5
+            "'The day of slavery
+  Takes half our manly worth away.'[2]
+
+"As, then (if what I have heard is credible), the cages in which those
+pigmies commonly called dwarfs are reared not only stop the growth of
+the imprisoned creature, but absolutely make him smaller by compressing
+every part of his body, so all despotism, however equitable, may be
+defined as a cage of the soul and a general prison."
+
+    [Footnote 2: _Od._ xvii. 322.]
+
+6
+My answer was as follows: "My dear friend, it is so easy, and so
+characteristic of human nature, always to find fault with the
+present.[3] Consider, now, whether the corruption of genius is to be
+attributed, not to a world-wide peace,[4] but rather to the war within
+us which knows no limit, which engages all our desires, yes, and still
+further to the bad passions which lay siege to us to-day, and make utter
+havoc and spoil of our lives. Are we not enslaved, nay, are not our
+careers completely shipwrecked, by love of gain, that fever which rages
+unappeased in us all, and love of pleasure?--one the most debasing, the
+other the most ignoble of the mind's diseases.
+
+    [Footnote 3: Comp. Byron, "The good old times,--all times when old
+    are good."]
+
+    [Footnote 4: A euphemism for "a world-wide tyranny."]
+
+7
+"When I consider it I can find no means by which we, who hold in such
+high honour, or, to speak more correctly, who idolise boundless riches,
+can close the door of our souls against those evil spirits which grow up
+with them. For Wealth unmeasured and unbridled is dogged by
+Extravagance: she sticks close to him, and treads in his footsteps: and
+as soon as he opens the gates of cities or of houses she enters with him
+and makes her abode with him. And after a time they build their nests
+(to use a wise man's words[5]) in that corner of life, and speedily set
+about breeding, and beget Boastfulness, and Vanity, and Wantonness, no
+base-born children, but their very own. And if these also, the offspring
+of Wealth, be allowed to come to their prime, quickly they engender in
+the soul those pitiless tyrants, Violence, and Lawlessness, and
+Shamelessness.
+
+    [Footnote 5: Plato, _Rep._ ix. 573, E.]
+
+8
+"Whenever a man takes to worshipping what is mortal and irrational[6] in
+him, and neglects to cherish what is immortal, these are the inevitable
+results. He never looks up again; he has lost all care for good report;
+by slow degrees the ruin of his life goes on, until it is consummated
+all round; all that is great in his soul fades, withers away, and is
+despised.
+
+    [Footnote 6: Reading +kanoeta+.]
+
+9
+"If a judge who passes sentence for a bribe can never more give a free
+and sound decision on a point of justice or honour (for to him who takes
+a bribe honour and justice must be measured by his own interests), how
+can we of to-day expect, when the whole life of each one of us is
+controlled by bribery, while we lie in wait for other men's death and
+plan how to get a place in their wills, when we buy gain, from whatever
+source, each one of us, with our very souls in our slavish greed, how, I
+say, can we expect, in the midst of such a moral pestilence, that there
+is still left even one liberal and impartial critic, whose verdict will
+not be biassed by avarice in judging of those great works which live on
+through all time?
+
+10
+"Alas! I fear that for such men as we are it is better to serve than to
+be free. If our appetites were let loose altogether against our
+neighbours, they would be like wild beasts uncaged, and bring a deluge
+of calamity on the whole civilised world."
+
+11
+I ended by remarking generally that the genius of the present age is
+wasted by that indifference which with a few exceptions runs through the
+whole of life. If we ever shake off our apathy[7] and apply ourselves to
+work, it is always with a view to pleasure or applause, not for that
+solid advantage which is worthy to be striven for and held in honour.
+
+    [Footnote 7: Comp. Thuc. vi. 26. 2, for this sense of
+    +analambanein+.]
+
+12
+We had better then leave this generation to its fate, and turn to what
+follows, which is the subject of the passions, to which we promised
+early in this treatise to devote a separate work.[8] They play an
+important part in literature generally, and especially in relation to
+the Sublime.
+
+    [Footnote 8: iii. 5.]
+
+
+
+
+NOTES ON LONGINUS
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+Citation format is as in the printed text. The last number in each
+group appears to refer to clauses in the original Greek; there is no
+correspondence with line numbers in the printed book.]
+
+
+I. 2. 10. There seems to be an antithesis implied in +politikois
+tetheorekenai+, referring to the well-known distinction between the
++praktikos bios+ and the +theoretikos bios+.
+
+4. 27. I have ventured to return to the original reading, +diephotisen+,
+though all editors seem to have adopted the correction +diephoresen+, on
+account, I suppose, of +skeptou+. To _illumine_ a large subject, as a
+landscape is lighted up at night by a flash of lightning, is surely a
+far more vivid and intelligible expression than to _sweep away_ a
+subject.[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: Comp. for the metaphor Goethe, _Dichtung und Wahrheit_,
+    B 8. "Wie vor einem Blitz erleuchteten sich uns alle Folgen dieses
+    herrlichen Gedankens."]
+
+
+III. 2. 17. +phorbeias d' ater+, lit. "without a cheek-strap," which was
+worn by trumpeters to assist them in regulating their breath. The line
+is contracted from two of Sophocles's, and Longinus's point is that the
+extravagance of Cleitarchus is not that of a strong but ill-regulated
+nature, but the ludicrous straining after grandeur of a writer at once
+feeble and pretentious.
+
+Ruhnken gives an extract from some inedited "versus politici" of
+Tzetzes, in which are some amusing specimens of those felicities of
+language Longinus is here laughing at. Stones are the "bones," rivers
+the "veins," of the earth; the moon is "the sigma of the sky" (+(lunate
+Sigma)+ the old form of +(Sigma)+); sailors, "the ants of ocean"; the
+strap of a pedlar's pack, "the girdle of his load"; pitch, "the ointment
+of doors," and so on.
+
+
+IV. 4. 4. The play upon the double meaning of +kora+, (1) maiden, (2)
+pupil of the eye, can hardly be kept in English. It is worthy of remark
+that our text of Xenophon has +en tois thalamois+, a perfectly natural
+expression. Such a variation would seem to point to a very early
+corruption of ancient manuscripts, or to extraordinary inaccuracy on the
+part of Longinus, who, indeed, elsewhere displays great looseness of
+citation, confusing together totally different passages.
+
+9. +itamon+. I can make nothing of this word. Various corrections have
+been suggested, but with little certainty.
+
+5. 10. +hos phoriou tinos ephaptomenos+, literally, "as though he were
+laying hands on a piece of stolen property." The point seems to be, that
+plagiarists, like other robbers, show no discrimination in their
+pilferings, seizing what comes first to hand.
+
+
+VIII. 1. 20. +edaphous+. I have avoided the rather harsh confusion of
+metaphor which this word involves, taken in connection with +pegai+.
+
+
+IX. 2. 13. +apechema+, properly an "echo," a metaphor rather Greek than
+English.
+
+
+X. 2. 13. +chlorotera de poias+, lit. "more wan than grass"--of the
+sickly yellow hue which would appear on a dark Southern face under the
+influence of violent emotion.[2]
+
+    [Footnote 2: The notion of _yellowness_, as associated with grass,
+    is made intelligible by a passage in Longus, i. 17. 19. +chloroteron
+    to prosopon en poas _therines_.+]
+
+3. 6. The words +e gar ... tethneken+ are omitted in the translation,
+being corrupt, and giving no satisfactory sense. Ruhnken corrects,
++alogistei, phronei, ptoeitai, e p. o. t.+
+
+18. +splanchnoisi kakos anaballomenoisi.+ Probably of sea-sickness; and
+so I find Ruhnken took it, quoting Plutarch, _T._ ii. 831: +emountos tou
+heterou, kai legontos ta splanchna ekballein+. An objection on the score
+of _taste_ would be out of place in criticising the laureate of the
+Arimaspi.
+
+
+X. 7. 2. +tas exochas aristinden ekkatherantes.+ +aristinden
+ekkatherantes+ appears to be a condensed phrase for +aristinden
+eklexantes kai ekkatherantes+. "Having chosen the most striking
+circumstances _par excellence_, and having relieved them of all
+superfluity," would perhaps give the literal meaning. Longinus seems
+conscious of some strangeness in his language, making a quasi-apology in
++hos an eipoi tis+.
+
+3. Partly with the help of Toup, we may emend this corrupt passage as
+follows: +lumainetai gar tauta to holon, hosanei psegmata e araiomata,
+ta empoiounta megethos te pros allela schesei sunteteichismena+. +to
+holon+ here = "omnino." To explain the process of corruption, +ta+ would
+easily drop out after the final +-ta+ in +araiomata+; +sunoikonomoumena+
+is simply a corruption of +sunoikodomoumena+, which is itself a gloss on
++sunteteichismena+, having afterwards crept into the text; +megethos+
+became corrupted into +megethe+ through the error of some copyist, who
+wished to make it agree with +empoiounta+. The whole maybe translated:
+"Such [interpolations], like so many patches or rents, mar altogether
+the effect of those details which, by being built up in an uninterrupted
+series [+te pros allela sch. suntet.+], produce sublimity in a work."
+
+
+XII. 4. 2. +en auto+; the sense seems clearly to require +en hauto+.
+
+
+XIV. 3. 16. +me ... huperemeron.+ Most of the editors insert +ou+ before
++phthenxaito+, thus ruining the sense of this fine passage. Longinus has
+just said that a writer should always work with an eye to posterity. If
+(he adds) he thinks of nothing but the taste and judgment of his
+contemporaries, he will have no chance of "leaving something so written
+that the world will not willingly let it die." A book, then, which is
++tou idiou biou kai chronou huperemeros+, is a book which is in advance
+of its own times. Such were the poems of Lucretius, of Milton, of
+Wordsworth.[3]
+
+    [Footnote 3: Compare the "Gefluegelte Worte" in the Vorspiel to
+    Goethe's _Faust_:
+      Was glaenzt, ist fuer den Augenblick geboren,
+      Das Aechte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren. ]
+
+
+XV. 5. 23. +pokoeideis kai amalaktous+, lit. "like raw, undressed wool."
+
+
+XVII. 1. 25. I construct the infinit. with +hupopton+, though the
+ordinary interpretation joins +to dia schematon panourgein+: "proprium
+est _verborum lenociniis_ suspicionem movere" (Weiske).
+
+2. 8. +paralephtheisa+. This word has given much trouble; but is it not
+simply a continuation of the metaphor implied in +epikouria+?
++paralambanein tina+, in the sense of calling in an ally, is a common
+enough use. This would be clearer if we could read +paralephtheisi+. I
+have omitted +tou panourgein+ in translating, as it seems to me to have
+evidently crept in from above (p. 33, l. 25). +he tou panourgein
+techne+, "the art of playing the villain," is surely, in Longinus's own
+words, +deinon kai ekphulon+, "a startling novelty" of language.
+
+12. +to photi auto+. The words may remind us of Shelley's "Like a poet
+_hidden in the light of thought_."
+
+
+XVIII. 1. 24. The distinction between +peusis+ or +pusma+ and +erotesis+
+or +erotema+ is said to be that +erotesis+ is a simple question, which
+can be answered yes or no; +peusis+ a fuller inquiry, requiring a fuller
+answer. _Aquila Romanus in libro de figuris sententiarum et
+elocutionis_, Sec. 12 (Weiske).
+
+
+XXXI. 1. 11. +anankophagesai+, properly of the fixed diet of athletes,
+which seems to have been excessive in quantity, and sometimes nauseous
+in quality. I do not know what will be thought of my rendering here; it
+is certainly not elegant, but it was necessary to provide some sort of
+equivalent to the Greek. "Swallow," which the other translators give, is
+quite inadequate. We require a threefold combination--(1) To swallow (2)
+something nasty (3) for the sake of prospective advantage.
+
+
+XXXII. 1. 3. The text is in great confusion here. Following a hint in
+Vahlin's critical note, I have transposed the words thus: +ho kairos de
+tes chreias horos; entha ta pathe cheimarrou diken elaunetai, kai ten
+polupletheian auton hos anankaian entautha sunephelketai; ho gar D.,
+horos kai ton toiouton, anthropoi, phesin, k.t.l.+
+
+8. 16. Some words have probably been lost here. The sense of +plen+, and
+the absence of antithesis to +houtos men+, point in this direction. The
+original reading may have been something of this sort: +plen houtos men
+hupo philoneikias _paregeto_; all' oude ta themata tithesin
+homologoumena+, the sense being that, though we may allow something to
+the partiality of Caecilius, yet this does not excuse him from arguing
+on premises which are unsound.
+
+
+XXXIV. 4. 10. +ho de enthen helon, k.t.l.+ Probably the darkest place in
+the whole treatise. Toup cites a remarkable passage from Dionysius of
+Halicarnassus, from which we may perhaps conclude that Longinus is
+referring here to Thucydides, the traditional master of Demosthenes. _De
+Thucyd._ Sec. 53, +Rhetoron de Demosthenes monos Thoukudidou zelotos
+egeneto kata polla, kai prosetheke tois politikois logois, par' ekeinou
+labon, has oute Antiphon, oute Lusias, oute Isokrates, hoi proteusantes
+ton tote rhetoron, eschon aretas, ta tache lego, kai tas sustrophas, kai
+tous tonous, kai to struphnon, kai ten exegeirousan ta pathe deinoteta.+
+So close a parallel can hardly be accidental.
+
+
+XXXV. 4. 5. Longinus probably had his eye on the splendid lines in
+Pindar's _First Pythian_:
+
+  +tas [Aitnas] ereugontai men aplatou puros hagnotatai
+  ek muchon pagai, potamoi d'
+  hameraisin men procheonti rhoon kapnou--
+  aithon'; all' en orphnaisin petras
+  phoinissa kulindomena phlox es bathei-
+  an pherei pontou plaka sun patago+,
+
+which I find has also been pointed out by Toup, who remarks that
++hagnotatai+ confirms the reading +autou monou+ here, which has been
+suspected without reason.
+
+
+XXXVIII. 2. 7. Comp. Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A: +Tisian de Gorgian te
+easomen heudein, hoi pro ton alethon ta eikota eidon hos timetea mallon,
+ta te au smikra megala kai ta megala smikra poiousi phainesthai dia
+rhomen logou, kaina te archaios ta t' enantia kainos, suntomian te logon
+kai apeira meke peri panton aneuron.+
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX
+
+SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LESS KNOWN WRITERS
+MENTIONED IN THE TREATISE ON THE SUBLIME
+
+
+AMMONIUS.--Alexandrian grammarian, carried on the school of Aristarchus
+previously to the reign of Augustus. The allusion here is to a work on
+the passages in which Plato has imitated Homer. (Suidas, _s.v._; Schol.
+on Hom. Il. ix. 540, quoted by Jahn.)
+
+AMPHIKRATES.--Author of a book _On Famous Men_, referred to by
+Athenaeus, xiii. 576, G, and Diog. Laert. ii. 101. C. Muller, _Hist. Gr.
+Fragm._ iv. p. 300, considers him to be the Athenian rhetorician who,
+according to Plutarch (_Lucullus_, c. 22), retired to Seleucia, and
+closed his life at the Court of Kleopatra, daughter of Mithridates and
+wife of Tigranes (Pauly, _Real-Encyclopaedie der classischen
+Alterthumswissenschaft_). Plutarch tells a story illustrative of his
+arrogance. Being asked by the Seleucians to open a school of rhetoric,
+he replied, "A dish is not large enough for a dolphin" (+hos oude lekane
+delphina choroie+), v. _Luculli_, c. 22, quoted by Pearce.
+
+ARISTEAS.--A name involved in a mist of fable. According to Suidas he
+was a contemporary of Kroesus, though Herodotus assigns to him a much
+remoter antiquity. The latter authority describes him as visiting the
+northern peoples of Europe and recording his travels in an epic poem, a
+fragment of which is given here by Longinus. The passage before us
+appears to be intended as the words of some Arimaspian, who, as
+belonging to a remote inland race, expresses his astonishment that any
+men could be found bold enough to commit themselves to the mercy of the
+sea, and tries to describe the terror of human beings placed in such a
+situation (Pearce ad. l.; Abicht on Hdt. iv. 12; Suidas, _s.v._)
+
+BAKCHYLIDES, nephew and pupil of the great Simonides, flourished about
+460 B.C. He followed his uncle to the Court of Hiero at Syracuse, and
+enjoyed the patronage of that despot. After Hiero's death he returned to
+his home in Keos; but finding himself discontented with the mode of life
+pursued in a free Greek community, for which his experiences at Hiero's
+Court may well have disqualified him, he retired to Peloponnesus, where
+he died. His works comprise specimens of almost every kind of lyric
+composition, as practised by the Greeks of his time. Horace is said to
+have imitated him in his _Prophecy of Nereus_, c. I. xv. (Pauly, as
+above). So far as we can judge from what remains of his works, he was
+distinguished rather by elegance than by force. A considerable fragment
+on the Blessings of Peace has been translated by Mr. J. A. Symonds in
+his work on the Greek poets. He is made the subject of a very bitter
+allusion by Pindar (Ol. ii. s. fin. c. Schol.) We may suppose that the
+stern and lofty spirit of Pindar had little sympathy with the "tearful"
+(Catullus, xxxviii.) strains of Simonides or his imitators.
+
+CAECILIUS, a native of Kale Akte in Sicily, and hence known as Caecilius
+Kalaktinus, lived in Rome at the time of Augustus. He is mentioned with
+distinction as a learned Greek rhetorician and grammarian, and was the
+author of numerous works, frequently referred to by Plutarch and other
+later writers. He may be regarded as one of the most distinguished Greek
+rhetoricians of his time. His works, all of which have perished,
+comprised, among many others, commentaries on Antipho and Lysias;
+several treatises on Demosthenes, among which is a dissertation on the
+genuine and spurious speeches, and another comparing that orator with
+Cicero; "On the Distinction between Athenian and Asiatic Eloquence"; and
+the work on the Sublime, referred to by Longinus (Pauly). The criticism
+of Longinus on the above work may be thus summed up: Caecilius is
+censured (1) as failing to rise to the dignity of his subject; (2) as
+missing the cardinal points; and (3) as failing in practical utility. He
+wastes his energy in tedious attempts to define the Sublime, but does
+not tell us how it is to be attained (I. i.) He is further blamed for
+omitting to deal with the Pathetic (VIII. i. _sqq._) He allows only two
+metaphors to be employed together in the same passage (XXXII. ii.) He
+extols Lysias as a far greater writer than Plato (_ib._ viii.), and is a
+bitter assailant of Plato's style (_ib._) On the whole, he seems to have
+been a cold and uninspired critic, finding his chief pleasure in minute
+verbal details, and incapable of rising to an elevated and extensive
+view of his subject.
+
+ERATOSTHENES, a native of Cyrene, born in 275 B.C.; appointed by Ptolemy
+III. Euergetes as the successor of Kallimachus in the post of librarian
+in the great library of Alexandria. He was the teacher of Aristophanes
+of Byzantium, and his fame as a man of learning is testified by the
+various fanciful titles which were conferred on him, such as "The
+Pentathlete," "The second Plato," etc. His great work was a treatise on
+geography (Luebker).
+
+GORGIAS of Leontini, according to some authorities a pupil of
+Empedokles, came, when already advanced in years, as ambassador from his
+native city to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.) Here he attracted
+notice by a novel style of eloquence. Some time after he settled
+permanently in Greece, wandering from city to city, and acquiring wealth
+and fame by practising and teaching rhetoric. We find him last in
+Larissa, where he died at the age of a hundred in 375 B.C. As a teacher
+of eloquence Gorgias belongs to what is known as the Sicilian school, in
+which he followed the steps of his predecessors, Korax and Tisias. At
+the time when this school arose the Greek ear was still accustomed to
+the rhythm and beat of poetry, and the whole rhetorical system of the
+Gorgian school (compare the phrases +gorgieia schemata+, +gorgiazein+)
+is built on a poetical plan (Luebker, _Reallexikon des classischen
+Alterthums_). Hermogenes, as quoted by Jahn, appears to classify him
+among the "hollow pedants" (+hupoxuloi sophistai+), "who," he says,
+"talk of vultures as 'living tombs,' to which they themselves would best
+be committed, and indulge in many other such frigid conceits." (With the
+metaphor censured by Longinus compare Achilles Tatius, III. v. 50, ed.
+Didot.) See also Plato, _Phaedrus_, 267, A.
+
+HEGESIAS of Magnesia, rhetorician and historian, contemporary of Timaeus
+(300 B.C.) He belongs to the period of the decline of Greek learning,
+and Cicero treats him as the representative of the decline of taste. His
+style was harsh and broken in character, and a parody on the Old Attic.
+He wrote a life of Alexander the Great, of which Plutarch (_Alexander_,
+c. 3) gives the following specimen: "On the day of Alexander's birth the
+temple of Artemis in Ephesus was burnt down, a coincidence which
+occasions Hegesias to utter a conceit frigid enough to extinguish the
+conflagration. 'It was natural,' he says, 'that the temple should be
+burnt down, as Artemis was engaged with bringing Alexander into the
+world'" (Pauly, with the references).
+
+HEKATAEUS of Miletus, the logographer; born in 549 B.C., died soon after
+the battle of Plataea. He was the author of two works--(1) +periodos
+ges+; and (2) +geneelogiai+. The _Periodos_ deals in two books, first
+with Europe, then with Asia and Libya. The quotation in the text is from
+his genealogies (Luebker).
+
+ION of Chios, poet, historian, and philosopher, highly distinguished
+among his contemporaries, and mentioned by Strabo among the celebrated
+men of the island. He won the tragic prize at Athens in 452 B.C., and
+Aristophanes (_Peace_, 421 B.C.) speaks of him as already dead. He was
+not less celebrated as an elegiac poet, and we still possess some
+specimens of his elegies, which are characterised by an Anacreontic
+spirit, a cheerful, joyous tone, and even by a certain degree of
+inspiration. He wrote also Skolia, Hymns, and Epigrams, and was a pretty
+voluminous writer in prose (Pauly). Compare the Scholiast on Ar.
+_Peace_, 801.
+
+KALLISTHENES of Olynthus, a near relative of Aristotle; born in 360, and
+educated by the philosopher as fellow-pupil with Alexander, afterwards
+the Great. He subsequently visited Athens, where he enjoyed the
+friendship of Theophrastus, and devoted himself to history and natural
+philosophy. He afterwards accompanied Alexander on his Asiatic
+expedition, but soon became obnoxious to the tyrant on account of his
+independent and manly bearing, which he carried even to the extreme of
+rudeness and arrogance. He at last excited the enmity of Alexander to
+such a degree that the latter took the opportunity afforded by the
+conspiracy of Hermolaus, in which Kallisthenes was accused of
+participating, to rid himself of his former school companion, whom he
+caused to be put to death. He was the author of various historical and
+scientific works. Of the latter two are mentioned--(1) _On the Nature of
+the Eye_; (2) _On the Nature of Plants_. Among his historical works are
+mentioned (1) the _Phocian War_ (read "Phocicum" for v. l. "Troikum" in
+Cic. _Epp. ad Div._ v. 12); (2) a _History of Greece_ in ten books; (3)
++ta Persika+, apparently identical with the description of Alexander's
+march, of which we still possess fragments. As an historian he seems to
+have displayed an undue love of recording signs and wonders. Polybius,
+however (vi. 45), classes him among the best historical writers. His
+style is said by Cicero (_de Or._ ii. 14) to approximate to the
+rhetorical (Pauly).
+
+KLEITARCHUS, a contemporary of Alexander, accompanied that monarch on
+his Asiatic expedition, and wrote a history of the same in twelve books,
+which must have included at least a short retrospect on the early
+history of Asia. His talents are spoken of in high terms, but his credit
+as an historian is held very light--"probatur ingenium, fides
+infamatur," Quint. x. 1, 74. Cicero also (_de Leg._ i. 2) ranks him very
+low. That his credit as an historian was sacrificed to a childish
+credulity and a foolish love of fable and adventure is sufficiently
+testified by the pretty numerous fragments which still remain (Pauly).
+Demetrius Phalereus, quoted by Pearce, quotes a grandiloquent
+description of the wasp taken from Kleitarchus, "feeding on the
+mountainside, her home the hollow oak."
+
+MATRIS, a native of Thebes, author of a panegyric on Herakles, whether
+in verse or prose is uncertain. In one passage Athenaeus speaks of him
+as an Athenian, but this must be a mistake. Toup restores a verse from
+an allusion in Diodorus Siculus (i. 24), which, if genuine, would agree
+well with the description given of him by Longinus: +Eraklea kaleesken,
+hoti kleos esche dia Heran+ (see Toup ad Long. III. ii.)
+
+PHILISTUS of Syracuse, a relative of the elder Dionysius, whom he
+assisted with his wealth in his attack on the liberty of that city, and
+remained with him until 386 B.C., when he was banished by the jealous
+suspicions of the tyrant. He retired to Epirus, where he remained until
+Dionysius's death. The younger Dionysius recalled him, wishing to employ
+him in the character of supporter against Dion. By his instrumentality
+it would seem that Dion and Plato were banished from Syracuse. He
+commanded the fleet in the struggle between Dion and Dionysius, and lost
+a battle, whereupon he was seized and put to death by the people. During
+his banishment he wrote his historical work, +ta Sikelika+, divided into
+two parts and numbering eleven books. The first division embraced the
+history of Sicily from the earliest times down to the capture of
+Agrigentum (seven books), and the remaining four books dealt with the
+life of Dionysius the elder. He afterwards added a supplement in two
+books, giving an account of the younger Dionysius, which he did not,
+however, complete. He is described as an imitator, though at a great
+distance, of Thucydides, and hence was known as "the little Thucydides."
+As an historian he is deficient in conscientiousness and candour; he
+appears as a partisan of Dionysius, and seeks to throw a veil over his
+discreditable actions. Still he belongs to the most important of the
+Greek historians (Luebker).
+
+THEODORUS of Gadara, a rhetorician in the first century after Christ;
+tutor of Tiberius, first in Rome, afterwards in Rhodes, from which town
+he called himself a Rhodian, and where Tiberius during his exile
+diligently attended his instruction. He was the author of various
+grammatical and other works, but his fame chiefly rested on his
+abilities as a teacher, in which capacity he seems to have had great
+influence (Pauly). He was the author of that famous description of
+Tiberius which is given by Suetonius (_Tib._ 57), +pelos haimati
+pephuramenos+, "A clod kneaded together with blood."[1]
+
+    [Footnote 1: A remarkable parallel, if not actually an imitation,
+    occurs in Goethe's _Faust_, "Du Spottgeburt von Dreck und Feuer."]
+
+THEOPOMPUS, a native of Chios; born 380 B.C. He came to Athens while
+still a boy, and studied eloquence under Isokrates, who is said, in
+comparing him with another pupil, Ephorus, to have made use of the image
+which we find in Longinus, c. ii. "Theopompus," he said, "needs the
+curb, Ephorus the spur" (Suidas, quoted by Jahn ad v.) He appeared with
+applause in various great cities as an advocate, but especially
+distinguished himself in the contest of eloquence instituted by
+Artemisia at the obsequies of her husband Mausolus, where he won the
+prize. He afterwards devoted himself to historical composition. His
+great work was a history of Greece, in which he takes up the thread of
+Thucydides's narrative, and carries it on uninterruptedly in twelve
+books down to the battle of Knidus, seventeen years later. Here he broke
+off, and began a new work entitled _The Philippics_, in fifty-eight
+books. This work dealt with the history of Greece in the Macedonian
+period, but was padded out to a preposterous bulk by all kinds of
+digressions on mythological, historical, or social topics. Only a few
+fragments remain. He earned an ill name among ancient critics by the
+bitterness of his censures, his love of the marvellous, and the
+inordinate length of his digressions. His style is by some critics
+censured as feeble, and extolled by others as clear, nervous, and
+elevated (Luebker and Pauly).
+
+TIMAEUS, a native of Tauromenium in Sicily; born about 352 B.C. Being
+driven out of Sicily by Agathokles, he lived a retired life for fifty
+years in Athens, where he composed his History. Subsequently he returned
+to Sicily, and died at the age of ninety-six in 256 B.C. His chief work
+was a _History of Sicily_ from the earliest times down to the 129th
+Olympiad. It numbered sixty-eight books, and consisted of two principal
+divisions, whose limits cannot now be ascertained. In a separate work he
+handled the campaigns of Pyrrhus, and also wrote _Olympionikae_,
+probably dealing with chronological matters. Timaeus has been severely
+criticised and harshly condemned by the ancients, especially by
+Polybius, who denies him every faculty required by the historical writer
+(xii. 3-15, 23-28). And though Cicero differs from this judgment, yet it
+may be regarded as certain that Timaeus was better qualified for the
+task of learned compilation than for historical research, and held no
+distinguished place among the historians of Greece. His works have
+perished, only a few fragments remaining (Luebker).
+
+ZOILUS, a Greek rhetorician, native of Amphipolis in Macedonia, in the
+time probably of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247 B.C.), who is said by
+Vitruvius to have crucified him for his abuse of Homer. He won the name
+of Homeromastix, "the scourge of Homer," and was also known as +kuon
+rhetorikos+, "the dog of rhetoric," on account of his biting sarcasm;
+and his name (as in the case of the English Dennis) came to be used to
+signify in general a carping and malicious critic. Suidas mentions two
+works of his, written with the object of injuring or destroying the fame
+of Homer--(1) _Nine Books against Homer_; and (2) _Censures on Homer_
+(Pauly).
+
+  [The facts contained in the above short notices are taken chiefly
+  from Luebker's _Reallexikon des classischen Alterthums_, and the
+  very copious and elaborate _Real-Encyclopaedie der classischen
+  Alterthumswissenschaft_, edited by Pauly. I have here to acknowledge
+  the kindness of Dr. Wollseiffen, Gymnasialdirektor in Crefeld, in
+  placing at my disposal the library of the Crefeld Gymnasium, but for
+  which these biographical notes, which were put together at the
+  suggestion of Mr. Lang, could not have been compiled.
+    CREFELD, _31st July 1890_.]
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_
+
+
+
+
+CLASSICAL LIBRARY.
+
+Texts, Edited with Introductions and Notes, for the use of Advanced
+Students; Commentaries and Translations.
+
+
+AESCHYLUS.--THE SUPPLICES. A Revised Text, with Translation. By T. G.
+  TUCKER, M.A., Professor of Classical Philology in the University of
+  Melbourne.    8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+THE SEVEN AGAINST THEBES. With Translation. By A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.,
+  Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.    8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+AGAMEMNON. With Translation. By A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.    8vo.    12s.
+
+AGAMEMNON, CHOEPHOROE, AND EUMENIDES. By A. O. PRICKARD, M.A., Fellow
+  and Tutor of New College, Oxford.    8vo.    [_In preparation._
+
+
+ARISTOTLE.--THE METAPHYSICS. BOOK I. Translated by a Cambridge
+  Graduate.    8vo.    5s.
+
+THE POLITICS. Translated by Rev. J. E. C. WELLDON, M.A., Headmaster of
+  Harrow.    Cr. 8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+THE RHETORIC. Translated by the same.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+AN INTRODUCTION TO ARISTOTLE'S RHETORIC. With Analysis, Notes, and
+  Appendices. By E. M. COPE, Fellow and late Tutor of Trinity College,
+  Cambridge.    8vo.    14s.
+
+THE ETHICS. Translated by Rev. J. E. C. WELLDON, M.A.    Cr. 8vo.
+                                                 [_In preparation._
+
+THE SOPHISTICI ELENCHI. With Translation. By E. POSTE, M.A., Fellow of
+  Oriel College, Oxford.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
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+ATTIC ORATORS.--FROM ANTIPHON TO ISAEOS. By R. C. JEBB, Litt.D.,
+  Regius Professor of Greek in the University of Cambridge.    2 vols.
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+
+
+BABRIUS.--With Lexicon. By Rev. W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D.,
+  Headmaster of Westminster.    8vo.    12s. 6d.
+
+
+CICERO.--THE ACADEMICA. By J. S. REID, Litt.D., Fellow of Caius
+  College, Cambridge.    8vo.    15s.
+
+THE ACADEMICS. Translated by the same.    8vo.    5s. 6d.
+
+SELECT LETTERS. After the Edition of ALBERT WATSON, M.A. Translated by
+  G. E. JEANS, M.A., Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford.    Cr. 8vo.
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+
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+EURIPIDES.--MEDEA. Edited by A. W. VERRALL, Litt.D.    8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+IPHIGENIA IN AULIS. Edited by E. B. ENGLAND, M.A.    8vo.
+                                                      [_In the Press._
+
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+HERODOTUS.--BOOKS I.-III. THE ANCIENT EMPIRES OF THE EAST. Edited by
+  A. H. SAYCE, Deputy-Professor of Comparative Philology, Oxford.
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+
+BOOKS IV.-IX. Edited by R. W. MACAN, M.A., Lecturer in Ancient History
+  at Brasenose College, Oxford.    8vo.             [_In preparation._
+
+THE HISTORY. Translated by G. C. MACAULAY, M.A.    2 vols.    Cr. 8vo.
+  18s.
+
+
+HOMER.--THE ILIAD. By WALTER LEAF, Litt.D.    8vo.    Books I.-XII.
+  14s.    Books XIII.-XXIV. 14s.
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+THE ILIAD. Translated into English Prose by ANDREW LANG, M.A., WALTER
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+
+THE ODYSSEY. Done into English by S. H. BUTCHER, M.A., Professor of
+  Greek in the University of Edinburgh, and ANDREW LANG, M.A.
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+
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+HORACE.--STUDIES, LITERARY AND HISTORICAL, IN THE ODES OF HORACE. By
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+
+
+JUVENAL.--THIRTEEN SATIRES OF JUVENAL. By JOHN E. B. MAYOR, M.A.,
+  Professor of Latin in the University of Cambridge.    Cr. 8vo.
+  2 vols. 10s. 6d. each.    Vol. I. 10s. 6d.    Vol. II. 10s. 6d.
+
+THIRTEEN SATIRES. Translated by ALEX. LEEPER, M.A., LL.D., Warden of
+  Trinity College, Melbourne.    Cr. 8vo.    3s. 6d.
+
+
+KTESIAS.--THE FRAGMENTS OF THE PERSIKA OF KTESIAS. By JOHN GILMORE,
+  M.A.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
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+LIVY.--BOOKS XXI.-XXV. Translated by A. J. CHURCH, M.A., and W. J.
+  BRODRIBB, M.A.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+PAUSANIAS.--DESCRIPTION OF GREECE. Translated with Commentary by
+  J. G. FRAZER, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.
+                                                    [_In preparation._
+
+
+PHRYNICHUS.--THE NEW PHRYNICHUS; being a Revised Text of the Ecloga of
+  the Grammarian Phrynichus. With Introduction and Commentary by Rev.
+  W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D., Headmaster of Westminster.    8vo.
+  18s.
+
+
+PINDAR.--THE EXTANT ODES OF PINDAR. Translated by ERNEST MYERS, M.A.
+  Cr. 8vo.    5s.
+
+THE NEMEAN ODES. By J. B. BURY, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College,
+  Dublin.    8vo.                                     [_In the Press._
+
+
+PLATO.--PHAEDO. By R. D. ARCHER-HIND, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College,
+  Cambridge.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+PHAEDO. By W. D. GEDDES, LL.D., Principal of the University of
+  Aberdeen.    8vo.    8s. 6d.
+
+TIMAEUS. With Translation. By R. D. ARCHER-HIND, M.A.    8vo.    16s.
+
+THE REPUBLIC OF PLATO. Translated by J. LL. DAVIES, M.A., and D. J.
+  VAUGHAN, M.A.    18mo.    4s. 6d.
+
+EUTHYPHRO, APOLOGY, CRITO, AND PHAEDO. Translated by F. J. CHURCH.
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+
+
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+  RAMSAY, M.A., Professor of Humanity in the University of Glasgow.
+  8vo.    14s.
+
+
+PLINY.--CORRESPONDENCE WITH TRAJAN. C. Plinii Caecilii Secundi
+  Epistulae ad Traianum Imperatorem cum Eiusdem Responsis. By E. G.
+  HARDY, M.A.    8vo.    10s. 6d.
+
+
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+  M.A.    2 vols.    Cr. 8vo.    24s.
+
+
+TACITUS.--THE ANNALS. By G. O. HOLBROOKE, M.A., Professor of Latin in
+  Trinity College, Hartford, U.S.A. With Maps.    8vo.    16s.
+
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+  With Maps.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+THE HISTORIES. By Rev. W. A. SPOONER, M.A., Fellow of New College,
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+  4s. 6d.
+
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+
+
+THUCYDIDES.--BOOK IV. A Revision of the Text, Illustrating the
+  Principal Causes of Corruption in the Manuscripts of this Author.
+  By Rev. W. G. RUTHERFORD, M.A., LL.D., Headmaster of Westminster.
+  8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+VIRGIL.--THE AENEID. Translated by J. W. MACKAIL, M.A., Fellow of
+  Balliol College, Oxford.    Cr. 8vo.    7s. 6d.
+
+
+XENOPHON.--Translated by H. G. DAKYNS, M.A. In four vols. Vol. I.,
+  containing "The Anabasis" and Books I. and II. of "The Hellenica."
+  Cr. 8vo.    10s. 6d.                       [Vol. II. _in the Press._
+
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+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+           *       *       *       *
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Errata Noted by Transcriber:
+
+The spellings "Heracles" and "Herakles" each occur twice.
+
+certain tasteless conceits blamed / in Plato
+  _so in original: "on Plato"?_
+
+I.2 And since...
+  _text shows chapter break in previous line, "writer's ... instead"_
+
+... the very maidens in their eyes."[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
++... choris hekasto ton eidon+
+  _text reads_ hekasio  [_alternate citation form: 1449b_]
+
+XXIII.4 And in those words ...
+  _text shows chapter break in following line, "already ... to the"_
+
+... a good and temperate drink."[1]
+  _close quote missing in text_
+
+XXXIX.3 though these are mere shadows...
+  _chapter break conjectural: no sentence-ends in English text_
+
+APPENDIX
+  _any punctuation anomalies, including missing full stops after
+  sentence-final parentheses, are as in the original_
+
+to ask help against Syracuse (427 B.C.)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+the capture of Agrigentum (seven books)
+  _open parenthesis missing in text_
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Sublime, by Longinus
+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
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author	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-15 04:52:13 -0700
committer	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-15 04:52:13 -0700
commit	83691e20fe8533dfd6b4f0d0874cd5f0f95d40aa (patch)
tree	716524b0439c93406dab3a775d04fcaea87f213b