orders. Each order, also, is distinguished by its final accent and pause: the unequal division in the first order makes an impression of ascending; and the mind at the close is in the highest elevation, which naturally prompts it to put a strong emphasis upon the concluding syllable, whether by raising the voice to a sharper tone, or by expressing the word in a fuller tone. This order accordingly is of all the least proper for concluding a period, where a cadence is proper and not an accent. The second order, being destitute of the impression of ascent, cannot rival the first order in the elevation of its concluding accent, nor consequently in the dignity of its concluding pause; for these have a mutual influence. This order, however, with respect to its close, maintains a superiority over the third and fourth orders in these the close is more humble, being brought down by the impression of descent, and by the remitted effort in pronouncing; considerably in the third order, and still more considerably in the last. According to this description, the concluding accents and pauses of the four orders being reduced to a scale, will form a descending series probably in an arithmetical progression. After what is said, will it be thought refining too much to suggest, that the different orders are qualified for different purposes, and that a poet of genius will naturally be led to make a choice accordingly? I cannot think this altogether chimerical. As it appears to me, the first order is proper for a sentiment that is bold, lively, or impetuous; the third order is proper for what is grave, solemn, or lofty; the second for what is tender, delicate, or melancholy, and in general for all the sympathetic emotions; and the last for subjects of the same kind, when tempered with any degree of solemnity. I do not contend that any one order is fitted for no other task than that assigned it; for at that rate no sort of melody would be left for accompanying thoughts that have nothing peculiar in them. I only venture to suggest, and I do it with diffidence, that each of the orders is peculiarly adapted to certain subjects, and better qualified than the others for expressing them. The best way to judge is by experiment; and to avoid the imputation of a partial search, I shall confine my instances to a single poem, beginning with the First order: On her white breast, a sparkling cross she wore, Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride, Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide : If to her share some female errors fall, Look on her face, and you'll forget them all.—Rape of the Lock. In accounting for the remarkable liveliness of this passage, it will be acknowledged by every one who has an ear, that the melody must come in for a share. The lines, all of them, are of the first order; a very unusual circumstance in the author of this poem, so eminent for variety in his versification. Who can doubt that he has been led by delicacy of taste to employ the first order preferably to the others. Second order: Again: Our humbler province is to tend the fair, Not a less pleasing, though less glorious care; To draw fresh colours from the vernal flowers; To steal from rainbows, ere they drop their showers, &c. Oh, thoughtless mortals! ever blind to fate, Third order. Again: To fifty chosen Sylphs, of special note, O say what stranger cause, yet unexplor'd, A plurality of lines of the fourth order would not have a good effect in succession; because, by a remarkable tendency to rest, their proper office is to close a period. The reader, therefore, must be satisfied with instances where this order is mixed with others. Not louder shrieks to pitying Heav'n are cast, Again : Steel could the works of mortal pride confound, Again: She sees, and trembles at th' approaching ill, Again: With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face, He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case. And this suggests another experiment, which is, to set the different orders more directly in opposition, by giving examples, where they are mixed in the same passage. First and second orders. Sol through white curtains shot a tim'rous ray, Jove's thunder roars, heav'n trembles all around, Second and third. Again: Sunk in Thalestris' arms, the nymph he found, On her heav'd bosom hung her drooping head, Musing on the foregoing subject, I begin to doubt whether all this while I have not been in a reverie, and whether the scene before me, full of objects new and singular, be not mere fairy-land. Is there any truth in the appearance, or is it wholly a work of imagination? We cannot doubt of its reality; and we may with assurance pronounce, that great is the merit of English heroic verse: for though uniformity prevails in the arrangement, in the equality of the lines, and in the resemblance of the final sounds, variety is still more conspicuous in the pauses and in the accents, which are diversified in a surprising manner. Of the beauty that results from a due mixture of uniformity and variety,* many instances have already occurred, but none more illustrious than English versification; however rude it may be in the simplicity of its arrangement, * See chap. 9. 1 it is highly melodious by its pauses and accents, so as already to rival the most perfect species known in Rome or Greece; and it is no disagreeable prospect to find it susceptible of still greater refinement. We proceed to blank verse, which has so many circumstances in common with rhyme, that its peculiarities may be brought within a narrow compass. With respect to form, it differs from rhyme in rejecting the jingle of similar sounds, which purifies it from a childish pleasure. But this improvement is a trifle compared with what follows. Our verse is extremely cramped by rhyme; and the peculiar advantage of blank verse is, that it is at liberty to attend the imagination in its boldest flights. Rhyme necessarily divides verse into couplets; each couplet makes a complete musical period, the parts of which are divided by pauses, and the whole summed up by a full close at the end: the melody begins anew with the next couplet; and in this manner a composition in rhyme proceeds, couplet after couplet. I have often had occasion to mention the correspondence and concord that ought to subsist between sound and sense; from which it is a plain inference, that if a couplet be a complete period with regard to melody, it ought regularly to be the same with regard to sense. As it is extremely difficult to support such strictness of composition, licences are indulged, as explained above; which, however, must be used with discretion, so as to preserve some degree of concord between the sense and the music: there ought never to be a full close in the sense but at the end of a couplet; and there ought always to be some pause in the sense at the end of every couplet: the same period as to sense may be extended through several couplets; but each couplet ought to contain a distinct member, distinguished by a pause in the sense as well as in the sound; and the whole ought to be closed with a complete cadence.* Rules such as these must confine rhyme within very narrow bounds. A thought of any extent cannot be reduced within its compass the sense must be curtailed and broken into parts, to make it square with the curtness of the melody; and, besides, short periods afford no latitude for inver sion. I have examined this point with the stricter accuracy, in order to give a just notion of blank verse; and to shew, that a slight difference in form may produce a great difference in substance. Blank verse has the same pauses and accents with rhyme; and a pause at the end of every line, like what concludes the first line of a couplet. In a word, the rules of melody in blank verse are the same that obtain with respect to the first line of a couplet; but being disengaged from rhyme, or from couplets, there is access to make every line run into another, precisely as to make the first line of a couplet run into the second. There must be a musical pause at the end of every line; but this pause is so slight as not to require a pause in This rule is quite neglected in French versification. Even Boileau makes no difficulty to close one subject with the first line of a couplet, and to begin a new subject with the second. Such licence, however sanctioned by practice, is unpleasant by the discordance between the pauses of the sense and of the melody. the sense; and, accordingly, the sense may be carried on with or without pauses, till a period of the utmost extent be completed by a full close both in the sense and the sound. There is no restraint other than that this full close be at the end of a line; and this restraint is necessary, in order to preserve a coincidence between sense and sound; which ought to be aimed at in general, and is indispensable in the case of a full close, because it has a striking effect. Hence the fitness of blank verse for inversion ; and, consequently, the lustre of its pauses and accents; for which, as observed above, there is greater scope in inversion, that when words run in their natural order. In the second section of this chapter it is shewn, that nothing contributes more than inversion to the force and elevation of language. The couplets of rhyme confine inversion within narrow limits; nor would the elevation of inversion, were there access for it in rhyme, readily accord with the humbler tone of that sort of verse. It is universally agreed, that the loftiness of Milton's style supports admirably the sublimity of his subject; and it is not less certain, that the loftiness of his style arises chiefly from inversion. Shakspeare deals little in inversion; but his blank verse being a sort of measured prose, is perfectly well adapted to the stage, where laboured inversion is highly improper, because in dialogue it never can be natural. Hitherto I have considered that superior power of expression which verse acquires by laying aside rhyme. But this is not the only ground for preferring blank verse: it has another preferable quality not less signal; and that is, a more extensive and more complete melody. Its music is not, like that of rhyme, confined to a single couplet, but takes in a great compass, so as in some measure to rival music, properly so called. The interval between its cadences may be long or short at pleasure; and, by that means, its melody, with respect both to richness and variety, is superior far to that of rhyme, and superior even to that of the Greek and Latin Hexameter. Of this observation no person can doubt who is acquainted with the Paradise Lost in which work there are indeed many careless lines; but at every turn the richest melody as well as the sublimest sentiments are conspicuous. Take the following specimen : Now Morn her rosy steps in th' eastern clime And temp'rate vapours bland, which th' only sound |