CONTENTS FAMILY GOVERNMENT. Herbert Spencer.... ESSAY ON CRITICISM. Alexander Pope... SHALL WE LIVE AGAIN? Victor Hugo. ..... 93 MODELS FOR STUDY ON EXCELLENCE IN STYLE BY ARISTOTLE Let excellence of style be defined to consist in its being clear (a sign of this is this, that the diction, unless it make the sentiment clear, will not affect its purpose); and neither low, nor above the dignity of the subject, but in good taste; for the style of poetry, indeed, is not low, yet it is not becoming in prose. Of nouns and verbs, those which are in gen-, eral use produce the effect of clearness; to prevent its being low, and to give it ornament, there are other nouns which have been men tioned in the "Poetics, " for a departure [from ordinary acceptations] causes it to appear more dignified; for men are affected in respect of style in the very same way as they are toward foreigners and citizens. On which account you should give your phrase a foreign air; for men are admirers of things out of the way, and what is an object of admiration is pleasant. Now in the case of metrical compositions, there are many things which produce this effect, and they are very becoming, because both the subject and the person stand more apart [from ordinary life]; in prose, however, these helps are much fewer, for the subject is less exalted: since even in that art were a slave, or a mere youth, or [any one, in fact, in speaking] of mere trifles to express himself in terms of studied ornament, it would be rather unbecoming; but there, too [as in poetry], the rule of good taste is that your style be lowered or raised according to the subject. On which account we must escape observation in doing this, and not appear to speak in a studied manner, but naturally, for the one is of a tendency to persuade, the other is the very reverse; because people put themselves on their guard, as tho against one who has a design upon them, just as they would against adulterated wine. [Let your style, then, be such] as was the case with the voice of Theodorus as compared with that of the other actors; for it appeared to be that of the character which was speaking, theirs, however, were foreign from the character. And the deceit is neatly passed off if one frame his nomenclature upon a selection from ordinary conversation; the thing which Euripides does, and first gave the hint of. As, however, nouns and verbs are [the materials] of which the speech is made up, and as nouns admit so many species as have been examined in the "Poetics," out of the number of these we must employ but sparingly, and in very few places, exotic and compound words, and those newly coined; where they |