tant and high, the towers of Bowes like steel upon the anvil glows; and Stanmore's ridge, behind that lay, rich with the spoils of parting day, in crimson and in gold arrayed, streaks yet awhile the closing shade, then slow resigns to darkening heaven the tints which brighter hours have given. Thus aged men, full loth and slow, the vanities of life forego, and count their youthful follies o'er, till Memory lends her light no more. The eve, that slow on upland fades, has darker closed on Rokeby's glades, where, sunk within their banks profound, her guardian streams to meeting wound. The stately oaks, whose sombre frown of noontide made a twilight brown, impervious now to fainter light, of twilight make an early night. Hoarse into middle air arose the vespers of the roosting crows, and with congenial murmurs seem to wake the Genii of the stream; for louder clamoured Greta's tide, and Tees in deeper voice replied, and fitful waked the evening wind, fitful in sighs its breath resigned. Scott.

159. GOOD BYE.

GOOD-BYE, proud world! I'm going home:
Thou art not my friend, and I'm not thine:
Long through thy weary crowds I roam;
A river-ark on the ocean brine;

Long I've been tossed like the driven foam,
But now, proud world! I'm going home.

Good-bye to Flattery's fawning face;
To Grandeur with his wise grimace;

To upstart Wealth's averted eye;

To supple Office, low and high;

To crowded halls, to court and street;

To frozen hearts and hasting feet;
To those who go, and those who come;
Good-bye, proud world! I'm going home.
I am going to my own hearth-stone,
Bosomed in yon green hills alone,
A secret nook in a pleasant land,
Whose groves the frolic fairies planned;
Where arches green, the livelong day,
Echo the blackbird's roundelay,

And vulgar feet have never trod,

A spot that is sacred to thought and God.
O, when I am safe in my sylvan home,
I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome;

And when I am stretched beneath the pines,
Where the evening star so holy shines,

I laugh at the lore and the pride of man,
At the sophist schools, and the learned clan;
For what are they all, in their high conceit,
When man in the bush with God may meet!

Emerson.

XX. ANTITHESIS.

160 ROME has the West. Let Palmyra possess the East. Not that nature prescribes this and no more. The gods prospering, and I swear not that the Mediterranean shall hem me in upon the west, or Persia on the east. Longinus is right, I would that the world were mine. I feel, within, the will and the power to bless it, were it so.

161 AND yet when all is thought and said,

The heart still overrules the head;
Still what we hope we must believe,
And what is given us receive;

Must still believe, for still we hope
That in a world of larger scope,
What here is faithfully begun

Will be completed, not undone.

Ware.

ONE of the simplest means by which we can test the method

and processes of the mind, is antithesis. "Antithesis is the soul of oratory." All thinking is dependent upon discrimination; this is its most fundamental element. The application of antithesis to Vocal Expression and delivery was one of the earliest discoveries in English elocution. Thomas Sheridan discussed it in his lectures in 1754. He writes:

The necessity of observing propriety of emphasis is so great, that the true meaning of words cannot be conveyed without it. For the same individual words, ranged in the same order, may have several different meanings, according to the placing of the emphasis. Thus, to use a trite instance, the following sentence may have as many different meanings as there are words in it, by varying the emphasis: "Will you ride to town to-morrow?" If

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the emphasis is on 'will,' as, Will you ride to town to-morrow? it implies that the person spoken to had expressed before such an intention, but that there is some doubt in the questioner whether he be determined on it or not, and the answer may be, "Certainly;" or, "I am not sure." If it be on 'you,' as, Will you ride to town tomorrow? the question implies that some one is to go, and do you mean to go yourself, or send some one in your stead? and the answer may be," No; but my servant will." If on ' ride,' as, Will you ride, etc., the answer may be, "No; I shall walk, or go in a coach." If on 'town,' as, Will you ride to town to-morrow? the answer may be, "No; but I shall ride to the forest." If on 'to-morrow,' as, Will you ride to town to-morrow? the answer may be, "No; not to-morrow, but the next day."

Many still regard antithesis as furnishing the whole secret of emphasis. The principle of antithesis may be further illustrated by the simplest sentence we can think of: "You left your book on my table this morning." Any word in this sentence may be made emphatic; the emphasis in such a case being entirely dependent, not upon the sequence of ideas, but upon the antithesis to another idea. "You left your book on my table this morning," implies that the leaving of the book is all understood; the point of the assertion is upon the individual. Left may be accentuated as the natural central act, but with a more salient emphasis it may be taken as an antithesis in reference to some other act, or to a question as to how it came there.

"You left your book on my table this morning." Everything is implied except the ownership of the book. The question might be answered, "No; I left John's book;" for such emphasis not only implies an antithesis in the mind of the speaker, but it raises an antithesis in the mind of the hearer. This accentuation also might imply that a mistake had been made, that there had been an intention to leave some other person's book; still other situations would cause this emphasis.

"You left your book on my table this morning." The word 'book' is the natural centre of the sentence, and emphasis upon

this may imply the mere statement of the fact to another. Or it may be accentuated still more saliently, and then there is an implied antithesis to other objects. An antithesis may be awakened, and may be answered, "No; I left my pencil."

"You left your book on my table this morning." The atten tion of the mind now is directed to the place. "I told you to put it under the table, or in the drawer." "You left your book on my table this morning." Instantly the mind's attention is directed to a table belonging to some one else. "You left your book on my table this morning." "That is not the place to leave it.” Emphasis upon 'this' brings up the antithesis, "No; it was yesterday morning;" or upon morning," "last night."

It is a very important discipline, in enabling the mind to grasp an antithesis, to take the simplest sentence like this, and to emphasize every word in succession, holding at the same time a definite antithesis in the mind.

One of the most important exercises for the development of antithesis is debate. A good debater presents the arguments for a question in a great measure according to the law of antithesis. Whenever any idea is presented as a point in a logical argument, it is accentuated with great saliency. Take the simple sentence," Webster praised Clay." Without emphasis, this sentence is a mere copy-book illustration; it is a mere sentence given as a sentence, and not as a thought; but when some one says, "Webster praised Clay," then it is given as an argument to prove a point. I may possibly be arguing for the nobleness of Clay, and I make the statement to prove it. Again, "Webster praised Clay." Now I must be talking about the relations of the two men, or about Webster's conduct toward Clay. If I should say, "Webster praised Clay," the point which I am trying to prove must be something like the fair-mindedness of Webster.

Antitheses may be expressed or implied. In the latter case, the emphasis is very strong. There are four degrees of emphasis: first, the simple accentuation of the successive ideas;

secondly, emphasis of central ideas, or those which underlie many others; third, emphasis of an expressed antithesis; and fourth, emphasis that will suggest an implied antithesis. The degree of emphasis is least in the first, and strongest in the last. The second, however, may be at times strongest of all.

Antithesis is a characteristic of all clear and forcible writers. One of the most forcible writers in the English language is Macaulay; he is also the most antithetic. He is accused of straining an antithesis, or of sacrificing truth sometimes to an antithesis. For example, in this sentence regarding Charles, “We charge him with having broken his coronation oath, and we are told he kept his marriage vow." In reading this, if a strong emphasis is given to 'vow,' it may throw a slur upon marriage. It may be read with vow' subordinated, that is, synonymous with 'oath,' and the antithesis brought out between 'coronation' and 'marriage.' This is, I think, Macaulay's meaning.

162 THE Long Parliament could not trust the king. He had no doubt passed salutary laws; but what assurance was there that he would not break them? He had renounced oppressive prerogatives; but where was the security that he would not resume them? The nation had to deal with a man whom no tie could bind, a man who made and broke promises with equal facility, a man whose honor had been a hundred times pawned, and never redeemed. The Lords and Commons present him with a bill in which the constitutional limits of his power are marked out. He hesitates; he evades; at last he bargains to give his assent for five subsidies. The bill receives his solemn assent; the subsidies are voted; but no sooner is the tyrant relieved, than he returns at once to all the arbitrary measures which he had bound himself to abandon, and violates all the clauses of the very Act which he had been paid to pass.

For more than ten years the people had seen the rights which were theirs by a double claim, by immemorial inheritance and by recent purchase, infringed by the perfidious king who had recognized them. At length circumstances compelled Charles to summon another parliament; another chance was given to our fathers; were they to throw it away as they had thrown away the former? Were they again to be cozened? Were they again to advance their money on pledges which had been for