trates the subject in the following emphatic manner: "He can excite images in the mind without the help of words, and make scenes rise up be fore us, and seem present to the eye, without the assistance of bodies or exterior objects. He can transport the imagination with such beautiful and glorious visions, as cannot possibly enter into our present conceptions, or haunt it with such ghastly spectres and apparitions, as would make us hope for annihilation, and think existence no better than a curse. In short, he can so exquisitely ravish or torture the soul through this single faculty, as might suffice to make the whole heaven or hell of any finite being *." In another part of the same paper, alluding to the dreadful symptoms of derangement, he employs language still more concise and energetic. "There is not a sight," says he, "in nature so mortifying as that of a distracted person, when his imagination is troubled, and his whole soul disordered and confused. Babylon in ruins is not so melancholy a spectacle." There are passages also in the works of Addison which display the strength and elaboration, the point and antithesis for which modern composition, since the era of Johnson has been so re*Spectator, No 421. markably distinguished. One of these I shall quote from the Freeholder, the close of which will immediately strike the reader as the prototype of many a recent period. Reprobating the acrimony and party abuse of the political paper, entitled the Examiner, the author observes, "No sanctity of character, or privilege of sex, exempted persons from this barbarous usage. Several of our prelates were the standing marks of public raillery, and many ladies of the first quality branded by name for matters of fact, which, as they were false, were not heeded, and if they had been true, were innocent *." It is not meant to be denied, however, that the style of Addison partook, in some degree, of the inaccuracies and defects incident to the period of literature that we are contemplating. His grammar and syntax are not always correct, and what would now be termed inelegancies or vulgarisms, occasionally disfigure his pages. These blemishes, it must be remembered, are by no means frequent; but, as critical assertion is of little utility without proof, I shall adduce a few instances of the errors which sometimes violate the composition of this accomplished writer. A strict attention to the laws of grammar and syntax is now exhibited by every writer who has * Freeholder, No 19. any claims to literary distinction. In the days of Queen Anne, however, though termed the Augustan age of Great Britain, authors of the first eminence, and who have never been exceeded, perhaps, in the knowledge of the idiom and powers of the language, are not unfrequently found inattentive to the minutiae of grammar. Of the classics of this favoured age, I have ventured, though contrary to common opinion, to consider Addison as, in this respect, the most correct. That he was not entirely exempt, however, from errors of a similar description, the two following instances, the first a solecism in syntax, the second in grammar, will sufficiently prove : "We have the power of retaining, altering, and compounding those images which we have once received, into all the varieties, &c. &c. *” "The last are, indeed, more preferable, &c. &c. +" As I wish to be brief on this ungrateful subject, I shall subjoin but two examples of inelegant expression, and but two of inaccurate composition. "I cannot stick to pronounce of such a one that whatever he may think, &c.‡" "If a man considers the face of Italy in general, * Spectator, No 411. Spectator, N 185. + Spectator, No 411, one would think that Nature had laid it out into such a variety of styles and governments as one finds in it *" "The wisest of men are sometimes acted by such unaccountable motives, as the life of the fool, and the superstitious is guided by nothing else +." "I have already given my reader an account of a set of merry fellows, who are passing their summer together in the country, being provided of a great house." This last solecism frequently occurs in the writings of Sir Philip Sidney, an example of which may be seen in the commencement of the first quotation that we have given from this author. The defects, however, which an accurate research may discover in the pages of Addison, are almost forgotten, when we take into consider. ation the many excellencies which have so justly given celebrity to his style and composition. These have been amply acknowledged, and by some of the first authors in our language, during the course of the last sixty years. MR. MELMOTH thus admirably takes the lead in appreciating the merits of our author's diction and manner: "I know not," says he, "whether Sir Wil * Travels. † Spectator, No 191. liam Temple may not be considered as the first of our prose authors, who introduced a graceful manner into our language; at least that quality does not seem to have appeared early, or spread far amongst us. But wheresoever we may look for its origin, it is certain to be found in its highest perfection in the essays of a gentleman, whose writings will be distinguished so long as politeness and good sense have any admirers That becoming air which Tully esteemed the criterion of fine composition; and which every reader, he says, imagines so easy to be imitated, yet will find so difficult to attain; is the prevailing characteristic of all that excellent author's most elegant performances. In a word, one may justly apply to him what Plato, in his allegorical language, says of Aristophanes, that the Graces having searched all the world for a temple wherein they might for ever dwell, settled at last in the breast of Mr. Addison *. " Nor is DR. YOUNG less striking and emphatic in expressing his idea of Addisonian excellence : "Addison," he remarks," wrote little in verse, much in sweet, elegant, Virgilian prose; so let me call it, since Longinus calls Herodotus most Homeric; and Thucydides is said to have formed his style on Pindar. Addison's compositions are *Fitzosborne's Letters, Letter 29th, dated 1746. |