(24) You thus employed, I will go root away The noisome weeds, that without profit suck (25) A man that has a journey before him twenty miles in length, which he is to perform on foot, will not hesitate and doubt whether he shall set out or not, because he does not readily conceive how he shall ever reach the end of it; for he knows, that by the simple operation of moving one foot forwards first, and then the other, he shall be sure to accomplish it. (26) There is nothing in which men more deceive themselves than in what the world calls zeal. There are so many passions which hide themselves under it, and so many mischiefs arising from it, that some have gone so far as to say, it would have been for the benefit of mankind if it had never been reckoned in the catalogue of virtues. (27) The events which I propose to relate form only a single act of a great and eventful drama extending through ages, and must be very imperfectly understood unless the plot of the preceding acts be well known. (28) It is a celebrated thought of Socrates, that if all the misfortunes of mankind were cast into a public stock, in order to be equally distributed among the whole species, those who now think themselves the most unhappy would prefer the share they are already possessed of before that which would fall to them by such a division. (29) High on a throne of royal state, which far Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind, To that bad eminence. (30) Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. (31) At the end of the long dark valley he passes the dens in which the old giants dwelt, amidst the bones of those whom they had slain. (32) The Londoners loved their city with that patriotic love which is found only in small communities, like those of ancient Greece, or like those which arose in Italy during the middle ages. (33) When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married. PART VIII. SPECIAL RULES OF CONSTRUCTION. 187. Emphasis and distinctness are obtained by the repetition of a Noun, instead of using such words as one and that: The army which now became supreme in the state was an army very different from any that has since been seen among us.-Macaulay. The sheep and the ox of that time were diminutive when compared with the sheep and oxen which are now driven to our markets. Macaulay. The style of Bunyan is delightful to every reader, and invaluable as a study to every person who wishes to obtain a wide command over the English language. The vocabulary is the vocabulary of the common people.—Macaulay. The present constitution of our country is, to the constitution under which she flourished five hundred years ago, what the tree is to the sapling, what the man is to the boy. Macaulay. 188. Emphasis and distinctness in a sentence are obtained by making its clauses and its phrases evenly balanced in length, as, for example, by repeating a preposition : Everywhere flags were flying, bells and music sounding, wine and ale flowing in rivers to the health of him whose return was the return of peace, of law, and of freedom.— Macaulay. He was not to be corrupted either by titles or by money.— Macaulay. As every climate has its peculiar diseases, so every walk of life has its peculiar temptations.—Macaulay. Such a man might fall a victim to power; but truth, and reason, and liberty, would fall with him.-Bolingbroke. History, which undertakes to record the transactions of the past, for the instruction of future ages, would ill deserve that honourable office if she condescended to plead the cause of tyrants, or to justify the maxims of persecution.—Gibbon. The habits of his early life had accustomed him to bear privation with fortitude, but not to taste pleasure with moderation.-Macaulay. The Puritan hated bearbaiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectator.—Macaulay. NOTE.-Observe, in the last passage, how the balance is obtained by putting the negative clause first. 189. Emphasis is obtained when words at the commencement of a sentence are in contrast to words at the end: The grey old walls were hung with scarlet.—Macaulay. Neither the culprit nor his advocates attracted so much notice as his accusers.-Macaulay. About two thousand ministers of religion, whose conscience did not suffer them to conform, were driven from their benefices in one day.—Macaulay. Thinking thus of mankind, Charles naturally cared very little what they thought of him.-Macaulay. By no people has beauty been so highly esteemed as by the Greeks.-Pater. As it was with the faces of the men of this noble family, so was it also with their minds. Nature had done much for them all.-Macaulay. 190. Than is a Conjunction introducing the second of two sentences of comparison. The Verb in the second sentence is often omitted: There is no man that fears you less than he; There is no man that I fear more than him; where than he stands for than he fears you, and than him stands for than I fear him. Hence in choosing the form, nominative or objective, of a Pronoun to follow than in a sentence of comparison, we must take the nominative when the Pronoun is the subject of the suppressed Verb, and the objective when the Pronoun is the object of the suppressed Verb. NOTE. Custom has sanctioned the use of whom after than in sentences where the strict rules of grammar would demand who: thus A domineering pedant o'er the boy, Than whom no mortal so magnificent.-Shakespeare. Which when Beelzebub perceiv'd, than whom, Satan except, none higher sat, with grave Aspect he rose.-Milton. It is to be observed, that our poets are not careful to follow strict rules with regard to the use of the nominative and objective forms of Pronouns: in many passages we find Me for I, Thee for Thou, She for Her, and the like. 191. Notice some of the chief uses of That: A. As a Demonstrative Adjective, pointing to something apart from the speaker, and so differing from the use of This in reference to something closely connected with the speaker: What means that hand upon that breast of thine?—Shakespeare. H |