cared nothing about the employment of is here that, properly considered, the injustwomen; and that his lectures on "Women ice of man begins. Here, then, let man and Watchwork" were but ingenious puffs begin to make reparation. No legislative to gull the public, to advertise his own shop, enactment is required. The right that is and to put money into his own pocket. sought is merely the right to labour. But We cannot be surprised at this. When with short-sighted selfishness men monopoeducated gentlemen set an example of sel-lize the labour-market, and block up avefishness and exclusiveness, it is only to be nues of employment, which women might expected that the working classes should well and worthily tread. follow it. And so the greed of man is the degradation of woman. But will Woman be true to Woman? Let the ladies of Great Britain ponder some How long is this state of things to last? of the results which we have indicated, lay By one of those strange coincidences which them to heart, and ask themselves how show how oftentimes the lessons of large a part of all this misery and all "chance" are more significant than those of this crime ought to lie as a burden on their design, we find, at the back of Mr. Bennett's own consciences. And when the answer is letter as cut out of the Times, another letter, honestly given, let them begin at once to do earnestly and indignantly written, by an what they can. Every woman who saves English lady, under the heading of "Traffic one sister from a life of degradation, will do in Women —a letter relating to the "infa- that for which she will have her reward. If mous traffic in young girls at this time, car- she saves but one, she has done a great thing. ried on to a greater extent than can be con- Let her not concern herself about aggregate ceived or believed by those who sit at home, results. Her mite will be accepted. and trenched round by all the sanctities of by taking care of these mites, that the domestic life, and all the safeguards of pounds, and tens of pounds, and hundreds virtue;" a letter in which English-women of pounds, of social improvement, come in are called to "lay to heart" this state of time to take care of themselves. It is ART. II.-1. English, Past and Present. 2. things, and use their utmost power to stop the progress of the enormous wrong. Let them lay it to heart; let them think earnestly and solemnly of the obtrusive fact, that women, by thousands and tens of thousands, are either fast sinking into their graves under the combined effects of hunger, cold, and continued watching, or else perishging body and soul together, painted and bedizened, in the public streets, and draging others, the sons and brothers of our English ladies, down to destruction with. them. We read, even as this sheet is pass- WHEN Will Shakspere and Ben Jonson ing through the press, of an influential de- fought in loving rivalry the battle of the putation to the Home Secretary, exhorting Classic and Romantic Schools, the world, the Government to suppress houses of im-looking on delighted, said, "It is the age of proper character, and of attempts made by the Drama." When Swift hurled unclean the Police to sweep lost women from the satires at those who refused him fat benefi pavement of a particular street in London. ces; and Voltaire taught that Holy Writ And is this the remedy for a deeply-seated was a meet study for Judæus Apella, they disease? We might as well attempt to cure the small-pox by applying a caustic to the pustules on the sufferer's face. said, "It is the age of Humour." When "She lived unknown, and few could know It is not the curse of the poor that women are compelled to work from morning to night. Labour has its pleasures and privileges. It is the curse of the poor, that having the desire to work, women cannot obtain work to do that they cannot live and be honest. We are making great the efforts to obtain for women the right of working for themselves. But of what avail And now, when we have no drama but is it to secure for them the benefits of their the French-no Poetry but a Laureate'slabour, if we cannot secure for them, in the no Humour but the shilling wit of Egyptian first instance, labour by which to profit? It Hall,-What is the world to say? astonished world muttered, "It is the age of Poesy." 1857. Modern Style. The plea on which Sydney Smith excused we feel that Prior and Gray are dead among the Edinburgh for being quarterly, was, us; while Swift, Addison, Steele, and Pope There remain the last half of the eighthat time was wanted to allow a sufficient are fast following in their wake. number of books to be published from which to choose; but to-day we saw two whole teenth century, and the first of the present. pages of the Times filled with advertise- Now, an Augustan age is the climax after ments of forthcoming volumes. Is it not which literature declines, and that, too, rathe age of books? Let Routledge and Mu- pidly. We can mark this epoch clearly in the cases of Greece, Rome, Italy, and Spain. We feel that we are all progressIt is the old story of supply and demand. But not so with the tetrarchy of modern The Brahman caste exists no more in Eng- Europe. land. Walpole's valet might have his own ing, and, if we have satisfied a single want copy of St. Simon now. We have educated in literature, it is that the countries of Raall classes more or less, and the population cine and Shakspere have passed that early has doubled itself. Cheap literature, however epoch in which the drama is brought to perit be deplored, is a necessity of the times, fection. But Greece still wanted Thucydilike cheap flour, and to fill the hungry minds des, Plato, Demosthenes, when Eschylus of masses, most write and many publish. flourished, and we cannot deny to our childNor is this an accident of the Anglo-Saxon ren all hope of excelling in so many other genius. France, too, has its railway libra- branches. ries-its thousand novelists, and million vaudevillists; in Germany, each youth entering the battle of life trenches himself behind a neat octavo, of much learning and And wherever there is not a more theory. Catalogus Expurgatus, and a few adventurous Sosii may be found, the majority of those who write publish also. Perhaps no better proof could be offered of this, than that no history of English literature has yet been written. The time is not come for it. But another work, with which we cannot so easily dispense, is an Essay on Style. For this we must look to some critic of this age of critics. Doubtless it is felt that before justice can be done to this sub It is the age of books. But is it the Au- ject, we must be able to handle our language gustan age? Sir Archibald Alison consi- discreetly, and we know how little we know ders the period "immediately succeeding of our own tongue as yet. The very fact that the fall of Napoleon," as the Augustan (or the two admirable little works, which head as he calls it, the Augustine*) age, in France this article, have first appeared since 1850, and England, and extends it to the present is a proof of the ignorance which Englishday. Now, strictly speaking, a literary age men begin to feel of their own language. Philology is yet in its cradle. Grimm, ends when the stars which brightened it have set. No one will call this the age of Bopp, Rask, Pictet, Latham, and now Dean Scott and the Lake Poets. The reign of Trench, have done, or are doing, their best Tennyson is not the reign of Byron; and to wean the baby science; but, with all its forty years have sufficed to supplant the value in connection with Ethnology, Archæmorbid sentimentalism of the one, with the ology, and History, and in spite of the new lights it sheds upon the mind of man, it is healthier philosophy of the other. still confined to the student, nor will it be thrown open to the general reader, until its results are sufficiently ascertained to form *Among the little helps contributed to the study found their way into our language, by Mr. W. Hall. of English, is a list of the Greek roots, which have This valuable little book has reached a third edition, and is in constant use at King's College, London. It contains alphabetical lists of Greek roots, ranged *This is either a misprint or an intended amend- according to their parts of speech, with an English ment on the received form. If the latter, it cannot translation, and the English words derived from each. be supported. Johnson and Richardson have neither To this Mr. Hall has added notes which do him Augustan nor Augustine, Webster and Ogilvie have great credit for labour and research, and are full of the former only. As to its derivation, Schiller and interesting, and often surprising information. If the Forcellini give Augustanus, Augustianus, and Augus-book has a fault, it is that of all philologists, who tinus; but the first is found in Tacitus, with the compare a mixed language with a single one. In meaning, "ad Augustum pertinens," the second and third only in Suetonius. The town of Berytus, too, was called Colonia Augustana, not Augustina. We believe that Augustine can only be used in speaking of the order of Monks, and that the eminent historian has been misled by no better an authority than Ainsworth's Latin Dictionary. his zeal for his hobby, we cannot but think Mr. ture. an accompaniment to the history of litera- than in a grammar, a dictionary, or a catalogue. Again, in theological works we canLanguage is the escutcheon of to-day. We not complain if the manner be somewhat may indeed have an aristocracy of wealth debased, since the matter is so lofty. The superseding the old one that these levelling man who carries his head in Heaven may times have hunted down, but we have learnt not be called down to the worldly considerwith rude teaching the real worth of money ation whether a Saxon or a Latin derivative without morality, and are not afraid that we should be used as an epithet of what he sees are degenerating so far yet. We certain- there. ly have a Republic of Literature, and an aristocracy whose letters-patent are Letters indeed. But in such a republic, it may be asked, how is the aristocracy created? Public opinion dubs them, and is guided in its choice by their Style. For as acts are the test of moral, words are that of mental character, the test, first of genius, next of education and, in the world's annals, it will be said of this age, that in it language began to be the lawgiver of caste. Again, style is limited to the prose that is written. It may be doubted if oratory be prose at all, any more than conversation or dialectic argument. At any rate, it is clear that we cannot guide the orator by the rules which apply to the calm thinker at his desk; nor can we expect the same neatness in speech which is indispensable in writing. Indeed, it seems to be acknowledged that the best speeches and sermons are those which read worst, and the school-boy wonWe are convinced that this same "Style," ders why Demosthenes and Cicero should of which thousands of readers and not a few have acquired a distinctive reputation among writers think so little, is of the greatest im- the full-mouthed orators, born of the genius portance in the present day. We are cer- of Thucydides and Livy. On the other tain that next to the matter of a book, the gravest consideration is the manner of treating it. It is this which, with the masses, no less than with men of education and taste, really, though without their knowing it, decides the merits of the book, and certifies its popularity; and it is simply on account of this that many a praiseworthy thinker becomes the nightmare of his publisher, and many a trashy scribbler, with nothing but his style to recommend him, achieves a fleeting reputation. If, then, we offer a few of the ideas on this subject which have flitted through our mind from time to time, it is because we feel that its importance will cover a multitude of their deficiencies. hand, not even the most devoted among a high-church congregation can maintain, that the extempore does not far surpass the written sermon in the pulpit. Yet the priests of St. Barnabas may publish and sell; Mr. Spurgeon can scarcely hope to be read as well as heard. And if this be true, we may say that, although a good style is such as not only to bear reading aloud, but even to profit by it, it will be spoiled, and sound ridiculous if recited. Style, then, is the rhythm of prose, and it is confined to that kind of writing in which the matter is not too great to make the author forgetful of the manner; in short, to history, the essay, descriptive writing geneWhat is style? Every idea may be ex- rally, and fiction. Now, rhythm is "meapressed in two or three manners. We may sured movement," and in poetry is guided select particular words, and arrange them in by definite rules. But as the good poet each of the admissible orders, still express- uses his ear and taste rather than any set ing the same thought. Style is the manner canons, so in prose, if there be any laws of in which we do this, and in this its largest taste, it is they which must direct us in the sense, may be applied to every kind of writ- criticism of style. It is these laws, vague ing. But it is evident that in some of these as they are, which we propose to examine the manner to be used is under certain rules, with reference to our modern literature. as, for instance, in metrical composition of Bacon says, in one of his essays, "Some every kind; and we may therefore take a books are to be tasted, others to be swalnarrower view of style as applying only to lowed, and some few to be chewed and diprose; and that not to all classes of prose. gested;" which means, from one point of For in some the matter is so important, view, that the manner may differ in proporthat the author cannot attend to the man- tion to the matter; that you must allow ten ner. Strict accuracy of minor details, for times the licence, and thirty times the length instance, is an excuse for awkwardness of of tether to the railway novelist, who knows expression; and there are works of science that his pages will light chibouks and meerand even philosophy, (at least if it be purely schaums, when once read through, than you speculative, and demand a clear string of concede to Mr. Macaulay and Sir Archibald syllogisms throughout,) in which it would Alison, who naturally expect their ponderous be no more fair to expect the graces of style tomes to be bound in rich-scented Russian, 1857. Modern Style. man who is deficient in ear and taste. To and set in the nooks of honour in the library lawful?-for whom necessary?-For the book-case. Not that these four styles are not often form a style is an acknowledgment of inmingled in the same work. Macaulay, in feriority. But if a man feels that inferiority, spite of all his genius, and that course of it is right and proper that he should do so. self-education to which he has devoted his The first faults of style are sins against taste, life, has, to our mind, never risen-if it be as prolixity, repetition, long periods, allitera rise-from the essayist to the historian. ations, playing on words, and others. But Each chapter of his reads like an essay on there are faults which depend entirely on political science, where the facts appear the writer's kind of mind. And these he is rather to be illustrations of the arguments, not likely to see-no, not if a "forty-parson than the reflections to rise naturally from power" bellowed them for ever into his ears.. the facts. That dear old Herodotus, too, Such are affectation, coarseness, sneering, well knew he was writing a book of travel- adulation, egotism, bombast, and the use of lers' fiction, when he dignified his nine books trite phrases. Style is a test of genius. Men with the name of History. On the other deny this, and say it is a test only of cirside we have often, to our bitterness, had to cumstances. The German is homely, the wade through a discursive novel-"Perver- Frenchman social, the Englishman respectsion" is a recent instance-and the novelists able. For Germany is a land of cottages of the last century seemed to think that to and wife-cooks, and France is a street of insert, wherever possible, an essay on morals cafés. And as far as fiction is concerned, or religion, was the sole aim of their writing this is true, for the romance is a picture of at all. That they were grossly mistaken, what we see around us. But were Goethe and that such is not the way to make novels and Jean Paul homely ?-do all the theoinstructive-if it be proved that they ought rists of the fatherland smack of the cotto be so-is shown by the skill with which tage? or are all French writers forward, every child will learn to avoid the reflections vain, impertinent, as Emile de Girardin, or in Robinson Crusoe, to say nothing of the meretricious, as Paul de Kock? Are Guizot distaste for so-called religious novels, demon- and Sismondi of this mould? The secret strated by the majority. Is it lawful to form a style at all?-Yes. The genius of this latter was English, and good translation. The genius of the author accordingly the style is English, for it is a was French, and his English is in French style. The short aphoristic sentences, the frequent absence of the copulative, the avoidance of dependent phrases, the terse decision, and the disdain of polite and modifying adverbs, here give to our tongue a breadth and power which no Englishman ever achieves. Not every style can be made to suit every genius. If the young Piso, feeling his own weakness, prefer Tacitus to Livy, as a man of taste should do, let him ask himself, if he has condensation equal to that of Gibbon, and courage to epitomize as tersely as the | where technicality excused it, and he used Roman. If the philosopher prefer Aris- it where we should have used "opaqueness.” totle's to Descartes' style, let him be first Originality is twofold, true or false, born certain that he has talent to handle the ellip- of genius or forced. In some men, as in sis as neatly, and even then see if his subject Mr. Carlyle, the two are mingled. He has will bear the obscurity of the unsatisfactory great genius, and by it is original, but his ἐν τύπῳ. originality is his Eurydice, and when he It is certainly better to take a model, finds her not in his couch, when he flags a both good and suitable, or to make a well-little, he will go to Hell itself to fetch her known style one's own, as Hume and Gib- back. Do you wish to see him journeying bon did with the French, than to imitate the thither? Read his little preface to Emerpopular jargon of the newspaper, as Alison son's Essays. "In a word, while so many seems to have been contented to do. It is Benthamisms, Socialisms, Fourrierisms, better to be a bold, even though imperfect, professing to have no soul, go staggering imitator of Claude, as Turner once was, than and lowing, like monstrous mooncalves, the to accept humbly the mannerisms and mild- product of a heavy-laden moonstruck age; ness of the Royal Academy. Not that Gib- and in this baleful 'twelfth hour of the bon and Hume formed their styles. They night,' even galvanic Puseyisms, as we say, admired the terseness of the French, and are visible, and dancings of the sheeted dead saw that it was far better adapted to the shall not any voice of a living man be clear narrative of History than the prolixity welcome to us, even because it is alive?" of the English. They took the model, but May we not take this poet, this genius of a it was so thoroughly suited to their own New School, to be a little moonstruck himgenius, that they had no need to form their self when we read this, or is not this "fine manner after it. And in Gibbon, moreover, phrensy" of the hero-worshipper laboured it was a matter of education, and may be and strained at? Mr. Dickens is another taken as a proof that style is in part the in- genius who forces originality, and we shall dex of youthful training. show the fallacy of the system when we It is lawful, then, to form the style upon come to speak of him. But of those who a good model; and without any model, it is force originality, without having genius, it lawful to form it by the correction of faults, is perhaps needless to speak. Every one but never by the forcing of beauties. Yet must despise a man who pretends to what the copyists even from a first-rate model he has not. risk contempt. Who of all the herd of The materialists of the age are those who would-be Thackerays and Dickenses is write in the imitative style. Regardless of known to fame? Which of the young men the manner, they fall into the thickest slough who worship and imitate Carlyle has spoken of mannerism. They take their tone from like him enough to reach even the upper the newspapers, and the newspapers pick it crust of insignificance? None, if he be not from what has gone before. It is literally Emerson. Or take the trumpery of nautical phraseography. It may be excusable in the novelists. Because Marryat succeeded, the press. The writer of "articles" has no time thousand-and-one who tried to write like to care for the manner, no space to be origihim have not done so too. nal. Rapidity and brevity oppress him. He Samuel Johnson is a warning to those has something to say, and he says it in the who would form their style without a model. most effective, not the most tasteful manner. No man was fitter to do so than the doctor, He is content to reproduce the trite phrases and yet even Rasselas is unread-we do not of the penny-a-liner, his truisms, his prosay unreadable-because he was too careful verbs, such as "Time, the greatest of all of his periods. His style has been called innovators." This kind of thing has satislaboured, but it was only formed. His fied the public; he would be foolish, he whole life was passed in reducing his rules (thinks, to depart from the standard. of taste to practice. He brought his mind to this, that newspaper writers are more to that condition that he wrote and spoke, politicians than men of letters, and you will as he probably also thought, only with excuse them at least. But when we find a chosen words and balanced epithets. It man of the extensive reading and excellent soon ceased to be a labour to him, but it judgment of Sir A. Alison, cloaking so large was always the companion of his pen. He a theme as the History of Europe in the thought the French idiom, "It is not done, commonplace diction of a Times leader, we but by so and so," an elegant one, and you are fain to cry "Ichabod !" will find it three times in a page. Hé Well, then, if all these styles have so much knew that "opacity" was the Latin ab- that is bad in them, can we lay down a rule stract from opaque, he found it in Newton, for good writing Let every man, when |