Sweet is the gale that | breathes the spring, | Sweet | through the | vale yon | winding | stream,7 Sweet is the note, Love's | warblers | sing, But | sweeter | Friendship's | soothing | theme. ר ר These, however, are niceties into which it is. not within the purport of this work to enter more at large. They, who wish to see the grace notes further exemplified, are referred to the pieces marked with the accidents of speech at the end of Chapman's Grammar. * This mark is used by Mr. Chapman to denote the emphasis of sense and the emphasis of force. CHAPTER X. FORCE OR QUALITY. THERE is still one of the Accidents of Speech which remains to be explained, namely FORCE or QUALITY. This relates to the distinction of loud and soft, or to what musicians call forte and piano. This distinction must not be confounded, as it too often is, with that of high and low. Those, who understand any thing of music, know that high and loud, low and soft, are by no means necessarily connected, and that we may be very soft in a high note, and very loud in a low one; just as a slight stroke on a high-toned bell will produce a soft tone, though the note be high, and a smart stroke on a low-toned bell will produce a loud tone, though the note be low. But to explain this difference to those who are unacquainted with music, we may say, that a high tone is that which we naturally adopt when we wish to be heard at a distance; since the same degree of force is more audible in a high than in a low tone, from the acuteness of the former and the gravity of the latter ;-and that a low tone is that which we naturally adopt when we are speaking to a person at a short distance, and wish not to be heard by others, since a low tone we with the same force is less audible than a high one. If, therefore, we raise our voice to the pitch which we should naturally use, if we were calling to a person at a great distance, and at the same time exert so small a degree of force, as to be heard only by a person who is near us, shall have an example of a high note in a soft tone. On the contrary, if we suppose ourselves speaking to a person at a short distance, and wish to be heard by those who are at a greater, in this situation we shall naturally sink the voice into a low note, and at the same time throw just so much force or loudness into it, as is necessary to make it audible to persons at a distance. This is exactly the manner in which actors deliver the speeches which are spoken aside. The low note conveys the idea that they are speaking either to themselves or to a person near them, and the loud tone makes the words audible. at a distance. Thus we perceive that high and loud, low and soft, though often associated, are essentially distinct from each other. The quality of spoken sounds must be also distinguished from their weight. The organic pulsation of heavy and light, or of emphatic and unemphatic syllables, is as regularly periodical and constant as the swings of a pendulum, but of itself implies no sound or noise at all; and agreeably to this, a band of musicians are much better governed in their measures by a silent waving of the hand, or of any thing which may catch the eye, than by the more noisy way of beating time with the foot. But the application of loud and soft, both in music and in language, must be only as occasion calls for it: its place depends on the nature of the subject, and the taste and judgment of the reader. It is always upon whole words or sentences, and never upon mere syllables. In all unimpassioned reading, such as that of plain narrative, calm argument, or dissertation, there is no place for the introduction of different degrees of loudness or softness; an uniformity of voice, in this respect, is here more appropriate. But wherever there is any striking variety in the style and matter of what is read, and particularly where there is any thing in the sense which at all corresponds with, or bears any analogy to, loud or soft in the human voice, this accident of speech is introduced with great advantage; thus the first of the four following lines must be pronounced in a soft tone of voice; the second, except the first two words, in a still softer; and the third and fourth in a loud tone : Soft is the strain when | Zephyr | gently | blows, And the smooth numbers flows; streamin | smoother | This passage affords an illustration of a remark, which must here be made, that, as the degrees of loud and soft are infinite, so the voice may gradually swell out into a louder, or die away into a softer tone, for the second line requires to be read more softly than the first. Shakspeare's description of moonlight affords a still better example of this gradual increase of softness: How the sweet | moonlight | sleeps up- | on this | bank!| Here will we | sit, 7 and | let the sound of | music ר ר Creep in our | ears; | soft stillness and The swell of the voice, or its increase in loudness, is necessary in all well-constructed climaxes, whether in prose or in poetry; thus, Consult your whole nature; consider yourselves ノ not only as sensitive, but as rational beings; not only 1 as rational, but social; not only as social, but immortal. ノ Besides the four modifications of voice already mentioned, namely loud and soft, high and low, there are four others, namely quick and slow, forcible and feeble. Forcible and feeble are qualities of voice which are compounded of the other simple states, that is, force is loudness and quickness, either in a high or a low tone; and |