and I shall discuss the question of style in the two next chapters, which will have the same heading as this, so that my good friends may turn over the leaves if they like and pass on to the next chapter but two. I advise them however not to do so, if they wish to learn something that is worth knowing.

OF STYLE.

F a man would treat this matter fully, he would treat of the style of all authors

who have written in all languages. This

is called the exhaustive method, but it is a method more suited to exhaust the reader's patience than to do anything else. We who live in this nook of western Europe are content with knowing how a few people have written in a few languages, and we are so prejudiced as to think that what these few languages contain is worth more to us than all the rest. I shall therefore save my readers the pain of a dissertation on all styles and even on style in general, and I shall limit myself to style in particular, which means the style of a very few writers.

Speech or writing consists of two parts, the words and the order of the words; and by the order of the words is meant not only their place in the sentence,

but their relation to the words which precede and follow. The choice of the words must depend on the subject and on the writer's ability to choose ; and again the words must depend on the matter about which a man is going to write. The matter then will in a great degree determine the words, for though the larger part of every language consists of words which may be used on all occasions, there is a great number of words which are suited only to particular subjects. If we write on matters of common life, on such things as happen daily or are the subject of common conversation, we use only common words, and if we use them well, we have done all that we need to do. A man who writes a letter to a friend or on ordinary business has nothing to do but to use such words as express his meaning clearly. He will write just as a sensible man would talk, in plain words and in a simple manner without any affectation. If he has any idea that his letters will ever appear in print, he is sure to spoil them. We have a large collection of Cicero's letters, the greater part of them certainly never intended to be seen by any persons except those to whom they were addressed; and they are written with the utmost plainness and simplicity, sometimes carelessly, and perhaps even incorrectly.

When Voltaire corresponded with the empress Catharine and some other great people, he may have thought that his letters would not be lost; but a large part of his letters were only meant to be read by those who received them, and he thought no more of them after they were written. They are among the best specimens of that plain simple style which pleases because it is natural and easy, and they are enlivened by the witty and satirical vein, which failed him not when he had numbered his fourscore years. We have in English also good specimens of the easy epistolary style, such as Cowper's letters and others.

The art, if you choose to call it by that name, or the power of writing well, is as rare as the power of speaking well, and indeed of doing anything well, for the nature of things is such that most things are done well enough for some purpose, but very few are done very well. I will give an example which every man can understand: I cannot just at present find one of the same kind for the women. All men in this country, except a few, wear breeches, and I appeal to them confidently and ask how often their breeches fit well and are easy. My own long experience is decidedly unfavourable to the makers. Their style is not good. A perfect article should be easy.

and not unbecoming, if the wearer has legs of average quality.

Now if I have not demonstrated the rarity of good style, I have given those who choose to try, hints for making their own demonstration. Accordingly I affirm that the specimens of good writing are few; and so I bring into a narrow compass a subject which seemed at first to be unlimited; and this is very different from the way in which a bungler would have handled the matter on the exhaustive method.

This being settled, in what languages must we look for the few specimens of good writing? I think that I must not take the modern European languages, at least I will not begin with them, for fear that the people whose languages I do not mention, will be displeased with me and not read the book. It would be no excuse to say that I can't read their languages, because people do write about languages without knowing them, and, more wonderful still, even translate what they cannot understand. I must go further back. If everybody knew Hebrew, I would discourse of Hebrew style, and I should thus certainly find Hebrew readers. If our English version of the Bible faithfully represents the manner of the Hebrew, it is a very noble lan