3. A phrase occurring between an active verb and the word which it governs, is separated as above.

Ex. "I saw standing beside me a form of diviner features and a more benign radiance.”

4. A phrase occurring between one verb and another which it governs in the infinitive mood, is separated from the latter.

Er. "Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them."—

5. A short pause takes place where the parts of a sentence might be transposed.

Ex. "The greatest misery is to be condemned by our own hearts."

6. When an adjective follows its substantive, it is parted from it by a short pause.

Er. "It was a calculation | accurate to the last degree."

7. When one substantive is made dependent on. another by a preposition, and is followed by other words in close connexion, a short pause takes place before the preposition.

Er. "I would rather look upon a tree in all its luxuriance and diffusion of boughs and branches, than when it is cut and trimmed into a mathematical figure."

8. Relative pronouns, conjunctions, prepositions, and adverbs, and all other parts of speech used for transition or connexion, are preceded by a short pause. Ex. "Nothing is in vain | that rouses the soul to activity."

"I must be pardoned for this short tribute to the memory of a man who, while living, would as much detest to receive any thing that wore the appearance of flattery, as I should to offer it."

"Homer's style* is more simple | and animated; Virgil's more elegant and uniform."

*In order to avoid confusion, the rhetorical pause is marked, in each instance, in that place only which exemplifies the rule

"The former has, on many occasions, a sublimity to which the latter never attains."

8

"We were to drag up oceans of gold | from the bottom of the sea."

"There is nothing which we estimate so fallaciously as the strength of our own resolutions.” "What ought to be done while it yet hangs only in speculation, is plain and certain."

"His character requires that he estimate the happiness of every condition."

9. A short pause takes place at an ellipsis or omission of words.

Ex. "Homer was the greater genius, Virgil | the better artist."

RULE H. A full and long pause,-several times the usual length of that of a period,-is required between paragraphs, particularly when these contain important divisions of a subject or a discourse, in which case they may be properly prolonged to double their own usual length.

The comparative length of this pause depends on the character of the piece, as grave and serious or familiar and light, and on the length and importance of paragraphs, as principal or subordinate. In general, it should not be shorter than twice the length of the pause usually made at a period.

ERRORS. The common fault in regard to pauses, is that they are made too short for clear and distinct expression.

Feeble utterance and defective emphasis, along with rapid articulation, usually combine to produce this fault in young readers and speakers. For, whatever force of utterance or energy, of emphasis, or whatever rate of articulation we accustom ourselves to use, our pauses are always in proportion to it.

Undue brevity in pausing has a like bad effect with too rapid articulation: it produces obscurity and confusion in speech, or imparts sentiment in a manner which is deficient and unimpressive, and prevents the

proper effect both of thought and language. To be fully convinced how much of the clearness, force, and dignity of style, depends on due pauses, we have only to advert for a moment to the effect of rapid reading on a passage of Milton, and observe what an utter subversion of the characteristic sublimity of the author seems to take place. This instance is, no doubt, a strong and peculiar one. But a similar result, though less striking, may be traced in the hurried reading of any piece of composition characterized by force of thought or dignity of expression.

SUGGESTIONS FOR PRACTICE.

When habitual rapidity of voice, and omission of pause, are difficult to correct, the learner may be required to accompany the teacher's voice in the practice of sentences. This simultaneous reading, if sufficiently long continued, will probably prove effectual for the cure of habitual faults. A second stage of progress may be entered on, when the learner's improvement will warrant it; and he may be permitted to read after the teacher.

Pupils who possess an ear for music, may be taught to observe that there is in reading and speaking a 'time,' as distinct and perceptible, and as important, as in singing, or in performing on any instrument; and that pauses are uniformly measured with reference to this time. The poetry of Milton will furnish, in the sonorous flow of its language, the best matter for exercises in regular pausing, that can be found in any English author. But the selection of passages, must, of course, be adapted to the capacity of the reader.

Exercises in simultaneous reading, embracing entire classes, may be useful in teaching large numbers of pupils; as the necessity of timing the movement of the voice, and regulating the duration of pauses, is in such circumstances fully felt; and, not unfrequently, an individual who has little control over the rate of his own voice, when reading alone, will gain a great power over it, when acting under the impulse of sympathy in simultaneous reading. When this form of

practice is adopted, the length of every pause may be determined by a motion of the teacher.*

Pieces for practice may be selected as follows: first, for frequent and long pauses, passages from Ossian, or other authors abounding in grand and gloomy description; secondly, for pauses not so frequent or so long as in the preceding style, but still of considerable length,passages from Thomson's Seasons, or any other descriptive poem to which the capacities of learners may be thought adequate. Declamatory pieces in poetry or in prose, may be taken as the next stage of practice; and didactic discourses, or essays, may succeed to these. In both of these last-mentioned kinds of exercise, however, the selection of matter for practice, will, in the case of young pupils, require much attention, lest, from the thoughts and the language being either 、unintelligible or uninteresting, the reading may be performed merely as a verbal exercise, and with those uniform and mechanical pauses which form a prominent fault in what is called the 'school-boy' style. Familiar pieces in the narrative and descriptive styles, should form the last stage of practice in this depart

ment.

TONES AND MODULATION.

General Observations. The preceding parts of this work refer chiefly to those modifications of voice which are used in the expression of thought, and which are addressed to the understanding, rather than the feelings. The chief use of inflections, emphasis,

*Much time must necessarily be spent in training some pupils to just and discriminating pauses. Carelessness and haste in expression, seem to be natural tendencies of voice, with the young; and early neglect is so prevalent in whatever regards the exercise of speech, that incorrect habit is fully formed, in most instances, long before the learner has become capable of distinguishing between right and wrong, and their necessary consequences, in this department of elocution. It becomes important for the teacher, therefore, to commence and continue his efforts as a reformer rather than an instructor, and to devise and adopt many mechanical expedients which would be unnecessary, but for the existence of erroneous habit.

and pauses, is to regulate vocal expression, with reference to meaning in general, or the sense of particular words, clauses, and sentences. But there are other qualities of voice to be considered in the full expression of a sentiment,-those which indicate feeling or emotion, rather than intellectual distinctions; and which, though they naturally accompany, with more or less vividness, all our thoughts, yet admit of being considered separately from them, in an analysis or examination of vocal expression. These qualities of voice are comprehended under the name of tones and modulation; their office is to impart the states of mind corresponding to the emotions of joy, grief, fear, courage, anger, hatred, pity, love, awe, reverence, &c.

In poetical and empassioned language, tones are often the most prominent and the most important qualities of voice; and to give these with propriety, force and vividness, is the chief excellence of good reading or recitation. The language of prose, being generally less imaginative and exciting, does not require the extent and power of tone used in poetry. But as true feeling is, in both cases, the same in kind, though not in degree, and as no sentiment can be uttered naturally without the tone of its appropriate emotion, and no thought, indeed, can arise in the mind without a degree of emotion; a great importance is attached, even in the reading or speaking of prose composition, to those qualities of voice comprehended under the name of tones. Without these, utterance would degenerate into a merely mechanical process of articulation. It is these that give impulse and vitality to thought, and which constitute the chief instruments of eloquence.

DEFINITION. Tones are those qualities of voice which express emotions considered singly. Modulation is the variation of voice in successive tones and consecutive passages.

Note. Tones may be considered individually or singly, as occurring in particular passages, or pervading a whole piece, when the tenor of the language