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marked thus (-). This tone belongs to emotions arising from sublimity and grandeur. It characterizes, also, the extremes of amazement and horror.

"High on a throne of royal state, that far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus or of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand,
Shōwers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold,
Satan exalted sat." *

RULES ON THE FALLING INFLECTION.

RULE I. Forcible expression requires the falling inflection, as in the following instances of energetic emotion: earnest calling or shouting, abrupt and vehement exclamation, imperious or energetic command, indignant or reproachful address, challenge and defiance, swearing and adjuration, imprecation, accusation, assertion, affirmation, or declaration,-assurance, threatening, warning, denial, contradiction, refusal,―appeal, remonstrance, and expostulation, earnest intreaty, exhortation, earnest or animated invitation, temperate command, admiration, adoration.

Examples.

Calling and shouting: "Awake! arise! or be for ever fallen!"

Abrupt exclamation: "To àrms! they come !-the Greek, the Greek!"

Imperious command: "Hènce! home, you idle creatures, get you home!"

Indignant address: "You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things"

Challenge and defiance: "I dàre him to his proofs." Swearing and adjuration: "By all the blood that fury ever breathed,

The youth says well."

*Farther examples of this inflection occur under the Rules on Monotone.

"I do beseech you,

By all the battles wherein we have fought, By the blood we have shèd together, by the vows We have made to endure friends, that you directly Set me against Aufidius and his Antiates." Imprecation: "Accùrs'd may his memory blacken, If a coward there be that would slacken" Accusation: "With a foul tràitor's name stuff I thy throat."

Assertion, affirmation, declaration: "We must fight,-I repeat it, sir,-we must fight."

Assurance: "But whatever may be our fate, be assùred, be assured that this Declaration will stand." Threatening: "Have mind upon your health, tempt me no further."

Warning: "Lochiel, Lochiel, beware of the day."
Denial:
"For Gloucester's death,-
I slew him not, but, to my own disgrace,
Neglected my sworn duty in that case."
Contradiction::- "Brutus. I did send to you
For certain summs of gold, which you denied me-
Cassius. I denied you not.

Bru. You did.

Cas. I did not"

Refusal: "Your grace shall pàrdon me, I will not back."

Appeal: "I appeal to all who hear me, for the truth of my assertion."

Remonstrance and expostulation:

"Good reverend father, make my person yours, And tell me how you would bestow yourself. This royal hand and mine are newly knit;The latest breath that gave the sound of words, Was deep-sworn faith, peace amity, true love, Between our kingdoms, and our royal sèlves; And shall these hands, so lately purged of blood, So newly joined in love, so strong in both, Unyoke this seizure and this kind regret?" Earnest intreaty: "Let me, upon my kneè, prevail in this!"

Exhortation: "Come on, then; be mèn."

Earnest invitation: "Come forth, O ye children of gladness, còme!"

Temperate command: "Now launch the boat upon the waves."

Admiration: "How beautiful is night!"

Adoration: "Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty!"

RULE II. The falling inflection is required in the expression of relative force of thought, as in the emphasis of contrast, when one part of an antithesis is made preponderant, whether by affirmation opposed to negation, or merely by comparative force or promi

nence.

Examples.

"They fought not for fame but freedom."

"Are you an actor in this busy scene, or are you but an idle spectator?".

"True politeness is not a mere compliance with arbitrary custom. It is the expression of a refined

benèvolence."*

"You were paid to fight against Alexander,-not to ráil at him.”

“A countenance more in sòrrow than in anger."

*Teachers must have felt the difficulty of imparting a clear conception of the effect of the falling slide, in examples like the above, in which its character is wholly dependent on a preceding or a subsequent rising inflection. To the ear of the pupil, the rising note at the end of the negative or less forcible sentence, seems unnatural, from his habit of complying with the direction to 'let the voice un formly fall at a period,'-a direction which, from not being duly qualified, is one of the chief causes of monotonous and unmeaning tones in reading.

It is not to the learner's attention has been attracted to the circumstance of relative force, or preponderance, in the members of a comparison or a contrast, that his ear catches the true tone of meaning in such cases, and recognizes the falling inflection as its appropriate characteristic, and the rising as a necessary contrast, in whatever part of a sentence they occur.

RULE III. The falling inflection terminates a forcible interrogation, or any form of question which does not admit of being answered by yes or no.

Examples.

"What conquests brings he home?"

"Who's here so base that he would be a bondman?" "When went there by an age since the great flood, But it was famed with more than with one man?" "Why should this worthless tègument endure, If its undying guèst be lost for ever?" "How shall we do for money for these wars?" "Where wilt thou find a cavern dàrk enough To mask thy monstrous visage ?"

Exception. Any question repeated or echoed in the tone of genuine or affected surprise. Such questions always end with the rising inflection, as in the following instances:

"Where gróws!-where grows it not?"

"What news! Can any thing be more new, than that a man of Macedonia should lord it over all Greece?"

"How accomplish it?—certainly not by never attempting it!"

Note. The examples which follow the preceding rule, are classed under the general head of 'forcible interrogation,' as it is their comparative force which seems to require the falling inflection; while the form of interrogation which is answered by yes or no, demands, on the principle of incompleteness or suspension of thought, the rising inflection; since the circuit of thought is not completed till the answer is given, as well as the question put.

That there is a comparative rhetorical force in the former species of interrogation,-that which is not answered by yes or no,-will appear by changing, in one of the above examples, the form of the question; thus, "Is any here so base that he would be a bond

man?"-a feeble and lifeless inquiry, compared to the original, "Who's here so base," &c.

The echoing question of surprise, assumes the rising inflection, because in it an ellipsis takes place, which would be supplied by a question demanding an affirmative or a negative answer; thus, as before, "What néws!"-i. e. "What news! (did you say?)"

RULE IV. Completeness of thought and expression, is indicated by the falling inflection, whether at the end of a sentence, or of a clause which forms perfect sense, independently of the remainder of a sentence.* Examples.

"Human life is the journey of a day."

"I have seen,

The dumb men throng to see him, and the blind
To hear him speak: matrons flung their gloves,
Ladies and maids their scarfs and handkerchiefs,
Upon him as he passed; the nobles bended
As to Jove's stàtue; and the commons made
A shower and thunder, with their caps and shoùts:
I never saw the like."

Exceptions. Pathetic expression and poetic description, whether in the form of verse or of prose, require the rising inflection, even where the sense is complete, as in the following instances:

"For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,

Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share." "Are they gone?-all gone from the sunny hill? But the bird and the blue fly rove over it still, And the red deer bound in their gladness frée, And the turf is bent by the singing bée, And the waters leap, and the fresh winds blow". "The most intimate friendship,-of what brief and scattered portions of time does it consist! We take

* See Concluding Remarks on the Theory of Inflection.

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