Latin terminology, of the short word as against the long, of monosyllables, in fact, as against polysyllables, is a modern discovery, or not so much a discovery as a recrudescence. It was known to the Elizabethans, it was forgotten by their successors, it was rediscovered in more modern times. Shakespeare and the English Bible have established and retained their hold on the popular heart by their knowledge of this great rhetorical fact. But Shakespeare and the Bible (as a literary force) had become discredited in Queen Anne's age. For that age was big with the coming portent of Johnsonese and Gibbonese, it was the legitimate precursor of the "Rambler" and the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," it was subconsciously aware of the revolution which it bore within its womb. It is not astonishing, therefore, to find in the work of a great Queen Anne poet the well-known gibe against monosyllabic verse,—

And ten low words oft creep in one dull line.

This, of course, is Pope, in the "Dunciad." A successor of Pope, a satirist who lived in the very heyday of Johnsonese English,-Churchill, in short,— in his "Rosciad" has this sarcastic fling at the actor Mossop:

With studied impropriety of speech,

He soars beyond the hackney'd critic's reach;

To epithets allots emphatic state,

Whilst principals, ungraced, like lackeys wait;
In ways first trodden by himself excels,

And stands alone in indeclinables;

Conjunction, preposition, adverb, join

To stamp new vigor on the nervous line;
In monosyllables his thunders roll,

He, she, it, and we, ye, they, affright the soul.

But in spite of Pope, in erring Churchill's spite, ten words can fly as well as creep, and thunders may roll in monosyllables as readily as in sesquipedalia verba. The finest passages in Shakespeare, the "To be or not to be," for example, the most impressive portions of the Bible, as in the books of Job and Revelation, or the denunciations of Jeremiah against Jehoiakim, King of Judah, "O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the Lord," etc., the Burial Service, Tennyson's "Tears, Idle Tears," Pope's "Universal Prayer," Gray's "Elegy," Scott's description of the battle of Flodden Field,-all these and many more of the best-remembered passages in English literature might be searched in vain for words hard enough to set at a spelling-bee. They represent all moods of the mind, all the possibilities of human expression. They show that directness and simplicity may consort with majesty, with dignity, with passion, with eloquence. This truth is excellently put in the following two sonnets by Dr. J. Addison Alexander, written throughout in monosyllables, which originally appeared in the Princeton Review:

THE POWER OF SHORT WORDS.

Think not that strength lies in the big round word,
Or that the brief and plain must needs be weak.
To whom can this be true who once has heard
The cry for help, the tongue that all men speak,
When want or woe or fear is in the throat,

So that each word gasped out is like a shriek
Pressed from the sore heart, or a strange wild note
Sung by some fay or fiend? There is a strength

Which dies if stretched too far or spun too fine,

Which has more height than breadth, more depth than length.

Let but this force of thought and speech be mine,

And he that will may take the sleek fat phrase

Which glows and burns not, though it gleam and shine,

Light, but no heat,-a flash, but not a blaze!

Nor is it mere strength that the short word boasts :
It serves of more than fight or storm to tell,
The roar of waves that dash on rock-bound coasts,
The crash of tall trees when the wild winds swell,
The roar of guns, the groans of men that die

On blood-stained fields. It has a voice as well
For them that far off on their sick-beds lie;

For them that weep, for them that mourn the dead;
For them that laugh and dance and clap the hand;
To joy's quick step, as well as grief's slow tread,
The sweet, plain words we learnt at first keep time,
And though the theme be sad, or gay, or grand,
With each, with all, these may be made to chime,
In thought, or speech, or song, in prose or rhyme.

Let us cull from literature a few of the more notable examples of verse and prose wherein monosyllables play the chief and sometimes the only part. Shakespeare and the Bible, as we have already noted, yield a rich harvest. Where is the language of passionate grief made more expressive than in the speech of the widowed Constance in "King John"?—

Thou may'st, thou shalt; I will not go with thee:

I will instruct my sorrows to be proud;

For grief is proud, and makes his owner stout.
To me, and to the state of my great grief,
Let kings assemble; for my grief's so great,
That no supporter but the huge firm earth
Can hold it up: here I and Sorrow sit;
Here is my throne, bid kings come bow to it.
Act iii., Sc. 1.

Here are seventy-three words, of which only six are polysyllables. In the same play, in the thrilling scene where King John is inciting Hubert to murder Arthur, his speech consists largely of monosyllables. Here are four lines without a single word of more than one syllable:

In one of the most forceful of all the Shakespearian plays, "King Lear," the most forceful passages are made up of words of one syllable. Here again are four lines without a single polysyllable :

Thou know'st the first time that we smell the air,
We wawl and cry: I will preach to thee, mark me.
When we are born we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools.-This a good block?
Act iv., Sc. 6.

Coleridge considered that the most beautiful verse, and also the most sublime, in the Bible was that in the book of Ezekiel which runs, “And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest." Here are seventeen monosyllables, and only three words of two syllables.

Here are a few more examples, selected almost at random :

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good.-Genesis i. 3, 4.

At her feet he bowed, he fell, he lay down at her feet he bowed, he fell where he bowed, there he fell down dead.-Judges v. 27.

O Lord my God, I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me. O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from the grave: thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit. Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his, and give thanks.-Psalm xxx. 2-4.

Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.-1 Thessalonians v. 21.

For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him.-2 Timothy ii. 1I.

For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?-Revelation vi. 17. And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day; for there shall be no night there.Revelation xxi. 25.

If the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.-Matthew xv. 14.

Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink.-Matthew vi. 25. Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone?— Matthew vii. 9.

The tree is known by his fruit.-Matthew xii. 33.

Be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.-James i. 19.

If they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?-Luke xxiii. 31. We walk by faith, not by sight.—2 Corinthians v. 7.

Lord Russell, in his Life of Moore, records a conversation between that poet, Rogers, and the once popular critic Crowe on the use of short words. Phrases like "He jests at scars who never felt a wound," "Give all thou canst," and "Sigh on my lip" were quoted with approval as most musical and vigorous. Rogers cited two lines from Pope, declaring that they could not be improved :

Pant on thy lip, and to thy heart be press'd;
Give all thou canst-and let me dream the rest.
Eloisa to Abelard, 1. 123.

Moore himself offers some excellent examples:

Rich and rare were the gems she wore,
And a bright gold ring on her wand she bore.
Rich and rare were the Gems she wore.
I know not, I ask not, if guilt's in that heart,
I but know that I love thee whatever thou art.

Love on through all ills, and love on till they die.
The Light of the Harem.

I knew, I knew it could not last:
'Twas bright, 'twas heavenly, but 'tis past.

Oh, ever thus, from childhood's hour,

I've seen my fondest hopes decay;

I never loved a tree or flower

But 'twas the first to fade away.

I never nursed a dear gazelle,

To glad me with its soft black eye,
But when it came to know me well
And love me, it was sure to die.
Now, too, the joy most like divine
Of all I ever dreamt or knew,

To see thee, hear thee, call thee mine,-
Oh, misery! must I lose that too?

Yet go! On peril's brink we meet;

Those frightful rocks-that treacherous sea

No, never come again-though sweet,

Though heaven, it may be death to thee!"

The Fire-Worshippers.

Phineas Fletcher in "The Purple Island" has a remarkable passage:

New light new love, new love new life hath bred;

A life that lives by love, and loves by light;

A love to Him to whom all loves are wed;

A light to whom the sun is darkest night :

Eye's light, heart's love, soul's only life He is;

Life, soul, love, heart, light, eye, and all are His;

He eye, light, heart, love, soul; He all my joy and bliss.

Here are seventy words, and only one word of more than one syllable, and that merely the superlative form of a monosyllable. Giles Fletcher, the brother of Phineas, was often quite as happy in his simplicity of phrase,—as, for example:

Love is the blossom where there blows
Every thing that lives or grows;
Love doth make the Heav'ns to move,
And the Sun doth burn in love:
Love the strong and weak doth yoke,
And makes the ivy climb the oak;
Under whose shadows lions wild,
Soften'd by love, grow tame and mild.

Love no med'cine can appease,

He burns the fishes in the seas;

Not all the skill his wounds can stench,

Not all the sea his fire can quench:

Love did make the bloody spear

Once a leafy coat to wear.

Here are two of the most famous of George Herbert's poems. The second is especially noteworthy as containing but a single dissyllable and eighty-two monosyllables:

Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life:
Such a Way, as gives us breath;

Such a Truth, as ends all strife;

Such a Life, as killeth death.

Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength:
Such a Light, as shows a feast;

Such a Feast, as mends in length;

Such a Strength, as makes his guest.

Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart :

Such a Joy, as none can move;

Such a Love, as none can part;

Such a Heart, as joys in love.

Thomas Lodge, the poet from whose "Euphues' Golden Legacy" Shake

speare drew the plot of his

"As You Like It," has this notable example :

MADRIGAL.

Love in my bosom, like a bee,

Doth sucke his sweete;

Now with his wings he plays with me,

Now with his feete.

Within mine eyes he makes his nest,
His bed amid my tender breast;
My kisses are his daily feast,
And yet he robs me of my rest.

Strike I my lute, he tunes the string,
He music plays, if I do sing;
He lends me every living thing,
Yet cruel he my heart doth sting.

What if I beat the wanton boy
With many a rod,

He will repay me with annoy,
Because a god.

Then sit thou safely on my knee,
And let thy bower my bosom be;
O Cupid! so thou pity me,

I will not wish to part from thee.

In this stanza by Ben Jonson-the most famous passage in all his voluminous verse-there is but one word of more than one syllable:

It is

Bailey's "Festus" once threw all England into ecstasies of admiration. To-day only a few passages here and there live in the popular memory. worthy of note that they consist almost entirely of monosyllables:

Night brings out stars as sorrow shows us truth:

Though many, yet they help not; bright, they light not
They are too late to serve us; and sad things

Are aye too true. We never see the stars

Till we can see naught but them. So with truth.

And yet if one would look down a deep well,

Even at noon, we might see those same stars.

Life's more than breath, and the quick round of blood.
We live in deeds, not years,-in thoughts, not breaths.
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.
Life's but a means unto an end.

We may say that the sun is dead, and gone
For ever; and may swear he will rise no more;
The skies may put on mourning for their God,
And earth heap ashes on her head; but who
Shall keep the sun back when he thinks to rise?
Where is the chain shall bind him? Where the cell

Shall hold him? Hell he would burn down to embers,
And would lift up the world with a lever of light
Out of his way: yet, know ye, 'twere thrice less
To do thrice this, than keep the soul from God.

It is well worth noting, also, that the arch-offender against the simplicity of the English language, Dr. Johnson himself, is remembered best by the things he did when not in the Johnsonese mood. His plain, direct taĺk, as embalmed in Boswell, is a delight forever; his essays, even his "Rasselas," are unread. Of his poems only a few nervous Saxon lines survive :

He left the name at which the world grew pale,
To point a moral or adorn a tale,

Vanity of Human Wishes;

For we that live to please must please to live,

Prologue on opening of Drury Lane:

and the couplet which he added to Goldsmith's "Traveller:"