it assumes a theatrical manner, and must be highly improper, as well as give offence to the hearers; because it is inconsistent with that delicacy and modesty, which are indispensible on such occasions. The speaker who delivers his own emotions, must be supposed to be more vivid and animated, than would be proper in the person who relates them at second hand.

We shall conclude this section with the following rule, for the tones that indicate the passions and emotions. "In reading, let all your tones of expression be borrowed from those of common speech, but, in some degree, more faintly characterised. Let those tones which signify any disagreeable passion of the mind, be still more faint than those which indicate agreeable emotions: and on all occasions, preserve yourself so far from being affected with the subject, as to be able to proceed through it, with that easy and masterly manner, which has its good effects in this as well as in every other art.'

SECTION VII.

Pauses.

PAUSES or rests, in speaking or reading, are a total cessation of the voice, during a perceptible, and, in many cases, a measurable space of time. Pauses are equally necessary to the speaker, and the hearer. To the speaker, that he may take breath, without which he cannot proceed far in delivery; and that he may, by these temporary rests, relieve the organs of speech, which otherwise would be soon tired by continued action; to the hearer, that the ear also may be relieved from the fatigue which it would otherwise endure from a continuity of sound; and that the understanding may have sufficient time to mark the distinction of sentences, and their several members.

There are two kinds of pauses: first, emphatical pauses; and next, such as mark the distinctions of sense. An emphatical pause is generally made after something has been said of peculiar moment, and on which we desire to fix the hearer's attention. Sometimes, before such a thing is said, we usher it in with a pause of this nature. Such pauses have the same effect as a strong emphasis; and are subject to the same rules; especially to the caution, of not repeating them too frequently. For as they excite uncommon attention, and of course raise expectation, if the importance of the matter be not fully answerable to such expectation, they occasion disappointment and disgust.

But the most frequent and the principal use of pauses, is to mark the divisions of the sense, and at the same time to allow the reader to draw his breath; and the proper and delicate adjustment of such pauses, is one of the most nice and difficult articles of delivery. In all reading, the management of the breath requires a good deal of care, so as not to oblige us to divide words from one another, which have so intimate a connection, that they ought to be pronounced with the same breath, and without the least separation. Many a sentence is miserably

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mangled, and the force of the emphasis totally lost, by divisions being made in the wrong place. To avoid this, every one, while he is reading, should be very careful to provide a full supply of breath for what he is to utter. It is a great mistake to imagine, that the breath must be drawn only at the end of a period, when the voice is allowed to fall. It may easily be gathered at the intervals of the period, when the voice is suspended only for a moment; and by this management, one may always have a sufficient stock for carrying on the longest sentence, without improper interruptions.

Pauses in reading must generally be formed upon the manner in which we utter ourselves in ordinary, sensible conversation; and not upon the stiff artificial manner, which is acquired from reading books according to the common punctuation. It will by no means be sufficient to attend to the points used in printing; for these are far from marking all the pauses, which ought to be made in reading. A mechanical attention to these resting places, has perhaps been one cause of monotony, by leading the reader to a similar tone at every stop and a uniform cadence at every period. The primary use of points, is to assist the reader in discerning the grammatical construction; and it is only as a secondary object, that they regulate his pronunciation. On this head, the following direction may be of use: "Though in reading great attention should be paid to the stops, yet a greater should be given to the sense; and their correspondent times ocoasionally lengthened beyond what is usual in common speech.'

To render pauses pleasing and expressive, they must not only be made in the right place, but also accompanied with a proper tone of voice, by which the nature of these pauses is intimated; much more than by the length of them, which can seldom be exactly measured. Sometimes it is only a slight and simple suspension of voice that is proper; sometimes a degree of cadence in the voice is required; and sometimes that peculiar tone and cadence which denote the sentence to be finished. In all these cases, we are to regulate ourselves by attending to the manner in which nature teaches us to speak, when engaged in real and earnest discourse with others. The following sentence exemplifies the suspending and the closing pauses: "Hope, the balm of life, soothes us under every misfortune." The first and second pauses are accompanied by an inflection of voice, that gives the an expectation of something further to complete the sense the inflection attending the third pause, signifies that the sense is completed.

hearer

The preceding example is an illustration of the suspending pause, in its simple state: the following instance exhibits that pause with a degree of cadence in the voice; "If content cannot remove the disquietudes of mankind, it will at least alleviate them."

The suspending pause is often, in the same sentence, attended with both the rising and the falling infection of voice; as

will be seen in this example: "Moderate exercise, and habitual temperance', strengthen the constitution.”*

As the suspending pause may be thus attended with both the rising and the falling inflection, it is the same with regard to the closing pause: it admits of both. The falling inflection generally accompanies it; but it is not unfrequently connected with the rising inflection. Interrogative sentences, for instance, are often terminated in this manner; as, "Am I ungrateful'?" "Is he in earnest'?"

But where a sentence is begun by an interrogative pronoun or adverb, it is commonly terminated by the falling inflection: as, "What has he gained by his folly?" "Who will assist him?” "Where is the messenger?" "When did he arrivev?”

Where two questions are united in one sentence, and connected by the conjugation or, the first takes the rising, the second the falling inflection: as, "Does his conduct support discipline', or destroy it?"

The rising and falling inflections must not be confounded with emphasis. Though they may often coincide, they are, in their nature, perfectly distinct. Emphasis sometimes controls those inflections,

The regular application of the rising and falling inflections, confers so much beauty on expression, and is so necessary to be studied by the young reader, that we shall insert a few more examples to induce him to pay greater attention to the subject. In these instances, all the inflections are not marked. Such only are distinguished as are most striking, and will best serve to shew the reader their utility and importance.

"Manufactures, trade, and agriculture', naturally employ more than nineteen parts in twenty, of the human species.'

"He who resigns the world, has no temptation to envy', hatred, malice, anger'; but is in constant possession of a serene mind: he who follows the pleasures of it, which are in their very nature disappointing, is in constant search of care, solitude', remorse, and confusion."

"To advise the ignoranty, relieve the needy, comfort the afflicted', are duties that fall in our way almost every day of our lives." "Those evil spirits, who, by long custom, have contracted in the body, habits of lust, and sensuality; malice and revenge; an aversion to every thing that is good, jus, and laudable', are naturally seasoned and prepared for pain and misery."

"I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life; nor angels', nor principalities', nor powers; nor things present, nor things to come; nor height', nor depth; nor any other creature', shall be able to separate us from the love of God."

The reader who would wish to see a minute and ingenious investigation of the nature of these inflections, and the rules by which they are governed, may consult the first volume of Walker's Elements of Elocution.

* The rising inflection is denoted by the acute; the falling, by the grave accent.

SECTION VIII.

Manner of reading Verse.

WHEN we are reading verse, there is a peculiar difficulty in making the pauses justly. The difficulty arises from the melody of verse, which dictates to the ear pauses or rests of its own; and to adjust and compound these properly with the pauses of the sense, so as neither to hurt the ear, nor offend the understanding, is so very nice a matter, that it is no wonder we so seldom meet with good readers of poetry. There are two kinds of pauses that belong to the melody of verse: one is, the pause at the end of the line; and the other, the cæsural pause in or near the middle of it. With regard to the pause at the end of the line, which marks the strain or verse to be finished, rhyme renders this always sensible: and in some measure compels us to observe it in our pronunciation. In respect to blank verse, we ought also to read it so as to make every line sensible to the ear; for, what is the use of melody, or for what end has the poet composed in verse, if in reading his lines, we suppress his numbers, by omitting the final pause; and degrade them, by our pronunciation, into mere prose? At the same time that we attend to this pause, every appearance of sing-song and tone must be carefully guarded against. The close of the line where it makes no pause in the meaning, ought not to be marked by such a tone as is used in finishing a sentence but without either fall> er elevation of the voice, it should be denoted only by such a slight suspension of sound as may distinguish the passage from one line to another, without injuring the meaning.

The other kind of melodious pause, is that which falls some where about the middle of the verse, and divides it into two hemistics; a pause not so great as that which belongs to the close of the line, but still sensible to an ordinary ear. This, which is called the cæsural pause, may fall, in English heroic verse, after the 4th, 5th, 6th, or 7th, syllables in the line. Where the verse is so constructed, that this cæsural pause coincides with the slightest pause or division in the sense, the line can be read easily; as in the two first verses of Pope's Messiah :

"Ye nymphs of Solymaw! begin the song;

To heav'nly themes, sublimer strains belong." But if it should happen that words which have such a strict and intimate connection, as not to bear even a momentary separation, are divided from one another by this casural pause, we then feel a sort of struggle between the sense and the sound, which renders it difficult to read such lines harmoniously. The rule of proper pronunciation in such cases, is to regard only the pause which the sense forms; and to read the line accordingly. The neglect of the casural pause may make the line sound somewhat unharmoniously; but the effect would be much worse, if the sense

were sacrificed to the sound. For instance, in the following line of Milton,

"What in me is dark,

"Illumine: what is low, raise and support :"

the sense clearly dictates the pause after illumine, at the end of the third syllable, which, in reading, ought to be made accordingly; though, if the melody only were to be regarded, illumine ⚫ should be connected with what follows, and the pause not made till the fourth or sixth syllable. So in the following line of Pope's Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot,

"I sit, with sad civility I read :"

the ear plainly points out the casural pause as falling after sad, the fourth syllable. But it would be very bad reading to make any pause there, so as to separate sad and civility. The sense admits of no other pause than after the second syllable sit, which therefore must be the only pause made in reading this part of the

sentence.

There is another mode of dividing some verses, by introducing what may be called demi cesuras, which require very slight pauses; and which the reader should manage with judg ment, or he will be apt to fall into an affected sing-song mode of pronouncing verses of this kind. The following lines exemplify the demi cæsura. *

"Warms' in the sun", refreshes in the breeze,

"Glows' in the stars", and blossoms' in the trees;

"Lives/through all life", extends' through all extent,
"Spreads' undivided", operates' unspent."

Before the conclusion of this introduction, the complier takes the liberty to recommend to those teachers, who may favor his compilation, to exercise their pupils in discovering and explaining the emphatic words, and the proper tones and pauses, of every portion assigned them to read, previously to their being called out to the performance. These preparatory lessons, in which they should be regularly examined, will improve their judgment and taste; prevent the practice of reading without attention to the subject; and establish a habit of readily discovering the meaning, force, and beauty of every sentence they pe

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