Part 3

I shall now proceed to enumerate the five principal sources, as we may call them, from which almost all sublimity is derived, assuming, of course, the preliminary gift on which all these five sources depend, namely, command of language. The first and the most important is (1) grandeur of thought, as I have pointed out elsewhere in my work on Xenophon. The second is (2) a vigorous and spirited treatment of the passions. These two conditions of sublimity depend mainly on natural endowments, whereas those which follow derive assistance from Art. The third is (3) a certain artifice in the employment of figures, which are of two kinds, figures of thought and figures of speech. The fourth is (4) dignified expression, which is sub-divided into (_a_) the proper choice of words, and (_b_) the use of metaphors and other ornaments of diction. The fifth cause of sublimity, which embraces all those preceding, is (5) majesty and elevation of structure. Let us consider what is involved in each of these five forms separately.

I must first, however, remark that some of these five divisions are omitted by Caecilius; for instance, he says nothing about the passions.

2 Now if he made this omission from a belief that the Sublime and the Pathetic are one and the same thing, holding them to be always coexistent and interdependent, he is in error. Some passions are found which, so far from being lofty, are actually low, such as pity, grief, fear; and conversely, sublimity is often not in the least affecting, as we may see (among innumerable other instances) in those bold expressions of our great poet on the sons of Aloëus--

"Highly they raged To pile huge Ossa on the Olympian peak, And Pelion with all his waving trees On Ossa's crest to raise, and climb the sky;"

and the yet more tremendous climax--

"And now had they accomplished it."

3 And in orators, in all passages dealing with panegyric, and in all the more imposing and declamatory places, dignity and sublimity play an indispensable part; but pathos is mostly absent. Hence the most pathetic orators have usually but little skill in panegyric, and conversely those who are powerful in panegyric generally fail in pathos.

4 If, on the other hand, Caecilius supposed that pathos never contributes to sublimity, and this is why he thought it alien to the subject, he is entirely deceived. For I would confidently pronounce that nothing is so conducive to sublimity as an appropriate display of genuine passion, which bursts out with a kind of "fine madness" and divine inspiration, and falls on our ears like the voice of a god.

IX

I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime the most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind. Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired, nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble thoughts.

2 How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul. Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance, the silence of Ajax in the eleventh _Odyssey_[1] is great, and grander than anything he could have said.

[Footnote 1: _Od._ xi. 543.]

3 It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the lasting reverence of mankind. It is only natural that their words should be full of sublimity whose thoughts are full of majesty.

4 Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had observed, "Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied"; "And I, were I Parmenio"...

The distance between heaven and earth[1]--a measure, one might say, not less appropriate to Homer's genius than to the stature of his discord.

[Footnote 1: _Il._ iv. 442.]

5 How different is that touch of Hesiod's in his description of sorrow--if the _Shield_ is really one of his works: "rheum from her nostrils flowed"[2]--an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now consider how Homer gives dignity to his divine persons--

"As far as lies his airy ken, who sits On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea: So far extends the heavenly coursers' stride."[3]

He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world--a grand comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no room in the world for another.

[Footnote 2: _Scut. Herc._ 267.]

[Footnote 3: _Il._ v. 770.]

6 Sublime also are the images in the "Battle of the Gods"--

"A trumpet sound Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height; Then terror seized the monarch of the dead, And springing from his throne he cried aloud With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder By Neptune's mighty arm, forthwith reveal To mortal and immortal eyes those halls So drear and dank, which e'en the gods abhor."[4]

Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell, mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.

[Footnote 4: _Il._ xxi. 388; xx. 61.]

7 A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels, revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities, as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities--or rather, his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when we are unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods, according to him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.

8 Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on Poseidon:--

"Mountain and wood and solitary peak, The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy, Trembled beneath the god's immortal feet. Over the waves he rode, and round him played, Lured from the deeps, the ocean's monstrous brood, With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord: The charmèd billows parted: on they flew."[5]

[Footnote 5: _Il._ xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.]

9 And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression in the opening words of his "Laws": "God said"--what?--"let there be light, and there was light: let there be land, and there was."

10 I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries aloud--

"Almighty Sire, Only from darkness save Achaia's sons; No more I ask, but give us back the day; Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt."[6]

The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you observe, ask for his life--such a request would have been unworthy of his heroic soul--but finding himself paralysed by darkness, and prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. "At least," he thinks, "I shall find a warrior's grave, even though Zeus himself should fight against me."

[Footnote 6: _Il._ xvii. 645.]

11 In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of the struggle, and, in his own words, he

"Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side; His lips drop foam."[7]

[Footnote 7: _Il._ xv. 605.]

12 But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer's mind. When we turn to the _Odyssey_ we find occasion to observe that a great poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work was composed after the _Iliad_, in proof of which we may mention, among many other indications, the introduction in the _Odyssey_ of the sequel to the story of his heroes' adventures at Troy, as so many additional episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of sorrow and mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if in fulfilment of some previous design. The _Odyssey_ is, in fact, a sort of epilogue to the _Iliad_--

"There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there, And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor; There lies my own dear son."[8]

[Footnote 8: _Od._ iii. 109.]

13 And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the _Iliad_, which was written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the poem is founded on action and struggle, in the _Odyssey_ he generally prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence Homer in his _Odyssey_ may be compared to the setting sun: he is still as great as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is now pitched to a lower key than in the "Tale of Troy divine": we begin to miss that high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that continuous current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that force of eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to Nature. Like the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores waste and bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and draws us away into the dim region of myth and legend.

14 In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the _Odyssey_, the story of the Cyclops,[9] and other striking passages. It is Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every one of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.

My purpose in making this digression was, as I said, to point out into what trifles the second childhood of genius is too apt to be betrayed; such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are confined,[10] the tale of Odysseus's comrades being changed by Circe into swine[11] ("whimpering porkers" Zoïlus called them), and how Zeus was fed like a nestling by the doves,[12] and how Odysseus passed ten nights on the shipwreck without food,[13] and the improbable incidents in the slaying of the suitors.[14] When Homer nods like this, we must be content to say that he dreams as Zeus might dream.

[Footnote 9: _Od._ ix. 182.]

[Footnote 10: _Od._ x. 17.]

[Footnote 11: _Od._ x. 237.]

[Footnote 12: _Od._ xii. 62.]

[Footnote 13: _Od._ xii. 447.]

[Footnote 14: _Od._ xxii. _passim_.]

15 Another reason for these remarks on the _Odyssey_ is that I wished to make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they have lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a sort of comedy of manners.

X

Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces to the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things there are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It necessarily follows, therefore, that one cause of sublimity is the choice of the most striking circumstances involved in whatever we are describing, and, further, the power of afterwards combining them into one animate whole. The reader is attracted partly by the selection of the incidents, partly by the skill which has welded them together. For instance, Sappho, in dealing with the passionate manifestations attending on the frenzy of lovers, always chooses her strokes from the signs which she has observed to be actually exhibited in such cases. But her peculiar excellence lies in the felicity with which she chooses and unites together the most striking and powerful features.

2 "I deem that man divinely blest Who sits, and, gazing on thy face, Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips, And marks thy lovely smile. This, this it is that made my heart So wildly flutter in my breast; Whene'er I look on thee, my voice Falters, and faints, and fails; My tongue's benumbed; a subtle fire Through all my body inly steals; Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim; Strange murmurs drown my ears; With dewy damps my limbs are chilled; An icy shiver shakes my frame; Paler than ashes grows my cheek; And Death seems nigh at hand."

3 Is it not wonderful how at the same moment soul, body, ears, tongue, eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to her as completely as if they were not her own? Observe too how her sensations contradict one another--she freezes, she burns, she raves, she reasons, and all at the same instant. And this description is designed to show that she is assailed, not by any particular emotion, but by a tumult of different emotions. All these tokens belong to the passion of love; but it is in the choice, as I said, of the most striking features, and in the combination of them into one picture, that the perfection of this Ode of Sappho's lies. Similarly Homer in his descriptions of tempests always picks out the most terrific circumstances.

4 The poet of the "Arimaspeia" intended the following lines to be grand--

"Herein I find a wonder passing strange, That men should make their dwelling on the deep, Who far from land essaying bold to range With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep; Their eyes are fixed on heaven's starry steep; The ravening billows hunger for their lives; And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep, With suppliant hands to move heaven's pity strives, While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives."

All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the description. Now let us turn to Homer.

5 One passage will suffice to show the contrast.

"On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave, Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds, On a swift ship, and buries her in foam; Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast, And quakes the breathless seamen's shuddering heart In terror dire: death lours on every wave."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 624.]

6 Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought--

"But one frail timber shields them from their doom,"[2]--

banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying "shields them"; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether the "timber" be "frail" or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting the anxiety of the sailors' minds, and the diction being stamped, as it were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.

[Footnote 2: _Phaenomena_, 299.]

7 Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of Elatea[3]--"It was evening," etc. Each of these authors fastidiously rejects whatever is not essential to the subject, and in putting together the most vivid features is careful to guard against the interposition of anything frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such blemishes mar the general effect, and give a patched and gaping appearance to the edifice of sublimity, which ought to be built up in a solid and uniform structure.

[Footnote 3: _De Cor._ 169.]

XI

Closely associated with the part of our subject we have just treated of is that excellence of writing which is called amplification, when a writer or pleader, whose theme admits of many successive starting-points and pauses, brings on one impressive point after another in a continuous and ascending scale.

2 Now whether this is employed in the treatment of a commonplace, or in the way of exaggeration, whether to place arguments or facts in a strong light, or in the disposition of actions, or of passions--for amplification takes a hundred different shapes--in all cases the orator must be cautioned that none of these methods is complete without the aid of sublimity,--unless, indeed, it be our object to excite pity, or to depreciate an opponent's argument. In all other uses of amplification, if you subtract the element of sublimity you will take as it were the soul from the body. No sooner is the support of sublimity removed than the whole becomes lifeless, nerveless, and dull.

3 There is a difference, however, between the rules I am now giving and those just mentioned. Then I was speaking of the delineation and co-ordination of the principal circumstances. My next task, therefore, must be briefly to define this difference, and with it the general distinction between amplification and sublimity. Our whole discourse will thus gain in clearness.

XII

I must first remark that I am not satisfied with the definition of amplification generally given by authorities on rhetoric. They explain it to be a form of language which invests the subject with a certain grandeur. Yes, but this definition may be applied indifferently to sublimity, pathos, and the use of figurative language, since all these invest the discourse with some sort of grandeur. The difference seems to me to lie in this, that sublimity gives elevation to a subject, while amplification gives extension as well. Thus the sublime is often conveyed in a single thought,[1] but amplification can only subsist with a certain prolixity and diffusiveness.

[Footnote 1: Comp. i. 4. 26.]

2 The most general definition of amplification would explain it to consist in the gathering together of all the constituent parts and topics of a subject, emphasising the argument by repeated insistence, herein differing from proof, that whereas the object of proof is logical demonstration, ...

Plato, like the sea, pours forth his riches in a copious and expansive flood.

3 Hence the style of the orator, who is the greater master of our emotions, is often, as it were, red-hot and ablaze with passion, whereas Plato, whose strength lay in a sort of weighty and sober magnificence, though never frigid, does not rival the thunders of Demosthenes.

4 And, if a Greek may be allowed to express an opinion on the subject of Latin literature, I think the same difference may be discerned in the grandeur of Cicero as compared with that of his Grecian rival. The sublimity of Demosthenes is generally sudden and abrupt: that of Cicero is equally diffused. Demosthenes is vehement, rapid, vigorous, terrible; he burns and sweeps away all before him; and hence we may liken him to a whirlwind or a thunderbolt: Cicero is like a widespread conflagration, which rolls over and feeds on all around it, whose fire is extensive and burns long, breaking out successively in different places, and finding its fuel now here, now there.

5 Such points, however, I resign to your more competent judgment.

To resume, then, the high-strung sublimity of Demosthenes is appropriate to all cases where it is desired to exaggerate, or to rouse some vehement emotion, and generally when we want to carry away our audience with us. We must employ the diffusive style, on the other hand, when we wish to overpower them with a flood of language. It is suitable, for example, to familiar topics, and to perorations in most cases, and to digressions, and to all descriptive and declamatory passages, and in dealing with history or natural science, and in numerous other cases.

XIII

To return, however, to Plato: how grand he can be with all that gentle and noiseless flow of eloquence you will be reminded by this characteristic passage, which you have read in his _Republic_: "They, therefore, who have no knowledge of wisdom and virtue, whose lives are passed in feasting and similar joys, are borne downwards, as is but natural, and in this region they wander all their lives; but they never lifted up their eyes nor were borne upwards to the true world above, nor ever tasted of pleasure abiding and unalloyed; but like beasts they ever look downwards, and their heads are bent to the ground, or rather to the table; they feed full their bellies and their lusts, and longing ever more and more for such things they kick and gore one another with horns and hoofs of iron, and slay one another in their insatiable desires."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Rep._ ix. 586, A.]

2 We may learn from this author, if we would but observe his example, that there is yet another path besides those mentioned which leads to sublime heights. What path do I mean? The emulous imitation of the great poets and prose-writers of the past. On this mark, dear friend, let us keep our eyes ever steadfastly fixed. Many gather the divine impulse from another's spirit, just as we are told that the Pythian priestess, when she takes her seat on the tripod, where there is said to be a rent in the ground breathing upwards a heavenly emanation, straightway conceives from that source the godlike gift of prophecy, and utters her inspired oracles; so likewise from the mighty genius of the great writers of antiquity there is carried into the souls of their rivals, as from a fount of inspiration, an effluence which breathes upon them until, even though their natural temper be but cold, they share the sublime enthusiasm of others.

3 Thus Homer's name is associated with a numerous band of illustrious disciples--not only Herodotus, but Stesichorus before him, and the great Archilochus, and above all Plato, who from the great fountain-head of Homer's genius drew into himself innumerable tributary streams. Perhaps it would have been necessary to illustrate this point, had not Ammonius and his school already classified and noted down the various examples.