But I would this fault were only peculiar to versifiers,and had not as large possession among prose printers:and,which is to be marvelled,among many scholars,and,which is to be pitied,among some preachers.Truly,I could wish (if at least I might be so bold to wish,in a thing beyond the reach of my capacity)the diligent imitators of Tully and Demosthenes,most worthy to be imitated,did not so much keep Nizolian paper-books {92}of their figures and phrases,as by attentive translation,as it were,devour them whole,and make them wholly theirs.For now they cast sugar and spice upon every dish that is served at the table:like those Indians,not content to wear ear-rings at the fit and natural place of the ears,but they will thrust jewels through their nose and lips,because they will be sure to be fine.
Tully,when he was to drive out Catiline,as it were with a thunderbolt of eloquence,often useth the figure of repetition,as "vivit et vincit,imo in senatum venit,imo in senatum venit,"&c.
{93}Indeed,inflamed with a well-grounded rage,he would have his words,as it were,double out of his mouth;and so do that artificially which we see men in choler do naturally.And we,having noted the grace of those words,hale them in sometimes to a familiar epistle,when it were too much choler to be choleric.
How well,store of "similiter cadences"doth sound with the gravity of the pulpit,I would but invoke Demosthenes'soul to tell,who with a rare daintiness useth them.Truly,they have made me think of the sophister,that with too much subtlety would prove two eggs three,and though he may be counted a sophister,had none for his labour.So these men bringing in such a kind of eloquence,well may they obtain an opinion of a seeming fineness,but persuade few,which should be the end of their fineness.
Now for similitudes in certain printed discourses,I think all herbalists,all stories of beasts,fowls,and fishes are rifled up,that they may come in multitudes to wait upon any of our conceits,which certainly is as absurd a surfeit to the ears as is possible.
For the force of a similitude not being to prove anything to a contrary disputer,but only to explain to a willing hearer:when that is done,the rest is a most tedious prattling,rather overswaying the memory from the purpose whereto they were applied,than any whit informing the judgment,already either satisfied,or by similitudes not to be satisfied.
For my part,I do not doubt,when Antonius and Crassus,the great forefathers of Cicero in eloquence;the one (as Cicero testifieth of them)pretended not to know art,the other not to set by it,because with a plain sensibleness they might win credit of popular ears,which credit is the nearest step to persuasion (which persuasion is the chief mark of oratory);I do not doubt,I say,but that they used these knacks very sparingly;which who doth generally use,any man may see,doth dance to his own music;and so to he noted by the audience,more careful to speak curiously than truly.Undoubtedly (at least to my opinion undoubtedly)I have found in divers small-learned courtiers a more sound style than in some professors of learning;of which I can guess no other cause,but that the courtier following that which by practice he findeth fittest to nature,therein (though he know it not)doth according to art,though not by art:where the other,using art to show art,and not hide art (as in these cases he should do),flieth from nature,and indeed abuseth art.
But what!methinks I deserve to be pounded {94}for straying from poetry to oratory:but both have such an affinity in the wordish considerations,that I think this digression will make my meaning receive the fuller understanding:which is not to take upon me to teach poets how they should do,but only finding myself sick among the rest,to allow sonic one or two spots of the common infection grown among the most part of writers;that,acknowledging ourselves somewhat awry,we may bend to the right use both of matter and manner:whereto our language giveth us great occasion,being,indeed,capable of any excellent exercising of it.{95}I know some will say,it is a mingled language:and why not so much the better,taking the best of both the other?Another will say,it wanteth grammar.Nay,truly,it hath that praise,that it wants not grammar;for grammar it might have,but needs it not;being so easy in itself,and so void of those cumbersome differences of cases,genders,moods,and tenses;which,I think,was a piece of the tower of Babylon's curse,that a man should be put to school to learn his mother tongue.But for the uttering sweetly and properly the conceit of the mind,which is the end of speech,that hath it equally with any other tongue in the world,and is particularly happy in compositions of two or three words together,near the Greek,far beyond the Latin;which is one of the greatest beauties can be in a language.
