64

ARGUMENT - SOPHISTRY.

Enjoy thy gay wit and false rhetoric,

That hath so well been taught her dazzling fence;
Thou art not fit to hear thyself convinced.

Reproachful speech from either side
The want of argument supplied;
They rail'd, revil'd-as often ends
The contests of disputing friends.

Dogmatic jargon learnt by heart,
Trite sentences, hard terms of art,
To vulgar ears seems so profound,
They fancy learning in the sound.

He'd undertake to prove, by force
Of argument, a man's no horse;
He'd prove a buzzard is no fowl,
And that a lord may be an owl;
A calf an alderman, a goose a justice,
And rooks committee-men and trustees.

MILTON'S Comus.

GAY's Fables.

GAY's Fables.

BUTLER'S Hudibras.

A man convinc'd against his will,
Is of the same opinion still.

BUTLER'S Hudibras.

Now with fine phrase, and foppery of tongue,
More graceful action, and a smoother tone,
The orator of fable and fair face
Will steal on your brib'd hearts.

In subtle sophistry's laborious forge.

False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,
Its gaudy colours spreads in every place;
The face of nature we no more survey,
All glares alike, without distinction gay:—

4

YOUNG.

YOUNG

ARGUMENT-SOPHISTRY.

But true expression, like th' unchanging sun,
Clears and improves whate'er it shines upon;
It gilds all objects, but it alters none.

POPE'S Essay on Criticism.

Who shall decide when doctors disagree,
And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me?

POPE'S Moral Essays

Like doctors thus, when much dispute has past,
We find our tenets just the same at last.

POPE'S Moral Essays.

But as some muskets do contrive it,
As oft to miss the mark they drive at,
And, though well-aim'd at duck or plover,
Bear wide, and kick their owners over,—
So fared our squire, whose reas'ning toil
Would often on himself recoil,
And so much injur'd more his side,
The stronger arguments he apply'd.

TRUMBULL'S M'Fingal

The self-torturing sophist, wild Rousseau,
The apostate of affection-he, who threw
Enchantment over passion, and from woe
Wrung overwhelming eloquence.

BYRON'S Childe Harold. He cast

O'er erring deeds and thoughts a heav'nly hue
Of words, like sunbeams, dazzling as they pass'd.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.

His speech was a fine sample, on the whole,
Of rhetoric, which the learn'd call "rigmarole."

With temper calm and mild,

BYRON'S Don Juan.

And words of soften'd tone,

He overthrows his neighbour's cause,

And justifies his own.

Vicksburg Whig.

35

56

ARTIFICE - CANDOUR.

With neat and rounded phrase

He tricks the shapeless thought;

Like hope of power, it charms to-day;

To-morrow, it is nought.

Vicksburg Whig.

ARTIFICE-CANDOUR.

Make my breast

Transparent as pure crystal, that the world,
Jealous of me, may see the foulest thought
My heart doth hold.

Shallow artifice begets suspicion,

And, like a cobweb veil, but thinly shades
The face of thy design; alone disguising
What should have ne'er been seen.

Imperfect mischief!

Thou, like the adder venomous and deaf,

BUCKINGHAM

CONGREVE.

Hast stung the traveller; and when thou think'st
To hide, the rustling leaves and bended grass
Confess and point the path which thou hast crept.
O, fate of fools! officious in contriving,

In executing, puzzled, lame, and lost.

You talk to me in parables;

CONGREVE

You may have known that I'm no wordy man:
Fine speeches are the instruments of knaves,
Or fools, that use them when they want good sense.

Honesty

Needs no disguise nor ornament; be plain.

`OTWAY.

OTWAY.

ASSASSINATION - MURDER.

The brave do never shun the light;

Just are their thoughts, and open are their tempers;
Truly, without disguise, they love or hate;

Still are they found in the fair face of day,
And heaven and men are judges of their actions

"Tis great, 't is manly to disdain disguise;
It shows our spirit, or it proves our strength

RowE.

YOUNG'S Night Thoughts.

A man of sense can artifice disdain,
As men of wealth may venture to go plain;
I find the fool when I behold the screen,
For 't is the wise man's interest to be seen.

YOUNG'S Love of Fame.

57

ASSASSINATION - MURDER.

Will all Neptune's ocean wash this blood

Clear from my hand? No, this my hand will rather

The multitudinous seas incarnadine,

Making this green one, red.

The great King of kings

SHAKSPEARE.

Hath in the table of his law commanded

That thou shalt do no murder; wilt thou then

Spurn at his edict, and fulfil a man's?

SHAKSPEARE.

The tyrannous and bloody act is done;
The most arch deed of piteous massacre
That ever yet this land was guilty of.

Though in the trade of war I have slain men,
Yet do I hold it very stuff o' the conscience
To do no contriv'd murder; I lack iniquity
Sometimes, to do me service.

SHAKSPEARE.

SHAKSPEARE.

Bee-his face is black and full of blood;

His eyeballs further out than when he lived,
Staring full ghastly, like a strangled man;

His hair uprear'd; his nostrils stretch'd with struggling;
His hands abroad display'd, as one that grasp'd
And tugg'd for life, and was by strength subdued.

Blood, though it sleeps a time, yet never dies;
The gods on murd'rers fix revengeful eyes.

Murder itself is past all expiation,
The greatest crime that nature doth abhor.

Is there a crime

SHAKSPEARE.

Beneath the roof of heaven, that stains the soul
Of men with more infernal hue, than damn'd
Assassination?

you

CHAPMAN

Cease, triflers; would have me feel remorse,
Leave me alone-nor cell, nor chain, nor dungeons,
Speak to the murderer with the voice of solitude.

Oh! thou dead

GoFFE.

CIBBER.

MATURIN'S Bertram

And everlasting witness! whose unsinking

Blood darkens earth and heaven! what thou now art,
I know not; but if thou seest what I am,

I think thou wilt forgive him, whom his God
Can ne'er forgive, nor his own soul-farewell!

ASSOCIATES-COMPANY.

Unbidden guests

Are often welcomest when they are gone.

BYRON'S Cain.

SHAKSPEARE.