When mellowing years their full perfection And each bold figure just begins to líve: Conjunctive and Disjunctive Accents. When sentences do not maintain a dependent construction to the end, the use of the downward or upward accent to signify completion or incompletion at those places where the construction is perfect, but the sentence unfinished,―must frequently be left to the discretion of the reader. Sometimes, indeed, the sense forbids the downward accent at such a place, because, though the portion of the sentence there terminating, may not seem to have a grammatical dependence on what follows, yet it has a dependence for its true intention, inasmuch as the following portion contains a contemplated qualification, restriction, or counterpart of what precedes. Nos. 3, 4, 5, page 47, will make the remark understood; for it will be perceived in those instances, that the suspensive and conclusive members, have not that evident grammatical dependence observable in the other examples, and yet the meaning requires a connexion equally strong to be enforced. It is when not only the construction is complete, but the meaning clear of what follows, that the reader will frequently have to choose between the upward and downward In theory, indeed, independence both of construction and of meaning would seem always to demand the downward; and yet in natural speaking and just reading, the contrary practice often ocFor however complete a proposition may be in itself, yet if intended to lead to another, we may choose, in finishing it, to signify that we shall join something to what has been said. The upward accent used for this purpose, should be called 'not suspensive, but conjunctive. But if the reader chooses to enforce the distinctness of a proposition, rather than imply that something is to be added, the downward accent will be used, which must then be called, not conclusive, but disjunctive, inasmuch as though the proposition is complete of itself, the sentence is unfinished. Let the different ef accent. curs. tence. fect of these accents be tried by two readings of the following senModesty is the great ornament of youth; and it has ever been esteemed a presage of rising merit." Modesty is the great ornament of yoùth ;--and it has ever been esteemed a presage of rising merit." Each mode of reading might be advocated, and the reader is entirely left to choose for himself. And the effect of each reading with the previous explanation may easily suggest, that a good reader will often employ these accents on occasions very different from those that commonly authorize them. He will often use the conjunctive accent even at the end of sentences, particularly in poetry, and still more particularly in Milton's poetry, in order to imitate, and keep pace with, the writer's flow of thought: as on the other hand, he will frequently employ the disjunctive accent even in the course of sentences completely periodic, for the purpose of enforcing the distinctness of members which are independent of each other's meaning, though all have a common dependence on some other member. This use of the disjunctive accent is exemplified by the sentences composing Exercise 9 at page 60. As to the extraordinary use of the conjunctive accent, it needs not an example, because the principle of its adoption in common cases, to join distinct propositions that meet in one sentence, is just the same. Indeed the pupil will probably require to be cautioned, while pursuing his exercises, against a more frequent use of the conjunctive accent than is absolutely necessary, lest encouragement be given to a mechanical running tone, indefinite in its quality and import, with which bad readers are accustomed to conclude all their sentences till they reach a final cadence. EXERCISE 6. Suspensive and Disjunctive, Suspensive and Conclusive Accents. 1. It is of the last impórtance to season the passions of a child with devòtion; which seldom díes in a mind that has received an early tìncture-of-it. 2. A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wròng; which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser to day than he was yesterday. 3. Mémory is the purveyor of reason ; the pówer which places those images before the mind, upon which the judgment is to be èxercised. 4. He that is loudly praised, will be clamorously censured; he that rises hastily into fáme, will be in danger of sinking suddenly into oblivion. 5. He that lies in bed all a summer's morning, loses the chief pleasure of the dày; he that gives up his youth to índolence, undergoes a loss of the same kind. 6. Human characters are, by no means, cònstant; men change, by change of place, of fortune, of acquaintance; he who is at one time a lover of pleasure, is, at another, a lover of money. 7. Lífe is constantly ravaged by invàders; one steals away an hour, another a dày; one conceals the robbery by hurrying us into búsiness, another by lulling us with amusement: the depredation is continued through a thousand vicissitudes of tumult and tranquillity, till, having lost all, we can lose no mòre. 8. 'Tis with our júdgments as our watches, none Go just alike, but each believes his own. 9. O'rder is Heaven's first làw; and this conféssed, Some are, and must be, greater than the rest, More rich, more wise; but who infers from hence That such are happier, shocks all common sènse. 10. For love of nóvelty, the daring youth Breaks from his weeping mother's anxious arms, In foreign climes to ròve; the pensive ságe, Heedless of sleep or midnight's harmful Hangs o'er the sickly tàper; and, untíred, From morn to ève. 11. Virtue, the strength and beauty of the soul Is the best gift of Heaven; a happiness That even above the smiles and frowns of fate Exalts great nature's favourites; a wealth That ne'er encumbers, nor to baser hands Can be transfèrred: it is the only good Man justly boasts-of, or can call his own. 12. Wisdom, in sable garb arrayed, Immersed in rapturous thought profound, With leaden eye that loves the ground, Warm Charity, the general friend, And Pity, dropping soft the sadly pleasing teàr. EXERCISE 7. The Conjunctive and Conclusive Accents. 1. The temperate man's pleasures are durable, because they are régular; and all his life is calm and serene, because it is ìnnocent. 2. He that is truly polite, knows how to contradict with respect, and to please without adulátion; and is equally remote from an insipid complaisance, and a low familiàrity. 3. No object is more pleasing to the eye, than the sight of a man whom you have obliged; nor any music so agreeable to the ear, as the voice of one, that owns you for his benefàctor. 4. There is scarcely a thinking man in the world who is involved in the business of it, but lives under a secret impatience of the hurry and fatigue he suffers; and has formed a resolution to fix himself, one time or other, in such a state as is suitable to the end of his bèing. 5. To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creep, in this petty pace, from day to day, |
