out of the imbroglio.

He could act with vigour, but action was not a necessity of his nature. After his fixed resolution "never more to meddle with any public employment," he busied himself with his garden and his books, "taking no more notice of what passed upon the public scene than an old man uses to do of what is acted on a theatre, where he gets as easy a seat as he can, entertains himself with what passes on the stage, not caring who the actors are, nor what the plot, nor whether he goes out before the play be done."

In practical politics the most important of Temple's views are those regarding England's best Continental policy in the then existing situation. The Triple Alliance, between England, Holland, and Sweden, is a clear and easily-remembered index. As Sidney and Raleigh had to urge the growing power of Spain upon the Government of Elizabeth, so Temple had to urge the growing power of France upon the Government of Charles. He advocated alliance with Holland in opposition both to commercial jealousy and to the French proclivities of the Court. As a speculator upon the Original and Nature of Government,' he writes with characteristic sagacity. Concerning the origin of Government, his leading views coincide with what is now generally accepted. He dismisses the theory of an original contract, and treats political communities as an expansion of the family system. The existence of aristocracies he ascribes in most cases to an incoming of conquerors. As regards the best form of government, he holds that there are but two leading forms, the rule of one and the rule of several; that experience gives little light as to the best system in detail. He lays down the seeming truism that "those are generally the best governments where the best men govern." But farther, he considers that all government rests ultimately on the will of the people, however propitiated, and that the most stable government is the pyramidal, the government that rests on the widest basis of popular confidence. He is not misled into overrating the importance of Greek and Roman history to the political student; he regards the classical governments as short-lived political failures, and considers the more stable institutions of China, of the Ottomans, of the Goths, and of Peru, as at least equally deserving of attention.

His Essay on Ancient and Modern Learning maintains that the ancient literature is superior to the modern. We must remember that it was written before 1688. He was not the originator of the comparison; it was a favourite theme among members of the French Academy and of the English Royal Society. Our author dwells chiefly on general considerations. He rebuts the argument

that the moderns must be better than the ancients because intellects are very much the same in all ages and countries, and because

the moderns have always the advantage of the experience of their predecessors. He argues that the Greeks had before them the wisdom of the Egyptians and the Hindus; that "many circumstances concur to one production that do not to any other, in one or many ages;" and that in recent times learning had been discouraged by ecclesiastical disputes, civil dissensions, want of royal patronage, and general contempt of scholarship, owing to the excessive pedantry of some scholars. He considers Sidney, Bacon, and Selden the three greatest "wits" among the English moderns; he does not mention Shakspeare.

ELEMENTS OF STYLE.

Vocabulary.-In Temple we meet with very few words that are not to be found in good modern prose. But some of the phrases and combinations are rather old-fashioned, such as, "I am not in pain" for I am under no alarm; "wits possessed of the vogue; "it is all a case for it is all one; "the bottom and reach of the design," where a modern writer would probably say "the foundation and object of the plot (or of the conspiracy);""these spirits were fed and heightened" for "this state of feeling was inflamed (or encouraged)."-Any reader comparing Temple's diction with ordinary modern diction cannot fail to notice in how many cases Saxon expressions have been superseded by Latin.

His style is sometimes decried as being tainted with Gallicisms. The accusation should be limited. In his Memoirs' he uses a good many French terms and turns-such as, "with all the secret imaginable" (for secrecy), “resentment of kindness shown me (for gratitude), "this testimony is justly due to all that practised him" (for all that had much intercourse with him). As Swift tells us, he used these expressions unconsciously, being led into them naturally from carrying on diplomacy in French. But when the fault was pointed out to him, he took pains to correct it, and, except in his Memoirs,' there are few traces either of French terms or of French idiom.

Sentences. Comparing Temple's composition with any publication of anterior date, we remark that the placing of words is better attended to; the cadence being more regularly filled out, and the balance of the clauses more neatly finished. In especial, we remark a peculiar finish of pointed balance-greater pains to bring two opposed words or phrases into corresponding places in the syntax of two successive clauses, and so more pointedly direct attention to the antithesis.

. We must not suppose from Johnson's panegyric that Temple was the inventor of rhythmical balance and point. It has been seen that these arts of style were practised under Elizabeth; every

age, indeed, can produce at least one representative of the pointed style. Temple's merit lies in improving and perfecting. In his composition the recurrence of clauses formed after the same model is more measured and regular. After reading a part of any of his highly-finished passages, our ear comes to expect something more or less pointed in every sentence, and we are seldom disappointed. Were the subject-matter trifling, this would soon become tiresome; but as the matter is usually weighty, and the language dignified and varied, the play of antithesis is rather an agreeable addition.

To illustrate the superior dignity and finish of his pointed sentences, one or two passages may be quoted. Our quotations under this head are longer than usual, because this is really the chief distinction of the author's style.

The following is from the Preface to his 'Observations on the United Provinces.' He is upholding the dignity of History :

:

"Nor are we to think Princes themselves losers, or less entertained, when we see them employ their time and their thoughts in so useful speculations, and to so glorious ends: but that rather thereby they attain their true prerogative of being happier, as well as greater, than subjects can be. For all the pleasures of sense that any man can enjoy, are within the reach of a private fortune and ordinary contrivance; grow fainter with age, and duller with use; must be revived with intermissions, and wait upon the returns of appetite, which are no more at call of the rich than the poor. The flashes of wit and good-humour that rise from the vapours of wine, are little different from those that proceed from the heats of blood in the first approaches of fevers or frenzies, and are to be valued, but as (indeed) they are, the effects of distemper. But the pleasures of imagination, as they heighten and refine the very pleasures of sense, so they are of larger extent and longer duration; and if the most sensual man will confess there is a pleasure in pleasing, he must likewise allow there is good to a man's self in doing good to others: and the further this extends the higher it rises, and the longer it lasts. Besides, there is beauty in order, and there are charms in well-deserved praise: and both are the greater by how much greater the subject; as the first appearing in a well-framed and well-governed state, and the other arising from noble and generous actions. Nor can any veins of good-humour be greater than those that swell by the success of wise counsels, and by the fortunate events of public affairs; since a man that takes pleasure in doing good to ten thousand, must needs have more than he that takes none but in doing good to himself."

Our next passage is from the "Original and Nature of Government," expounding why the country population is less democratic. than the town:

"The contrary of all this happens in countries thin inhabited, and especially in vast Campanias, such as are extended through Asia and Afric, where there are few cities besides what grow by the residence of the kings or their governors. The people are poorer, and having little to lose, have little to care for, and are less exposed to the designs of power or violence. The assembling of persons, deputed from people at great distances one from another, is trouble to them that are sent, and charge to them that send. And, where ambition and avarice have made no entrance, the desire of leisure

is much more natural than of business and care; besides, men conversing all their lives with the woods, and the fields, and the herds, more than with one another, come to know as little as they desire; use their senses a great deal more than their reasons; examine not the nature or the tenure of power and authority; find only they are fit to obey, because they are not fit to govern; and so come to submit to the will of him they found in power, as they do to the will of heaven, and consider all changes of conditions that happen to them under good or bad Princes, like good or ill seasons, that happen in the weather and the air."

His letter of consolation to the Countess of Essex is one of his most finished productions. The following paragraph illustrates at once the rhythmical finish of his style and the soundness of his judgment:

"But, Madam, though religion were no party in your case, and that for so violent and injurious a grief, you had nothing to answer to God, but only to the world and yourself; yet, I very much doubt, how you would be acquitted. We bring into the world with us a poor, needy, uncertain life, short at the longest, and unquiet at the best; all the imaginations of the witty and the wise have been perpetually busied to find out the ways how to revive it with pleasures, or relieve it with diversions; how to compose it with ease, and settle it with safety. To some of these ends have been employed the institutions of lawgivers, the reasonings of philosophers, the inventions of poets, the pains of labouring, and the extravagances of voluptuous men. All the world is perpetually at work about nothing else, but only that our poor mortal lives should pass the easier and happier for that little time we possess them, or else end the better when we lose them. Upon this occasion, riches came to be coveted, honours to be esteemed, friendship and love to be pursued, and virtues themselves to be admired in the world. Now, Madam, is it not to bid defiance to all mankind, to condemn their universal opinions and designs; if, instead of passing your life as well and easily, you resolve to pass it as ill and miserably as you can? You grow insensible to the conveniences of riches, the delights of honour and praise, the charms of kindness or friendship, nay to the observance or applause of virtues themselves; for who can you expect, in these excesses of passion, will allow you to show either temperance or fortitude, to be either prudent or just and for your friends, I suppose you reckon upon losing their kindness, when you have sufficiently convinced them, they can never hope for any of yours, since you have none left for yourself or anything else. You declare upon all occasions, you are incapable of receiving any comfort or pleasure in anything that is left in this world; and, I assure you, Madam, none can ever love you that can have no hopes ever to please you.'

The following is a balanced comparison between Homer and Virgil; the order is well kept up :

"Homer was, without dispute, the most universal genius that has been known in the world, and Virgil the most accomplished. To the first must be allowed the most fertile invention, the richest vein, the most general knowledge, and the most lively expression; to the last, the noblest ideas, the justest institution, the wisest conduct, and the choicest elocution. To speak in the painter's terms, we find, in the works of Homer, the most spirit, force, and life; in those of Virgil, the best design, the truest proportions, and the greatest grace; the colouring in both seems equal, and indeed is in both admirable. Homer had more fire and rapture, Virgil more light and

swiftness; or at least the poetical fire was more raging in one, but clearer in the other, which makes the first more amazing, and the latter more agreeable. The ore was richer in one, but in the other more refined, and better allayed to make up excellent work. Upon the whole, I think it must be confessed, that Homer was of the two, and perhaps of all others, the vastest, the sublimest, and the most wonderful genius; and that he has been generally so esteemed, there cannot be a greater testimony given, than what has been by some observed, that not only the greatest masters have found in his works the best and truest principles of all their sciences or arts, but that the noblest nations have derived from them the original of their several races, though it be hardly yet agreed whether his story be true or a fiction. In short, these two immortal poets must be allowed to have so much excelled in their kinds, as to have exceeded all comparison, to have even extinguished emulation, and in a manner confined true poetry, not only to their two languages, but to their very persons."

We have noticed only the merits of Temple's sentences. These are not uniformly sustained. The sentence-structure of his 'Memoirs' is not so good. Our quotations are fair specimens of his general style, and even they have not the grammatical accuracy and finish that Johnson introduced into the language. In his 'Memoirs' he aims at Thucydidean compactness and brevity, and so falls into the error of condensations that are too forced, and sentences that are deficient in unity. I shall quote the most faulty condensation that I have observed :—

"This, I suppose, gave the occasion for reflections upon what had passed in the course of my former embassies in Holland and at Aix; and his Majesty, and his ministers, the resolution to send for me out of my private retreat, where I had passed two years (as I intended to do the rest of my life), and to engage me in going over into Holland, to make the separate peace with that State."

Paragraphs.-Our author has a certain apprehension, however faint, of paragraph method. If we except Fuller, he makes his paragraphs more orderly and consecutive than any writer before Johnson. His Essay on the " Original and Nature of Government" is a favourable example of his method. He has five large breaks, at each of which he introduces a new proposition. But the passages between the breaks are far from being perfectly consecutive, or strictly confined to the subject enounced in the first proposition; although, to do them justice, they are quite as orderly as many compositions of much later date. As an example of the minuter paragraph arrangement, may be quoted one of these larger divisions. It will be seen that the first paragraph is not a complete introduction, and that towards the end the arrangement becomes more confused :

"Authority arises from the opinion of wisdom, goodness, and valour in the persons who possess it.

"Wisdom is that which makes men judge what are the best ends, and what the best means to attain them; and gives a man advantage among the