10. Whether in company of the common people or nobles, he was always the saine plain man; always most perfectly at his ease, his faculties in full play, and the full orbit of his genius forever clear and unclouded. And then the stores of his mind were inexhaustible.

11. He had commenced life with an attention so vigilant, that nothing had escaped his observation; and a judgment so solid, that every incident was turned to advantage. His youth had not been wasted in idleness, nor overcast by intemperance.

12. He had been, all his life,1 a close and deep reader, as well as2 thinker; and, by the force of his own powers, had wrought up the raw materials, which he had gath ered from books, with such exquisite skill and felicity, that he had added a hundred fold to their original value, and justly made them his own.

CHAPTER VIII.

[MITFORD.]

RIENZI'S ADDRESS TO THE ROMANS.
I come not here to talk. Ye know too well
The story of our thraldom. We are slaves!
The bright sun rises to his course, and lights
A race of slaves! He sets, and his last beam
Falls on a slave, not such3 as4, swept along
By the full tide of power, the conqueror
To crimson glory and undying fame;
But base, ignoble slaves3- Islaves to a horde
Of petty tyrants, feudal despots! lords,3

Rich in some dozen paltry villages

led

Strong in some hundred spearmen-only great3

1 Rule X. 2 Rule XXIII., Rem. 5.

3 What words are to be supplied to complete the sentence?
4 Rule XXIII., Rem. 3.

5

10

In that strange spell- a name.

I that speak to ye,l

a gracious boy,

I had a brother once
Full of gentleness, of calmest hope,
Of sweet and quiet joy; there was the look
Of heaven upon his face, which limners give
To the beloved disciple. How I loved
That gracious boy! Younger by fifteen years,
Brother,2 at once, and son! He left my side,
A summer bloom3 on his fair cheeks, a smile
Parting his innocent lips. In one short hour
The pretty, harmless boy was slain! I saw
The corse, the mangled corse! and then I cried
For vengeance.

Rouse, ye Romans !4 Rouse, ye slaves!
Have ye brave sons? Look in the next fierce brawl
To see them die. Have ye fair daughters? Look
To see them live, torn from your arms, distained,
Dishonored; and, if ye dare call5 for justice,
Be answered by the lash. Yet this is Rome,
That sat on seven hills, and, from her throne
Of beauty, ruled the world! Yet we are Romans!
Why, in that elder day, to be a Roman
Was greater than a king! And once again,
Hear me, ye walls, that echoed to the tread
Of either Brutus!—once again, I swear,
The eternal city shall be free, her sons
Shall walk with princes.

1 Ye is rarely used in the objective case.
2 Rule I.

3 Rule XII., supply the participle being.
• Rule XIII.

5 Rule XIX.

6 XXI., Rem. 13.
7 Rule IV. Rem. L

5

10

16

20

25

THE MINSTREL.-[BEATTIE.]

I.

Ah! who can tell how hard it is to climb,

The steep where Fame's proud temple shines afar;
Ah! who can tell how many a soul sublime,
Has felt the influence of malignant star,

And waged with Fortune an eternal war;
Checked by the scoff of Pride, by Envy's frown,

And Poverty's unconquerable bar,

In life's low vale remote has pined alone,

Then dropped into the grave, unpitied and unknown!

II.

5

And yet the languor of inglorious days

10

Not equally oppressive is to all:

Him, who ne'er listened to the voice of praise,

The silence of neglect can ne'er appal.

There are, who, deaf to mad Ambition's call,

14

Would shrink to hear the obstreperous trump of Fame;

Supremely blessed, if to their portion fall

Health, competence, and peace. Nor higher aim

Had he, whose simple tale these artless lines proclaim.

III.

The rolls of fame I will not now explore

Nor need I here describe in leared lay,
How forth the minstrel fared in days of yore,
Right glad of heart, though homely in array;
His waving locks and beard all hoary gray:
While, from his bending shoulder, decent hung
His harp, the sole companion of his way,
Which to the whistling wind responsive rung;
And ever, as he went, some merry lay he sung.

20

25

IV.

Fret not thyself, thou glittering child of pride.
That a poor villager inspires my strain;
With thee let Pageantry and Power abide ;
The gentle Muses haunt the sylvan reign;
Where through wild groves at eve the lonely swain
Enraptured roams, to gaze on Nature's charms:
They hate the sensual,1 and scorn the vain ;1
The parasite their influence never warms,
Nor him whose sordid soul the love of gold alarms.

5

CHAPTER IX.

THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.

[MACAULAY.]

It should be constantly borne in mind, that one great object in analyzing and parsing, is to learn how good writers employ language.

1. That wonderful book, while it obtains admiration from the most fastidious critics, is loved by those who are too simple to admire it. Doctor Johnson, all whose studies were desultory, and who hated, as he said, to read books through, made an exception in favor of the "Pilgrim's Progress."

2. That work, he said, was one of the two or three works which he wished longer. It was by no common merit that the illiterate sectary extracted praise like this from the most pedantic of critics and the most bigoted of Tories.

3. In the wildest part of Scotland the "Pilgrim's Progress " is a greater favorite than "Jack the Giant Killer." Every reader knows the straight and narrow path, as well 2 Rule I., Rem. 4.

1 Rule XV., Rem. 5.

as he knows a road in which he has gone backward and forward a hundred times.1

4. This is the highest miracle of genius; that? things which are not should be as though they were, that the imaginations of one mind should become the personal recollections of another.

5. And this miracle the tinker has wrought. There is no ascent, no declivity, no resting-place, no turnstile with which we are not perfectly acquainted. The wicket gate, and the desolate swamp which separates it from the City of Destruction; the long line of road, as straight as rule can make it; the Interpreter's house, and all its fair shows; the prisoner in the iron cage; the palace, at the doors of which armed men kept guard, and on the battlements of which walked persons clothed all in gold; the cross and the sepulcher; the steep hill and the pleasant arbor; the stately front of the House Beautiful by the way side; the low green valley of Humiliation, rich with grass and covered with flocks, all3 are as well known to us as the sights of our own street.

6. Then we come to the narrow place where Apollyon strode right across the whole breadth of the way, to stop the journey of Christian, and where afterwards the pillar was set up to testify how bravely the pilgrim had fought the good fight. As we advance, the valley becomes deeper and deeper. The shade of the precipices on both sides falls blacker and blacker.

7. The clouds gather overhead. Doleful voices, the clanking of chains, and the rushing of many feet to and fro, are heard through the darkness. The way, hardly discernible in gloom, runs close by the mouth of the

1 Rule X. 2 Rule I., Rem, 3 Rule XVL 4 Rua XXI., Rem. 14.