But words of this rank may receive the rhetorical emphasis. The reply of Sir Robert Peel to Cobbett makes a good illustration :—

'Why does the hon. Member attack me? I have done nothing to merit his assaults. I never lent him a thousand pounds.'

Here the pronouns are emphasized, because there is an allusion to Mr. Burdett, who had lent Cobbett a thousand pounds, and had been rewarded with scurrility. At the close of the Night Thoughts we have this line,

The course of nature is the art of God.'

Here it will be perceived that the symbol-verb comes in for some emphasis, receiving as it does the ictus of the metre; though this little word is naturally toneless. The emphasis which it here carries awakens the remembrance of the fact that there are philosophers in the world who would question the statement. We may show ourselves that this is the case by playing a variety or two upon the phrase. If we say thus, 'the course of nature is changeful,' the symbol-verb does its duty in the most unobtrusive manner. If now we contrive to force the is into prominence, we shall convert a proposition which, as it stands, is a very inoffensive truism, into a ludicrous dictum emphasizing a statement which nobody denies. And this may be done by expressing that truism in the form of a heroic line, with the stroke of the metre upon the symbol verb.

The course of nature is a course of change.'

The elevation given to the word is produces the effect of leaving one to expect a pointed assertion in the predicate, and the disappointment of this expectation produces the palpable bathos.

Emphasis, then, is a distinct thing from accent. The latter is an elevation of a syllable above the rest of the word; the

former is the elevation of a word over the rest of a phrase. But it should be noticed that, while there is this difference of relation between emphasis and accent, there is, on the other hand, an identity of incidence. The emphasis rests on the selfsame point as does the accent. We say indeed that the emphasis is on such and such a word, because by it one word is distinguished above all other words in the phrase. But the precise place of the emphasis is there where the accent is, in all words that have an accent; that is to say, in all words that have more than one syllable. In the case of a polysyllable, which has more than one accented syllable, the emphasis falls on the syllable that has the higher tone. An accented word is emphasized by the intensification of its chief accent.

In Acts xvii. 28, ' for we are also his offspring,' there is no doubt that the emphatic word is 'offspring.' The Greek tells us so explicitly, by prefixing to this word a particle, which is in our version ill rendered by also.' A reader who enters into the spirit of the reasoning in this place, will very markedly distinguish the word 'offspring.' And he will do so by sharpening the acuteness of that accent which already raises the first syllable above the second.

There is a well-known line in the opening of the Satires of Juvenal, which the greatest of translators has thus rendered, and thus emphasized by capitals :

'Hear, ALWAYS hear; nor ONCE the debt repay?'

In this instance of a disyllable emphasized, the rhetorical emphasis rests on that syllable which had the accent, while the word was in its private capacity. In fact, emphasis is a sort of public accent, which is incident to a word in regard of its external and social relations.

Where a polysyllable, like elementary, has two accents, the

M m

emphasis heightens the tone of that which is already the higher. In a sentence like this, 'I was not speaking of grammar schools, but of elementary schools,' the rhetorical emphasis falling on elementary, will heighten the tone of the third syllable.

In all this there is no change of quantity, no lengthening of the syllable so affected by accent and emphasis together. It is true, we often hear such a syllable very sensibly lengthened, as thus: 'I beg leave once more to repeat, that I was speaking only of ele-ma-entary schools.' The syllable is isolated and elongated very markedly, but then this is something more than emphasis, it is stress.

In living languages, accent and emphasis are unwritten. The so-called French accents have nothing whatever to do with the accentuation of the language, but belong solely to its etymology and orthography. In Greek, as transmitted to us, the accents are written, but they were an invention of the grammarians of Alexandria. In the Hebrew Bible, not only are the accents written, but likewise the emphasis; these signs are, however, no part of the original text, but a scholastic notation of later times.

Written accents are very useful as historical guides to a pronunciation that might be lost without them. But for the present and living exercise of a living language they are undesirable. All writing tends to become traditional, and characters once established are apt to survive their signification. Had our language been accentuated in the early printed books, we should have had in them a treasure of information indeed, but it would have been misleading in modern times, and probably it would have cramped the natural development of the language. For example, we whatso and whóso, but in early times it was whatsó and whosó. This change is in natural and harmonious keep

now say

ing with the changes that have taken place in the relative values and functions of the words entering into these compounds, as already explained above, p. 404. Here, therefore, we see the accent still true to its office as an interpreter and illustrator. An instance of the old emphasis on so occurs in The Faerie Queene, iii. 2. 7:—

'By sea, by land, where so they may be mett.'

But, while we make no attempt to write accent, we may be said to attempt some partial and indirect tokens of emphasis by means of our system of punctuation. It is, however, in our old Saxon literature that we find emphasis in the most remarkable manner signalised. The alliteration of the *Saxon poetry not only gratified the ear with a resonance like that of modern rhyme, but it also had the rhetorical advantage of touching the emphatic words; falling as it did on the natural summits of the construction, and tinging them. with the brilliance of a musical reverberation.

The most convenient illustration we can offer of the Saxon alliteration will perhaps be obtained by selecting from the Song of the Fight of Malden, such staves as have retained their alliteration in Mr. Freeman's version, in Old English History for Children :

Had we continued to be isolated from the Romanesque influence, like the people of Iceland, we might have developed this form of poetry into something of the luxuriance and precision which it has in Icelandic literature, as may be seen in the Preface to Mr. Magnusson's Lilja, 1870.

Since we have adopted the French principles of poetry, alliteration has retired into the background. As late as the fourteenth century we find it pretty equally matched as a rival with the iambic couplet in rhyme; but within that century the victory of the latter was assured. By Shakspeare's time alliteration was spoken of contemptuously, as if it had reached the stage of senility. The pedantic Holofernes says he will 'affect the letter,' that is to say, compose verses with alliteration.

'Hol. I will something affect the letter, for it argues facilitie.

The prayfull Princesse pearst and prickt a prettie pleasing Pricket,
Some say a Sore, but not a sore, till now made sore with shooting.'
Loves Labours Lost, iv. 2.

But however much it had come to be despised, it has notwithstanding managed to retain a certain position in our poetry. 'Alliteration's artful aid' is still found to be a real auxiliary to the poet, which, sparingly and unobtrusively used, has often an artistic effect, though its agency may be unnoticed. Shakspeare himself provides us with some very pretty instances of alliteration.