how shall you look for
wit from him whose leisure and head, assisted with the examination of his
eyes, yield you no life or sharpness in his writing?
wit from him whose leisure and head, assisted with the examination of his
eyes, yield you no life or sharpness in his writing?
Ben Jonson - Discoveries Made Upon Men, and Some Poems
We must not go about, like men anguished and
perplexed, for vicious affectation of praise, but calmly study the
separation of opinions, find the errors have intervened, awake antiquity,
call former times into question; but make no parties with the present,
nor follow any fierce undertakers, mingle no matter of doubtful credit
with the simplicity of truth, but gently stir the mould about the root of
the question, and avoid all digladiations, facility of credit, or
superstitious simplicity, seek the consonancy and concatenation of truth;
stoop only to point of necessity, and what leads to convenience. Then
make exact animadversion where style hath degenerated, where flourished
and thrived in choiceness of phrase, round and clean composition of
sentence, sweet falling of the clause, varying an illustration by tropes
and figures, weight of matter, worth of subject, soundness of argument,
life of invention, and depth of judgment. This is _monte potiri_, to get
the hill; for no perfect discovery can be made upon a flat or a level.
_De optimo scriptore_. --_Cicero_. --Now that I have informed you in the
knowing of these things, let me lead you by the hand a little farther, in
the direction of the use, and make you an able writer by practice. The
conceits of the mind are pictures of things, and the tongue is the
interpreter of those pictures. The order of God's creatures in
themselves is not only admirable and glorious, but eloquent: then he who
could apprehend the consequence of things in their truth, and utter his
apprehensions as truly, were the best writer or speaker. Therefore
Cicero said much, when he said, _Dicere recte nemo potest_, _nisi qui
prudenter intelligit_. {124a} The shame of speaking unskilfully were
small if the tongue only thereby were disgraced; but as the image of a
king in his seal ill-represented is not so much a blemish to the wax, or
the signet that sealed it, as to the prince it representeth, so
disordered speech is not so much injury to the lips that give it forth,
as to the disproportion and incoherence of things in themselves, so
negligently expressed. Neither can his mind be thought to be in tune,
whose words do jar; nor his reason in frame, whose sentence is
preposterous; nor his elocution clear and perfect, whose utterance breaks
itself into fragments and uncertainties. Were it not a dishonour to a
mighty prince, to have the majesty of his embassage spoiled by a careless
ambassador? and is it not as great an indignity, that an excellent
conceit and capacity, by the indiligence of an idle tongue, should be
disgraced? Negligent speech doth not only discredit the person of the
speaker, but it discrediteth the opinion of his reason and judgment; it
discrediteth the force and uniformity of the matter and substance. If it
be so then in words, which fly and escape censure, and where one good
phrase begs pardon for many incongruities and faults, how shall he then
be thought wise whose penning is thin and shallow?
how shall you look for
wit from him whose leisure and head, assisted with the examination of his
eyes, yield you no life or sharpness in his writing?
_De stylo epistolari_. --_Inventio_. --In writing there is to be regarded the
invention and the fashion. For the invention, that ariseth upon your
business, whereof there can be no rules of more certainty, or precepts of
better direction given, than conjecture can lay down from the several
occasions of men's particular lives and vocations: but sometimes men make
baseness of kindness: As "I could not satisfy myself till I had
discharged my remembrance, and charged my letters with commendation to
you;" or, "My business is no other than to testify my love to you, and to
put you in mind of my willingness to do you all kind offices;" or, "Sir,
have you leisure to descend to the remembering of that assurance you have
long possessed in your servant, and upon your next opportunity make him
happy with some commands from you? " or the like; that go a-begging for
some meaning, and labour to be delivered of the great burden of nothing.
When you have invented, and that your business be matter, and not bare
form, or mere ceremony, but some earnest, then are you to proceed to the
ordering of it, and digesting the parts, which is had out of two
circumstances. One is the understanding of the persons to whom you are
to write; the other is the coherence of your sentence; for men's capacity
to weigh what will be apprehended with greatest attention or leisure;
what next regarded and longed for especially, and what last will leave
satisfaction, and (as it were) the sweetest memorial and belief of all
that is passed in his understanding whom you write to. For the
consequence of sentences, you must be sure that every clause do give the
cue one to the other, and be bespoken ere it come. So much for invention
and order.
_Modus_. --1. _Brevitas_. --Now for fashion: it consists in four things,
which are qualities of your style. The first is brevity; for they must
not be treatises or discourses (your letters) except it be to learned
men. And even among them there is a kind of thrift and saving of words.
perplexed, for vicious affectation of praise, but calmly study the
separation of opinions, find the errors have intervened, awake antiquity,
call former times into question; but make no parties with the present,
nor follow any fierce undertakers, mingle no matter of doubtful credit
with the simplicity of truth, but gently stir the mould about the root of
the question, and avoid all digladiations, facility of credit, or
superstitious simplicity, seek the consonancy and concatenation of truth;
stoop only to point of necessity, and what leads to convenience. Then
make exact animadversion where style hath degenerated, where flourished
and thrived in choiceness of phrase, round and clean composition of
sentence, sweet falling of the clause, varying an illustration by tropes
and figures, weight of matter, worth of subject, soundness of argument,
life of invention, and depth of judgment. This is _monte potiri_, to get
the hill; for no perfect discovery can be made upon a flat or a level.
_De optimo scriptore_. --_Cicero_. --Now that I have informed you in the
knowing of these things, let me lead you by the hand a little farther, in
the direction of the use, and make you an able writer by practice. The
conceits of the mind are pictures of things, and the tongue is the
interpreter of those pictures. The order of God's creatures in
themselves is not only admirable and glorious, but eloquent: then he who
could apprehend the consequence of things in their truth, and utter his
apprehensions as truly, were the best writer or speaker. Therefore
Cicero said much, when he said, _Dicere recte nemo potest_, _nisi qui
prudenter intelligit_. {124a} The shame of speaking unskilfully were
small if the tongue only thereby were disgraced; but as the image of a
king in his seal ill-represented is not so much a blemish to the wax, or
the signet that sealed it, as to the prince it representeth, so
disordered speech is not so much injury to the lips that give it forth,
as to the disproportion and incoherence of things in themselves, so
negligently expressed. Neither can his mind be thought to be in tune,
whose words do jar; nor his reason in frame, whose sentence is
preposterous; nor his elocution clear and perfect, whose utterance breaks
itself into fragments and uncertainties. Were it not a dishonour to a
mighty prince, to have the majesty of his embassage spoiled by a careless
ambassador? and is it not as great an indignity, that an excellent
conceit and capacity, by the indiligence of an idle tongue, should be
disgraced? Negligent speech doth not only discredit the person of the
speaker, but it discrediteth the opinion of his reason and judgment; it
discrediteth the force and uniformity of the matter and substance. If it
be so then in words, which fly and escape censure, and where one good
phrase begs pardon for many incongruities and faults, how shall he then
be thought wise whose penning is thin and shallow?
how shall you look for
wit from him whose leisure and head, assisted with the examination of his
eyes, yield you no life or sharpness in his writing?
_De stylo epistolari_. --_Inventio_. --In writing there is to be regarded the
invention and the fashion. For the invention, that ariseth upon your
business, whereof there can be no rules of more certainty, or precepts of
better direction given, than conjecture can lay down from the several
occasions of men's particular lives and vocations: but sometimes men make
baseness of kindness: As "I could not satisfy myself till I had
discharged my remembrance, and charged my letters with commendation to
you;" or, "My business is no other than to testify my love to you, and to
put you in mind of my willingness to do you all kind offices;" or, "Sir,
have you leisure to descend to the remembering of that assurance you have
long possessed in your servant, and upon your next opportunity make him
happy with some commands from you? " or the like; that go a-begging for
some meaning, and labour to be delivered of the great burden of nothing.
When you have invented, and that your business be matter, and not bare
form, or mere ceremony, but some earnest, then are you to proceed to the
ordering of it, and digesting the parts, which is had out of two
circumstances. One is the understanding of the persons to whom you are
to write; the other is the coherence of your sentence; for men's capacity
to weigh what will be apprehended with greatest attention or leisure;
what next regarded and longed for especially, and what last will leave
satisfaction, and (as it were) the sweetest memorial and belief of all
that is passed in his understanding whom you write to. For the
consequence of sentences, you must be sure that every clause do give the
cue one to the other, and be bespoken ere it come. So much for invention
and order.
_Modus_. --1. _Brevitas_. --Now for fashion: it consists in four things,
which are qualities of your style. The first is brevity; for they must
not be treatises or discourses (your letters) except it be to learned
men. And even among them there is a kind of thrift and saving of words.
