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dignity of inspiration, which we have no more to expect, or by the intellectual power of a genius almost surpassing human nature. I do not know whether it be absolutely impossible that there should arise a man whose manner of thinking shall be so transcendent in originality and demonstrative vigour, as to authorize him to throw the language into a new order, all his own: but it is questionable whether there ever appeared such a writer, in any language which had been cultivated to its maturity. Even Milton, who might, if ever mortal might, be warranted to sport with all established authority and usage, and to run the language into whatever unsanctioned forms would enlarge his freedom in grand mental enterprise, has been, for presuming in a certain degree to create for himself a peculiar diction, charged by Johnson with writing in a "Babylonish dialect." And Johnson's own mighty force of mind has not defended his Roman dialect from

being condemned by all men of taste. The magic of Burke's eloquence is not enough to beguile the perception, that it is of less dignified and commanding tone, has less of the claim to be “for all time,” than if the same marvellous affluence of thought and fancy had been conveyed in a language of less arbitrary, capricious, and mannerish character. To revert to the theological peculiarity of dialect; we may look in vain for any theologian of genius so supereminently powerful as might impress on it either a dignity to overawe, or a grace to conciliate, literary taste. But indeed if we had such a one he would not attempt it. If he disregarded the classical standard, and chose to speak in an alien dialect, it would be a dialect of his own, formed in still more complete independence and disregard of the model which so many theological teachers have concurred to establish for the language of religion.

It may be said, perhaps, that any such splendid intervention, in authorization of that model, can be spared; for that the class contains so many of great ability, and so many more of great piety and usefulness, that the peculiar diction will maintain its ground. Probably it will do so, in a considerable degree, for a long time. But no numbers, ability, or piety, will ever redeem it from the character of barbarism.

LETTER IV.

IN defence of the diction which I have been describing, it will be said, that it has grown out of the language of the Bible. To a great extent, this is evidently true. Many phrases indeed which casually occurred in the writings of divines, and many which were laboriously invented by those who wished to give to divinity a complete systematic arrangement, and therefore wanted denominations or titles for the multitude of articles in the artificial distribution, have been incorporated in the theological dialect. But a large proportion of its phrases consists partly in such combinations of words as were taken originally from the Bible, and still more in such as have, from familiarity with that book, partly grown in insensible assimilation, and partly been formed intentionally, but rudely, in resemblance, to its characteristic language.

Before proceeding further, I do not know whether it may be necessary, in order to prevent misapprehension, to advert to the high advantage and propriety of often introducing sentences from the Bible, not only in theological, but in any grave moral composition. Passages of the inspired writings must necessarily be cited, in some instances, in proof of the truth of opinions, and

may be most happily cited, in many others, to give a venerable and impressive air to serious sentiments which would be admitted as just though unsupported by such a reference to the authority. Both complete sentences, and striking short expressions, consisting perhaps sometimes of only two or three words, may be thus introduced with an effect at once useful and ornamental, while they appear pure and unmodified amidst the composition, as simple particles of scripture, quite distinct from the diction in which they are inserted. When thus appearing in their own genuine quality, as lines or parts of lines taken from a venerable book which is written in a manner very different from our common mode of language, they are read as expressions foreign to the surrounding composition, and, without an effort, referred to the work from which they are brought and of which they retain the unaltered consistence; in the same manner as passages, or striking short expressions, adopted from some respected and well-known classic in our language. Whatever dignity therefore characterizes the great work itself, is possessed also by these detached pieces in the various places where they are inserted, but not, if I may so express it, infused. And if they be judiciously inserted, they impart their dignity to the sentiments which they are employed to enforce. This employment of the sacred expressions may be very frequent, as the Bible contains such an immense variety of ideas, applicable to all manner of interesting subjects. And from its being so familiarly known, its sentences or shorter expressions may be introduced without the formality of noticing, either in terms or by any other mark, from what volume they are drawn.-These observations are more than enough, to obviate any imputation of wanting a due sense of the dignity and force which may be

imparted by a judicious introduction of the language of the Bible.

It is a different mode of using biblical language, that constitutes so considerable a part of the dialect which I have ventured to disapprove. When insertions are made from the Bible in the manner here described as effective and ornamental, the composition exhibits two kinds of diction, each bearing its own separate character; the one being the diction which belongs to the author, the other that of the sacred book whence the citations are drawn. We pass along the course of his language with the ordinary feeling of being addressed in a common general phraseology; and when the pure scripture expressions occur, they are recognised in their own peculiar character, and with the sense that we are reading, in small detached portions, just so much of the Bible itself. This distinct recognition of the two separate characters of language prevents any impression of an uncouth heterogeneous consistence. But in the theological dialect, that part of the phraseology which has a biblical cast, is neither the one of these two kinds of language nor the other, but an inseparable though crude amalgam of both. For the expressions resembling those of scripture are blended and moulded into the substance of the diction. I say resembling; for though some of them are precisely phrases from the Bible, yet most of them are phrases a little modified from the form in which they occur in the sacred book, by changing or adding words, by compounding two phrases into one, and by fitting the rest of the language to the biblical phrases by an imitative antique construction. In this manner the scriptural expressions, instead of appearing as distinguished points on a common ground, as gems advantageously set in an inferior substance, are reduced to

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become an ordinary and desecrated ingredient in an uncouth phraseology. They are no longer brought directly from the scriptures, by an act of thought and choice in the person who uses them, and with a recollection of their sacred origin; but merely recur to him in the common usage of the diction, into which they have degenerated in the school of divines. They therefore are now in no degree of the nature of quotations, introduced for their special appositeness in the particular instance, as the expressions of an admired and revered human author would be repeated.

This is the kind of biblical phraseology which I could wish to see less employed,—unless it be either more venerable or more lucid than that which I have recommended. We may be allowed to doubt how far such language can be venerable, after considering, that it gives not the smallest assurance of striking or elevated thought, since in fact a vast quantity of most inferior writing has appeared in this kind of diction; that it is not now actually drawn from the sacred fountains; that the incessant repetition of its phrases in every kind of religious exercise and performance has worn out any solemnity it might ever have had; and that it is the very usual concomitant and sign of a servilely systematic and cramped manner of thinking. It may be considered also, that, from whatever high origin any modes and figures of speech may be drawn, they are reduced, 'n point of dignity, to the quality of the material with which they become interfused; so that if the whole character of the dialect of divines is not adapted to excite veneration, the proportion of it which gives a colour of scripture-phraseology, not standing out distinct from the composition, will have lost the virtue to excite it. And again, let it be considered, that in almost all cases, an attempt to imitate

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