Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies! But beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of love arise. LONGFELLOW. 24. Youth longs and manhood strives, but age remem bers― Sits by the raked-up ashes of the past; Spreads its thin hands above the whitening embers These thick-sown snow-flakes hint of toil's release; The tasks once welcome-evening asks for peace. 25. O, a wonderful stream is the river Time, HOLMES. As it runs through the realm of tears, As it blends with the Ocean of Years. 26. THE WEDDING BELLS. TAYLOR. [Read this stanza with pure tone, middle pitch, slow movement, and orotund quality.] Hear the mellow wedding-bells-golden bells! What a world of happiness their harmony foretèlls! Through the balmy air of night, how they ring out their delight! From the molten-golden nótes, All in túne, What a liquid ditty floats To the turtle-dove that listens, while she glóats On the moon! Oh, from out the sounding célls, What a gush of eùphony voluminously wells! On the Future! How it tells of the rapture that impels 27. INVOCATION TO LIGHT. POE. [Read the following selection with orotund quality, slow movement, and strong force.] Hail! holy Light-offspring of Heaven, first-born, Or of the Eternal, co-eternal beam; May I express thee unblamed? since God is light, Dwelt from eternity-dwelt then in thee, The rising world of waters, dark and deep, 28. LIBERTY OF THE PRESS. MILTON. 1. The liberty of the press is the highest. safeguard to all free government. Ours could not exist without it. It is like a great, exulting, and abounding river. It is fed by the dews of heaven, which distill their sweetest drops to form it. It gushes from the rill, as it breaks from the deep caverns of the earth. It is augmented by a thousand affluents, that dash from the mountain top, to separate again into a thousand bounteous and irrigating streams around. 2. On its broad bosom it bears a thousand barks. There genius spreads its purpling sail. There poetry dips its silver oar. There art, invention, discovery, science, morality, religion, may safely and securely float. It wanders through every land. It is a genial, cordial source of thought and inspiration, whatever it touches, whatever it surrounds. Upon its borders there grows every flower of grace, and every fruit of truth. 29. FROM THE BOOK OF PSALMS. BAKER. Bless the Lord, O my soul. O Lord my God, Thou art very great; Thou art clothed with honor and majesty: who coverest thyself with light as with a garment; who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain; who layeth the beams of His chambers in the waters; who maketh the clouds His chariot; who walketh upon the wings of the wind; who laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be removed forever. 30. OSSIAN'S ADDRESS TO THE SUN. O thou that rollest above, round as the shield of my fathers! whence are thy beams, O sun! thy everlasting light? Thou comest forth in thy awful beauty; the stars hide themselves in the sky; the moon, cold and pale, sinks in the western wave. But thou thyself movest alone who can be a companion of thy course? : III. VANISHING STRESS. 1. The vanishing or terminal stress is used when the force of voice hangs upon the final part of a word. It corresponds to the crescendo in music. It is a form of stress expressive of very strong emphasis, and is often combined with the rising or falling circumflex. 2. Used with a moderate degree of force, this stress is applied in the expression of petulance, of peevishness, of impatience, of willfulness, and of querulous complaint; combined with strong force, it is applied to express persistent determination, astonishment, amazement, and horror. 3. Concerning the use of this stress, Prof. Russell remarks: “Like all other forms of impassioned utterance which are strongly marked in the usages of natural habit, this property of voice is indispensable to appropriate elocution, whether in speaking or reading. Without 'vanishing stress,' declamation will sometimes lose its manly energy of determined will, and become feeble song to the ear. High-wrought resolution can never be expressed without it. Even the language of protest, though respectful in form, needs the aid of the right degree of vanishing stress, to intimate its sincerity and its firmness of determination, as well as its depth of conviction. 4. But when we extend our views to the demands of lyric and dramatic poetry, in which high-wrought emotion is so abundant an element of effect, the full command of this property of voice, as the natural utterance of extreme passion, becomes indispensable to true, natural, and appropriate style." EXAMPLES. [The italicized words have the vanishing stress, and are marked with the circumflex inflection.] 1. I know we do not mean to submit. We never shall submit. 2. Earth may hide, waves engulf, fire consûme us, But they shall not to slavery doom us. 3. I'll have my bônd; I will not hear thee spêak: I'll have my bônd: and therefore speak no môre. 4. But they shall go to school. Don't tell me they should n't. (You are so aggravating, Caudle, you'd spoil the temper of an angel!) They shall go to school: mark that! and if they get their deaths of cold, it's not my fault; I didn't lend the umbrella. 5. "Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend," I shrieked, upstarting; "Get thee back into the tempest, and the night's Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken! quìt the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!” Quoth the Raven, "Nēvērmōre." 6. FROM GRATTAN'S SPEECH. Here I stand for impeachment or trial. I dâre accusation! I defy the honorable gentleman ! I defy the government! I defy their whole phalanx! Let them come fôrth! 7. FROM WEBSTER. On such occasions, I will place myself on the extreme boundary of my right, and bid defiance to the arm that would push me from it. 8. THE SEMINOLE'S REPLY. I loathe ye in my bosom, 9. RIENZI. PATTEN. I come not here to talk. Ye know too well 10. BRUTUS TO CASSIUS. Frèt, till your proud heart break; Go, show your slaves how choleric you are, MITFORD. And make your bondsmen tremble. Must I budge? |