particulars, or upon
details in unsuspected relation to those truths; and when I wish the
attention to be absorbed by these particulars which are of interest in
themselves, not upon the general truths which are of no present
interest except in as far as they light up these details. A growing
thought requires the inductive exposition, an applied thought the
deductive.

This principle, which is of very wide application, is subject to two
important qualifications--one pressed on it by the necessities of
Climax and Variety, the other by the feebleness of memory, which cannot
keep a long hold of details unless their significance is apprehended;
so that a paragraph of suspended meaning should never be long, and when
the necessities of the case bring together numerous particulars in
evidence of the conclusion, they should be so arranged as to have
culminating force: one clause leading up to another, and throwing its
impetus into it, instead of being linked on to another, and dragging
the mind down with its weight.

It is surprising how few men understand that Style is a Fine Art; and
how few of those who are fastidious in their diction give much care to
the arrangement of their sentences, paragraphs, and chapters--in a
word, to Composition. The painter distributes his masses with a view to
general effect; so does the musician: writers seldom do so. Nor do they
usually arrange the members of their sentences in that sequence which
shall secure for each its proper emphasis and its determining influence
on the others--influence reflected back and influence projected
forward. As an example of the charm that lies in unostentatious
antiphony, consider this passage from Ruskin:--"Originality in
expression does not depend on invention of new words; nor originality
in poetry on invention of new measures; nor in painting on invention of
new colours or new modes of using them. The chords of music, the
harmonies of colour, the general principles of the arrangement of
sculptural masses, have been determined long ago, and in all
probability cannot be added to any more than they can be altered." Men
write like this by instinct; and I by no means wish to suggest that
writing like this can be produced by rule. What I suggest is, that in
this, as in every other Fine Art, instinct does mostly find itself in
accordance with rule; and a knowledge of rules helps to direct the
blind gropings of feeling, and to correct the occasional mistakes of
in