timent itself is weighty. It is uttered wholly in the dactylic
measure, the noblest and most magnificent of all measures, and hence
forming the chief constituent in the finest metre we know, the heroic.
[And it is with great judgment that the words +hosper nephos+ are
reserved till the end.[2]] Supposing we transpose them from their proper
place and read, say +touto to psephisma hosper nephos epoiese ton tote
kindunon parelthein+--nay, let us merely cut off one syllable, reading
+epoiese parelthein hos nephos+--and you will understand how close is
the unison between harmony and sublimity. In the passage before us the
words +hosper nephos+ move first in a heavy measure, which is metrically
equivalent to four short syllables: but on removing one syllable, and
reading +hos nephos+, the grandeur of movement is at once crippled by
the abridgment. So conversely if you lengthen into +hosperei nephos+,
the meaning is still the same, but it does not strike the ear in the
same manner, because by lingering over the final syllables you at once
dissipate and relax the abrupt grandeur of the passage.

[Footnote 2: There is a break here in the text; but the context
indicates the sense of the words lost, which has accordingly been
supplied.]

XL

There is another method very efficient in exalting a style. As the
different members of the body, none of which, if severed from its
connection, has any intrinsic excellence, unite by their mutual
combination to form a complete and perfect organism, so also the
elements of a fine passage, by whose separation from one another its
high quality is simultaneously dissipated and evaporates, when joined in
one organic whole, and still further compacted by the bond of harmony,
by the mere rounding of the period gain power of tone.

2
In fact, a clause may be said to derive its sublimity from the joint
contributions of a number of particulars. And further (as we have shown
at large elsewhere), many writers in prose and verse, though their
natural powers were not high, were perhaps even low, and though the
terms they employed were usually common and popular and conveying no
impression of refinement, by the mere harmony of their composition have
attained dignity and elevation, and avoided the appearance of meanness.
Such among many others are Philistus, Aristophanes occasionally,
Euripides almost always.

3
Thus when Heracles says, after the murder of his children,

"I'm full of