We must now proceed to the third thing proposed,--that _numerous_ and well-adjusted style; of the beauty of which, if any are so insensible as not to feel it, I cannot imagine what kind of ears they have, or what resemblance of a human Being! For my part, my ears are always fond of a complete and full-measured flow of words, and perceive in an instant what is either defective or redundant. But wherefore do I say _mine_? I have frequently seen a whole assembly burst into raptures of applause at a happy period: for the ear naturally expects that our sentences should be properly tuned and measured. This, however, is an accomplishment which is not to be met with among the ancients. But to compensate the want of it, they had almost every other perfection: for they had a happy choice of words, and abounded in pithy and agreeable sentiments, though they had not the art of harmonizing and completing their periods. This, say some, is the very thing we admire. But what if they should take it into their heads to prefer the ancient _peinture_, with all its poverty of colouring, to the rich and finished style of the moderns? The former, I suppose, must be again adopted, to compliment their delicacy, and the latter rejected. But these pretended connoisseurs regard nothing but the mere _name_ of antiquity. It must, indeed, be owned that antiquity has an equal claim to authority in matters of imitation, as grey hairs in the precedence of age. I myself have as great a veneration for it as any man: nor do I so much upbraid antiquity with her defects, as admire the beauties she was mistress of:--especially as I judge the latter to be of far greater consequence than the former. For there is certainly more real merit in a masterly choice of words and sentiments, in which the ancients are allowed to excell, than in those measured periods with which they were totally unacquainted. This species of composition was not known among the Romans till lately: but the ancients, I believe, would readily have adopted it, if it had then been discovered: and we accordingly find, that it is now made use of by all Orators of reputation. "But when _number_, or (as the Greeks call it) prosaic _metre_, is professedly introduced into judicial and forensic discourses, the very name, say they, has a suspicious sound: for people will conclude that there is too much artifice employed to sooth and captivate their ears, when the Speaker is so over-exact as to attend to the harmony of his periods." Relying upon the force of this objection, these pretenders are perpetually grating our ears with their broken and mutilated sentences; and censure those, without mercy, who have the presumption to utter an agreeable and a well-turned period. If, indeed, it was our design to spread a varnish over empty words and trifling sentiments, the censure would be just: but when the matter is good, and the words are proper and expressive, what reason can be assigned why we