The style of Mr. Paine is as peculiar as the great mind that produced it, and I will describe it to be: _strong, bold, clear, and harmonious_. The construction of any of his pieces, is like the building of a fine edifice. He never begins without plan and specifications. He builds it in the ideal before he puts it on paper. The reader finds a foundation fit and substantial in the first paragraph, often in the first sentence. Upon this he finds a superstructure to correspond, which in size and proportions, is neat and artistic, constructed with each separate material of the best kind, and in its proper place, never left without cornice and entablature, so that when taken all together it is most pleasing and useful. He never leaves a period like a broken column, yet a careless vine sometimes winds around it, to attract the mind from its stately proportions, and we have lost the argument in the beauty of the figure. But the effect is momentary. He soon brings us back to the practical and the real. And it is his peculiar beauty, that he does not impose ideas upon us which his language can not convey to the commonest understanding. Mr. Jefferson says of his style: "No writer has exceeded Paine in familiarity of style, in perspicuity of expression, happiness of elucidation, and in simple and unassuming language." Style presents the _law_, as well as the image, of the writers' mind; in other words, style gives us the true portrait and habits of the mind, for the mind can by no means counterfeit itself. I will therefore proceed to an analysis and comparison of Mr. Paine's style with that of Junius; and, first, of the sentence, or period. The different members are of the same length, hence the rythm or harmony. Take the following examples, and I will place bars between the different members to aid the eye: "The style and language you have adopted are, I confess, | not ill suited to the elegance of your own manners, | or to the dignity of the cause you have undertaken. | Every common dauber writes rascal and villain under his pictures, | because the pictures themselves have neither character nor resemblance. | But the works of a master require no index; | his features and coloring are taken from nature; | the impression is immediate and uniform; | nor is it possible to mistake the characters, | whether they represent the treachery of a minister, | or the abused simplicity of a king." | "Were I disposed to paint a contrast, | I could easily set off what you have done in the present case | against what you would have done in _that_ case, | and by justly opposing them, | conclude a picture that would make you blush. | But as, when any of the prouder passions are hurt, | it is much better philosophy | to let a man slip into a good temper | than to attack him in a bad one-- | for that reason, therefore, I only state the case, | and leave you to reflect upon it." |