knew Mozart, than by those who did not." These truths are little
remembered by modern critics: though, indeed, it is not possible to convey
to a reader adequate notions about the style of an author, whom that
reader has not pondered for himself; about his thoughts or his subjects,
it may be different. Still, I may write something about the manner of
Tacitus, which will not violate Cardinal Newman's laws, nor be an outrage
to taste and common-sense. "It is the great excellence of a writer," says
Dr. Johnson, "to put into his book as much as it will hold:" and if this
judgment be sound, then is Tacitus the greatest of all writers in prose.
Gordon says of him, "He explains events with a redundancy of images, and a
frugality of words: his images are many, but close and thick; his words
are few, but pointed and glowing; and even his silence is instructive and
affecting. Whatever he says, you see; and all, that you see, affects you.
Let his words be ever so few, his thought and matter are always abundant.
His imagination is boundless, yet never outruns his judgment; his wisdom
is solid and vast, yet always enlivened by his imagination. He starts the
idea, and lets the imagination pursue it; the sample he gives you is so
fine, that you are presently curious to see the whole piece, and then you
have your share in the merit of the discovery; a compliment, which some
able writers have forgot to pay to their readers." I would remark here,
that many of the old writers give me the sense of handling things, they
are definite and solid; while some of the moderns appear to play with
words only, and never to come up with the objects of their pursuit: "we
are too often ravished with a sonorous sentence," as Dr. Johnson says, "of
which, when the noise is past, the meaning does not long remain." But of
Tacitus, Gordon says, "His words and phrases are admirably adapted to his
matter and conceptions, and make impressions sudden and wonderful upon the
mind of man. Stile is a part of genius, and Tacitus had one peculiar to
himself; a sort of language of his own, one fit to express the amazing
vigour of his spirit, and that redundancy of reflections which for force