Note 26 — DISSERTATION I.
Reading edition
A remarkable example of this kind of stile, we have in Elphinstone's principles of the English Language. The author has taken great pains to be obscure, and has succeeded to admiration.
Of this kind of stile, the reader may see a specimen in the following passage, taken from Young's spirit of Athens. Page 6.
"Surely, in every mind, there is an emulation of virtuous superiority, which, however fortune or the meaner passions may hebitate its powers, still, at every example of success in the particular object of its predilection, glows into a momentary flame, which from frequent resuscitation may acquire a stability and strength sufficient to reach at the attainment of what, at first, was regarded solely as matter of admiration; the idea of imitation which hath thus enraptured the fancy, may in times of perilous crisis somewhat elevate the mind and influence the conduct; and if such ever may be the effect, what other lecture can ballance the utility of that, which thus animates the man, and urges him to noble and disinterested services in a good, great and public cause."
The author could hardly have invented an arrangement, better calculated to obscure his meaning.
It is said of Moliere, that before he would suffer a new play of his to be acted, he read it to an old woman, and judged, by the effect it had upon her, what reception it would meet with on the stage. It is a pity, some modern writers do not copy the example.