SECTION VII.

Of Means for Approximation toward a juft Expreffion of the Harmony of the GREEK and LATIN LANGUAGES.

APPARENTLY it can have been only through a want of all knowlege of mufic, or a neglect of all confideration of the analogies between music and fpeech, that thofe terms, fo exactly correfponding in the two antient languages, and in each fo plainly speaking their own meaning, porę and ris, fublevatio and pofitio, can have been fo strangely mistaken by fome learned men, and paffed for matter of inexplicable mystery with others. The arfis and thefis are clearly marked by Quintilian, Terentianus, and other antient writers, to have meant precifely beating time, and nothing elfe.

The antient TIME-BEATING, however,, as we have already had occafion tranfiently to remark, was not precifely the fame as the modern, but a more complex operation. The reafon of this, and the reason of the ufe of time-beating, among the antients, in the recitation of verfe, will be obvious in confidering the nature of the metrical cadence, In modern mufic, we have obferved, as in modern poetry, the cadence is marked by accent; and the even and triple cadences being never intermingled, fingle ftrokes regularly repeated, whether in coin

cidence with the accented note, or to fupply the place of an accented note, fuffice for giving the time fimply of either cadence; or the accented note, ftrongly marked for the ear, may alone fuffice; the number and proportion of notes within the cadence deciding its character as even or double, that is, as common time or triple time. But in almost every kind of antient verse, except the epic and the anapeftic, the two kinds of cadence are found intermingled; and it is largely implied in the writings of the antients, that in their mufic alfo the two times, common and triple, were mixed, to accommodate the poetical cadences. It will be obvious then that neither the cadences of mufic, with bars of triple and common time intermingled, nor the cadences of poetry, with triple and even, or trochaïc and dactylic feet intermingled, could be fufficiently indicated by any return of fingle ftrokes. Time fimply beaten, with intervals varying in the proportions of four to three, would appear, to ears not practifed with extraordinary affiduity in attention to fuch intervals, time falfely beaten. Indeed fcarcely any ear, without affistance from regular divifions of parts of fuch intervals, could affure itfelf of the exact nefs of their proportions, or even difcover any diftinguishing character in each, Syllables, pronounced

1 If I remember right, Dr. Burney, in his musical travels, mentions modern mufic which he fomewhere found, of no unpleafing effect, having the two times intermixed.

in just measure, would show the proportions and mark the character; but if, for ascertaining the measure given by the fyllables or for directing the measure to be given, affiftance were wanted from time-beating, it must be other time-beating than the simple stroke of the modern musician.

Hence then the invention of the DOUBLE TIMEBEATING, the ARSIS and THESIS, RAISING and DROPPING. This double action divided the cadence into two parts, bearing certain proportions to each other. For the dactylic rhythmus, the even cadence or common time, the raifing and dropping were performed in equal time, and they proved the juftnefs with which the reciter made the fingle long fyllable of the dactyl or anapest balance the two fhort ones. For the trochaic or iambic rhythmus, the triple cadence or triple time, the arfis and thefis were to each other in the proportion of two to one: for the trochaic foot the arfis was double the time of the thefis; for the iambic foot, the thefis was double the time of the arfis. Thefe operations themfelves, and their purpofes, and the familiarity of the use of them among the antients, are fo clearly indicated by the antient writers on meter, that there feems no room for doubt, no poffibility of miftake about them.

Now fhould it be an object for any modern scholar to exprefs, in any degree, the juft harmony of the metrical cadences of the antient languages, or even to conceive with any clearness their effect,

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he muft not, I apprehend, refufe that labor which the antients did not refufe; he must learn to mark the time while he reads, by the antient method of double beating, the arfis and thefis. Nor must it be expected that the amount of exercise which might have inabled an antient Roman to keep time in reading Greek verfe, will fuffice to inable the modern to keep time in either Greek or Latin. For the Roman found in Greek a difpofition of accents indeed different from that of his own language, but no different indications of cadence whereas the modern is habituated to indications different from the antient, and to impreffions from them of a kind to obviate or disturb the perception of the antient indications of cadence. practice therefore of the antient time-beating will be likely to be found difficult enough at first to be irksome; and it must be perfeveringly pursued to be effectual. For the diftribution of time to the fyllables, with due exactness, will not be the only, nor perhaps the greatest difficulty. Another, of amount scarcely to be imagined without trial, will arife from the accents; which must be carefully preferved to their proper fyllables, while the ftroke indicating the cadence falls on other fyllables. But from the habit of the modern ear to pay deference to accent as the mark of cadence, accent being itfelf the time-beater of modern poetry, a perplexity arifes, of a moft teazing kind, till habit may have overcome it. The dificulty has a near analogy to

that

that of the children's trick of tapping with one hand while they rub with the other. Tho each action is so easy by itself, with either or with both hands, yet, in firft attempting the two together, each hand is fo difturbed by the contrary motion of the other, as to be unable to effect its own intended motion.

For the recitation of Greek and Latin poetry to time beaten, perhaps the difficulty would be nearly equal for all the western Europeans; unless the French might have a greater facility for the quantities, through their deficiency for accent: they would not be difturbed by accent which they do not exprefs, and to which, in the verfe of their own language, they are not habituated to attribute any importance.

For fimply pronouncing at the fame time according to quantity and accent, the habit of English fpeech gives advantages, even over the Italian. In English, numerous grave fyllables, variously fituated in regard to the acuted fyllable of the word, are long by duplication of confonantfounds, and fome few have long vowels; whence arifes, for English voices, facility for expreffing the fame thing in the antient languages: whereas a very small proportion of grave fyllables, even of the former defcription,. is long in Italian, none of them ever following an acuted fyllable, and I believe the language has not one long vowel, clearly and neceffarily long, without the acute accent.

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