TAUTOLOGIES FOR STRONG FEELING. But she the while was murmuring low, So in the well-known lines of the Ancient Mariner : And in Byron : Alone, alone, all, all alone, Alone on a wide, wide sea. The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece, Where burning Sappho loved and sang. 333 Scarcely to be distinguished from this class of cases is the production of strong emphasis. No doubt, emphasis has also to do with the correct expression of the thought; but most frequently there is likewise some strength of feeling in cases of this sort. Emphasis may be considered as what is sought in such expressions as a delusion, a mockery, and a snare'; 'many a time and oft'; 'let it be read and re-read and read again'. So also in the following: The very scheme and plan of his life differed from that of other men'. Here is the sum and substance, the pith and marrow, the life and soul of the Gospel.'* The following instances of Tautology, used for the more effective expression of intense feeling, are from Shelley : Cloudless skies and windless streams *There is a small group of instances of justifiable Tautology that do not come under either of the two great classes now specified. They are such as tear and wear,' use and wont,' 'without let or hindrance,' 'null and void,' 'bribery and corruption,' 'a fit and proper person to represent a constituency in Parliament'. In these cases the words have become welded together through long usage, so that we do not think of them as expressing distinct meanings. In this combined form, they have become part of the English vocabulary; and it would be mere pedantry to judge them by the principles that apply to ordinary tautologies. The combination must be regarded as one compound expression, and the occasions for its use must be compared with single words. Some of them are the terms regularly employed in particular situations, as, for instance, the political phrases quoted above. The pleasing effect of alliteration or rhyme seems to account for some examples; as watch and ward,'' might and main, tear and wear'. We see this effect sought after in similar combinations that do not depend on long usage. as in this example: 'The glare and glitter of public life had for him no attraction'. In this last case the repetition of the thought gives time to realise the full conception of perfect calm; while a single epithet would fail to produce an adequate impression. And we sail on, away, afar, Without a course, without a star, But by the instinct of sweet music driven. Thus the thought of long-continued sailing with no special course or direction is dwelt on and emphasised. How art thou sunk, withdrawn, covered, drunk up By thirsty nothing! The four expressions reiterate what is really but one thought, only they serve to give utterance to strong emotion. Thomson describes jealousy as Agony unmix'd, incessant gall, Corroding every thought, and blasting all where the same thought is reiterated four times; the last two forms being a slight addition to the idea. The tautologies in the following lines of Milton are hardly redeemed by the poetry:— But cloud instead, and ever-during dark Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Of nature's works, to me expunged and rased, Hebrew poetry adopts, as a system, the repetition of the same or a similar meaning in different words. The rhythm of Hebrew poetry consists, not in measured accent or quantity, but in a correspondence of thought between successive lines, which is known as Parallelism. The correspondence may be antithetic, in which there is some kind of opposition between the members of the couplet or triplet; or synthetic, when the second, and perhaps a third, confirms, explains, or adds to the statement in the first. But the most common form is the synonymous Parallelism, in which the one line expresses an idea the same, or nearly the same, as the other, but in different language. It is on the principle just expressed that this system mainly depends for its effect; the emotion, to which the poetry gives utterance, not only tolerates the reiteration, but delights in it as its natural expression. Moreover, a certain correspondence of form generally goes along with the parallelism of thought, and this gives a pleasure similar to what we receive from the Balanced sentence. Thus Tautology, carried out on a system, is one of the most prominent elements of this primitive poetic form. Take the following as examples of pure synonymous Parallelism, in couplets: Days, Arise, shine! the Lord is risen upon thee. rkness shall cover the earth, ess the people; REDUNDANCY. But the Lord shall arise upon thee, And kings to the brightness of thy rising. When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, And the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands, 35 For farther examples of pure synonymous Parallelism sustained through passages of some length, see Psalm cxiv.; Proverbs iii. 13-17; Isaiah liii. 1-5. In combination with the other forms of Parallelism, it is of constant occurrence in the poetical books. 8. II.-REDUNDANCY, or Pleonasm, consists of superfluous words that are not in the same grammatical place. Thus I rejoiced at the glad sight,' is not tautological, but redundant or pleonastic; the idea of the verb is repeated in the adjective to sight'. Under Redundancy the forms of diffuseness take a much wider range. The following is an extreme illustration: They returned back again to the same city from whence they came forth'. The five words in italics are redundant.* So: An original discovery of his own; all without exception'; 'all constitutional writers unanimously admit'; 'I drink to the general joy of the whole table'; 'the middle of humanity thou never knewest, but the extremity of both ends'; 6 after the accident happened'; 'ask the reason why'; 'the course of true love never did run smooth'; 'it will be time to speak when the events arrive'; the ephe merous tale that does its business and dies in a day'; business too deep for (the line of the understanding to fathom'; 'some circumstances which modify (the action of) chemical attraction'; 'he declined (to accept) the post'; 'directions for the guidance of voters (in voting)'; Taught by the heavenly muse to venture down The dark descent, and up to re-ascend. а I do not doubt that the remote consequence may be that men may be ultimately led into crime.' * Quintilian quotes from Livy an example almost as bad as this:-'Legati, non impetrata pace, retro domum, unde venerant, abierunt,' where retro, domum, and unde venerant are all superfluous. The following are the terms of Pitt's motion on the Reform of Parliament: 'That an addition of knights of the shire and of representatives of the metropolis should be added to the state of the representation'.* For objection against,' we should say 'objection to'. It is superfluous to add the word 'wine' to 'sherry,' 'port'. A 'gale of wind' is a sailor's redundancy. Therefore we will disperse (ourselves).' 'Umbrageous shade,' sylvan forest,' well-spring,' 'prison-house,' 'all persons' (for persons simply), are redundancies. Thou art not born for death, immortal bird.' So: a missile thrown,' his name is called John,' a new discovery'. The form used in legal indictments, yet true it is and of verity,' like many other legal expressions, is redundant. What is required in the first commandment?' may appear a redundancy; but the explanation is that each commandment in the Decalogue is viewed as implying both something 'required' and something 'forbidden'. The following examples illustrate a very common pleonasm:-'Charles V. and Francis I. mutually encouraged each other to extirpate the heretics'; in this dialect they could render themselves mutually intelligible to each other'; 'the parts do not mutually exclude each other'. Each other expresses everything that is implied in mutually'. The following instance exemplifies a somewhat similar redundancy :-The speech of the victors and the speech of the vanquished were happily blended together'. It is true, the blending might be with something else, so that there is more excuse for 'together than for the mutually' of the preceding examples; yet blend alone, when spoken of two subjects, fully implies this. There is a case of Redundancy in naming the place where we happen to be. Thus, in regulations posted up for a town, park, or establishment, it is superfluous to give the name of the town, &c. Being in Manchester, we should not need to be told that we are there, by means of regulations for Manchester streets, squares, buildings, or parks'. The heading, Rules for visitors to this Establishment,' is a double pleonasm both the establishment and the visitors may be taken for granted. 'Trespassing on these grounds will be prosecuted' is redundant, and might be misleading. The implication is that these grounds are special and exceptional, and that on other grounds trespassers would not be prosecuted. Over-expression has always this danger of wrong suggestion. There is no need to put up at a railway station railway passengers'; nor to say 'passengers going north keep this side'; say, 'passengers to In the first sentence of Cæsar's Gaul, there are three superfluous words :'Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres'. When Gaul is mentioned, the whole of Gaul must be understood; divided' and parts' and 'three,' repeat the same idea. Compare Shakespeare in Lear, ‘We have divided into three our kingdom'. PURPOSES SERVED BY REDUNDANCY. 37 the north take this side'. Even 'passengers' is unnecessary: 'this side for the north' is enough. 'The club will meet on the 7th' contains a double expression of futurity. The date alone gives the future time; and the present tense, being really universal, accommodates itself to the futurity as shown by the date: The club meets on the 7th' has the elegance of parsimony. No doubt our grammar abounds in double expression, and Latin and Greek still more; the concords of Syntax are pleonastic-'man is,'‘men are'. These forms we cannot abolish; and there are occasions when they assist the sense. (See Companion to the Higher Grammar, p. 283.) A good many provincialisms are pleonastic; which gives them their taint of inelegance and vulgarity. The following are Scotticisms of this class: We shall go both together'; he is gone away home'; 'I am going to my breakfast, to my bed'; 'down this way to the park gate'; I did not finish it all'; 'butter the eggs all over'; 'you are forced to run to keep up alike with me'. Examples such as these are common -Leading to some megalithic circles are planted, in a few instances, long double rows of megalithic stones'. The effect is confusing; the reader naturally seeks a meaning for the second expression different from the first, and not finding it, is perplexed. So it is also in this sentence from Bolingbroke: How many are there by whom these tidings of good news were never heard'. The idea suggested is, 'tidings about good news'; the meaning intended is merely 'glad tidings'. 6 The next two examples are of a different kind :- Sinecure places which have no duty attached to them'; no credence is given to the truth of the report'. The second expression in both cases is not merely superfluous, but weakens the impression of the first. If, in the first instance, easy' had been used for sinecure,' and in the second 'dependence is placed on had stood for 'credence is given to,' then the expressions that follow would be fully appropriate. Another instance of the same kind is the following:-I desire to express my most grateful thanks for the favour'. Sincere thanks' or 'grateful acknowledgments' is all that is meant; and, probably, it is all that would be said, if people fully realised the meaning of the words. Farther examples of this sort occur in these quotations :-'The thing has no intrinsic value in itself'; Noah was directed to construct an ark, a huge vessel of enormous dimensions'; 'the king was forced unwillingly to yield. All these are no doubt the result of the writer realising but faintly the force of the first expression, and in each the second form is quite superfluous. 9. Redundancy is justifiable on the grounds already assigned for Tautology. To express in language' is redundant, but permissible in order to make sure that the vehicle of the expression is language, and not any other class of signs. The barring of ambiguity, already mentioned under Tautology, is also gained by what seems redundancy. In giving important directions, we cannot be too explicit, provided we do not incur the evil, already hinted at, of wrong suggestion. |