MOTIVES TO INVERSION. 5 in favour of the greater impressiveness of the closing circumstance, whatever that may be. We can remark that, on introducing a new fact intended to be emphatic, the disposition is to place it at the end; and this confirms the conclusion that greater emphasis belongs to this position. Add to your faith, virtue; and to virtue, knowledge.' Compare this with- Add virtue to your faith; and knowledge to virtue'. Only by the emphasis of a special pronunciation could the same importance be given to new members. 10. There are various incidental motives to inversion, besides the natural influences now stated. (1.) When the predicate is a simple adjective, and the subject loaded with qualifying circumstances, there is a felt convenience in giving the predicate first. This appears in the Beatitudes, and is one, but not the only, reason for their inverted order throughout. (2.) The Adverbial qualifications in a sentence often control the order, for the sake of getting their proper play. Mary thinks so too.' The crush of the two adverbs 'so' and' too' has a slightly embarrassing effect; and we feel that the play of both is freer thus:- So thinks Mary too'. (3.) Inversion occasionally assists in connecting a sentence with what precedes or follows. The complete elucidation of this influence falls under the laws of the PARAGRAPH. (4.) To all this it must be added that a certain power belongs to the inversion from the mere fact of its being the less usual order. When a writer thinks it necessary to deviate from the ordinary arrangement, the deviation naturally excites our attention. It is this that makes the inverted order so natural a device when poetic and rhetorical effects are sought; even when no other advantage is gained, the unusual form of sentence gives to the style a certain strength and elevation. In this respect English, while much less free in its order than such highly inflected languages as Latin and Greek, has still some advantage in comparison with these tongues. It is more restricted in its power of placing any word of the sentence in the emphatic positions; but this very restriction gives the inversion, when it can be used, so much more rhetorical power. In the classical languages, the devices of emphasis can be more frequently employed, but are generally less striking. Hence, when the emphasis of a Latin or Greek sentence is sought to be preserved in translation by giving a correspouding order in English, there is often a danger of really producing more emphasis than is conveyed by the original translated; besides that the sentence may take on a rhetorical flavour not contained in the classical form. This consideration is sometimes overlooked by translators.* The inversions in * Take the following example. There is a formula mɩσròs ó λóyos, used in the our translation of the Bible would often prevent it from being a correct representation of the simple prose that constitutes so large a portion of the Scriptures, if these inversions always produced their full rhetorical effect. In point of fact, however, those introduced into prose often go no farther than to constitute one element among others in the archaic colouring of the whole. Such is a brief outline of the principles governing the departures from the regular or grammatical order of words in the sentence. We shall now, by a copious selection of examples, endeavour to illustrate their bearing and utility. Great is your 11. I.—An Adjective Predicate first. 'Great is Diana of the Ephesians'; reward in heaven'; 'Wide is the gate, and broad is the way'; 'Sweet are the uses of adversity'; 'Richer by far is the heart's adoration'; Vain are their hopes'; 'Few are thy days'; Cold is Cadwallo's tongue'. Both our translation of the Bible and our English poets have accustomed us to these inversions, in cases where some thought is to be expressed with more than ordinary emphasis. Prose writers also take the same liberty, although more rarely. Additional instances from the Bible:- Many are the wonderful works which Thou hast done'; 'Great and marvellous are Thy works'; 'Just and true are Thy ways'. The following is particularly noted by Campbell:'Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city'. Altered by him thus, with obvious advantage: Fallen, fallen is Babylon, that great city'. This is the emphasis in the Greek, and has been followed in the Revised Version. It is good for me, that I have been afflicted' might have been Good is it for me'. 6 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle-Easier were it for a camel'. Pastoral Epistles (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus) to introduce some familiar Christian maxim. See 1 Timothy i. 15; iii. 1; iv. 9; 2 Timothy ii. 11; Titus iii. 8. It is variously rendered in the Authorised Version by This is a faithful saying,' 'This is a true saying,' and 'It is a faithful saying'; while the Revised Version uniformly gives, Faithful is the saying'. Now there can be no doubt that morós is the predicate, not a mere attribute of Aóyos, and also that the emphasis lies upon it; and these are the reasons for the Revisers' correction. But it may fairly be doubted whether that emphasis is so strong in the familiar Greek phrase as it is in the less usual English order. This is a faithful saying,' really gives the same meaning, and is felt to be more in harmony with the tone of the passages, which are without poetical or rhetorical colouring. ADJECTIVE PREDICATE FIRST. 7 Instead of Every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills,' we might say with greater emphasis, Mine is every beast of the forest, and the cattle upon a thousand hills'. 'The way of transgressors is hard' Hard is the way of transgressors'. Compare also Stolen waters are sweet' and 'Sweet are stolen waters, and pleasant is bread eaten in secret'. 'Good were it for that man, if he had never been born.' Sick is the whole head, faint is the whole heart,' would be in perfect keeping with the other instances; but we should probably dislike any alteration in such a marked and emphatic utterance. The series of the Beatitudes may be quoted as illustrating more than one principle of order. Our translators here followed their Greek original; they could not have done better, had they been thinking solely of the effect upon the mind of the reader. 'Blessed' is a strong word, and should either begin or end a sentence. At the beginning, it possesses emphasis, and, by rousing our interest, it adds to the force of the subject at the end; so that, on the whole, we are made more alive to the sentiment expressed than if the subject had been first and the predicate last. Again, it is convenient to adopt the inverted order, when the predicate is one word and the subject loaded with circumstances. We could say"The poor in spirit are blessed; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven'; but the predicate word awkwardly divides the subject from the pronominal clause. Lastly, in the case of a sequence of propositions, with one predicate, the placing of the predicate at the beginning exhibits the parallelism. It also reserves the place of emphasis at the end for the subject, as being always the new circumstance. Next as to the Poets:- Sharper than a serpent's tooth is an ungrateful child'. Dear is the memory of our wedded lives, And dear the last embraces of our wives. (Id.) O sweet is the new violet that comes beneath the skies, And sweeter is the lamb's young voice to me that cannot rise; And sweet is all the land about, and all the flowers that blow, Past was the flight, and welcome seemed the tower. Great is thy power, and great thy fame, Far kenn'd and noted is thy name. (Burns.) (Id.) The following instance from Gray shows a frequent usage with the poets:- Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere'. It could equally well have stood—' and sincere his soul'; there being the same reason for both. So Sweet is the breath of vernal shower, The bee's collected treasures sweet, Sweet music's melting fall, but sweeter yet It The second line is evidently made to deviate from the inversion of the others for the mere sake of change. might have run— -Sweet are the treasures of the bee'. Although Shakespeare exemplifies nearly every rhetorical artifice known, this particular inversion is not very frequent with him. For example: -either death or life Shall thereby be the sweeter. 'Sweeter shall be thereby either death or life,' would be a permissible inversion, and, perhaps, an improvement in force. Now for Prose. Many of the instances from the translation of the Bible are in point here. Others we can cull from general literature. Profligate that coalition was,' is the utterance of an energetic writer on the coalition of Fox and North. To make the inversion thorough, we should say-Profligate was that coalition'. The same writer (Goldwin Smith), speaking of the youthful Pitt, says, 'His command of rounded sentences was already fearful'. Try inversion: Fearful already was his command -- Speaking of Greek style in the fifth century before Christ, Jowett remarks,-'But not at once was language adequate to receive or take up into itself the ideas which were asking for expression'. Arthur Helps has the following example: 'Rare almost as great poets-rarer, perhaps, than veritable saints and martyrs-are consummate men of business'. My yoke is easy and my burden is light.' This might be more forcible in the inverted form, Easy is my yoke, and light is my burden'; and if the words occurred in a passage of sustained poetical character, the inversion would be preferable. The inversion may be happily used when a long subject. has a single-worded predicate adjective: Small is the chance of our agreeing on the minute details of the scheme'. So, Cold is Cadwallo's tongue' is not only an effective arrangement in itself, but is the most suitable on account of the clause that follows: Again ADVERB AND VERB FIRST. Cold is Cadwallo's tongue How wonderful is Death, 9 'Short was his triumph.' If this stands alone, it is the most impressive arrangement. If it is the introduction to a longer statement, it will also be the best form, provided that statement is intended to show how the triumph was short. If, on the other hand, 'short' is only one attribute to be predicated of the triumph, and others immediately follow, it is better to place triumph' in the foreground as the subject of the whole: 'His triumph was short; it gave him little satisfaction while it lasted,' &c. When the predicate is a noun standing as complement to the verb to be, the inversion is not so common as in the case of the adjective. Yet we have cases like the following: 'I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame'. This might be more fully inverted: Eyes was I to the blind, and feet was I to the lame '. Miserable comforters are ye all.' A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in his holy habitation.' This inversion is limited by the fact that in many cases of the kind it would produce ambiguity. When Pope saysThe proper study of mankind is man,' there is nothing but the sense to show there is an inversion. 12. II.—Adverb and Verb first. A more frequent case. In poetry it is habitual, constituting a feature of poetic style. 6 Our familiar form of inverting by 'There' and the verb 'Be' belongs to the soberest prose. So with Now,' Then,' Thus,' 'Never,' Neither,' Nor'. (See COMPANION, p. 295.) But in the earlier periods of our language, the inversion was much more extensively used in the ordinary prose style; and so we find it still in the kindred Teutonic languages, such as German. The older tendency of our language may be illustrated by the following quotations from the translation of the Bible : In the beginning was the Word.' Without him was not anything made that was made. 'In him was life.' 'After me cometh a man which is preferred before me. So persecuted they the prophets which were before you." "Therefore disputed he in the synagogue with the Jews.' 'In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias.' 'On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.' 'Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance ; but from him that hath not shall be taken even that which he hath.' |