Letter to the Reverend Mr. Furly.
LETTER
TO
THE REVEREND MR. FURLY.
———
DEAR SIR, LIVERPOOL, July 15, 1764.
I HAVE had many thoughts since we parted, on the subject of our late conversation. I send you them just as they occur. “What is it that constitutes a good style?” Perspicuity, purity, propriety, strength, and easiness, joined together. When any one of these is wanting, it is not a good style. Dr. Middleton’s style wants easiness: It is stiff to a high degree. And stiffness in writing is full as great a fault as stiffness in behavior. It is a blemish hardly to be excused, much less to be imitated. He is pedantic. “It is pedantry,” says the great Lord Boyle, “to use a hard word, where an easier will serve.” Now, this the Doctor continually does, and that of set purpose. His style is abundantly too artificial: Artis est celare artem; 42 but his art glares in every sentence. He continually says, “Observe how fine I speak:” Whereas, a good speaker seems to forget he speaks at all. His full round curls naturally put one in mind of Sir Cloudesley Shovel’s peruke, that “eternal buckle takes in Parian stone.” Yet this very fault may appear a beauty to you, because you are apt to halt on the same foot. There is a stiffness both in your carriage and speech, and something of it in your very familiarity. But for this very reason you should be jealous of yourself, and guard against your natural infirmity. If you imitate any writers, let it be South, Atterbury, or Swift, in whom all the properties of a good writer meet. I was myself once much fonder of Prior than Pope; as I did not then know that stiffness was a fault. But what in all Prior can equal, for beauty of style, some of the first lines that Pope ever published? —
“Poets themselves must die, like those they sung,
Deaf the poised ear, and mute the tuneful tongue;
E’en he whose heart now melts in tender lays,
Shall shortly want the generous tear he pays.
Then from his eyes thy much-loved form shall part;
And the last pang shall tear thee from his heart:
Life’s idle business at one gasp be o’er,
The Muse forgot, and thou beloved no more.”
Here is style! How clear, how pure, proper, strong; and yet how amazingly easy! This crowns all; no stiffness, no hard words; no apparent art, no affectation; all is natural, and therefore consummately beautiful. Go thou and write likewise. As for me, I never think of my style at all; but just set down the words that come first. Only when I transcribe anything for the press, then I think it my duty to see every phrase be clear, pure, and proper. Conciseness (which is now, as it were, natural to me) brings quantum sufficit of strength. If, after all, I observe any stiff expression, I throw it out, neck and shoulders.
Clearness in particular is necessary for you and me; because we are to instruct people of the lowest understanding. Therefore we, above all, if we think with the wise, yet must speak with the vulgar. We should constantly use the most common, little, easy words (so they are pure and proper) which our language affords. When I had been a member of the University about ten years, I wrote and talked much as you do now. But when I talked to plain people in the castle, or the town, I observed they gaped and stared. This quickly obliged me to alter my style and adopt the language of those I spoke to. And yet there is a dignity in this simplicity, which is not disagreeable to those of the highest rank.
I advise you sacredly to abstain from reading any stiff writer. A bystander sees more than those that play the game. Your style is much hurt already. Indeed, something might be said, if you were a learned infidel, writing for money or reputation. But that is not the case: You are a Christian Minister, speaking, and writing to save souls. Have this end always in your eye, and you will never designedly use any hard word. Use all the sense, learning, and time you have; forgetting yourself, and remembering only, those are the souls for whom Christ died; heirs of a happy or miserable eternity!
I am
Your affectionate friend and brother,
JOHN WESLEY.