65. I imagine that in most cases, the reply would be given with hesitation, yet if you will give me a little patience, and take some accurate pains, I can show you the main tests of style in the space of a couple of pages.
I take two examples of absolutely perfect, and in manner highest, _i. e._, kingly, and heroic, style: the first example in expression of anger, the second of love.
"We are glad the Dauphin is so pleasant with us, His present, and your pains, we thank you for. When we have match'd our rackets to these balls, We will in France, by God's grace, play a set Shall strike his father's crown into the hazard."
"My gracious Silence, hail! Would'st thou have laughed, had I come coffin'd home That weep'st to see me triumph? Ah, my dear, Such eyes the widows in Corioli wear And mothers that lack sons."
66. Let us note, point by point, the conditions of greatness common to both these passages, so opposite in temper.
A. Absolute command over all passion, however intense; this the first-of-first conditions, (see the King's own sentence just before, "We are no tyrant, but a Christian King, Unto _whose grace_ our passion is as subject As are our wretches fettered in our prisons"); and with this self-command, the supremely surveying grasp of every thought that is to be uttered, before its utterance; so that each may come in its exact place, time, and connection. The slightest hurry, the misplacing of a word, or the unnecessary accent on a syllable, would destroy the "style" in an instant.
B. Choice of the fewest and simplest words that can be found in the compass of the language, to express the thing meant: these few words being also arranged in the most straightforward and intelligible way; allowing inversion only when the subject can be made primary without obscurity: (thus, "his present, and your pains, we thank you for" is better than "we thank you for his present and your pains," because the Dauphin's gift is by courtesy put before the Ambassador's pains; but "when to these balls our rackets we have matched" would have spoiled the style in a moment, because--I was going to have said, ball and racket are of equal rank, and therefore only the natural order proper; but also here the natural order is the desired one, the English racket to have precedence of the French ball). In the fourth line the "in France" comes first, as announcing the most important resolution of action; the "by God's grace" next, as the only condition rendering resolution possible; the detail of issue follows with the strictest limit in the final word. The King does not say "danger," far less "dishonor," but "hazard" only; of _that_ he is, humanly speaking, sure.