On (Essays Collection). Hilaire Belloc

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      Harmonides of Ephesus says in one of his treatises upon method (I forget which, but I think the fifth) that a matter is very often more clearly presented by way of example than in the form of a direct statement and analysis. I have determined to follow the advice of this great though pagan authority in what you will now read or not read, according to your inclination.

      As I was sitting one of these sunny mornings in my little Park, reading an article upon vivisection in the Tablet newspaper, a Domestic [Be seated, be seated, I pray you!] brought me a letter upon a Silver Salver [Be covered!]

      Which reminds me, why do people say that silver is the only perfect spondee in the English language? Salver is a perfectly good spondee; so is North-Cape; so is great-coat; so is High-Mass; so is Wenchthorpe; so is forewarp, which is the rope you throw out from the stem to the little man in the boat who comes to moor you along the west gully in the Ramsgate Harbour; so is Longnose, the name of a buoy, and of a reef of rocks just north of the North Foreland; so are a great many other words. But I digress. I only put in these words to show you in case you had any dissolving doubts remaining upon the matter, that the kind of stuff you read is very often all nonsense, and that you must not take things for granted merely because they are printed. I have watched you doing it from time to time, and have been torn between pity and anger. But all that is neither here nor there. This habit of parenthesis is the ruin of good prose. As I was saying, example clearly put down without comment is very often more powerful than analysis for the purpose of conviction.

      The Domestic brought me a letter upon a Silver Salver. I took it and carefully examined the outside.

      They err who will maintain through thick and thin upon a mere theory and without any true experience of the world, that it matters not what the outside of a letter may be so long as the contents provoke terror or amusement. The outside of a letter should appeal to one. When one gets a letter with a halfpenny stamp and with the flap of the letter stuck inside, and with the address on the outside typewritten, one is very apt to throw it away. I believe that there is no recorded case of such a letter containing a cheque, a summons, or an invitation to eat good food, and as for demand notes, what are they? Then again those long envelopes which come with the notice, "Paid in bulk," outside instead of a stamp—no man can be moved by them. They are very nearly always advertisements of cheap wine.

      Do not misunderstand me: cheap wine is by no means to be despised. There are some sorts of wine the less you pay for them the better they are—within reason; and if a Gentleman has bought up a bankrupt stock of wine from a fellow to whom he has been lending money, why on earth should he not sell it again at a reasonable profit, yet quite cheap? It seems to be pure benefit to the world. But I perceive that all this is leading me from my subject.

      I took up the letter, I say, and carefully examined the outside. It was written in the hand of an educated man. It was almost illegible, and had all the appearance of what an honest citizen of some culture might write to one hurriedly about some personal matter. I noticed that it had come from the eastern central district, but when you consider what an enormous number of people live there during the day, that did not prejudice me against it.

      Now, when I opened this letter, I found it written a little more carefully, but still, written, not printed, or typewritten, or manifolded, or lithographed, or anything else of that kind. It was written.

      The art of writing … but Patience! Patience! …

      It was written. It was very cordial, and it appealed directly, only the style was otiose, but in matters of the first importance style is a hindrance.

      _Telephone No. 666.

       The Mercury,

       15th Nishan 5567.

      Dear Sir—Many people wonder, especially in your profession,_ [what is It?] why a certain Taedium Vitae seizes them towards five o'clock in the afternoon. The stress and hurry of modern life have forced so many of Us to draw upon Our nervous energy that We imagine that [Look at that 'that'! The whole Elizabethan tradition chucked away!] _We are exceeding our powers, and when this depression comes over Us, we think it necessary to take a rest, and Let up from working. This is an erroneous supposition. What it means is that Our body has received insufficient nutriment during the last twenty-four hours, and that Nature is craving for more sustenance.

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