wives in equal calamities; and judging the reception she would be likely to meet in the land of Judah, entering it defolate, unfriended, and unadorned, fhe paused a moment, and thus pathetically addressed the young widows: "Go, my children, each "of you return to your mother's house; "the Lord deal kindly with you as you "have dealt with the dead, and with me. "The Lord grant that ye may find reft, "each of you, in the house of your dear "deceased hufband."-Having uttered this fhort prayer for their happiness, fhe kiffed them, and prepared to depart alone. How true to nature was their reply! They did not pour forth unmeaning compliments of condolence-They did not interchange any idle civilities of forrow, for their anguifh was too fincere for ceremony-Neither did they enter into the parade of promifing future interviews-for they spoke not at all. The extreme of grief has, at the firft furprize, little to do with language at the moft, it burfts into fhort exclamations, as if it would fhew the impoffibility of of proceeding for our alleviation, therefore, in these cafes, that power who to every wound hath provided fomething wherewith to heal it, gave the comfort of tears, fo that the fullness of the fad heart is, in part, discharged by that kindly effufion which Providence has intended as a fountain to relieve the exceffes of nature; either in the furplus of mifery, or transport. "They lift up their voice and "wept"-A folio could not fo well display their condition-After fome time paffed in this kind of fignificant filence, they faid unto her "Surely we will return with "thee unto thy people." Here again genuine grief discovers itself: one tender sentence, and one only, expreffes their designs and wishes to attend her. In fuch cases, concifeness is nature, and circumlocution, mere art and affectation.* Perceiving the defign : The pathetic, as well as the grand, fays the most elegant tranflator of Longinus, is displayed as ftrongly by filence, or a bare word, as in a number of periods. I will venture to say much more ftrongly, by a sentence than a vo lume, defign of the daughters, the widow-woman Naomi again began to diffuade them, and to lume, in many cafes, and in some (as in the present instance) total filence is more expreffive and characteristic than the moft feeling or forcible fentence. There is a kind of mournful eloquence In a dumb grief, which shames all clam'rous Sorrow. Or, as a bard who better understood the operations of the human heart, more poetically has it, My grief lies all within; And thofe external manners of laments Are merely fhadows to the unfeen grief That fwells with filence in the tortur'd foul. When words are too weak, fays the critic, or colours too faint to present a pathos, as the poet will be filent, fo the painter will hide what he cannot shew :-) Mr. Smith hath offered a very fine example of this, wherein the skill of Timanthes, the painter, is fhewn in marking the gradations of forrow in a groupe of characters, till he bad exhausted the paffions, and filence became neceflary to the last figure in the distressful climax ; but nothing can furnish a finer illuftration than Orpah and Ruth. Lord Kames, however, in his chapter upon the Language of Paffion, after having obferved, that immoderate to press their speedy return. She painted the various difafters they would be liable to, in her company-told them fhe had no more grief is mute, because complaining is ftruggling for confolation, hath illuftrated that remark by so apt a story from the 3d book of Herodotus, that I am fure the reader will not be displeafed with me for fetting it down amongst the notes for his fervice. "Cambyfes, when he conquered Egypt, took Pfam"menitus the king prifoner; and for trying his conftancy, "ordered his daughter to be dreffed in the habit of a flave, "and to be employed in bringing water from the river; his fon alle was led to execution with a halter about his "neck. The Egyptians vented their forrow in tears and "lamentations; Pfammenitus only with a downcast eye, ‹‹ remained filent. Afterward meeting one of his compa“nions, a man advanced in years, who, being plundered of all, was begging alms, he wept bitterly, calling him "by his name. Cambyfes, ftruck with wonder, demand"ed an answer to the following question:" Pfammeni tus, thy master Cambyfes is defirous to know, why, • after thou hadft seen thy daughter fo ignominiously treated, and thy fon led to execution, without exclaiming or • weeping, thou shouldst be so highly concerned for a poor man, no way related to thee?' "Pfammenitus re"turned the following anfwer :"Son of Cyrus, the ⚫ calamities of my family are too great to leave me the pow er of weeping; but the misfortunes of a companion, reduced in his old age to want of bread, is a fit fubje&t for < lamentation.' more fons to give them for husbandsnor even a hut, however uncheary, and forlorn, to accommodate them with in her own country-and furthermore, that the had not wherewithal to repose her own head upon, if, after the fatigues of travel, fhe fhould haply arrive fafe. And, now the once more preffed the women in a farewel embrace, whilft fhe clofed her arguments with another bleffing, more melting even than the first. "Nay-my daugh"ters-weep not I entreat you. It griev "eth me more for your fakes than my own, "that the hand of the Lord hath gone "out against me." This was the touchftone she had now fairly discovered all the horrors of her fituation, and fhewed herself a woman without accommodation -a traveller without hope of rest at the end of her journey, and a widow, without one to take her by the hand, and fay unto her, Welcome unfortunate-welcome again to thine own country. The picture was too darkly shaded for Orpah. of poverty, and all its fable The dread catalogue of terrors, |