who uses an illogical diction, or a style fitted to excite only the
low and changeable pleasure of wonder by means of groundless novelty,
substitutes a language of folly and vanity, not for that of the
rustic, but for that of good sense and natural feeling.

Here let me be permitted to remind the reader, that the positions,
which I controvert, are contained in the sentences--'_a selection of
the_ REAL _language of men_';--'_the language of these men_' (i. e.
men in low and rustic life) '_I propose to myself to imitate, and, as
far as is possible, to adopt the very language of men._' '_Between the
language of prose and that of metrical composition, there neither is,
nor can be, any essential difference._' It is against these
exclusively that my opposition is directed.

I object, in the very first instance, to an equivocation in the use of
the word 'real'. Every man's language varies, according to the extent
of his knowledge, the activity of his faculties, and the depth or
quickness of his feelings. Every man's language has, first, its
individualities; secondly, the common properties of the class to which
he belongs; and thirdly, words and phrases of universal use. The
language of Hooker, Bacon, Bishop Taylor, and Burke differs from the
common language of the learned class only by the superior number and
novelty of the thoughts and relations which they had to convey. The
language of Algernon Sidney differs not at all from that, which every
well-educated gentleman would wish to write, and (with due allowance
for the undeliberateness, and less connected train, of thinking
natural and proper to conversation) such as he would wish to talk.
Neither one nor the other differ half so much from the general
language of cultivated society, as the language of Mr. Wordsworth's
homeliest composition differs from that of a common peasant. For
'real' therefore, we must substitute ordinary, or _lingua communis_.
And this, we have proved, is no more to be found in the phraseology of
low and rustic life than in that of any other class. Omit the
peculiarities of each and the result of course must be common to all.
And assuredly the omissions and changes to be made in the language of
rustics, before it could be transferred to any species of poem, except
the drama or other professed imitation, are at least as numerous and
weighty, as would be required in adapting to the same purpose the
ordinary language of tradesmen and manufacturers. Not