the
other, whereby it cometh to pass_, and such like idle particles." Either
sort of brevity may be learned from Milton. But any one who has been
compelled to make efforts of unprompted eloquence, and to choose his
expressions while he is on his feet, knows well how necessary is the
function performed by these same prefaces, protestations, parentheses,
and idle particles. Suavely uttered, they keep expectation alive in the
audience, and give the orator time to think. Whether in speaking or in
writing, no fluent and popular style can well be without them. _I should
be inclined to say--If I may be permitted to use the expression--Speaking
for myself and for those who agree with me--It is no great rashness to
assert_-- a hundred phrases like these are an indispensable part of an
easy writer's, as of an easy speaker's, equipment. To forego all these
swollen and diluted forms of speech is to run the risk of the opposite
danger, congestion of the thought and paralysis of the pen--the scholar's
melancholy. To give long days and nights to the study of Milton is to
cultivate the critical faculty to so high a pitch that it may possibly
become tyrannical, and learn to distaste all free writing. Accustomed to
control and punish wanton activity, it will anticipate its judicial
duties, and, not content with inflicting death, will devote its malign
energy to preventing birth.

It is good, therefore, to remember that Milton himself took a holiday
sometimes, and gave a loose to his pen and to his thought. Some parts of
his prose writings run in a full torrent of unchastened eloquence. An
open playground for exuberant activity is of the first importance for a
writer. Johnson found such a playground in talk. There he could take the
curb off his prejudices, give the rein to his whimsical fancy, and better
his expression as he talked. But where men must talk, as well as write,
upon oath, paralysis is not easily avoided. In the little mincing
societies addicted to intellectual and moral culture the creative zest is
lost. The painful inhibition of a continual rigorous choice, if it is
never relaxed, cripples the activity of the mind. Those who can talk the
best and most compact sense have often found irresponsible paradox and
nonsense a useful and pleasant recreation ground. It was Milton's
misfortune, not the least of those put upon him by the bad age in which
he lived, that what Shakespeare found in the tavern he had to seek in the
Church.