slating the
booke of the preacher.
_Salomon Davids sonne, king of Ierusalem._

This verse is a very good _Alexandrine_, but perchaunce woulde haue
sounded more musically, if the first word had bene a dissillable, or two
monosillables and not a trissillable: hauing his sharpe accent vppon the
_Antepenultima_ as it hath, by which occasion it runnes like a _Dactill_,
and carries the two later sillables away so speedily as it seemes but one
foote in our vulgar measure, and by that meanes makes the verse seeme but
of eleuen sillables, which odnesse is nothing pleasant to the eare. Iudge
some body whether it would haue done better (if it might) haue bene fayd
thus,
_Roboham Dauids sonne, king of Ierusalem._
Letting the sharpe accent fall vpon _bo_, or thus
_Restore king Dauids sonne vnto Ierusalem_.
For now the sharpe accent falles vpon _bo_, and so doth it vpon the last
in _restore_, which was not in th'other verse. But because we haue seemed
to make mention of _Cesure_, and to appoint his place in euery measure, it
shall not be amisse to say somewhat more of it, & also of such pauses as
are vsed in vtterance, & what commoditie or delectation they bring either
to the speakers or to the hearers.

_CHAP. IIII._

_Of Cesure._

There is no greater difference betwixt a ciuill and brutish vtteraunce
then cleare distinction of voices: and the most laudable languages are
alwaies most plaine and distinct, and the barbarous most confuse and
indistinct: it is therefore requisit that leasure be taken in
pronuntiation, such as may make our wordes plaine & most audible and
agreable to the eare: also the breath asketh to be now and then releeued
with some pause or stay more or lesse: besides that the very nature of
speach (because it goeth by clauses of seuerall construction & sence)
requireth some space betwixt them with intermission of sound, to th'end
they may not huddle one vpon another so rudly & so fast that th'eare may
not perceiue their difference. For these respectes the auncient reformers
of language, inuented, three maner of pauses, one of lesse leasure then
another, and such seuerall intermissions of sound to serue( besides
easment to the breath) for a treble distinction of sentences or parts of
speach, as they happened to be more or lesse perfect in sence. The
shortest pause or intermission they called _comma_ as who would say a
peece of a speach cut of. The second they called _colon_, not a peece but
as