Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Atlantic Essays

[36] of texture. So the next element of literary art lies in the choice of words. Style must have richness and felicity. Words in a master's hands seem more than words; he can double or quadruple their power by skill in using; and this is a result so delightful as to give to certain authors a value out of all proportion to their thought. There are books which are luxuries, livres de luxe, whose pages seem builded of materials more precious than those of common life. Keats, for example, in poetry, and Landor in prose, give illustrations of this; and perhaps the representative instance, in all English literature, of the prismatic resources of mere words is the poem of “The Eve of St. Agnes.” But thus to be crowned monarch of the sunset, to trust one's self with full daring in these realms of glory, demands such a balance of endowments as no one in English literature save Shakespeare has attained.

In choosing words, it is to be remembered that there is not a really poor one in any language; each had originally some vivid meaning, but most of them have been worn smooth by passing from hand to hand, and hence the infinite care required in their use. “Language,” says Max Muller, “is a dictionary of faded metaphors” ; and every writer who creates a new image, or even reproduces an old one by passing it through a fresh mind, enlarges this vast treasure-house. And this applies not only to words of beauty, but to words of wit. “All wit,” said Mr. Pitt, “is true reasoning” ; and Rogers, who preserved this saying, added, that he himself had lived long before making the discovery that wit was truth.

A final condition of literary art is thoroughness, which must be shown both in the preparation and in the revision of one's work. The most brilliant mind needs a large accumulated capital of facts and images, before it can safely