164“ Whether Music is necessary to the Orator,— 
2 -tF ie 
, notes at the conclusion As-—*-=S =4-, whose cha- 
racter more nearly approaches the character of speech, than our 
national air of “ God save the King:’’ divested of its TIME, it 
may, with the exception of these notes, be almost spoken; a 
quality peculiarly ascribable to certain passages of the reci/atives 
of HaNDEL; but in no degree to those of our fashionable com- 
posers. 
This great original, in fulfilling the design of recitative, (which 
is, or rather should be, no more than highly-coloured reci~ 
tation,) must, in my opinion, have closely attended to the mo- 
dulation of our best speakers, particularly our theatrical perform- 
ers; otherwise, it were impossible that such extraordinary com- 
positions could have issued from his hand. In the oratorio of 
Athalia he has outdone himself; and therefore I shall confine 
myself, in the present observation on periods, to the close of that 
remarkable passage already quoted i your Magazine for May*. 
———< — pp --— —--——--——-- ee 
aS ee peepee 
I shriek’d, I eal ed, and I fell. 
Here is the true art of speaking literally made visible ; and to 
this passage I would direct the particular attention of every ora- 
tor ; for without some reasonable approximaticn to this excellent 
method, I cannot see the possibility, in superior composition, of 
executing a graceful, and at the same time an audible period. 
This method is closely analogous to the ancient practice. The 
“voice was let down some few words before the closet: anew 
level (if level it may be called, while admitting of certain varia- 
tions) was the consequence of their accentual system; and the 
ultimate falling syllables, which never exceeded two, were go- 
yerned by the character of the final word. 
I shall endeavour to illustrate this level and these ultimate 
syllables, as far as they relate te the terminating word of an an- 
cient period, by an appropriate example. Suppose that the 
* In a more Suitable place I shall gratify the reader with a transcript of 
the entire passage, of which the May Magazine contains but an extract. 
+ This letting down the voice may be called the rhetorical cadence, of 
which Quintilian, i in the xith book of his Institutes, chap. 3d, has given us 
an example. Treating of the period which terminates the opening of the 
fEneid, he says in the plainest terms, “ When I come to atque alt@ manic 
Rome, I will lower my voice [deponam] and then form a new beginning.” 
Cicero in his “de Oruiore” says that the last three words [I should sup- 
pose iadependent words, exclusive of particles, |.are sufficient for the govern- 
ance. of a period. 
word 
