is exceedingly ungraceful, and oftentimes absurd; for example, in the word industry u before s, t, r is made very fhort, contrary to all rule and nature; but John Bull will have it fo, and if you fay any thing to the contrary, he will fay, you are a blockhead, or will knock you down as readily as the confonants.

This rapidity and boiftrousness may perhaps be borne with in common utterance, but it certainly ought not to be carried into finging, poetry and oratory.

From the preceding obfervations we may draw two ufeful rules, that as one vowel before another, or a vowel before a fingle confonant, may make a short fyllable, so two very short fyllables will be equal in time to one short, that is, two quavers to one crotchet; as,

For those rebellious, here their pruun ordained. And again, four very, very fhort fyllables are equal to one fhort, that is, four femiquavers to one crotchet, as,

FF F F

Various are the ways of God to man: or,
How various are the ways of God to man!

Immediate

FF F F

Immediate are the works of God.

These two rules may ferve to explain and render needless the exceptions and licences of three figures, called fynalapha, fynærefis, and diarefis, affumed by the Greek and Latin Poets to abate the rigourous laws of quantity.

Synalæpha is the elifion of a final vowel, or an m, before one initial, or the collifion of a vowel left out in fcanning, as in Homer,

Πολλας δε οφθιμές

In Virgil

αλγια έθηκε

-Multum ille et

In Milton

Above the Aonian mount

Synærefis is the coalefcence of two or three fhort vowels between two confonants into one, as toward, poet, being, question, or the contraction of a word by the expulfion of a very short vowel before a mute or a liquid, as ev'n, heav'nly, fov'reign, gen'ral,

lov'd, e're, o're, pris'n, sp'rit, for even, heavenly, fovereign, general, loved, ever, over, prifon, fpirit, or of a confonant, as, wou'd, ta'k, Lon'on, for would, talk, London; but there is no reason for the expulfion of a vowel or confonant in writing, either by fynalapha or fynærefis, because the doctrine or rule of two very fhort fyllables are equal to one fhort, and two, or four very, very short, equal to one short, will make the time the fame in two, three, or four fyllables as in one.

No English reader of common understanding wants to be informed, that even, heaven, are not to be pronounced drawlingly and flow, as two fyllables, even, heavenly, but rapidly as one fyllable, with a weak final fyllable, or rather as two very short fyllables, equal to one, as in the verse,

Before all temples the upright heart and pure

Here les and the are two very fhort fyllables to be pronounced quick as one short, with the hand up; for it fpoils the verse to join th' with upright, the hand or foot down, as printed.

If any word beginning with a confonant, as godly, be substituted for upright, the measure and melody will be the same,

Before all temples the godly heart and pure.

These and other abreviations have been introduced by hafty writers, humouring common pronunciation, and readily embraced by printers, to the defilement, corruption and change of the Greek and English languages, as e're, o're, fro, for ever, over, from

The expulfion of a vowel or confonant, with an apostrophe, is not only a deformity to the eye, but it oftentimes embarraffes the fenfe, and spoils the melody of the verfe, especially at the end.

A final very fhort fyllable is fo weak, that it pafleth off imperceptibly to the ear, and goes for nothing.

This is continually obfervable in Milton, not only at the end of a verfe, but in the beginning and middle.

-and in his rifing feemed

A pillar of ftate

Briftled with upright beams innumerable

Hence fills and empties to enlighten the earth.

. Innu

Innumerable before the Almighty's throne.
Yet not fo ftrictly hath our Lord impofed labour-

The expulfion or filence of a consonant in pronunciation, efpecially of a mute or liquid, may come under fynærefis, as / in pillar, would, t in bristle, fetch, din and

In this cafe a fyllable may be confidered as common, either long or fhort, just as it may fuit the poet's conveniency, notwithstanding the rule of pofition; fo in Latin a in patris, a contraction of pateris, the genitive of pater, is common.

Diærefis is the reverse to fynærefis, feparating two vowels, toward, being, poet, into two fyllables instead of one.

There is a rule, which might have been extended to other languages, and not be confined to the English language, that prepofitions in compound, as, converfe, afpect, defpife, acquaint, may be fhort, if feparated, according to derivation, that is, con-verfe, ǎ-spect, de-fpife, ă-quaint, like in-fpire, re-flect, or long by pofition.

Milton follows this rule fo closely, that he is fuppofed to make a in afpect, pro in procefs