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THOREAU 247
A perfectly healthy sentence, it is true, is extremely rare.
For the most part we miss the hue and fragrance of the
thought;
as if we could be satisfied with the dews of the
morning or evening without their colors, or the heavens without
their azure. The most attractive sentences are, perhaps,
not the wisest, but the surest and roundest. They are spoken
firmly and conclusively, as if the speaker had a right to know
what he says, and if not wise, they have at least been well
learned. Sir \Yalter Raleigh might well be studied, if only
for the excellence of his style, for he is remarkable in the
midst of so many masters. There is a natural emphasis in
his style,
like a man's tread, and a breathing space between
the sentences, which the best of modern writing does not
furnish. His chapters are like English parks, or say rather
like a Western forest, where the larger growth keeps down
the underwood, and one may ride on horseback through the
openings. All the distinguished writers of that period possess
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a greater vigor and naturalness than the more modern,
for it is allowed to slander our own time, and when we
read a quotation from one of them in the midst of a modern
author, we seem to have come suddenly upon a greener
ground, a greater depth and strength of soil. It is as if a
n ( -n
bough were laid across the page, and we are refreshed
as by the sight of fresh grass in midwinter or early spring.
You have constantly the warrant of life and experieme
in
what you read. The little that is said is eked out by implication
of the much that was done. The sentcnco are \vr
durous and blooming as evergreen and llowers,
because they
oted in fart and experience, hut our fal-e and florid
sentences have only the tints of llowers without their sap or
roots. All men are really most I
by the beauty of
plain sped h, and they even write in a llorid style in imitation
of th;
-o be mi-understood rather than to