_Many a word if able shall est arise
And such as now bene held in hiest prise
Will fall as fast, when vse and custome will
Onely vmpiers of speach, for force and skill._
_CHAP. V._
_Of Stile_.
Stile is a constant & continuall phrase or tenour of speaking and writing,
extending to the whole tale or processe of the poeme or historie, and not
properly to any peece or member of a tale: but is of words speeches and
sentences together, a certaine contriued forme and qualitie, many times
naturall to the writer, many times his peculier by election and arte, and
such as either he keepeth by skill, or holdeth on by ignorance, and will
not or peraduenture cannot easily alter into any other. So we say that
_Ciceros_ stile and _Salusts_ were not one, nor _Cesars_ and _Linies_, nor
_Homers_ and _Hesiodus_, nor _Herodotus_ and _Theucidides_, nor
_Euripides_ & _Aristophones_, nor _Erasmus_ and _Budeus_ stiles. And
because this continuall course and manner of writing or speech sheweth the
matter and disposition of the writers minde, more than one or few words or
sentences can shew, therefore there be that haue called stile, the image
of man [_mentes character_] for man is but his minde, and as his minde is
tempered and qualified, so are his speeches and language at large, and his
inward conceits be the mettall of his minde and his manner of vtterance
the very warp & woofe of his conceits, more plaine, or busie and
intricate, or otherwise affected after the rate.
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