Hence when they write, it is not so much words
as whole phrases that they put together--_phrases banales_. This is
the explanation of that palpable lack of clearly-expressed thought in
what they say. The fact is that they do not possess the die to give
this stamp to their writing; clear thought of their own is just
what they have not got. And what do we find in its place?--a vague,
enigmatical intermixture of words, current phrases, hackneyed terms,
and fashionable expressions. The result is that the foggy stuff they
write is like a page printed with very old type.
On the other hand, an intelligent author really speaks to us when he
writes, and that is why he is able to rouse our interest and commune
with us. It is the intelligent author alone who puts individual words
together with a full consciousness of their meaning, and chooses them
with deliberate design. Consequently, his discourse stands to that of
the writer described above, much as a picture that has been really
painted, to one that has been produced by the use of a stencil. In the
one case, every word, every touch of the brush, has a special purpose;
in the other, all is done mechanically. The same distinction may be
observed in music. For just as Lichtenberg says that Garrick's soul
seemed to be in every muscle in his body, so it is the omnipresence of
intellect that always and everywhere characterizes the work of genius.
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