Hugh Blair

1718-1800 · Scottish · Belles Lettres, Literary Criticism, Pulpit Eloquence, Scottish Enlightenment

Perspicuity, it will be readily admitted, is the fundamental quality of style; a quality so essential in every kind of writing, that for the want of it, nothing can atone.

Hugh Blair held the first Regius Chair of Rhetoric and Belles Lettres at Edinburgh, preached at St Giles' to the most fashionable congregation in Scotland, and wrote a book of lectures that became the most widely used textbook of English composition in the world for a century. Generations of British and American students learned what a good sentence was from him.

Topics Hugh Blair addresses

• taste as a faculty
• the standard of taste
• the office of criticism
• genius and the rules
• sublimity
• the sublime in objects and in writing
• perspicuity
• precision in style
• propriety of language
• purity of language
• figurative language
• the rules of metaphor
• the structure of the sentence
• the periodic sentence
• belles lettres
• the kinds of composition
• historical writing
• philosophical writing
• the eloquence of the pulpit
• the eloquence of the bar
• the eloquence of popular assemblies
• Ossian and primitive poetry
• the poetry of rude ages
• Addison and the Spectator criticized

Questions to put to Hugh Blair

Taste and the Standard of Criticism

• What do you mean by taste, and how is it different from mere personal preference?
• How can there be a standard of taste if people disagree about what's beautiful?
• Why do you think the judgment of cultivated observers across time gives us a real standard?
• Can someone with bad taste improve it, or is taste something you're born with?
• How do you respond to the worry that your standard just reflects the prejudices of educated Europeans?

Perspicuity and the Art of Style

• Why do you insist that clarity is more important than ornament?
• What makes a sentence perspicuous, and what ruins it?
• How should a writer use figurative language without obscuring the sense?
• What do you admire about Addison's style, and what faults do you find in it?
• Can a piece of writing be too plain, or is simplicity always a virtue?

The Sublime in Writing

• What do you mean by the sublime, and how does it differ from the beautiful?
• Why do you disagree with Burke that terror is the source of sublimity?
• How does a writer achieve sublimity without falling into bombast?
• What's the connection between grandeur of conception and simplicity of expression?
• Can you give me an example of a passage you consider truly sublime?

The Poems of Ossian and Primitive Poetry

• Why are you convinced that the Ossian poems are genuine ancient works?
• What do the poems show about the capacity of a primitive society to produce great poetry?
• How do you answer the charge that Macpherson composed them himself?
• What makes Ossian's poetry both tender and sublime at once?
• Why does it matter so much to you whether these poems are authentic?

Rhetoric, Composition, and Eloquence

• Why did you expand rhetoric beyond speeches to include all kinds of writing?
• How is the study of taste and criticism a foundation for eloquence?
• What's the difference between writing well and speaking well?
• How should someone learn to write clearly and persuasively?
• Does your approach to rhetoric lose sight of its civic and political purpose?

Pulpit Eloquence and the Art of Preaching

• What makes a sermon different from other kinds of persuasive speech?
• Why should preaching be grave and unaffected rather than ornate?
• How do you address both the understanding and the heart in a sermon?
• What faults do you see in the preaching of your own time?
• Should a preacher aim to move the passions, or is that manipulation?

Converse with Hugh Blair on Simposeum. Replies are grounded in Hugh Blair's own writing, cited to the page.