Chapter 42: Excessive Syncopation

And of course excessive use of syncope in phrasing makes sublimity pettier; you see, greatness is maimed whenever it is cramped into too short a space. Now understand this to be said not of what ought to be constrained, but of what is totally constrained and cut up into bits: syncope, you see, curtails the thought, but conciseness directs it. And furthermore, it is clear that a length unsuitable to the occasions, like a corpse that is stretched out, calls up the lifeless spirits.