might lengthen syllables at will. He caricatured the practice in the very
form of his diction, as in the verse: '{Epsilon pi iota chi alpha rho eta
nu / epsilon iota delta omicron nu / Mu alpha rho alpha theta omega nu
alpha delta epsilon / Beta alpha delta iota zeta omicron nu tau alpha},
or, {omicron upsilon kappa / alpha nu / gamma / epsilon rho alpha mu
epsilon nu omicron sigma / tau omicron nu / epsilon kappa epsilon iota nu
omicron upsilon /epsilon lambda lambda epsilon beta omicron rho omicron
nu}. To employ such license at all obtrusively is, no doubt, grotesque;
but in any mode of poetic diction there must be moderation. Even
metaphors, strange (or rare) words, or any similar forms of speech, would
produce the like effect if used without propriety and with the express
purpose of being ludicrous. How great a difference is made by the
appropriate use of lengthening, may be seen in Epic poetry by the
insertion of ordinary forms in the verse. So, again, if we take a strange
(or rare) word, a metaphor, or any similar mode of expression, and
replace it by the current or proper term, the truth of our observation
will be manifest. For example Aeschylus and Euripides each composed the
same iambic line. But the alteration of a single word by Euripides, who
employed the rarer term instead of the ordinary one, makes one verse
appear beautiful and the other trivial. Aeschylus in his Philoctetes
says: {Phi alpha gamma epsilon delta alpha iota nu alpha / / eta
/ mu omicron upsilon / sigma alpha rho kappa alpha sigma / epsilon rho
theta iota epsilon iota / pi omicron delta omicron sigma}.

Euripides substitutes {Theta omicron iota nu alpha tau alpha iota}
'feasts on' for {epsilon sigma theta iota epsilon iota} 'feeds on.'
Again, in the line, {nu upsilon nu / delta epsilon / mu /epsilon omega nu
/ omicron lambda iota gamma iota gamma upsilon sigma / tau epsilon /
kappa alpha iota / omicron upsilon tau iota delta alpha nu omicron sigma
/ kappa alpha iota / alpha epsilon iota kappa eta sigma, the difference