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THE Nor does his Wolfey with lefs propriety moralize upon his fall, in the following beautiful metaphor, taken from vegetable

nature.

This is the ftate of man; to-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope; to-morrow bloffoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him;
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,
And-nips his root-

In fuch metaphors (befides their intrinfic elegance) we may fay the reader is flattered; I mean flattered by being left to difcover fomething for himself.

There is one obfervation, which will at the fame time fhew both the extent of this figure, and how natural it is to all men.

There are metaphors fo obvious, and of courfe fo naturalized, that, ceafing to be metaphors, they become (as it were) the proper words. It is after this manner we fay, a fharp fellow; a great orator; the foot of a mountain; the eye of a needle; the bed of a river; to ruminate, to ponder, to edify, &c. &c.

These we by no means reject, and yet the metaphors we require we wish to be fomething more, that is, to be formed under the refpectable conditions here eftablished.

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We obferve too, that a fingular ufe be made of metaphors either to exalt or to depreciate, according to the fources from which we derive them. In ancient ftory, Oreftes was by fome called the murtherer of his mother; by others, the avenger of his father. The reafons will appear, by refering to the fact. The poet Simonides was offered money to celebrate certain mules, that had won a race. The fum being pitiful, he faid, with difdain, he should not write upon demi-affes-A more competent fum was offered, he then began,

Hail! Daughters of the generous horfe, That fkims, like wind, along the courfe. There are times, when, in order to exalt, we may call beggars, petitioners; and pick-pockets, collectors: other times, when, in order to depreciate, we may call petitioners, beggars; and collectors, pickpockets. But enough of this.

We fay no more of metaphors, but that it is a general caution with regard to every fpecies, not to mix them, and that more particularly, if taken from fubjects which are contrary.

Such was the cafe of that orator, who once afferted in his oration, that" If cold "water were thrown upon a certain mea

"fure, it would kindle a flame, that would "obfcure the luftre," &c. &c. Harris.

$199. On Enigmas and Puns.

A word remains upon Enigmas and Puns. It shall indeed be thort, because, though they resemble the metaphor, it is as brass and copper refemble gold.

A pun feldom regards meaning, being chiefly confined to found.

Horace gives a fad fample of this fpurious wit, where (as Dryden humourously tranflates it) he makes Perfius the buffoon exhort the patriot Brutus to kill Mr. King, that is, Rupilius Rex, because Brutus, when he flew Cæfar, had been accustomed to king-killing.

Hunc Regem occide; operum hoc mihi crede

tuorum eft.

Horat. Sat. Lib. I. VII.

We have a worse attempt in Homer, his name was OYTIE, and where the dull where Ulyffes makes Polypheme believe Cyclops, after he had loft his eye, upon him to much mischief, replies it was done being afked by his brethren, who had done by OrTIE, that is, by nobody.

Enigmas are of a more complicated nature, being involved either in pun, or metaphor, or fometimes in both.

Αιδή είδον πυρὶ χαλκὸν ἐπ ̓ ἀνέρι κολλήσαντα, I faw a man, who, unprovok'd with ire, Struck brafs upon another's back by fire.

This enigma is ingenious, and means the operation of cupping, performed in ancient days by a machine of brass.

In fuch fancies, contrary to the principles of good metaphor and good writing, a perplexity is caufed, not by accident but by defign, and the pleasure lies in the being able to refolve it.

$200. Rules defended.

Ibid.

Having mentioned Rules, and indeed this whole theory having been little more than rules developed, we cannot but remark upon a common opinion, which feems to have arifen either from prejudice or mistake.

"Do not rules," fay they, "cramp "genius? Do they not abridge it of cer "tain privileges "

'Tis anfwered, If the obeying of rules were to induce a tyranny like this; to defend them would be abfurd, and against the liberty of genius. But the truth is, rules, fuppofing them good, like good government, take away, no privileges.

They

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will fuffice, fallacious.

It must be confeffed, 'tis a flattering doctrine, to tell a young beginner, that he has nothing more to do than to trust his own genius, and to contemn all rules, as the tyranny of pedants. The painful toils of accuracy by this expedient are eluded, for geniufes, like Milton's Harps, (Par. Loft, Book III. v. 365, 366.) are fuppofed to be ever tuned.

But the misfortune is, that genius is fomething rare; nor can he who poffeffes it, even then, by neglecting rules, produce what is accurate. Thofe, on the contrary, who, though they want genius, think rules worthy their attention, if they cannot become good authors, may ftill make tolerable critics; may be able to fhew the difference between the creeping and the fimple; the pert and the pleating; the turgid and the fublime; in fhort, to sharpen, like the whetstone, that genius in others, which nature in her frugality has not given to themselves.

Ibid.

§ 202. No Genius never acted without Rules.

Indeed I have never known, during a life of many years, and fome fmall attention paid to letters, and literary men, that genius in any art had been ever crampt by rules. On the contrary, I have feen great geniuses, miferably err by tranfgreffing them, and, like vigorous travellers, who lofe their way, only wander the wider on account of their own ftrength.

And yet 'tis fomewhat fingular in literary compofitions, and perhaps more fo in poetry than elsewhere, that many things have been done in the best and pureft tafte, long before rules were established and fyftematized in form. This we are certain was true with refpect to Homer, Sophocle, Euripides, and other Greeks. modern times it appears as true of our admired Shakespeare; for who can believe

In

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§ 203. There never was a Time when
Rules did not exist.

A fpecious objection then occurs.
"If
"thefe great writers were fo excellent
"before rules were established, or at least,
"were known to them, what had they to
"direct their genius, when rules (to them
“at least) did not exist ?”

To this queftion 'tis hoped the answer
will not be deemed too hardy, fhould we
affert, that there never was a time when
rules did not exift; that they always made

a part

of that immutable truth, the natural object of every penetrating genius; and that if, at that early Greek period, fystems of rules were not established, thofe great and fublime authors were a rule to themfelves. They may be faid indeed to have excelled, not by art, but by nature; yet by a nature which gave birth to the perfection of art.

The cafe is nearly the fame with refpect to our Shakespeare. There is hardly any thing we applaud, among his innumerable beauties, which will not be found ftrictly conformable to the rules of found and ancient criticism.

That this is true with refpect to his characters and his fentiment, is evident hence, that in explaining thefe rules, we have fo often recurred to him for illuftrations.

Befides quotations already alledged, we fubjoin the following as to character.

When Falstaff and his fuite are fo ignominioufly routed, and the fcuffle is by Falstaff fo humorously exaggerated; what can be more natural than fuch a narrative to fuch a character, diftinguished for his humour, and withal for his want of veracity and courage?

The fagacity of common poets might not perhaps have fuggefted fo good a narrative, but it certainly would have fuggefted fomething of the kind, and 'tis in this we view the effence of dramatic character, which is, when we conjecture what any one will do or fay, from what he has done or faid already.

If we pafs from characters (that is to fay manners) to fentiment, we have already given inftances, and yet we shall still give

another.

When Rofincroffe and Guildernstern wait

upon Hamlet, he offers them a recorder or
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pire,

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pipe, and defires them to play-they reply, they cannot-He repeats his requeft -they answer, they have never learnt He affures them nothing was fo eafy-they ftill decline.-'Tis then he tells them, with disdain," There is much mufic in this "little organ; and yet you cannot make "it fpeak-Do you think I am eafier to "be played on than a pipe ?" Hamlet, A& III.

This I call an elegant fample of fentiment, taken under its comprehenfive fenfe. But we ftop not here-We confider it as a complete inftance of Socratic reafoning, though 'tis probable the author knew nothing how Socrates ufed to argue.

To explain-Xenophon makes Socrates reafon as follows with an ambitious youth, by name Euthydemus.

"'Tis ftrange (fays he) that those who "defire to play upon the harp, or upon "the flute, or to ride the managed horse, "should not think themfelves worth notice, "without having practifed under the best "mafters while there are thofe who af"pire to the governing of a state, and can "think themfelves completely qualified, "though it be without preparation or "labour." Xenoph. Mem. IV. c. 1. 6.

2.

Ariftotle's Illuftration is fimilar, in his reafoning against men chofen by lot for magiftrates. ""Tis (fays he) as if wreftlers were to be appointed by lot, and not thofe that are able to wrestle: or, as if from among failors we were to chufe a piJot by lot, and that the man so elected was to navigate, and not the man who knew the bufinefs." Rhetor. L. II. c. zo. p. 94. Edit. Sylb.

Nothing can be more ingenious than this mode of reafoning. The premises are obvious and undeniable; the conclufion cogent and yet unexpected. It is a fpecies of that argumentation, called in dialectic 'Exaywyn, or induction.

Aristotle in his Rhetoric (as above quoted) call fuch reafonings rà axerxà, the Socratics; in the beginning of his Poetics, he calls them the Σωκρατικοί λόγοι, the Socratic difcourfes; and Horace, in his Art of Poetry, calls them the Socra

tice charta.

Harris.

$204. The Connection between Rules and Genius.

If truth be always the fame, no wonder geniufes fhould coincide, and that too in philofophy, as well as in criticism.

We venture to add, returning to rules, that if there be any things in Shakespeare objectionable (and who is hardy enough to deny it ?) the very objections, as well as the beauties, are to be tried by the fame rules; as the fame plummet alike fhews both what is out of the perpendicular, and in it; the fame rules alike prove both what is crooked and what is ftraight.

We cannot admit that geniufes, though prior to fyftems, were prior alfo to rules, becaufe rules from the beginning existed in their own minds, and were a part of that immutable truth, which is eternal and every where. Ariftotle, we know, did not form Homer, Sophocles, and Euripi. des; 'twas Homer, Sophocles, and Euripides, that formed Aristotle,

And this furely fhould teach us to pay attention to rules, in as much as they and genius are fo reciprocally connected, that 'tis genius which difcovers rules; and then rules which govern genius.

'Tis by this amicable concurrence, and by this alone, that every work of art juftly merits admiration, and is rendered as highly perfect as, by human power it can be Ibid,

made.

§ 205. We ought not to be content with knowing what we like, but what it really worth liking.

'Tis not however improbable, that fome intrepid fpirit may demand again, What avail these subtleties ?-Without fo much trouble, I can be full enough pleased-I know what I like. We answer, And fo does the carrion-crow, that feeds upon a carcafe. The difficulty lies not in knowing what we like, but in knowing how to like, and what is worth liking. Till thefe ends are obtained, we may admire Durfey before Milton; a finoking boor of Hemfkirk, before an apostle of Raphael.

Now as to the knowing how to like, and then what is worth liking; the first of thefe, being the object of critical difquifition, has been attempted to be shewn through the course of these inquiries.

As to the fecond, what is worth our liking, this is best known by ftudying the beit authors, beginning from the Greeks; then paffing to the Latins; nor on any account excluding those who have excelled among the moderns.

And here, if, while we perufe fome author of high rank, we perceive we don't inftantly relish him, let us not be difheartened-let us even feign a relish, till we

find a relish come. A morfel perhaps pleafes us-let us cherish it-Another morfel ftrikes us-let us cherish this alfo. -Let us thus proceed, and steadily perfe. vere, till we find we can relish, not morfels, but wholes; and feel, that what began in fiction terminates in reality. The film being in this manner removed, we fhall difcover beauties which we never imagined; and contemn for puerilities, what we once foolishly admired.

One thing however in this procefs is indifpenfably required: we are on no account to expect that fine things fhould defcend to us; our taste, if poffible, must be made afcend to them.

This is the labour, this the work; there is pleasure in the fuccess, and praise even in the attempt.

This fpeculation applies not to literature only: it applies to mufic, to painting, and, as they are all congenial, to all the liberal arts. We should in each of them endeavour to investigate what is beft, and there (if I may fo exprefs myself) fix our abode. By only feeking and perufing what is truly excellent, and by contemplating always this and this alone, the mind infenfibly becomes accustomed to it, and finds that in this alone it can acquiefce with content. It happens indeed here, as in a fubject far more important, I mean in a moral and a virtuous conduct: If we chufe the beft life, ufe will make it pleasant.

Harris.

times the feat of enormous monarchy * : on its natives fair liberty never fhed its genial influence. If at any time civil difcords arofe among them (and arise there did innumerable) the conteft was never about the form of their government (for this was an object of which the combatants had no conception;) it was all from the poor motive of, who fhould be their mafter; whether a Cyrus or an Artaxerxės, a Mahomet or a Mustapha.

Such was their condition; and what was the confequence ?—Their ideas became confonant to their fervile ftate, and their words became confonant to their fervile ideas. The great diftinction for ever in their fight, was that of tyrant and flave; the most unnatural one conceivable, and the moft fufceptible of pomp and empty exaggeration. Hence they talked of kings as gods; and of themselves as the meaneft and most abject reptiles. Nothing was either great or little in moderation, but every fentiment was heightened by incredible hyperbole. Thus, though they fometimes afcended into the great and magnificent †, they as frequently degenerated into the tumid and bombaft. The Greeks too of Afia became infected by their neighbours, who were often, at times, not only their neighbours, but their masters; and hence that luxuriance of the Afiatic ftyle, unknown to the chafte eloquence and purity of Athens. But of the Greeks we forbear to speak now, as we shall speak of them more fully, when we have firft

§ 206. Character of the ENGLISH, the confidered the nature or genius of the RoORIENTAL, the LATIN, and the GREEK Languages.

We Britons in our time have been remarkable borrowers, as our multiform language may fufficiently fhew. Our terms in polite literature prove, that this came from Greece; our terms in mutic and painting, that these came from Italy; our phrafes in cookery and war, that we learnt thefe from the French; and our phrases in phrafes in navigation, that we were taught by the Flemings and Low Dutch. Thefe many and very different fources of our language may be the cause why it is fo deficient in regularity and analogy. Yet we have this advantage to compenfate the defect, that what we want in elegance, we gain in copioufnefs, in which laft refpect few languages will be found fuperior to our own.

Let us pafs from ourfelves to the nations of the Eaft. The Eaftern world, from the earliest days, has been at all

mans.

And what fort of people may we pronounce the Romans? A nation engaged in wars and commotions, fome foreign, fome domeftic, which for feven hundred years wholly engroffed their thoughts. Hence therefore their language became, like their ideas, copious in all terms expreffive of things political, and well adapted to the purpoics both of hiftory and popular eloquence.But what was their philosophy ?-As a nation it was none, if we may credit their ableft writers. And hence

For the Barbarians, by being more flavish in their manners than the Greeks, and those of Afia than thofe of Europe, fubmit to defpotic government without murmuring or difcontent. Arift. Polit. 111. 4.

The trucft fublime of the Eaft may be found in the fcriptures, of which perhaps the principal caufe is the intrinfic greatnefs of the fubject there treated; the creation of the universe, the difpen fations of divine Providence, &c.

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the unfitnefs of their language to this fubject; a defect, which even Cicero is compelled to confefs, and more fully makes appear, when he writes philofophy himself, from the number of terms which he is obliged to invent*. Virgil feems to have judged the most truly of his countrymen, when, admitting their inferiority in the

See Cic. de Fin. I. C. 1, 2, 3. III. C. 1, 2, 4, &c. but in particular Tufc. Difp. I. 3. where he fays, "Philofophia jacuit ufque ad hanc ætatem, nec ullum habuit lumen literarum Latinarum; quæ illuftranda & excitanda nobis eft; ut fi," &c. See alfo Tufc. Difp. IV. 3. and Acad. I. 2. where it appears, that until Cicero applied himself to the writing of philofophy, the Romans had nothing of the kind in their language, except fome mean performances of Amafanius the Epicurean, and others of the fame fect. How far the Romans were indebted to Cicero for pilofophy, and with what industry, as well as eloquence, he cultivated the subject, may be feen not only from the titles of thofe works that are now loft, but much more from the many noble ones ftill fortunately preferved.

The Epicurean poet Lucretius, who flourished nearly at the fame time, feems by his filence to have overlooked the Latin writers of his own fect; deriving all his philofophy, as well as Cicero, from Grecian fources; and, like him, acknowledging the difficulty of writing philofophy in Latin, both from the poverty of the tongue, and from the novelty of the fubject.

Nec me animi fallit, Graiorum obfcura reperta
Difficile inluftrare Latinis verfibus effe,
(Multa novis rebus præfertim quum fit agen-
dum,)

Propter egeftatem linguæ et rerum novitatem:
Sed tua me virtus tamen, et fperata voluptas
Suavis amicitiæ quemvis perferre laborem
Suadet-
Lucr. 1. 237.

In the fame age, Varro, among his numerous works, wrote fome in the way of philofophy; as did the patriot Brutus a treatife concerning virtue, much applauded by Cicero; but thefe works are now loft.

Soon after the writers above mentioned came Horace, fome of whofe fatires and epiftles may be juftly ranked among the most valuable pieces of Latin philofophy, whether we confider the purity of their ftyle, or the great addrefs with which they treat the fubje&t.

After Horace, though with as long an interval as from the days of Auguftus to thofe of Nero, came the fatirift Perfius, the friend and difciple of the ftoic Cornutus; to whofe precepts, as he did honour by his virtuous life, fo his works, though fmall, fhew an early proficiency in the fcience of morals. Of him it may be fad, that he is almoft the fingle difficult writer among the Latin claffics, whofe meaning has fufficient merit to make it worth while to labour through his obfcurities.

In the fame degenerate and tyrannic period lived alfo Seneca; whofe character, both as a man and a writer, is difcuffed with great accuracy by the noble author of the Characteristics, to whom we refer,

more elegant arts, he concludes at laft, with his utual majesty.

Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento, (Hæ tibi erunt artes) pacifque imponere morem, Parcere fubjeétis, et debellare fuperbos.

From confidering the Romans, let us pafs to the Greeks. The Grecian commonwealths, while they maintained their

Under a milder dominion, that of Hadrian and the Antonines, lived Aulus Gellius, or (as fome call him) Agellius, an entertaining writer in the mifcellaneous way, well skilled in criticism and antiquity; who, though he can hardly be entitled to the name of a philofopher, yet deferves not to país unmentioned here, from the curious fragments of philofophy interfperfed in his works. With Aulus Gellius we range Macrobius, not because a contemporary (for he is fuppofed to have lived under Honorius and Theodofius) but from his near refemblance, in the character of a writer. His works, like the other's, are mifcellaneous; filled with mythology and ancient litcrature, fome philofophy being intermixed. His Commentary upon the Somnium Scipionis of Cicero may be confidered as wholly of the philo. fophical kind.

In the fame age with Aulus Gellius, flourished Apuleius of Madura in Africa, a Platonic writer, whofe matter in general far exceeds his perplexed and affected ftyle, too conformable to the falle rhetoric of the age when he lived.

Of the fame country, but of a later age, and a harfher ftyle, was Martianus Capella, if indeed he deferve not the name rather of a philologist, than of a philofopher.

After Capella we may rank Chalcidius the Platonic, though both his age, and country, and religion, are doubtful. His manner of writing is rather more agreeable than that of the two preceding, nor does he appear to be their inferior in the knowledge of philofophy, his work being a laudable commentary upon the Timæus of Plato.

The laft Latin philofopher was Boëthius, who was defcended from fome of the nobleft of the Roman families, and was conful in the beginning of the fixth century. He wrote many phi lofophical works, the greater part in the logical way. But his ethic piece, "On the Confolation of Philofophy," and which is partly profe and partly verfe, deferves great encomiums both for the matter and for the ftyle, in which laft he approaches the purity of a far better age than his own, and is in all refpects preferable to thofe crabbed Africans already mentioned. By command of Theodoric, king of the Geths, it was the hard fate of this worthy man to fuffer death; with whom the Latin tongue, and the laft remains of Roman dignity, may be faid to have funk in the western world.

There were other Romans, who left philofophical writings; fuch as Mufonius Rufus, and the two emperors, Marcus Antoninus and Julian; but as thefe preferred the ufe of the Greek tongue to their own, they can hardly be confidered among the number of Latin writers,

And fo much (by way of sketch) for the Istin authors of philofophy; a fmall number for to vast an empire, if we confider them as all the product of near fix fucceffive centuries.

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