CHAPTER XIII. CONCERNING NATURAL BEAUTY-ITS IDEA THE SAME IN ALL TIMESTHESSALIAN TEMPLE-TASTE OF VIRGIL AND HORACE OF MILTON, IN DESCRIBING PARADISE-EXHIBITED OF LATE YEARS FIRST IN PICTURES-THENCE TRANSFERRED ΤΟ ENGLISH GARDENS-NOT WANTING TO THE ENLIGHTENED FEW OF THE MIDDLE AGE-PROVED IN LELAND, PETRARCH, AND SANNAZARIUS-COMPARISON BETWEEN THE YOUNGER CYRUS AND PHILIP LE BEL OF FRANCE. But let us pass for a moment from the elegant works of art to the more elegant works of nature. The two subjects are so nearly allied, that the same taste usually relishes them both. Now there is nothing more certain, than that the face of inanimate nature has been at all times captivating. The vulgar, indeed, look no further than to the scenes of culture, because all their views merely terminate in utility. They only remark, that it is fine barley; that it is rich clover; as an ox or an ass, if they could speak, would inform us. But the liberal have nobler views; and though they give to culture its due praise, they can be delighted with natural beauties, where culture was never known. Ages ago they have celebrated, with enthusiastic rapture, "a deep retired vale, with a river rushing through it; a vale having its sides formed by two immense and opposite mountains, and those sides diversified by woods, precipices, rocks, and romantic caverns. Such was the scene produced by the river Peneus, as it ran between the mountains Olympus and Ossa, in that well-known vale, the Thessalian Tempe." Virgil and Horace, the first for taste among the Romans, appear to have been enamoured with beauties of this character. Horace prayed for a villa where there was a garden, a rivulet, and above these a little grove. Hortus ubi, et tecto vicinus jugis aquæ fons, Sat. vi. 2. Virgil wished to enjoy rivers, and woods, and to be hid under immense shade in the cool valleys of Mount Hæmus: O! qui me gelidis in vallibus Hæmi Georg. ii. 486. The great elements of this species of beauty, according to "Est nemus Hæmoniæ, prærupta quod undique claudit Silva: vocant Tempe. Per qua Peneus ab imo Effusus Pindo spumosis volvitur undis, Dejectuque gravi, &c.-Ovid. Met. i. 568. A fuller and more ample account of this beautiful spot may be found in the first chapter of the third book of Ælian's Various History. these principles, were water, wood, and uneven ground; to which may be added a fourth, that is to say, lawn. It is the happy mixture of these four that produces every scene of natural beauty, as it is a more mysterious mixture of other elements (perhaps as simple, and not more in number) that produces a world or universe. Virgil and Horace having been quoted, we may quote, with equal truth, our great countryman, Milton. Speaking of the flowers of Paradise, he calls them flowers Which not nice art In beds and curious knots, but nature boon Pours forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain. Par. Lost, iv. 245. Soon after this he subjoins, This was the place A happy rural seat, of various view. He explains this variety, by recounting the lawns, the flocks, the hillocks, the valleys, the grots, the waterfalls, the lakes, &c.; and in another book, describing the approach of Raphael, he informs us, that this divine messenger passed Through groves of myrrh, And flow'ring odours, cassia, nard, and balm ; Par. Lost, v. 292. The painters in the preceding century seem to have felt the power of these elements, and to have transferred them into their landscapes with such amazing force, that they appear not so much to have followed, as to have emulated nature. Claude de Lorraine, the Poussins, Salvator Rosa, and a few more, may be called superior artists in this exquisite taste. Our gardens in the mean time were tasteless and insipid. Those who made them, thought the further they wandered from nature, the nearer they approached the sublime. Unfortunately, where they travelled, no sublime was to be found; and the further they went, the further they left it behind. But perfection, alas! was not the work of a day. Many prejudices were to be removed; many gradual ascents to be made; ascents from bad to good, and from good to better, before the delicious amenities of a Claude or a Poussin could be rivalled in a Stour-head, a Hagley, or a Stow; or the tremendous charms of a Salvator Rosa be equalled in the scenes of a Piercefield or a Mount Edgecumb. Not however to forget the subject of our inquiry. Though it was not before the present century that we established a chaster taste; though our neighbours at this instant are but learning it from us; and though to the vulgar everywhere it is totally incomprehensible, (be they vulgar in rank, or vulgar in capacity ;) yet even in the darkest periods we have been treating, periods when taste is often thought to have been lost, we shall still discover an enlightened few, who were by no means insensible to the power of these beauties. How warmly does Leland describe Guy's Cliff; Sannazarius, his villa of Mergilline; and Petrarch, his favourite Vaucluse? Take Guy's Cliff from Leland in his own old English, mixed with Latin: "It is a place meet for the Muses; there is sylence; a praty wood; antra in vivo saxo, (grottos in the living rock ;) the river roling over the stones with a praty noyse.' His Latin is more elegant: Nemusculum ibidem opacum, fontes liquidi et gemmei, prata florida, antra muscosa, rivi levis et per saxa decursus, nec non solitudo et quies Musis amicissima.* Mergilline, the villa of Sannazarius near Naples, is thus sketched in different parts of his poems. It would be difficult to translate these elegant morsels; it is sufficient to express what they mean, collectively: "that the villa of Mergillina had solitary woods; had groves of laurel and citron; had grottos in the rock, with rivulets and springs; and that, from its lofty situation, it looked down upon the sea, and commanded an extensive prospect." It is no wonder that such a villa should enamour such an owner. So strong was his affection for it, that when, during the subsequent wars in Italy, it was demolished by the imperial troops, this unfortunate event was supposed to have hastened his end." * See Leland's Itinerary, vol. iv. p. 66. So we learn from Paulus Jovius, the writer of his life, published with his poems by Grævius, in a small edition of some of the Italian poets, at Amsterdam, in the year 1695. Vaucluse (Vallis Clausa) the favourite retreat of Petrarch, was a romantic scene, not far from Avignon. "It is a valley, having on each hand, as you enter, immense cliffs, but closed up at one of its ends by a semi-circular ridge of them; from which incident it derives its name. One of the most stupendous of these cliffs stands in the front of the semicircle, and has at its foot an opening into an immense cavern. Within the most retired and gloomy part of this cavern is a large oval bason, the production of nature, filled with pellucid and unfathomable water; and from this reservoir issues a river of respectable magnitude, dividing, as it runs, the meadows beneath, and winding through the precipices that impend from above."ź This is an imperfect sketch of that spot where Petrarch spent his time with so much delight, as to say, that this alone was life to him, the rest but a state of punishment. In the two preceding narratives I seem to see an anticipation of that taste for natural beauty which now appears to flourish through Great Britain in such perfection. It is not to be doubted that the owner of Mergillina would have been charmed with Mount Edgecumb; and the owner of Vaucluse have been delighted with Piercefield. When we read in Xenophon," that the younger Cyrus had with his own hand planted trees for beauty, we are not surprised, though pleased with the story, as the age was polished, and Cyrus an accomplished prince. But when we read that in the beginning of the fourteenth century a king of France (Philip le Bell) should make it penal to cut down a tree, qui a esté gardè pour sa beaultè, "which had been preserved for its beauty;" though we praise the law, we cannot help being surprised that the prince should at such a period have been so far enlightened.b See Memoires pour la Vie de François Petrarque, quarto, vol. i. p. 231. 341, 342. See also Plin. Nat. Hist. 1. xxviii. c. 22. See the Economics of Xenophon, where this fact is related. See a valuable work, entitled Observa tions on the Statutes, chiefly on the ancient, &c. p. 7, by the Hon. Mr. Barrington; work concerning which it is difficult to de cide, whether it be more entertaining, or more instructive. CHAPTER XIV. SUPERIOR LITERATURE AND KNOWLEDGE BOTH OF THE GREEK AND LATIN CLERGY, WHENCE-BARBARITY AND IGNORANCE OF THE LAITY, WHENCE SAMPLES OF LAY-MANNERS, IN A STORY FROM ANNA COMNENA'S HISTORY CHURCH AUTHORITY INGENIOUSLY EMPLOYED TO CHECK BARBARITY-THE SAME AUTHORITY EMPLOYED FOR OTHER GOOD PURPOSES TO SAVE THE POOR JEWS-TO STOP TRIALS BY BATTLE-MORE SUGGESTED CONCERNING LAY-MANNERSFEROCITY OF THE NORTHERN LAYMEN, WHENCE-DIFFERENT CAUSES ASSIGNED INVENTIONS DURING THE DARK AGES-GREAT, THOUGH THE INVENTORS OFTEN UNKNOWN-INFERENCE ARISING FROM THESE INVENTIONS. BEFORE I quit the Latins, I shall subjoin two or three observations on the Europeans in general. The superior characters for literature here enumerated, whether in the western or eastern Christendom, (for it is of Christendom only we are now speaking,) were by far the greater part of them ecclesiastics. In this number we have selected from among the Greeks the patriarch of Constantinople, Photius; Michael Psellus; Eustathius and Eustratius, both of episcopal dignity; Planudes; cardinal Bessario. From among the Latins, Venerable Bede; Gerbertus, afterwards pope Sylvester the Second; Ingulphus, abbot of Croyland; Hildebert, archbishop of Tours; Peter Abelard; John of Salisbury, bishop of Chartres; Roger Bacon; Francis Petrarch; many monkish historians; Æneas Sylvius, afterwards pope Pius the Second, &c. Something has been already said concerning each of these, and other ecclesiastics. At present we shall only remark, that it was necessary, from their very profession, that they should read and write; accomplishments at that time usually confined to themselves. Those of the western church were obliged to acquire some knowledge of Latin; and for Greek, to those of the eastern church it was still (with a few corruptions) their native language. If we add to these preparations their mode of life, which, being attended mostly with a decent competence, gave them immense leisure; it was not wonderful that, among such a multitude, the more meritorious should emerge, and soar, by dint of genius, above the common herd. Similar effects proceed from similar causes. Those who wish to see more particulars may consult the third part of these Inconcerning these learned men, may recur to quiries, in chapters iv. ix. x. xi, xiv. their names in the Index; or, if he please, |