СНАР. III. Of Judg ment. all epic and dramatic fiction; and that, by which it is chiefly enabled to fix and rivet the attention to transactions avowedly fabulous and unreal: for, where the events described or represented, spring, in their natural order of succession, from one source, the sentiments of sympathy, which they excite, will all verge to one centre, and be connected by one chain. But if new sources be introduced, new and distinct trains of ideas will, of course, arise; which will distract the attention, and divide the interest; which happens in most of the French tragedies (as well as in the Cato of Addison, written upon the French model) where one plot of love and another of ambition are carried on at the same time, and often in alternate scenes *. 25. This mixture is more certainly fatal to the general interest of the piece, than that of comic with tragic scenes; which has been so much, and in many instances, so justly blamed, on the English stage: for where the comic scenes belong to the general plot, as in Othello, they serve to bring down occasionally the high tone of tragedy to the level of common life, which is certainly better adapted to the stage; Xen τα μέρη συνεσταναι των πραγματων ἔτως, ὥστε μετατιθεμενα τινος μέρες, η αφαιρεμενο, διαφέρεσθαι και κινείσθαι το όλον. ὁ γας προσον η μη προσον, μηδεν ποιεί επίδηλον, εδε μορών τετο εςτι.-ARISTOT. Poet, f. xvii, where the persons that speak are known to be mere men and women of the common class, under whatever titles they may appear. In expressing the glowing sentiments of heroic passions and affections, this high tone ought, indeed, to be kept up: for the violent agitations of passion or affection always raise and expand vigorous minds; and give them a character of enthusiasm: wherefore their expressions, when under the influence of them, ought to be bold, elevated, and poetical; the language of poetry being, in fact, no other than that of enthusiasm. But why this exalted style is to be kept up in the common situations of familiar intercourse, to which tragedy must sometimes descend, I can see no reason whatever; and therefore decidedly prefer the mixture of prose and blank verse, which our old dramatic writers took from nature, to that monotonous pomp of diction, which their successors borrowed from the French: nor do I see any impropriety in mixing sallies of pleasantry in these familiar parts of the dialogue. 26. To draw any inference to the contrary from the uniform style of epic poetry, is to reason upon an analogy, which does not exist : for, as the personages of the epic are not subjected to the evidence of sense, like those of the dramatic, the imagination is at liberty to form what notions of them it pleases; and it CHAP. Of Judg ment. CHAP. III. Of Judg ment. belongs to the art of the poet to aggrandize and embellish those notions, in proportion as he wishes to impress his reader with grand and sublime ideas of the transactions, which he relates. For this purpose, a style uniformly elevated above that of the common vehicle of social intercourse is absolutely necessary; and a metrical style is more appropriate than any other; as it can sustain this elevation withoutbeing turgid or transposed; and consequently descend without being debased, and rise without being inflated. Its ordinary tone is not that of common nature; but of nature elevated to enthusiasm by supernatural inspiration; and it is by speaking in this tone that the persons of the epic acquire a supernatural elevation of character, which the imagination readily yields to them, because its deceptions are never controverted by the evidence of the senses. Homer has no where told us that his heroes were of supernatural dimensions; and, if he had, he would have destroyed the interest of his poem; but, nevertheless, no one, I believe, ever read the Iliad without conceiving in his mind ideas of men whose ordinary stature could not have been less than ten feet. 27. This expansion of the imagination, by a systematic elevation of language, is one of the most efficacious means of giving poetical probability; or making supernatural events appear credible for, when once we have conceived supernatural ideas of the characters, we expect them to perform supernatural actions. The fictions of the Iliad are as extravagant as those of any common romance or book of knight-. errantry; and if we read them in prose, we immediately perceive them to be so; but the enthusiasm of the poet's numbers so expands the imaginations of his readers, that they spontaneously conceive ideas of his characters adequate to the actions which he makes them perform. 28. But even with this magical enthusiasm of verse, had Achilles been brought into action. at once; and, without our having any previous acquaintance with him, defeated a whole Trojan army of fifty thousand men by the force of his single arm, we should have turned away with coldness and disgust from so absurd a tale but the poet has opened his character to us by degrees; and raised it by artful contrasts, and allusions seemingly accidental, scattered through all the preceding parts of the poem :-every faculty of his mind, too, is upon the same scale as the strength and agility of his body; all that he says being distinguished by a glow of imagination, a fervor of passion, and energy of reasoning peculiar to himself:-even the tender affections of his mind partake of its greatness and its pride his piety is reverence and not CHAP, Of Judg ment. CHAP. III. Of Judg ment. fear; his friendship gives, but never seeks protection; his love imparts favour, which it scorns to ask; and his grief assumes the character of rage, and expends itself in menaces and vows of vengeance against those who have caused it. By an artful concatenation of circumstances, seemingly accidental, he is shown to the reader under the influence of every passion by turns, all of which operate to the same end, and conspire to swell his rage, rendered doubly dreadful by despair and impending death. In this temper of mind, endowed with more than mortal strength, and clad in celestial armour, he is shown advancing to the fight, like the autumnal star, whose approach taints the air, and diffuses disease, pestilence, and death. Such an image prepares the mind for the events that follow, which thence seem natural consequences, instead of extravagant fictions *. 29. To describe such a character as this, or indeed any other, requires neither feeling nor talents but to delineate or represent it-to exhibit it speaking and acting under the influence of all the variety of passions, to which it is liable-requires the utmost perfection of both; and the more highly the picture is finished, the greater is the difficulty and the greater the merit for it is in the little expressions of αξίσται των ὑπερβολων αἱ αυτο τετο διαλανθανεσαι, ὅτι εἰσιν Coxα-LONGIN. f. xxxviii. |