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faces, by which it may be presented to us, according to the circumstances with which we surround it; and it will appear superlatively sublime, or not, in proportion as these circumstances are happily chosen, and of a sublime kind. In this the great art of the writer consists; and indeed the principal difficulty of sublime description. If the description be too general, and divested of circumstances, the object is shown in a faint light, and makes a feeble impression, or no impression, on the reader. At the same time, if any trivial or improper circumstance be mingled, the whole is degraded.

The nature of that emotion which is aimed at by sublime description, admits no mediocrity, and cannot subsist in a middle state; but must either highly transport us, or, if unsuccessful in the execution, leave us exceedingly disgusted. We attempt to rise with the writer; imagination is awakened and put upon the stretch; but it ought to be supported; and, if in the midst of its effort it be deserted unexpectedly, it falls with a painful shock. When Milton, in his battle of the angels, describes them, as tearing up mountains, and throwing them at one another, there are in his description, as Mr. Addison has remarked, no circumstances but what are truly sublime:

From their foundations loosening to and fro,
They plucked the seated hills with all their load,
Rocks, waters, woods; and by the shaggy tops
Uplifting bore them with their hands.-

This idea of the giants throwing the mountains, which is in itself so grand, Claudian renders burlesque and ridiculous, by the single circumstance of one of his giants, with the mountain Ida upon his shoulders, and a river, which flowed from the mountain, running down the giant's back, as he held it up in that posture.-Virgil, in his description of Mount Etna, is guilty of a slight inaccuracy of this kind. After several magnificent images, the poet concludes with personifying the mountain under this figure,— -Eructans viscera cum gemitu”—

"belching up its bowels with a groan;" which, by making the mountain resemble a sick or drunken person, degrades the majesty of the description. The debasing effect of this idea will appear in a stronger light, from observing what figure it makes in a poem of Sir Richard Blackmore; who, through an extravagant perversity of taste, selected it for the principal circumstance in his description; and thereby, as Dr. Arbuthnot humorously observes, represented the mountain as in a fit of the colic.

Etna and all the burning mountains find

Their kindled stores, with inbred storms of wind,
Blown up to rage, and roaring out complain,
As torn with inward gripes and torturing pam;
Labouring, they cast their dreadful vomit round,
And with their melted bowels spread the ground.

Such instances show how much the sublime depends upon a proper collection of circumstances; and with how great care every circumstance must be avoided, which, by approaching in the smallest degree to the mean, or even to the gay or trifling, changes the tone of the emotion.

What is commonly called the sublime style, is for the most part a very bad one, and has no relation whatever to the true sublime. Writers are apt to imagine, that splendid words, accumulated epithets, and a certain swelling kind of expression, by rising above what is customary or vulgar, constitutes the sublime; yet nothing is in reality more false. In genuine instances of sublime writing, nothing of this kind appears. "God said, let there be light; and there was light." This is striking and sublime; but put it in what is commonly called the sublime style; "The Sovereign Arbiter of nature, by the potent energy of a single word, commanded the light to exist;" and, as Boileau justly observed, the style is indeed raised, but the thought is degraded. In general it may be observed, that the sublime lies in the thought, not in the expression; and, when the thought is really noble, it will generally clothe itself in a native majesty of language.

The faults, opposite to the sublime, are principally two, the frigid and the bombast. The frigid consists

in degrading an object or sentiment, which is sublime in itself, by a mean conception of it, or by a weak, low, or puerile description of it. This betrays entire absence, or, at least, extreme poverty of genius. The bombast lies in forcing a common or trivial object out of its rank, and in labouring to raise it into the sublime; or, in attempting to exalt a sublime object beyond all natural bounds.

In what must the foundation of the sublime be laid?
What objects are thus excluded?

How must the objects be described?

On what does this depend?

Where do we find the most striking instances of the sub lime?

Why?

What change have genius and manners undergone }
What writings are most sublime?

What instance is given from the Scriptures?
What from Longinus?

To what is Homer indebted for his sublimity 1
Are conciseness and simplicity necessary?
Define them.

Why does a defect in either hurt the sublime?

What is said of our blank verse?

What author illustrates this?

What instance is mentioned as sublime?

Why?

What, besides simplicity and conciseness, are necessary? What does strength of description imply?

Illustrate this.

What is the nature of the sublime emotion?

What is said of the sublime in style?

What is the common fault of writers?
In what does the sublime lie?

What are the faults opposite to the sublime?
In what does the frigid consist?
In what the bombast?

BEAUTY, AND OTHER PLEASURES OF TASTE.

BEAUTY, next to sublimity, affords the highest pleasure to the imagination. The emotion which it raises, is easily distinguished from that of sublimity. It is of a calmer kind; more gentle and soothing; does not elevate the mind so much, but produces a pleasing serenity. Sublimity excites a feeling too violent to be lasting; the pleasure proceeding from beauty, admits longer duration. It extends also to a much greater variety of objects than sublimity; to a variety indeed so great, that the sensations which beautiful objects excite, differ exceedingly, not in degree only, but also in kind, from each other. Hence no word is used in a more undetermined signification than beauty. It is applied to almost every external object, which pleases the eye or ear; to many of the graces of writing; to several dispositions of the mind; nay, to some objects of abstract science. We speak frequently of a beautiful tree or flower; a beautiful poem; a beautiful character; and a beautiful theorem in mathematics. Colour seems to afford the simplest instance of beauty. Association of ideas, it is probable, has some influence on the pleasure which we receive from colours. Green, for example, may appear more beautiful, from being connected in our ideas with rural scenes and prospects; white, with innocence; blue, with the serenity of the sky. Independently of associations of this sort, all that we can farther observe respecting colours is, that those chosen for beauty, are commonly delicate, rather than glaring. Such are the feathers of several kinds of birds, the leaves of flowers, and the fine variation of colours, shown by the sky at the rising and setting of the sun.

Figure opens to us forms of beauty more complex and diversified. Regularity first offers itself as a source of beauty. By a regular figure is meant one, which we perceive to be formed according to some certain rule, and not left arbitrary or loose in the construction of its parts. Thus a circle, a square, a triangle, or a hexagon, gives pleasure to the eye by its regularity, as a beautiful figure; yet a certain graceful variety is found to be a much more powerful principle of

beauty. Regularity seems to appear beautiful to us chiefly, if not entirely, on account of its suggesting the idea of fitness, propriety, and use, which have always a more intimate connection with orderly and proportioned forms, than those which appear not constructed according to any certain rule. Nature, who is the most graceful artist, hath, in all her ornamental works, pursued variety with an apparent neglect of regularity. Cabinets, doors, and windows, are made after a regular form, in cubes and parallelograms, with exact proportion of parts; and thus formed, they please the eye, for this just reason, that, being works of use, they are by such figures better adapted to the ends for which they were designed. But plants, flowers, and leaves, are full of variety and diversity. A straight canal is an insipid figure, when compared with the meanders of a river. Cones and pyramids have their degree of beauty; but trees, growing in their natural wildness, have infinitely more beauty, than when trimmed into pyramids and cones. The apartments of a house must be disposed with regularity for the convenience of its inhabitants; but a garden, which is intended merely for beauty, would be extremely disgusting, if it had as much uniformity and order as a dwelling house.

Motion affords another source of beauty, distinct from figure. Motion of itself is pleasing; and bodies in motion are, "cæteris paribus," universally preferred to those at rest. Only gentle motion, however, belongs to the beautiful; for, when it is swift, or very powerful, such as that of a torrent, it partakes of the sublime. The motion of a bird gliding through the air is exquisitely beautiful; but the swiftness with which lightning darts through the sky, is magnificent and astonishing. Here it is necessary to observe, that the sensations of sublime and beautiful are not always distinguished by very distant boundaries; but are capable in many instances of approaching towards each other. Thus a gentle running stream is one of the most beautiful objects in nature; but, as it swells gradually into a great river, the beautiful by degrees is lost in the sublime. A young tree is a beautiful object; a spreading ancient oak is a venerable and sublime one. To return, however, to the beauty of

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