of sublimity, unless it be ample and lofty. There is too, in architecture, what is called greatness of manner; which seems chiefly to arise from presenting the object to us in one full point of view; so that it shall make its impression whole, entire, and undivided, upon the mind. A Gothic cathedral raises ideas of grandeur in our minds, by its size, its height, its awful obscurity, its strength, its antiquity, and its durability

There still remains to be mentioned one class of sublime objects, which may be called the moral or sentimental sublime; arising from certain exertions of the human mind; from certain affections and actions of our fellow-creatures. These will be found to be all, or chiefly, of that class, which comes under the name of magnanimity or heroism; and they produce an effect extremely similar to what is produced by the view of grand objects in nature; filling the mind with admiration, and elevating it above itself. A noted instance of this, quoted by all the French critics, is the celebrated Qu'il mourut of Corneille, in the tragedy of Horace. In the famous combat betwixt the Horatii and the Curiatii, the old Horatius, being informed that two of his sons are slain, and that the third had betaken himself to flight, at first will not believe the report; but being thoroughly assured of the fact, is fired with all the sentiments of high honour and indignation at this supposed unworthy behaviour of his surviving son. He is reminded, that his son stood alone against three, and asked what he wished him to have done ?-« To have died!"-he answers. In the same manner, Porus, taken prisoner by Alexander, after a gallant defence, and asked how he wished to be treated? answering, "Like a king ;" and Cæsar chiding the pilot who was afraid to set out with him in a storm, "Quid times? Cæsarem vehis;" are good instances of this sentimental sublime. Wherever, in some critical and high situation, we behold a man uncommonly intrepid, and resting upon himself; superior to passion and to fear; animated by some great principle to the contempt of popular opinion, of selfish interest, of dangers, or of death; there we are struck with a sense of the sublime.*

The sublime, in natural and in moral objects, is brought before us in one view, and compared together, in the following beautiful passage of Akenside's Pleasures of the Imagination:

Look then abroad through nature; to the range
Of planets, suns, and adamantine spheres,
Wheeling, unshaken, through the void immense;
And speak, O man! does this capacious scene,
With half that kindling majesty, dilate
Thy strong conception, as when Brutus rose

High virtue is the most natural and fertile source of this moral sublimity. However, on some occasions, where virtue either has no place, or is but imperfectly displayed, yet if extraordinary vigour and force of mind be discovered, we are not insensible to a degree of grandeur in the character; and from the splendid conqueror, or the daring conspirator, whom we are far from approving, we cannot withhold our admiration. *

I have now enumerated a variety of instances, both in inanimate objects and in human life, wherein the sublime appears. In all these instances, the emotion raised in us is of the same kind, although the objects that produce the emotion be of widely different kinds. A question next arises, whether we are able to discover some one fundamental quality in which all these different objects agree, and which is the cause of their producing an emotion of the same nature in our minds? Various hypotheses have been formed concerning this, but, as far as appears to me, hitherto unsatisfactory. Some have imagined that amplitude or great extent, joined with simplicity, is either immediately, or remotely, the fundamental quality of whatever is sublime; but we have seen that amplitude is confined to one species of sublime objects; and cannot, without violent straining, be applied to them all. The author of "A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful,"

Refulgent, from the stroke of Cæsar's fate,
Amid the crowd of patriots; and his arm

Aloft extending, like eternal Jove,

When guilt brings down the thunder, call'd aloud

On Tully's name, and shook his crimson steel,

And bade the father of his country hail!

For lo the tyrant prostrate on the dust;
And Rome again is free!—

Book i.

Silius Italicus studied to give an august idea of Hannibal, by representing him as surrounded with all his victories, in the place of guards. One who had formed the design of assassinating him in the midst of a feast, is thus addressed:

Fallit te, mensas inter quod credis inermem;
Tot bellis quæsita viro, tot cædibus, armat
Majestas æterna ducem. Si admoveris ora,

Cannas, et Trebiam ante oculos, Trasymenaque busta
Et Pauli stare ingentem miraberis umbram.

Lib. xi. 342.

A thought somewhat of the same nature occurs in a French author: "Il se cache; mais sa réputation le découvre: il marche sans suite et sans équipage; mais chacun, dans son esprit, le met sur un char de triomphe. On compte, en le voyant, les ennemis qu'il a vaincu, non pas les serviteurs qui le suivent. Tout seul qu'il est, on se figure, autour de lui, ses vertus, et ses victoires qui l'accompagnent. Moins il est superbe, plus il devient vénérable.” Oraison Funebre de M. de Turenne, par M. Flechier.-Both these passages are splendid, rather than sublime. In the first there is a want of justness in the thought; in the second, of simplicity in the expression.

to whom we are indebted for several ingenious and original thoughts upon this subject, proposes a formal theory upon this foundation, That terror is the source of the sublime, and that no objects have this character, but such as produce impressions of pain and danger. It is indeed true, that many terrible objects are highly sublime; and that grandeur does not refuse an alliance with the idea of danger. But though this is very properly illustrated by the author, (many of whose sentiments on tha head I have adopted,) yet he seems to stretch his theory too far, when he represents the sublime as consisting wholly in modes of danger, or of pain For the proper sensation of sublimity appears to be distinguishable from the sensation of either of these, and, on several occasions, to be entirely separated from them. In many grand objects, there is no coincidence with terror at all; as in the magnificent prospect of wide extended plains, and of the starry firmament; or in the moral dispositions and sentiments, which we view with high admiration; and in many painful and terrible objects also, it is clear, there is no sort of grandeur. The amputation of a limb, or the bite of a snake, are exceedingly terrible; but are destitute of all claim whatever to sublimity. I am inclined to think, that mighty force or power, whether accompanied with terror or not, whether employed in protecting or in alarming us, has a better title, than any thing that has yet been mentioned, to be the fundamental quality of the sublime; as, after the review which we have taken, there does not occur to me any sublime object, into the idea of which, power, strength, and force, either enter not directly, or are not, at least, intimately associated with the idea, by leading our thoughts to some astonishing power, as concerned in the production of the object. However, I do not insist upon this as sufficient to found a general theory: it is enough to have given this view of the nature and different kinds of sublime objects; by which I hope to have laid a proper foundation for discussing, with greater accuracy, the sublime in writing and composition.

LECTURE IV.

THE SUBLIME IN WRITING.

HAVING treated of grandeur or sublimity in external objects, the way seems now to be cleared, for treating, with more

advantage, of the description of such objects; or, of what is called the sublime in writing. Though I may appear to enter early on the consideration of this subject; yet, as the sublime is a species of writing which depends less than any other on the artificial embellishments of rhetoric, it may be examined with as much propriety here, as in any subsequent part of the Lec

tures.

Many critical terms have unfortunately been employed in a sense too loose and vague, none more so, than that of the sublime. Every one is acquainted with the character of Cæsar's Commentaries, and of the style in which they are written; a style remarkably pure, simple, and elegant; but the most remote from the sublime, of any of the classical authors. Yet this author has a German critic, Johannes Gulielmus Bergerus, who wrote no longer ago than the year 1720, pitched upon as the perfect model of the sublime, and has composed a quarto volume, entitled De naturali Pulchritudine Orationis; the express intention of which is to show, that Cæsar's Commentaries contain the most complete exemplification of all Longinus's rules relating to sublime writing. This I mention as a strong proof of the confused ideas which have prevailed concerning this subject. The true sense of sublime writing, undoubtedly, is such a description of objects, or exhibition of sentiments, which are in themselves of a sublime nature, as shall give us strong impressions of them. But there is another very indefinite, and therefore very improper sense, which has been too often put upon it; when it is applied to signify any remarkable and distinguishing excellency of composition; whether it raise in us the ideas of grandeur, or those of gentleness, elegance, or any other sort of beauty. In this sense Cæsar's Commentaries may, indeed, be termed sublime, and so may many sonnets, pastorals, and love elegies, as well as Homer's Iliad. But this evidently confounds the use of words; and marks no one species, or character of composition whatever.

I am sorry to be obliged to observe, that the sublime is too often used in this last and improper sense, by the celebrated critic Longinus, in his treatise on this subject. He sets out, indeed, with describing it in its just and proper meaning; as something that elevates the mind above itself, and fills it with high conceptions, and a noble pride. But from this view of it, he frequently departs; and substitutes in the place of it, whatever, in any strain of composition, pleases highly. Thus many of the passages which he produces as instances of the sublime

are merely elegant, without having the most distant relation to proper sublimity; witness Sappho's famous ode, on which he descants at considerable length. He points out five sources of the sublime. The first is, boldness or grandeur in the thoughts; the second is, the pathetic; the third, the proper application of figures; the fourth, the use of tropes and beautiful expressions the fifth, musical structure and arrangement of words. This is the plan of one who was writing a treatise of rhetoric, or of the beauties of writing in general; not of the sublime in particular For of these five heads, only the two first have any peculiar relation to the sublime; boldness and grandeur in the thoughts, and, in some instances, the pathetic, or strong exertions of passion; the other three, tropes, figures, and musical arrangements, have no more relation to the sublime, than to other kinds of good writing; perhaps less to the sublime, than to any other species whatever; because it requires less the assistance of ornament. From this it appears, that clear and precise ideas on this head are not to be expected from that writer. I would not, however, be understood, as if I meant, by this censure, to represent his treatise as of small value; I know no critic, ancient or modern, that discovers a more lively relish of the beauties of fine writing, than Longinus; and he has also the merit of being himself an excellent, and in several passages, a truly sublime, writer. But, as his work has been generally considered as a standard on this subject, it was incumbent on me to give my opinion concerning the benefit to be derived from it. It deserves to be consulted, not so much for distinct instruction concerning the sublime, as for excellent general ideas concerning beauty in writing.

I return now to the proper and natural idea of the sublime in composition. The foundation of it must always be laid in the nature of the object described. Unless it be such an object as, if presented to our eyes, if exhibited to us in reality, would raise ideas of that elevating, that awful, and magnificent kind, which we call sublime; the description, however finely drawn, is not entitled to come under this class. This excludes all objects that are merely beautiful, gay, or elegant. In the next place, the object must not only, in itself, be sublime, but it must be set before us in such a light as is most proper to give us a clear and full impression of it; it must be described with strength, with conciseness, and simplicity. This depends, principally, upon the lively impression which the poet, or orator, nas of the object which he exhibits; and upon his being deeply