But when t' examine ev'ry part he came, 135 140 NOTES. Some VER. 138. As if the Stagyrite] According to a fine precept in the fourteenth fection of Longinus, who exhorts us, when we aim at any thing elevated and fublime, to afk ourselves while we are compofing, "how would Homer, or Plato, or Demofthenes, have exerted and expreffed themselves on this fubject? And ftill more, if we should continue to afk ourfelves; what would Homer or Demofthenes, if they had been prefent, and had heard this paffage, have thought of it, and how would they have been affected by it?" VER. 140. To copy Nature] It may not be unuseful or unpleasant to see the very different opinion of a writer, who, perhaps, had done better if he had followed this rule. "A fpirit of imitation hath many ill effects, (fays Dr. Young);" I fhall confine myfelf to three. First, It deprives the liberal and politer arts of an advantage which the mechanic enjoy; in thefe, men are ever endeavouring to go beyond their predeceffors; in the former, to follow them. And fince copies furpaís not their originals, as ftreams rife not higher than their spring, rarely fo high; hence, while arts mechanic are in perpetual progress, and increase, the liberal are in retrogradation, and decay. Thefe resemble pyramids, are broad at bottom, but leffen exceedingly as they rife; those resemble rivers which, from a small fountain-head, are spreading ever wider and wider, as they run. Hence it is evident, that different portions of understanding are not (as fome imagine) allotted to different periods of time; for we fee, in the fame period, understanding rifing in one fet of artists, and declining in another. Therefore nature stands absolved, and our inferiority in compofition must be charged on ourfelves. "Nay, so far are we from complying with a neceffity, which nature lays us under, that, fecondly, by a spirit of imitation we counteract 4 م Some beauties yet no Precepts can declare, For there's a happiness as well as care. NOTES. Mufic counteract nature, and thwart her defign. She brings us into the world all originals. No two faces, no two minds, are just alike; but all bear Nature's evident mark of feparation on them. Born originals, how comes it to pafs that we die copies? That meddling ape, Imitation, as foon as we come to years of indiscretion, (so let me fpeak), fnatches the pen, and blots out Nature's mark of feparation, cancels her kind intention, destroys all mental individuality; the lettered world no longer confists of fingulars, it is a medley, a mass; and a hundred books, at bottom, are but one. Why are monkies fuch mafters of mimickry? Why receive they fuch a talent at imitation? Is it not as the Spartan slaves received a licence for ebriety; that their betters might be ashamed of it? "The third fault to be found with a spirit of imitation is, that with great incongruity it makes us poor, and proud; makes us think little, and write much; gives us huge folios, which are little better than more reputable cushions to promote our repose, Have not some seven-fold volumes put us in mind of Ovid's feven-fold channels of the Nile at the conflagration? "Oftia feptem Pulverulenta vacant feptem fine flumine valles." Such leaden labours are like Lycurgus's iron money, which was fo much less in value than in bulk, that it required barns for ftrong boxes, and a yoke of oxen to draw five hundred pounds." VER. 141. Some beauties yet no precepts] Pope in this paffage seems to have remembered one of the effays of Bacon, of which he is known to have been remarkably fond. "There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. A man cannot tell whether Apelles, or Abel Durer, were the more trifler; whereof the one would make a perfonage by geometrical proportions; the other, by taking the best parts out of divers faces to make one excellent. Such perfonages, I think, would please nobody, but the painter that made them. Not but I think, a painter may make a better face than ever was; but he muft do it by a kind of felicity, as a mufician that maketh an excellent air in mufic, and not by rule. A man fhall fee faces, that if you examine them, part by part, you shall find never a good one; and yet altogether do well." "Non Mufic resembles Poetry, in each Are nameless graces which no methods teach, Th' intent propos'd, that Licence is a rule. May boldly deviate from the common track. NOTES. 145 150 155 "Non ratione aliquâ (fays Quintilian finely) fed motû nefcio an inerrabili judicatur. Neque ab hoc ullo fatis explicari puto, licet multi tentaverint." Quintil. Inft. L. vi. In short, in poetry, we must judge by tafte and fentiment, not by rules and reasoning. Different theories of philosophy, and different systems of theology, are maintained and exploded in different ages; but true and genuine pictures of nature and paffion, are not subject to fuch revolutions and changes. The doctrines of Plato, Epicurus, and Zeno; of Defcartes, Hobbes, and Malebranche, and Gaffendi, yield in fucceffion to each other; but Homer, Sophocles, Terence, and Virgil, being felt and relished by all men, ftill retain and preserve, unaltered and undisputed, admiration and applause. VER. 143. Mufic resembles] I am informed by one of the best musicians of the age that this obfervation is not accurate, nor agreeable to the rules of that art. VER. 146. If, where the rules, &c.] "Neque enim rogationibus. plebifve fcitis fancta funt ifta praecepta, fed hoc, quicquid eft, Utilitas excogitavit. Non negabo autem fic utile effe plerumque ; verum fi eadem illa nobis aliud fuadebit Utilitas, hanc, relictis magiftrorum autoritatibus, fequemur." Quintil. lib. cap. 13. P. Which without paffing through the judgment gains The heart, and all its end at once attains. 160 In profpects thus, fome objects please our eyes, 165 I know there are, to whofe prefumptuous thoughts Those freer beauties, ev'n in them, seem faults. 170 Some figures monftrous and mis-fhap'd appear, Confider'd fingly, or beheld too near, Which, but proportion'd to their light, or place, Due diftance reconciles to form and grace. A prudent chief not always must display His pow'rs, in equal ranks, and fair array, NOTES. 175 But VER. 161.] Their means their own. VER.175.A prudent chief,&c.] Olóv ti moiñoi di Qęúniμoi sgalnλátai xalá Tás Takes Tar sealevμát-Dion. Hal. De ftruct. orat. P. The fame may be faid of mufic; concerning which, a difcerning judge has lately made the following obfervation. "I do not mean to affirm, that in this extenfive work (of Marcello) every recitative air, or chorus, is of equal excellence. A continued elevation of this kind no author ever came up to. Nay, if we confider that variety, which in all arts is neceffary to keep up attention, But with th' occafion and the place comply, NOTES. 180 Secure attention, we may perhaps affirm with truth, that inequality makes a part of the character of excellence; that fomething ought to be thrown into fhades, in order to make the lights more ftriking. And, in this refpect, Marcello is truly excellent; if ever he feems to fall, it is only to rife with more astonishing majefty and greatness *." It may be pertinent to fubjoin Rofcommon's remark on the fame fubject. "Far the greatest part Of what fome call neglect, is ftudy'd art. To reach the noble height of some unufual flight.” VER. 180. Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream.] "Modefte, et circumfpecto judicio de tantis viris pronunciandum eft, ne (quod plerifque accidit) damnent quod non intelligunt. Ac fi neceffe eft in alteram errare partem, omnia eorum legentibus placere, quam multa difplicere maluerim." Quint. P. Racine applied this fine paffage to Perrault and La Motte when they fo much undervalued the ancients, in their famous controverfy. How well Fontenelle, who was at the head of the French wits, that attacked and depreciated Homer, was qualified to judge of our divine old Bard, may be gathered from what the prefent Lord Mansfield told me; that of all the Iliad, the following was the favourite line of this champion of the moderns; Τίσειαν Δαναοι εμα δακρυα σοισι βελεσσιν. VER. 181. Each ancient Altar] "All the inventions and thoughts of the ancients, whether conveyed to us in ftatues, bas-reliefs, * Avifon on Musical Expreffion, page 103. intaglio's |