This celebrated paffage in Lucan,

The heav'ns entomb the man that wants an urn, which is apply'd to foldiers that are flain in the field and lie unburied, may, at firft view, feem elegant and ingenious; but when we confider that the carcafs of a horse, a kite, or a crow is entomb'd in the fame manner, the appearance of wit will fubfide. For wit (in the fenfe it is ufed when apply'd to polite compofition) is elegance of thought, which adds beauty to propriety, and not only pleafes the fancy, but informs the judgment.

It is amazing, that one of the beft poets this nation has produced should have been the author of the following wretched lines:

Thou shalt not wish her thine, thou shalt not dare
To be fo impudent as to defpair.

There's not a far of thine dares ftay with thee,
Ill while thy tame fortune after me.

Thoughts are more or less just and true, as they are more or less conformable to their object; and entire conformity is, in this refpect, what we call the juftness of a thought; for thoughts are juft and fit when they perfectly agree with the things they represent.

Thoughts in poetry, however, may be juft without being philofophically true; for it is the poet's business to reprefent things not as they are, but as they feem to be. In defcribing the rainbow, for inftance, he may with juftnefs dwell on the colours that feem to compofe that beatiful phanomenon, though the philofopher fhould ftand by with his prifm, to prove that the whole of this appearance was occafioned only by the refraction of the rays of light. Nor are metaphors, hyperboles, ironies, or equivocal expreffions, when properly used, nor fiction or fable, any deviation from this rule of right thinking; for there is a great difference between falfhood and fiction, between that which is really falfe, and that which is only fo in appearance. Tropes, figures, and fictions, when they are of any value, are raised on the foundation of right reason; they have truth for their basis, which is recommended and rendered more amiable by those airy disguises.

To think juflly, therefore, and to raise beautiful thoughts, it is not fufficient that they have nothing in them false, for fometimes thoughts may become trivial by being only true.

When Cicero applauds Craffus on the fubject of his thoughts, after obferving that they were juft and true, he alfo adds, that they were new and uncommon; that befides truth and juftnefs to fatisfy the mind, he had thrown in fomething more to captivate and furprise it. Truth, fays father Boubours, is to thoughts what foundations are to buildings, it fupports and gives them folidity; but a building which has nothing to recommend it but folidity, will not please those who are killed in architecture. Befides folidity therefore, magnificence, beauty and delicacy are required; and thefe alfo muft find a place in the thoughts of our poems, or they will be ever lifeless and unaffecting Truth, which on other occafions pleafes though unadorned, requires embellishment here: though this ornament is fometimes no more than placing a thought, otherwife common and ordinary, in a new point of light, and giving it an agreeable turn.

Time fays for no man is a very true and just thought, but is very plain and common. It is raifed, however, and made in a manner new by the following turn:

Time in his full career keeps preffing on,
Nor heeds he the entreaties, or commands,
Of the poor peasant, or tyrannic king.

So when you tell a fluggard that he has loft an hour in the morning, which he can never recover, you tell him the truth, yet there is no beauty or wit in it, because the thought is trite and common; but in Sir ****'s remark on his friend, that he loft an hour in the morning, and ran after it all day, there is wit.

But, as Longinus obferves, it is thofe elevated thoughts, which reprefent nothing but what is great to the mind, that principally heighten and animate our poems. The fublimity and grandeur of a thought will always gratify and transport the foul, if it be just and conformable to the fubject; but where that conformity is wanting, dignity will rather difguft than please. To dress up a mean fubject with pomp and fplendor, is like putting the robes of royalty on a clown, which, inftead of procuring him respect and efteem, will reduce him to the lowest degree of contempt and ridicule. The thoughts, therefore, as well as the ftyle, must be fuitable to the fubject, or the writer will ever mifs of his aim.

Sublime thoughts are no where to be found in fuch plenty, nor perhaps fo well decorated, as in the facred books of the Old and New Teftament.-The Almighty's decking bimself with light as with a garment, Spreading out the heavens like a curtain, making the clouds his chariot, and riding upon the avings of the wind, are thoughts amazingly majestic.

Homer alfo abounds with thefe ftrains of fublimity. The paffages wherein he describes Jupiter fhaking the heavens with a nod, and Neptune enraged at the deftruction of the Grecians, are nobly conceived, but they fall fhort of the preceding.

He spoke, and awful bends his fable brows,

Shakes his ambrofial curls, and gives the nod,
The stamp of fate, and fanction of the God:
High heav'n with trembling the dread fignal took,
And all Olympus to the centre shook.

Mean time the monarch of the watry main
Obferv'd the Thund'rer, nor observ'd in vain :
In Samothracia, on a mountain's brow,
Whose waving woods o'er-hung the deeps below,
He fate; and round him caft his azure eyes,
Where Ida's mifty tops confus'dly rife;
Below, fair lion's glitt'ring fpires were seen;
The crouded fhips, and fable feas between.
There, from the cryftal chambers of the main
Emerg'd, he fate; and mourn'd his Argives flain.
At Jove incens'd, with grief and fury ftung,
Prone down the rocky fteep he rush'd along,
Fierce as he paft; the lofty mountains nod,
The forefts shake! earth trembled as he trod,
And felt the footfteeps of th' immortal God.
From realm to realm three ample ftrides he took,
And at the fourth, the diftant Egæ fhook.

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The thought with which he has defcribed the speed of the celeftial courfers is altogether as magnificent. He difdains all comparisons drawn from the wind, hail, whirlwinds and torrents, which he had before apply'd to express the swiftness and impetuofity of his combatants, and to give us an idea of the rapidity of these immortal horfes, he measures their strokes, as Longinus obferves, by the whole breadth of the horizon.

Far as a fhepherd from fome point on high
O'er the wide main extends his boundless eye,
Through such a space of air, with thund'ring found,
At every leap th' immortal courfers bound.
РОРЕ.

Milton's Paradife Loft is replete with thefe fublime thoughts; among which, the feveral defcriptions he has given us of Satan are admirably adapted to raise terror in the imagination of the reader.

Thus Satan talking to his nearest mate,

With head up-lift above the wave, and eyes
That sparkling blazed, his other parts befide
Prone on the flood, extending long and large,
Lay floating many a rood-

His fpear, to equal which the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the maft
Of fome great Admiral, were but a wand
He walk'd with to fupport uneasy steps.

And in another place:

-he, above the reft
In fhape and gefture proudly eminent,
Stood like a tower: his form not yet had loft
All her original brightness, nor appear'd
Lefs than arch-angel ruin'd, and th' excess
Of glory obscur'd: As when the fun new.ris'n
Looks thro' the horizontal mifty air,

Shorn of his beams; or from behind the moon,
In dim eclipse disaft'rous twilight sheds

On half the nations, and with fear of change
Perplexes monarchs; darken'd fo, yet fhone
Above them all the arch-angel.-

As Homer has described Discord, and Virgil Fame, with their feet ftanding upon the earth, and their heads extended above the clouds, Milton, in imitation of them, has thus defcribed Satan;

-On th`o her fide, Satan alarm'd,
Collecting all his might dilated flood
Like Teneriff or Atlas unremov'd:

His ftature reach'd the sky, and on his creft
Sat horror plum'd-

The breaking up of this infernal affembly is alfo well defcribed.

Their rifing all at once was as the found

Of thunder heard remote

The following speech of Satan to the Sun is very beautiful, and, as Mr. Addifon obferves, has fome tranfient touches of remorfe and self-accufation.

O thou that, with furpaffing glory crown'd,
Look'st from thy fole dominion like the god
Of this new world, at whofe fight all the stars
Hide their diminish'd heads, to thee I call,
But with no friendly voice, and add thy name,
O Sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams,
That bring to my remembrance from what state
I fell, how glorious once above thy sphere.

We cannot leave Milton, without pointing out other pasfages that are as fublime as those we have already quoted: for fuch are his undrawn chariots that inove by inftinct; his everlafting gates of heaven, that felf-open'd wide on golden hinges moving; and the Meffiah attended by angels, looking down into Chaos, calming its confufion, and drawing the first out-lines of the creation; which is thus happily defcribed.

On heav'nly ground they stood, and from the fhore
They view'd the vast immeasurable abyss,
Outrageous as a sea, dark, wasteful, wild,
Up from the bottom turn'd by furious winds
And furging waves, as mountains to affault
Heav'n's height, and with the centre mix the pole.
Silence ye troubled waves, and thou deep, peace,
Said then th' omnific word, your difcord end:
Nor ftaid, but on the wings of cherubim
Up-lifted, in paternal glory rode

Far into Chaos, and the world unborn;
For Chaos heard his voice: him all his train
Followed in bright proceffion to behold
Creation, and the wonders of his might.
Then ftaid the fervid wheels, and in his hand
He took the golden compaffes, prepar'd
In God's eternal store, to circumfcribe