ELEMENTS
OF
CRITICISM.

In THREE VOLUMES.
VOLUME II.
EDINBURGH:
Printed for A. Millar, London;
AND
A. Kincaid & J. Bell, Edinburgh,
MDCCLXII.

CONTENTS.

Vol.Pag.
Introduction,11
Ch.1.Perceptions and ideas in a train,121
Ch.2.Emotions and passions,142
Ch.3.Beauty,1241
Ch.4.Grandeur and sublimity,1264
Ch.5.Motion and force,1309
Ch.6.Novelty, and the unexpected appearance of objects,1319
Ch.7.Risible objects,1337
Ch.8.Resemblance and contrast,1345
Ch.9.Uniformity and variety,1380
Ch.[10][Congruity and propriety,]2[2]
Ch.[11][Dignity and meanness,]2[27]
Ch.[12][Ridicule,]2[40]
Ch.[13][Wit,]2[58]
Ch.[14][Custom and habit,]2[80]
Ch.[15][External signs of emotions and passions,]2[116]
Ch.[16][Sentiments,]2[149]
Ch.[17][Language of passion,]2[204]
Ch.[18][Beauty of language,]2[234]
Ch.19Comparisons,33
Ch.20Figures,353
Ch.21Narration and description,3169
Ch.22Epic and dramatic compositions,3218
Ch.23The three unities,3259
Ch.24Gardening and architecture,3294
Ch.25Standard of taste,3351
Appendix,3375
[Index to volume II.]

CHAP. X.

Congruity and Propriety.

MAn is distinguished from the brute creation, not more remarkably by the superiority of his rational faculties, than by the greater delicacy of his perceptions and feelings. With respect to the gross pleasures of sense, man probably has little superiority over other animals. Some obscure perception of beauty may also fall to their share. But they are probably not acquainted with the more delicate conceptions of regularity, order, uniformity, or congruity. Such refined conceptions, being connected with morality and religion, are reserved to dignify the chief of the terrestrial creation. Upon this account, no discipline is more suitable to man, or more congruous to the dignity of his nature, than that by which his taste is refined, to distinguish in every subject, what is regular, what is orderly, what is suitable, and what is fit and proper[1].

No discerning person can be at a loss about the meaning of the terms congruity and propriety, when applied to dress, behaviour, or language; that a decent garb, for example, is proper for a judge, modest behaviour for a young woman, and a lofty style for an epic poem. In the following examples every one is sensible of an unsuitableness or incongruity: a little woman sunk in an overgrown farthingale, a coat richly embroidered covering coarse and dirty linen, a mean subject in an elevated style, or an elevated subject in a mean style, a first minister darning his wife’s stocking, or a reverend prelate in lawn sleeves dancing a hornpipe.

But it is not sufficient that these terms be understood in practice; the critical art requires, that their meaning be traced to its foundation in human nature. The relations that connect objects together, have been examined in more than one view. Their influence in directing the train of our perceptions, is handled in the first chapter; and in the second, their influence in generating passion. Here they must be handled in a new view; for they are clearly the occasion of congruity and propriety. We are so framed by nature, as to require a certain suitableness or correspondence among things connected by any relation. This suitableness or correspondence is termed congruity or propriety; and the want of it, incongruity or impropriety. Among the many principles that compose the nature of man, a sense of congruity or propriety is one. Destitute of this sense, we could have no notion of congruity or propriety: the terms to us would be unintelligible[2].

As this sense is displayed upon relations, it is reasonable beforehand to expect, that we should be so formed, as to require among connected objects a degree of congruity proportioned to the degree of the relation. And upon examination we find this to hold in fact. Where the relation is strong and intimate as betwixt a cause and its effect, a body and its members, we require that the things be suited to each other in the strictest manner. On the other hand, where the relation is slight, or accidental, as among things jumbled together in the same place, we demand little or no congruity. The strictest propriety is required in behaviour and manner of living; because a man is connected with these by the relation of cause and effect. The situation of a great house ought to be lofty; for the relation betwixt an edifice and the ground it stands upon, is of the most intimate kind. Its relation to neighbouring hills, rivers, plains, being that of propinquity only, demands but a small share of congruity. Among members of the same club, the congruity ought to be considerable, as well as among things placed for show in the same niche. Among passengers in a stage-coach, we require very little congruity; and less still at a public spectacle.

Congruity is so nearly allied to beauty, as commonly to be held a species of it. And yet they differ so essentially, as never to coincide. Beauty, like colour, is placed upon a single subject; congruity upon a plurality. Further, a thing beautiful in itself, may, with relation to other things, produce the strongest sense of incongruity.

Congruity and propriety are commonly reckoned synonymous terms; and hitherto in opening the subject they are used indifferently. But they are distinguishable; and the precise meaning of each must be ascertained. Congruity is the genus, of which propriety is a species. For we call nothing propriety, but that congruity or suitableness which ought to subsist betwixt sensible beings and their thoughts, words, and actions.

In order to give a full view of this subject, I shall trace it through some of the most considerable relations. The relation of a part to the whole, being extremely intimate, demands the utmost degree of congruity. For that reason, the slightest deviation is disgustful. Every one must be sensible of a gross incongruity in the Lutrin, a burlesque poem, being closed with a serious and warm panegyric on Lamoignon, one of the King’s judges:

—————— Amphora cœpit
Institui; currente rota, cur urceus exit?

No relation affords more examples of congruity and incongruity, than that betwixt a subject and its ornaments. A literary performance intended merely for amusement, is susceptible of much ornament, as well as a music-room or a play-house. In gaiety, the mind hath a peculiar relish for show and decoration. The most gorgeous apparel, however unsuitable to an actor in a regular tragedy, disgusts not at an opera. The truth is, an opera, in its present form, is a mighty fine thing; but as it deviates from nature in its capital circumstances, we look not for any thing natural in those which are accessory. On the other hand, a serious and important subject, admits not much ornament[3]: nor a subject that of itself is extremely beautiful. And a subject that fills the mind with its loftiness and grandeur, appears best in a dress altogether plain.

To a person of a mean appearance, gorgeous apparel is unsuitable: which, beside the incongruity, has a bad effect; for by contrast it shows the meanness of appearance in the strongest light. Sweetness of look and manner, requires simplicity of dress joined with the greatest elegance. A stately and majestic air requires sumptuous apparel, which ought not to be gaudy, or crowded with little ornaments. A woman of consummate beauty can bear to be highly adorned, and yet shows best in a plain dress:

——————For loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is when unadorn’d, adorn’d the most.
Thomson’s Autumn, 208.

In judging of the propriety of ornament, we must attend, not only to the nature of the subject that is to be adorned, but also to the circumstances in which it is placed. The ornaments that are proper for a ball, will appear not altogether so decent at public worship; and the same person ought to dress differently for a marriage-feast and for a burial.

Nothing is more intimately related to a man, than his sentiments, words, and actions; and therefore we require here the strictest conformity. When we find what we thus require, we have a lively sense of propriety: when we find the contrary, our sense of impropriety is not less lively. Hence the universal distaste of affectation, which consists in making a shew of greater delicacy and refinement than is suited either to the character or circumstances of the person. Nothing hath a worse effect in a story than impropriety of manners. In Corneille’s tragedy of Cinna, Æmilia, a favourite of Augustus, receives daily marks of his affection, and is loaded with benefits; yet all the while is laying plots to assassinate her benefactor, directed by no other motive but to avenge her father’s death[4]. Revenge against a benefactor founded solely upon filial piety, will never suggest unlawful means; because it can never exceed the bounds of justice. And yet the crime here attempted, murder under trust reposed, is what even a miscreant will scarce attempt against his bitterest enemy.

What is said may be thought sufficient to explain the qualities of congruity and propriety. But the subject is not exhausted. On the contrary, the prospect enlarges upon us, when we take under view the effects these qualities produce in the mind. Congruity and propriety, where-ever perceived, appear agreeable; and every agreeable object produceth in the mind a pleasant emotion. Incongruity and impropriety, on the other hand, are disagreeable; and consequently produce painful emotions. An emotion of this kind sometimes vanisheth without any consequence; but more frequently is the occasion of other emotions. When any slight incongruity is perceived in an accidental combination of persons or things, as of passengers in a stage-coach or of individuals dining at an ordinary, the emotion of incongruity, after a momentary existence, vanisheth without producing any effect. But this is not the case of propriety and impropriety. Voluntary acts, whether words or deeds, are imputed to the author: when proper, we reward him with our esteem: when improper, we punish him with our contempt. Let us suppose, for example, an heroic action suitable to the character of the author, which raises in him and in every spectator the pleasant emotion of propriety. This emotion generates in the author both self-esteem and joy; the former when he considers his relation to the action, and the latter when he considers the good opinion that others will entertain of him. The same emotion of propriety, produceth in the spectators, esteem for the author of the action: and when they think of themselves, it also produceth, by means of contrast, an emotion of humility. To discover the effects of an unsuitable action, we must invert each of these circumstances. The painful emotion of impropriety, generates in the author of the action both humility and shame; the former when he considers his relation to the action, and the latter when he considers what others will think of him. The same emotion of impropriety, produceth in the spectators, contempt for the author of the action; and it also produceth, by means of contrast when they think of themselves, an emotion of self-esteem. Here then are many different emotions, derived from the same action considered in different views by different persons; a machine provided with many springs, and not a little complicated. Propriety of action, it would seem, is a chief favourite of nature, or of the author of nature, when such care and solicitude is bestowed upon it. It is not left to our own choice; but, like justice, is required at our hands; and, like justice, inforced by natural rewards and punishments. A man cannot, with impunity, do any thing unbecoming or improper. He suffers the chastisement of contempt inflicted by others, and of shame inflicted by himself. An apparatus so complicated and so singular, ought to rouse our attention. Nature doth nothing in vain; and we may conclude with great certainty, that this curious branch of the human constitution is intended for some valuable purpose. To the discovery of this purpose I shall with ardor apply my thoughts, after discoursing a little more at large upon the punishment, for I may now call it so, that Nature hath provided for indecent or unbecoming behaviour. This, at any rate, is necessary, in order to give a full view of the subject; and who knows whether it may not, over and above, open some track that will lead us to what we are in quest of?

A gross impropriety is punished with contempt and indignation, which are vented against the offender by every external expression that can gratify these passions. And even the slightest impropriety raises some degree of contempt. But there are improprieties, generally of the slighter kind, that provoke laughter; of which we have examples without end in the blunders and absurdities of our own species. Such improprieties receive a different punishment, as will appear by what follows. The emotions of contempt and of laughter occasioned by an impropriety of this kind, uniting intimately in the mind of the spectator, are expressed externally by a peculiar sort of laugh, termed a laugh of derision or scorn[5]. An impropriety that thus moves not only contempt but laughter, is distinguished by the epithet of ridiculous; and a laugh of derision or scorn is the punishment provided for it by nature. Nor ought it to escape observation, that we are so fond of inflicting this punishment, as sometimes to exert it even against creatures of an inferior species; witness a Turkycock swelling with pride, and strutting with displayed feathers. This object appears ridiculous, and in a gay mood is apt to provoke a laugh of derision.

We must not expect that the improprieties to which these different punishments are adapted, can be separated by any precise boundaries. Of improprieties, from the slightest to the most gross, from the most risible to the most serious, a scale may be formed ascending by degrees almost imperceptible. Hence it is, that in viewing some unbecoming actions, too risible for anger and too serious for derision, the spectator feels a sort of mixt emotion partaking both of derision and of anger. This accounts for an expression, common with respect to the impropriety of some actions, That we know not whether to laugh or be angry.

It cannot fail to be observed, that in the case of a risible impropriety, which is always slight, the contempt we have for the offender is extremely faint, though derision, its gratification, is extremely pleasant. This disproportion betwixt a passion and its gratification, seems not conformable to the analogy of nature. In looking about for a solution, I reflect upon what is laid down above, that an improper action, not only moves our contempt for the author, but also, by means of contrast, swells the good opinion we have of ourselves. This contributes, more than any other article, to the pleasure we feel in ridiculing the follies and absurdities of others. And accordingly, it is well known, that they who put the greatest value upon themselves, are the most prone to laugh at others. Pride is a vivid passion, as all are which have self for their object. It is extremely pleasant in itself, and not less so in its gratification. This passion singly would be sufficient to account for the pleasure of ridicule, without borrowing any aid from contempt. Hence appears the reason of a noted observation, That we are the most disposed to ridicule the blunders and absurdities of others, when we are in high spirits; for in high spirits, self-conceit displays itself with more than ordinary vigor.

Having with wary steps traced an intricate road, not without danger of wandering; what remains to complete our journey, is to account for the final cause of congruity and propriety, which make so great a figure in the human constitution. One final cause, regarding congruity, is pretty obvious. The sense of congruity, as one of the principles of the fine arts, contributes in a remarkable degree to our entertainment. This is the final cause assigned above for our sense of proportion[6], and need not be enlarged upon here. Congruity indeed with respect to quantity, coincides with proportion. When the parts of a building are nicely adjusted to each other, it may be said indifferently, that it is agreeable by the congruity of its parts, or by the proportion of its parts. But propriety, which regards voluntary agents only, can never in any instance be the same with proportion. A very long nose is disproportioned, but cannot be termed improper. In some instances, it is true, impropriety coincides with disproportion in the same subject, but never in the same respect. I give for an example a very little man buckled to a long toledo. Considering the man and the sword with respect to size, we perceive a disproportion. Considering the sword as the choice of the man, we perceive an impropriety.

The sense of impropriety with respect to mistakes, blunders, and absurdities, is happily contrived for the good of mankind. In the spectators it is productive of mirth and laughter, excellent recreation in an interval from business. The benefit is still more extensive. It is not agreeable to be the subject of ridicule; and to punish with ridicule the man who is guilty of an absurdity, tends to put him more upon his guard in time coming. Thus even the most innocent blunder is not committed with impunity; because, were errors licensed where they do no hurt, inattention would grow into a habit, and be the occasion of much hurt.

The final cause of propriety as to moral duties, is of all the most illustrious. To have a just notion of it, the two sorts of moral duties must be kept in view, viz. those that respect others, and those that respect ourselves. Fidelity, gratitude, and the forbearing injury, are examples of the first sort; temperance, modesty, firmness of mind, are examples of the other. The former are made duties by means of the moral sense; the latter, by means of the sense of propriety. Here is a final cause of the sense of propriety, that must rouse our attention. It is undoubtedly the interest of every man, to regulate his behaviour suitably to the dignity of his nature, and to the station allotted him by Providence. Such rational conduct contributes in every respect to happiness: it contributes to health and plenty: it gains the esteem of others: and, which is of all the greatest blessing, it gains a justly-founded self-esteem. But in a matter so essential to our well-being, even self-interest is not relied on. The sense of propriety superadds the powerful authority of duty to the motive of interest. The God of nature, in all things essential to our happiness, hath observed one uniform method. To keep us steady in our conduct, he hath fortified us with natural principles and feelings. These prevent many aberrations, which would daily happen were we totally surrendered to so fallible a guide as is human reason. The sense of propriety cannot justly be considered in another light, than as the natural law that regulates our conduct with respect to ourselves; as the sense of justice is the natural law that regulates our conduct with respect to others. I call the sense of propriety a law, because it really is so, not less than the sense of justice. If by law be meant a rule of conduct that we are conscious ought to be obeyed, this definition, which I conceive to be strictly accurate, is applicable undoubtedly to both. The sense of propriety includes this consciousness; for to say an action is proper, is, in other words, to say, that it ought to be performed; and to say it is improper, is, in other words, to say, that it ought to be forborn. It is this very consciousness of ought and should included in the moral sense, that makes justice a law to us. This consciousness of duty, when applied to propriety, is perhaps not so vigorous or strong as when applied to justice: but the difference is in degree only, not in kind: and we ought, without hesitation or reluctance, to submit equally to the government of both.

But I have more to urge upon this head. It must, in the next place, be observed, that to the sense of propriety as well as of justice are annexed the sanctions of rewards and punishments; which evidently prove the one to be a law as well as the other. The satisfaction a man hath in doing his duty, joined with the esteem and good-will of others, is the reward that belongs to both equally. The punishments also, though not the same, are nearly allied; and differ in degree more than in quality. Disobedience to the law of justice, is punished with remorse; disobedience to the law of propriety, with shame, which is remorse in a lower degree. Every transgression of the law of justice raises indignation in the beholder; and so doth every flagrant transgression of the law of propriety. Slighter improprieties receive a milder punishment: they are always rebuked with some degree of contempt, and frequently with derision. In general, it is true, that the rewards and punishments annexed to the sense of propriety are slighter in degree than those annexed to the sense of justice. And that this is wisely ordered, will appear from considering, that to the well-being of society, duty to others is still more essential than duty to ourselves; for society could not subsist a moment, were individuals not protected from the headstrong and turbulent passions of their neighbours.

Reflecting coolly and carefully upon the subject under consideration, the constitution of man, admirable in all its parts, appears here in a fine light. The final cause now unfolded of the sense of propriety, must, to every discerning eye, appear delightful; and yet hitherto we have given but a partial view of it. The sense of propriety reaches another illustrious end; which is, to co-operate with the sense of justice in inforcing the performance of social duties. In fact, the sanctions visibly contrived to compel a man to be just to himself, are equally serviceable to compel him to be just to others. This will be evident from a single reflection, That an action, by being unjust, ceases not to be improper. An action never appears more eminently improper, than when it is unjust. It is obviously becoming and suitable to human nature, that each man do his duty to others; and accordingly every transgression of duty with respect to others, is at the same time a transgression of duty with respect to self. This is an undisguised truth without exaggeration; and it opens a new and delightful view in the moral landscape. The prospect is greatly enriched, by the multiplication of agreeable objects. It appears now, that nothing is overlooked, nothing left undone, that can possibly contribute to the enforcing social duty. For to all the sanctions that belong to it singly, are superadded the sanctions of self-duty. A familiar example shall suffice for illustration. An act of ingratitude considered in itself, is to the author disagreeable as well as to every spectator: considered by the author with relation to himself, it raises self-contempt: considered by him with relation to the world, it makes him ashamed. Again, considered by others, it raises their contempt and indignation against the author. These feelings are all of them occasioned by the impropriety of the action. When the action is considered as unjust, it occasions another set of feelings. In the author it produces remorse, and a dread of merited punishment; and in others, the benefactor chiefly, indignation and hatred directed upon the ungrateful person. Thus shame and remorse united in the ungrateful person, and indignation united with hatred in the hearts of others, are the punishments provided by nature for injustice. Stupid and insensible must he be in extreme, who, in a contrivance so exquisite, perceives not the hand of the Sovereign Architect.

CHAP. XI

Of Dignity and Meanness.

THese terms are applied to man in point of character, sentiment, and behaviour. We say, for example, of one man, that he hath a natural dignity in his air and manner; of another, that he makes a mean figure. There is a dignity in every action and sentiment of some persons: the actions and sentiments of others are mean and vulgar. With respect to the fine arts, some performances are said to be manly and suitable to the dignity of human nature: others are termed low, mean, trivial. Such expressions are common, though they have not always a precise meaning. With respect to the art of criticism, it must be a real acquisition to ascertain what these terms truly import; which possibly may enable us to rank every performance in the fine arts according to its dignity.

Inquiring first to what subjects the terms dignity and meanness are appropriated, we soon discover, that they are not applicable to any thing inanimate. The most magnificent palace ever built, may be lofty, may be grand, but it has no relation to dignity. The most diminutive shrub may be little, but it is not mean. These terms must belong to sensitive beings, probably to man only; which will be evident when we advance in the inquiry.

Of all objects, human actions produce in a spectator the greatest variety of feelings. They are in themselves grand or little: with respect to the author, they are proper or improper: with respect to those affected by them, just or unjust. And I must now add, that they are also distinguished by dignity and meanness. It may possibly be thought, that with respect to human actions, dignity coincides with grandeur, and meanness with littleness. But the difference will be evident upon reflecting, that we never attribute dignity to any action but what is virtuous, nor meanness to any but what in some degree is faulty. But an action may be grand without being virtuous, or little without being faulty. Every action of dignity creates respect and esteem for the author; and a mean action draws upon him contempt. A man is always admired for a grand action, but frequently is neither loved nor esteemed for it: neither is a man always contemned for a low or little action.

As it appears to me, dignity and meanness are founded on a natural principle not hitherto mentioned. Man is endued with a sense of the worth and excellence of his nature. He deems it to be more perfect than that of the other beings around him; and he feels that the perfection of his nature consists in virtue, particularly in virtue of the highest rank. To express this sense, the term dignity is appropriated. Further, to behave with dignity, and to refrain from all mean actions, is felt to be, not a virtue only, but a duty: it is a duty every man owes to himself. By acting in this manner, he attracts love and esteem. By acting meanly or below himself, he is disapproved and contemned.

According to the description here given of dignity and meanness, they will be found to be a species of propriety and impropriety. Many actions may be proper or improper, to which dignity or meanness cannot be applied. To eat when one is hungry is proper, but there is no dignity in this action. Revenge fairly taken, if against law, is improper, but it is not mean. But every action of dignity is also proper, and every mean action is also improper.

This sense of the dignity of human nature, reaches even our pleasures and amusements. If they enlarge the mind by raising grand or elevated emotions, or if they humanize the mind by exercising our sympathy, they are approved as suited to our nature: if they contract the mind by fixing it on trivial objects, they are contemned as low and mean. Hence in general, every occupation, whether of use or amusement, that corresponds to the dignity of man, obtains the epithet of manly; and every occupation below his nature, obtains the epithet of childish.

To those who study human nature, there is a point which has always appeared intricate. How comes it that generosity and courage are more valued and bestow more dignity, than good-nature, or even justice, though the latter contribute more than the former, to private as well as to public happiness? This question bluntly proposed, might puzzle a cunning philosopher; but by means of the foregoing observations will easily be solved. Human virtues, like other objects, obtain a rank in our estimation, not from their utility, which is a subject of reflection, but from the direct impression they make on us. Justice and good-nature are a sort of negative virtues, that make no figure unless when they are transgressed. Courage and generosity producing elevated emotions, enliven greatly the sense of a man’s dignity, both in himself and in others; and for that reason, courage and generosity are in higher regard than the other virtues mentioned. We describe them as grand and elevated, as of greater dignity, and more praise-worthy.

This leads us to examine more directly emotions and passions with respect to the present subject. And it will not be difficult to form a scale of them, beginning at the meanest, and ascending gradually to those of the highest rank and dignity. Pleasure felt as at the organ of sense, named corporeal pleasure, is perceived to be low; and when indulged to excess, beyond what nature demands, is perceived also to be mean. Persons therefore of any delicacy, dissemble the pleasure they have in eating and drinking. The pleasures of the eye and ear, which have no organic feeling[7], are free from any sense of meanness; and for that reason are indulged without any shame. They even arise to a certain degree of dignity, when their objects are grand or elevated. The same is the case of the sympathetic passions. They raise the character considerably, when their objects are of importance. A virtuous person behaving with fortitude and dignity under the most cruel misfortunes, makes a capital figure; and the sympathising spectator feels in himself the same dignity. Sympathetic distress at the same time never is mean: on the contrary, it is agreeable to the nature of a social being, and has the general approbation. The rank that love possesses in this scale, depends in a great measure on its object. It possesses a low place when founded on external properties merely; and is mean when bestowed upon a person of a rank much inferior without any extraordinary qualification. But when founded on the more elevated internal properties, it assumes a considerable degree of dignity. The same is the case of friendship. When gratitude is warm, it animates the mind; but it scarce rises to dignity. Joy bestows dignity when it proceeds from an elevated cause.

So far as I can gather from induction, dignity is not a property of any disagreeable passion. One is slight another severe, one depresses the mind another rouses and animates it; but there is no elevation, far less dignity, in any of them. Revenge, in particular, though it inflame and swell the mind, is not accompanied with dignity, not even with elevation. It is not however felt as mean or groveling, unless when it takes indirect measures for its gratification. Shame and remorse, though they sink the spirits, are not mean. Pride, a disagreeable passion, bestows no dignity in the eye of a spectator. Vanity always appears mean; and extremely so where founded, as commonly happens, on trivial qualifications.

I proceed to the pleasures of the understanding, which possess a high rank in point of dignity. Of this every one will be sensible, when he considers the important truths that have been laid open by science; such as general theorems, and the general laws that govern the material and moral worlds. The pleasures of the understanding are suited to man as a rational and contemplative being; and they tend not a little to ennoble his nature. Even to the Deity he stretches his contemplations, which, in the discovery of infinite power wisdom and benevolence, afford delight of the most exalted kind. Hence it appears, that the fine arts studied as a rational science, afford entertainment of great dignity; superior far to what they afford as a subject of taste merely.

But contemplation, though in itself valuable, is chiefly respected as subservient to action; for man is intended to be more an active than a contemplative being. He accordingly shows more dignity in action than in contemplation. Generosity, magnanimity, heroism, raise his character to the highest pitch. These best express the dignity of his nature, and advance him nearer to divinity than any other of his attributes.

By every production that shows art and contrivance, our curiosity is excited upon two points; first how it was made, and next to what end. Of the two, the latter is the more important inquiry, because the means are ever subordinate to the end; and in fact our curiosity is always more inflamed by the final than by the efficient cause. This preference is no where more visible, than in contemplating the works of nature. If in the efficient cause, wisdom and power be displayed, wisdom is not less conspicuous in the final cause; and from it only can we infer benevolence, which of all the divine attributes is to man the most important. Having endeavoured to assign the efficient cause of dignity and meanness, and to unfold the principle on which they are founded, we proceed to explain the final cause of the dignity or meanness bestowed upon the several particulars above mentioned, beginning with corporeal pleasures. These, so far as useful, are like justice fenced with sufficient sanctions to prevent their being neglected. Hunger and thirst are painful sensations; and we are incited to animal love by a vigorous propensity. Were they dignified over and above with a place in a high class, they would infallibly overturn the balance of the mind, by outweighing the social affections. This is a satisfactory final cause for refusing to corporeal pleasures any degree of dignity. And the final cause is not less evident of their meanness, when they are indulged to excess. The more refined pleasures of external sense, conveyed by the eye and the ear from natural objects and from the fine arts, deserve a high place in our esteem, because of their singular and extensive utility. In some cases they arise to a considerable dignity. The very lowest pleasures of the kind, are never esteemed mean or groveling. The pleasure arising from wit, humour, ridicule, or from what is simply ludicrous, is useful, by relaxing the mind after the fatigue of more manly occupation. But the mind, when it surrenders itself to pleasure of this kind, loses its vigor, and sinks gradually into sloth. The place this pleasure occupies in point of dignity, is adjusted to these views. To make it useful as a relaxation, it is not branded with meanness. To prevent its usurpation, it is removed from this place but a single degree. No man values himself upon this pleasure, even during the gratification; and if more time have been given to it than is requisite for relaxation, a man looks back with some degree of shame.

In point of dignity, the social passions rise above the selfish, and much above the pleasures of the eye and ear. Man is by his nature a social being; and to qualify him for society, it is wisely contrived, that he should value himself more for being social than selfish.

The excellency of man is chiefly discernible in the great improvements he is susceptible of in society. These, by perseverance, may be carried on progressively to higher and higher degrees of perfection, above any assignable limits; and, even abstracting from revelation, there is great probability, that the progress begun in this life will be completed in some future state. Now, as all valuable improvements proceed from the exercise of our rational faculties, the author of our nature, in order to excite us to a due use of these faculties, hath assigned a high rank to the pleasures of the understanding. Their utility, with respect to this life as well as a future, intitles them to this rank.

But as action is the end of all our improvements, virtuous actions justly possess the highest of all the ranks. These, I find, are by nature distributed into different classes, and the first in point of dignity assigned to actions which appear not the first in point of use. Generosity, for example, in the sense of mankind, is more respected than justice, though the latter is undoubtedly more essential to society. And magnanimity, heroism, undaunted courage, rise still higher in our esteem. One would readily think, that the moral virtues should be esteemed according to their importance. Nature has here deviated from her ordinary path, and great wisdom is shown in the deviation. The efficient cause is explained above; and the final cause is explained in the Essays of morality and natural religion[8].

CHAP. XII.

RIDICULE.

THis subject has puzzled and vexed all the critics. Aristotle gives a definition of ridicule, obscure and imperfect[9]. Cicero handles it at great length[10]; but without giving any satisfaction. He wanders in the dark, and misses the distinction betwixt risible and ridiculous. Quintilian is sensible of this distinction[11]; but has not attempted to explain it. Luckily this subject lies no longer in obscurity. A risible object produceth an emotion of laughter merely[12]. A ridiculous object is improper as well as risible; and produceth a mixt emotion, which is vented by a laugh of derision or scorn[13].

Having therefore happily unravelled the abstruse and knotty part, I proceed to what may be thought further necessary upon this subject.

Burlesque is one great engine of ridicule. But it is not confined to that subject; for it is clearly distinguishable into burlesque that excites laughter merely, and burlesque that provokes derision or ridicule. A grave subject in which there is no impropriety, may be brought down by a certain colouring so as to be risible. This is the case of Virgil Travestie[14]. And it is the case of the Secchia Rapita[15]. The authors laugh first at every turn, in order to make their readers laugh. The Lutrin is a burlesque poem of the other sort. The author Boileau, lays hold of a low and trifling incident to expose the luxury, indolence, and contentious spirit of a set of monks. He turns the subject into ridicule by dressing it in the heroic style, and affecting to consider it as of the utmost dignity and importance; and though ridicule is the poet’s aim, he himself carries all along a grave face, and never once bewrays a smile. The opposition betwixt the subject and the manner of handling it, is what produces the ridicule. In a composition of this kind, no image professedly ludicrous ought to have quarter; because such images destroy the contrast.

Though the burlesque that aims at ridicule, produces its effect by elevating the style far above the subject, yet it has limits beyond which the elevation ought not to be carried. The poet, consulting the imagination of his readers, ought to confine himself to such images as are lively and readily apprehended. A strained elevation, soaring above an ordinary reach of fancy, makes not a pleasant impression. The mind fatigued with being always upon the stretch, is soon disgusted; and if it perseveres, becomes thoughtless and indifferent. Further, a fiction gives no pleasure, unless where painted in so lively colours as to produce some perception of reality; which never can be done effectually where the images are formed with labour or difficulty. For these reasons, I cannot avoid condemning the Batrachomuomachia said to be the composition of Homer. It is beyond the power of imagination, to form a clear and lively image of frogs and mice acting with the dignity of the highest of our species: nor can we form a conception of the reality of such an action, in any manner so distinct as to interest our affections even in the slightest degree.

The Rape of the Lock is of a character clearly distinguishable from those now mentioned. It is not properly a burlesque performance, but what may rather be termed an heroi-comical poem. It treats a gay and familiar subject, with pleasantry and with a moderate degree of dignity. The author puts not on a mask like Boileau, nor professes to make us laugh like Tassoni. The Rape of the Lock is a genteel and gay species of writing, less strained than the others mentioned; and is pleasant or ludicrous without having ridicule for its chief aim; giving way however to ridicule where it arises naturally from a particular character, such as that of Sir Plume. Addison’s Spectator upon the exercise of the fan[16] is extremely gay and ludicrous, resembling in its subject the Rape of the Lock.

Humour belongs to the present chapter, because it is undoubtedly connected with ridicule. Congreve defines humour to be “a singular and unavoidable manner of doing or saying any thing, peculiar and natural to one man only, by which his speech and actions are distinguished from those of other men.” Were this definition just, a majestic and commanding air, which is a singular property, is humour; as also that natural flow of eloquence and correct elocution which is a rare talent. Nothing just or proper is denominated humour; nor any singularity of character, words, or actions, that is valued or respected. When we attend to the character of an humorist, we find that the peculiarity of this character lessens the man in our esteem: we find that this character arises from circumstances both risible and improper, and therefore in some measure ridiculous.

Humour in writing is very different from humour in character. When an author insists upon ludicrous subjects with a professed purpose to make his readers laugh, he may be styled a ludicrous writer; but is scarce intitled to be styled a writer of humour. This quality belongs to an author, who, affecting to be grave and serious, paints his objects in such colours as to provoke mirth and laughter. A writer that is really an humorist in character, does this without design. If not, he must affect the character in order to succeed. Swift and Fontaine were humorists in character, and their writings are full of humour. Addison was not an humorist in character; and yet in his prose writings a most delicate and refined humour prevails. Arbuthnot exceeds them all in drollery and humorous painting; which shows a great genius, because, if I am not misinformed, he had nothing of this peculiarity in his character.

There remains to show, by examples, the manner of treating subjects so as to give them a ridiculous appearance.

Il ne dit jamais, je vous donne, mais, je vous
prete le bon jour.
Moliere.

Orleans. I know him to be valiant.

Constable. I was told that by one that knows him better than you.

Orleans. What’s he?

Constable. Marry, he told me so himself; and he said, he car’d not who knew it.

Henry V. Shakespear.

He never broke any man’s head but his own, and
that was against a post when he was drunk.
Ibid.

Millament. Sententious Mirabell! pr’ythee don’t look with that violent and inflexible wise face, like Solomon at the dividing of the child in an old tapestry hanging.

Way of the world.

A true critic in the perusal of a book, is like a dog at a feast, whose thoughts and stomach are wholly set upon what the guests fling away, and consequently is apt to snarl most when there are the fewest bones.

Tale of a Tub.

In the following instances the ridicule is made to appear from the behaviour of the persons introduced.

Mascarille. Te souvient-il, vicomte, de cette demi-lune, que nous emportâmes sur les ennemis au siege d’Arras?

Jedelet. Que veux tu dire avec ta demi-lune? c’etoit bien une lune toute entiere.

Moliere les Precieuses Ridicules, sc. 11.

Slender. I came yonder at Eaton to marry Mrs. Anne Page; and she’s a great lubberly boy.

Page. Upon my life then you took the wrong.

Slender. What need you tell me that? I think so, when I took a boy for a girl: if I had been marry’d to him, for all he was in woman’s apparel, I would not have had him.

Merry Wives of Windsor.

Valentine. Your blessing, Sir.

Sir Sampson. You’ve had it already, Sir: I think I sent it you to-day in a bill for four thousand pound; a great deal of money, Brother Foresight.

Foresight. Ay indeed, Sir Sampson, a great deal of money for a young man; I wonder what can he do with it.

Love for Love, act 2. sc. 7.

Millamant. I nauseate walking; ’tis a country-diversion; I lothe the country, and every thing that relates to it.

Sir Wilful. Indeed! hah! look ye, look ye, you do? nay, ’tis like you may—— here are choice of pastimes here in town, as plays and the like; that must be confess’d indeed.

Millamant. Ah l’etourdie! I hate the town too.

Sir Wilful. Dear heart, that’s much—— hah! that you should hate ’em both! hah! ’tis like you may; there are some can’t relish the town, and others can’t away with the country—— ’tis like you may be one of those, Cousine.

Way of the world, act 4. sc. 4.

Lord Froth. I assure you, Sir Paul, I laugh at no body’s jest but my own, or a lady’s: I assure you, Sir Paul.

Brisk. How? how, my Lord? what, affront my wit! Let me perish, do I never say any thing worthy to be laugh’d at?

Lord Froth. O foy, don’t misapprehend me, I don’t say so, for I often smile at your conceptions. But there is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality, than to laugh; ’tis such a vulgar expression of the passion! every body can laugh. Then especially to laugh at the jest of an inferior person, or when any body else of the same quality does not laugh with one; ridiculous! To be pleas’d with what pleases the crowd! Now, when I laugh I always laugh alone.

Double Dealer, act 1. sc. 4.

So sharp-sighted is pride in blemishes, and so willing to be gratified, that it will take up with the very slightest improprieties; such as a blunder by a foreigner in speaking our language, especially if the blunder can bear a sense that reflects upon the speaker:

Quickly. The young man is an honest man.

Caius. What shall de honest man do in my closet? dere is no honest man dat shall come in my closet.

Merry Wives of Windsor.

Love-speeches are finely ridiculed in the following passage.

Quoth he, My faith as adamantine,
As chains of destiny, I’ll maintain;
True as Apollo ever spoke,
Or oracle from heart of oak;
And if you’ll give my flame but vent,
Now in close hugger-mugger pent,
And shine upon me but benignly,
With that one, and that other pigsneye,
The sun and day shall sooner part,
Than love, or you, shake off my heart;
The sun that shall no more dispense
His own, but your bright influence:
I’ll carve your name on barks of trees,
With true love knots, and flourishes;
That shall infuse eternal spring,
And everlasting flourishing:
Drink ev’ry letter on’t in stum,
And make it brisk champaign become.
Where-e’er you tread, your foot shall set
The primrose and the violet;
All spices, perfumes, and sweet powders,
Shall borrow from your breath their odours;
Nature her charter shall renew
And take all lives of things from you;
The world depend upon your eye,
And when you frown upon it, die.
Only our loves shall still survive,
New worlds and natures to outlive;
And, like to herald’s moons, remain
All crescents, without change or wane.
Hudibras, part 2. canto 1.

Irony turns things into ridicule in a peculiar manner. It consists in laughing at a man under disguise, by appearing to praise or speak well of him. Swift affords us many illustrious examples of this species of ridicule. Take the following example. “By these methods, in a few weeks, there starts up many a writer, capable of managing the profoundest and most universal subjects. For what though his head be empty, provided his commonplace book be full? And if you will bate him but the circumstances of method, and style, and grammar, and invention; allow him but the common privileges of transcribing from others, and digressing from himself, as often as he shall see occasion; he will desire no more ingredients towards fitting up a treatise that shall make a very comely figure on a bookseller’s shelf, there to be preserved neat and clean, for a long eternity, adorned with the heraldry of its title, fairly inscribed on a label; never to be thumbed or greased by students, nor bound to everlasting chains of darkness in a library; but when the fullness of time is come, shall happily undergo the trial of purgatory, in order to ascend the sky[17].” The following passage from Arbuthnot is not less ironical. “If the Reverend clergy showed more concern than others, I charitably impute it to their great charge of souls; and what confirmed me in this opinion was, that the degrees of apprehension and terror could be distinguished to be greater or less, according to their ranks and degrees in the church[18].”

A parody must be distinguished from every species of ridicule. It enlivens a gay subject by imitating some important incident that is serious. It is ludicrous, and may be risible. But ridicule is not a necessary ingredient. Take the following examples, the first of which refers to an expression of Moses.

The skilful nymph reviews her force with care:
Let spades be trumps! she said, and trumps they were.
Rape of the Lock, canto iii. 45.

The next is an imitation of Achilles’s oath in Homer.

But by this lock, this sacred lock, I swear,
(Which never more shall join its parted hair,
Which never more its honours shall renew,
Clip’d from the lovely head where late it grew),
That while my nostrils draw the vital air,
This hand, which won it, shall for ever wear.
He spoke, and speaking, in proud triumph spread
The long contended honours of her head.
Ibid. canto iv. 133.

The following imitates the history of Agamemnon’s sceptre in Homer.

Now meet thy fate, incens’d Belinda cry’d,
And drew a deadly bodkin from her side,
(The same, his ancient personage to deck,
Her great-great-grandsire wore about his neck,
In three seal rings; which after, melted down,
Form’d a vast buckle for his widow’s gown:
Her infant grandame’s whistle next it grew,
The bells she jingled, and the whistle blew;
Then in a bodkin grac’d her mother’s hairs,
Which long she wore, and now Belinda wears.)
Ibid. canto v. 87.

Ridicule, as observed above, is no necessary ingredient in a parody. But I did not intend to say, that there is any opposition betwixt them. A parody, no doubt, may be successfully employed to promote ridicule; witness the following example, in which the goddess of Dullness is addressed upon the subject of modern education.

Thou gav’st that ripeness, which so soon began,
And ceas’d so soon, he ne’er was boy nor man;
Through school and college, thy kind cloud o’ercast,
Safe and unseen the young Æneas past[19];
Thence bursting glorious, all at once let down,
Stunn’d with his giddy larum half the town.
Dunciad, b. iv. 287.

The interposition of the gods in the manner of Homer and Virgil, ought to be confined to ludicrous subjects, which are much enlivened by such interposition handled in the form of a parody; witness the cave of Spleen, Rape of the Lock, canto 4.; the goddess of Discord; Lutrin, canto 1.; and the goddess of Indolence, canto 2.

Those who have a talent for ridicule, which is seldom united with a taste for delicate and refined beauties, are quick-sighted in improprieties; and these they eagerly lay hold of, in order to gratify their favourite propensity. The persons galled have no other refuge but to maintain, that ridicule ought not to be applied to grave subjects. It is yielded, on the other hand, that subjects really grave and important, are by no means fit for ridicule: but then it is urged, that ridicule is the only proper test for discovering whether a subject be really grave, or be made so artificially by custom and fashion. This dispute has produced a celebrated question, Whether ridicule be or be not a test of truth? I give this question a place here, because it tends to illustrate the nature of ridicule.

The question stated in accurate terms is, Whether the sense of ridicule be the proper test for distinguishing ridiculous objects from those that are not so? To answer this question with precision, I must premise, that ridicule is not a subject of reasoning, but of sense or taste[20]. This being taken for granted, I proceed thus. No person doubts that our sense of beauty is the true test of what is beautiful, and our sense of grandeur, of what is great or sublime. Is it more doubtful whether our sense of ridicule be the true test of what is ridiculous? It is not only the true test, but indeed the only test. For this is a subject that comes not, more than beauty or grandeur, under the province of reason. If any subject, by the influence of fashion or custom, have acquired a degree of veneration or esteem to which naturally it is not intitled, what are the proper means for wiping off the artificial colouring, and displaying the subject in its true light? Reasoning, as observed, cannot be applied. And therefore the only means is to judge by taste. The test of ridicule which separates it from its artificial connections, exposes it naked with all its native improprieties.

But it is urged, that the gravest and most serious matters may be set in a ridiculous light. Hardly so; for where an object is neither risible nor improper, it lies not open in any quarter to an attack from ridicule. But supposing the fact, I foresee not any harmful consequence. By the same sort of reasoning, a talent for wit ought to be condemned, because it may be employed to burlesque a great or lofty subject. Such irregular use made of a talent for wit or ridicule, cannot long impose upon mankind. It cannot stand the test of correct and delicate taste; and truth will at last prevail even with the vulgar. To condemn a talent for ridicule because it may be perverted to wrong purposes, is not a little ridiculous. Could one forbear to smile, if a talent for reasoning were condemned because it also may be perverted? And yet the conclusion in the latter case, would be not less just than in the former; perhaps more just, for no talent is so often perverted as that of reason.

We had best leave Nature to her own operations. The most valuable talents may be abused, and so may that of ridicule. Let us bring it under proper culture if we can, without endeavouring to pull it up by the root. Were we destitute of this test of truth, I know not what might be the consequences: I see not what rule would be left us to prevent splendid trifles passing for matters of importance, show and form for substance, and superstition or enthusiasm for pure religion.

CHAP. XIII.

WIT.

WIt is a quality of certain thoughts and expressions. The term is never applied to an action or a passion, and as little to an external object.

However difficult it may be in every particular instance to distinguish a witty thought or expression from one that is not so, yet in general it may be laid down, that the term wit is appropriated to such thoughts and expressions as are ludicrous, and also occasion some degree of surprise by their singularity. Wit also in a figurative sense expresses that talent which some men have of inventing ludicrous thoughts or expressions. We say commonly, a witty man, or a man of wit.

Wit in its proper sense, as suggested above, is distinguishable into two kinds; wit in the thought, and wit in the words or expression. Again, wit in the thought is of two kinds; ludicrous images, and ludicrous combinations of things that have little or no natural relation.

Ludicrous images that occasion surprise by their singularity, as having little or no foundation in nature, are fabricated by the imagination. And the imagination is well qualified for the office; being of all our faculties the most active, and the least under restraint. Take the following example.

Shylock. You knew (none so well, none so well as you) of my daughter’s flight.

Salino. That’s certain; I, for my part, knew the tailor that made the wings she flew withal.

Merchant of Venice, act 3. sc. 1.

The image here is undoubtedly witty. It is ludicrous: and it must occasion surprise; for having no natural foundation, it is altogether unexpected.

The other branch of wit in the thought, is that only which is taken notice of by Addison, following Locke, who defines it “to lie in the assemblage of ideas; and putting those together with quickness and variety, wherein can be found any resemblance or congruity, thereby to make up pleasant pictures and agreeable visions in the fancy[21].” It may be defined more curtly, and perhaps more accurately, “A junction of things by distant and fanciful relations, which surprise because they are unexpected[22].” The following is a proper example.

We grant although he had much wit,
H’ was very shie of using it,
As being loth to wear it out;
And therefore bore it not about,
Unless on holidays, or so,
As men their best apparel do.
Hudibras, canto 1.

Wit is of all the most elegant recreation. The image enters the mind with gaiety, and gives a sudden flash which is extremely pleasant. Wit thereby gently elevates without straining, raises mirth without dissoluteness, and relaxes while it entertains.

Wit in the expression, commonly called a play of words, being a bastard sort of wit, is reserved for the last place. I proceed to examples of wit in the thought. And first of ludicrous images.

Falstaff, speaking of his taking Sir John Colevile of the Dale:

Here he is, and here I yield him; and I beseech your Grace, let it be book’d with the rest of this day’s deeds; or, by the Lord, I will have it in a particular ballad else, with mine own picture on the top of it, Colevile kissing my foot: to the which course if I be inforc’d, if you do not all shew like gilt twopences to me; and I, in the clear sky of fame, o’er-shine you as much as the full moon doth the cinders of the element, which shew like pins’ heads to her; believe not the word of the Noble. Therefore let me have right, and let desert mount.

Second part, Henry IV. act 4. sc. 6.

I knew, when seven justices could not take up a quarrel, but when the parties were met themselves, one of them thought but of an if; as, if you said so, then I said so; and they shook hands, and swore brothers. Your if is the only peacemaker; much virtue is in if.

Shakespear.

For there is not through all nature, another so callous and insensible a member as the world’s posteriors, whether you apply to it the toe or the birch.

Preface to a Tale of a tub.

The war hath introduced abundance of polysyllables, which will never be able to live many more campaigns. Speculations, operations, preliminaries, ambassadors, palisadoes, communication, circumvallation, battalions, as numerous as they are, if they attack us too frequently in our coffeehouses, we shall certainly put them to flight, and cut off the rear.

Tatler, Nº 230.

Speaking of Discord, “She never went abroad, but she brought home such a bundle of monstrous lies, as would have amazed any mortal, but such as knew her; of a whale that had swallowed a fleet of ships; of the lions being let out of the tower to destroy the Protestant religion; of the Pope’s being seen in a brandy-shop at Wapping,” &c.

History of John Bull, part. 1. ch. 16.

The other branch of wit in the thought, viz. ludicrous combinations and oppositions, may be traced through various ramifications. And, first, fanciful causes assigned that have no natural relation to the effects produced.

Lancaster. Fare you well, Falstaff; I, in my condition, Shall better speak of you than you deserve. [Exit.

Falstaff. I would you had but the wit; ’twere better than your dukedom. Good faith, this same young sober-blooded boy doth not love me; nor a man cannot make him laugh; but that’s no marvel, he drinks no wine. There’s never any of these demure boys come to any proof; for thin drink doth so over-cool their blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male green-sickness; and then, when they marry, they get wenches. They are generally fools and cowards; which some of us should be too, but for inflammation. A good sherris-sack hath a twofold operation in it; it ascends me into the brain; dries me there all the foolish, dull, and crudy vapours which environ it; makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes; which deliver’d o’er to the voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes excellent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris, is, the warming of the blood; which before cold and settled left the liver white and pale; which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice: but the sherris warms it, and makes it course from the inwards, to the parts extreme; it illuminateth the face, which, as a beacon, gives warning to all the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm; and then the vital commoners and inland petty spirits muster me all to their captain, the heart; who, great, and puff’d up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage: and this valour comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is nothing without sack, for that sets it a-work; and learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, till sack commences it, and sets it in act and use. Hereof comes it, that Prince Harry is valiant; for the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his father, he hath, like lean, steril, and bare land, manured, husbanded, and till’d, with excellent endeavour of drinking good and good store of fertil sherris, that he is become very hot and valiant. If I had a thousand sons, the first human principle I would teach them, should be to forswear thin potations, and to addict themselves to sack.

Second part of Henry IV. act. 4. sc. 7.

The trenchant blade, toledo trusty,
For want of fighting was grown rusty,
And ate into itself, for lack
Of some body to hew and hack.
The peaceful scabbard where it dwelt,
The rancor of its edge had felt:
For of the lower end two handful,
It had devoured, ’twas so manful;
And so much scorn’d to lurk in case,
As if it durst not shew its face.
Hudibras, canto 1.

Speaking of physicians,

Le bon de cette profession est, qu’il y a parmi les morts une honnêteté, une discretion la plus grande du monde; jamais on n’en voit se plaindre du médicin qui l’a tué.

Le medicin malgré lui.

Admirez les bontez, admirez les tendresses,
De ces vieux esclaves du sort.
Ils ne sont jamais las d’aquérir des richesses,
Pour ceux qui souhaitent leur mort.

Belinda. Lard, he has so pester’d me with flames and stuff—I think I shan’t endure the sight of a fire this twelvemonth.

Old Bachelor, act 2. sc. 8.

To account for effects by such fantastical causes, being highly ludicrous, is quite improper in any serious composition. Therefore the following passage from Cowley, in his poem on the death of Sir Henry Wooton, is in a bad taste.

He did the utmost bounds of Knowledge find,
He found them not so large as was his mind.
But, like the brave Pellæan youth, did moan,
Because that Art had no more worlds than one.
And when he saw that he through all had past,
He dy’d, lest he should idle grow at last.

Fanciful reasoning,

Falstaff. Imbowell’d!—— if thou imbowel me to-day, I’ll give you leave to powder me, and eat me to-morrow! ’Sblood, ’twas time to counterfeit, or that hot termagant Scot had paid me scot and lot too. Counterfeit? I lie, I am no counterfeit; to die is to be a counterfeit; for he is but the counterfeit of a man, who hath not the life of a man: but to counterfeit dying, when a man thereby liveth, is to be no counterfeit, but the true and perfect image of life, indeed.

First Part Henry IV. act 1. sc. 10.

Clown. And the more pity that great folk should have countenance in this world to drown or hang themselves, more than their even Christian.

Hamlet, Act 5. sc. 1.

Pedro. Will you have me, Lady?

Beatrice. No, my Lord, unless I might have another for working days. Your Grace is too costly to wear every day.

Much ado about nothing, act 2. sc. 5.

Jessica. I shall be saved by my husband; he hath made me a Christian.

Launcelot. Truly the more to blame he; we were Christians enough before, e’en as many as could well live by one another: this making of Christians will raise the price of hogs; if we grow all to be pork-eaters, we shall not have a rasher on the coals for money.

Merchant of Venice, act 3. sc. 6.

In western clime there is a town,
To those that dwell therein well known;
Therefore there needs no more be said here,
We unto them refer our reader:
For brevity is very good,
When w’ are, or are not understood.

Hudibras, canto 1.
But Hudibras gave him a twitch,
As quick as lightning, in the breech,
Just in the place where honour’s lodg’d,
As wise philosophers have judg’d;
Because a kick in that part, more
Hurts honour, than deep wounds before.
Ibid. canto 3.

Ludicrous junction of small things with great, as of equal importance.

This day black omens threat the brightest fair
That e’er deserv’d a watchful spirit’s care;
Some dire disaster, or by force, or flight;
But what, or where, the fates have wrapt in night:
Whether the nymph shall break Diana’s law;
Or some frail china jar receive a flaw;
Or stain her honour, or her new brocade;
Forget her pray’rs, or miss a masquerade;
Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball;
Or whether Heav’n has doom’d that Shock must fall.
Rape of the Lock, canto ii. 101.

One speaks the glory of the British Queen,
And one describes a charming Indian screen.

Ibid. canto iii. 13.
Then flash’d the living lightning from her eyes,
And screams of horror rend th’ affrighted skies.
Not louder shrieks to pitying heav’n are cast,
When husbands, or when lapdogs breathe their last;
Or when rich china vessels fall’n from high,
In glitt’ring dust, and painted fragments lie!
Ibid. canto iii. 155.

Not youthful kings in battle seiz’d alive,
Not scornful virgins who their charms survive,
Not ardent lovers robb’d of all their bliss,
Not ancient ladies when refus’d a kiss,
Not tyrants fierce that unrepenting die,
Not Cynthia when her manteau’s pinn’d awry,
E’er felt such rage, resentment, and despair,
As thou, sad virgin! for thy ravish’d hair.
Ibid. canto iv. 3.

Joining things that in appearance are opposite. As for example, where Sir Roger de Coverley, in the Spectator, speaking of his widow, “That he would have given her a coal-pit to have kept her in clean linen; and that her finger should have sparkled with one hundred of his richest acres.”

Premisses that promise much and perform nothing. Cicero upon this article says, “Sed scitis esse notissimum ridiculi genus, cum aliud expectamus, aliud dicitur: hic nobismetipsis noster error risum movet[23].”

Beatrice.—— With a good leg and a good foot, uncle, and money enough in his purse, such a man would win any woman in the world, if he could get her good-will.

Much ado about nothing, act 2. sc. 1.

Beatrice. I have a good eye, uncle, I can see a church by day-light.

ibid.

Le medecin que l’on m’indique
Sait le Latin, le Grec, l’Hebreu,
Les belles lettres, la physique,
La chimie et la botanique.
Chacun lui donne son aveu:
Il auroit aussi ma pratique;
Mais je veux vivre encore un peu.

Again,

Vingt fois le jour le bon Grégoire
A soin de fermer son armoire.
De quoi pensez vous qu’il a peur?
Belle demande! Qu’un voleur
Trouvant une facile proie,
Ne lui ravisse tout son bien.
Non; Gregoire a peur qu’on ne voie
Que dan son armoire il n’a rien.

Again,

L’athsmatique Damon a cru que l’air des champs
Repareroit en lui le ravage des ans,
Il s’est fait, a grands fraix, transporter en Bretagne.
Or voiez ce qu’a fait l’air natal qu’il a pris!
Damon seroit mort à Paris:
Damon est mort à la campagne.

Having discussed wit in the thought, we proceed to what is verbal only, commonly called a play of words. This sort of wit depends for the most part upon chusing words that have different significations. By this artifice, hocus-pocus tricks are played in language; and thoughts plain and simple take on a very different appearance. Play is necessary for man, in order to refresh him after labour; and accordingly man loves play. He even relisheth a play of words; and it is happy for us, that words can be employed, not only for useful purposes, but also for our amusement. This amusement accordingly, though humble and low, is relished by some at all times, and by all at some times, in order to unbend the mind.

It is remarkable, that this low species of wit, has, at one time or other, made a figure in most civilized nations, and has gradually gone into disrepute. So soon as a language is formed into a system, and the meaning of words are ascertained with tolerable accuracy, opportunity is afforded for expressions, which, by the double meaning of some words, give a familiar thought the appearance of being new. And the penetration of the reader or hearer, is gratified in detecting the true sense disguised under the double meaning. That this sort of wit was in England deemed a reputable amusement, during the reigns of Elisabeth and James I. is vouched by the works of Shakespear, and even by the writings of grave divines. But it cannot have any long endurance: for as language ripens, and the meaning of words is more and more ascertained, words held to be synonymous diminish daily; and when those that remain have been more than once employed, the pleasure vanisheth with the novelty.

I proceed to examples, which, as in the former case, shall be distributed into different classes.

A seeming resemblance from the double meaning of a word.

Beneath this stone my wife doth lie:
She’s now at rest, and so am I.

A seeming contrast from the same cause, termed a verbal antithesis, which hath no despicable effect in ludicrous subjects.

Whilst Iris his cosmetic wash would try
To make her bloom revive, and lovers die.
Some ask for charms, and others philters chuse,
To gain Corinna, and their quartans lose,
Dispensary, canto 2.

And how frail nymphs, oft by abortion, aim
To lose a substance, to preserve a name.
Ibid. canto 3.

Other seeming connections from the same cause.

Will you employ your conqu’ring sword,
To break a fiddle and your word.
Hudibras, canto 2.

To whom the knight with comely grace
Put off his hat to put his case.
Hudibras, Part 3. canto 3.

Here Britain’s statesmen oft the fall foredoom
Of foreign tyrants, and of nymphs at home;
Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey,
Does sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.
Rape of the Lock, canto 3. l. 5.

O’er their quietus where fat judges dose,
And lull their cough and conscience to repose.
Dispensary, canto 1.

Speaking of Prince Eugene. “This General is a great taker of snuff as well as of towns.”

Pope, Key to the Lock.

Exul mentisque domusque.
Metamorphoses, lib. ix. 409.

A seeming inconsistency from the same cause.

Hic quiescit qui nunquam quievit.

Again,

Quel âge a cette Iris, dont on fait tant de bruit?
Me demandoit Cliton n’aguere.
Il faut, dis-je, vous satisfaire,
Elle a vingt ans le jour, et cinquante ans la nuit.

Again,

So like the chances are of love and war,
That they alone in this distinguish’d are;
In love the victors from the vanguish’d fly,
They fly that wound, and they pursue that die.
Waller.

What new-found witchcraft was in thee,
With thine own cold to kindle me?
Strange art; like him that should devise
To make a burning-glass of ice.
Cowley.

Wit of this kind is unsuitable in a serious poem; witness the following line in Pope’s Elegy to the memory of an unfortunate lady:

Cold is that breast which warm’d the world before.

This sort of writing is finely burlesqued by Swift:

Her hands, the softest ever felt,
Though cold would burn, though dry would melt.
Strephon and Chloe.

Taking a word in a different sense from what is meant, comes under wit, because it occasions some slight degree of surprise.

Beatrice. I may sit in a corner, and cry Heigh ho! for a husband.

Pedro. Lady Beatrice, I will get you one.

Beatrice. I would rather have one of your father’s getting: hath your Grace ne’er a brother like you? Your father got excellent husbands, if a maid could come by them.

Much ado about nothing, act 2. sc. 5.

Falstaff. My honest lads, I will tell you what I am about.

Pistol. Two yards and more.

Falstaff. No quips now, Pistol: indeed, I am in the waste two yards about; but I am now about no waste; I am about thrift.

Merry wives of Windsor, act 1. sc. 7.

Lo. Sands.—— By your leave, sweet ladies, If I chance to talk a little wild, forgive me: I had it from my father.

Anne Bullen. Was he mad, Sir?

Sands. O, very mad, exceeding mad, in love too; But he would bite none——

K. Henry VIII.

An assertion that bears a double meaning, one right, one wrong; but so connected with other matters as to direct us to the wrong meaning. This species of bastard wit is distinguished from all others by the name pun. For example,

Paris.—— Sweet Helen, I must woo you,
To help unarm our Hector: his stubborn buckles,
With these your white inchanting fingers touch’d,
Shall more obey, than to the edge of steel,
Or force of Greekish sinews: you shall do more
Than all the island kings, disarm great Hector.
Troilus and Cressida, act 3. sc. 2.

The pun is in the close. The word disarm has a double meaning. It signifies to take off a man’s armour, and also to subdue him in fight. We are directed to the latter sense by the context. But with regard to Helen the word holds only true in the former sense. I go on with other examples.

Esse nihil dicis quicquid petis, improbe Cinna:
Si nil, Cinna, petis, nil tibi, Cinna, nego.
Martial, l. 3. epigr. 61.

Jocondus geminum imposuit tibi, Sequana, pontem;
Hunc tu jure potes dicere pontificem.
Sanazarius.

N. B. Jocondus was a monk.

Chief Justice. Well! the truth is, Sir John, you live in great infamy.

Falstaff. He that buckles him in my belt, cannot live in less.

Chief Justice. Your means are very slender, and your waste is great.

Falstaff. I would it were otherwise: I would my means were greater, and my waste slenderer.

Second part, Henry IV. act. 1 sc. 5.

Celia. I pray you bear with me, I can go no further.

Clown. For my part, I had rather bear with you than bear you: yet I should bear no cross if I did bear you; for I think you have no money in your purse.

As you like it, act 2. sc. 4.

He that imposes an oath makes it,
Not he that for convenience takes it;
Then how can any man be said,
To break an oath he never made?
Hudibras, part 2. canto 2.

The seventh satire of the first book of Horace, is purposely contrived to introduce at the close a most execrable pun. Talking of some infamous wretch whose name was Rex Rupilius.

Persius exclamat, Per magnos, Brute, deos te
Oro, qui reges consueris tollere, cur non
Hunc regem jugulas? Operum hoc, mihi crede, tuorum est.

Though playing with words is a mark of a mind at ease, and disposed for any sort of amusement, we must not thence conclude that playing with words is always ludicrous. Words are so intimately connected with thought, that if the subject be really grave, it will not appear ludicrous even in this fantastic dress. I am, however, far from recommending it in any serious performance. On the contrary, the discordance betwixt the thought and expression must be disagreeable; witness the following specimen.

He hath abandoned his physicians, Madam, under whose practices he hath persecuted time with hope: and finds no other advantage in the process, but only the losing of hope by time.

All’s well that ends well, act 1. sc. 1.

K. Henry. O my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows!
When that my care could not with-hold thy riots,
What wilt thou do when riot is thy care?
Second part, K. Henry IV.

A smart repartee may be considered as a species of wit. A certain petulant Greek, objecting to Anacharsis that he was a Scythian: True, says Anacharsis, my country disgraces me, but you disgrace your country.

CHAP. XIV.

Custom and Habit.

INquiring into the nature of man as a sensitive being, and finding him affected in a high degree with novelty, would any one conjecture that he is equally affected with custom? Yet these frequently take place, not only in the same person, but even with relation to the same subject: when new, it is inchanting; familiarity renders it indifferent; and custom, after a longer familiarity, makes it again desirable. Human nature, diversified with many and various springs of action, is wonderfully, and, indulging the expression, intricately constructed.

Custom hath such influence upon many of our feelings, by warping and varying them, that we must attend to its operations if we would be acquainted with human nature. This subject, in itself obscure, has been much neglected; and to give a complete analysis of it will be no easy task. I pretend only to touch it cursorily; hoping, however, that what is here laid down, will dispose more diligent inquirers to attempt further discoveries.

Custom respects the action, habit the actor. By custom we mean, a frequent reiteration of the same act; and by habit, the effect that custom has on the mind or body. This effect may be either active, witness the dexterity produced by custom in performing certain exercises; or passive, as when, by custom, a peculiar connection is formed betwixt a man and some agreeable object, which acquires thereby a greater power to raise emotions in him than it hath naturally. Active habits come not under the present undertaking; and therefore I confine myself to those that are passive.

This subject is thorny and intricate. Some pleasures are fortified by custom; and yet custom begets familiarity, and consequently indifference[24]. In many instances, satiety and disgust are the consequences of reiteration. Again, though custom blunts the edge of distress and of pain; yet the want of any thing to which we have long been accustomed, is a sort of torture. A clue to guide us through all the intricacies of this labyrinth, would be an acceptable present.

Whatever be the cause, it is an established fact, that we are much influenced by custom. It hath an effect upon our pleasures, upon our actions, and even upon our thoughts and sentiments. Habit makes no figure during the vivacity of youth; in middle age it gains ground; and in old age it governs without control. In that period of life, generally speaking, we eat at a certain hour, take exercise at a certain hour, go to rest at a certain hour, all by the direction of habit. Nay a particular seat, table, bed, comes to be essential. And a habit in any of these, cannot be contradicted without uneasiness.

Any slight or moderate pleasure frequently reiterated for a long time, forms a connection betwixt us and the thing that causes the pleasure. This connection, termed habit, has the effect to raise our desire or appetite for that thing when it returns not as usual. During the course of enjoyment, the pleasure grows insensibly stronger till a habit be established; at which time the pleasure is at its height. It continues not however stationary. The same customary reiteration which carried it to its height, brings it down again by insensible degrees, even lower than it was at first. But of this circumstance afterward. What at present we have in view, is to prove by experiments, that those things which at first are but moderately agreeable, are the aptest to become habitual. Spirituous liquors, at first scarce agreeable, readily produce an habitual appetite; and custom prevails so far, as even to make us fond of things originally disagreeable, such as coffee, assa-sœtida, and tobacco. This is pleasantly illustrated by Congreve:

Fainall. For a passionate lover, methinks you are a man somewhat too discerning in the failings of your mistress.

Mirabell. And for a discerning man, somewhat too passionate a lover; for I like her with all her faults; nay like her for her faults. Her follies are so natural, or so artful, that they become her; and those affectations which in another woman would be odious, serve but to make her more agreeable. I’ll tell thee, Fainall, she once us’d me with that insolence, that in revenge I took her to pieces, sifted her, and separated her failings; I study’d ’em, and got ’em by rote. The catalogue was so large, that I was not without hopes, one day or other, to hate her heartily: to which end I so us’d myself to think of ’em, that at length, contrary to my design and expectation, they gave me every hour less and less disturbance; till in a few days it became habitual to me, to remember ’em without being displeased. They are now grown as familiar to me as my own frailties; and in all probability, in a little time longer, I shall like ’em as well.

The way of the world, act 1. sc. 3.

A walk upon the quarterdeck, though intolerably confined, becomes however so agreeable by custom, that a sailor in his walk on shore, confines himself commonly within the same bounds. I knew a man who had relinquished the sea for a country-life. In the corner of his garden he reared an artificial mount with a level summit, resembling most accurately a quarterdeck, not only in shape but in size; and this was his choice walk. Play or gaming, at first barely amusing by the occupation it affords, becomes in time extremely agreeable; and is frequently prosecuted with avidity, as if it were the chief business of life. The same observation is applicable to the pleasures of the internal senses, those of knowledge and virtue in particular. Children have scarce any sense of these pleasures; and men very little, who are in the state of nature without culture. Our taste for virtue and knowledge improves slowly; but is capable of growing stronger than any other appetite in human nature.

To introduce a habit, frequency of acts is not alone sufficient: length of time is also necessary. The quickest succession of acts in a short time, is not sufficient; nor a slow succession in the longest time. The effect must be produced by a moderate soft action, and a long series of easy touches removed from each other by short intervals. Nor are these sufficient, without regularity in the time, place, and other circumstances of the action. The more uniform any operation is, the sooner it becomes habitual; and this holds equally in a passive habit. Variety in any remarkable degree, prevents the effect. Thus any particular food will scarce ever become habitual, where the manner of dressing is varied. The circumstances then requisite to augment any pleasure and at the long run to form a habit, are weak uniform acts, reiterated during a long course of time without any considerable interruption. Every agreeable cause which operates in this manner, will grow habitual.

Affection and aversion, as distinguished from passion on the one hand, and on the other from original disposition, are in reality habits respecting particular objects, acquired in the manner above set forth. The pleasure of social intercourse with any person, must originally be faint, and frequently reiterated, in order to establish the habit of affection. Affection thus generated, whether it be friendship or love, seldom swells into any tumultuous or vigorous passion; but is however the strongest cement that can bind together two individuals of the human species. In like manner, a slight degree of disgust often reiterated with any degree of regularity, grows into the habit of aversion, which generally subsists for life.

Those objects of taste that are the most agreeable, are so far from having a tendency to become habitual, that too great indulgence fails not to produce satiety and disgust. No man contracts a habit of taking sugar, honey, or sweet-meats, as he doth of tobacco:

Dulcia non ferimus: succo renovamur amaro.
Ovid. art. Amand. l. 3.

Insipido è quel dolce, che condito
Non è di qualche amaro, e tosto satia.
Aminta di Tasso.

These violent delights have violent ends,
And in their triumph die. The sweetest honey
Is loathsome in its own deliciousness,
And in the taste confounds the appetite;
Therefore love mod’rately, long love doth so:
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.
Romeo and Juliet, act 2. sc. 6.

The same holds in the causes of all violent pleasures: these causes are not naturally susceptible of habit. Great passions suddenly raised are incompatible with a habit of any sort. In particular they never produce affection or aversion. A man who at first sight falls violently in love, has a strong desire of enjoyment, but no affection for the woman[25]. A man who is surprised with an unexpected savour, burns for an opportunity to exert his gratitude, without having any affection for his benefactor. Neither does desire of vengeance for an atrocious injury involve aversion.

It is perhaps not easy to say why moderate pleasures gather strength by custom. But two causes concur to prevent this effect in the more intense pleasures. These, by an original law in our nature, increase quickly to their full growth, and decay with no less precipitation[26]; and custom is too slow in its operation to overcome this law. Another cause is not less powerful. The mind is exhausted with pleasure as well as with pain. Exquisite pleasure is extremely fatiguing; occasioning, as a naturalist would say, great expence of animal spirits[27]. And therefore, of such the mind cannot bear so frequent gratification as to superinduce a habit. If the thing which raises the pleasure return before the mind have recovered its tone and relish, disgust ensues instead of pleasure.

A habit never fails to admonish us of the wonted time of gratification, by raising a pain for want of the object, and a desire to have it. The pain of want is always first felt; the desire naturally follows; and upon presenting the object, both vanish instantaneously. Thus a man accustomed to tobacco, feels, at the end of the usual interval, a confused pain of want, which in its first appearance points at nothing in particular, though it soon settles upon its accustomed object. The same may be observed in persons addicted to drinking, who are often in an uneasy restless state before they think of their bottle. In pleasures indulged regularly and at equal intervals, the appetite, remarkably obsequious to custom, returns regularly with the usual time of gratification; and a sight of the object in the interim, has scarce any power to move it. This pain of want arising from habit, seems directly opposite to that of satiety. Singular it must appear, that frequency of gratification should produce effects so opposite as are the pains of excess and of want.

The appetites that respect the preservation and propagation of our species, are attended with a pain of want similar to that occasioned by habit. Hunger and thirst are uneasy sensations of want, which always precede the desire of eating or drinking: and a pain for want of carnal enjoyment precedes the desire of a proper object. The pain being thus felt independent of an object, cannot be cured but by gratification. An ordinary passion, in which desire precedes the pain of want, is in a different condition. It is never felt but while the object is in view; and therefore by removing the object out of thought, it vanisheth with its desire and pain of want[28].

These natural appetites above mentioned, differ from habit in the following particular, They have an undetermined direction toward all objects of gratification in general; whereas an habitual appetite is directed upon a particular object. The attachment we have by habit to a particular woman, differs widely from the natural passion which comprehends the whole sex; and the habitual relish for a particular dish, is far from being the same with a vague appetite for food. Notwithstanding this difference, it is still remarkable, that nature hath inforced the gratification of certain natural appetites essential to the species, by a pain of the same sort with that which habit produceth.

The pain of habit is less under our power, than any other pain for want of gratification. Hunger and thirst are more easily endured, especially at first, than an unusual intermission of any habitual pleasure. We often hear persons declaring, they would forego sleep or food, rather than snuff or any other habitual trifle. We must not however conclude, that the gratification of an habitual appetite affords the same delight with the gratification of one that is natural. Far from it: the pain of want only is greater.

The slow and reiterated acts that produce a habit, strengthen the mind to enjoy the habitual pleasure in greater quantity and more frequency than originally; and by this means a habit of intemperate gratification is often formed. After unbounded acts of intemperance, the habitual relish is soon restored, and the pain for want of enjoyment returns with fresh vigor.

The causes of the pleasant emotions hitherto in view, are either an individual, such as a companion, a certain dwelling-place, certain amusements, &c.; or a particular species, such as coffee, mutton, or any particular food. But habit is not confined to these. A constant train of trifling diversions, may form such a habit in the mind, as that it cannot be easy a moment without amusement. Variety in the objects prevents a habit as to any one in particular; but as the train is uniform with respect to amusement in general, the habit is formed accordingly; and this sort of habit may be denominated a generic habit, in opposition to the former, which may be called a specific habit. A habit of a town-life, of country-sports, of solitude, of reading, or of business, where sufficiently varied, are instances of generic habits. It ought to be remarked, that every specific habit hath a mixture of the generic. The habit of one particular sort of food, makes the taste agreeable; and we are fond of this taste where-ever found. A man deprived of an habitual object, takes up with what most resembles it: deprived of tobacco, any bitter herb will do, rather than want. The habit of drinking punch, makes wine a good resource. A man accustomed to the sweet society and comforts of matrimony, being unhappily deprived of his beloved object, inclines the sooner to a second choice. In general, the quality which the most affects us in an habitual object, produceth, when we are deprived of it, a strong appetite for that quality in any other object.

The reasons are assigned above, why the causes of intense pleasure become not readily habitual. But now I must observe, that these reasons conclude only against specific habits. With regard to any particular object that is the cause of a weak pleasure, a habit is formed by frequency and uniformity of reiteration, which in the case of an intense pleasure cannot obtain without satiety and disgust. But it is remarkable, that satiety and disgust have no effect, except as to that thing which occasions them. A surfeit of honey produceth not a loathing of sugar; and intemperance with one woman, produceth no disrelish of the same pleasure with others. Hence it is easy to account for a generic habit in any strong pleasure. The disgust of intemperance, is confined to the object by which it is produced. The delight we had in the gratification of the appetite, inflames the imagination, and makes us, with avidity, search for the same gratification in whatever other object it can be found. And thus frequency and uniformity in gratifying the same passion upon different objects, produceth at the longrun a habit. In this manner, a man acquires an habitual delight in high and poignant sauces, rich dress, fine equipage, crowds of company, and in whatever is commonly termed pleasure. There concurs at the same time to introduce this habit, a peculiarity observed above, that reiteration of acts enlarges the capacity of the mind, to admit a more plentiful gratification than originally, with regard to frequency as well as quantity.

Hence it appears, that though a specific habit can only take place in the case of a moderate pleasure, yet that a generic habit may be formed with respect to every sort of pleasure, moderate or immoderate, that can be gratified by a variety of objects indifferently. The only difference is, that any particular object which causes a weak pleasure, runs naturally into a specific habit; whereas a particular object that causes an intense pleasure, is altogether incapable of such a habit. In a word, it is but in singular cases that a moderate pleasure produces a generic habit: an intense pleasure, on the other hand, cannot produce any other habit.

The appetites that respect the preservation and propagation of the species, are formed into habit in a peculiar manner. The time as well as measure of their gratification, are much under the power of custom; which, by introducing a change upon the body, occasions a proportional change in the appetites. Thus, if the body be gradually formed to a certain quantity of food at regular times, the appetite is regulated accordingly; and the appetite is again changed when a different habit of body is introduced by a different practice. Here it would seem, that the change is not made upon the mind, which is commonly the case in passive habits, but only upon the body.

When rich food is brought down by ingredients of a plainer taste, the composition is susceptible of a specific habit. Thus the sweet taste of sugar, rendered less poignant in a mixture, may, in course of time, produce a specific habit for such mixture. As moderate pleasures, by becoming more intense, tend to generic habits; so intense pleasures, by becoming more moderate, tend to specific habits.

The beauty of the human figure, by a special recommendation of nature, appears to us supreme, amid the great variety of beauteous forms bestowed upon animals. The various degrees in which individuals enjoy this property, render it an object sometimes of a moderate sometimes of an intense passion. The moderate passion, admitting frequent reiteration without diminution, and occupying the mind without exhausting it, becomes gradually stronger till it settle in a habit. So true this is, that instances are not wanting, of an ugly face, at first disagreeable, afterward rendered indifferent by familiarity, and at the longrun agreeable. On the other hand, consummate beauty, at the very first view, fills the mind so as to admit no increase. Enjoyment in this case lessens the pleasure[29]; and if often repeated, ends commonly in satiety and disgust. Constant experience shows, that the emotions created by great beauty become weaker by familiarity. The impressions made successively by such an object, strong at first and lessening by degrees, constitute a series opposite to that of the weak and increasing emotions, which grow into a specific habit. But the mind, when accustomed to beauty, contracts a relish for it in general, though often repelled from particular objects by the pain of satiety. Thus a generic habit is formed, of which inconstancy in love is the necessary consequence. For a generic habit, comprehending every beautiful object, is an invincible obstruction to a specific habit, which is confined to one.

But a matter which is of great importance to the youth of both sexes, deserves more than a cursory view. Though the pleasant emotion of beauty differs widely from the corporeal appetite, yet both may concur upon the same object. When this is the case, they inflame the imagination; and produce a very strong complex passion[30], which is incapable of increase, because the mind as to pleasure is limited rather more than as to pain. Enjoyment in this case must be exquisite, and therefore more apt to produce satiety than in any other case whatever. This is a never-failing effect, where consummate beauty on the one side, meets with a warm imagination and great sensibility on the other. What I am here explaining, is the naked truth without exaggeration. They must be insensible upon whom this doctrine makes no impression; and it deserves well to be pondered by the young and the amorous, who in forming a society which is not dissolvable, are too often blindly impelled by the animal pleasure merely, inflamed by beauty. It may indeed happen after this pleasure is gone, and go it must with a swift pace, that a new connection is formed upon more dignified and more lasting principles. But this is a dangerous experiment. For even supposing good sense, good temper, and internal merit of every sort, which is a very favourable supposition, yet a new connection upon these qualifications is rarely formed. It generally or rather always happens, that such qualifications, the only solid foundation of an indissoluble connection, are rendered altogether invisible by satiety of enjoyment creating disgust.

One effect of custom, different from any that have been explained, must not be omitted, because it makes a great figure in human nature. Custom augments moderate pleasures, and diminishes those that are intense. It has a different effect with respect to pain; for it blunts the edge of every sort of pain and distress great and small. Uninterrupted misery therefore is attended with one good effect. If its torments be incessant, custom hardens us to bear them.

It is extremely curious, to remark the gradual changes that are made in forming habits. Moderate pleasures are augmented gradually by reiteration till they become habitual; and then are at their height. But they are not long stationary; for from that point they gradually decay till they vanish altogether. The pain occasioned by the want of gratification, runs a very different course. This pain increases uniformly; and at last becomes extreme, when the pleasure of gratification is reduced to nothing.

—— It so falls out
That what we have we prize not to the worth,
Whiles we enjoy it; but being lack’d and lost,
Why then we rack the value; then we find
The virtue that possession would not shew us
Whilst it was ours.
Much ado about nothing, act 4. sc. 2.

The effect of custom with relation to a specific habit, is displayed through all its varieties in the use of tobacco. The taste of this plant is at first extremely unpleasant. Our disgust lessens gradually till it vanish altogether; at which period the plant is neither agreeable nor disagreeable. Continuing the use, we begin to relish it; and our relish increases by use till it come to its utmost extent. From this state it gradually decays, while the habit becomes stronger and stronger, and consequently the pain of want. The result is, that when the habit has acquired its greatest vigor, the pleasure of gratification is gone. And hence it is, that we often smoke and take snuff habitually, without so much as being conscious of the operation. We must except gratification after the pain of want; because gratification in that case is at the height when the habit is strongest. It is of the same kind with the joy one feels upon being delivered from the rack, the cause of which is explained above[31]. This pleasure however is but occasionally the effect of habit; and however exquisite, is guarded against as much as possible, by preventing want.

With regard to the pain of want, I can discover no difference betwixt a generic and specific habit: the pain is the same in both. But these habits differ widely with respect to the positive pleasure. I have had occasion to observe, that the pleasure of a specific habit decays gradually till it become imperceptible. Not so the pleasure of a generic habit. So far as I can discover, this pleasure suffers little or no decay after it comes to its height. The variety of gratification preserves it entire. However it may be with other generic habits, the observation I am certain holds with respect to the pleasures of virtue and of knowledge. The pleasure of doing good has such an unbounded scope, and may be so variously gratified, that it can never decay. Science is equally unbounded; and our appetite for knowledge has an ample range of gratification, where discoveries are recommended by novelty, by variety, by utility, or by all of them.

Here is a large field of facts and experiments, and several phenomena unfolded, the causes of which have been occasionally suggested. The efficient cause of the power of custom over man, a fundamental point in the present chapter, has unhappily evaded my keenest search; and now I am reduced to hold it an original branch of the human constitution, though I have no better reason for my opinion, than that I cannot resolve it into any other principle. But with respect to the final cause, a point of still greater importance, I promise myself more success. It cannot indeed have escaped any thinking person, that the power of custom is a happy contrivance for our good. Exquisite pleasure produceth satiety: moderate pleasure becomes stronger by custom. Business is our province, and pleasure our relaxation only. Hence, satiety is necessary to check exquisite pleasures, which otherwise would ingross the mind, and unqualify us for business. On the other hand, habitual increase of moderate pleasure, and even conversion of pain into pleasure, are admirably contrived for disappointing the malice of Fortune, and for reconciling us to whatever course of life may be our lot:

How use doth breed a habit in a man!
This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods,
I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.
Here I can sit alone, unseen of any,
And to the nightingale’s complaining notes
Tune my distresses, and record my woes.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, act 5. sc. 4.

The foregoing distinction betwixt intense and moderate, holds in pleasure only, not in pain, every degree of which is softened by time and custom. Custom is a catholicon for pain and distress of every sort; and of this regulation the final cause is so evident as to require no illustration.

Another final cause of custom will be highly relished by every person of humanity; and yet has in a great measure been overlooked. Custom hath a greater influence than any other known principle, to put the rich and poor upon a level. Weak pleasures, which fall to the share of the latter, become fortunately stronger by custom; while voluptuous pleasures, the lot of the former, are continually losing ground by satiety. Men of fortune, who possess palaces, sumptuous gardens, rich fields, enjoy them less than passengers do. The goods of Fortune are not unequally distributed: the opulent possess what others enjoy.

And indeed, if it be the effect of habit to produce the pain of want in a high degree while there is little pleasure in enjoyment, a voluptuous life is of all the least to be envied. Those who are accustomed to high feeding, easy vehicles, rich furniture, a crowd of valets, much deference and flattery, enjoy but a small share of happiness, while they are exposed to manifold distresses. To such a man, inslaved by ease and luxury, even the petty inconveniencies of a rough road, bad weather, or homely fare on a journey, are serious evils. He loses his tone of mind, becomes peevish, and would wreak his resentment even upon the common accidents of life. Better far to use the goods of Fortune with moderation. A man who by temperance and activity has acquired a hardy constitution, is, on the one hand, guarded against external accidents, and is, on the other, provided with great variety of enjoyment ever at command.

I shall close this chapter with the discussion of a question more delicate than abstruse, viz. What authority custom ought to have over our taste in the fine arts? It is proper to be premised, that we chearfully abandon to its authority every thing that nature leaves to our choice, and where the preference we bestow has no foundation other than whim or fancy. There appears no original difference betwixt the right and the left hand: custom however has established a difference, so as to make it aukward and disagreeable to use the left where the right is commonly used. The various colours, though they affect us differently, are all of them agreeable in their purity. But custom has regulated this matter in another manner: a black skin upon a human creature, is to us disagreeable; and a white skin probably not less so to a negro. Thus things originally indifferent, become agreeable or disagreeable by the force of custom. Nor ought this to be surprising after the discovery made above, that the original agreeableness or disagreeableness of an object, is, by the influence of custom, often converted into the opposite quality.

Concerning now those matters of taste where there is naturally a preference of one thing before another; it is certain, in the first place, that our faint and more delicate feelings are readily susceptible of a bias from custom; and therefore that it is no proof of a defective taste, to find these in some measure under the government of custom. Dress, and the modes of external behaviour, are justly regulated by custom in every country. The deep red or vermilion with which the ladies in France cover their cheeks, appears to them beautiful in spite of nature; and strangers cannot altogether be justified in condemning this practice, considering the lawful authority of custom, or of the fashion, as it is called. It is told of the people who inhabit the skirts of the Alps facing the north, that the swelling they universally have in the neck is to them agreeable. So far has custom power to change the nature of things, and to make an object originally disagreeable take on an opposite appearance.

But as to the emotions of propriety and impropriety, and in general as to all emotions involving the sense of right or wrong, custom has little authority, and ought to have none at all. Emotions of this kind, being qualified with the consciousness of duty, take naturally place of every other feeling; and it argues a shameful weakness or degeneracy of mind, to find them in any case so far subdued as to submit to custom.

These few hints may enable us to judge in some measure of foreign manners, whether exhibited by foreign writers or our own. A comparison betwixt the ancients and the moderns, was some time ago a favourite subject. Those who declared for the former, thought it a sufficient justification of ancient manners, that they were supported by the authority of custom. Their antagonists, on the other hand, refusing submission to custom as a standard of taste, condemned ancient manners in several instances as irrational. In this controversy, an appeal being made to different principles, without the slightest attempt on either side to establish a common standard, the dispute could have no end. The hints above given tend to establish a standard, for judging how far the lawful authority of custom may be extended, and within what limits it ought to be confined. For the sake of illustration, we shall apply this standard in a few instances.

Human sacrifices, the cruellest effect of blind and groveling superstition, wore gradually out of use by the prevalence of reason and humanity. In the days of Sophocles and Euripides, the traces of this savage practice were still recent; and the Athenians, through the prevalence of custom, could without disgust suffer human sacrifices to be represented in their theatre. The Iphigenia of Euripides is a proof of this fact. But a human sacrifice, being altogether inconsistent with modern manners, as producing horror instead of pity, cannot with any propriety be introduced upon a modern stage. I must therefore condemn the Iphigenia of Racine, which, instead of the tender and sympathetic passions, substitutes disgust and horror. But this is not all. Another objection occurs against every fable that deviates so remarkably from improved notions and sentiments. If it should even command our belief, by the authority of genuine history, its fictitious and unnatural appearance, however, would prevent its taking such hold of the mind as to produce a perception of reality[32]. A human sacrifice is so unnatural, and to us so improbable, that few will be affected with the representation of it more than with a fairy tale. The objection first mentioned strikes also against the Phedra of this author. The queen’s passion for her stepson, being unnatural and beyond all bounds, creates aversion and horror rather than compassion. The author in his preface observes, that the queen’s passion, however unnatural, was the effect of destiny and the wrath of the gods; and he puts the same excuse in her own mouth. But what is the wrath of a heathen god to us Christians? We acknowledge no destiny in passion; and if love be unnatural, it never can be relished. A supposition, like what our author lays hold of, may possibly cover slight improprieties; but it will never engage our sympathy for what appears to us frantic or extravagant.

Neither can I relish the catastrophe of this tragedy. A man of taste may peruse, without disgust, a Grecian performance describing a sea-monster sent by Neptune to destroy Hippolytus. He considers, that such a story might agree with the religious creed of Greece; and, entering into ancient opinions, may be pleased with the story, as what probably had a strong effect upon a Grecian audience. But he cannot have the same indulgence for such a representation upon a modern stage; for no story which carries a violent air of fiction, can ever move us in any considerable degree.

In the Coëphores of Eschylus[33], Orestes is made to say, that he was commanded by Apollo to avenge his father’s murder; and yet if he obeyed, that he was to be delivered to the furies, or be struck with some horrible malady. The tragedy accordingly concludes with a chorus, deploring the fate of Orestes, obliged to take vengeance against a mother, and involved thereby in a crime against his will. It is impossible for any man at present to accommodate his mind to opinions so irrational and absurd, which must disgust him in perusing even a Grecian story. Among the Greeks again, grossly superstitious, it was a common opinion, that the report of a man’s death was a presage of his death; and Orestes, in the first act of Electra, spreading a report of his own death in order to blind his mother and her adulterer, is even in this case affected with the presage. Such imbecility can never find grace with a modern audience. It may indeed produce some degree of compassion for a people afflicted to such a degree with absurd terrors, similar to what is felt in perusing a description of the Hottentotes: but manners of this kind will not interest our affections, nor excite any degree of social concern.

CHAP. XV.

External Signs of Emotions and Passions.

SO intimately connected are the soul and body, that there is not a single agitation in the former, but what produceth a visible effect upon the latter. There is, at the same time, a wonderful uniformity in this operation; each class of emotions being invariably attended with an external appearance peculiar to itself[34]. These external appearances or signs, may not improperly be considered as a natural language, expressing to all beholders the several emotions and passions as they arise in the heart. We perceive display’d externally, hope, fear, joy, grief: we can read the character of a man in his face; and beauty, which makes so strong an impression, is known to result, not so much from regular features and a fine complexion, as from good nature, good sense, sprightliness, sweetness, or other mental quality, expressed some way upon the countenance. Though perfect skill in this language be rare, yet so much knowledge of it is diffused through mankind, as to be sufficient for the ordinary events of life. But by what means we come to understand this language, is a point of some intricacy. It cannot be by sight merely; for upon the most attentive inspection of the human visage, all that can be discerned are figure, colour, and motion; and yet these, singly or combined, never can represent a passion or a sentiment. The external sign is indeed visible. But to understand its meaning, we must be able to connect it with the passion that causes it; an operation far beyond the reach of eye-sight. Where then is the instructor to be found, that can unvail this secret connection? If we apply to experience, it is yielded, that from long and diligent observation, we may gather in some measure in what manner those we are acquainted with express their passions externally. But with respect to strangers, of whom we have no experience, we are left in the dark. And yet we are not puzzled about the meaning of these external expressions in a stranger, more than in a bosom-companion[35]. Further, had we no other means but experience for understanding the external signs of passion, we could not expect any uniformity or any degree of skill in the bulk of individuals. But matters are ordered so differently, that the external expressions of passion form a language understood by all, by the young as well as the old, by the ignorant as well as the learned. I talk of the plain and legible characters of this language; for undoubtedly we are much indebted to experience in deciphering the dark and more delicate expressions. Where then shall we apply for a solution of this intricate problem, which seems to penetrate deep into human nature? In my mind it will be convenient to suspend the inquiry, till we be better acquainted with the nature of external signs and with their operations. These articles therefore shall be premised.

The external signs of passion are of two kinds, voluntary and involuntary. The voluntary signs are also of two kinds: some are arbitrary and some natural. Words are arbitrary signs, excepting a few simple sounds expressive of certain internal emotions; and these sounds, being the same in all languages, must be the work of nature. But though words are arbitrary, the manner of employing them is not altogether so; for each passion has by nature peculiar expressions and tones suited to it. Thus the unpremeditated tones of admiration, are the same in all men; as also of compassion, resentment, and despair. Dramatic writers ought to be well acquainted with this natural manner of expressing passion. The chief talent of a fine writer, is a ready command of the expressions that nature dictates to every man when any vivid emotion struggles for utterance; and the chief talent of a fine reader, is a ready command of the tones suited to these expressions.

The other kind of voluntary signs, comprehends certain attitudes and gestures that naturally accompany certain emotions with a surprising uniformity. Thus excessive joy is expressed by leaping, dancing, or some elevation of the body; and excessive grief by sinking or depressing it. Thus prostration and kneeling have been employ’d by all nations and in all ages to signify profound veneration. Another circumstance, still more than uniformity, demonstrates these gestures to be natural, viz. their remarkable conformity or resemblance to the passions that produce them[36]. Joy, which produceth a chearful elevation of mind, is expressed by an elevation of body. Pride, magnanimity, courage, and the whole tribe of elevating passions, are expressed by external gestures that are the same as to the circumstance of elevation, however distinguishable in other respects. Hence it comes, that an erect posture is a sign or expression of dignity:

Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall,
Godlike erect, with native honour clad,
In naked majesty, seem’d lords of all.
Paradise Lost, book 4.

Grief, on the other hand, as well as respect, which depress the mind, cannot for that reason be expressed more significantly than by a similar depression of the body. Hence, to be cast down, is a common phrase, signifying to be grieved or dispirited.

One would not imagine, who has not given peculiar attention, that the body is susceptible of such a variety of attitude and motion, as readily to accompany every different emotion with a corresponding gesture. Humility, for example, is expressed naturally by hanging the head; arrogance, by its elevation; and langour or despondence, by reclining it to one side. The expressions of the hands are manifold. By different attitudes and motions, the hands express desire, hope, fear: they assist us in promising, in inviting, in keeping one at a distance: they are made instruments of threatening, of supplication, of praise, and of horror: they are employ’d in approving, in refusing, in questioning; in showing our joy, our sorrow, our doubts, our regret, our admiration. These gestures, so obedient to passion, are extremely difficult to be imitated in a calm state. The ancients, sensible of the advantage as well as difficulty of having these expressions at command, bestowed much time and care, in collecting them from observation, and in digesting them into a practical art, which was taught in their schools as an important branch of education.

The foregoing signs, though in a strict sense voluntary, cannot however be restrained but with the utmost difficulty when they are prompted by passion. Of this we scarce need a stronger proof, than the gestures of a keen player at bowls. Observe only how he wreaths his body, in order to restore a stray bowl to the right track. It is one article of good breeding, to suppress, as much as possible, these external signs of passion, that we may not in company appear too warm or too interested. The same observation holds in speech. A passion, it is true, when in extreme, is silent[37]; but when less violent, it must be vented in words, which have a peculiar force, not to be equalled in a sedate composition. The ease and trust we have in a confident, encourages us no doubt to talk of ourselves and of our feelings. But the cause is more general; for it operates when we are alone as well as in company. Passion is the cause; for in many instances it is no slight gratification to vent a passion externally by words as well as by gestures. Some passions, when at a certain height, impel us so strongly to vent them in words, that we speak with an audible voice even where there is none to listen. It is this circumstance in passion, that justifies soliloquies; and it is this circumstance that proves them to be natural[38]. The mind sometimes favours this impulse of passion, by bestowing a temporary sensibility upon any object at hand, in order to make it a confident. Thus in the Winter’s Tale[39], Antigonus addresses himself to an infant whom he was ordered to expose:

Come, poor babe,
I have heard, but not believ’d, the spirits of the dead
May walk again: if such thing be, thy mother
Appear’d to me last night; for ne’er was dream
So like a waking.

The involuntary signs, which are all of them natural, are either peculiar to one passion or common to many. Every violent passion hath an external expression peculiar to itself, not excepting pleasant passions: witness admiration and mirth. The pleasant emotions that are less vivid, have one common expression; from which we may gather the strength of the emotion, but scarce the kind: we perceive a chearful or contented look; and we can make no more of it. Painful passions, being all of them violent, are distinguishable from each other by their external expressions. Thus fear, shame, anger, anxiety, dejection, despair, have each of them peculiar expressions; which are apprehended without the least confusion. Some of these passions produce violent effects upon the body, such as trembling, starting, and swooning. But these effects, depending in a good measure upon singularity of constitution, are not uniform in all men.

The involuntary signs, such of them as are display’d upon the countenance, are of two kinds. Some make their appearance occasionally with the emotions that produce them, and vanish with the emotions: others are formed gradually by some violent passion often recurring; and, becoming permanent signs of this prevailing passion, serve to denote the disposition or temper. The face of an infant indicates no particular disposition, because it cannot be marked with any character to which time is necessary. And even the temporary signs are extremely aukward, being the first rude essays of Nature to discover internal feelings. Thus the shrieking of a new-born infant, without tears or sobbings, is plainly an attempt to weep. Some of the temporary signs, as smiling and frowning, cannot be observed for some months after birth. The permanent signs, formed in youth while the body is soft and flexible, are preserved entire by the firmness and solidity which the body acquires; and are never obliterated even by a change of temper. Permanent signs are not produced after a certain age when the fibres become rigid; some violent cases excepted, such as reiterated fits of the gout or stone through a course of time. But these signs are not so obstinate as what are produced in youth; for when the cause is removed, they gradually wear away, and at last vanish.

The natural signs of emotions, voluntary and involuntary, being nearly the same in all men, form an universal language, which no distance of place, no difference of tribe, no diversity of tongue, can darken or render doubtful. Education, though of mighty influence, hath not power to vary or sophisticate, far less to destroy, their signification. This is a wise appointment of Providence. For if these signs were, like words, arbitrary and variable, it would be an intricate science to decipher the actions and motives of our own species, which would prove a great or rather invincible obstruction to the formation of societies. But as matters are ordered, the external appearances of joy, grief, anger, fear, shame, and of the other passions, forming an universal language, open a direct avenue to the heart. As the arbitrary signs vary in every country, there could be no communication of thoughts among different nations, were it not for the natural signs in which all agree. Words are sufficient for the communication of science, and of all mental conceptions: but the discovering passions instantly as they arise, being essential to our well-being and often necessary for self-preservation, the author of our nature, attentive to our wants, hath provided a passage to the heart, which never can be obstructed while our external senses remain entire.

In an inquiry concerning the external signs of passion, actions ought not altogether to be overlooked: for though singly they afford no clear light, they are upon the whole the best interpreters of the heart[40]. By observing a man’s conduct for a course of time, we discover unerringly the various passions that move him to action, what he loves and what he hates. In our younger years, every single action is a mark not at all ambiguous of the temper; for in childhood there is little or no disguise. The subject becomes more intricate in advanced age; but even there, dissimulation is seldom carried on for any length of time. And thus the conduct of life is the most perfect expression of the internal disposition. It merits not indeed the title of an universal language; because it is not thoroughly understood but by those who either have a penetrating genius or extensive observation. It is a language, however, which every one can decipher in some measure; and which, joined with the other external signs, affords sufficient means for the direction of our conduct with regard to others. If we commit any mistake when such light is afforded, it never can be the effect of unavoidable ignorance, but of rashness or inadvertence.

In reflecting upon the various expressions of our emotions, voluntary and involuntary, we must recognise the anxious care of Nature to discover men to each other. Strong emotions, as above hinted, beget an impatience to express them externally by speech and other voluntary signs, which cannot be suppressed without a painful effort. Thus a sudden fit of passion is a common excuse for indecent behaviour or harsh words. As to the involuntary signs, these are altogether unavoidable. No volition or effort can prevent the shaking of the limbs or a pale visage, when one is agitated with a violent fit of terror. The blood flies to the face upon a sudden emotion of shame, in spite of all opposition:

Vergogna, che’n altrui stampo natura,
Non si puo’ rinegar: che se tu’ tenti
Di cacciarla dal cor, fugge nel volto.
Pastor Fido, act 2. sc. 5.

Emotions indeed properly so called, which are quiescent, produce no remarkable signs externally; nor is it necessary that the more deliberate passions should, because the operation of such passions is neither sudden nor violent. These however remain not altogether in the dark. Being more frequent than violent passion, the bulk of our actions are directed by them. Actions therefore display, with sufficient evidence, the more deliberate passions, and complete the admirable system of external signs, by which we become skilful in human nature.

Next in order comes an article of great importance, which is, to examine the effects produced upon a spectator by external signs of passion. None of these signs are beheld with indifference: they are productive of various emotions tending all of them to ends wise and good. This curious article makes a capital branch of human nature. It is peculiarly useful to writers who deal in the pathetic; and with respect to history-painters, it is altogether indispensable.

When we enter upon this article, we gather from experience, that each passion, or class of passions, hath its peculiar signs; and that these invariably make certain impressions on a spectator. The external signs of joy, for example, produce a chearful emotion, the external signs of grief produce pity, and the external signs of rage produce a sort of terror even in those who are not aimed at.

Secondly, it is natural to think, that pleasant passions should express themselves externally by signs that appear agreeable, and painful passions by signs that appear disagreeable. This conjecture, which Nature suggests, is confirmed by experience. Pride seems to be an exception; its external signs being disagreeable, though it be commonly reckoned a pleasant passion. But pride is not an exception; for in reality it is a mixed passion, partly pleasant partly painful. When a proud man confines his thoughts to himself, and to his own dignity or importance, the passion is pleasant, and its external signs agreeable: but as pride chiefly consists in undervaluing or contemning others, it is so far painful, and its external signs disagreeable.

Thirdly, it is laid down above, that an agreeable object produceth always a pleasant emotion, and a disagreeable object one that is painful[41]. According to this law, the external signs of a pleasant passion, being agreeable, must produce in the spectator a pleasant emotion; and the external signs of a painful passion, being disagreeable, must produce in him a painful emotion.

Fourthly, in the present chapter it is observed, that pleasant passions are, for the most part, expressed externally in one uniform manner; and that only the painful passions are distinguishable from each other by their external expressions. In the emotions accordingly raised by external signs of pleasant passions, there is little variety. They are pleasant or chearful, and we have not words to reach a more particular description. But the external signs of painful passions produce in the spectator emotions of different kinds: the emotions, for example, raised by external signs of grief, of remorse, of anger, of envy, of malice, are clearly distinguishable from each other.

Fifthly, emotions raised by the external signs of painful passions, are some of them attractive, some repulsive. Every painful passion that is also disagreeable[42], raises by its external signs a repulsive emotion, repelling the spectator from the object. Thus the emotions raised by external signs of envy and rage, are repulsive. But this is not the case of painful passions that are agreeable. Their external signs, it is true, are disagreeable, and raise in the spectator a painful emotion. But this painful emotion is not repulsive. On the contrary, it is attractive; and produceth in the spectator good-will to the man who is moved by the passion, and a desire to relieve or comfort him. This cannot be better exemplified than by distress painted on the countenance, which instantaneously inspires the spectator with pity, and impels him to afford relief. The cause of this difference among the painful emotions raised by external signs of passion, may be readily gathered from what is laid down chapter Emotions and passions, part 7.

It is now time to look back to the question proposed in the beginning, How we come to understand external signs, so as readily to ascribe each sign to its proper passion? We have seen that this branch of knowledge, cannot be derived originally from sight, nor from experience. Is it then implanted in us by nature? The following considerations will help us to answer this question in the affirmative. In the first place, the external signs of passion must be natural; for they are invariably the same in every country, and among the different tribes of men. Pride, for example, is always expressed by an erect posture, reverence by prostration, and sorrow by a dejected look. Secondly, we are not even indebted to experience for the knowledge that these expressions are natural and universal. We are so framed as to have an innate conviction of the fact. Let a man change his habitation to the other side of the globe; he will, from the accustomed signs, infer the passion of fear among his new neighbours, with as little hesitation as he did at home. And upon second thoughts, the question may be answered without any preliminaries. If the branch of knowledge we have been inquiring about be not derived from sight nor from experience, there is no remaining source from whence it can be derived but from nature.

We may then venture to pronounce, with some degree of confidence, that man is provided by nature with a sense or faculty which lays open to him every passion by means of its external expressions. And I imagine that we cannot entertain any reasonable doubt of this fact, when we reflect, that even infants are not ignorant of the meaning of external signs. An infant is remarkably affected with the passions of its nurse expressed on her countenance: a smile chears it, and a frown makes it afraid. Fear thus generated in the infant, must, like every other passion, have an object. What is the object of this passion? Surely not the frown considered abstractly, for a child never abstracts. The nurse who frowns is evidently the object. Fear, at the same time, cannot arise but from apprehending danger. But what danger can a child apprehend, if it be not sensible that the person who frowns is angry? We must therefore admit, that a child can read anger in its nurse’s face; and it must be sensible of this intuitively, for it has no other means of knowledge. I have no occasion to affirm, that these particulars are clearly apprehended by the child. To produce clear and distinct perceptions, reflection and experience are requisite. But that even an infant, when afraid, must have some notion of its being in danger, is extremely evident.

That we should be conscious intuitively of a passion from its external expressions, is conformable to the analogy of nature. The knowledge of this language is of too great importance to be left upon experience. To rest it upon a foundation so uncertain and precarious, would prove a great obstacle to the formation of societies. Wisely therefore is it ordered, and agreeably to the system of Providence, that we should have Nature for our instructor.

Manifold and admirable are the purposes to which the external signs of passion are made subservient by the author of our nature. What are occasionally mentioned above, make but a part. Several final causes remain to be unfolded; and to this task I apply myself with alacrity. In the first place, the signs of internal agitation that are displayed externally to every spectator, tend to fix the signification of many terms. The only effectual means to ascertain the meaning of any doubtful word, is an appeal to the thing it represents. Hence the ambiguity of words expressive of things that are not objects of external sense; for in that case an appeal is denied. Passion, strictly speaking, is not an object of external sense: but its external signs are; and by means of these signs, passions may be appealed to, with tolerable accuracy. Thus the words that denote our passions, next to those that denote external objects, have the most distinct meaning. Words signifying internal action and the more delicate feelings, are less distinct. This defect with respect to internal action, is what chiefly occasions the intricacy of logic. The terms of that science are far from being sufficiently ascertained, even after the care and labour bestowed by an eminent writer[43]: to whom however the world is greatly indebted, for removing a mountain of rubbish, and moulding the subject into a rational and correct form. The same defect is remarkable in criticism, which has for its object the more delicate feelings. The terms that denote these feelings, are not more distinct than those of logic. To reduce this science of criticism to any regular form, has never once been attempted. However rich the ore may be, no critical chymist has been found to give us a regular analysis of its constituent parts, and to distinguish each by its own name.

In the second place, society among individuals is greatly promoted by this universal language. The distance and reserve that strangers naturally discover, show its utility. Looks and gestures give direct access to the heart; and lead us to select with tolerable accuracy the persons who may be trusted. It is surprising how quickly, and for the most part how correctly, we judge of character from external appearances.

Thirdly, after social intercourse is commenced, these external signs contribute above all other means to the strictest union, by diffusing through a whole assembly the feelings of each individual. Language no doubt is the most comprehensive vehicle for communicating emotions: but in expedition, as well as in the power of conviction, it falls short of the signs under consideration; the involuntary signs especially, which are incapable of deceit. Where the countenance, the tones, the gestures, the actions, join with the words, in communicating emotions, these united have a force irresistible. Thus all the agreeable emotions of the human heart, with all the social and virtuous affections, are, by means of these external signs, not only perceived but felt. By this admirable contrivance, social intercourse becomes that lively and animating amusement, without which life would at best be insipid. One joyful countenance spreads chearfulness instantaneously through a multitude of spectators.

Fourthly, dissocial passions being hurtful by prompting violence and mischief, are noted by the most conspicuous external signs, in order to put us upon our guard. Thus anger and revenge, especially when suddenly provoked, display themselves on the countenance in legible characters[44]. The external signs again of every passion that threatens danger, raise in us the passion of fear. Nor is this passion occasioned by consciousness of danger, though it may be inflamed by such consciousness. It is an instinctive passion, which operating without reason or reflection, moves us by a sudden impulse to avoid the impending danger[45].

In the fifth place, these external signs are made subservient in a curious manner to the cause of virtue. The external signs of a painful passion that is virtuous or innocent, and consequently agreeable, produce indeed a painful emotion. But this emotion is attractive, and connects the spectator with the person who suffers. Disagreeable passions only, are productive of repulsive emotions involving the spectator’s aversion, and frequently his indignation. This artful contrivance makes us cling to the virtuous and abhor the wicked.

Sixthly, of all the external signs of passion, those of affliction or distress are the most illustrious with respect to a final cause; and deservedly merit a place of distinction. They are illustrious by the singularity of their contrivance; and they are still more illustrious by the sympathy they inspire, a passion to which human society is indebted for its greatest blessing, that of securing relief in all cases of distress. A subject so interesting, ought to be examined with leisure and attention. The conformity of the nature of man to his external circumstances, is in every particular wonderful. His nature makes him prone to society; and his situation makes it necessary for him. In a solitary state he is the most helpless of beings; destitute of support, and in his manifold distresses destitute of relief. Mutual support, the shining attribute of society, being essential to the well-being of man, is not left upon reason, but is inforced even instinctively by the passion of sympathy. Here sympathy makes a capital figure; and contributes, more than any other means, to make life easy and comfortable. But however essential sympathy be to comfortable existence, one thinking of it beforehand, would find difficulty in conjecturing how it could be raised by external signs of distress. For considering the analogy of nature, if these signs be agreeable, they must give birth to a pleasant emotion leading every beholder to be pleased with human misfortunes. If they be disagreeable, as they undoubtedly are, ought not the painful emotion they produce to repel the spectator from them, in order to be relieved from pain? Such would be the conjecture, in thinking of this matter beforehand; and such would be the effect, were man purely a selfish being. But the benevolence of our nature gives a very different direction to the painful passion of sympathy, and to the desire involved in it. Far from flying from distress, we fly to it in order to afford relief; and our sympathy cannot be otherwise gratified than by giving all the succour in our power[46]. Thus external signs of distress, though disagreeable, are attractive; and the sympathy they inspire us with is a powerful cause, impelling us to afford relief even to a stranger as if he were our friend or blood-relation.

This branch of human nature concerning the external signs of passion, is so finely adjusted to answer its end, that those who understand it the best will admire it the most. These external signs, being all of them resolvable into colour, figure, and motion, should not naturally make any deep impression on a spectator. And supposing them qualified for making deep impressions, we have seen above, that the effects they produce are not what would be expected. We cannot therefore account otherwise for the operation of these external signs, than by ascribing it to the original constitution of human nature. To improve the social state, by making us instinctively rejoice with the glad of heart, weep with the mourner, and shun those who threaten danger, is a contrivance illustrious for its wisdom as well as benevolence. With respect to the external signs of distress in particular, to judge of the excellency of their contrivance, we need only reflect upon several other means seemingly more natural, that would not have answered the end proposed. I am attracted by this amusing speculation, and will not ask pardon for indulging in it. We shall in the first place reverse the truth, by putting the case that the external signs of joy were disagreeable, and the external signs of distress agreeable. This is no whimsical supposition; for these external signs, so far as can be gathered from their nature, seem indifferent to the production of pleasure or pain. Admitting then the supposition, the question is, How would our sympathy operate? There is no occasion to deliberate for an answer. Sympathy, upon that supposition, would be not less destructive, than according to the real case it is beneficial. We should be incited, to cross the happiness of others if its external signs were disagreeable to us, and to augment their distress if its external signs were agreeable. I make a second supposition, That the external signs of distress were indifferent to us, and productive neither of pleasure nor pain. This would annihilate the strongest branch of sympathy, that which is raised by means of sight. And it is evident, that reflective sympathy, felt by those only who have more than an ordinary share of sensibility, would be far from being sufficient to fulfil the ends of the social state. I shall approach nearer truth in a third supposition, That the external signs of distress being disagreeable, were productive of a painful repulsive emotion. Sympathy upon this supposition would not be annihilated; but it would be rendered useless. For it would be gratified by flying from or avoiding the object, instead of clinging to it, and affording relief. The condition of man would in reality be worse than if sympathy were totally eradicated; because sympathy would only serve to plague those who feel it, without producing any good to the afflicted.

Loath to quit so interesting a subject, I add a reflection, with which I shall conclude. The external signs of passion are a strong indication, that man, by his very constitution, is framed to be open and sincere. A child, in all things obedient to the impulses of nature, hides none of its emotions: the savage and clown, who have no guide other than pure nature, expose their hearts to view by giving way to all the natural signs: and even when men learn to dissemble their sentiments, and when behaviour degenerates into art, there still remain checks, which keep dissimulation within bounds, and prevent a great part of its mischievous effects. The total suppression of the voluntary signs during any vivid passion, begets the utmost uneasiness, which cannot be endured for any considerable time. This operation becomes indeed less painful by habit: but luckily the involuntary signs, cannot by any effort be suppressed or even dissembled. An absolute hypocrisy, by which the character is concealed and a fictitious one assumed, is made impracticable; and nature has thereby prevented much harm to society. We may pronounce therefore, that nature, herself sincere and candid, intends that mankind should preserve the same character, by cultivating simplicity and truth, and banishing every sort of dissimulation that tends to mischief.

CHAP. XVI.

SENTIMENTS.

EVery thought suggested by a passion or emotion, is termed a sentiment[47].

The knowledge of the sentiments peculiar to each passion considered abstractly, will not alone enable an artist to make a just representation of nature. He ought, over and above, to be acquainted with the various appearances of the same passion in different persons. Passions, it is certain, receive a tincture from every peculiarity of character; and for that reason, it rarely happens that any two persons vent their passions precisely in the same manner. Hence the following rule concerning dramatic and epic compositions, That a passion be adjusted to the character, the sentiments to the passion, and the language to the sentiments. If nature be not faithfully copied in each of these, a defect in execution is perceived. There may appear some resemblance; but the picture upon the whole will be insipid, through want of grace and delicacy. A painter, in order to represent the various attitudes of the body, ought to be intimately acquainted with muscular motion: not less intimately acquainted with emotions and characters ought a writer to be, in order to represent the various attitudes of the mind. A general notion of the passions, in their grosser differences of strong and weak, elevated and humble, severe and gay, is far from being sufficient. Pictures formed so superficially, have little resemblance, and no expression. And yet it will appear by and by, that in many instances our reputed masters are deficient even in this superficial knowledge.

In handling the present subject, it would be endless to trace even the ordinary passions through their nicer and more minute differences. Mine shall be an humbler task; which is, to select from the best writers instances of faulty sentiments, after paving the way by some general observations.

To talk in the language of music, each passion hath a certain tone, to which every sentiment proceeding from it ought to be tuned with the greatest accuracy. This is no easy work, especially where such harmony is to be supported during the course of a long theatrical representation. In order to reach such delicacy of execution, it is necessary that a writer assume the precise character and passion of the personage represented. This requires an uncommon genius. But it is the only difficulty; for the writer, who, forgetting himself, can thus personate another, so as to feel truly and distinctly the various agitations of the passion, need be in no pain about the sentiments: these will flow without the least study, or even preconception; and will frequently be as delightfully new to himself as afterward to his reader. But if a lively picture even of a single emotion require an effort of genius; how much greater must the effort be, to compose a passionate dialogue, in which there are as many different tones of passion as there are speakers? With what ductility of feeling ought a writer to be endued who aims at perfection in such a work; when, to execute it correctly, it is necessary to assume different and even opposite characters and passions, in the quickest succession? And yet this work, difficult as it is, yields to that of composing a dialogue in genteel comedy devoid of passion; where the sentiments must be tuned to the nicer and more delicate tones of different characters. That the latter is the more difficult task, appears from considering, that a character is greatly more complex than a passion, and that passions are more distinguishable from each other than characters are. Many writers accordingly who have no genius for characters, make a shift to represent, tolerably well, an ordinary passion in its plain movements. But of all works of this kind, what is truly the most difficult, is a characteristical dialogue upon any philosophical subject. To interweave characters with reasoning, by adapting to the peculiar character of each speaker a peculiarity not only of thought but of expression, requires the perfection of genius, taste, and judgement.

How hard dialogue-writing is, will be evident, even without reasoning, from the imperfect compositions of this kind found without number in all languages. The art of mimicking any singularity in voice or gesture, is a rare talent, though directed by sight and hearing, the acutest and most lively of our external senses: how much more rare must the talent be of imitating characters and internal emotions, tracing all their different tints, and representing them in a lively manner by natural sentiments properly expressed? The truth is, such execution is too delicate for an ordinary genius; and for that reason, the bulk of writers, instead of expressing a passion like one who is under its power, content themselves with describing it like a spectator. To awake passion by an internal effort merely, without any external cause, requires great sensibility; and yet this operation is necessary not less to the writer than to the actor; because none but they who actually feel a passion, can represent it to the life. The writer’s part is much more complicated: he must join composition with action; and, in the quickest succession, be able to adopt every different character introduced in his work. But a very humble flight of imagination, may serve to convert a writer into a spectator, so as to figure, in some obscure manner, an action as passing in his sight and hearing. In this figured situation, he is led naturally to describe as a spectator, and at second hand to entertain his readers with his own observations, with cool description and florid declamation; instead of making them eye-witnesses, as it were, to a real event, and to every movement of genuine passion[48]. Thus, in the bulk of plays, a tiresome monotony prevails, a pompous declamatory style, without entering into different characters or passions.

This descriptive manner of expressing passion, has a very unhappy effect. Our sympathy is not raised by description: we must be lulled first into a dream of reality; and every thing must appear as actually present and passing in our sight[49]. Unhappy is the player of genius who acts a capital part in what may be termed a descriptive tragedy. After he has assumed the very passion that is to be represented, how must he be cramped in his action, when he is forced to utter, not the sentiments of the passion he feels, but a cold description in the language of a by-stander? It is this imperfection, I am persuaded, in the bulk of our plays, that confines our stage almost entirely to Shakespear, his many irregularities notwithstanding. In our latest English tragedies, we sometimes find sentiments tolerably well adapted to a plain passion. But it would be fruitless labour, to search in any of them for a sentiment expressive of character; and, upon that very account, all our modern performances of the dramatic kind, are intolerably insipid.

Looking back upon the foregoing observation, I am uncertain whether it will be sufficiently apprehended; for, upon this complicated subject, I find some difficulty to express myself with perspicuity. I despair not however to place this matter in the clearest light, by adding example to precept. In the front shall be set one or two examples of sentiments that appear the legitimate offspring of passion; and to them shall be opposed a few others that are descriptive only, and illegitimate. In making this comparison, I shall borrow my instances from Shakespear and Corneille, who for genius in dramatic composition stand uppermost in the rolls of fame.

Shakespear shall furnish the first instance, being of sentiments dictated by a violent and perturbed passion.

Lear.——————Filial ingratitude!
Is it not, as if this mouth should tear this hand
For lifting food to’t?—But I’ll punish home;
No, I will weep no more.—— In such a night,
To shut me out!—— Pour on, I will endure.
In such a night as this! O Regan, Gonerill,
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all—
O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that.——

Kent. Good, my Lord, enter here.

Lear. Pr’ythee, go in thy thyself, seek thine own ease,
This tempest will not give me leave to ponder
On things would hurt me more—but I’ll go in;
In, boy, go first. You houseless poverty——
Nay, get thee in; I’ll pray, and then I’ll sleep—
Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm!
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your loop’d and window’d raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these?—— O I have ta’en
Too little care of this! take physic, Pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou may’st shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.
King Lear. act 3. sc 5.

To illustrate the foregoing doctrine, one other instance of the same kind may suffice, expressing sentiments arising from remorse and despair.

Othello. Lo! I have a weapon:
A better never did itself sustain
Upon a soldier’s thigh. I’ve seen the day,
That with this little arm, and this good sword,
I’ve made my way through more impediments
Than twenty times your stop. But, oh vain boast!
Who can controul his fate? ’tis not so now.
Be not afraid, though you do see me weapon’d;
Here is my journey’s end, here is my butt,
The very sea mark of my outmost sail.
Do you go back dismay’d? ’tis a lost fear.
Man but a rush against Othello’s breast,
And he retires. Where should Othello go?
Now—— how dost thou look now? Oh ill starr’d wench!
Pale as thy smoke! when we shall meet at compt,
This look of thine will hurl my soul from heav’n,
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl,
Ev’n like thy chastity. O cursed slave!
Whip me, ye devils,
From the possession of this heav’nly sight;
Blow me about in winds, roast me in sulphur,
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire——
Oh, Desdemona! Desdemona! dead! dead! oh, oh!
Othello, act 5. sc. 9.

The sentiments here display’d flow so naturally from the passions represented, and are such genuine expressions of these passions, that it is not possible to conceive any imitation more perfect.

With regard to the French author, truth obliges me to acknowledge, that he describes in the style of a spectator, instead of expressing passion like one who feels it; and also that he is thereby betray’d into the other faults above mentioned, a tiresome monotony, and a pompous declamatory style[50]. It is scarce necessary to produce particular instances; for he never varies from this tone. I shall however take two passages at a venture, in order to be confronted with those transcribed above. In the tragedy of Cinna, Æmilia, after the conspiracy was discovered, having nothing in view but racks and death to herself and her lover, receives a pardon from Augustus, attended with the brightest circumstances of magnanimity and tenderness. This is a happy situation for representing the passions of surprise and gratitude in their different stages. These passions, raised at once to the utmost pitch, are at first too big for utterance; and Æmilia’s feelings must, for some moments, have been expressed by violent gestures only. So soon as there is a vent for words, the first expressions are naturally broken and interrupted. At last we ought to expect a tide of intermingled sentiments, occasioned by the fluctuation of the mind betwixt the two passions. Æmilia is made to behave in a very different manner. With extreme coolness she describes her own situation, as if she were merely a spectator; or rather the poet takes the task off her hands.

Et je me rens, Seigneur, à ces hautes bontés,
Je recouvre la vûe auprés de leurs clartés,
Je connois mon forfait qui me sembloit justice,
Et ce que n’avoit pû la terreur du supplice,
Je sens naitre en mon ame un repentir puissant;
Et mon cœur en secret me dit, qu’il y consent.
Le ciel a résolu votre grandeur suprême,
Et pour preuve, Seigneur, je n’en veux que moi-même;
J’ose avec vanité me donner cet éclat,
Puisqu’il change mon cœur, qu’il veut changer l’état.
Ma haine va mourir que j’ai crue immortelle,
Elle est morte, et ce cœur devient sujet fidéle,
Et prenant désormais cette haine en horreur,
L’ardeur de vous servir succede à sa fureur.
Act 5. sc. 3.

In the tragedy of Sertorius, the Queen, surprised with the news that her lover was assassinated, instead of venting any passion, degenerates into a cool spectator, even so much as to instruct the by-standers how a queen ought to behave on such an occasion.

Viriate. Il m’en fait voir ensemble, et l’auteur, et la cause.
Par cet assassinat c’est de moi qu’on dispose,
C’est mon trône, c’est moi qu’on pretend conquerir,
Et c’est mon juste choix qui seul l’a fait perir.
Madame, aprés sa perte, et parmi ces alarmes,
N’attendez point de moi de soupirs, ni de larmes;
Ce sont amusemens que dédaigne aisement
Le prompt et noble orgueil d’un vif ressentiment.
Qui pleure, l’affoiblit, qui soupire, l’exhale,
Il faut plus de fierté dans une ame royale;
Et ma douleur soumise aux soins de le venger, &c.
Act 5. sc. 3.

So much in general upon the genuine sentiments of passion. I proceed now to particular observations. And, first, Passions are seldom uniform for any considerable time: they generally fluctuate, swelling and subsiding by turns, often in a quick succession[51]. This fluctuation, in the case of a real passion, will be expressed externally by proper sentiments; and ought to be imitated in writing and acting. Accordingly, a climax shows never better than in expressing a swelling passion. The following passages shall suffice for an illustration.

Oroonoko.———— Can you raise the dead?
Pursue and overtake the wings of time?
And bring about again, the hours, the days,
The years, that made me happy?
Oroonoko, act 2. sc. 2.

Almeria.———— How hast thou charm’d
The wildness of the waves and rocks to this?
That thus relenting they have giv’n thee back
To earth, to light and life, to love and me?
Mourning Bride, act 1. sc. 7.

I would not be the villain that thou think’st
For the whole space that’s in the tyrant’s grasp,
And the rich earth to boot.
Macbeth, act 4. sc. 4.

The following passage expresses finely the progress of conviction.

Let me not stir, nor breathe, lest I dissolve
That tender, lovely form, of painted air,
So like Almeria. Ha! it sinks, it falls;
I’ll catch it ere it goes, and grasp her shade.
’Tis life! ’tis warm! ’tis she! ’tis she herself!
It is Almeria! ’tis, it is my wife!

Mourning Bride, act 2. sc. 6.

In the progress of thought, our resolutions become more vigorous as well as our passions.

If ever I do yield or give consent,
By any action, word, or thought, to wed
Another Lord; may then just Heav’n show’r down, &c.

Mourning Bride, act 1. sc. 1.

And this leads to a second observation, That the different stages of a passion, and its different directions, from its birth to its extinction, ought to be carefully represented in the sentiments, which otherwise will often be misplaced. Resentment, for example, when provoked by an atrocious injury, discharges itself first upon the author. Sentiments therefore of revenge take place of all others, and must in some measure be exhausted before the person injured think of pitying himself, or of grieving for his present distress. In the Cid of Corneille, Don Diegue having been affronted in a cruel manner, expresses scarce any sentiment of revenge, but is totally occupied in contemplating the low situation to which he was reduced by the affront.

O rage! ô desespoir! ô vieillesse ennemie!
N’ai je donc tant vecu que pour cette infamie?
Et ne suis-je blanchi dans les travaux guerriers,
Que pour voir en une jour fletrir tant de lauriers?
Mon bras, qu’avec respect toute l’Espagne admire,
Mon bras, qui tant de fois a sauvé cet empire,
Tant de fois affermi le trône de son roi,
Trahit donc ma querelle, et ne fait rien pour moi!
O cruel souvenir de ma gloire passée!
Oeuvre de tant de jours en un jour effacée!
Nouvelle dignité fatale à mon bonheur!
Precipice élevé d’ou tombe mon honneur!
Faut-il de votre éclat voir triompher le Comte,
Et mourir sans vengeance, ou vivre dans la honte?
Comte, fois de mon Prince à present gouverneur,
Ce haut rang n’admet point un homme sans honneur;
Et ton jaloux orgueil par cet affront insigne,
Malgré le choix du Roi, m’en a su rendre indigne.
Et toi, de mes exploits glorieux instrument,
Mais d’un corps tout de glace inutile ornement,
Fer jadis tant a craindre, et qui dans cette offense
M’as servi de parade, et non pas de defense,
Va quitte desormais le dernier des humains,
Passe pour me vanger en de meilleures mains.
Le Cid, act 1. sc. 4.

These sentiments are certainly not what occur to the mind in the first movements of the passion. In the same manner as in resentment, the first movements of grief are always directed upon its object. Yet with relation to the hidden and severe distemper that seized Alexander bathing in the river Cydnus, Quintus Curtius describes the first emotions of the army as directed upon themselves, lamenting that they were left without a leader far from home, and had scarce any hopes of returning in safety. Their King’s distress, which must naturally have been their first concern, occupies them but in the second place according to that author. In the Aminta of Tasso, Sylvia, upon a report of her lover’s death, which she believed certain, instead of bemoaning the loss of a beloved object, turns her thoughts upon herself, and wonders her heart does not break.

Ohime, ben son di sasso,
Poi che questa novella non m’uccide.
Act 4. sc. 2.

In the tragedy of Jane Shore, Alicia, in the full purpose of destroying her rival, has the following reflection:

Oh Jealousy! thou bane of pleasing friendship,
Thou worst invader of our tender bosoms;
How does thy rancour poison all our softness,
And turn our gentle natures into bitterness?
See where she comes! Once my heart’s dearest blessing,
Now my chang’d eyes are blasted with her beauty,
Loathe that known face, and sicken to behold her.
Act 3. sc. 1.

These are the reflections of a cool spectator. A passion while it has the ascendant, and is freely indulged, suggests not to the man who feels it any sentiment to its own prejudice. Reflections like the foregoing, occur not to him readily till the passion have spent its vigor.

A person sometimes is agitated at once by different passions. The mind in this case vibrating like a pendulum, vents itself in sentiments which partake of the same vibration. This I give as a third observation:

Queen. ‘Would I had never trod this English earth,
Or felt the flatteries that grow upon it!
Ye’ve angels faces, but Heav’n knows your hearts.
What shall become of me now! wretched lady!
I am the most unhappy woman living.
Alas! poor wenches, where are now your fortunes? [To her women.
Shipwreck’d upon a kingdom, where no pity,
No friends, no hope! no kindred weep for me!
Almost, no grave allow’d me.
Henry VIII. act 3. sc. 1.

Othello. Oh devil, devil! If that the earth could teem with woman’s tears, Each drop she falls, would prove a crocodile. Out of my sight.

Desdemona. I will not stay t’offend you. [going.

Lodovico. Truly, an obedient lady: I do beseech your Lordship, call her back.

Oth. Mistress——

Des. My Lord.

Oth. What would you with her, Sir?

Lod. Who, I, my Lord?

Oth. Ay; you did wish that I would make her turn: Sir, she can turn and turn, and yet go on; And turn again. And she can weep, Sir, weep; And she’s obedient: as you say, obedient; Very obedient—proceed you in your tears—Concerning this, Sir,—oh well-painted passion!—I am commanded home—get you away, I’ll send for you anon—Sir, I obey the mandate, And will return to Venice.—— Hence, avaunt! [Exit Desdemona.

Othello, act 4. sc. 6.

Æmilia. Oh! my good Lord, I would speak a word with you.

Othello. Yes, ’tis Æmilia—by and by—she’s dead. ’Tis like, she comes to speak of Cassio’s death; The noise was high.—Ha, no more moving? Still as the grave. Shall she come in? were’t good? I think she stirs again—No—what’s the best? If she come in, she’ll, sure, speak to my wife; My wife! my wife! What wife? I have no wife. Oh insupportable! oh heavy hour!

Othello, act 5. sc. 7.

A fourth observation is, that nature, which gave us passions, and made them extremely beneficial when moderate, intended undoubtedly that they should be subjected to the government of reason and conscience[52]. It is therefore against the order of nature, that passion in any case should take the lead in contradiction to reason and conscience. Such a state of mind is a sort of anarchy, which every one is ashamed of, and endeavours to hide or dissemble. Even love, however laudable, is attended with a conscious shame when it becomes immoderate: it is covered from the world, and disclosed only to the beloved object:

Et que l’amour souvent de remors combattu
Paroisse une foiblesse, et non une vertu.
Boileau, L’art poet. chant. 3. l. 101.

O, they love least that let men know their love.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, act 1. sc. 3.

Hence a capital rule in the representation of strong passions, that their genuine sentiments ought to be hid or dissembled as much as possible. And this holds in an especial manner with respect to criminal passions. One never counsels the commission of a crime in plain terms. Guilt must not appear in its native colours, even in thought: the proposal must be made by hints, and by representing the action in some favourable light. Of the propriety of sentiment upon such an occasion, Shakespear, in the Tempest, has given us a beautiful example. The subject is a proposal made by the usurping Duke of Milan to Sebastian, to murder his brother the King of Naples.

Antonio.—————— What might
Worthy Sebastian—O, what might—no more.
And yet, methinks, I see it in thy face,
What thou should’st be: th’occasion speaks thee, and
My strong imagination sees a crown
Dropping upon thy head.
Act 2. sc. 1.

There cannot be a finer picture of this sort, than that of King John soliciting Hubert to murder the young Prince Arthur.

K. John. Come hither, Hubert. O my gentle Hubert,
We owe thee much; within this wall of flesh
There is a soul counts thee her creditor,
And with advantage means to pay thy love.
And, my good friend, thy voluntary oath
Lives in this bosom, dearly cherished.
Give me thy hand, I had a thing to say——
But I will fit it with some better time.
By Heaven, Hubert, I’m almost asham’d
To say what good respect I have of thee.

Hubert. I am much bounden to your Majesty.

K. John. Good friend, thou hast no cause to say so yet——
But thou shalt have—and creep time ne’er so slow,
Yet it shall come for me to do thee good.
I had a thing to say—but, let it go:
The sun is in the heav’n, and the proud day,
Attended with the pleasures of the world,
Is all too wanton, and too full of gawds,
To give me audience. If the midnight-bell
Did with his iron tongue and brazen mouth
Sound one into the drowsy race of night;
If this same were a church-yard where we stand,
And thou possessed with a thousand wrongs;
Or if that surly spirit Melancholy
Had bak’d thy blood and made it heavy-thick,
Which else runs tickling up and down the veins,
Making that idiot Laughter keep men’s eyes,
And strain their cheeks to idle merriment,
(A passion hateful to my purposes);
Or if that thou could’st see me without eyes,
Hear me without thine ears, and make reply
Without a tongue, using conceit alone,
Without eyes, ears, and harmful sounds of words;
Then, in despight of broad-ey’d watchful day,
I would into thy bosom pour my thoughts.
But ah, I will not—Yet I love thee well;
And, by my troth, I think thou lov’st me well.

Hubert. So well, that what you bid me undertake,
Though that my death were adjunct to my act,
By Heav’n, I’d do’t.

K. John. Do not I know, thou would’st?
Good Hubert, Hubert, Hubert, throw thine eye
On yon young boy. I’ll tell thee what, my friend;
He is a very serpent in my way.
And, wheresoe’er this foot of mine doth tread,
He lies before me. Dost thou understand me?
Thou art his keeper.
King John, act 3. sc. 5.

As things are best illustrated by their contraries, I proceed to collect from classical authors, sentiments that appear faulty. The first class shall consist of sentiments that accord not with the passion; or, in other words, sentiments that the passion represented does not naturally suggest. In the second class, shall be ranged sentiments that may belong to an ordinary passion, but unsuitable to it as tinctured by a singular character. Thoughts that properly are not sentiments, but rather descriptions, make a third. Sentiments that belong to the passion represented, but are faulty as being introduced too early or too late, make a fourth. Vicious sentiments exposed in their native dress, instead of being concealed or disguised, make a fifth. And in the last class, shall be collected sentiments suited to no character or passion, and therefore unnatural.

The first class contains faulty sentiments of various kinds, which I shall endeavour to distinguish from each other. And first sentiments that are faulty by being above the tone of the passion.

Othello.———— O my soul’s joy!
If after every tempest come such calms,
May the winds blow till they have waken’d death:
And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas
Olympus high, and duck again as low
As hell’s from heaven!
Othello, act 2. sc. 6.

This sentiment is too strong to be suggested by so slight a joy as that of meeting after a storm at sea.

Philaster. Place me, some god, upon a pyramid
Higher than hills of earth, and lend a voice
Loud as your thunder to me, that from thence
I may discourse to all the under-world
The worth that dwells in him.
Philaster of Beaumont and Fletcher, act 4.

Secondly, Sentiments below the tone of the passion. Ptolemy, by putting Pompey to death, having incurred the displeasure of Cæsar, was in the utmost dread of being dethroned. In this agitating situation, Corneille makes him utter a speech full of cool reflection, that is in no degree expressive of the passion.

Ah! si je t’avois crû, je n’aurois pas de maître,
Je serois dans le trône où le Ciel m’a fait naître;
Mais c’est une imprudence assez commune aux rois,
D’ecouter trop d’avis, et se tromper au choix.
Le Destin les aveugle au bord du précipice,
Ou si quelque lumiere en leur ame se glisse,
Cette fausse clarté dont il les eblouit,
Le plonge dans une gouffre, et puis s’evanouit.
La mort de Pompée, act 4. sc. 1.

In Les Freres ennemies of Racine, the second act is opened with a love-scene. Hemon talks to his mistress of the torments of absence, of the lustre of her eyes, that he ought to die no where but at her feet, and that one moment of absence was a thousand years. Antigone on her part acts the coquette, and pretends she must be gone to wait on her mother and brother, and cannot stay to listen to his courtship. This is odious French gallantry, below the dignity of the passion of love. It would scarce be excusable in painting modern French manners; and is insufferable where the ancients are brought upon the stage. The manners painted in the Alexandre of the same author are not more just. French gallantry prevails there throughout.

Third. Sentiments that agree not with the tone of the passion; as where a pleasant sentiment is grafted upon a painful passion, or the contrary. In the following instances the sentiments are too gay for a serious passion.

No happier talk these faded eyes pursue;
To read and weep is all they now can do.
Eloisa to Abelard, l. 47.

Again,

Heav’n first taught letters for some wretch’s aid,
Some banish’d lover, or some captive maid;
They live, they speak, they breathe what love inspires,
Warm from the soul, and faithful to its fires;
The virgin’s wish without her fears impart,
Excuse the blush, and pour out all the heart;
Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the pole.
Eloisa to Abelard, l. 51.

These thoughts are pretty; they suit Pope extremely, but not Eloisa.

Satan, enraged by a threatening of the angel Gabriel, answers thus:

Then when I am thy captive talk of chains,
Proud limitary cherub; but ere then
Far heavier load thyself expect to feel
From my prevailing arm, though Heaven’s King
Ride on thy wings, and thou with thy compeers,
Us’d to the yoke, draw’st his triumphant wheels
In progress through the road of heav’n star-pav’d.
Paradise Lost, book 4.

The concluding epithet forms a grand and delightful image, which cannot be the genuine offspring of rage.

Fourth. Sentiments too artificial for a serious passion. I give for the first example a speech of Piercy expiring:

O, Harry, thou hast robb’d me of my growth:
I better brook the loss of brittle life,
Than those proud titles thou hast won of me;
They wound my thoughts, worse than thy sword my flesh.
But thought’s the slave of life, and life time’s fool;
And time, that takes survey of all the world,
Must have a stop.
First part, Henry IV. act 5. sc. 9.

Livy inserts the following passage in a plaintive oration of the Locrenses accusing Pleminius the Roman legate of oppression.

“In hoc legato vestro, nec hominis quicquam est, Patres Conscripti, præter figuram et speciem; neque Romani civis, præter habitum vestitumque, et sonum linguæ Latinæ. Pestis et bellua immanis, quales fretum, quondam, quo ab Sicilia dividimur, ad perniciem navigantium circumsedisse, fabulæ ferunt[53].”

Congreve shows a fine taste in the sentiments of the Mourning Bride. But in the following passage the picture is too artful to be suggested by severe grief:

Almeria. O no! Time gives increase to my afflictions.
The circling hours, that gather all the woes
Which are diffus’d through the revolving year,
Come heavy-laden with th’ oppressing weight
To me; with me, successively, they leave
The sighs, the tears, the groans, the restless cares,
And all the damps of grief, that did retard their flight,
They shake their downy wings, and scatter all
The dire collected dews on my poor head;
Then fly with joy and swiftness from me.
Act 1. sc. 1.

In the same play, Almeria seeing a dead body, which she took to be Alphonso’s, expresses sentiments strained and artificial, which nature suggests not to any person upon such an occasion:

Had they, or hearts, or eyes, that did this deed?
Could eyes endure to guide such cruel hands?
Are not my eyes guilty alike with theirs,
That thus can gaze, and yet not turn to stone?
—I do not weep! The springs of tears are dry’d,
And of a sudden I am calm, as if
All things were well; and yet my husband’s murder’d!
Yes, yes, I know to mourn! I’ll sluice this heart,
The source of wo, and let the torrent loose.
Act 5. sc. 11.

Lady Trueman. How could you be so cruel to defer giving me that joy which you knew I must receive from your presence? You have robb’d my life of some hours of happiness that ought to have been in it.

Drummer, act 5.

Pope’s Elegy to the memory of an unfortunate lady, expresses delicately the most tender concern and sorrow for the deplorable fate of a person of worth. A poem of this kind, deeply serious and pathetic, rejects all fiction with disdain. We therefore can give no quarter to the following passage, which is eminently discordant with the subject. It is not the language of the heart, but of the imagination indulging its flights at ease. It would be a still more severe censure, if it should be ascribed to imitation, copying indiscreetly what has been said by others.

What though no weeping loves thy ashes grace,
Nor polish’d marble emulate thy face?
What though no sacred earth allow thee room,
Nor hallow’d dirge be muttered o’er thy tomb?
Yet shall thy grave with rising flow’rs be drest,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast:
There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow,
There the first roses of the year shall blow;
While angels with their silver wings o’ershade
The ground, now sacred by thy reliques made.

Fifth. Fanciful or sinical sentiments, sentiments that degenerate into point or conceit, however they may amuse in an idle hour, can never be the offspring of any serious or important passion. In the Ierusalem of Tasso, Tancred, after a single combat, spent with fatigue and loss of blood, falls into a swoon. In this situation, understood to be dead, he is discovered by Erminia, who was in love with him to distraction. A more happy situation cannot be imagined, to raise grief in an instant to its highest pitch; and yet, in venting her sorrow, she descends most abominably to antithesis and conceit, even of the lowest kind.

E in lui versò d’inessicabil vena
Lacrime, e voce di sospiri mista.
In che misero punto hor qui me mena
Fortuna? a che veduta amara e trista?
Dopo gran tempo i’ ti ritrovo à pena
Tancredi, e ti riveggio, e non son vista,
Vista non son da te, benche presente
E trovando ti perdo eternamente.
Cant. 19. st. 105.

Armida’s lamentation respecting her lover Rinaldo[54], is in the same vitious taste.

Queen. Give me no help in lamentation,
I am not barren to bring forth complaints:
All springs reduce their currents to mine eyes,
That I, being govern’d by the wat’ry moon,
May send forth plenteous tears to drown the world.
Ah, for my husband, for my dear Lord Edward.
King Richard III. act 2. sc. 2.

Jane Shore. Let me be branded for the public scorn,
Turn’d forth, and driven to wander like a vagabond,
Be friendless and forsaken, seek my bread
Upon the barren wild, and desolate waste,
Feed on my sighs, and drink my falling tears;
Ere I consent to teach my lips injustice,
Or wrong the orphan who has none to save him.
Jane Shore, act 4.

Give me your drops, ye soft-descending rains,
Give me your streams, ye never-ceasing springs,
That my sad eyes may still supply my duty,
And feed an everlasting flood of sorrow.
Jane Shore, act 5.

Jane Shore utters her last breath in a witty conceit.

Then all is well, and I shall sleep in peace——
’Tis very dark, and I have lost you now——
Was there not something I would have bequeath’d you?
But I have nothing left me to bestow,
Nothing but one sad sigh. Oh mercy, Heav’n! [Dies.
Act 5.

Gilford to Lady Jane Gray, when both were condemned to die:

Thou stand’st unmov’d;
Calm temper sits upon thy beauteous brow;
Thy eyes that flow’d so fast for Edward’s loss,
Gaze unconcern’d upon the ruin round thee,
As if thou hadst resolv’d to brave thy fate,
And triumph in the midst of desolation.
Ha! see, it swells, the liquid crystal rises,
It starts in spight of thee—— but I will catch it,
Nor let the earth be wet with dew so rich.
Lady Jane Gray, act 4. near the end.

The concluding sentiment is altogether sinical, unsuitable to the importance of the occasion, and even to the dignity of the passion of love.

Corneille, in his Examen of the Cid[55], answering an objection, that his sentiments are sometimes too much refined for persons in deep distress, observes, that if poets did not indulge sentiments more ingenious or refined than are prompted by passion, their performances would often be low; and extreme grief would never suggest but exclamations merely. This is in plain language to assert, That forced thoughts are more relished than such as are natural, and therefore ought to be preferred.

The second class is of sentiments that may belong to an ordinary passion, but are not perfectly concordant with it, as tinctured by a singular character. In the last act of that excellent comedy, The Careless Husband, Lady Easy, upon Sir Charles’s reformation, is made to express more violent and turbulent sentiments of joy, than are consistent with the mildness of her character.

Lady Easy. O the soft treasure! O the dear reward of long-desiring love—— Thus! thus to have you mine, is something more than happiness, ’tis double life, and madness of abounding joy.

If the sentiments of a passion ought to be suited to a peculiar character, it is still more necessary that sentiments devoid of passion be suited to the character. In the 5th act of the Drummer, Addison makes his gardener act even below the character of an ignorant credulous rustic: he gives him the behaviour of a gaping idiot.

The following instances are descriptions rather than sentiments, which compose a third class.

Of this descriptive manner of painting the passions, there is in the Hippolytus of Euripides, act 5. an illustrious instance, viz. the speech of Theseus, upon hearing of his son’s dismal exit. In Racine’s tragedy of Esther, the Queen hearing of the decree issued against her people, instead of expressing sentiments suitable to the occasion, turns her attention upon herself, and describes with accuracy her own situation.

Juste Ciel? Tout mon sang dans mes veines se glace.
Act 1. sc. 3.

Again,

Aman. C’en est fait. Mon orgueil est forcé de plier,
L’inexorable Aman est reduit a prier.
Esther, act 3. sc. 5.

Athalie. Quel prodige nouveau me trouble et m’embarrasse?
La douceur de sa voix, son enfance, sa grace,
Font insensiblement à mon inimitié
Succéder—— Je serois sensible a la pitié?
Athalie, act 2. sc. 7.

Titus. O de ma passion fureur desesperée!
Brutus of Voltaire, act 3. sc. 6.

What other are the foregoing instances than describing the passion another feels?

An example is given above of remorse and despair expressed by genuine and natural sentiments. In the fourth book of Paradise Lost, Satan is made to express his remorse and despair in sentiments, which though beautiful, are not altogether natural. They are rather the sentiments of a spectator, than of a person who actually is tormented with these passions.

The fourth class is of sentiments introduced too early or too late.

Some examples mentioned above belong to this class. Add the following from Venice preserv’d, act 5. at the close of the scene betwixt Belvidera and her father Priuli. The account given by Belvidera of the danger she was in, and of her husband’s threatening to murder her, ought naturally to have alarmed her relenting father, and to have made him express the most perturbed sentiments. Instead of which he dissolves into tenderness and love for his daughter, as if he had already delivered her from danger, and as if there were a perfect tranquillity.

Canst thou forgive me all my follies past?
I’ll henceforth be indeed a father; never,
Never more thus expose, but cherish thee,
Dear as the vital warmth that feeds my life,
Dear as these eyes that weep in fondness o’er thee:
Peace to thy heart.

Immoral sentiments exposed in their native colours, instead of being concealed or disguised, compose the fifth class.

The Lady Macbeth projecting the death of the King, has the following soliloquy:

—————— The raven himself’s not hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come all you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to th’ toe, top-full
Of direct cruelty; make thick my blood,
Stop up th’ access and passage to remorse
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose.
Macbeth, act 1. sc. 7.

This speech is not natural. Murder under trust was never perpetrated even by the most hardened miscreant without compunction. And that the lady here must have been in horrible agitation appears, from her invoking the infernal spirits to fill her with cruelty, and to stop up all avenues to remorse. But in this state of mind, it is a never-failing device of self-deceit, to draw the thickest veil over the wicked action, and to extenuate it by all circumstances that imagination can suggest. And if the crime cannot bear disguise, the next attempt is, to thrust it out of mind altogether, and to rush on to action without thought. This last was the husband’s method.

Strange things I have in head, that will to hand;
Which must be acted, ere they must be scann’d.
Act 3. sc. 5.

The lady follows neither of these courses, but in a deliberate manner endeavours to fortify her heart in the commission of an execrable crime, without even attempting a disguise. This I think is not natural. I hope there is no such wretch to be found, as is here represented. In the Pompey of Corneille[56], Photine counsels a wicked action in the plainest terms without disguise.

Seigneur, n’attirez point le tonnerre en ces lieux,
Rangez-vous du parti des destins et des dieux,
Et sans les accuser d’injustice, ou d’outrage,
Puis qu’ils font les heureux, adorez leur ouvrage;
Quels que soient leurs decrets, déclarez-vouz pour eux,
Et pour leur obéir, perdez le malheureux.
Pressé de toutes parts des coléres celestes,
Il en vient dessus vous faire fondre les restes;
Et sa tête qu’à peine il a pû dérober,
Tout prête de choir, cherche avec qui tomber.
Sa retraite chez vous en effet n’est qu’un crime;
Elle marque sa haine, et non pas son estime;
Il ne vient que vous perdre en venant prendre port,
Et vous pouvez douter s’il est digne de mort!
Il devoit mieux remplir nos vœux et notre attente,
Faire voir sur ses nefs la victoire flotante;
Il n’eût ici trouvé que joye et que festins,
Mais puisqu’il est vaincu, qu’il s’en prenne aux destins
J’en veux à sa disgrace et non à sa personne,
J’exécute à regret ce que le ciel ordonne,
Et du même poignard, pour César destiné,
Je perce en soupirant son cœur infortuné.
Vouz ne pouvez enfin qu’aux dépens de sa tête
Mettre à l’abri la vôtre et parer la tempête.
Laissez nommer sa mort un injuste attentat,
La justice n’est pas une vertu d’etat.
Le choix des actions, ou mauvaises, ou bonnes,
Ne fait qu’anéantir la force des couronnes;
Le droit des rois consiste à ne rien épargner;
La timide équité détruit l’art de regner,
Quand on craint d’être injuste on a toûjours à craindre,
Et qui veut tout pouvoir doit oser tout enfraindre,
Fuir comme un deshonneur la vertu qui le pert,
Et voler sans scrupule au crime qui lui fert.

In the tragedy of Esther[57], Haman acknowledges, without disguise, his cruelty, insolence, and pride. And there is another example of the same kind in the Agamemnon of Seneca[58]. In the tragedy of Athalie[59], Mathan, in cool blood, relates to his friend many black crimes he had been guilty of to satisfy his ambition.

In Congreve’s Double-dealer, Maskwell, instead of disguising or colouring his crimes, values himself upon them in a soliloquy:

Cynthia, let thy beauty gild my crimes; and whatsoever I commit of treachery or deceit, shall be imputed to me as a merit.—— Treachery! what treachery? Love cancels all the bonds of friendship, and sets men right upon their first foundations.

Act 2. sc. 8.

In French plays, love, instead of being hid or disguised, is treated as a serious concern, and of greater importance than fortune, family, or dignity. I suspect the reason to be, that in the capital of France, love, by the easiness of intercourse, has dwindled down from a real passion to be a connection that is regulated entirely by the mode or fashion[60]. This may in some measure excuse their writers, but will never make their plays be relished among foreigners.

Maxime. Quoi, trahir, mon ami!

Euphorbe.—— L’amour rend tout permis, Un véritable amant ne connoît point d’amis.

Cinna, act 3. sc. 1.

Cesar. Reine, tout est paisible, et la ville calmée,
Qu’un trouble assez leger avoit trop alarmée,
N’a plus à redouter le divorce intestin
Du soldat insolent, et du peuple mutin.
Mais, ô Dieux! ce moment que je vous ai quittée,
D’un trouble bien plus grand à mon ame agitée,
Et ces soins importuns qui m’arrachoient de vous
Contre ma grandeur même allumoient mon courroux.
Je lui voulois du mal de m’être si contraire,
De rendre ma presence ailleurs si necessaire.
Mais je lui pardonnois au simple souvenir
Du bonheur qu’a ma flâme elle fait obtenir.
C’est elle dont je tiens cette haute espérance,
Qui flate mes desirs d’une illustre apparence,
Et fait croire à Cesar qu’il peut former de vœux,
Qu’il n’est pas tout-à-fait indigne de vos feux,
Et qu’il peut en pretendre une juste conquête,
N’ayant plus que les Dieux au dessus de sa tête.
Oui, Reine, si quelqu’un dans ce vaste univers
Pouvoit porter plus haut la gloire de vos fers;
S’il étoit quelque trône où vous puissiez paroître
Plus dignement assise en captivant son maître,
J’irois, j’irois à lui, moins pour le lui ravir,
Que pour lui disputer le droit de vous servir;
Et je n’aspirerois au bonheur de vous plaire,
Qu’aprés avoir mis bas un si grand adversaire.
C’etoit pour acquerir un droit si précieux,
Que combatoit par tout mon bras ambitieux,
Et dans Pharsale même il a tiré l’epée
Plus pour le conserver, que pour vaincre Pompée.
Je l’ai vaincu, Princesse, et le Dieu de combats
M’y favorisoit moins que vos divins appas.
Ils conduisoient ma main, ils enfloient mon courage,
Cette pleine victoire est leur dernier ouvrage,
C’est l’effet des ardeurs qu’ils daignoient m’inspirer;
Et vos beaux yeux enfin m’ayant fait soûpirer,
Pour faire que votre ame avec gloire y réponde,
M’ont rendu le premier, et de Rome, et du monde;
C’est ce glorieux titre, à présent effectif,
Que je viens ennoblir par celui de captif;
Heureux, si mon ésprit gagne tant sur le vôtre,
Qu’il en estime l’un, et me permette l’autre.
Pompée, act 4. sc. 3.

The last class comprehends sentiments that are unnatural, as being suited to no character nor passion. These may be subdivided into three branches: first, sentiments unsuitable to the constitution of man and the laws of his nature; second, inconsistent sentiments; third, sentiments that are pure rant and extravagance.

When the fable is of human affairs, every event, every incident, and every circumstance, ought to be natural, otherwise the imitation is imperfect. But an imperfect imitation is a venial fault, compared with that of running cross to nature. In the Hippolytus of Euripides[61], Hippolytus, wishing for another self in his own situation, How much (says he) should I be touched with his misfortune! as if it were natural to grieve more for the misfortunes of another than for one’s own.

Osmyn. Yet I behold her—yet—and now no more.
Turn your lights inward, Eyes, and view my thought,
So shall you still behold her—’twill not be.
O impotence of sight! mechanic sense
Which to exterior objects ow’st thy faculty,
Not seeing of election, but necessity.
Thus do our eyes, as do all common mirrors,
Successively reflect succeeding images.
Nor what they would, but must; a star or toad;
Just as the hand of Chance administers!
Mourning Bride, act 2. sc. 8.

No man, in his senses, ever thought of applying his eyes to discover what passes in his mind; far less of blaming his eyes for not seeing a thought or idea. In Moliere’s L’Avare[62], Harpagon being robbed of his money, seizes himself by the arm, mistaking it for that of the robber. And again he expresses himself as follows:

Je veux aller querir la justice, et faire donner la question à toute ma maison; à servantes, à valets, à fils, à fille, et à moi aussi.

This is so absurd as scarce to provoke a smile if it be not at the author.

Of the second branch the following are examples.

—————— Now bid me run
And I will strive with things impossible,
Yea get the better of them.
Julius Cæsar, act 2. sc. 3.

Vos mains seules ont droit de vaincre un invincible.
Le Cid, act 5. sc. last.

Que son nom soit beni. Que son nom soit chanté.
Que l’on celebre ses ouvrages
Au de la de l’eternité.

Esther, act 5. sc. last.
Me miserable! which way shall I fly
Infinite wrath and infinite despair?
Which way I fly is hell: myself am hell:
And in the lowest deep, a lower deep
Still threat’ning to devour me, opens wide;
To which, the hell I suffer seems a heav’n.
Paradise Lost, book 4.

Of the third branch, take the following samples.

Lucan, talking of Pompey’s sepulchre,

—————— Romanum nomen, et omne
Imperium Magno est tumuli modus. Obrue saxa
Crimine plena deûm. Si tota est Herculis Oete,
Et juga tota vacant Bromio Nyseia; quare
Unus in Egypto Magno lapis? Omnia Lagi
Rura tenere potest, si nullo cespite nomen
Hæserit. Erremus populi, cinerumque tuorum,
Magne, metu nullas Nili calcemus arenas.
L. 8. l. 798.

Thus in Rowe’s translation:

Where there are seas, or air, or earth, or skies,
Where-e’er Rome’s empire stretches, Pompey lies.
Far be the vile memorial then convey’d!
Nor let this stone the partial gods upbraid.
Shall Hercules all Oeta’s heights demand,
And Nysa’s hill for Bacchus only stand;
While one poor pebble is the warrior’s doom
That fought the cause of liberty and Rome?
If fate decrees he must in Egypt lie,
Let the whole fertile realm his grave supply,
Yield the wide country to his awful shade,}
Nor let us dare on any part to tread,}
Fearful we violate the mighty dead.}

The following passages are pure rant. Coriolanus speaking to his mother,

What is this?
Your knees to me? to your corrected son?
Then let the pebbles on the hungry beach
Fillop the stars: then let the mutinous winds
Strike the proud cedars ’gainst the fiery sun:
Murd’ring impossibility, to make
What cannot be, slight work.
Coriolanus, act 5. sc. 3.

Cæsar.———— Danger knows full well,
That Cæsar is more dangerous than he.
We were two lions litter’d in one day,
And I the elder and more terrible.
Julius Cæsar, act 2. sc. 4.

Almahide. This day——
I gave my faith to him, he his to me.

Almanzor. Good Heav’n, thy book of fate before me lay
But to tear out the journal of this day.
Or if the order of the world below,}
Will not the gap of one whole day allow,}
Give me that minute when she made that vow.}
That minute ev’n the happy from their bliss might give,
And those who live in grief a shorter time would live.
So small a link if broke, th’ eternal chain
Would like divided waters join again.
Conquest of Granada, act 3.

Almanzor.—— I’ll hold it fast
As life; and when life’s gone, I’ll hold this last.
And if thou tak’st it after I am slain,
I’ll send my ghost to fetch it back again.
Conquest of Granada, part 2. act 3.

Lynairaxa. A crown is come, and will not fate allow.
And yet I feel something like death is near.
My guards, my guards——
Let not that ugly skeleton appear.
Sure Destiny mistakes; this death’s not mine;
She doats, and meant to cut another line.
Tell her I am a queen—— but ’tis too late;
Dying, I charge rebellion on my fate;
Bow down, ye slaves——
Bow quickly down and your submission show;
I’m pleas’d to taste an empire ere I go. [Dies.
Conquest of Granada, part 2. act. 5.

Ventidius. But you, ere love misled your wand’ring eyes,
Were, sure, the chief and best of human race,
Fram’d in the very pride and boast of nature,
So perfect, that the gods who form’d you wonder’d
At their own skill, and cry’d, A lucky hit
Has mended our design.
Dryden, All for Love, act 1.

Not to talk of the impiety of this sentiment, it is ludicrous instead of being lofty.

The famous Epitaph on Raphael is not less absurd than any of the foregoing passages:

Raphael, timuit, quo sospite, vinci
Rerum magna parens, et moriente mori.

Imitated by Pope in his Epitaph on Sir Godfrey Kneller:

Living, great Nature fear’d he might outvie
Her works; and dying, fears herself may die.

Such is the force of imitation; for Pope of himself would never have been guilty of a thought so extravagant.

CHAP. XVII.

Language of Passion.

AMong the particulars that compose the social part of our nature, a propensity to communicate our opinions, our emotions, and every thing that affects us, is remarkable. Bad fortune and injustice affect every one greatly; and of these we are so prone to complain, that if we have no friend or acquaintance to take part in our sufferings, we sometimes utter our complaints aloud even where there are none to listen.

But this propensity, though natural, operates not in every state of mind. A man immoderately grieved, seeks to afflict himself; and self-affliction is the gratification of the passion. Immoderate grief is therefore mute; because complaining is struggling for relief:

It is the wretch’s comfort still to have
Some small reserve of near and inward wo,
Some unsuspected hoard of inward grief,
Which they unseen may wail, and weep, and mourn,
And glutton-like alone devour.
Mourning Bride, act 1. sc. 1.

When grief subsides, it then and no sooner finds a tongue. We complain, because complaining is an effort to disburden the mind of its distress[63].

Surprise and terror are silent passions for a different reason: they agitate the mind so violently, as for a time to suspend the exercise of its faculties, and in particular that of speech.

Love and revenge, when immoderate, are not more loquacious than immoderate grief. But when these passions become moderate, they set the tongue free, and, like moderate grief, become loquacious. Moderate love, when unsuccessful, is vented in complaints; when successful, is full of joy expressed both in words and gestures.

As no passion hath any long uninterrupted existence[64] nor beats always with an equal pulse, the language suggested by passion is also unequal and interrupted. And even during an uninterrupted fit of passion, we only express in words the more capital sentiments. In familiar conversation, one who vents every single thought is justly branded with the character of loquacity. Sensible persons express no thoughts but what make some figure. In the same manner, we are only disposed to express the strongest impulses of passion, especially when it returns with impetuosity after some interruption.

I already have had occasion to observe[65], that the sentiments ought to be tuned to the passion, and the language to both. Elevated sentiments require elevated language: tender sentiments ought to be clothed in words that are soft and flowing: when the mind is depressed with any passion, the sentiments must be expressed in words that are humble, not low. Words have an intimate connection with the ideas they represent; and the representation must be imperfect, if the words correspond not precisely to the ideas. An elevated tone of language to express a plain or humble sentiment, has a bad effect by a discordant mixture of feeling. There is not less discord when elevated sentiments are dressed in low words:

Versibus exponi tragicis res comica non vult.
Indignatur item privatis ac prope Socco
Dignis carminibus narrari cœna Thyestæ.
Horace, Ars poet. l. 89.

This however excludes not figurative expression, which, within moderate bounds, communicates to the sentiment an agreeable elevation. We are sensible of an effect directly opposite, where figurative expression is indulged beyond a just measure. The opposition betwixt the expression and the sentiment, makes the discord appear greater than it is in reality[66].

At the same time, all passions admit not equally of figures. Pleasant emotions, which elevate or swell the mind, vent themselves in strong epithets and figurative expression. Humbling and dispiriting passions, on the contrary, affect to speak plain:

Et tragicus plerumque dolet sermone pedestri
Telephus et Peleus: cum pauper et exul uterque;
Projicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba,
Si curat cor spectantis tetigisse querela.
Horace, Ars poet. 95.

Figurative expression is the work of an enlivened imagination, and for that reason cannot be the language of anguish or distress. A scene of this kind is painted by Otway in colours finely adapted to the subject. There is scarce a figure in it, except a short and natural simile with which the speech is introduced.

Belvidera talking to her father of her husband:

Think you saw what pass’d at our last parting;
Think you beheld him like a raging lion,
Pacing the earth, and tearing up his steps,
Fate in his eyes, and roaring with the pain
Of burning fury; think you saw his one hand
Fix’d on my throat, while the extended other
Grasp’d a keen threat’ning dagger; oh, ’twas thus
We last embrac’d, when, trembling with revenge,
He dragg’d me to the ground, and at my bosom
Presented horrid death; cry’d out, My friends,
Where are my friends? swore, wept, rag’d, threaten’d, lov’d;
For he yet lov’d, and that dear love preserv’d me
To this last trial of a father’s pity.
I fear not death, but cannot bear a thought
That that dear hand should do th’ unfriendly office;
If I was ever then your care, now hear me;
Fly to the senate, save the promis’d lives
Of his dear friends, ere mine be made the sacrifice.
Venice preserv’d, act 5.

To preserve this resemblance betwixt words and their meaning, the sentiments of active and hurrying passions ought to be dressed in words where syllables prevail that are pronounced short or fast; for these make an impression of hurry and precipitation. Emotions, on the other hand, that rest upon their objects, are best expressed by words where syllables prevail that are pronounced long or slow. A person affected with melancholy has a languid and slow train of perceptions. The expression best suited to this state of mind, is where words not only of long but of many syllables abound in the composition. For that reason, nothing can be finer than the following passage:

In those deep solitudes, and awful cells,
Where heav’nly-pensive Contemplation dwells,
And ever-musing Melancholy reigns.
Pope, Eloisa to Abelard.

To preserve the same resemblance, another circumstance is requisite, that the language conformable to the emotion, be rough or smooth, broken or uniform. Calm and sweet emotions are best expressed by words that glide softly; surprise, fear, and other turbulent passions, require an expression both rough and broken.

It cannot have escaped any diligent inquirer into nature, that in the hurry of passion, one generally expresses that thing first which is most at heart. This is beautifully done in the following passage.

Me, me; adsum qui feci: in me convertite ferrum,
O Rutuli, mea fraus omnis.
Æneid ix. 427.

Passion has often the effect of redoubling words, the better to make them express the strong conception of the mind. This is finely represented in the following examples:

———— Thou sun, said I, fair light!
And thou enlighten’d earth, so fresh and gay!
Ye hills and dales, ye rivers, woods, and plains!
And ye that live, and move, fair creatures! tell
Tell, if ye saw, how came I thus, how here.—
Paradise Lost, b. viii. 273.

———— Both have sinn’d! but thou
Against God only; I, ’gainst God and thee:
And to the place of judgement will return.
There with my cries importune Heav’n; that all
The sentence, from thy head remov’d, may light
On me, sole cause to thee of all this woe;
Me! Me! only just object of his ire.
Paradise Lost, book x. 930.

Shakespear is superior to all other writers in delineating passion. It is difficult to say in what part he most excels, whether in moulding every passion to peculiarity of character, in discovering the sentiments that proceed from various tones of passion, or in expressing properly every different sentiment. He imposes not upon his reader, general declamation and the false coin of unmeaning words, which the bulk of writers deal in. His sentiments are adjusted, with the greatest propriety, to the peculiar character and circumstances of the speaker; and the propriety is not less perfect betwixt his sentiments and his diction. That this is no exaggeration, will be evident to every one of taste, upon comparing Shakespear with other writers, in similar passages. If upon any occasion he fall below himself, it is in those scenes where passion enters not. By endeavouring in this case to raise his dialogue above the style of ordinary conversation, he sometimes deviates into intricate thought and obscure expression[67]. Sometimes, to throw his language out of the familiar, he employs rhyme. But may it not in some measure excuse Shakespear, I shall not say his works, that he had no pattern, in his own or in any living language, of dialogue fitted for the theatre? At the same time, it ought not to escape observation, that the stream clears in its progress, and that in his later plays he has attained the purity and perfection of dialogue; an observation that, with greater certainty than tradition, will direct us to arrange his plays in the order of time. This ought to be considered by those who magnify every blemish that is discovered in the finest genius for the drama ever the world enjoy’d. They ought also for their own sake to consider, that it is easier to discover his blemishes, which lie generally at the surface, than his beauties, of which none can have a thorough relish but those who dive deep into human nature. One thing must be evident to the meanest capacity, that where-ever passion is to be display’d, Nature shows itself strong in him, and is conspicuous by the most delicate propriety of sentiment and expression[68].

I return to my subject from a digression I cannot repent of. That perfect harmony which ought to subsist among all the constituent parts of a dialogue, is a beauty, not less rare than conspicuous. As to expression in particular, were I to give instances, where, in one or other of the respects above mentioned, it corresponds not precisely to the characters, passions, and sentiments, I might from different authors collect volumes. Following therefore the method laid down in the chapter of sentiments, I shall confine my citations to the grosser errors, which every writer ought to avoid.

And, first, of passion expressed in words flowing in an equal course without interruption.

In the chapter above cited, Corneille is censured for the impropriety of his sentiments; and here, for the sake of truth, I am obliged to attack him a second time. Were I to give instances from that author of the fault under consideration, I might copy whole tragedies; for he is not less faulty in this particular, than in passing upon us his own thoughts as a spectator, instead of the genuine sentiments of passion. Nor would a comparison betwixt him and Shakespear upon the present point, redound more to his honour, than the former upon the sentiments. Racine here is less incorrect than Corneille, though many degrees inferior to the English author. From Racine I shall gather a few instances. The first shall be the description of the sea-monster in his Phædra, given by Theramene the companion of Hippolytus, and an eye-witness to the disaster. Theramene is represented in terrible agitation, which appears from the following passage, so boldly figurative as not to be excused but by violent perturbation of mind.

Le ciel avec horreur voit ce monstre sauvage,
La terre s’en émeut, l’air en est infecté,
Le flot, qui l’apporta, recule epouvanté.

Yet Theramene gives a long pompous connected description of this event, dwelling upon every minute circumstance, as if he had been only a cool spectator.

A peine nous sortions des portes de Trézene, &c.
Act 5. sc. 6.

The last speech of Atalide, in the tragedy of Bajazet, of the same author, is a continued discourse, and but a faint representation of the violent passion which forc’d her to put an end to her own life.

Enfin, c’en est donc fait, &c.
Act 5. sc. last.

Though works, not authors, are the professed subject of this critical undertaking, I am tempted by the present speculation, to transgress once again the limits prescribed, and to venture a cursory reflection upon this justly-celebrated author, That he is always sensible, generally correct, never falls low, maintains a moderate degree of dignity without reaching the sublime, paints delicately the tender passions, but is a stranger to the true language of enthusiastic or fervid passion.

If in general the language of violent passion ought to be broken and interrupted, soliloquies ought to be so in a peculiar manner. Language is intended by nature for society; and a man when alone, though he always clothes his thoughts in words, seldom gives his words utterance unless when prompted by some strong emotion; and even then by starts and intervals only[69]. Shakespear’s soliloquies may be justly established as a model; for it is not easy to conceive any model more perfect. Of his many incomparable soliloquies, I confine myself to the two following, being different in their manner.

Hamlet. Oh, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His cannon ’gainst self slaughter? O God! O God!
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
Fie on’t! O fie! ’tis an unweeded garden,
That grows to seed: things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
But two months dead, nay not so much; not two—
So excellent a king, that was, to this,
Hyperion to a satyr: so loving to my mother,
That he permitted not the winds of heav’n
Visit her face too roughly. Heav’n and earth!
Must I remember,—why, she would hang on him,
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on; yet, within a month——
Let me not think——Frailty, thy name is Woman!
A little month, or ere those shoes were old,
With which she follow’d my poor father’s body,
Like Niobe, all tears—— why she, ev’n she——
(O Heav’n! a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourn’d longer——) married with mine uncle,
My father’s brother; but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules—— Within a month——
Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing in her gauled eyes,
She married—— Oh, most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not, nor it cannot come to good.
But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue.
Hamlet, act 1. sc. 3.

Ford. Hum! ha! is this a vision? is this a dream? do I sleep? Mr Ford, awake; awake Mr Ford; there’s a hole made in your best coat, Mr Ford! this ’tis to be married! this ’tis to have linen and buck baskets! Well, I will proclaim myself what I am; I will now take the leacher; he is at my house, he cannot ’scape me; ’tis impossible he should; he cannot creep into a halfpenny-purse, nor into a pepper-box. But lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places; though what I am I cannot avoid, yet to be what I would not, shall not make me tame.

Merry Wives of Windsor, act 3. sc. last.

These soliloquies are accurate copies of nature. In a passionate soliloquy one begins with thinking aloud; and the strongest feelings only, are expressed. As the speaker warms, he begins to imagine one listening, and gradually slides into a connected discourse.

How far distant are soliloquies generally from these models? They are indeed for the most part so unhappily executed, as to give disgust instead of pleasure. The first scene of Iphigenia in Tauris discovers that princess, in a soliloquy, gravely reporting to herself her own history. There is the same impropriety in the first scene of Alcestes, and in the other introductions of Euripides, almost without exception. Nothing can be more ridiculous. It puts one in mind of that ingenious device in Gothic paintings, of making every figure explain itself by a written label issuing from its mouth. The description a parasite, in the Eunuch of Terence[70], gives of himself in the form of a soliloquy, is lively; but against all the rules of propriety; for no man, in his ordinary state of mind, and upon a familiar subject, ever thinks of talking aloud to himself. The same objection lies against a soliloquy in the Adelphi of the same author[71]. The soliloquy which makes the third scene, act third, of his Heicyra, is insufferable; for there Pamphilus, soberly and circumstantially, relates to himself an adventure which had happened to him a moment before.

Corneille is not more happy in his soliloquies than in his dialogue. Take for a specimen the first scene of Cinna.

Racine also is extremely faulty in the same respect. His soliloquies, almost without exception, are regular harangues, a chain completed in every link, without interruption or interval. That of Antiochus in Berenice[72] resembles a regular pleading, where the parties pro and con display their arguments at full length. The following soliloquies are equally destitute of propriety: Bajazet, act 3. sc. 7. Mithridate, act 3. sc. 4. & act 4. sc. 5. Iphigenia, act 4. sc. 8.

Soliloquies upon lively or interesting subjects, but without any turbulence of passion, may be carried on in a continued chain of thought. If, for example, the nature and sprightliness of the subject prompt a man to speak his thoughts in the form of a dialogue, the expression must be carried on without break or interruption, as in a dialogue betwixt two persons. This justifies Falstaff’s soliloquy upon honour:

What need I be so forward with Death, that calls not on me? Well, ’tis no matter, Honour pricks me on. But how if Honour prick me off, when I come on? how then? Can Honour set a leg? No: or an arm? No: or take away the grief of a wound? No: Honour hath no skill in surgery then? No. What is Honour? A word.—What is that word honour? Air; a trim reckoning.—— Who hath it? He that dy’d a Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. Is it insensible then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No: Why? Detraction will not suffer it. Therefore, I’ll none of it; honour is a mere scutcheon, and so ends my catechism.

First part Henry IV. act 5. sc. 2.

And even without dialogue, a continued discourse may be justified, where the soliloquy is upon an important subject that makes a strong impression, but without much agitation. For if it be at all excusable to think aloud, it is necessary that the language with the reasoning be carried on in a chain without a broken link. In this view that admirable soliloquy in Hamlet upon life and immortality, being a serene meditation upon the most interesting of all subjects, ought to escape censure. And the same consideration will justify the soliloquy that introduces the 5th act of Addison’s Cato.

The next class of the grosser errors which all writers ought to avoid, shall be of language elevated above the tone of the sentiment; of which take the following instances.

Zara. Swift as occasion, I
Myself will fly; and earlier than the morn
Wake thee to freedom. Now ’tis late; and yet
Some news few minutes past arriv’d, which seem’d
To shake the temper of the King—— Who knows
What racking cares disease a monarch’s bed?
Or love, that late at night still lights his lamp,
And strikes his rays through dusk, and folded lids,
Forbidding rest, may stretch his eyes awake,
And force their balls abroad at this dead hour.
I’ll try.
Mourning Bride, act 3. sc. 4.

The language here is undoubtedly too pompous and laboured for describing so simple a circumstance as absence of sleep. In the following passage, the tone of the language, warm and plaintive, is well suited to the passion, which is recent grief. But every one will be sensible, that in the last couplet save one, the tone is changed, and the mind suddenly elevated to be let fall as suddenly in the last couplet.

Il déteste à jamais sa coupable victoire,
Il renonce à la cour, aux humains, à la gloire;
Et se fuïant lui-même, au milieu des deserts,
Il va cacher sa peine au bout de l’univers;
La, soit que le soleil rendît le jour au monde,
Soit qu’il finît sa course au vaste sein de l’onde,
Sa voix faisoit redire aux echos attendris,
Le nom, le triste nom, de son malheureux fils.
Henriade, chant. viii. 229.

Language too artificial or too figurative for the gravity, dignity, or importance, of the occasion, may be put in a third class.

Chimene demanding justice against Rodrigue who killed her father, instead of a plain and pathetic expostulation, makes a speech stuffed with the most artificial flowers of rhetoric:

Sire, mon pere est mort, mes yeux ont vû son sang
Couler à gros bouillons de son généreux flanc;
Ce sang qui tant de fois garantit vos murailles,
Ce sang qui tant de fois vous gagna des batailles,
Ce sang qui, tout sorti fume encore de courroux
De se voir répandu pour d’autres que pour vous,
Qu’au milieu des hazards n’osoit verser la guerre,
Rodrigue en votre cour vient d’en couvrir la terre.
J’ai couru sur le lieu sans force, et sans couleur;
Je l’ai trouvé sans vie. Excusez ma douleur,
Sire; la voix me manque à ce récit funeste,
Mes pleurs et mes soupirs vous diront mieux le reste.

And again:

Son flanc etoit ouvert, et, pour mieux m’emouvoir,
Son sang sur la poussiére écrivoit mon devoire;
Ou plutôt sa valeur en cet état réduite
Me parloit par sa plaie, et hâtoit ma pursuite,
Et pour se faire entendre au plus juste des Rois,
Par cette triste bouche elle empruntoit ma voix.
Act 2. sc. 9.

Nothing can be contrived in language more averse to the tone of the passion than this florid speech. I should imagine it more apt to provoke laughter than to inspire concern or pity.

In a fourth class shall be given specimens of language too light or airy for a severe passion.

The agony a mother must feel upon the savage murder of two hopeful sons, rejects all imagery and figurative expression, as discordant in the highest degree. Therefore the following passage is undoubtedly in a bad taste:

Queen. Ah, my poor princes! ah, my tender babes,
My unblown flow’rs, new-appearing sweets!
If yet your gentle souls fly in the air,
And be not fixt in doom perpetual,
Hover about me with your airy wings,
And hear your mother’s lamentation.
Richard III. act 4. sc. 4.

Again,

K. Philip. You are as fond of grief as of your child.

Constance. Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garment with his form;
Then have I reason to be fond of grief.
King John, act 3. sc. 6.

A thought that turns upon the expression instead of the subject, commonly called a play of words, being low and childish, is unworthy of any composition, whether gay or serious, that pretends to the smallest share of dignity. Thoughts of this kind make a fifth class.

In the Aminta of Tasso[73] the lover falls into a mere play of words, demanding how he who had lost himself, could find a mistress. And for the same reason, the following passage in Corneille has been generally condemned:

Chimene. Mon pere est mort, Elvire, et la premiére épée
Dont s’est armé Rodrigue à sa trame coupée.
Pleurez, pleurez, mes yeux, et fondez-vous en eau,
La moitié de ma vie a mis l’autre au tombeau,
Et m’oblige à venger, aprés ce coup funeste,
Celle que je n’ai plus, sur celle qui me reste.
Cid, act 3. sc. 3.

To die is to be banish’d from myself:
And Sylvia is myself; banish’d from her,
Is self from self; a deadly banishment!
Two Gentlemen of Verona, act 3. sc. 3.

Countess. I pray thee, Lady, have a better cheer:
If thou ingrossest all the griefs as thine,
Thou robb’st me of a moiety.
All’s well that ends well, act 3. sc. 3.

K. Henry. O my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows!
When that my care could not with-hold thy riots,
What wilt thou do when riot is thy care?
O, thou wilt be a wilderness again,
Peopled with wolves, thy old inhabitants.
Second part, Henry IV. act 4. sc. 11.

Cruda Amarilli, che col nome ancora
D’amar, ahi lasso, amaramente insegni.
Pastor Fido, act 1. sc. 2.

Antony, speaking of Julius Cæsar:

O world! thou wast the forest of this hart;
And this, indeed, O world, the heart of thee.
How like a deer, stricken by many princes,
Dost thou here lie!
Julius Cæsar, act 3. sc. 3.

Playing thus with the sound of words, which is still worse than a pun, is the meanest of all conceits. But Shakespear, when he descends to a play of words, is not always in the wrong; for it is done sometimes to denote a peculiar character; as is the following passage.

King Philip. What say’st thou, boy? look in the lady’s face.

Lewis. I do, my Lord, and in her eye I find
A wonder, or a wond’rous miracle;
The shadow of myself form’d in her eye;
Which being but the shadow of your son,
Becomes a sun, and makes your son a shadow.
I do protest, I never lov’d myself,
Till now infixed I beheld myself
Drawn in the flatt’ring table of her eye.

Faulconbridge. Drawn in the flatt’ring table of her eye!
Hang’d in the frowning wrinkle of her brow!
And quarter’d in her heart! he doth espy
Himself Love’s traitor: this is pity now,
That hang’d, and drawn, and quarter’d, there should be,
In such a love so vile a lout as he.
King John, act. 2. sc. 5.

A jingle of words is the lowest species of this low wit; which is scarce sufferable in any case, and least of all in an heroic poem. And yet Milton in some instances has descended to this puerility:

And brought into the world a world of wo.
—— Begirt th’ almighty throne
Beseeching or besieging——
Which tempted our attempt——
At one slight bound high overleap’d all bound,
—————— With a shout
Loud as from numbers without number.

One should think it unnecessary to enter a caveat against an expression that has no meaning, or no distinct meaning; and yet somewhat of this kind may be found even among good writers. These make a sixth class.

Sebastian. I beg no pity for this mould’ring clay.
For if you give it burial, there it takes
Possession of your earth:
If burnt and scatter’d in the air; the winds
That strow my dust, diffuse my royalty,
And spread me o’er your clime; for where one atom
Of mine shall light, know there Sebastian reigns.
Dryden, Don Sebastian King of Portugal, act 1.

Cleopatra. Now, what news my Charmion?
Will he be kind? and will he not forsake me?
Am I to live or die? nay, do I live?
Or am I dead? for when he gave his answer,
Fate took the word, and then I liv’d or dy’d.
Dryden, All for Love, act 2.

If she be coy, and scorn my noble fire,
If her chill heart I cannot move;
Why, I’ll enjoy the very love,
And make a mistress of my own desire.
Cowley, poem inscribed, The Request.

His whole poem, inscribed, My Picture, is a jargon of the same kind:

—————— ’Tis he, they cry, by whom
Not men, but war itself is overcome.
Indian Queen.

Such empty expressions are finely ridiculed in the Rehearsal:

Was’t not unjust to ravish hence her breath,
And in life’s stead to leave us nought but death?
Act 4. sc 1.

CHAP. XVIII.

Beauty of Language.

OF all the fine arts, painting only and sculpture are in their nature imitative. A field laid out with taste, is not, properly speaking, a copy or imitation of nature, but nature itself embellished. Architecture deals in originals, and copies not from nature. Sound and motion may in some measure be imitated by music; but for the most part music, like architecture, deals in originals. Language has no archetype in nature, more than music or architecture; unless where, like music, it is imitative of sound or motion. In the description of particular sounds, language sometimes happily furnisheth words, which, beside their customary power of exciting ideas, resemble by their softness or harshness the sound described: and there are words, which, by the celerity or slowness of pronunciation, have some resemblance to the motion they signify. This imitative power of words goes one step farther. The loftiness of some words, makes them proper symbols of lofty ideas: a rough subject is imitated by harsh-sounding words; and words of many syllables pronounced slow and smooth, are naturally expressive of grief and melancholy. Words have a separate effect on the mind, abstracting from their signification and from their imitative power. They are more or less agreeable to the ear, by the roundness, sweetness, faintness, or roughness, of their tones.

These are beauties, but not of the first rank: They are relished by those only, who have more delicacy of sensation than belongs to the bulk of mankind. Language possesseth a beauty superior greatly in degree, of which we are eminently conscious when a thought is communicated in a strong and lively manner. This beauty of language, arising from its power of expressing thought, is apt to be confounded with the beauty of the thought expressed; which beauty, by a natural transition of feeling among things intimately connected, is convey’d to the expression, and makes it appear more beautiful[74]. But these beauties, if we wish to think accurately, must be carefully distinguished from each other. They are indeed so distinct, that we sometimes are conscious of the highest pleasure language can afford, when the subject expressed is disagreeable. A thing that is loathsome, or a scene of horror to make one’s hair stand on end, may be described in the liveliest manner. In this case, the disagreeableness of the subject, doth not even obscure the agreeableness of the description. The causes of the original beauty of language considered as significant, which is a branch of the present subject, will be explained in their order. I shall only at present observe, that this beauty is the beauty of means fitted to an end, viz. the communication of thought. And hence it evidently appears, that of several expressions all conveying the same thought, the most beautiful, in the sense now mentioned, is that which in the most perfect manner answers its end.

The several beauties of language above mentioned, being of different kinds and distinguishable from each other, ought to be handled separately. I shall begin with those beauties of language which arise from sound; after which will follow the beauties of language considered as significant. This order appears natural; for the sound of a word is attended to, before we consider its signification. In a third section come those singular beauties of language that are derived from a resemblance betwixt sound and signification. The beauties of verse I propose to handle in the last section. For though the foregoing beauties are found in verse as well as in prose; yet verse has many peculiar beauties, which for the sake of perspicuity must be brought under one view. And versification, at any rate, is a subject of so great importance, as to deserve a place by itself.