The 'Mirror.'—Vol. II. No. 74.
'Dreams depend in part on the state of the air; that which has power over the passions may reasonably be presumed to have power over the thoughts of men. Now, most people know by experience how effectual, in producing joy and hope, are pure skies and sunshine, and that a long continuance of dark weather brings on solicitude and melancholy. This is particularly the case with those persons whose nervous system has been weakened by a sedentary life and much thinking; and they, as I hinted formerly, are most subject to troublesome dreams. If the external air can affect the motions of so heavy a substance as mercury in the tube of a barometer, we need not wonder that it should affect those finer liquids that circulate through the human body.
'How often, too, do thoughts arise during the day which we cannot account for, as uncommon, perhaps, and incongruous, as those which compose our dreams! Once, after riding thirty miles in a very high wind, I remember to have passed a night of dreams that were beyond description terrible; insomuch that I at last found it expedient to keep myself awake, that I might no more be tormented with them. Had I been superstitious, I should have thought that some disaster was impending. But it occurred to me that the tempestuous weather I had encountered the preceding day might be the occasion of all these horrors; and I have since, in some medical author, met with a remark to justify the conjecture.'
The 'Mirror.'—Vol. III. No. 79.
Of Pastoral Poetry.
'It may be doubted whether the representation of sentiments belonging to the real inhabitants of the country, who are strangers to all refinement, or those entertained by a person of an elegant and cultivated mind, who from choice retires into the country with a view of enjoying those pleasures which it affords, is calculated to produce a more interesting picture. If the former is recommended by its naïveté and simplicity, it may be expected that the latter should have the preference in point of beauty and variety.
'The enlargement of the field of pastoral poetry would surely be of advantage, considering how much the common topics of that species of writing are already exhausted. We are become weary of the ordinary sentiments of shepherds, which have been so often repeated, and which have usually nothing but the variety of expression to recommend them. The greater part of the productions which have appeared under the name of pastorals are, accordingly, so insipid as to have excited little attention; which is the more remarkable because the subjects which they treat of naturally interest the affections, and are easily painted in such delusive colours as tend to soothe the imagination by romantic dreams of happiness.'
The 'Mirror.'—Vol. III. No. 84.