WIT, SPIRIT, INTELLECT.
A man who had some knowledge of the human heart, was consulted upon a tragedy which was to be represented; and he answered, there was so much wit in the piece, that he doubted of its success. What! you will exclaim, is that a fault, at a time when every one is in search of wit—when each one writes but to show that he has it—when the public even applaud the falsest thoughts, if they are brilliant?—Yes, doubtless, they will applaud the first day, and be wearied the second.
What is called wit, is sometimes a new comparison, sometimes a subtle allusion; here, it is the abuse of a word, which is presented in one sense, and left to be understood in another; there, a delicate relation between two ideas not very common. It is a singular metaphor; it is the discovery of something in an object which does not at first strike the observation, but which is really in it; it is the art either of bringing together two things apparently remote, or of dividing two things which seem to be united, or of opposing them to each other. It is that of expressing only one-half of what you think, and leaving the other to be guessed. In short, I would tell you of all the different ways of showing wit, if I had more; but all these gems—and I do not here include the counterfeits—are very rarely suited to a serious work—to one which is to interest the reader. The reason is, that then the author appears, and the public desire to see only the hero; for the hero is constantly either in passion or in danger. Danger and the passions do not go in search of wit. Priam and Hecuba do not compose epigrams while their children are butchered in flaming Troy; Dido does not sigh out her soul in madrigals, while rushing to the pile on which she is about to immolate herself; Demosthenes makes no display of pretty thoughts while he is inciting the Athenians to war. If he had, he would be a rhetorician; whereas he is a statesman.
The art of the admirable Racine is far above what is called wit; but if Pyrrhus had always expressed himself in this style:
Vaincu, chargé de fers, de regrets consumé,
Brûlé de plus de feux que je n'en allumai....
Hélas! fus-je jamais si cruel que vous l'êtes?
Conquered and chained, worn out by vain desire,
Scorched by more flames than I have ever lighted....
Alas! my cruelty ne'er equalled yours!
—if Orestes had been continually saying that the "Scythians are less cruel than Hermione," these two personages would excite no emotion at all; it would be perceived that true passion rarely occupies itself with such comparisons; and that there is some disproportion between the real flames by which Troy was consumed and the flames of Pyrrhus' love—between the Scythians immolating men, and Hermione not loving Orestes. Cinna says, speaking of Pompey:
Le ciel choisit sa mort, pour servir dignement
D'une marque éternelle à ce grand changement;
Et devait cette gloire aux manes d'un tel homme,
D'emporter avec eux la liberté de Rome.
Heaven chose the death of such a man, to be
Th' eternal landmark of this mighty change.
His manes called for no less offering
Than Roman liberty.
This thought is very brilliant; there is much wit in it, as also an air of imposing grandeur. I am sure that these lines, pronounced with all the enthusiasm and art of a great actor, will be applauded; but I am also sure that the play of "Cinna," had it been written entirely in this taste, would never have been long played. Why, indeed, was heaven bound to do Pompey the honor of making the Romans slaves after his death? The contrary would be truer: the manes of Pompey should rather have obtained from heaven the everlasting maintenance of that liberty for which he is supposed to have fought and died.
What, then, would any work be which should be full of such far-fetched and questionable thoughts? How much superior to all these brilliant ideas are those simple and natural lines: