Death overthrows equally the palaces of Kings and the huts of the poor, The fecond gives it a different turn. Le pauvre en fa cabane où le chaume le couvre Et la garde qui veille aux barrieres du Louvre N'en défend pas nos Rois. The turn of the Latin poet is more figurative and lively; that of the French poet more natural and delicate. There's fomething noble in both, p. 75, 78, 79. . [Elevated thoughts, which reprefent nothing but what is great to the mind, principally heighten a difcourfe.] It is the fublimity and grandeur of a thought which properly transports and ravishes us, provided it be conformable to the fubject. For it is a general rule, that our thoughts muft fuit our matter; and nothing is more inconfiftent than to introduce fublime thoughts upon a mean fubject, which requires only thofe of the mediate kind. It were almoft better to introduce mediate thoughts upon a great fubject, which required fublime ones, p. 80. b Fortune has given you nothing greater, than the power to preferve the lives of fuch multitudes; nor nature any thing better than the will to do fo. Thus the Roman orator fpeaks to Cæfar; and an hiftorian fpeaks of the former in the following words. He owed his excellent endowments folely to himself; and his great genius prevented the conquered nations from baving the fame advantage over the Romans by genius and knowledge, the Romans had over them by valour. > Non ad perfuafionem, fed ad ftuporem rapiunt grandia. Long. de fublim, fect. 1. z Á fermone tenui fublime difcordat, fitque corruptum, quia in plano tumet. Q.1.8. c. 3. a Nihil habet nec fortuna tua majus, quam ut poffis, nec natura tua melius quàm ut velis confervare quàm plurimos. Orat. pro Lig. n. 38. b Omnia incrementa fua fibi debuit: vir ingenio maximus, qui effecit ne, quorum arma viceramus, eorum ingenio vinceremur. Vell. Paterc. lib. 1. C that But Seneca the elder fays fomething nobler and greater on this occafion, That Cicero's understanding alone was equal to the Roman empire, p. 83, 84.Cicero fpeaks very nobly of Cæfar, by faying there was no occafion to oppose the Alps against the Gauls, nor the Rhine against the Germans; though the highest mountains should be levelled, and the deepest rivers dried up, Italy would have nothing to fear; and that the brave actions and victories of Cæfar would defend it much better than the ramparts with which nature had fortified it, p. 87. e Pompey having conquered Tigranes King of Armenia, would not fuffer him to continue long at his feet, but put the crown again upon his Head. He refored him to his former condition, fays an hiftorian, thinking there was as much glory to make, as to conquer Kings, p. 88. The funeral oration of Henrietta of France, Queen of England, and that of Henrietta Anne of England, Dutchefs of Orleans (by M. Boffuet) are full of thoughts which Hermogenes calls majeftic. "Her great foul was fuperior to her birth; any other place but a throne had been unworthy of her. "As gentle, familiar, and agreeable, as firm and couragious, the knew as well how to perfuade "and convince, as to command; and could make " reafon no lefs prevalent than authority. હૈદ "Notwithstanding the ill fuccefs of his arms (fpeak"ing of King Charles I.) though he could be overcome, he could not be compelled; and as he never "refused any thing juft and reasonable when a conqueror, he always rejected whatever was inglorious and unjust when a prifoner, p. 105." Illud ingenium, quod folum populus Romanus par imperio fuo habuit. Controv. lib. 1. • Perfecit ille, ut fi montes refediffent, amnes exaruiffent, non naturæ præfidio, fed victoria faa rebufque geftis Italiam munitim haberemus. Contra Pif. n. 62. In priftinum fortunæ habitum reftituit æquè pulchrum effe u dicans, & vincere reges, & facere. Val. Max. lib. 5. c. 1.. Thoughts Thoughts of this kind carry their own conviction along with them, feize the judgment in a manner by force, move our paffions, and fire our fouls. 2. This is then a firft fpecies of thoughts which not only gain belief, as being true, but excite admiration, as being new and extraordinary. Thofe of the second fpecies are the agreeable which furprize, and strike us fometimes as much as the noble and fublime; but effect that by their beauty, which the others do by grandeur and fublimity. Sublime thoughts 3 are alfo agreeable, but it is not their agreeableness that forms their character. They please, because they have fomething great, which always charms the mind; whereas the others please only because they are agreeable. What is charming in the latter is like the foft, : tender and graceful touches we obferve in fome paintings. It is partly that foft and facetious the molle atque facetum, which Horace attributes to Virgil, and does not confift in what we call humourous, but in fome inexpreffible grace, which cannot be defined in general, and of which there is more than one kind, p. 131, 132. Comparifons taken from florid and delightful fubjects form agreeable thoughts, in like manner as thofe we take from grand fubjects form noble ones. think, fays Coftar, it is a great advantage for a "perfon to be naturally inclined to good; which un"forced difpofition is like a gentle rivulet that fol"lowing its own natural course, runs without ob"stacle between two flowery banks. Methinks, on "the contrary, those who are good from reflection, "who perform fometimes more virtuous actions than "the former, are like those fountains in which art "does violence to nature; and which after having 66 fpouted their waters to the skies, are often flopp'd "by the leaft obftacle. Balfac thinks very prettily when he fays of a little river, "This beautiful ftream is fo fond of these “meadows, that it divides itself into a thousand 66 branches, and forms an infinite number of islands "and turnings, in order to fport itself in them the "“more agreeably, p. 137, 138.” Ingenious fictions produce as agreeable effects in profe as in verfe. They are fo many diverting (pectacles to the mind, which always please persons of tafte and judgment. When Pliny the younger exhorts Cornelius Tacitus to follow his example and study, even when hunting, he tells him, that the exercise of the body exalts the mind; that woods, folitude and even the filence of fome sports, contribute very much to our thinking juftly of things; in fine, that if he carried his tablets with him, he would find that Minerva delighted as much in forefts and mountains as Diana. Here is a little fiction in a very few words. Pliny had faid before, that being at a hunting match, where they took three wild boars in toils, he fat down near the toils, with his tablets in his hand, writing down any happy thought which occured to his mind, in order, that if he should chance to return home with empty hands, yet his pocket book might be full. This is a pretty thought; but there is more beauty in his imagining that Minerva inhabits the woods as well as Diana, and that fhe is to be found in the val Jeys and mountains, p. 139, 140. The agreeable arifes generally from oppofition; efpecially in thoughts which have two meanings, and, as it were, two faces; for that figure which feems to deny what it advances, and contradict itself in out Mirum eft ut animus agitatione motumque corporis excitetur. * Jam undique sylvæ, & folitudo, ipfumque illud filentium quod venationi datur, magna cogitationis incitamenta funt... Experieris Яon Dianam magis in montibus quam Minervam inerrare. Lib. 1. .... ep. 6. AAd retia fedebam: erant in proximo non venabulum aut lancea, fed ftylus & pugillares. Medita bar aliquid, enotabamque, ut, fi manus vacuas, plenas tamen ceras reportarem. Ibid. ward ward appearance, is vaftly elegant. Sophocles fays, the prefents of an enemy are not presents, and that a cruel mother is not a mother. And Seneca tells us, a great fortune is great flavery; Tacitus, that we are fometimes guilty of the baseft and most servile actions for the fake of power. Horace fpeaks of a fage folly, of an active floth, and of a jarring concord. Some have faid, Kings were flaves upon the throne; that the body and foul are two enemies who cannot part with each other, and two friends who cannot bear each other. According to Voiture, the fecret to be healthy and gay, confifts in the exercife of the body, and the tranquillity of the mind. The fame author fays, fpeaking of a person of quality who was a prodigious genius and his friend; I am never so haughty as when I receive his letters, nor fo humble as when I am going to anfwer them, p. 146. However, we muft not fancy that a thought cannot be agreeable or beautiful, unless it glitters and carries with it a play of words; fimplicity alone fometimes forms all its beauty. This fimplicity confifts in a plain and ingenuous, but lively and rational air, fuch as is obferved fometimes in a peasant of good fense, or in a witty child, p. 150. 3. There is a third fpecies of thoughts, which have agreeablenefs mixed with delicacy; or rather, whofe 'whole agreeablenefs, beauty, and merit, are owing to their delicacy. We may fay, a delicate thought is the moft exquifite production, and as it were the quinteffence of wit. In my opinion tutors fhould reafon "upon the delicacy of the thoughts which are introduced in works of genius, with relation to that of the works of nature. The moft delicate are those which i Magna fervitus eft magna fortuna. De Confol. ad Polyb. * Omnia ferviliter pro dominatione. Hift. lib. 1. 1 Infanientis dum fapientiæ confultus erro.... Strenua nos exercet inertia... Rerum concor dia difcors. Horat. m Rerum natura nufquam magis, quàm in minimis tota. Plin. l. 21. C. 3. In arctum coacta rerum naturæ majeftas, multis'nulla fui parte mirabilior. Idem, 1. 37. Procem. F 6 nature |