It is the most agreeable talent of an hiftorian to be able to draw up his armies and fight his battles in proper expreffions, to fet before our eyes the divifions, cabals and jealoufies of great men, to lead us ftep by ftep into the feveral actions and events of his hiftory. We love to fee the fubject unfolding itself by juft degrees, and breaking upon us infenfibly, that fo we may be kept in a pleafing fufpence, and have time given us to raise our expectations, and to fide with one of the parties concerned in the relation. I confefs this fhews inore the art than the veracity of the hiftorian, but I am only to speak of him as he is qualified to pleafe the imagination. And in this refpect Livy has, perhaps, excelled all who went before him, or have written fince his time. He defcribes every thing in fo lively a manner, that his whole history is an admirable picture, and touches on fuch proper circumftances in every flory, that his reader becomes a kind of fpcctator, and feels in himself all the variety of paffions which are correfpondent to the feveral parts of the relations. But among this fet of writers there are none who more gratify and enlarge the imagination, than the authors of the new philofophy, whether we confider their theories of the earth or heavens, the difcoveries they have made by glaffes, or any other of their contemplations on nature. We are not a little pleafed to find every green leaf fwarm with millions of animals, that at their largeft growth are not visible to the naked eye. There is fomething very engaging to the fancy, as well as to our reafon, in the treatifes of metals, minerals, plants, and meteors. But when we furvey the whole earth at once, and the feveral planets that lie within its neighbourhood, we are filled with a pleafing aft nifhment, to fee fo many worlds hanging one above another, and fliding round their axles in fuch an amazing pomp and folemnity. If, after this, we contemplate thofe wild fields of Ether, that reach in height as far as from Saturn to the fix'd stars, and run abroad almoft to an infinitude, our imagination finds its capa ity filled with to immenfe a profpect, and puts itfelf upon the ftretch to comprehend it. But if we yet rife higher, and confider the fix'd stars as fo many vaits oceans of flame, VOL. VI. E that that are each of them attended with a different set of planets, and ftill difcover new firmaments and new lights that are funk farther in those unfathomable depths of Ether, fo as not to be feen by the strongest of our telescopes, we are loft in fuch a labyrinth of funs and worlds, and confounded with the immenfity and magnificence of nature. Nothing is more pleasant to the fancy, than to enlarge itself by degrees, in its contemplation of the various proportions which its feveral objects bear to each other, when it compares the body of man to the bulk of the whole earth, the earth to the circle it describes round the fun, that circle to the fphere of the fix'd ftars, the fphere of the fix'd ftars to the circuit of the whole creation, the whole creation itself to the infinite space that is every where diffused about it; or when the imagination works downward, and confiders the bulk of a human body, in respect of an animal a hundred times less than a mite, the particular limbs of such an animal, the different fprings that actuate the limbs, the fpirits which fet the fprings a going, and the proportionable minuteness of these feveral parts, before they have arrived at their full growth and perfection. But if, after all this, we take the leaft particle of thefe animal fpirits, and confider its capacity of being wrought inte a world that fhall contain within thofe narrow dimenfions a heaven and earth, stars and planets, and every different fpecies of living creatures, in the fame analogy and proportion they bear to each other in our own univerfe; fuch a fpeculation, by reason of its nicety, appears ridiculous to thofe who have not turned their thoughts that way, though at the fame time it is founded on no less than the evidence of a demonstration. Nay, we may yet carry it farther, and discover in the smallest particle of this little world a new exhaufted fund of matter, capable of being fpun out into another universe. I have dwelt the longer on this fubject, because I think it may fhew us the proper limits, as well as the defectiveness of our imagination; how it is confined to a very fmall quantity of space, and immediately ftopt in its operations, when it endeavours to take in any thing that is very great, or very little. Let a man try to con ceive ceive the different bulk of an animal, which is twenty, from another which is an hundred times lefs than a mite, or to compare, in his thoughts, a length of a thousand diameters of the earth, with that of a million, and he will quickly find that he has no different measures in his mind, adjusted to fuch extraordinary degrees of grandeur or minutenefs. The understanding, indeed, opens an infinite space on every fide of us, but the imagination, after a few faint efforts, is immediately at a ftand, and finds herself swallowed up in the immenfity of the void that furrounds it: Our reafon can purfue a particle of matter through an infinite variety of divifions, but the fancy foon lofes fight of it, and feels in itself a kind of chaẩm, that wants to be filled with matter of a more fenfible bulk. We can neither widen nor contract the faculty to the dimenfion of either extreme. object is too big for our capacity, when we would comprehend the circumference of a world, and dwindles into nothing, when we endeavour after the idea of an atom. The It is poffible this defect of imagination may not be - in the foul itself, but as it acts in conjunction with the body. Perhaps there may not be room in the brain for fuch a variety of impreffions, or the animal fpirits may be incapable of figuring them in fuch a manner, as is neceffary to excite fo very large or very minute ideas. However it be, we may well fuppofe that beings of a higher nature very much excel us in this refpect, as it is probable the foul of man will be infinitely more perfect hereafter in this faculty, as well as in all the reft; infomuch that, perhaps, the imagination will be able to keep pace with the understanding, and to form in itself distinct ideas of all the different modes and quantities of space.. 000 No 421 Thursday, June 3. Ignotis errare locis, ignota videre Ovid. Met. 1. 4. v. 294 He fought fresh fountains in a foreign foil; TH ADDISON. HE pleafures of the imagination are not wholly confined to fuch particular authors as are converfant in material objects, but are often to be met with among the polite mafters of morality, criticism, and other fpeculations abftracted from matter, who tho' they do not directly treat of the vifible parts of nature, often draw from them their fimilitudes, metaphors, and allegories. By thefe allufions a truth in the underlanding is at it were reflected by the imagination; we are able to fee fomething like colour and shape in a notion, and to discover a fcheme of thoughts traced out upon matter. And here the mind receives a great deal of fatisfaction, and has two of its faculties gratified at the fame time, while the fancy is bufy in copying after the understanding, and tranfcribing ideas out of the intellectual world into the material. 4 The great art of a writer fhews itself in the choice of pleafing allufions, which are generally to be taken from the great or beautiful works of art or nature; for though whatever is new or uncommon is apt to delight the imagination, the chief defign of an allufion being to illuftrate and explain the paffages of an author, it fhould be always borrowed from what is more known and common, than the paffages which are to be explained. Allegories, when well chofen, are like fo many tracks of light in a difcou:fe, that make every thing about them clear and beautiful. A noble metaphor, when when it is placed to an advantage, cafts a kind of glory round it, and darts a luftre through a whole fentence. These different kinds of allufion are but fo many different manners of fimilitude, and, that they may please the imagination, the likenefs ought to be very exact, or very agreeable, as we love to fee a picture where the refemblance is juft, or the pofture and air graceful. But we often find eminent writers very faulty in this refpect; great fcholars are apt to fetch their comparisons and allufions from the fciences in which they are most converfant, so that a man may fee the compafs of their learning in a treatise on the moft indifferent fubject. I have read a difcourfe upon love, which none but a profound chymift could understand, and have heard many a fermon that fhould only have been preached before a congregation of Cartefians. On the contrary, your men of bufinefs ufually have recourfe to fuch inftances as are too mean and familiar. They are for drawing the reader into a game of chefs or tennis, or for leading him from shop to fhop, in the cant of particular trades and employments. It is certain, there may be found an infinite variety of very agreeable allufions in both thefe kinds, but, for the generality, the most entertaining ones lie in the works of nature, which are obvious to all capacities, and more delightful than what is to be found in arts and fciences. It is this talent of affecting the imagination, that gives an embellishment to good fenfe, and makes one man's compofitions more agreeable than another's. It fets off all writings in general, but is the very life and highest perfection of poetry: where it fhines in an eminent degree, it has preferved feveral poems for many ages, that have nothing elfe to recommend them; and where all the other beauties are prefent, the work appears dry and infipid, if this fingle one be wanting. It has fomething in it like creation: It beftows a kind of existence, and draws up to the reader's view feveral objects which are not to be found in being. It makes additions to nature, and gives greater variety to God's works. In a word, it is able to beautify and adorn the most illuftrious fcenes in the univerfe, or to fill the mind with more glorious E 3 |