{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_59711/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_59711","id":"gutenberg_59711","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/59711","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Art","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Composers -- Great Britain -- Correspondence","Jackson, William, 1730-1803 -- Correspondence","Poets, English -- 18th century -- Correspondence"],"text":"Produced by Sonya Schermann, Robert Tonsing, and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This\nfile was produced from images generously made available\nby The Internet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                                THIRTY\n                                LETTERS\n                                  ON\n                           VARIOUS SUBJECTS.\n                            IN TWO VOLUMES.\n                              =VOL.= II.\n\n                                LONDON:\n          Printed for T. CADELL, and T. EVANS, in the Strand;\n                   and B. THORN and SON, in EXETER.\n                             MDCCLXXXIII.\n\n\n\n\n                               CONTENTS\n                                OF THE\n                            SECOND VOLUME.\n\n\n    LETTER                                                     PAGE\n\n    XIX.    _Criticism on Quarles_                                5\n\n    XX.     _On Warm Colouring_                                  27\n\n    XXI.    _A false Principle in Painting exposed_              32\n\n    XXII.   _Passages in Shakspeare explained_                   41\n\n    XXIII.  _Petition of_ TO _and_ THE                           49\n\n    XXIV.   _On Self-Production_                                 56\n\n    XXV.    _Some Phrases explained_                             71\n\n    XXVI.   _Obstructions in the Way of Fame_                    77\n\n    XXVII.  _On Alliteration and Literation_                     82\n\n    XXVIII. _On common Superstitions_                            88\n\n    XXIX.   _Wrong Representations of the Solar System_          92\n\n    XXX.    _Criticism on Quarles concluded_                    103\n\n\n\n\n                               LETTERS.\n\n\n\n\n                             =LETTER= XIX.\n\n\nThere was never a poet more admired in his life or more despised after\nhis death than Quarles. He was patronized by the best of his age while\nliving, and when dead was first criticised, then contemned, and last\nof all totally forgotten, unless when some bard wanted a name of one\nsyllable to fill up a list of miserable rhymers. Pope was the last who\nmade this use of him, and at the same time, in a note, abused Benlowes\nfor being his patron. I think it is Sir Philip Sidney who says that no\npiece was ever a favourite of the common people without merit. Now,\nthough every thing I had heard of Quarles was much in his disfavour,\nI could not help thinking but that he had something good in him, from\nmy never seeing one of his books of emblems that was not worn to rags;\na sign of its being read a good deal, unless it may be imagined that\nit was so used by children in turning over the prints. Be that as it\nmay, I have perused as much of him as a very dirty tattered book would\ngive me leave, and will risque the declaring, that where he is good,\nI know but few poets better. He has a great deal of genuine fire,\nis frequently happy in similies, admirable in epithets and compound\nwords, very smooth in his versification, so different from the poets\nof his own age; and possessed that great qualification of keeping you\nin perpetual alarm, so very different from the elegant writers of the\npresent times.\n\nI have run through his book of emblems to select some passages for\nyour observation\u2014they are buried, it must be confessed, in a heap\nof rubbish, but are of too much value not to be worth some pains in\nrecovering.\u2014Where Quarles is bad, \u201che sounds the very base-string\nof humility\u201d\u2014but this may be said of Shakspeare and Milton as\nwell.\u2014I mean not to put him in the same rank with these two poets; he\nhas a much greater proportion of bad to good than is to be found in\nthem, so much indeed as almost to prevent his good from appearing at\nall. My intention is to clear some of his shining passages of their\nincumbrances; which may occasion their being noticed, and preserved\nfrom oblivion.\n\nWhat think you of the following similies?\n\n    Look how the stricken hart that wounded flies\n      Oe\u2019r hills and dales, and seeks the lower grounds\n    For running streams, the whilst his weeping eyes\n      Beg silent mercy from the following hounds;\n    At length, embost, he droops, drops down, and lies\n      Beneath the burthen of his bleeding wounds:\n      Ev\u2019n so my gasping soul, dissolv\u2019d in tears, &c.\n\n                                         EMB. 11. BOOK IV.\n\n    Mark how the widow\u2019d turtle, having lost\n      The faithful partner of her loyal heart,\n    Stretches her feeble wings from coast to coast,\n      Hunts ev\u2019ry path; thinks ev\u2019ry shade doth part\n      Her absent love and her; at length, unsped,\n      She re-betakes her to her lonely bed,\n    And there bewails her everlasting widow-head.\n\n                                         EMB. 12. BOOK IV.\n\n    Look how the sheep, whose rambling steps do stray\n      From the safe blessing of her shepherd\u2019s eyes,\n    Eft-soon becomes the unprotected prey\n      To the wing\u2019d squadron of beleag\u2019ring flies;\n    Where swelt\u2019red with the scorching beams of day\n      She frisks from bush to brake, and wildly flies away\n        From her own self, ev\u2019n of herself afraid;\n        She shrouds her troubled brows in ev\u2019ry glade\n    And craves the mercy of the soft removing shade.\n\n                                         EMB. 14. BOOK IV.\n\nThe first, will probably remind you of Shakspeare\u2019s description of the\nwounded stag in _As you like it_; which it may do, and not suffer by\nthe comparison. The second, is very original in the expression\u2014the\ncircumstance of\n\n    \u2014\u2014thinks _every shade_ doth part\n    Her absent love and her\u2014\u2014\n\nis I believe new, and exquisitely tender. There are others not much\ninferior to these.\n\nThe following verses allude to the print prefixed, where a bubble is\nrepresented as heavier than the globe. It is necessary to observe, that\nthe prints were designed first, and the poems are in a great measure\nexplanatory of them.\n\n    Lord! what a world is this, which day and night\n      Men seek with so much toil, with so much trouble,\n    Which weigh\u2019d in equal scales is found so light,\n      So poorly overbalanc\u2019d with a bubble?\n        Good God! that frantic mortals should destroy\n        Their higher hopes, and place their idle joy\n    Upon such airy trash, upon so light a toy!\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n    Thrice happy he, whose nobler, thoughts despise\n      To make an object of so easy gains;\n    Thrice happy he, who scorns so poor a prize\n      Should be the crown of his heroic pains:\n        Thrice happy he, that ne\u2019er was born to try\n        Her frowns or smiles: or being born, did lie\n    In his sad nurse\u2019s arms an hour or two, and die.\n\n                                           EMB. 4. BOOK I.\n\nTho\u2019 the considering mortality on the gloomy side, is not productive\nof much happiness, yet there are certain dispositions which feel\nsome gratification in it\u2014Quarles was one of these. He seizes all\nopportunities of abusing the world; and it must be confessed he has\nhere done it in \u201cchoice and elegant terms.\u201d\n\nSometimes he is more outrageous in his abuse.\n\n    Let wit, and all her studied plots effect\n              The best they can;\n    Let smiling fortune prosper and perfect\n              What wit began;\n    Let earth advise with both, and so project\n              A happy man;\n    Let wit or fawning fortune vie their best;\n              He may be blest\n    With all that earth can give; but earth\n              Can give no rest.\n\n                                           EMB. 6. BOOK I.\n\nAgain\u2014\n\n    False world, thou ly\u2019st: thou canst not lend\n              The least delight:\n    Thy favours cannot gain a friend,\n              They are so slight:\n    Thy morning-pleasures make an end\n            To please at night:\n    Poor are the wants that thou supply\u2019st:\n    And yet thou vaunt\u2019st, and yet thou vy\u2019st\n    With heav\u2019n; fond earth, thou boast\u2019st,\n            False world, thou ly\u2019st.\n\n                                          EMB. 5. BOOK II.\n\nThe next quotation is an allusion to the print, where the world is made\na mirror.\n\n    Believe her not, her glass diffuses\n    False portraitures\u2014\u2014\n    Were thy dimensions but a stride,\n      Nay, wert thou statur\u2019d but a span,\n    Such as the long-bill\u2019d troops defy\u2019d,\n      A very fragment of a man!\n\n    Had surfeits, or th\u2019 ungracious star\n      Conspir\u2019d to make one common place\n    Of all deformities that are\n      Within the volume of thy face,\n        She\u2019d lend the favour shou\u2019d out-move\n    The Troy-bane Helen, or the Queen of Love.\n\n                                          EMB. 6. BOOK II.\n\nThis is finely wrought up\u2014Quarles perfectly comprehended the effect of\nthe musical _crescendo_, which is instanced particularly in the last\npassage.\n\nThere is something very dreadful in the 4th line of this stanza.\n\n    See how the latter trumpet\u2019s dreadful blast\n      Affrights stout Mars his trembling son!\n      See how he startles! how he stands aghast,\n        And scrambles from his melting throne!\n        Hark! how the direful hand of vengeance tears\n        The swelt\u2019ring clouds, whilst Heav\u2019n appears\n    A circle fill\u2019d with flame, and center\u2019d with his fears.\n\n                                          EMB. 9. BOOK II.\n\nDr. Young has some lines on this subject which are by some much\nadmired.\u2014But tho\u2019 the subject be the same, it is differently\ncircumstanced.\u2014Young\u2019s is a general description of the last judgment,\nQuarles describes its effect on a single being who is supposed to have\nlived fearless of such an event.\n\n    \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014At the destin\u2019d hour,\n    By the loud trumpet summon\u2019d to the charge,\n    See all the formidable sons of fire,\n    Eruptions, earthquakes, comets, lightnings, play\n    Their various engines; all at once disgorge\n    Their blazing magazines; and take by storm\n    This poor terrestrial citadel of man.\n    Amazing period! when each mountain height\n    Out-burns Vesuvius! rocks eternal pour\n    Their melted mass, as rivers once they pour\u2019d;\n    Stars rush, and final _Ruin_ fiercely drives\n    Her plough-share o\u2019er creation.\u2014\u2014\n\nNow to me, all this is a \u201cpestilent congregation of vapour.\u201d\u2014\u2014The\nformidable sons of fire spewing out blazing magazines\u2014and _Ruin_ like\na plough-man (or rather plough-woman) driving _her_ plough-share\u2014are\nmean, incoherent images. How much more sublimely Quarles expresses the\nsame, and indeed some additional ones, in the last three lines?\n\nIn the print belonging to the emblem from which the following is taken,\nis a figure striking a globe with his knuckles.\u2014The motto, _Tinnit,\ninane est_.\n\n    She\u2019s empty\u2014hark! she sounds\u2014there\u2019s nothing there\n                But noise to fill thy ear;\n    Thy vain enquiry can at length but find\n                A blast of murm\u2019ring wind:\n    It is a cask, that seems, as full as fair,\n                But merely tunn\u2019d with air;\n    Fond youth, go build thy hopes on better grounds:\n                The soul that vainly sounds\n    Her joys upon this world, but feeds on empty sounds!\n\n                                         EMB. 10. BOOK II.\n\nBut that you may not think the good passages of this poet are only\nscattered unequally through his poems; take some entire ones\u2014or nearly\nso.\n\n    What sullen star rul\u2019d my untimely birth,\n    That would not lend my days one hour of mirth?\n    How oft\u2019 have these bare knees been bent to gain\n    The slender alms of one poor smile in vain?\n    How often, tir\u2019d with the fastidious light,\n    Have my faint lips implor\u2019d the shades of night?\n    How often have my nightly torments pray\u2019d\n    For ling\u2019ring twilight, glutted with the shade?\n    Day worse than night, night worse than day appears,\n    In sighs I spend my nights, my days in tears:\n    I moan unpity\u2019d, groan without relief,\n    There is no end nor measure of my grief.\n    The smiling flow\u2019r salutes the day; it grows\n    Untouch\u2019d with care; it neither spins nor sows:\n    O that my tedious life were like this flow\u2019r,\n    Or freed from grief, or finish\u2019d with an hour:\n    Why was I born? why was I born a man?\n    And why proportion\u2019d by so large a span?\n    Or why suspended by the common lot,\n    And being born to die, why die I not?\n    Ah me! why is my sorrow-wasted breath\n    Deny\u2019d the easy privilege of death?\n    The branded slave, that tugs the weary oar,\n    Obtains the sabbath of a welcome shore.\n    His ransom\u2019d stripes are heal\u2019d; his native soil\n    Sweetens the mem\u2019ry of his foreign toil:\n    But ah! my sorrows are not half so blest;\n    My labour finds no point, my pains no rest.\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n    Thou just observer of our flying hours,\n    That with thy adamantine fangs, devours\n    The brazen mon\u2019ments of renowned kings,\n    Doth thy glass stand? or be thy moulting wings\n    Unapt to flie? if not, why dost thou spare\n    A willing breast; a breast that stands so fair?\n    A dying breast, that hath but only breath\n    To beg the wound, and strength to crave a death?\n    O that the pleased heav\u2019ns would once dissolve\n    These fleshly fetters, that so fast involve\n    My hamper\u2019d soul; then would my soul be blest\n    From all those ills, and wrap her thoughts in rest!\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n                                        EMB. 15. BOOK III.\n\nAt other times he complains of the shortness of life, and in strains\nequally pathetic.\n\n    My glass is half unspent; forbear t\u2019arrest\n    My thriftless day too soon: my poor request\n    Is that my glass may run but out the rest.\n\n    My time-devoured minutes will be done\n    Without thy help; see\u2014see how swift they run:\n    Cut not my thread before my thread be spun.\n\n    The gain\u2019s not great I purchase by this stay;\n    What loss sustain\u2019st thou by so small delay,\n    To whom ten thousand years are but a day?\n\n    My following eye can hardly make a shift\n    To count my winged hours; they fly so swift,\n    They scarce deserve the bounteous name of gift.\n\n    The secret wheels of hurrying time do give\n    So short a warning, and so fast they drive,\n    That I am dead before I seem to live.\n\n    And what\u2019s a life? a weary pilgrimage,\n    Whose glory in one day doth fill the stage\n    With childhood, manhood, and decrepit age.\n\n    And what\u2019s a life? the flourishing array\n    Of the proud summer-meadow, which to-day\n    Wears her green plush, and is to-morrow hay.\n\n    Read on this dial, how the shades devour\n    My short-liv\u2019d winter\u2019s day; hour eats up hour;\n    Alas! the total\u2019s but from eight to four.\n\n    Behold these lilies, which thy hands have made\n    Fair copies of my life, and open laid\n    To view, how soon they droop, how soon they fade!\n\n    Shade not that dial, night will blind too soon;\n    My non-aged day already points to noon;\n    How simple is my suit! how small my boon!\n\n    Nor do I beg this slender inch, to while\n    The time away, or falsely to beguile\n    My thoughts with joy; here\u2019s nothing worth a smile.\n\n    No, no, \u2019tis not to please my wanton ears\n    With frantic mirth; I beg but hours, not years:\n    And what thou giv\u2019st me, I will give to tears!\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n                                        EMB. 13. BOOK III.\n\n\u201cRead on _this_ dial\u201d\u2014\u201cBehold _these_ lilies\u201d\u2014does not this put you\nin mind of the same form of expression in Ossian? \u201cHis spear was like\n_that_ blasted fir.\u201d\n\nQuarles was commenting on his print in which the dial and lilies were\nrepresented; Ossian saw his images \u201cin his mind\u2019s eye\u201d\u2014\u2014but both the\npoets considered them as really existing\u2014at least, they make them\nexist to their readers.\n\n\u201cHow the shades devour,\u201d &c. Shakspeare has the same figure\n\n    \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014the tide\n    _Eats_ not the flats with more impetuous haste\n\nit is wonderfully expressive!\n\nIn what he calls his hieroglyphics, Quarles compares man to a taper,\nwhich furnishes him with a number of very striking allusions. It is\nat first unlighted, then a hand from heaven touches it with fire\u2014the\nmotto, _Nescius unde_.\n\n    This flame-expecting taper hath at length\n      Received fire, and now begins to burn:\n    It hath no vigour yet, it hath no strength;\n      Apt to be puft and quencht at every turn:\n        It was a gracious hand that thus endow\u2019d\n        This snuff with flame: but mark, this hand doth shroud\n    Itself from mortal eyes, and folds it in a cloud.\n\n    Thus man begins to live. An unknown flame\n      Quickens his finished organs, now possest\n    With motion; and which motion doth proclaim\n      An active soul, though in a feeble breast:\n        But how, and when infus\u2019d, ask not my pen;\n        Here flies a cloud before the eyes of men,\n    I cannot tell thee how, nor canst thou tell me when.\n\n    Was it a parcel of celestial fire,\n      Infus\u2019d by heav\u2019n into this fleshly mould?\n    Or was it, think you, made a soul entire?\n      Then, was it new created, or of old?\n        Or is\u2019t a propagated spark, rak\u2019d out\n        From nature\u2019s embers? while we go about\n    By reason to resolve, the more we raise a doubt.\n\n    If it be part of that celestial flame,\n      It must be ev\u2019n as pure, as free from spot,\n    As that eternal fountain whence it came;\n      If pure and spotless, then whence came the blot?\n        Itself being pure, could not itself defile;\n        Nor hath unactive matter pow\u2019r to soil\n    Her pure and active form, as jars corrupt their oil.\n\n    Or if it were created, tell me when?\n      If in the first six days, where kept \u2019till now?\n    Or if thy soul were new-created, then\n      Heav\u2019n did not all at first, he had to do:\n        Six days expired, all creation ceast;\n        All kinds, ev\u2019n from the greatest to the least,\n    Were finish\u2019d and compleat before the day of rest.\n\n    But why should man, the Lord of creatures, want\n      That privilege which plants and beasts obtain?\n    Beasts bring forth beasts, and plant a perfect plant;\n      And ev\u2019ry like brings forth her like again;\n        Shall fowls and fishes, beasts and plants convey\n        Life to their issue, and man less than they?\n    Shall these get living souls, and man dead lumps of clay?\n\n    Must human souls be generated then?\u2014\u2014\n      My water ebbs; behold a rock is nigh:\n    If nature\u2019s work produce the souls of men,\n      Man\u2019s soul is mortal\u2014all that\u2019s born must die.\n        What shall we then conclude! what sunshine will\n        Disperse this gloomy cloud? till then, be still\n    My vainly striving thoughts; lie down my puzzled quill.\n\n                                            HIEROGLYPH. 2.\n\nThe closeness of the reasoning, and the freedom of the verses cannot be\nenough admired. I believe it would be difficult if not impossible to\nreason so shortly and yet so clearly in prose. Pope says the thoughts\nin his Essay on Man are in less compass for their being in verse. The\npoetical language admits of elisions and other varieties we cannot have\nin prose. This poem is followed by another, before which is a design of\nthe winds blowing the flame of the taper, with this motto, \u201c_The wind\npasseth over it, and it is gone!_\u201d\n\n      No sooner is this lighted Taper set\n        Upon the transitory stage\n          Of eye-bedark\u2019ning night,\n      But it is straight subjected to the threat\n        Of envious winds, whose wasteful rage\n          Disturbs her peaceful light,\n    And makes her substance waste, and makes her flame less bright.\n\n      No sooner are we born, no sooner come\n        To take possession of this vast,\n          This soul-afflicting earth,\n      But danger meets us at the very womb;\n        And sorrow with her full-mouth\u2019d blast\n          Salutes our painful birth\n    To put out all our joys, and puff out all our mirth.\n\n      Nor infant innocence, nor childish tears,\n        Nor youthful wit, nor manly pow\u2019r,\n          Nor politic old age,\n      Nor virgins pleading, nor the widows pray\u2019rs,\n        Nor lowly cell, nor lofty tow\u2019r,\n          Nor prince, nor peer, nor page,\n    Can \u2019scape this common blast, nor curb her stormy rage.\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n      Tost to and fro, our frighted thoughts are driv\u2019n\n        With ev\u2019ry puff, with ev\u2019ry tide\n          Of life-consuming care;\n      Our peaceful flame, that would point up to heav\u2019n\n        Is still disturb\u2019d and turn\u2019d aside;\n          And ev\u2019ry blast of air\n    Commits such waste in man, as man cannot repair.\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n      What may this sorrow-shaken life present\n        To the false relish of our taste\n          That\u2019s worth the name of sweet?\n      Her minute\u2019s pleasure\u2019s choak\u2019d with discontent,\n        Her glory soil\u2019d with ev\u2019ry blast\u2014\n          How many dangers meet\n    Poor man betwixt the biggin and the winding sheet!\n\n                                            HIEROGLYPH. 3.\n\nTho\u2019 I have purposely omitted pointing out many of the particular\nbeauties of these poems, I would wish you to observe, in this last, the\nfine effect of compound words in which this author is so happy: also\nthe noble swell in the third stanza\u2014the application of his allegory\nto its meaning, in the fourth, where the expression so admirably\nsuits with both \u201cour peaceful flame, &c.\u201d\u2014\u2014if these are not genuine\nstrokes of genius, I must, as a great critic says on a like occasion,\nacknowledge my ignorance of such subjects. I wish we had some word in\nour language to express the same idea in poetry as _crescendo_ does in\nmusic; swell is applied to so many other purposes, that it has not the\neffect of an appropriated term.\n\nBut for the present I must quit the subject\u2014in a little time expect\nthe remainder of my observations on this poet.\n\n\n\n\n                             =LETTER= XX.\n\n\nEvery one seems to be satisfied that warm colouring is essential to\na good picture: but what _is_ warm colouring is not determined. Some\nhave joined the idea of warmth to yellow, others to red, others to the\ncompound of both, the orange\u2014they also differ in the degrees of each.\nA warm picture to some, is cold to others; and vice versa. Lambert\u2019s\nidea of warmth, was to make his pictures appear as if they were behind\na yellow glass. Vanbloom\u2019s have a red glass before them. Both\u2019s an\norange colour. Each has its admirers, who condemn the rest.\n\n    Who shall decide when Doctors disagree?\n\nNature. All these hues are right as _particulars_, but wrong as\n_universals_.\n\nLet us examine the different appearances of light from the dawn to\nnoon. The first break of day is a cold light in the East\u2014this, by\ndegrees, is tinged with purple, which grows redder and redder until\nthe purple is lost in orange\u2014the orange in yellow, and before the sun\nis two degrees high, the yellow is changed to white. Invert the order\nof these, and it is the coming on of the evening. All these hues then\nexist in nature, and one is just as right as the other.\n\nIt is necessary to distinguish between the painter\u2019s _warmth_, and the\nsensation. A picture, that has most warmth of colouring, represents\nthat time of the day when we feel least. A true representation of noon\nmust have no tinge of yellow or red in the sky; and yet from its being\nnoon, one might be led to imagine it must be _warm_. It is the critic,\nand not the artist, which confounds the meaning of these terms. In like\nmanner, summer and winter, in respect to light, are just the same: the\nsun rises and sets as gorgeously in December, if the weather be clear,\nas in June. I remember seeing two pictures of Cuyp, companions\u2014one,\na cattle piece in summer; the other, winter with figures skaiting. The\nsky in both was equally _warm_, for which the painter was much censured\nby an auction-connoisseur, who declared that it was impossible the sky\ncould be _warm_ in winter.\n\nI believe it is a common mistake to apply the red and purple tints to\nthe morning, and the orange and yellow to the evening. We hear pictures\nof Claude called mornings and evenings, which may be either. It is\nreally odd enough, that there should not be a single circumstance to\ndistinguish the morning from the evening, unless it be in a view of a\nparticular place\u2014in this case, the reversing of the light shews the\ndifference. In a picture, there is no distinction between going to\nwork, or milking, or returning from it\u2014men ride, drive cattle, are\nfishing, &c. as well early as late.\n\nThese considerations should soften the peremptory style of some judges,\nand extend their taste, which at present seems much confined. We have\nseen that there are more natural hues than one or two. I will allow\nthem to say, that a picture is too warm, too cold, too red, too yellow\nto please them, but let them not deny that these hues are all in\nnature, and that well-managed they are all pictoresque.\n\n\n\n\n                             =LETTER= XXI.\n\n\nAt the revival of the arts, some evil genius, who was determined to\nretard the progress of painting, dictated this rule. \u201cA picture should\nalways have its horizon the height of the eye _that looks at it_\u2014in\nnature, the eye being always the height of the horizon; therefore a\npicture will be most like nature that has its horizon the height of the\n_natural eye_.\u201d One of the falsest rules that ever was founded on a\nfalse principle! and this is the more lamentable, as it has spoiled,\nin point of perspective, three parts of the historical pictures that\nhave ever been painted.\n\nAs it is very difficult to destroy a rooted error, and as this is a\nmost pernicious one, it is necessary to be full and particular.\n\nWhen I say _eye_ and _horizon_\u2014the natural eye and horizon are meant.\nWhen the terms _artificial eye_ and _artificial horizon_ are used, the\neye and the horizon represented in painting are to be understood. We\nmust be clear in this distinction, for it is the confounding of the\nideas expressed by these terms which has occasioned the mischief.\n\nThe eye, and the horizon, are always of the same height\u2014therefore\n\nThe artificial eye and the artificial horizon must always be so\u2014but\n\nThere is no connection between the _real_ eye, and the _artificial_\nhorizon.\n\nIn every picture the artificial eye, or point of sight, is supposed to\nbe at a certain height from the base-line; as high as a human figure\nwould be, represented as standing there. To this point every thing in\nthe picture tends, as every thing in a real view tends to the natural\neye. The picture then, as far as this circumstance is concerned, is\nperfect, if the _artificial_ eye and the _artificial_ horizon go\ntogether; for these always bear the same relation to each other, let\nthe picture be placed any where.\n\n[Illustration]\n\nLet A be the eye, B the picture (in section) and c the horizon of the\npicture.\u2014The eye is always the apex of the cone; there is constantly\nthe same relation between the parts in every position. It must be\nobserved that there is a defect in this illustration which it was\nimpossible to avoid\u2014for tho\u2019 I have considered A as the eye, yet _upon\npaper_, it is _artificial_ as well as the picture B. If you cannot\nmake this distinction, I propose the following demonstration.\u2014\u2014Take\na landscape and stand it upon a table\u2014hang it up the height of the\neye\u2014above the height\u2014put it upon a chair\u2014upon the floor\u2014it still,\nperspectively considered, is seen equally well\u2014for\n\nThe _real_ eye is always the height of the _artificial_ eye, whether\nthe picture be fixed in the cieling or laid upon the floor.\n\nIndeed if this was not so, how would it be possible to hang one picture\nover another? and yet this is done, and with the greatest propriety.\n\nI have often lamented the shifts to which painters are reduced, who\nhave followed this rule in opposition to their senses. Laresse was so\nthoroughly possessed with it, that his idea of fitting up a room with\npictures, was to have those which were below the eye to contain nothing\nbut ground, and those which were above, the sky and clouds. But though\nhe was convinced of the rectitude of his principle, he was struck with\nthe oddity of the practice\u2014he therefore recommended that there should\nbe but one picture from the floor to the cieling, in which there might\nbe a perfect coincidence of the natural and artificial horizon.\n\nA portrait-painter sets the person he is to draw generally the height\nof his eye.\u2014\u2014Suppose it to be a whole-length with a landscape in\nthe back-ground: the artist considers his picture is to hang above\nthe eye, and for that reason makes his horizon low, about the height\nof the knees. The consequence is, that there are two points of sight,\nwhich supposes an impossibility; for the eye cannot be in two places\nat the same time. If the eye be supposed on a level with the head of\nthe figure, as it was on drawing the face, then the back-ground is\ntoo low; if equal to the horizon of the back-ground, then the figure\nis too high, unless we suppose it on an eminence, or ourselves in a\npit; in that case, instead of seeing the face in front, we must have\nlooked under the chin\u2014but as we do not, the figure always appears to\nbe falling forward.\n\nRaffaele\u2019s horizon is most commonly the height of his figures, so that\nthey stand properly, and seem to be, whether in a print or a picture,\nthe size of human creatures;\u2014on the contrary, when the horizon is low,\nthe figures always appear gigantic. When I was a boy, I had formed so\nvery exalted an idea of the size of running horses, from seeing them\ndrawn with the distant hills appearing under their bodies, that the\nfirst time I was at a course, it appeared but as a rat-race.\n\nEvery whole length picture will furnish you with an instance of this\nfalse principle, which would appear more disagreeable, if custom\nhad not in some measure reconciled us to it. I am aware that the\npractice of so many great men is a strong objection to my argument;\nbut as I conceive, with due submission to such authority, that there\nis _demonstration_ on my side, I cannot easily retract what I have\nadvanced.\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXII.\n\n\nThe commentators of Shakspeare think themselves obliged to find some\nmeaning in his nonsense; and to come at it, twist and turn his words\nwithout mercy: never considering, that in his scenes, as in common\nlife, some part must be necessarily unimportant.\n\nMany a passage has been criticised into consequence. The meaning, to\nuse Shakspeare\u2019s words on a like occasion, \u201cis like a grain of wheat\nhid in a bushel of chaff; you shall seek all day e\u2019er you find it, and\nwhen you have it, it is not worth the search.\u201d\n\nAn expression of _Shallow_\u2019s in the second part of Henry the fourth\nhas been the subject of much criticism and hypercriticism. \u201cWe will\neat a last year\u2019s pippin with a dish of carraways;\u201d and it is certain\nthat there was such a dish, but if Shakspeare had meant it, he would\nhave said, \u201cA dish of last year\u2019s pippins with carraways\u201d\u2014\u201c_with_ a\ndish, &c.\u201d clearly means something distinct from the pippins. Roasted\npippins stuck full of carraways, says one\u2014carraway confect, or comfit\nwell known to children, says another\u2014as if every one did not know\nwhat carraway comfits were, says a third, laughing at the second.\nDine with any of the _natural_ inhabitants of Bath about Christmas,\nand they probably will give you after dinner a dish of pippins and\ncarraways\u2014which last is the name of an apple as well known in that\ncountry as nonpareil is in London, and as generally associated with\ngolden pippins.\n\n\u201cThen am I a sous\u2019d gurnet,\u201d lays Falstaff. This fish has puzzled the\ncommentators as much as the apple did before.\u2014What can it be?\u2014I\nnever heard of such a fish.\u2014There is no such fish. A magazine critic,\nassured of its non-existence, proposed reading _grunt_, gurnet, quasi\ngrunet, quasi grunt\u2014\u2014well, and what do we get by that? Why, because\nhogs grunt, and pork is the flesh of hogs, sous\u2019d gurnet means pickled\npork! Very lately a commentator, who once denied its existence, has\ndiscovered in consequence of his great learning, that there is _really_\nsuch a fish\u2014\u2014he is _really_ in the right\u2014if he will go to the South\ncoast of Devonshire, he may see plenty of them\u2014but not _sous\u2019d_.\n\nAnd now I mention Falstaff, let me explain his copper ring. He\ncomplains of being robbed when he was asleep, and \u201closing a seal-ring\nof his _grandfather\u2019s_ worth forty marks.\u201d \u201cO Jesu,\u201d says the hostess,\n\u201cI have heard the prince tell him I know not how oft, that the ring was\n_copper_.\u201d Is the appearance of copper so much like gold, that one\nmay be mistaken for the other? Formerly, (about the time of Falstaff\u2019s\ngrandfather) gold was a scarce commodity in England, so scarce that\nthey frequently made rings of copper and plated them thinly with gold;\nI have seen two or three of them. As the look of both was alike,\nFalstaff might insist upon its being gold; on the contrary, the prince,\nfrom the quality of the wearer and lightness of the ring, might with\nequal fairness maintain that it was only plated.\n\nThough it is not my intention to make one of the number of Shakspeare\u2019s\ncommentators, I will take this opportunity of restoring a passage in\nKing Lear. In the agony of his passion with his daughter, he says (in\nthe modern editions)\n\n    \u201cTh\u2019 _untented_ woundings of a Father\u2019s curse\n    Pierce every sense about thee.\u201d\n\nIn the old editions it is printed exceeding plainly, \u201cTh\u2019 _untender_\nwoundings, &c.\u201d that is, not tender, or cruel. It would be waste\nof time to shew its propriety, and that there is no such word as\n_untented_. Who first threw out the true reading and substituted the\nfalse, I know not. Is it worth while to say, that the word is often\nused by Shakspeare, and once at least besides in the same play, \u201cso\nyoung and so untender?\u201d\n\nOne more and I will release you.\u2014Shylock says,\n\n    Some men there are, love not a gaping pig;\n    Some that are mad, if they behold a cat;\n    And others, when the bag-pipe sings in the nose,\n    Cannot contain, &c.\u2014\u2014for _affection_.\n\nthat is, because they are so _affected_. These poor lines have been\nnew-worded, new stopped, and all to find the meaning of as plain a\npassage as can be written. \u201cSome men cannot abide this thing, others\nhave an aversion to another, which sometimes produces strange effects\non their bodies, because their imagination is so strongly _affected_.\nMasterless passion, suffering, or feeling, compels them to follow\nthe impulse.\u201d The not understanding _affection_ and _passion_ in\nShakspeare\u2019s quaint sense has occasioned the difficulty.\n\nThere are many other corrupted and misunderstood passages that require\nas little attention, to set them right, as what has been exerted on\nthis occasion, by\n\n                                               Yours sincerely, &c.\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXIII.\n\n\nScarce a year passes but our language has some new trick played with\nit.\u2014But let the sufferers speak for themselves.\n\n                   _To the People of_ GREAT-BRITAIN.\n\n                    The Petition of _To_ and _The_,\n\n_Humbly sheweth_,\n\nThat your Petitioners have, time out of mind, possessed certain places\nallowed to be their undoubted right, and that they lately have been,\n_vi et armis_, thrust from their ancient possessions. Their misfortune\nbeing in common, they present their common petition; hoping that the\nlaudable zeal for the reformation of abuses will extend even to them,\nand that they shall be restored to their pristine use and consequence.\n\nThough your petitioners labour under a common misfortune, yet it is\nnecessary that they separately state their case.\u2014And first _To_ for\nhimself says,\n\nThat he has for years past had a place in the direction of all\nletters\u2014that he was first removed from thence, as he apprehends, by\nsome member of parliament, who was too much busied in his country\u2019s\ngood to attend to propriety. As it is the wicked custom of the world\nto press down a falling man, the said _To_ is in a manner totally\ndisplaced from his ancient possession: all people, except the very few\nwho prefer grammar to fashion, agreeing to his removal. Were his place\nfilled by a worthy successor he should keep his complaints secret,\nremembering that he himself succeeded _For_\u2014but to be succeeded by\nnothing, is reviving the old fanatic principle of the last century,\nwhich all who are lovers of the constitution must shudder at! Consider\ngood people, you who so well know the value of property, what\nquantities of letters are at this instant in the post-office that are\nneither _To_ nor _For_ any person? In many instances you condescend to\nbe instructed by your neighbours\u2014is the _A_ Monsieur yet left out in\nthe direction of French letters? If you were to address in Latin, would\nyou not use the dative case\u2014and pray what is the sign of the dative\nbut your petitioner\n\n                                                              _To?_\n\nSecondly, _The_ for himself says,\n\nThat he has had, from the first existence of our language, precedence\nof army, navy, commons, lords, and even government itself;\u2014that he\nis most basely removed from this his just station\u2014for he appeals to\nall impartial judges, if such are to be found, what a foolish figure\ndoes army, navy, commons, lords, and government cut without he takes\nthe lead. If this were alone the damage it is surely of great concern,\nbut alas! the evil is spreading! scarce a day passes but he loses\nsome ancient possession of trust and consequence! It is, indeed,\ninsinuated, that your petitioner formerly usurped a station he had by\nno means a right to, and that his present loss is a just retaliation.\nWhat business had _The_, says these meddlers, before _Faustina_ and\n_Cuzzoni_, and so on through all the _inas_ and _onis_ to the present\ntime? Alas! my good countrymen, consider, these were but possessions\nof a day! _The_ Faustina and her successors were but the grasshoppers\nof a season\u2014from this encroachment he was soon dispossessed; but\nnavy, army, ministry, are of perpetual duration. Perhaps you will\nreply that your petitioner is but an article\u2014true\u2014but think of the\nconsequence\u2014if you destroy your particles and articles, and reduce\nyour language by degrees to noun substantives, who knows but the next\ninnovation will be the substituting _things_ instead of _words_\u2014you\nhave heard of a country so incumbered.\u2014\u2014Consider the expence of\ncarriage.\u2014Think, O ye wits, of having your coaches attended with\nwaggon loads of conversation. Nip the evil in its bud, shew your regard\nfor posterity, and consider the petition of\n\n                                                            _The._\n\nIn a general wreck it is worth while to save something.\u2014\u2014Your\nPetitioners are contented to be thrust out of parliament\u2014it is\nconfessed that the members of that honourable house should not attend\nto trifles.\u2014But consider, good people, you are not _all_ members\nof parliament, _you_ may restore us to our ancient rights, our just\nprivileges, and legal possessions\u2014which we trust you will do, and your\npoor Petitioners\n\n                                               Shall ever pray, &c.\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXIV.\n\n\nI cannot agree with you in the cause of that uncommon production you\nmention; my thoughts on this subject, and on some others connected with\nit, will appear by the following reflections.\n\nUntil the last hundred years or thereabout, it was supposed that in\nmany instances life was produced by putrefaction, fermentation, &c.\nLeuwenhoek and other naturalists, clearly demonstrated that some\nanimals which were supposed to owe their existence to the above\ncauses, or in other words, to spontaneous generation, really had a\nregular production. This discovery established the general principle of\n_omnia ab ovo_\u2014but it must be received with reserve and exception.\n\nAfter giving every theory of the earth a patient reading, it seems to\nme probable that the whole world was originally covered with water\nto the depth of about three miles, which is about as much below the\nsurface, as the highest mountains rise above it. This depth, though far\nbelow all soundings, bears no more proportion to the earth\u2019s diameter,\nthan that of the paper it is covered with does to a common globe. The\nidea of the sea approaching the center, and of course, possessing\na superior share in quantity as well as surface of the earth, has\noccasioned many difficulties in accounting for the balance between the\ndifferent sides of the globe; which vanish, if the sea is not supposed\nof a greater depth than necessity requires, or reason and probability\nwarrant.\n\nI consider all continents as a congeries of islands heaved up from\nthe bottom of the sea at different times by vulcanos and earthquakes.\nModern philosophers have discovered ancient vulcanos where they were\nnever suspected to have existed, and the whole earth is full of\nevidence that it was once beneath the ocean. Marble, freestone, and\nmany other substances abound in seashells and marine productions. It\nis frequently said that the sea has left many places which were once\ncovered by it. Is it not rather to be supposed that those places have\nbeen elevated above the sea, than that the sea has sunk below them?\nThere seems to be no cause in nature equal to the altering the quantity\nof water in the ocean, but we know that there are many causes equal to\nthe elevating the land above it. If the sea had retired from the land,\nthe retiring must have been equal in all places; this we are sure is\nnot the case, therefore it is the land in that particular place that\nmust be risen.\n\nIn the manner I suppose all land to have been first brought to light,\nmany islands have been produced in our own time. What was under the\nwater is forced above it. The marine substances on the surface by\ndegrees decay; moss appears, grass succeeds, then the smaller kind of\nplants, bushes and trees. Animal life begins and goes on upon the same\nscale from the minuter, to beings of more consequence. This system is\nat least as general as the other, but like that must be received with\nmany restrictions; for it is certain that by far the greater part of\nvegetables and animals would never be found self-produced in any one\nplace, tho\u2019 many might live, and indeed flourish, if brought there.\n\nLet us proceed from reasoning to facts. Some voyager discovers an\nisland evidently formed by a vulcano, and very remote from other\ncountries; it is a perfect wood to the water\u2019s edge, has some plants\nwhich exist no where but in that spot, together with others common to\nplaces in the same latitude. It is full of insects, reptiles, birds,\nand sometimes quadrupeds. Now, if _every one_ of these organized bodies\nwas not brought there, something must be self-produced.\n\nIn some islands of the East-Indies are serpents of an enormous size;\nwho could carry them there? In all streams there are fish\u2014how could\nthey get there? Not from the sea, for fish which inhabit the source of\nrivers are as soon killed by salt water as in air, besides there are\nmany rivers which do not run into the ocean. Perhaps this circumstance\nwas never sufficiently considered. Every set of rivers is perfectly\ndistinct from any other set. The greater number have some fish which\nexist no where but in the particular stream they are bred. Find any\nother cause for their first production than what must be taken from the\nold philosophy.\n\nLet us attend to what we have always near us. Fill a vessel with water\nfrom the pump: it is pure, and contains neither animal, nor vegetable.\nAfter standing some days, a green substance begins to be formed in it,\nand which is inhabited by myriads of little beings: this seems the\nfirst step towards plants and animals. We are told indeed that the\nanimalcules are from eggs laid by flies, and the green slime is a plant\nwhich has its proper seed. That the water may accidentally receive\nboth eggs and seeds is highly probable; but these (by reasoning from\nother instances) seem the first efforts towards vegetable and animal\nlife. Besides, it yet remains to be proved, that the air so abounds\nwith flying seeds and insects. If the air swarmed, as is supposed,\nvision would be obstructed (as by a fog which consists of particles\ninconceivably small), and perhaps life in the nobler animals destroyed.\nThe slime to be produced from seed then must have come from some of\nthe same sort in the neighbourhood; besides, if its being produced in\nthe water depended upon accident, which it does by this supposition,\nit must sometimes fail. Again, if the animals and vegetables, in\nthe above instance, were from eggs floating in the air, why are the\nsmallest always produced first? must it not sometimes happen that ova\nof a larger sort precede the smaller? which is never the case: not to\nmention the total impossibility of some ova, particularly of animals,\nbeing so conveyed.\n\nIt is well known that by pepper-water, and a variety of other mixtures,\npeculiar animalcules are produced. Can we suppose that the fly, which\nlays the egg from which this creature exists, continues floating in the\nair until some philosopher makes a mixture proper for its deposit? is\nit done often enough to preserve the species? What must the fly have\ndone before pepper was brought from India? You may tell me that the egg\nwas deposited there\u2014well then, if the eggs are not hurt by the pepper\nbeing dried in an oven, happen to be brought to Europe, and fall in the\nway of a naturalist, the species is preserved. Much is not got by this.\nThere is great reason for believing that the animalcule was really\nproduced by the infusion, and did not exist before.\n\nHow are the worms in human bodies to be accounted for? There are some,\nit is true, which bear a resemblance to earth-worms, and are supposed\nto be eggs we take in with roots, vegetables, &c. Not to insist upon\nthe impossibility of a creature intended to live in the cold earth\nexisting on the hot stomach, it is well known that there are worms in\nthe intestines which have no resemblance to any other thing in the\ncreation\u2014the jointed worm, for instance, which is found of many yards\nin length: indeed, if some accounts are to be credited, of some scores\nof yards. Where does this animal exist except in the stomach where it\nis found? Sheep, dogs, horses, &c. breed worms peculiar to themselves.\nI have seen frequently between the sound and back-bone of a whiting,\nlong worms that were evidently bred there. As I have no system to\nsupport, I shall have no objection if you can account for these facts\naccording to the present philosophy\u2014but to me it seems absolutely\nimpossible.\n\nI may strengthen every thing I have advanced on self-production with\nadditional arguments, and those from instances on the largest scale.\nThe old and new continents are two immense islands. You will get little\nby supposing them once joined at Kamchatka. What should ever induce\nthose animals which are never seen out of a hot climate, to travel so\nfar North as the Strait between the continents? They do not approach\nit now, why should they then? Besides, has not each continent some\ncreatures peculiar to itself? Did those in America come from countries\nwhere no such animals exist? If they did not, and are found in America\nonly, what is the fair conclusion?\n\nWhen an inhabitant of the old continent asks how America was peopled,\nwhy does the question stop there? How was it supplied with vegetables\nand animals? particularly river-fish; and whence came those creatures\nthat exist no where else? Pray, what is to hinder an American from\nreversing the question? When did our people, he may say, first migrate\nand give inhabitants to the Eastern world? What answer can be given to\nthese questions confident with the present system of philosophy?\n\nThere is something in the sound of self-production which seems like\na contradiction. I mean nothing more by it, than that a vegetable or\nanimal does in many instances first exist by a different principle\nthan that upon which the species is afterwards continued. As the term\ndoes not exactly express this, it may easily be perverted from the\nsense in which I wish to be understood. Perhaps we shall find that\nself-production shocks the imagination more or less according to the\n_size_ of the thing produced. Who would not sooner believe that cheese\nbreeds mites, than that deserts produce elephants? And yet, according\nto our present philosophy, one is as possible as the other.\n\nIf the consequences I have drawn from these facts appear to you wrong,\nor the facts themselves ill-supported\u2014convince me of my error, and the\nwhole shall be retracted as freely as it is advanced by\n\n                                         Yours most faithfully, &c.\n\n\n\n\n                             =LETTER= XXV.\n\n\nTho\u2019 I hate to set out upon the principle of word-hunting, yet it\nalways gives me pleasure when by accident I can trace the meaning of\na word or phrase to its source, and pursue it through its various\nchanges to its present date. The pleasure is still greater to mark the\ngradual refinement of language from obscurity and barbarism, until it\narrives at precision and elegance. Our tongue, as every one knows, is\na compound of many.\u2014\u2014The pains which William the Conqueror took to\ngraft his Norman French upon it, succeeded in many instances, and there\nare others where we may trace the dying away of the French by degrees,\nand the English resuming its old place. Chaucer in his character of the\nMonk, says\n\n    He was a lord full fat and in _good point_.\n\nThis is the remains of the French _embonpoint_, or as it was written\nthen _en bon point_.\u2014\u2014The phrase was wearing out in Chaucer\u2019s time,\nthe _en bon_ being translated, and _point_ preserved. Now, the whole\nis translated, and we say _in good case_, or _plight_.\u2014\u2014You may find\nmany other instances of this in the old poets.\n\n\u201cThe days are now a cock-stride longer,\u201d say the country-folks at\nTwelfth-day\u2014and many have been the conjectures upon the derivation\nof this phrase (see the Gentleman\u2019s Magazine). It is not cock-stride,\nbut cock\u2019s-tread. In the country, _tread_ is pronounced _trede_, (not\n_tred_)\u2014and in most of the western counties, Devonshire excepted,\n_stride_ has more of the _e_ than _i_ in its sound.\u2014But the\nimpossibility of expressing by any known signs the different provincial\nmodifications of the sound of the vowels, has occasioned some strange\nmistakes when people of one county endeavour to write down an\nexpression used in another. Our old poets, who generally writ in the\ndialect of the province where they resided, and spelt as well as they\ncould with their own country vowels, have given birth to much laughable\ncriticism.\n\n_Help-mate_ is an odd corruption. In the Book of Genesis it is said,\n\u201cit is not good for man to be alone, I will make an help meet for\nhim\u201d\u2014that is an help, _proper_ for him\u2014_meet_ is an adjective. But\nthese two words, like the first man and his help, soon became one, and\nof late have been corrected into _help-mate_.\n\nAs I was reading John Struys\u2019s voyages the other day, I thought I\ndiscovered the original of the word, and perhaps of the liquor,\npunch; which, if I am right, has nothing to do with that diverting\npersonage in puppet-shews of the same name, from whom it is usually\nderived. Struys was at Gomroon in Persia, where he says, he drank\u2014\u2014\u201cA\nliquor much in use there, called _pale punshen_, being compounded of\narak, sugar, and raisins, which is so bewitching that they cannot\nrefrain from drinking it.\u201d I really believe he _forgot_ to mention the\nwater\u2014for how in such a climate as the southern part of Persia it was\npossible to drink undiluted arak, I have no conception. The raisins\nhave given place, and very properly, to lemons. But I had better leave\nthis to its own merits.\u2014I am afraid it will not bear too minute an\nexamination\u2014remember it is only _humbly_ offered together with the\nother conjectures of\n\n                                                         Yours, &c.\n\nAs Struys\u2019s Voyages is a scarce book, I might with great ease have\npractised the common trick of authors, and introduced _water_ into the\nquotation without fear of discovery. It being supposed that few will\ngive themselves the trouble to turn to the original book to examine\nextracts, authors have been made to give evidence to facts, \u201cof which\nthey nothing know,\u201d and to support systems which never had existence,\nbut in the imagination of the writer who presses them into his service.\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXVI.\n\n\nThe rubs and difficulties which the public throw in the way of a genius\nat his first appearance, are frequently too great to be surmounted.\n\nWe are apt to form our opinion of a man\u2019s abilities, by his resemblance\nto some other man of reputation in the art or science he professes.\nA painter, musician, or author perfectly new we are afraid to\ncommend\u2014like hounds, we wait for the opening of one whose cry we may\nventure to follow.\u2014But it should be remembered that a sure mark of a\ngenius is originality. As he is original, and therefore new, perhaps it\nmay be necessary to conquer some prepossessions before we can judge of\nhis merit; and as he is generally incapable, from that modesty which\nso frequently attends ability, of insisting on his own excellencies,\nthe world should take that task from him.\u2014But does it so? Or from the\nfear of commending too hastily, leave a Being to languish in obscurity,\nwhich should be protected and encouraged. The greatest part of those\nwho seem to have been born to make mankind happy, were themselves\nmiserable. A melancholy catalogue might be made of these. If we know\nany thing of Homer, it is, that he ran about ballad-singing. Poor,\nunhappy, half-starved Cervantes, Cam\u00f6ens, Butler, Fielding! Does it\nnot grieve you to be told that the author of Tom Jones lies in the\nfactory\u2019s burying-ground at Lisbon, undistinguished, unregarded\u2014not\na stone to mark the place! And would it not raise our indignation to\nbehold stately monuments erected for those whose names were never heard\nof, until they appeared in their epitaph?\u2014\u2014were they not considered\nrather as monuments of the sculptor\u2019s art, than as preserving the\nmemory of the persons whose dust they so pompously cover.\n\nThe instances of those original geniuses who in their life-time have\nenjoyed the public applause and lived by it, are very few\u2014indeed I\ncannot recollect any\u2014Garrick excepted. I do not consider Virgil or\nPope in this light\u2014they are not original. It is true that Shakspeare\nlived well enough, but the money he got was by acting, not writing.\nMilton was in tolerable circumstances, but if he had had nothing more\nto depend on than the profit arising from the sale of the finest poem\nin the world, he must have been starved.\n\nIt is common when we speak of a genius, to say, he will not be valued\nuntil he is dead\u2014not that his death is essential to his reputation;\nbut there is a necessity of his being known and understood, before he\ncan be esteemed; and it generally happens that life is of too short\nduration for that purpose\u2014\n\n    \u201cBut the fair guerdon when we hope to find\n    And think to burst out into sudden blaze,\n    Comes the blind Fury with th\u2019 abhorred shears\n    And slits the thin-spun life.\u201d\u2014\u2014\u2014\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXVII.\n\n\nAlliteration very early made its appearance in English poetry. I have\nseen an old piece where it was intended to supply the place of rhyme:\nthe terminations of each line were different; and there were in every\none, three or four words which begun with the same letter. This I\nsuppose was thought a beauty. Shakspeare in several places burlesques\nthe improper use of Alliteration with great pleasantry. It was much in\nrequest in the days of Thompson\u2014\u2014his\n\n    \u2014\u2014Floor, faithless to the fuddled foot,\n\nis scarce less ridiculous than Shakspeare\u2019s\n\n    Bravely broach\u2019d his bloody boiling breast.\n\nI believe wherever it is _perceived_, it disgusts. There is something\nvery ridiculous in the pains of an author when he is searching for a\nset of words beginning with the same letter: this surely argues a \u201clack\nof matter.\u201d A man who has _things_ in his head, is never curious about\n_words_, unless it be those which express his meaning quickest and\nclearest. I would have given something to have seen the paper upon\nwhich _Smollet_ first sketched the titles of some of his novels. I dare\nsay it cost him as much time to fix upon the name _Roderick Random_,\nas to write some of the best parts in that sprightly and entertaining\nperformance.\u2014\u2014_Robert_ and _Richard_ were common, _Roger_ and\n_Ralph_ were vulgar\u2014there was a necessity for a sounding uncommon\nname, and beginning with an _R_: at last, by a lucky chance _Roderick_\noccurred\u2014and _Roderick_ it is.\u2014Do you think me fanciful? I call upon\n_Peregrine Pickle_, and _Ferdinand Fathom_ to prove the contrary.\n\nIf we laugh at the hard-sought-for Alliteration of the poet and\nhistorian, may we not laugh a little louder at that of the comic\ndramatist? Can any language be less that of nature or common\nconversation, than strings of words beginning with an M or N? And yet\nthis has been done by one who paints the \u201cManners living as they rise.\u201d\nIt is surprizing that so sprightly a genius as Foote could submit to\nthe drudgery of consulting his spelling-book for words proper to be\npaired\u2014my three _ppp\u2019s_ put me in mind of a letter in the Student, in\nwhich _p_ is predominant\u2014it is highly humourous and well worth your\nperusing.\n\nWill you give me leave to make an abrupt transition from Alliteration\nto _Literation_, and pardon me also for coining?\n\nThe Germans in pronouncing English, and writing it too, if they have\nnot studied the language, almost constantly change _b_ into _p_, _d_\ninto _t_, _g_ (hard) into _k_, _v_ into _f_, and the reverse. This\npeculiarity of theirs, I find, upon recollection, is not confined to\nEnglish. In the Burletta of _La buona Figliola_, the author makes\nhis German character to say _trompetti_ and _tampurri_\u2014nay they\nserve their own language the same, as I have observed from their\npronunciation of proper names of cities, &c. it seems difficult to\naccount for this\u2014\u2014but perhaps not more so than for the trick of\nthe French in giving an aspirate to those English words where there\nis none, and omitting it where it should be used.\u2014\u2014I once saw a\nFrench-man much surprized, (not disconcerted) at a general laugh when\nhe was comparing our country women with his\u2014an unlucky misplaced\naspirate was all the cause\u2014\u201cThe English ladies,\u201d says he, \u201care so\nplain, but the French ladies are so \u1fde_airy_!\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                           =LETTER= XXVIII.\n\n\nThough superstition is pretty well laughed away, yet there are some\npoints in which we can never get the better of it. The wedding ring in\ncoffee grounds\u2014the coffin in the candle\u2014the stranger in the fire,\nare marked by none but vulgar and foolish eyes. You see salt spilt,\nhear death-watches\u2014owls hoot\u2014dogs howl, and despise the omen\u2014you are\nabove it. But yet let me ask _you_, an enlightened philosopher\u2014Whether\nyou are above choice of seats at whist? Whether you have not really\nbelieved that your chance for winning was much bettered by your taking\nthe fortunate chairs, and of course obliging your adversaries to sit,\nnot in those of the scornful, but of the losers? When you quit the game\non a run of ill luck, what is it but declaring your belief that the\ngames already played have an influence upon those which are to come?\n\nEach ticket in a lottery has an equal chance\u2014\u2014do you think so?\nNumber 1000 got the great prize in the last lottery\u2014now, confess\nhonestly that you feel something within that tells you the same\nnumber can never win the great prize again\u2014you would prefer every\nother number to it\u2014and yet reason says, that all the tickets have\nan equal probability of success. In these instances and many others,\nsuperstition, even in cultivated minds, will be always more than a\nmatch for truth.\n\nA gentleman coming a passenger in a vessel from the West-Indies,\nfinding it more inconvenient to be shaved than to wear his beard, chose\nthe latter\u2014\u2014but he was not suffered to have his choice long\u2014it\nwas the unanimous opinion of the sailors, and indeed of the Captain\nas well, that there was not the least probability of a wind as long\nas this ominous beard was suffered to grow. They petitioned\u2014they\nremonstrated, and at last prepared to cut the fatal hairs by violence.\nNow, as there is no operation at which it is so much the patient\u2019s\ninterest to consent, as that of the barber\u2014\u2014the gentleman quietly\nsubmitted\u2014nor could the wind resist the potent spell which instantly\nfilled all their sails, and \u201cwafted them merrily away.\u201d\n\nYou see we have only got rid of _general_ superstition, we still retain\nthat which belongs to our particular profession or pursuits.\n\n                                                             Adieu.\n\n\n\n\n                            =LETTER= XXIX.\n\n\nI have often tryed to have a proper idea of vast space\u2014great\nnumbers\u2014enormous size and such subjects, and as you may suppose,\nwithout success. But though I fail in getting a competent idea, I\nsometimes make an approach towards it, which is better than nothing.\n\nThe solar system is one of these sublime subjects in the consideration\nof which I have frequently been lost. I never attempted to conceive\nthe size of the sun, or the distance of saturn; the impossibility\ninstantly repels the most daring imagination. No, all that I have\nattempted is to have a just idea of the proportion (upon any scale)\nthat the sun and planets bear to each other in respect to size and\ndistance. At first sight, this seems easily done\u2014Draw some concentric\ncircles on a sheet of paper, make the sun the centre, and place the\nplanets round in their order.\u2014Or if you would have an idea of their\nmotion as well, look at an orrery. But a little examination will\nconvince you that this is doing nothing towards having an idea of\ntheir size and distance in proportion to each other, which is the\npoint sought. Nay, it is worse than nothing, for it imposes a falsity\nas a reality. Imagination by itself can do a great deal, if assisted\nit can do more, but if perverted, nothing. Let us try to assist the\nimagination then.\n\nIf the sun be only a million times bigger than the earth, (exactness\nis of no consequence to my argument, so that I am within the truth) it\nis plain that I cannot make two circles upon a sheet of paper (without\nconsidering any thing about distance) that can bear this proportion to\neach other; and if this cannot be done for the earth, much less can it\nfor other planets and moons where the disproportion is greater. Let\nus take the floor of a large room\u2014on this make a circle of two feet\ndiameter for the sun\u2014the size of the earth will be about a large\npin\u2019s head. The distance of the sun from the earth is about eighty of\nthe sun\u2019s diameters; if so, there must be a circle of three hundred\nand twenty feet diameter for the earth\u2019s orbit, which no room, nor\nindeed any other building, will contain. Let us try a field\u2014\u2014here\nwe may put our sun and draw the earth\u2019s orbit round. If we stand in\nthe center (which we should do) the earth is too small to be seen.\nThese difficulties occurring so soon, how will they increase when we\ntake in the superior planets? The ingenious Ferguson has endeavoured\nto assist our imagination by supposing St. Paul\u2019s dome, in diameter\none hundred and forty-five feet, to be the sun\u2014\u2014upon this scale,\nMercury is between nine and ten inches, and placed at the Tower; Venus\nnear eighteen, at St. James\u2019s Palace; the Earth eighteen, at Marybone;\nMars ten, at Kensington; Jupiter fifteen feet, at Hampton-Court; and\nSaturn eleven feet and half, at Cliffden. Let us be on the top of\nthe dome, and look for the planets where he has placed them. Do you\nthink we could see any thing of Jupiter and Saturn? to say nothing\nof their moons\u2014or that we could conceive properly the difference\nbetween four miles and twenty, when seen on a line? the four may be\ntwo, or one mile; and the twenty may be ten, or thirty, for ought we\ncan judge by the appearance. All that we get by this is the knowing\nthat a sheet of paper or an orrery give us wrong ideas, and that we\ncannot by any contrivance put the size and distance of the planets upon\na proportionable scale, so as to take in the whole with our eye or\nunderstanding.\n\nWe are as much at a loss to comprehend the slowness of their motion\u2014I\nhave not mistaken\u2014I mean slowness.\u2014A circuit which is six or\ntwelve months or twice as many years performing, is slow almost\nbeyond conception; and yet this motion is called whirling\u2014as if the\nplanets went round their orbits like a top! Though quick and slow are\ncomparative terms, we have ideas of each arising from the medium of\nthe two, from observation, and common application, that do not stand in\nneed of any comparison to be understood. The motion of a flea is quick;\nof a snail, slow; and the common walk of a man is neither quick nor\nslow. Let us imagine an elephant to walk, and a flea to hop the same\ndistance in the same time\u2014would you hesitate to say that the motion of\nthe one was slow, and the other quick? In short, swiftness or slowness\ndoes not depend upon the absolute quantity of ground the animal passes\nin a certain time, but upon the relative quantity to its own size.\nThe earth is about eight minutes in moving the space of one diameter,\ntherefore its absolute motion is slow\u2014it is twenty-four hours making\none revolution round its axis, which gives no idea of velocity. It\nis certain that if we were placed very near the earth (unaffected\nby its attraction) there would appear an exceeding quick change of\nsurface\u2014and so would the motion of a snail appear to an animalcule.\nThe quantity of space when compared to any we can move in the same time\nis vast, and the motion quick, but when considered as belonging to a\nbody of the size of a world, the motion is slow. Suppose a common globe\nwas turned round once in twenty-four hours\u2014imagine an animal as much\ninferior to it in size as we are to the earth, placed as I conceived\nthe human spectator placed to view the earth\u2014would the apprehension\nof this Being induce you to call a single revolution in twenty-four\nhours, whirling? Would not you say that though the surface passed quick\nin review before him, yet that the absolute motion of the whole was\nexceedingly slow. Perhaps it is our measuring this motion by miles that\nmakes us fancy that it is quick, which is much like taking the height\nof a mountain in hairs-breadths. When we are told that Saturn moves in\nhis orbit more than twenty-two thousand miles in an hour, we conceive\nthe velocity to be great; but when we find that he is more than three\nhours moving his own diameter, we must then think it as it really is,\nslow. Bishop Wilkins is the only writer I have met with who considers\nthe motion of the heavenly bodies as I do, and I am rather proud of\nhaving my opinion supported by so great a man.\n\nThere is another circumstance which prevents the solar system, as\ncommonly delineated, from bearing a true resemblance to the apparent\nposition and motion of the planets. It is always drawn in plan instead\nof section, whereas the _appearance_ of the orbits of the heavenly\nbodies is always in section and never can be in plan. This difference\nis not, as far as I know, noticed in any account of the solar system;\nand yet if it be not attended to, it is impossible to prove the truth\nof the system by the apparent paths of the planets. This will be best\nunderstood by considering the inferior ones. Mercury and Venus remove\nto a certain distance from the sun, and then, after seeming at rest,\nreturn in nearly the same line and remove to the same distance on the\nother side, where the same thing is repeated. This to the eye is not\na revolution in plan, but a revolution in section\u2014and this might\nbe explained by a draught which should always accompany the common\ndelineation of the planetary orbits.\n\n\n\n\n                             =LETTER= XXX.\n\n\nIt is so long since that I sent you the first part of my observations\non Quarles that perhaps you have forgot my promise for the\nremainder.\u2014\u2014I will now resume the subject.\n\nQuarles sometimes introduces personages, and makes his poem of the\ndramatic cast. The sixth hieroglyphic is a dialogue between _Time_\nand _Death_; as usual, alluding to the print, where _Death_ is going\nto extinguish the taper, but is prevented by _Time_. There are a few\nawkward expressions in this, which are easier to be overlooked than\nomitted.\n\n              _Time._      _Death._\n\n    _Time._   Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;\n                Alas! it hath not long to last;\n              Without the help of either thief or puff,\n                Her weakness knows the way to waste:\n              Nature hath made her substance apt enough\n                To spend itself, and spend too fast:\n                  It needs the help of none\n                    That is so prone\n              To lavish out untouch\u2019d, and languish all alone.\n\n    _Death._  _Time_, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac\u2019d sand;\n                Thine idle minutes make no way:\n              Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,\n                I cannot hold, I cannot stay.\n              Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,\n                I surfeit with too long delay:\n                  This brisk this bold-fac\u2019d light\n                    Doth burn too bright;\n              Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.\n\n    _Time._   Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,\n                Thy captive\u2019s fast and cannot flee:\n              What arm can rescue? who can countermand?\n                What pow\u2019r can set thy pris\u2019ner free?\n              Or if they could; what close, what foreign land\n                Can hide that head that flees from thee?\n                  But if her harmless light\n                    Offend thy sight\n              What need\u2019st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at\n                 night?\n\n    _Death._  I have outstaid my patience; my quick trade\n                Grows dull and makes too slow return:\n              This long-liv\u2019d debt is due, and should been paid\n                When first her flame began to burn:\n              But I have staid too long, I have delay\u2019d\n                To store my vast, my craving urn.\n                  My patent gives me pow\u2019r\n                    Each day, each hour,\n              To strike the peasant\u2019s thatch, and shake the princely\n                   tow\u2019r.\n\n    _Time._   Thou count\u2019st too fast: thy patent gives no pow\u2019r\n                Till Time shall please to say, Amen.\n    _Death._  Canst thou appoint my shaft?\n    _Time._   Or thou my hour?\n    _Death._  \u2019Tis I bid, do.\n    _Time._   \u2019Tis I bid, when;\n              Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow\u2019r\n                To hang the drooping head \u2019till then:\n                  Thy shafts can neither kill,\n                    Nor strike, until\n              My power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!\n\nThere is nothing which destroys the _reality_ in a dramatic dialogue\nmore than when the speakers ask questions and reply in an equal\nquantity of lines. Perhaps the most disgusting instance of this is in\nMilton\u2019s Mask, where Comus and the Lady have a verse each alternately,\nfor fourteen lines together. We are more sensible of the sameness in\nquantity where it is so short, and so often repeated, than here in\nQuarles where it is extended to a stanza, and that repeated for each\nspeaker but once\u2014but even here you begin to feel its bad effect,\nwhen it is finely relieved towards the end by the characters growing\nwarmer in their dispute, and, of course, making their speeches shorter.\nYet what I here condemn, others admire.\u2014\u2014You, who are so fond of the\nancients, may easily defend this practice by their example, and if you\nwant any assistance to demolish me, may call in Mr. West and the author\nof the Origin and Progress of Language.\u2014This passage of the former\nfrom his translation of the Iphigenia of Euripedes is quoted by the\nlatter with great commendations\u2014\u2014not indeed because the dialogue is\nin alternate verse, but for its being a fine imitation of the ancient\ntrochaic measure.\n\n    _Iph._ Know\u2019st thou what should now be ordered?\n      _Tho._ \u2019Tis thy office to prescribe.\n    _Iph._ Let them bind in chains the strangers.\n      _Tho._ Canst thou fear they should escape?\n    _Iph._ Trust no Greek; Greece is perfidious.\n      _Tho._ Slaves depart, and bind the Greeks.\n    _Iph._ Having bound, conduct them hither, &c.\n\nIt is true that here the reply wants one of having the same number of\nsyllables as the question\u2014but still the constant return of the same\nquantity for each speaker is disgusting to all unprejudiced ears. You\nwill tell me that it is in the high gusto of the antique, and that the\nfeet are trochaics\u2014I can only reply, that hard words cannot convince\nme contrary to reason, and if a proper effect is not produced, it is\nof very little consequence to me whether the authority is brought from\nGreece or Siberia. Horace\u2019s often-quoted _Pallida mors_, &c. was\nperhaps never better translated than at the end of the fourth stanza.\n\nThe ninth hieroglyphic will put you in mind of the poems that are\nsqueezed or stretched into the form of axes, altars, and wings\u2014\u2014but\nif you will attend to the matter, and not the form, you will find it\nexcellent\u2014\u2014to write this properly requires some care.\n\n                        _Behold_\n                    How short a span\n                  Was long enough of old\n              To measure out the life of man;\n        In those well-temper\u2019d days, his time was then\n    Survey\u2019d, cast up, and found but threescore years and ten!\n\n                        _Alas!_\n                    And what is that?\n              They come, and slide, and pass,\n            Before my pen can tell thee what.\n        The posts of Time are swift, which having run\n    Their sev\u2019n short stages o\u2019er, their short-liv\u2019d task is done.\n\n                        _Our days_\n                      Begun, we lend\n                  To sleep, to antick plays\n              And toys, until the first stage end:\n          12 waining moons, twice 5 times told, we give\n        To unrecover\u2019d loss: we rather breathe than live.\n\n                        _We spend_\n                    A ten years breath\n                  Before we apprehend\n              What \u2019tis to live, or fear a Death:\n        Our childish dreams are fill\u2019d with painted joys\n    Which please our sense awhile, and waking prove but toys!\n\n                        _How vain_\n                      How wretched is\n                Poor man, that doth remain\n              A slave to such a state as this!\n          His days are short, at longest; few at most;\n        They are but bad at best; yet lavish\u2019d out, or lost.\n\n                        _They be_\n                    The secret springs\n                That make our minutes flee\n            On wheels more swift than eagle\u2019s wings!\n          Our Life\u2019s a clock, and ev\u2019ry gasp of breath\n    Breathes forth a warning grief, till Time shall strike a Death!\n\n                        _How soon_\n                    Our new-born light\n                Attains to full-ag\u2019d noon!\n          And this, how soon to grey-hair\u2019d night!\n        We spring, we bud, we blossom and we blast\n    E\u2019er we can count our days, our days they flee so fast!\n\n                      _They end_\n                  When scarce begun;\n                And e\u2019er we apprehend\n          That we begin to live, our life is done:\n        Man count thy days; and if they fly too fast\n    For thy dull thoughts to count, count ev\u2019ry day the last.\n\nMethinks Quarles\u2019s ghost is at my elbow, which will not be appeased\nunless I remark that the first lines of each stanza make a verse, being\nthe text on which the poem is a comment.\n\n    _Behold, alas! our days we spend;\n    How vain they be, how soon they end!_\n\nThis is a kind of false wit once much in request. Jarvis, the\ntranslator of Don Quixote, calls it _glossing_\u2014upon what authority I\nknow not. In the first chapter of the second book of the second volume\nmay be found a text and gloss\u2014with this difference from Quarles\u2019s,\nthat the text is introduced at the end of the stanza and not at the\nbeginning.\n\nIt is impossible to avoid smiling at the pains he must have taken to\npreserve the form of the stanza\u2014in the third he is obliged to have\nthe assistance of figures, or his line would have been too long; and\nafter all his trouble there must be some for the reader before he has\ncalculated how much \u201c12 moons, twice 5 times told,\u201d are\u2014\u2014in the\nrest, to say the truth, it is not so apparent. If this pyramidical\nstanza prevents you from attending to the poetry, it is easily put in\nanother\u2014of the two first lines make one; and the false wit immediately\nvanishes.\u2014I hope Quarles\u2019s ghost vanished before I proposed the\nalteration.\n\nI have, like a prudent caterer, reserved the best thing for the last.\nIt is the twelfth emblem of the third book. The subject of the print is\na figure trying to escape from the Divine vengeance which is pursuing\nin thunders: the motto\u2014\u2014_O that thou wouldst hide me in the grave,\nthat thou wouldst keep me in secret until thy wrath be past!_ Upon this\nhint he has produced the following excellent poem.\n\n    Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrod\n    Shall I seek out to \u2019scape the flaming rod\n    Of my offended, of my angry God?\n\n    Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hide\n    My head from thunder? where shall I abide,\n    Until his flames be quench\u2019d or laid aside?\n\n    What, if my feet should take their hasty flight,\n    And seek protection in the shades of night?\n    Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.\n\n    What, if my soul should take the wings of day,\n    And find some desert? if she spring away\n    The wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.\n\n    What, if some solid rock should entertain\n    My frighted soul? can solid rocks restrain\n    The stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?\n\n    Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave,\n    Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave,\n    Where flame-ey\u2019d fury means to smite, can save.\n\n    Tis vain to flee; \u2019till gentle mercy shew\n    Her better eye; the farther off we go,\n    The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.\n\n    Th\u2019 ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flie\n    His angry mother\u2019s hand, but clings more nigh,\n    And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.\n\n    Great God! there is no safety here below;\n    Thou art my fortress, thou that seem\u2019st my foe,\n    \u2019Tis thou that strik\u2019st the stroke, must guard the blow.\n\nSix stanzas, which though very good, yet being of less merit than the\nrest are omitted. It is obvious that he had the 139th psalm in his\neye, of which he has made great use. The alarm at the beginning\u2014the\nsearching all nature for shelter\u2014the impossibility of being hid\nfrom the author of nature\u2014and the acquiescing at last in what was\nunavoidable, are grand and natural ideas. The motion of the wings of\nvengeance\u2014and the recapitulation of the places where protection was\nfought in vain\u2014are instances of expression rarely met with. But\nwhat praise is sufficient for the simile in the eighth stanza? To\nsay only that it is apposite and beautiful, comes very short of my\nsensations when I read it. Let me confess honestly that I think it\none of the noblest instances of the sublime pathetic! As a part of a\nreligious poem it is proper, in a high degree; the scripture frequently\nconsidering our connection with the Almighty as that of children\nwith a parent.\u2014As a pictoresque image it is distinct, natural, and\naffecting.\u2014But to remark all the beauties of this poem would be to\ncomment on every stanza.\u2014\u2014You will have more pleasure in finding them\nout yourself.\n\nNow what think you, is not this rather too good to be lost? Was it from\nnever reading Quarles, or taking his character from common report, that\nPope considered his productions as the very bathos of poetry? Poor\nQuarles! thou hast had many enemies, and art now forgotten. But thou\nhast at last found a friend\u2014not equal, indeed, to the task of turning\na tide that has been flowing for a hundred years against thee\u2014not\nequal to his wishes for giving thee and every neglected genius his due\nshare of reputation\u2014but barely capable of laying the first stone of\nthy temple of fame, which he leaves to be compleated by abler and by\nstronger hands!\n\n                                                           Farewel.\n\nP. S. I had forgot to inform you that these emblems were imitated in\nLatin by one Herman Hugo, a Jesuit. The first edition of them was in\n1623, soon after the appearance of Quarles; and the book was reprinted\nfor the ninth time in 1676, which last is the date of the copy in my\npossession. How many more editions there have been, I know not. He\nmakes no acknowledgement to Quarles, and speaks of his own work as\noriginal. As a specimen of his manner, take the following, which is\nintended as an imitation of \u201cAh whither shall I fly?\u201d\n\n    Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris?\n      Tecta, quibus dextr\u00e6 server ab igne tu\u00e6?\n    Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat,\n      Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.\n\n    Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas,\n      Lustr\u00e0que solivagis opto relicta feris.\n    Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris,\n      Aut maris exes\u00e2 condere rupe velim, &c.\n\nIt reads but poorly after the other, though I have given you the best\nof it. He afterwards by degrees quits his subject, runs into stuff\nabout Cain and Jonah, and has entirely omitted the simile.\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\nYou express an inclination to publish my letters. You should consider\nthat the date of some of them is so far back, that many allusions\nto passing incidents which might engage attention at the time, now\nmust fail of their effect.\u2014\u2014People are spoken of as living, who are\ndead\u2014\u2014and many other objections might be enumerated. However, you\nare at liberty to do what you please with them. Those which are of\na private nature, your prudence will, of course, keep to yourself:\nand for the others, where some conjectures are hazarded which may be\nthought different from received opinions; the writer wishes them to be\nread with the same impartiality they were written\u2014\u2014though he is well\napprized of the difficulty of dispossessing old opinions.\n\n\n                              _=FINIS.=_\n\n\n\n\n  Transcriber\u2019s Notes:\n\n   - Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).\n   - Text enclosed by equals is in gespertt (=gespertt=).\n   - Blank pages have been removed.\n   - Silently corrected typographical errors.\n   - Spelling and hyphenation variations made consistent.\n   - Page 87, end of letter XXVII: The symbol appears to be U+1FDE\n     Greek Dasia (rough breathing diacritical mark for an \u2018h\u2019 sound\n     before a vowel) and Oxia (acute accent).\n   - Formatting of a dialogue in letter XXX made more consistent.","title":"Thirty Letters on Various Subjects, Vol. 2 (of 2)","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":13603}