Γαίαν αναρρήξεις Ποσειδάων ενοσίχθων, Τρτσος άρα κτύπος ωςτο θεών έριδι ξυνώνπων. Iliad, xx. 47. &c. The works of Ossian (as I have elsewhere shewn) abound with examples of the sublime. The subjects of that author, and the manner in which he writes, are particularly favourable to it. He possesses all the plain and venerable manner of the ancient times. He deals in no superfluous or gaudy ornaments; but throws forth his images with a rapid conciseness, which enables them to strike the mind with the greatest force. Among poets of more polished times we are to look for the graces of correct writing, for just proportion of parts, and skilfully conducted narration. In the midst of smiling scenery and pleasurable themes, the gay and the beautiful will appear, undoubtedly, to more advantage. But amidst the rude scenes of nature and of society, such as Ossian describes; amidst rocks and torrents, and whirlwinds, and battles, dwells the sublime; and naturally associates itself with that grave and solemn spirit which distinguishes the author of Fingal. "As "autumn's dark storms pour from two echoing hills, so toward each other approached the heroes. As two dark streams from high rocks meet "and mix, and roar on the plain; loud, rough, and dark in battle, met "Lochlin and Inisfail: chief mixed his strokes with chief, and man " with man. Steel clanging sounded on steel. Helmets are cleft on "high; blood bursts, and smokes around. As the troubled noise of "the ocean when roll the waves on high; as the last peal of the “thunder of heaven; such is the noise of battle. The groan of the "people spread over the hills. It was like the thunder of night, when "the cloud bursts on Cona, and a thousand ghosts shriek at once on the "hollow wind." Never were images of more awful sublimity employed to heighten the terror of battle. * But when the powers descending swell'd the fight, Leapt from his throne, lest Neptune's arm should lay And pour in light on Pluto's drear abodes, Such wars th' immortals wage; such horrors rend The world's vast concave, when the gods contend. POPE I have produced these instances, in order to demonstrate how essential conciseness and simplicity are to sublime writing. Simplicity I place in opposition to studied and profuse ornament; and conciseness, to superfluous expression. The reason why a defect, either in conciseness or simplicity, is hurtful in a peculiar manner to the sublime, I shall endeavour to explain. The emotion occasioned in the mind by some great or noble object, raises it considerably above its ordinary pitch. A sort of enthusiasm is produced, extremely agreeable while it lasts; but from which the mind is tending every moment to fail down into its ordinary situation. Now, when an author has brought us, or is attempting to bring us, into this state; if he multiplies words unne cessarily; if he decks the sublime object which he presents to us, round and round, with glittering ornaments; nay, if he throws in any one decoration that sinks in the least below the capital image, that moment he alters the key; he relaxes the tension of the mind; the strength of the feeling is emasculated, the beautiful may remain, but the sublime is gone. When Julius Cæsar said to the pilot who was afraid to put to sea with him in a storm, "Quid times? Cæsarem vehis;" we are struck with the daring magnanimity of one relying with such confidence on his cause and his fortune. These few words convey every thing necessary to give us the impression full. Lucan resolved to amplify and adorn the thought. Observe how every time he twists it round, it departs farther from the sublime, till it ends at last in tumid declamation. Sperne minas, inquit, pelagi, ventoque furenti Trade sinum; Italiam, si, cœlo auctore, recusas, Non puppis nostræ labor est. Hanc Cæsare pressam Iste ratis.....Quid tanta strage peratur Ignoras? quærit pelagi cœlique tumultu Quid præstet fortuna mihi.* PHARS. V. 578. On account of the great importance of simplicity and conciseness, I conceive rhyme, in English verse, to be, if not inconsistent with the, * But Cæsar still superior to distress, Thou know'st not what a freight thy vessel bears; RowE. sublime, at least very unfavourable to it. The constrained elegance of this kind of verse, and studied smoothness of the sounds, answering regularly to each other at the end of the line, though they be quite consistent with gentle emotions, yet weaken the native force of sublimity; besides, that the superfluous words which the poet is often obliged to introduce in order to fill up the rhyme, tend farther to enfeeble it. Homer's description of the nod of Jupiter, as shaking the heavens, has been admired in all ages, as highly sublime. Literally translated, it runs thus: "He spoke, and bending his sable brows, gave the awful nod; while he "shook the celestial locks of his immortal head, all Olympus was shak"en." Mr. Pope translates it thus: He spoke; and awful bends his sable brows, High heaven with trembling the dread signal took, The image is spread out, and attempted to be beautified; but it is, in truth, weakened. The third line-"The stamp of fate, and sanction of 66 a God," is merely expletive, and introduced for no other reason but to fill up the rhyme; for it interrupts the description, and clogs the image. For the same reason, out of mere compliance with the rhyme, Jupiter is represented as shaking his locks before he gives the nod:-"Shakes "his ambrosial curls, and gives the nod," which is trifling, and without meaning: whereas, in the original, the hair of his head shaken, is the effect of his nod, and makes a happy picturesque circumstance in the description.* The boldness, freedom, and variety of our blank verse, is infinitely more favourable than rhyme, to all kinds of sublime poetry. The fullest proof of this is afforded by Milton; an author whose genius led him eminently to the sublime. The whole first and second books of Paradise Lost, are continued instances of it. Take only, for an example, the following noted description of Satan, after his fall, appearing at the head of the infernal hosts: -He, above the rest, In shape and gesture proudly eminent, Stood like a tower; his form had not yet lost Here concur a variety of sources of the sublime: the principal object eminently great; a high superior nature, fallen indeed, but erecting itself against distress; the grandeur of the principal object heightened, by associating it with so noble an idea as that of the sun suffering an eclipse; this picture shaded with all those images of change and trouble, of darkness and terror, which coincide so finely with the sublime emotion; and the whole expressed in a stile and versification, easy, natural and simple, but magnificent. * See Webb on the Beauties of Poetry. For I have spoken of simplicity and conciseness, as essential to sublime writing. In my general description of it, I mentioned strength, as another necessary requisite. The strength of description arises in a great measure, from a simple conciseness; but, it supposes also something more; namely, a proper choice of circumstances in the description, so as to exhibit the object in its full and most striking point of view. every object has several faces, so to speak, by which it may be presented to us according to the circumstances with which we surround it; and it will appear eminently sublime, or not, in proportion as all these circumstances are happily chosen, and of a sublime kind. Here lies the great art of the writer; and, indeed, the great difficulty of sublime description. If the description be too general, and divested of circumstances, the object appears in a faint light; it makes a feeble impression, or no impression at all, on the reader. At the same time, if any trivial or improper circumstances are mingled, the whole is degraded. A storm or tempest, for instance, is a sublime object in nature. But, to render it sublime in description, it is not enough either to give us mere general expressions concerning the violence of the tempest, or to describe its common vulgar effects, in overthrowing trees and houses. It must be painted with such circumstances as fill the mind with great and awful ideas. This is very happily done by Virgil, in the following pas sage: Ipse Pater, media nimborum in nocte, corusca GEOR. 1. Every circumstance in this noble description is the production of an imagination heated and astonished with the grandeur of the object. If there be any defect, it is in the words immediately following those I have quoted: "Ingeminant Austri, et densissimus imber;" where the transition is made too hastily, I am afraid, from the preceding sublime images, to a thick shower, and the blowing of the south wind; and shews how difficult it frequently is to descend with grace, without seeming to fall. The high importance of the rule which I have been now giving, concerning the proper choice of circumstances, when description is meant to be sublime, seems to me not to have been sufficiently attended to. It has, however, such a foundation in nature, as renders the least deflexion from it fatal. When a writer is aiming at the beautiful only, his descriptions may have improprieties in them, and yet be beautiful still. Some * The father of the gods his glory shrouds, F trivial, or misjudged circumstances, can be overlooked by the reader; they make only the difference of more or less: the gay, or pleasing emotion, which he has raised subsists still. But the case is quite different with the sublime. There, one trifling circumstance, one mean idea, is sufficient to destroy the whole charm. This is owing to the nature of the emotion aimed at by sublime description, which admits of no mediocrity, and cannot subsist in a middle state; but must either highly transport us, or, if unsuccessful in the execution, leave us greatly disgusted and displeased. We attempt to rise along with the writer; the imagination is awakened, and put upon the stretch; but it requires to be supported; and if, in the midst of its efforts, you desert it unexpectedly, down it comes with a painful shock. When Milton, in his battle of the angels, describes them as tearing up the mountains, and throwing them at one another: there are, in his description, as Mr. Addison has observed, no circumstances but what are properly sublime: From their foundations loos'ning to and fro, They pluck'd the seated hills, with all their load, Whereas Claudian, in a fragment upon the wars of the giants, has contrived to render this idea of their throwing the mountains, which is in itself so grand, burlesque, and ridiculous; by this single circumstance, of one of his giants with the mountain Ida upon his shoulders, and a river which flowed from the mountain, running down along the giant's' back, as he held it up in that posture. There is a description too in Virgil, which, I think, is censurable; though more slightly in this respect. It is that of the burning mountain Etna; a subject certainly very proper to be worked up by a poet into a sublime description : -Horrificis juxta tonat Ætna ruinis. Interdumque atram prorumpit ad æthera nubem, EN. III. 571, Here, after several magnificent images, the poet concludes with personifying the mountain under this figure," eructans viscera cum gemitu," belching up its bowels with a groan; which, by likening the mountain to a sick or drunk person, degrades the majesty of the description. It is to no purpose to tell us, that the poet here alludes to the fable of the giant Enceladus lying under mount Etna; and that he supposes his motions and tossings to have occasioned the fiery eruptions. He intended the description of a sublime object; and the natural ideas, raised by a burning mountain, are infinitely more lofty, than the belchings of any gi Fed from the fiery springs that boil below. DRYDEN. In this translation of Dryden's the debasing circumstance to which I object in the riginal, is, with propriety, omitted. |