brandishing their fwords, and chearing their troops; and in that manner I attend them through the battle, every incident of which appears to be paffing in my fight.

I have had occafion to obferve*, that ideas both of memory and of fpeech, produce emotions of the fame kind with what are produced by an immediate view of the object; only fainter, in proportion as an idea is fainter than an original perception. The infight we have now got, unfolds that mystery: ideal prefence supplies the want of real prefence; and in idea we perceive perfons acting and fuffering, precisely as in an original furvey: if our fympathy be engaged by the latter, it must also in fome degree be engaged by the former, especially if the diftinctness of ideal prefence approach to that of real prefence. Hence the pleasure of a reverie, where a man, forgetting himself, is totally occupied with the ideas paffing in his mind, the objects of which he conceives to be really exifting in his prefence. The power of language to raise emotions, depends entirely on the raifing fuch lively and diftinct images as are here defcribed: the reader's paffions are never fenfibly moved, till he be thrown into a kind of reverie; in which ftate, forgetting that he is reading, he conceives every incident as paffing in his prefence, precifely as if he were an eye-witnefs. A general or reflective remembrance cannot warm us into

* Part 1. fect. 1. of the prefent chapter.

any

any emotion: it may be agreeable in some flight degree; but its ideas are too faint and obfcure to raise any thing like an emotion; and were they ever fo lively, they pafs with too much. precipitation to have that effect: our emotions are never inftantaneous; even fuch as come the fooneft to their height, have different periods of birth and increment; and to give opportunity for thefe different periods, it is neceffary that the caufe of every emotion be present to the mind a due time; for an emotion is not carried to its height but by reiterated impreffions. We know that to be the cafe of emotions arifing from objects of fight; a quick fucceffion, even of the moft beautiful objects, fcarce making any impreffion; and if this hold in the fucceffion of original perceptions, how much more in the fucceffion of ideas?

Though all this while I have been only defcribing what paffeth in the mind of every one, and what every one must be confcious of, it was neceffary to enlarge upon the fubject; because, however clear in the internal conception, it is far from being fo when described in words. Ideal prefence, though of general importance, hath scarce ever been touched by any writer; and however difficult the explication, it could not be avoided in accounting for the effects produced by fiction. Upon that point, the reader, I guess, has prevented me: it already muft have occurred to him, that if, in reading, ideal prefence

prefence be the means by which our paffions are moved, it makes no difference whether the fubject be a fable or a true hiftory: when ideal prefence is complete, we perceive every object as in our fight; and the mind, totally occupied with an interesting event, finds no leifure for reflection. This reafoning is confirmed by conftant and univerfal experience. Let us take under confideration the meeting of Hector and Andromache, in the fixth book of the Iliad, or fome of the paffionate fcenes in King Lear: these pictures of human life, when we are fufficiently engaged, give an impreffion of reality not lefs diftinct than that given by Tacitus defcribing the death of Otho: we never once reflect whether the story be true or feigned; reflection comes afterward, when we have the scene no longer before our eyes. This reafoning will appear in a ftill clearer light, by oppofing ideal prefence to ideas raised by a curfory narrative; which ideas being faint, obfcure, and imperfect, leave a vacuity in the mind, which folicits reflection. And accordingly, a curt narrative of feigned incidents is never relifhed: any flight pleasure it affords, is more than counterbalanced by the disguft it infpires for want of truth.

To support the foregoing theory, I add what I reckon a decifive argument; which is, that even genuine hiftory has no command over our paffions but by ideal prefence only; and confequently, that in this refpect it ftands upon the

fame

fame footing with fable. To me it appears clear, that in neither can our fympathy hold firm against reflection: for if the reflection that a ftory is a pure fiction prevent our fympathy, fo will equally the reflection that the perfons described are no longer exifting. What effect, for example, can the belief of the rape of Lucretia have to raise our fympathy, when she died above 2000 years ago, and hath at prefent no painful feeling of the injury done her? The effect of hiftory, in point of instruction, depends in fome measure upon its veracity. But hiftory cannot reach the heart, while we indulge any reflection upon the facts: fuch reflection, if it engage our belief, never fails at the fame time to poifon our pleasure, by convincing us that our fympathy for those who are dead and gone is abfurd. And if reflection be laid afide, hiftory ftands upon the fame footing with fable: what effect either may have to raise our sympathy, depends on the vivacity of the ideas they raise; and, with respect to that circumftance, fable is generally more fuccefsful than history.

Of all the means for making an impreffion of ideal prefence, theatrical reprefentation is the moft powerful. That words, independent of action, have the fame power in a less degree, every one of fenfibility muft have felt a good tragedy will extort tears in private, though not fo forcibly as upon the ftage. That power belongs alfo to painting: a good hiftorical picture makes

a

a deeper impreffion than words can, though not equal to that of theatrical action. Painting seems to poffefs a middle place between reading and acting in making an impreffion of ideal prefence, it is not lefs fuperior to the former than inferior to the latter.

It must not however be thought, that our paffions can be raised by painting, to fuch a height as by words: a picture is confined to a single instant of time, and cannot take in a fucceffion of incidents: its impreffion indeed is the deepeft that can be made inftantaneously; but feldom is a paffion raised to any height in an inftant, or by a fingle impreffion: it was observed above, that our paffions, those especially of the sympathetic kind, require, a fucceffion of impreffions; and for that reason, reading and acting have greatly the advantage, by reiterating impreffions without end.

Upon the whole, it is by means of ideal prefence that our paffions are excited; and till words produce that charm, they avail nothing: even real events entitled to our belief, must be conceived present and paffing in our fight, before they can nove us. And this theory serves to explain feveral phenomena otherwise unaccountable. A misfortune happening to a ftranger, makes a lefs impreffion than happening to a man we know, even where we are no way interested in him our acquaintance with this man, however flight, aids the conception of his fuffering VOL. I.

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