Page images
PDF
EPUB

ESSAY ON POPE'S ART OF CRITICISM.
(Continued from page 253.)

HAVING thus taken a cursory view of the early state and gradual progress of the art of criticism in England, and among some of the principal continental nations, I proceed to introduce such passages from Pope's Essay, as are pecularly deserving of attention for originality of idea, or elegance of expression; and these are indeed so numerous, that it is difficult to make a just and concise selection. Amongst the first, however, we cannot but observe the following comparison of a student's progress in the sciences, with the journey of a traveller over the Alps; a comparison which, in Dr. Johnson's opinion, is one of the best that English poetry can show. "It has no useless parts, yet affords a striking picture by itself; it makes the foregoing position better understood, and enables it to take a stronger hold on the attention; it assists the apprehension, and elevates the fancy."

So pleas'd at first the tow'ring Alps we try, Mount o'er the vales, and seem to tread the sky;

Th' eternal snows appear already past,
And the first clouds and mountains seem
the last!

But those attain'd, we tremble to survey
The growing labours of the lengthen'd way;
The increasing prospect tires our wand'-
ring eyes,

Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps
arise!

225-232.

[blocks in formation]

The airy Caucasus, the Apennine, Pyrene's cliffes where sunne doth neve shine,

When he some heaps of hills hath overwent.

Beginnes to think on rest, his journey spent,

Till, mounting some tall mountaine, he doth finde

More hights before him than he left behinde*.

Silius Italicus also, in his poem on the second Punic war, in describing the difficulties and dangers attending Hannibal, has the following lines: the crossing of the Alps by the army of

-Crescit laber. Ardua supra

Sese aperit fessis, et nascitur altera moles,
Nude nec edomitos exsudatosque labores
Resexisse libet; tanta formidine plana
Exterrant repetita oculis, atque una pruinæ
Canentis, quâcumque datur permittere
visas,

Ingeritur facies +.

The following is a most elegant and accurate description of the Pantheon:

Thus when we view some well-proportion'd dome,

(The world's just wonder, and ev'n thine,
O Rome!)

No single parts unequally surprise,
All comes united to th' admiring eyes;
No monstrous height, or breadth, or length,
appear;

The whole at once is bold and regular.

247-252

Dr. Akenside, in his Ode to Lord Huntingdon, has attempted a similar description with equal success:

Hark, how the dread Pantheon stands

Amid the domes of modern hands!
Amid the toys of idle state,
How simply, how severely great!

And a living poet of great celebrity has drawn a picture of this noble edi

*The works of William Drummond, of Hawthornden, published in 1791-8to. page 39. + Lib. III. 529-535. See also Livy's account of this celebrated passage (lib. XXI. ch. 32 et seq.) and Lord Shaftesbury's Moralists, vol. II. part iii, page 253-duod. edit. of 1749.

fice not inferior to either of the preceding:

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime Shrine of all saints and temples of all gods From Jove to Jesus-spar'd and blest by time;

Looking tranquility, while falls or nods Arch, empire, each thing round thee, and man plods

His way thro' thorns to ashes-glorious dome!

Shalt thou not last? Time's scythe and tyrants rods

Shiver upon thee-sanctuary and home
Of art and piety-Pantheon! pride of
Rome*!

Childe Harold, Cant. iv. st. cxlvi.

Let us next observe the following

[blocks in formation]

The line too labours, and the words move slow :

Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain, Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main. 364-373

These lines are usually quoted as fine examples of a successful adaptation of the sound to the sense. But that Pope

has failed in this endeavour has been clearly demonstrated in the Rambler, (No. 92). Nor was this the first time that it had been made the subject of critical remark; for Aaron Hill had long before, in his "Letter to Pope," pointed out its various inaccuracies and imperfections. Dr. Johnson, in his "Life of Pope," has made some further observations on this celebrated passage, which may with propriety be introduced here. "The notion of representative metre, and the desire of discovering frequent adaptations of the sound to the sense, have produced many wild con

ceits and imaginary beauties. All that can furnish this representation are the sounds of the words considered singly, aud the time in which they are pronounced. Every language has some words framed to convey an image of the ideas which they express; but these are few,and the poet cannot make them more, nor can they be of any use except when sound is intended. Such words certainly give to a verse the proper simili

tude of sound without much labour of the writer; but these happinesses must be attributed to fortune rather than to skill; although when combined with propriety, they undoubtedly contribute to enforce the expression of the ideas †. In the dactylick measures of the learned languages, the time of pronunciation was capable of considerable variety; but that variety could be accommodated, only to motion and duration, and different degrees of motion were perhaps, expressed by verses rapid or slow, without engaging the attention of the writer, when the images had full poslanguage being susceptible of very little session of his fancy; but the English flexibility or modulation, our verses can differ very little in their cadence. Beauties of this kind, therefore, are commonly fancied; and when real are technical and nugatory, not to be rejected, and not to be solicited."

It is worthy of remark, that these verses which we have quoted, are taken from the third book of Vida's Art of Poetry, the whole of which work, Pope appears to have consulted in the course of his poem. The entire passage in Vida (from verse 389 to verse 441), of which a part only is here selected, deseves minute attention for the elegance of its style, and the harmony of its numbers; affording throughout, admirable examples of an exact accommodation of the sound to the sense, and displaying all the graces of versification by the contrast of objects.

Haud satis est illis utcunque claudere ver.

[blocks in formation]

See also Dyer's "Ruins of Rome,"-180-184.

↑ See Dr. Johnson's other excellent remarks on this subject in Nos. 92 and 94 of the Rambler; and observations on the language and versification of Milton, in Nos. 86, 88, and 90.

[blocks in formation]

ment to his great poetical master, with reference to that performance, at the conclusion of this passage, is introduced with singular dexterity and elegance:

The pow'r of music all our hearts allow, And what Timotheus was is Dryden now.

Pope was peculiarly happy in giving this unexpected turn to many of his sentences, whether panegyrical or satirical; for instance, to Sir William Trumball in his "Windsor Forest;" (v. 258.) and to Lord Cobham in his "Moral Essays," (Epist. I. 262.) “a most delicate compliment concealed under the appearance of satire." Many more are to be found throughout his works; but especially in the "Prologue to the Satires," and "Imitations of Horace."

So when the faithful pencil has design'd Some bright idea of the master's mind; When a new world leaps out at his command,

And ready nature waits upon his hand; When the ripe colours soften and unite, And sweetly melt into just shade and light, When mellowing years their full perfection give,

And each bold figure just begins to live, The treach'rous colours the fair art betray, And all the bright creation fades away. 484-493

Nothing can be more happily expressed than these beautiful lines on the art of painting. This was a subject which, of all others, was most pleasing to Pope, and which he therefore touched with the hand of a master. We may compare with them to advantage the following passage from the conclusion of Dryden's Epistle to Sir Godfrey Kneller:

More cannot be by mortal art express'd,
But venerable age shall add the rest:
For time shall with his ready pencil stand,
Retouch your figures with his rip'ning

hand;

Mellow your colours, and imbrown the tint,

Add every grace which time alone can grant;

To future ages shall your fame convey, And give more beauties than he takes away*.

The following passages display great depth of thought and vigour of imagi

* Dryden's Works. Epist. XV, 159–166.

nation, and are distinguished by singu lar ease and felicity of expression:

On the effects of the warmth of fancy:

Nature to all things fix'd the limits fit, And wisely curb'd proud man's pretending wit

As on the land while here the ocean gains, In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains; Thus in the soul while MEMORY prevails, The solid power of UNDERSTANDING fails:

Where beams of warm IMAGINATION play, The mem'ry's soft figures melt away. 52-59.

"I hardly believe," says Warton, in speaking of this passage, "that there is in any language a metaphor more appositely applied, or more elegantly expressed, than this of the effects of the warmth of fancy. Locke, who has embellished his dry subject with a variety of pleasing similitudes and allusions, has, in his Essay on the Human Understanding, a passage relating to the retentiveness of the memory, exactly similar to the one before us." For this we must refer the reader to the Essay itself.

On the adaptation of the human mind to one particular branch of science: One science only will one genius fit; So vast is art, so narrow human wit: Not only bounded to peculiar arts, But oft' in those confin'd to single parts. Like kings, we lose the conquests gain'd before,

By vain ambition still to make them more: Each might his sev'ral province well command,

Would all but stoop to what they understand. 60-67

On the universality of the operations of nature:

Unerring nature! still divinely bright, One clear, unchang'd, and universal light, Life, force, and beauty must to all impart, At once the source, and end, and test, of

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

True wit is nature to advantage dress'd, What oft' was thought, but ne'er so well express'd;

Something whose truth convinc'd at sight we find,

That gives us back the image of our mind. 297-300.

On real eloquence of style and expression :

Words are like leaves, and where they most abound,

Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.

False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,
Its gaudy colours spreads on ev'ry place ;
The face of nature we no more survey,
All glares alike, without distinction gay;
But true expression, like th' unchanging

[blocks in formation]

* Chap. x. sect. 5.

On the superiority of genius to the temporary attacks of envy, rancour and hostility:

Envy will merit as its shade pursue, But, like a shadow, prove the substance true;

For envy'd wit, like Sol eclips'd, makes known

Th' opposing body's grossness, not its own. When first that sun too pow'rful beams displays,

It draws up vapours which obscure its rays;

But e'en those clouds at last adorn its way, Reflect new glories, and augment the day. 466-472.

Many more such passages, distinguished by equal penetration and good sense, could be selected, were it not that they would encroach too largely upon the limits of this Essay. For these we must refer the reader to the work itself. The quotations we have introduced are sufficient to shew the extraordinary maturity and fertility of Pope's genius at the early period of life, at which this poem was written. We now, therefore, proceed to comment on a few passages relating to some of his contemporaries, and to offer such remarks as may tend to throw a new light on the men and manners of that day.

But most by numbers judge a poet's song, And smooth or rough with them is right

or wrong.

These equal syllables alone require, Tho' oft' the ear the open vowels tire;

While expletives their feeble aid do join, And ten low words oft' deep in one dull line:

While they ring round the same unvary'd chimes,

With sure returns of still expected rhymes; Where'er you find the cooling western breeze,

In the next line, it whispers thro' the trees: If chrystal streams with pleasing murmurs creep,

The reader's threaten'd (not in vain) with sleep. 337-353.

In these and the preceding lines, beginning at verse 289, the poet enumerates the faults which were, in his time, too common in poetical composition; such as a fondness for conceits (an erhas not unfrequently fallen in the course ror, by the way, into which he himself ing thoughts for florid and bombastic of this poem,) for showy and glitterlanguage, and for formal and antique phraseology. He also alludes to the harsh and inharmonious style of some authors, and the unvaried monotonous versification of others-to the disagreeable hiatus of the vowels-the too frebles, and to the general want of elequent use of expletives and monosyllagance and dignity in modern poetry.--The first few verses of the preceding quotation were probably suggested by some lines on the same subject in the first Satire of Persius, and the rest by different passages in Cicero's Epistle to Herennius, the ninth book of Quintilian, and Dryden's Essay on Dramatic Poetry. (To be concluded in the next.)

THE METAMORPHOSES OF LIFE.

LETTER II.

COUSIN SARAH TO COUSIN SUSAN.

Oн Sue, you could never guess half what has past,
With your dear Cousin Sal since she wrote to you last;
I'm dancing and singing all day, I'm so glad,

If you saw me so skittish you'd think me grown mad;

My joy is so great its enough to cause fits,
And I wonder I don't go quite out of my wits.
But to ease your suspense, let me say in a word,
I'm married next week, my dear Sue, to a lord;
'Twill make all my friends with vexation look blue,
To hear I have married my Lord Donknowho:

* See verses 31, 83, 109, 208, 271, 321, 332, 389, 432, 434, 501, 533, 601, 603, and 628.

« ՆախորդըՇարունակել »