themselves, having no Ballaft properly to poise, no Helm to guide their course, but cumbred with their own weight, and bold without Discretion. Genius may fometimes want the Spur, but it ftands as frequently in need of the Curb.

Demofthenes fomewhere judiciously obferves, "That in common Life Success is the

great"eft Good; that the next, and no less impor

tant, is Conduct, without which the other "muft be unavoidably of short continuance.” Now the fame may be afferted of Compofition, where Nature will fupply the Place of Succefs, and Art the Place of Conduct.

But further, there is one thing which deferves particular Attention. For tho' it must be own'd, that there is a Force in Eloquence, which depends not upon, nor can be learn'd by Rule, yet even this could not be known without that Light, which we receive from Art. If therefore, as I faid before, he who condemns fuch Works as this in which I am now engaged, would attend to these Reflexions, I have very good reason to believe, he would no longer think any Undertaking of this nature fuperfluous or useless.

SECTION III.

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Let them the Chimney's flafbing Flames repel.
Could but thefe Eyes one lurking Wretch arrest,
I'd whirl aloft one fireaming Curl of Flame,
And into Embers turn his crackling Dome.
But now a gen'rous Song I have not founded.

Streaming Curls of Flame, Spewing against Heaven, and making Boreas a Piper, with fuch like Expreffions, are not tragical, but fupertragical. For thofe forced and unnatural Images corrupt and deba.e the Stile, and cannot poffibly adorn or raise it; and whenever carefully examined in the Light, their fhew of being terrible gradually disappears, and they become contemptible and ridiculous. Tragedy will indeed by its nature admit of fome pompous and magnificent Swellings, yet even in Tragedy 'tis an unpardonable Offence to foar too high; much less allowable must it therefore be in Profe-writing, or those Works,

Here is a great Defect; but it is evident that the Author is treating of thofe Imperfections, which are oppofite to the true Sublime, and among thofe, of extravagant Swelling or Bombaft, an Example of which he produces from fome old Tragic Poet, none of whofe Lines, except thefe here quoted, and fome Expreffons below, remain at present.

2

which are founded in Truth. Upon this Account fome Expreffions of Gorgias the Leontine are highly ridicul'd, who ftiles Xerxes The Perfian Jupiter, and calls Vulturs Living Sepulchres. Some Expreffions of 3 Callifthenes deferve the fame Treatment, for they fhine not like Stars, but glare like Meteors. And 4 Glitarchus comes under this Cenfure ftill more, who blufters indeed and blows, as Sophocles expreffes it,

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Loud founding Blafts not fweetned by the Stop.

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Amphicrates, Hegefias, and

Matris, may all be tax'd with the fame Imperfections. For often, when, in their own opinion, they are all-divine, what they imagine to be godlike Spirit, proves empty fimple Froth.

Bombaft however is amongst those Faults, which are moft difficult to be avoided. All Men are naturally biafs'd to aim at Grandeur. Hence it is, that by fhunning with utmost Diligence the Censure of Impotence and Flegm, they are hurried into the contrary Extreme. They are mindful of the Maxim, that

In great Attempts 'tis glorious ev'n to fall.

But Tumours in Writing, as well as in the human Body, are certain Disorders. Empty and

veil'd over with fuperficial Bigness, they only delude, and work Effects contrary to those for which they were defigned. Nothing, according to the old Saying, is drier than a Perfon diftemper'd with a Dropfy.

Now the only Failure in this fwoln and puff'd-up Stile is, that it endeavours to go beyond the true Sublime, whereas Puerilities are directly oppofite to it. They are low and grov'ling, meanly and faintly exprefs'd, and in a Word are the most ungenerous and unpar-. donable Errors, that an Author can be guilty of.

But what do we mean by a Puerility? Why, 'tis certainly no more than a Schoolboy's Thought, which, by too eager a Pursuit of Elegance, becomes dry and infipid. And, thofe Perfons commonly fail in this Particular, who by an ill-managed Zeal for a neat, correct, and above all, a fweet Stile, are hurried into low Turns of Expreffion, into a heavy and naufeous Affectation.

To these may be added a third fort of Imperfection in the Pathetic, which & Theodorus has named the Parenthyrfe, or an ill-timed Emotion. It is an unneceffary Attempt to work upon the Paffions, where there is no need of a Pathos; or fome Excefs, where Moderation

is requifite. For feveral Authors, of no fober Understandings, are exceffively fond of paffionate Expreffions, which bear no relation at all to their Subject, but are Whims of their own, or borrowed from the Schools. The Confequence is, they meet with nothing but Contempt and Derifion from their unaffected Audience. And it is what they deserve, since they force themselves into Transport and Emotion, whilft their Audience is calm, fedate, and unmoved. But I muft referve the Pathetic for another Place.

SECTION IV.

1TIMÆUS abounds very much in the Frigid, the other Vice of which I am speaking; a Writer, it is true, fufficiently skilled in other Points, and who fometimes reaches the genuine Sublime. He was indeed a Perfon of a ready Invention, polite Learning, and a great Fertility and ftrength of Thought. But these Qualifications are, in a great measure, clouded by the Propenfity he has to blazon the Imperfections of others, and a wilful Blindness in regard to his own; tho' a fond Defire of new Thoughts and uncommon Turns has often plunged him into fhameful Puerilities. The Truth of thefe Affertions I fhall confirm by

one