Chapter VIII: Section II (2)

Still another instance comes in my way. How happened it, one may ask, that Sir PHILIP SYDNEY in his Arcadia, and afterwards SPENSER in his Fairy Queen, observed so unnatural a conduct in those works; in which the Story proceeds, as it were, by snatches, and with continual interruptions? How was the good sense of those writers, so conversant besides in the best models of antiquity, seduced into this preposterous method? The answer, no doubt, is, that they were copying the design, or disorder rather, of ARIOSTO, the favourite poet of that time.

III. Of near akin to this contrariety _to the genius of a people_ is another mark which a careful reader will observe “in the representation of certain TENETS, different from those which prevail in a writer’s country or time.”

1. We seldom are able to fasten an imitation, with certainty, on such a writer as Shakespear. Sometimes we are, but never to so much advantage as when he happens to forget himself in this respect. When Claudio, in _Measure for Measure_, pleads for his life in that famous speech,

Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;
To lye in cold obstruction, and to rot;
This sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice;
To be imprison’d in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence about
The pendant world—

It is plain that these are not the Sentiments which any man entertained of _Death_ in the writer’s age or in that of the speaker. We see in this passage a mixture of Christian and Pagan ideas; all of them very susceptible of poetical ornament, and conducive to the argument of the Scene; but such as Shakespear had never dreamt of but for Virgil’s Platonic hell; where, as we read,

aliae panduntur inanes
Suspensae ad ventos: aliis sub gurgite vasto,
Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni.
Virg. l. vi.

2. A prodigiously fine passage in Milton may furnish another example of this sort,

When Lust
By unchast looks, loose gestures, and foul talk,
But most by lewd and lavish act of Sin,
Lets in defilement to the inward parts,
The soul grows clotted by contagion,
Imbodies, and imbrutes, till she quite lose
The divine property of her first being.
Such are those thick and gloomy shadows damp,
Oft seen in charnel vaults and sepulchres,
Ling’ring, and sitting by a new-made grave,
As loth to leave the body, that it lov’d,
And linkt itself by carnal sensuality
To a degenerate and degraded state.
_Mask at Ludlow Castle._

This philosophy of _imbruted souls_ becoming _thick shadows_ is so remote from any ideas entertained at present of the effects of Sin, and at the same time is so agreeable to the notions of Plato (a double favourite of Milton, for his own sake, and for the sake of his being a favourite with his Italian Masters), that there is not the least question of its being taken from the PHAEDO.

Ἡ τοιαύτη ψυχὴ βαρύνεταί τε καὶ ἕλκεται πάλιν εἰς τὸν ὁρατὸν τόπον, φόβῳ τοῦ ἀειδοῦς τε καὶ ᾅδου, περὶ τὰ μνήματα καὶ τοὺς τάφους κυλινδουμένη· περὶ ἃ δὴ καὶ ὤφθη ἄττα ψυχῶν σκιοειδῆ φαντάσματα, οἷα παρέχονται αἱ τοιαῦται ψυχαὶ εἴδωλα, αἱ μὴ καθαρῶς ἀπολυθεῖσαι——

There is no wonder, now one sees the fountain Milton drew from, that, in admiration of this poetical philosophy (which nourished the fine spirits of that time, though it corrupted some), he should make the other speaker in the scene cry out, as in a fit of extasy,

How charming is divine philosophy!
Not harsh, and crabbed, as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo’s lute,
And a perpetual feast of nectar’d sweets,
Where no crude surfeit reigns—

The very ideas which Lord SHAFTESBURY has employed in his encomiums on the Platonic philosophy; and the very language which Dr. HENRY MORE would have used, if he had known to express himself so soberly.

3. Having said so much of Plato, whom the Italian writers have helped to make known to us, let me just observe one thing, to our present purpose, of those Italian writers themselves. One of their peculiarities, and almost the first that strikes us, is a certain sublime mystical air which runs through all their fictions. We find them a sort of philosophical fanatics, indulging themselves in strange conceits “concerning the _Soul_, the _chyming of celestial orbs_, and presiding _Syrens_.” One may tell by these marks, that they doted on the fancies of Plato; if we had not, besides, direct evidence for this conclusion. Tasso says of himself, and he applauds the same thing in Petrarch, “Lessi già tutte l’opere di Platone, è mi rimassero molti semi nella menta della sua dottrina.” I take these words from Menage, who has much more to the same purpose, in his elegant observations on the _Amintas_ of this poet.

One sees then where Milton had been for that imagery in the ARCADES,

then listen I
To the celestial Syrens’ harmony,
That sit upon the nine enfolded spheres
And sing to those that hold the vital shears,
And turn the adamantine spindle round,
On which the fate of Gods and men is wound.

The best comment on these verses is a passage in the x^{th} Book of Plato’s Republic, where this whole system, of _Syrens quiring to the fates_, is explained or rather delivered.

IV. We have seen a _Mark_ of Imitation, in the allusion of writers to certain strange, and foreign tenets of philosophy. The observation may be extended to all those passages (which are innumerable in our poets) that allude to the _rites, customs, language, and theology of Paganism_.

It is true, indeed, this Species of Imitation is not that which is, properly, the subject of this Letter. The most original writer is allowed to furnish himself with poetical ideas from all quarters. And the management of learned _Allusion_ is to be regarded, perhaps, as one of the nicest offices of Invention. Yet it may be useful to see from what sources a great poet derives his materials; and the rather, as this detection will sometimes account for the _manner_ in which he disposes of them. However, I will but detain you with a remark or two on this class of Imitations.

1. I observe, that even Shakespear himself abounds in learned Allusions. How he came by them, is another question; though not so difficult to be answered, you know, as some have imagined. They, who are in such astonishment at the learning of Shakespear, besides that they certainly carry the notion of his illiteracy too far, forget that the Pagan imagery was familiar to all the poets of his time—that abundance of this sort of learning was to be picked up from almost every English book, he could take into his hands—that many of the best writers in Greek and Latin had been translated into English—that his conversation lay among the most learned, that is, the most paganized poets of his age—but above all, that, if he had never looked into books, or conversed with bookish men, he might have learned almost all the secrets of paganism (so far, I mean, as a poet had any use of them) from the MASKS of B. Jonson; contrived by that poet with so pedantical an exactness, that one is ready to take them for lectures and illustrations on the ancient learning, rather than exercises of modern wit. The taste of the age, much devoted to erudition, and still more, the taste of the Princes, for whom he writ, gave a prodigious vogue to these unnatural exhibitions. And the knowledge of antiquity, requisite to succeed in them, was, I imagine, the reason that Shakespear was not over-fond to try his hand at these elaborate trifles. Once indeed he _did_, and with such success as to disgrace the very best things of this kind we find in Jonson. The short Mask in the _Tempest_ is fitted up with a classical exactness. But its chief merit lies in the beauty of the _Shew_, and the richness of the _poetry_. Shakespear was so sensible of his Superiority, that he could not help exulting a little upon it, where he makes _Ferdinand_ say,

This is a most majestic _Vision_, and
Harmonious charming _Lays_—

’Tis true, another Poet, who possessed a great part of Shakespear’s genius and all Jonson’s learning, has carried this courtly entertainment to its last perfection. But the _Mask at Ludlow Castle_ was, in some measure, owing to the _fairy Scenes_ of his Predecessor; who chose this province of _Tradition_, not only as most suitable to the wildness of his vast creative imagination, but as the _safest_ for his unlettered Muse to walk in. For here he had much, you knew, to expect from the popular credulity, and nothing to fear from the classic superstition of that time.

2. It were endless to apply this _note_ of imitation to other poets confessedly learned. Yet one instance is curious enough to be just mentioned.

Mr. Waller, in his famous poem on the victory over the Dutch on June 3, 1665, has the following lines;

His flight tow’rds heav’n th’ aspiring BELGIAN took;
But fell, like PHAETON, with thunder strook:
From vaster hopes than his, he seem’d to fall,
That durst attempt the BRITISH Admiral:
From her broadsides a ruder flame is thrown,
Than from the fiery chariot of the Sun:
THAT, bears THE RADIANT ENSIGN OF THE DAY;
And SHE, the flag that governs in the Sea.

He is comparing the British Admiral’s _Ship_ to the _Chariot_ of the Sun. You smile at the quaintness of the conceit, and the ridicule he falls into, in explaining it. But that is not the question at present. The _latter_, he says, bears _the radiant ensign of the day_: The _other_, _the ensign of naval dominion_. We understand how properly the _English Flag_ is here denominated. But what is that _other Ensign_? The _Sun_ itself, it will be said. But who, in our days, ever expressed the Sun by such a periphrasis? The image is apparently antique, and easily explained by those who know that anciently the Sun was commonly emblematized by a _starry or radiate figure_; nay, that such a figure was placed aloft, as an _Ensign_, over the _Sun’s charioteer_, as we may see in representations of this sort on ancient Gems and Medals.

From this original then Mr. Waller’s imagery was certainly taken; and it is properly applied in this place where he is speaking of the _Chariot of the Sun_, and _Phaeton’s fall_ from it. But to remove all doubt in the case, we can even point to the very passage of a Pagan poet, which Mr. Waller had in his eye, or rather translated.

Proptereà noctes hiberno tempore longæ
Cessant, dum veniat RADIATUM INSIGNE DIEI.
_Lucr._ l. v. 698.

Here, you see, the poet’s allusion to a classic idea has led us to the discovery of the very passage from which it was taken. And this use a learned reader will often make of the species of Imitation, here considered.

V. Great writers, you find, sometimes forget the character of the _Age_, they live in; the _principles_, and _notions_ that belong to it. “Sometimes they forget _themselves_, that is, their own situation and character.” Another sign of the influence of _Imitation_.

1. When we see such men, as STRADA and MARIANA, writers of fine talents indeed, but of recluse lives and narrow observation, chusing to talk like men of the world, and abounding in the most refined conclusions of the cabinet, we are sure that this character, which we find so natural in a Cardinal DE RETZ, is but assumed by these Jesuits. And we are not surprized to discover, on examination, that their best reflexions are copied from TACITUS.

On the other hand, when a man of the world took it into his head, the other day, in a moping fit, to talk _Sentences_, every body concluded that this was not the language of the writer or his situation, but that he had been poaching in some pedant; perhaps in the _Stoical Fop_, he affected so much contempt of, SENECA.

2. Sometimes we catch a great writer deviating from his _natural manner_, and taking pains, as it were, to appear the very reverse of his proper _character_. Would you wish a stronger proof of his being seduced, at least for the time, by the charms of _imitation_?

Nothing is better known than the easy, elegant, agreeable vein of VOITURE. Yet you have read his famous Letter to BALZAC, and have been surprized, no doubt, at the forced, quaint, and puffy manner, in which it is written. The secret is, Voiture is aping Balzac from one end of this letter to the other. Whether to pay his court to him, or to laugh at him, or that perhaps, in the instant of writing, he really fancied an excellence in the style of that great man, is not easy to determine. An eminent French critic, I remember, is inclined to take it for a piece of mockery. At all events, we must needs esteem it an _imitation_.

3. This remark on the turn of a writer’s _genius_ may be further applied to that of his _temper or disposition_.

The natural misanthropy of Swift may account for his thinking and speaking very often in the spirit of ROCHEFOUCAULT, without any thought of taking from his _Maxims_, though he was an admirer of them. But if at any time we observe so humane and benevolent a man as Mr. Pope giving into this language, we say of course, “This is not his own, but an assumed manner.”

Or what say you to an instance that exemplifies both these observations together? The natural unaffected turn of Mr. Cowley’s manner, and the tender sensibility of his mind, are equally seen and loved in his prose-works, and in such of his poems as were written after a good model, or came from the heart. A clear sparkling fancy, softened with a shade of melancholy, made him, perhaps, of all our poets the most capable of excelling in the elegiac way, or of touching us in any way where a vein of easy language and moral sentiment is required. Who but laments then to see this fine genius perverted by the prevailing pedantry of his age, and carried away, against the bias of his nature, to an emulation of the rapturous, high-spirited Pindar?

I might give many more examples. But you will observe them in your own reading. I take the first that come to hand only to explain my meaning, which is, “That if you find a course of sentiments or cast of composition different from that, to which the writer’s _situation_, _genius_, or _complexion_ would naturally lead him, you may well suspect him of imitation.”

Still it may be, these considerations are rather too general. I come to others more particular and decisive.

VI. It may be difficult sometimes to determine whether a single sentiment or image be derived or not. But when we see a cluster of them in two writers, applied to the same subject, one can hardly doubt that one of them has copied from the other.

A celebrated French moralist makes the following reflexions. “Quelle chimere est-ce donc que l’homme? Quelle nouveautè, quel chaos, quel sujet de contradiction? Juge de toutes choses, imbecile ver de terre; depositaire du vrai, amas d’incertitude; gloire, et rebut de l’univers.”

Turn now to the _Essay on Man_, and tell me if Mr. Pope did not work up the following lines out of these reflexions.

“Chaos of thought and passion, all confus’d;
Still by himself abus’d or disabus’d;
Created half to rise, and half to fall,
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl’d:
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world.”

2. This conclusion is still more certain, when, together with a general likeness of sentiments, we find the same _disposition_ of the parts, especially if that disposition be in no common form.

“Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet
With charm of earliest birds: pleasant the sun,
When first on this delightful land he spreads
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flow’r,
Glist’ring with dew”——

and the rest of that fine speech in the IVth Book of _Paradise Lost_, which you remember so perfectly that I need not transcribe more of it.

Milton’s fancy, as usual, is rich and exuberant; but the conduct and application of his imagery shews, that the whole passage was shadowed out of those charming but simpler lines in the DANAE of Euripides.

——φίλον μὲν φέγγος ἡλίου τόδε.
Καλὸν δὲ πόντου χεῦμ’ ἰδεῖν εὐήνεμον,
Γῆ τ’ ἠρινὸν θάλλουσα, πλούσιόν θ’ ὕδωρ,
Πολλῶν τ’ ἔπαινόν ἐστί μοι λέξαι καλῶν.
Ἀλλ’ οὐδὲν οὕτω λαμπρὸν, οὐδ’ ἰδεῖν, καλὸν,
Ὡς τοῖς ἄπαισι, καὶ πόθῳ δεδηγμένοις,
Παίδων νεογνῶν ἐν δόμοις ἰδεῖν φάος.

VII. There is little doubt in such cases as these. There needs not perhaps be much in the case, sometimes, of _single_ sentiments or images. As where we find “a sentiment or image in two writers precisely the same, yet new and unusual.”

1. Thus we are told very reasonably, that _Milton’s clust’ring locks_ is the copy of Apollonius’ ΠΛΟΚΑΜΟΙ ΒΟΤΡΥΟΕΝΤΕΣ. _Obs. on Spenser_, p. 80. For though the metaphor be a just one and very natural, yet there is perhaps no other authority for the use of it, but in these two poets. And Milton had certainly read Apollonius.

2. What the same critic observes of Milton’s

——“And _curl_ the grove
In ringlets _quaint_”—

being taken from Jonson’s

When was old Sherwood’s head more _quaintly curl’d_?

is still more unquestionable. For here is a combination of signs to convict the former of imitation: Not only the _singularity of the image_, but the _identity of expression_, and, what I lay the most stress upon, the _boldness of the figure_, as employed by Milton. Jonson speaks of old Sherwood’s _head_, as curl’d. Milton, as conscious of his authority, drops the preparatory idea, and says at once, The _grove_ curl’d.

Let me add to these, two more instances from the same poet.

3. _Spenser_ tells us of

A little _glooming light_, much like a shade.
F. Q. c. II., s. 14.

Can you imagine that Milton did not take his idea from hence, when he said, in his _Penseroso_,

—glowing embers thro’ the room
Teach _light_ to counterfeit a _gloom_?

4. Again, in his description of Paradise,

Flow’rs of all hues, and without thorn the rose.

Every poet of every time is lavish of his flowers on such occasions. But _the rose without thorn_ is a rarity. And, though it was fine to imagine such an one in Paradise, could only be an Italian refinement. Tasso, you will think, is the original, when you have read the following lines;

Senza quei suoi pungenti ispidi dumi
Spiegò le foglie la purpurea Rosa.

5. Another instance, still more remarkable, may be taken from Mr. Pope. One of the most striking passages in the _Essay on Man_ is the following,

Superior Beings, when of late they saw
A mortal man unfold all nature’s law,
Admir’d such wisdom in an earthly shape,
And shew’d a NEWTON, as we shew an ape.
Ep. ii. v. 31.

Can you doubt, from the _singularity_ of this sentiment, that the great poet had his eye on Plato? who makes Socrates say, in allusion to a remark of Heraclitus, Ὅτι ἀνθρώπων ὁ σοφώτατος πρὸς θεὸν πίθηκος φανεῖται. _Hipp. Major._

The application indeed is different. And it could not be otherwise. For the observation, which the Philosopher refers πρὸς θεὸν, is in the Poet given to _superior Beings_ only. The consequence is, that the _Ape_ is an object of _derision_ in the former case, of _admiration_, in the latter.

To conclude this head, I will just observe to you, that, though the _same uncommon sentiment_ in two _writers_ be usually the effect of imitation, yet we cannot affirm this of _Actors_ in real life. The reason is, when the situation of two men is the same, _Nature_ will dictate the same sentiments more invariably than _Genius_. To give a remarkable instance of what I mean.

Tacitus relates, in the _first_ book of his _Annals_, what passed in the senate on its first meeting after the death of Augustus. His politic successor carried it, for some time, with much apparent moderation. He wished, besides other reasons, to get himself solemnly recognized for Emperor by that Body, before he entered on the exercise of his new dignity. _Dabat famæ_, says the historian, _ut vocatus electusque potiùs à Republicâ videretur, quàm per uxorium ambitum et senili adoptione irrepsisse_. One of his courtiers would not be wanting to himself on such an occasion. When therefore several motions had been made in the Senate, concerning the honours to be paid to the memory of their late Prince, VALERIUS MESSALLA moved RENOVANDUM PER ANNOS SACRAMENTUM IN NOMEN TIBERII; in other words, that the oath of allegiance should be taken to Tiberius. This was the very point that Tiberius drove at. And the consciousness of it made him suspect that this motion might be thought to proceed from himself. He therefore asked Messalla, “_Num, se mandante, eam sententiam promsisset?_” His answer is in the following words. “Spontè _dixisse, respondit; neque in iis, quæ ad rempublicam pertinerent_, consilio nisi suo usurum, vel cum periculo offensionis.” _Ea_, concludes the historian, _sola species adulandi supererat_.

Now it is very remarkable, that we find in Ludlow’s memoirs, one of Cromwell’s officers, on the very same occasion, answering the Protector in the very same species of flattery.

Colonel WILLIAM JEPHSON moved in the House that Cromwell might be made King. Cromwell took occasion, soon after, to reprove the Colonel for this proposition, telling him, that he wondered what he could mean by it. To which the other replied, “_That while he was permitted the honour of sitting in that House, he must desire the liberty to discharge his conscience, though his opinion should happen to displease_.”

Here we have a very striking coincidence of _sentiment_, without the least probability of imitation. For no body, I dare say, suspects Colonel William Jephson of stealing this refined stroke of adulation from Valerius Messalla. The truth is, the same situation, concurring with the same corrupt disposition, dictated this peculiar sentiment to the two courtiers. Yet, had these similar thoughts been found in two dramatic poets of the Augustan and Oliverian ages, we should probably have cried out, “An Imitation.” And with good reason. For, besides the possibility of an Oliverian poet’s knowing something of Tacitus, the speakers had then been _feigned_, not real personages. And it is not so likely that two such should agree in this sentiment: I mean, considering how new and particular it is. For, as to the more common and obvious sentiments, even dramatic speakers will very frequently employ the _same_, without affording any just reason to conclude that their prompters had turned plagiaries.

VIII. If to this singularity of a sentiment, you add the _apparent harshness_ of it, especially when not gradually _prepared_ (as such sentiments always will be by exact writers, when of their own proper invention), the suspicion grows still stronger. I just glanced at an instance of this sort in Milton’s _curl’d_ grove. But there are others still more remarkable. Shall I presume for once to take an instance from yourself?

Your fine Ode to Memory begins with these very lyrical verses:

Mother of Wisdom! Thou whose sway
The throng’d ideal hosts obey;
Who bidst their ranks now vanish, now appear,
Flame in the van, and darken in the rear.

This sublime imagery has a very original air. Yet I, who know how familiar the best ancient and modern critics are to you, have no doubt that it is taken from STRADA.

“Quid accommodatius, says he, speaking of your subject, Memory, quàm _simulachrorum ingentes copias_, tanquàm _addictam ubique tibi sacramento militiam_, eo inter se nexu ac fide conjunctam cohærentemque habere; ut sive unumquodque separatim, sive confertim universa, sive singula ordinatim _in aciem proferre_ velis; nihil planè in tantâ rerum herbâ turbetur, sed alia _procul atque in recessu_ sita prodeuntibus locum cedant; alia, se tota confestim promant atque in medium _certò evocata prosiliant_? Hoc tam magno, tam fido domesticorum _agmine_ instructus animus, &c.” _Prol. Acad._ I.

Common writers know little of the art of _preparing_ their ideas, or believe the very name of an Ode absolves them from the care of art. But, if this uncommon sentiment had been intirely your own, you, I imagine, would have dropped some _leading_ idea to introduce it.

IX. You see with what a suspicious eye, we who aspire to the name of critics, examine your writings. But every poet will not endure to be scrutinized so narrowly.

1. B. Jonson, in his Prologue to the _Sad Shepherd_, is opening the subject of that poem. The _sadness_ of his shepherd is

For his lost Love, who in the TRENT is said
To have miscarried; _’las! what knows the head
Of a calm river, whom the feet have drown’d!_

The reflexion in this place is unnecessary and even impertinent. Who besides ever heard of the _feet_ of a river? Of _arms_, we have. And so it stood in Jonson’s original.

Greatest and fairest Empress, know you this,
Alas! no more than Thames’ calm head doth know
Whose meads his arms drown, or whose corn o’erflow.
Dr. DONNE.

The poet is speaking of the corruption of the courts of justice, and the allusion is perfectly fine and natural. Jonson was tempted to bring it into his prologue by the mere beauty of the sentiment. He had a river at his disposal, and would not let slip the opportunity. But “his unnatural use” of it detects his “imitation.”

2. I don’t know whether you have taken notice of a miscarriage, something like this, in the most judicious of all the poets.

Theocritus makes Polypheme say,

Καὶ γὰρ θὴν οὐδ’ εἶδος ἔχω κακὸν, ὥς με λέγοντι,
Ἦ γὰρ πρὰν ἐς Πόντον ἐσέβλεπον· ἦν δὲ γαλάνα.

Nothing could be better fancied than to make this enormous son of Neptune use the sea for his looking-glass. But is Virgil so happy when his little land-man says,

Nec sum adeò informis: nuper me in littore vidi,
Cùm placidum ventis staret _mare_——

His wonderful judgment for once deserted him, or he might have retained the sentiment with a slight change in the application. For instance, what if he had said,

Certè ego me novi, liquidæque in imagine vidi
Nuper aquæ, placuitque mihi mea forma videnti.

It is a sort of curiosity, you say, to find Ovid reading a lesson to Virgil. I will dissemble nothing. The lines are, as I have cited them, in the 13th book of the Metamorphosis. But unluckily they are put into the mouth of Polypheme. So that instead of instructing one poet by the other, I only propose that they should make an exchange; Ovid take Virgil’s _sea_, and Virgil be contented with Ovid’s _water_. However this be, you may be sure the authority of the Prince of the Latin poets will carry it with admiring posterity above all such scruples of decorum. Nobody wonders therefore to read in Tasso,

————————————————————————Non son’ io
Da disprezzar, se ben me stesso vidi
Nel liquido del mar, quando l’altr’ hieri
Taceano i venti, et ei giacea senz’ onda.

But of all the misappliers of this fine original sentiment, commend me to that _other_ Italian, who made his shepherd survey himself, in a _fountain_ indeed, but a fountain of his own weeping.

3. You will forgive my adding one other instance “of this vicious application of a fine thought.”

You remember those agreeable verses of Sir _John Suckling_,

“Tempests of winds thus (as my storms of grief
Carry my tears which should relieve my heart)
Have hurried to the thankless ocean clouds
And show’rs, that needed not at all the courtesy.
When the poor plains have languish’d for the want,
And almost burnt asunder.”——
_Brennoralt._ A. III. S. 1.

I don’t stay to examine how far the fancy of _tears relieving the heart_ is allowable. But admitting the propriety of the observation, in the sense the poet intended it, the simile is applied and expressed with the utmost beauty. It accordingly struck the best writers of that time. SPRAT, in his history of the _Royal Society_, is taking notice of the misapplication of philosophy to subjects of Religion. “That shower, says he, has done very much injury by falling on the sea, for which the shepherd, and the ploughman, called in vain: The wit of men has been profusely poured out on _Religion_, which needed not its help, and which was only thereby made more tempestuous: while it might have been more fruitfully spent, on some parts of _philosophy_, which have been hitherto barren, and might soon have been made fertile.” _p. 25._

You see what wire-drawing here is to make the comparison, so proper in its original use, just and pertinent to a subject to which it had naturally no relation. Besides, there is an absurdity in speaking of a shower’s doing _injury_ to the sea by falling into it. But the thing illustrated by this comparison requiring the idea of _injury_, he transfers the idea to the comparing thing. He would soften the absurdity, by running the comparison into metaphorical expression, but, I think, it does not remove it. In short, for these reasons, one might easily have inferred an Imitation, without that parenthesis to apologize for it—“To use that metaphor which an excellent poet of our nation turns to _another_ purpose—”

But a poet of that time has no better success in the management of this metaphor, than the Historian.

LOVE makes so many hearts the prize
Of the bright CARLISLE’S conqu’ring eyes;
Which she regards no more, than they
The tears of lesser beauties weigh.
So have I seen the lost clouds pour
Into the Sea an useless show’r;
And the vex’d Sailors curse the rain,
For which poor Shepherds pray’d in vain.
WALLER’S Poems, p. 25.

The Sentiment stands thus: “She regards the captive _hearts_ of others no more than those others—the _tears_ of lesser beauties.” Thus, with much difficulty, we get to _tears_. And when we have them, the allusion to _lost clouds_ is so strained (besides that he makes his shower both _useless_ and _injurious_), that one readily perceives the poet’s thought was distorted by _imitation_.

X. The charge of Plagiarism is so disreputable to a great writer that one is not surprized to find him anxious to avoid the imputation of it. Yet “this very anxiety serves, sometimes, to fix it upon him.”

Mr. Dryden, in the Preface to his translation of Fresnoy’s Art of Painting, makes the following observation on Virgil: “He pretends sometimes to trip, but ’tis only to make you think him in danger of a fall when he is most secure. Like a skilful dancer on the Rope (if you will pardon the meanness of the similitude) who slips willingly and makes a seeming stumble, that you may think him in great hazard of breaking his neck; while at the same time he is only giving you a proof of his dexterity. My late Lord Roscommon was often pleased with this reflexion, &c.” p. 50.

His apology for the use of this simile, and his concluding with Lord Roscommon’s satisfaction at his remark, betray, I think, an anxiety to pass for original, under the consciousness of being but an imitator. So that if we were to meet with a passage, very like this, in a celebrated ancient, we could hardly doubt of its being copied by Mr. Dryden. What think you then of this observation in one of Pliny’s Letters, “Ut quasdam artes, ità eloquentiam nihil magis quàm ancipitia commendant. Vides qui fune in summa nituntur, quantos soleant excitare clamores, cùm jam jamque casuri videntur.” L. ix. Ep. 26.

PRIOR, one may observe, has acted more naturally in his _Alma_, and by so doing, though the resemblance be full as great, one is not so certain of his being an Imitator. The verses are, of BUTLER:

He perfect Dancer climbs the Rope,
And balances your fear and hope:
If after some distinguish’d leap,
He drops his Pole and seems to slip;
Strait gath’ring all his active strength
He rises higher half his length.
With _wonder_ you approve his slight,
And owe your pleasure to your _fright_.
C. II.

Though the two last lines seem taken from the application of this similitude in Pliny, “Sunt enim maximè _mirabilia_, quæ maximè inexpectata, et maximè _periculosa_.”

XI. Writers are, sometimes, sollicitous to conceal themselves: At others, they are fond to proclaim their Imitation. “It is when they have a mind to shew their dexterity in contending with a great original.”

You remember these lines of Milton in his Comus,

Wisdom’s self
Oft seeks to sweet retired Solitude,
Where, with her best nurse, Contemplation,
She plumes her feathers, and lets grow her wings,
That in the various bustle of resort
Were all too ruffled, and sometimes impair’d.

On which Dr. Warburton has the following note. “Mr. Pope has imitated this thought and (as was always his way when he imitated) improved it.

“Bear me, some Gods! oh, quickly bear me hence
To wholesome Solitude, the nurse of Sense;
Where Contemplation prunes her ruffled wings,
And the free Soul looks down to pity Kings.

“Mr. Pope has not only improved the harmony, but the sense. In Milton, _Contemplation_ is called the _Nurse_; in Pope, more properly _Solitude_: In Milton, _Wisdom_ is said to _prune_ her wings; in Pope, _Contemplation_ is said to do it, and with much greater propriety, as she is of a _soaring_ nature, and on that account is called by Milton himself, the _Cherub Contemplation_.”

One sees that Mr. Pope’s view was to surpass his original; “which, it is said, was always his way when he imitated.” The meaning is, when he purposely and professedly bent himself to Imitation; for then his fine genius taught him to seize every beauty, and his wonderful judgment, to avoid every defect or impropriety, in his author. And this distinction is very material to our passing a right judgment on the merit of Imitation. It is commonly said, that their imitations fall short of their originals. And they will do so, whatever the Genius of the Imitator be, if they are formed only on a _general_ resemblance of the thought imitated. For an Inventor comprehends his own ideas more distinctly and fully, and of course expresses his purpose better, than a casual Imitator. But the case is different, when a good writer _studies_ the passage from which he borrows. For then he not only copies, but improves on the first idea; and thus there will frequently (as in the case of Pope) be greater merit in the Copyist, than the original.

XII. We sometimes catch an Imitation lurking “in a licentious Paraphrase.” The ground of suspicion lies in the very complacency with which a writer expatiates on a borrowed sentiment. He is usually more reserved in adorning one of his own.

1. AURELIUS VICTOR observes of Fabricius, “quòd difficiliùs ab honestate, quàm Sol à suo cursu, averti posset.”

TASSO flourishes a little on this thought;

Prima dal corso distornar la Luna
E le stelle potrà, che dal diritto
Torcere un sol mio passo—
C. x. S. 24.

Mr. Waller rises upon the Italian,

“where her love was due,
So fast, so faithful, loyal, and so true,
That a bold hand as soon might hope to force
The rowling lights of heav’n, as change her course.”
_On the Death of Lady_ RICH.

But Mr. COWLEY, knowing what authority he had for the general sentiment, gives the reins to his fancy and wantons upon it without measure.

Virtue was thy Life’s centre, and from thence
Did silently and constantly dispense
The gentle vigorous influence
To all the wide and fair circumference:
And all the parts upon it lean’d so easilie,
Obey’d the mighty force so willinglie,
That none could discord or disorder see
In all their contrarietie.
Each had his motion natural and free,
And the whole no more mov’d, than the whole world could be.
BRUTUS.

2. The ingenious author of the _Observations on Spenser_ (from which fine specimen of his critical talents one is led to expect great things) directs us to another imitation of this sort.

Tasso had said,

Cosi a le belle lagrime le piume
Si bagna Amore, e gode al chiaro lume.

On which short hint Spenser has raised the following luxuriant imagery,

The blinded archer-boy,
Like lark in show’r of rain,
Sate bathing of his wings,
And glad the time did spend
Under those crystal drops,
Which fall from her fair eyes,
And at their brightest beams
Him proyn’d in lovely wise.

3. I will just add two more examples of the same kind; chiefly, because they illustrate an observation, very proper to be attended to on this subject; which is, “That in this display of a borrowed thought, the Imitation will generally fall short of the Original, even though the borrower be the greater Genius.”

The Italian poet, just now quoted, says sublimely of the _Night_,

—Usci la Notte, è sotto l’ali
Menò il silentio—
C. v. S. 79.

Milton has given a paraphrase of this passage, but very much below his original,

Now came still ev’ning on, and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad;
_Silence accompany’d_—

The striking part of Tasso’s picture, is, “_Night’s bringing in Silence under her wings_.” So new and singular an idea as this had detected an Imitation. Milton contents himself, then, with saying simply, _Silence accompany’d_. However, to make amends, as he thought, for this defect, _Night itself_, which the Italian had merely personized, the English poet not only _personizes_, but employs in a very becoming office:

Now came still ev’ning on, and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad.

Every body will observe a little blemish, in this fine couplet. He should not have used the epithet _still_, when he intended to add,

_Silence_ accompanied—

But there is a worse fault in this _Imitation_. To hide it, he speaks of _Night’s livery_. When he had done that, to speak of her _wings_, had been ungraceful. Therefore he is forced to say obscurely as well as _simply_, _Silence accompany’d_: And so loses a more noble image for a less noble one. The truth is, they would not stand together. _Livery_ belongs to _human grandeur_; _wings_ to _divine_ or _celestial_. So that in Milton’s very attempt to surpass his original, he put it out of his power to employ the _circumstance_ that most recommended it.

He is not happier on another occasion. Spenser had said with his usual simplicity,

“Virtue gives herself light thro’ darkness for to wade,”
F. Q. B. 1.

Milton catched at this image, and has run it into a sort of paraphrase, in those fine lines,

“Virtue could see to do what virtue would
By her own radiant light, tho’ Sun and Moon
Were in the flat sea sunk—”
COMUS.

In Spenser’s line we have the idea of Virtue dropt down into a world, all over darkened with vice and error. Virtue excites the light of truth to see all around her, and not only dissipate the neighbouring darkness, but to direct her course in pursuing her victory and driving her enemy out of it; the arduousness of which exploit is well expressed by—_thro’ darkness for to_ WADE. On the contrary, Milton, in borrowing, substitutes the physical for the moral idea—_by her own radiant light_—and _tho’ Sun and Moon were in the flat sea sunk_. It may be asked, how this happened? Very naturally, Milton was caught with the obvious _imagery_, which he found he could display to more advantage; and so did not enough attend to the noble _sentiment_ that was couched under it.

XIII. These are instances of a paraphrastical licence in dilating on a famous Sentiment or Image. The _ground_ is the same, only flourished upon by the genius of the Imitator. At times we find him practising a different art; “not merely spreading, as it were, and laying open the same sentiment, but _adding_ to it, and by a new and studied device improving upon it.” In this case we naturally conclude that the refinement had not been made, if the plain and simple thought had not preceded and given rise to it. You will apprehend my meaning by what follows.

1. Shakespear had said of Henry IV^{th},

—He cannot long hold out these pangs;
The incessant care and labour of his mind
Hath wrought the mure, that should confine it in,
So thin, that life look through, and will break out.
HEN. IV. A. 4.

You have, here, the thought in its first simplicity. It was not unnatural, after speaking of the body, as a case or tenement of the Soul, _the mure that confines_ it, to say, that as that case wears away and grows thin, life looks through, and is ready to break out.

DANIEL, by refining on this sentiment, if by nothing else, shews himself to be the copyist. Speaking of the same Henry, he observes,

And Pain and Grief, inforcing more and more,
Besieg’d the hold that could not long defend;
Consuming so all the resisting store
Of those provisions Nature deign’d to lend,
As that the Walls, worn thin, permit the mind
To look out thorough, and his frailty find.

Here we see, not simply that _Life_ is going to break through the infirm and much-worn habitation, but that the _Mind_ looks through and _finds_ his frailty, that it discovers, that Life will soon make his escape. I might add, that the four first lines are of the nature of the _Paraphrase_, considered in the last article: And that the _expression_ of the others is too much the same to be original. But we are not yet come to the head of _expression_. And I choose to confine myself to the single point of view we have before us.

Daniel’s improvement, then, looks like the artifice of a man that would outdo his Master. Though he fails in the attempt: for his ingenuity betrays him into a false thought. The mind, looking through, does not find _its own frailty_, but the frailty of the _building_ it inhabits. However, I have endeavoured to rectify this mistake in my explanation.

The truth is, Daniel was not a man to improve upon Shakespear. But now comes a writer, that knew his business much better. He chuses to employ this well-worn image, or rather to alter it a little and then employ it, for the conveyance of a very new fancy. If the mind could look through a _thin_ body, much more one that was _cracked_ and battered. And if it be for looking through at all, he will have it look to good purpose, and find, not its frailty only, but much other useful knowledge.

The lines are Mr. Waller’s, and in the best manner of that very _refined_ writer.

Stronger by weakness, _wiser_, men become
As they draw near to their eternal home.
The Soul’s dark cottage, batter’d and decay’d,
Lets in new light thro’ chinks that time has made.

2. After all, these conceits, I doubt, are not much to your taste. The instance I am going to give, will afford you more pleasure. Is there a passage in Milton you read with more admiration, than this in the _Penseroso_?

Entice the dewy-feather’d sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings in airy stream;
Of lively portraiture display’d
Softly on my eye-lids laid.

Would you think it possible now that the ground-work of this fine imagery should be laid in a passage of Ben Jonson? Yet so we read, or seem to read, in his _Vision of Delight_.

Break, Phant’sy, from thy cave of cloud,
And spread thy purple wings:
Create of airy forms a stream,
And tho’ it be a waking dream,
Yet let it like an odour rise
To all the senses here,
And fall like sleep upon their eyes
Or musick in their ear.

It is a delicate matter to analyze such passages as these; which, how exquisite soever in the poetry, when estimated by the _fine phrenzy_ of a Genius, hardly look like sense when given in plain prose. But if you give me leave to take them in pieces, I will do it, at least, with reverence. We find then, that _Fancy_ is here employed in one of her nicest operations, the production of a _day-dream_; which both poets represent as an _airy form_, or forms _streaming_ in the air, gently falling on the eye-lids of her entranced votary. So far their imagery agrees. But now comes the _mark_ of imitation I would point out to you. Milton carries the idea still further, and improves finely upon it, in the _conception_ as well as expression. Jonson evokes fancy out of her _cave of cloud_, those cells of the mind, as it were, in which during her intervals of rest, and when unemploy’d, fancy lies hid; and bids her, like a Magician, _create_ this stream of forms. All this is just and truly poetical. But Milton goes further. He employs the _dewy-feather’d sleep_ as his Minister in this machinery. And the mysterious day-dream is seen _waving at his wings in airy stream_. Jonson would have Fancy _immediately_ produce this Dream. Milton more poetically, because in more distinct and particular imagery, represents Fancy as doing her work by means of _sleep_; that soft composure of the mind abstracted from outward objects, in which it yields to these phantastic impressions.

You see then a wonderful improvement in this addition to the original thought. And the notion of _dreams waving at the wings of sleep_ is, by the way, further justified by what Virgil feigns of their _sticking_ or rather fluttering on the leaves of his magic tree in the infernal regions. But it is curious to observe how this improvement itself arose from hints suggested by his original. From Jonson’s dream, _falling, like sleep upon their eyes_, Milton took his _feather’d sleep_, which he impersonates so properly; And from _Phant’sy’s spreading her purple wings_, a circumstance, not so immediately connected with Jonson’s design _of creating of airy forms a stream_, he catched the idea of _Sleep spreading her wings_; and to good purpose, since the airy stream of forms was to _wave at them_.

However, Jonson’s image is, in itself, incomparable. It is taken from a _winged_ insect breaking out of its Aurelia state, its _cave of cloud_, as it is finely called: Not unlike that of Mr. Pope,

So spins the Silk-worm small its slender store,
And labours till it _clouds_ itself all o’er.
IV. _Dunc._ v. 253.

And nothing can be juster than this allusion. For the ancients always pictured FANCY and HUMAN-LOVE with Insect’s wings.

XIV. Thus then, whether the poet _prevaricates_, _enlarges_, or _adds_, still we frequently find some latent circumstance, attending his management, that convicts him of Imitation. Nay, he is not safe even when he denies himself these liberties; I mean when he only _glances_ at his original. “For, in this case, the borrowed sentiment usually wants something of that perspicuity which always attends the first delivery of it.” This Rule may be considered as the Reverse of the _last_. A writer, sometimes, takes a pleasure to _refine_ on a plain thought: Sometimes (and that is usually when the original sentiment is well known and fully developed) he does not so much as attempt to open and _explain_ it.

A poet of the last age has the following lines, on the subject of _Religion_:

Religion now is a young Mistress here,
For which each man will fight, and dye at least;
Let it alone awhile, and ’t will become
A kind of married wife; people will be
Content to live with it in quietness.

SUCKLING says this in his Tragedy of Brennoralt; which is a Satire throughout on the rising troubles of that time. BUTLER has taken the thought and applied it on the same occasion:

When hard words, jealousies, and fears
Set folks together by the ears,
And make them fight, like mad or drunk,
For dame Religion, as for Punk.

Setting aside the difference between the burlesque and serious style, one easily sees that this sentiment is borrowed from Suckling. It has not the clear and full exposition of an original thought. Butler only represents men as drunk with Religion and fighting for it as for a Punk. The _other_ gives the reason of the Debauch, namely, _fondness for a new face_; and tells us, besides, how things would subside into peace or indifference on a nearer and more familiar acquaintance. One could expect no less from the _Inventor_ of this humorous thought; a _Borrower_ might be content to allude to it.

XV. This last consideration puts me in mind of another artifice to conceal a borrowed sentiment. Nothing lies more open to discovery than a Simile in form, especially if it be a remarkable one. These are a sort of _purpurei panni_ which catch all eyes; and, if the comparison be not a writer’s own, he is almost sure to be detected. The way then that refined Imitators take to conceal themselves, in such a case, is to run the Similitude into Allegory. We have a curious instance in Mr. Pope, who has succeeded so well in the attempt, that his plagiarism, I believe, has never been suspected.

The verses, I have in my eye, are these fine ones, addressed to Lord Bolingbroke,

Oh, while along the stream of time thy name
Expanded flies, and gathers all it’s fame,
Say, shall my little Bark attendant sail,
Pursue the triumph, and partake the Gale?

What think you, now, of these admired verses? Are they, besides their other beauties, perfectly original? You will be able to resolve this question, by turning to the following passage in a Poet, Mr. Pope was once fond of, I mean STATIUS,

Sic ubi magna novum Phario de litore puppis
Solvit iter, jamque innumeros utrinque rudentes
Lataque veliferi porrexit brachia mali
Invasitque vias, in eodem angusta phaselus
Æquore, et immensi partem sibi vendicat Austri.
SILV. l. V. I. v. 242.

But, especially, this other,

—immensæ veluti CONNEXA carinæ
CYMBA MINOR, cum sævit hyems, pro parte, furentes
Parva receptat aquas, et EODEM VOLVITUR AUSTRO.
SILV. l. I. iv. v. 120.

XVI. I release you from this head of _Sentiments_, with observing that we sometimes conclude a writer to have had a celebrated original in his eye, when “without copying the peculiar thought, or stroke of imagery, he gives us only a copy of the impression, it had made upon him.”

1. In delivering this rule, I will not dissemble that I myself am copying, or rather stealing from a great critic: From _one_, however, who will not resent this theft; as indeed he has no reason, for he is so prodigiously rich in these things, as in others of more value, that what he neglects or flings away, would make the fortune of an ordinary writer. The person I mean is the late Editor of Shakespear, who, in an admirable note on Julius Cæsar, taking occasion to quote that passage of Cato,

O think what anxious moments pass between
The birth of plots, and their last fatal periods,
Oh, ’tis a dreadful interval of time,
Fill’d up with horror all, and big with death,

observes “that Mr. Addison was so struck and affected with the _terrible graces_ of Shakespear (in the passage he is there considering) that, instead of imitating his author’s sentiments, he hath, before he was aware, given us only the copy of his own impressions made by them. For,

Oh, ’tis a dreadful interval of time,
Fill’d up with horror all, and big with death,

are but the affections raised by such forcible images as these,

——All the Int’rim is
Like a Phantasma, or a hideous dream
——The state of man,
Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
The nature of an Insurrection.”

The observation is new and finely applied. Give me leave to suppose that the following is an instance of the same nature.

2. Milton on a certain occasion says of _Death_, that she

“Grinn’d horrible a ghastly smile—”
_P. L._ B. II. v. 846.

This representation is supposed by his learned Editor to be taken from Homer, from Statius, or from the Italian poets. A certain friend of ours, not to be named without honour, and therefore not at all on so slight an occasion, suggests that it might probably be copied from Spenser’s,

Grinning griesly—
B. V. c. 12.

And there is the more likelihood in this conjecture, as the poet a little before had call’d _death—the griesly terror_—v. 704. But after all, if he had any preceding writer in view, I suspect it might be FLETCHER; who, in his _Wife for a Month_, has these remarkable lines,

The game of Death was never play’d more nobly,
The meagre thief grew _wanton_ in his mischiefs,
And _his shrunk hollow eyes smil’d_ on his ruin.

The word _Ghastly_, I would observe, gives the precise idea of _shrunk hollow eyes_, and looks as if Milton, in admiration of his original, had only looked out for an _epithet_ to Death’s smile, as he found it pictured in Fletcher.