constitute poetry, bad versification alone will certainly degrade and render disgustful the sublimest sentiments and finest flowers of imagination. This humiliating power of bad verse appears in many translations of the ancient poets; in Ogilby's Homer, Trapp's Virgil, and frequently in Creech's Horace. This last indeed is not wholly devoid of spirit; but it seldom rises above mediocrity, and, as Horace says,

Mediocribus esse poetis

Non homines, non Di, non concessere columnæ.
But God, and man, and letter'd post denies,
That Poets ever are of middling size.

How is that beautiful ode beginning with Justum et tenacem propositi virum called and tamed by the following transIation:

He who by principle is sway'd,

In truth and justice still the same, sether of the crowd afraid, Though civil broils the state inflame ;

to a haughty tyrant's frown will stoop,

Ser to a raging storm, when all the winds are up.

a

ld nature with convulsions shake, Stuck with the fiery bolts of Jove, Ce final doom and dreadful crack Cannot his constant courage move. at long Alexandrine-" Nor to ing storm, when all the winds are up," rawling, feeble, swoln with a pleonasm tautology, as well as deficient in the ime; and as for the "dreadful crack," the next stanza, instead of exciting Tor, it conveys a low and ludicrous

How much more elegant and ergetic is this paraphrase of the same inserted in one of the volumes of me's History of England:

The man whose mind, on virtue bent,
Pursues some greatly good intent
With undiverted aim,

Serene beholds the angry crowd:
Nor can their clamours fierce and loud
His stubborn honour tame,

Nor the proud tyrant's fiercest threat,
Nor storms that from their dark retreat
The lawless surges wake;

Nor Jove's dread bolt, that shakes the pole,
The firmer purpose of his soul

With all its powers can shake.

Should nature's frame in ruins fall,
And chaos o'er the sinking ball

Resume primeval sway,

His courage chance and fate defies,
Nor feels the wreck of earth and skies
Obstruct its destined way.

If poetry exists independent of versification, it will naturally be asked, how then is it to be distinguished? Undoubtedly by its own peculiar expression: it has a language of its own, which speaks so feelingly to the heart, and so pleasingly to the imagination, that its meaning cannot possibly be misunderstood by any person of delicate sensations. It is a species of painting with words, in which the figures are happily conceived, ingeniously arranged, affectingly expressed, and recommended with all the warmth and harmony of colouring: it consists of and sentiments, adapted with propriety imagery, description, metaphors, similes, to the subject, so contrived and executed as to soothe the ear, surprise and delight the fancy, mend and melt the heart, elevate the mind, and please the understanding. According to Flaccus : Aut prodesse volunt, aut delectare poetæ ; Aut simul et jucunda et idonea dicere vitæ. Poets would profit or delight mankind, And with th' amusing show th' instructive join'd. Omne tulit punctum, qui miscuit utile dulci, Lectorem delectando pariterque monendo. Profit and pleasure mingled thus with art, To soothe the fancy and improve the heart.

Tropes and figures are likewise liberally used in rhetoric; and some of the most celebrated orators have owned themselves much indebted to the poets. Theophrastus expressly recommends the poets for this purpose. From their source the spirit and energy of the pathetic, the sublime, and the beautiful, are derived. But these figures must be more sparingly used in rhetoric than in poetry, and even then mingled with argumentation, and a detail of facts, altogether different from poetical narration. The poet, instead of simply relating the incident, strikes off a glowing picture of the scene, and exhibits it in the most lively colours to the eye of the imagination. "It is reported that Homer was blind," says Tully in his Tusculan Questions; "yet his poetry is no other than painting. What country, what climate, what ideas, battles, commotions, and contests of men, as well as of wild beasts, has he not painted in such a manner, as to bring before our eyes those very scenes which he himself could not behold?" We

cannot, therefore, subscribe to the opinion of some ingenious critics, who have blamed Mr. Pope for deviating in some instances from the simplicity of Homer, in his translation of the Iliad and Odyssey. For example, the Grecian bard says simply "the sun rose;" and his translator gives us a beautiful picture of the sun rising. Homer mentions a person who played upon the lyre; the translator sets him before us warbling to the silver strings. If this be a deviation, it is at the same time an improvement. Homer himself, as Cicero observes above, is full of this kind of painting, and particularly fond of description, even in situations where the action seems to require haste. Neptune, observing from Samothrace the discomfiture of the Grecians before Troy, flies to their assistance, and might have been wafted thither in half a line; but the bard describes him, first, descending the mountain on which he sat; secondly, striding towards his palace at Ege, and yoking his horses; thirdly, he describes him putting on his armour; and, lastly, ascending his car, and driving along the surface of the sea. Far from being disgusted by these delays, we are delighted with the particulars of the description. Nothing can be more sublime than the circumstance of the mountain's trembling beneath the footsteps of an immortal :

Τρέμε δ' οὐρέα μακρὰ καὶ ὕλη Ποσσὶν ὑπ' ἀθανάτοισι Ποσειδάωνος ἰόντος.

But his passage to the Grecian fleet is altogether transporting :

Βῆ δ ̓ ἐλάαν ἐπὶ κύματ, κ. τ. λ.
He mounts the car, the golden scourge applies,
He sits superior, and the chariot flies;

His whirling wheels the glassy surface sweep;
Th' enormous monsters, rolling o'er the deep,
Gambol around him on the watery way,
And heavy whales in awkward measures play:
The sea subsiding spreads a level plain,
Exults and crowns the monarch of the main;
The parting waves before his coursers fly;
The wond'ring waters leave his axle dry.
With great veneration for the memory of
Mr. Pope, we cannot help objecting to
some lines of this translation. We have
no idea of the sea's exulting and crowning
Neptune, after it had subsided into a level
plain. There is no such image in the
original. Homer says, the whales exulted,
and knew, or owned their king; and that

the sea parted with joy: vnosuvn
@aráσoa ditoaro. Neither is there a wo
of the wondering waters: we therefo
think the lines might be thus altered
advantage:

They knew and own'd the monarch of the mai
The sea subsiding spreads a level plain;
The curling waves before his coursers fly;
The parting surface leaves his brazen axle dry.

Besides the metaphors, similes, and allu sions of poetry, there is an infinite variet of tropes, or turns of expression, occasion ally disseminated through works of genius which serve to animate the whole, and distinguish the glowing effusions of real inspiration from the cold efforts of mere science. These tropes consist of a certain happy choice and arrangement of words, by which ideas are artfully disclosed in a great variety of attitudes; of epithets, and compound epithets; of sounds collected in order to echo the sense conveyed; of apostrophes; and, above all, the enchanting use of the prosopopoeia, which is a kind of magic, by which the poet gives life and motion to every inanimate part of nature. Homer, describing the wrath of Agamemnon, in the first book of the Iliad, strikes off a glowing image in two words:

ὅσσε δ' οἱ πυρὶ λαμπετόωντι εἴκτην. -and from his eyeballs flash'd the living fire.

This indeed is a figure which has been copied by Virgil, and almost all the poets of every age, oculis micat acribus ignis

ignescunt iræ: auris delor ossilus ardet. Milton, describing Satan in hell, says,

With head uplift above the wave, and eye
That sparkling blazed—

-He spake: and to confirm his words out flew Millions of flaming swords, drawn from the thighs

Of mighty cherubim. The sudden blaze
Far round illumined hell—

There are certain words in every language particularly adapted to the poetical expression; some from the image or idea they convey to the imagination, and some from the effect they have upon the ear. The first are truly figurative; the others may be called emphatical. Rollin observes that Virgil has, upon many occasions. poetized (if we may be allowed the expres sion) a whole sentence by means of the same word, which is pendere.

where Glo'ster stood was so high above the surface of the sea that the pλoîo Bos, or dashing, could not be heard; and therefore an enthusiastic admirer of Shakespeare might, with some plausibility, affirm the poet had chosen an expression in which that sound is not at all conveyed.

In the very same page of Homer's Iliad we meet with two other striking instances of the same sort of beauty. Apollo, incensed at the insults his priest had sustained, descends from the top of Olympus with his bow and quiver rattling on his shoulder as he moved along :

Εκλαγξαν δ ̓ ἂρ' οΐστω ἐπ ̓ ὤμων. Here the sound of the word kλayğaν admirably expresses the clanking of armour; as the third line after this surprisingly imitates the twanging of a bow.

Δεινὴ δὲ κλαγγὴ γένετ' ἀργυρέοιο βιοῖο. In shrill-toned murmurs sang the twanging bow. Many beauties of the same kind are scattered through Homer, Pindar, and Theo-, critus, such as the Boußevra μéxioσa, susurrans apicula; the άδύ ψιθύρισμα, dulcem susurrum; and the μeλíodeτai, for the sighing of the pine.

The Latin language teems with sounds adapted to every situation, and the English is not destitute of this significant energy. We have the cooing turtle, the sighing reed, the warbling rivulet, the gliding stream, the whispering breeze, the glance, the gleam, the flash, the bickering flame, the dashing wave, the gushing spring, the howling blast, the rattling storm, the pattering shower, the crimp earth, the mouldering tower, the twanging bowstring, the clang ing arms, the clanking chains, the twinkling stars, the tinkling chords, the trickling drops, the twittering swallow, the cawing rook, the screeching owl; and a thousand other words and epithets, wonderfully suited to the sense they imply.

Among the select passages of poetry which we shall insert by way of illustration, the reader will find instances of all the different tropes and figures which, the best authors have adopted in the variety of their poetical works, as well as of the apostrophe, abrupt transition, repetition, and prosopopœia.

In the meantime it will be necessary still farther to analyse those principle which constitute the essence of poetica merit; to display those delightful parterres that teem with the fairest flowers of imag nation; and distinguish between the gaud offspring of a cold insipid fancy and the glowing progeny, diffusing sweets, produced and invigorated by the sun o genius.

ESSAY XVI. Metaphor.

OF all the implements of Poetry, the metaphor is the most generally and successfully used, and indeed may be termed the Muse's caduceus, by the power of which she enchants all nature. The metaphor is a shorter simile, or rather a kind of magical coat, by which the same idea assumes a thousand different appearances. Thus the word plough, which originally belongs to agriculture, being metaphorically used, represents the motion of a ship at sea and the effects of old age upon the human countenance:

-Plough'd the bosom of the deepAnd time had plough'd his venerable front. Almost every verb, noun substantive, or term of art in any language, may be in this manner applied to a variety of subjects with admirable effect; but the danger is in sowing metaphors too thick, so as to distract the imagination of the reader, and incur the imputation of deserting nature, in order to hunt after conceits. Every day produces poems of all kinds so inflated with metaphor, that they may be compared to the gaudy bubbles blown up from a solution of soap. Longinus is of opinion, that a multitude of metaphors is never excusable, except in those cases when the passions are roused, and, like a winter torrent, rush down impetuous, sweeping them with collective force along. He brings an instance of the following quotation from Demosthenes: "Men,' says he, "profligates, miscreants, and flatterers, who having severally preyed upon the bowels of their country, at length betrayed her liberty, first to Philip, and now again to Alexander; who, placing the chief felicity of life in the indulgence of infamous lusts and appetites, overtumed

the dust that freedom and independence ich was the chief aim and end of all worthy ancestors."

Aristotle and Theophrastus seem to k it is rather too bold and hazardous se metaphors so freely, without interErg some mitigating phrase, such as, I may be allowed the expression," or e equivalent excuse. At the same me, Longinus finds fault with Plato for arding some metaphors, which, indeed, pear to be equally affected and exgant; when he says, "The governt of a state should not resemble a oal of hot fermenting wine, but a cool moderate beverage chastised by the deity," a metaphor that signifies ng more than "mixed or lowered hwater." Demetrius Phalereus justly serves, that though a judicious use of phors wonderfully raises, sublimes, atoms oratory or elocution, yet they uld seem to flow naturally from the ject; and too great a redundancy of ten inflates the discourse to a mere psody. The same observation will A in poetry; and the more liberal or aring use of them will depend, in a great sure, on the nature of the subject. Passion itself is very figurative, and When bursts out into metaphors; but, in ching the pathos, the poet must be fectly well acquainted with the emos of the human soul, and carefully stinguish between those metaphors which The glowing from the heart, and those cold ocents which are engendered in the Lecy. Should one of these last unfortuately intervene, it will be apt to destroy he whole effect of the most pathetical cident or situation. Indeed, it requires e most delicate taste, and a consummate owledge of propriety, to employ metaors in such a manner as to avoid what e ancients call the rò uxpóv, the frigid, false sublime. Instances of this kind ere frequent even among the correct scients. Sappho herself is blamed for ong the hyperbole λευκοτέροι χιόνος, hiter than snow. Demetrius is so nice to be disgusted at the simile of swift the wind, though, in speaking of a ce-horse, we know from experience that is is not even a hyperbole. He would

have had more reason to censure that kind of metaphor which Aristotle styles κατ' ἐνέργειαν, exhibiting things inanimate as endued with sense and reason; such as that of the sharp pointed arrow, eager to take wing among the crowd: deußeλns καθ' ὅμιλον ἐπιπτέσθαι μενεαίνων. Not but that, in descriptive poetry, this figure is often allowed and admired. The cruel sword, the ruthless dagger, the ruffian blast, are epithets which frequently occur. The faithful bosom of the earth, the joyous boughs, the trees that admire their images reflected in the stream, and many other examples of this kind, are found disseminated through the works of our best modern poets: yet still they must be sheltered under the privilege of the poetica licentia; and, except in poetry, they would give offence.

More chaste metaphors are freely used in all kinds of writing; more sparingly in history, and more abundantly in rhetoric: we have seen that Plato indulges in them even to excess. The orations of Demosthenes are animated, and even inflamed with metaphors, some of them so bold as even to entail upon him the censure of the critics. Τότε τῷ Πύθωνι τῷ ῥήτορι béovTi Kat' iμŵv.-“Then I did not yield to Python the orator, when he overflowed you with a tide of eloquence." Cicero is still more liberal in the use of them; he ransacks all nature, and pours forth a redundancy of figures even with a lavish hand. Even the chaste Xenophon, who generally illustrates his subject by way of simile, sometimes ventures to produce an expressive metaphor, such as "Part of the phalanx fluctuated in the march;" and, indeed, nothing can be more significant than this word gekμnve, to represent a body of men staggered, and on the point of giving way. Armstrong has used the word fluctuate with admirable efficacy, in his philosophical poem, entitled The Art of Preserving Health.

Oh! when the growling winds contend, and all The sounding forest fluctuates in the storm, To sink in warm repose, and hear the din Howl o'er the steady battlements-

The word fluctuate on this occasion not only exhibits an idea of struggling, but also echoes to the sense like the