fince he teaches us how to hold, nay how to make a Cudgel!

Periphrafe is another great aid to Prolixity; being a diffufed circumlocutory manner of expreffing a known idea, which fhould be fo myfterioufly couch'd, as to give the reader the pleasure of guessing what it is that the author can poffibly mean, and a ftrange furprize when he finds it.

The Poet I laft mentioned is incomparable in this figure.

*A waving fea of heads was round me fpread,

And ftill fresh ftreams the gazing deluge fed.

Here is a waving fea of heads, which by a fresh Stream of heads, grows to be a gazing deluge of heads. You come at laft to find, it means a great crowd.

How pretty and how genteel is the following?
+ Nature's Confectioner,

Whofe fuckets are moist alchemy:
The ftill of his refining mold
Minting the garden into gold.

What is this but a Bee gathering honey?

Little Syren of the stage,

Empty warbler, breathing lyre,

Wanton gale of fond defire,

Tuneful mifchief, vocal spell.

Who would think, this was only a poor gentlewoman that fung finely?

We may define Amplification to be making the most of a Thought; it is the Spinning-wheel of the Bathos, which draws out and spreads it in the

Job, p. 78.

+ Cleveland.

A. Philips to Cuzzona.

fineft

1

fineft thread. There are Amplifiers who can extend half a dozen thin thoughts over a whole Folio; but for which, the tale of many a vaft Romance, and the substance of many a fair volume might be reduced into the fize of a primmer.

In the book of Job are these words, " Haft "thou commanded the morning, and caused the "day-fpring to know his place?" How is this extended by the most celebrated Amplifier of our age.

* Canft thou fet forth th' etherial mines on high,
Which the refulgent ore of light fupply?
Is the celeftial furnace to thee known,
In which I melt the golden metal down?
Treasures, from whence I deal out light as fast,
As all my ftars and lavish funs can wafte.

The fame author hath amplified a paffage in the civth Pfalm; "He looks on the earth, and it trem❝bles. He touches the hills, and they smoke."

The hills forget they're fix'd, and in their flight
Gaft off their weight, and ease themselves for flight -
The woods, with terror wing'd, out-fly the wind,
And leave the heavy, panting hills behind.

You here fee the hills not only trembling, but fhaking off the woods from their backs, to run the fafter: After this you are prefented with a foot-race of mountains and woods, where the woods distance the mountains, that, like corpulent purfy fellows, come puffing and panting a vaft way behind them.

* Job, p. 108.

+ P. 257.

CHAP.

CHA P. IX.

Of Imitation, and the Manner of Imitating.

HAT the true authors of the Profund are

TH

to imitate diligently the examples in their own way, is not to be queftioned, and that divers have by this means attained to a depth whereunto their own weight could never have carried them, is evident by fundry inftances. Who fees not that De Foe was the poetical fon of Withers, Tate of Ogilby, E. Ward of John Taylor, and E-n of Blackmore? Therefore when we fit down to write, let us bring fome great author to our mind, and ask ourselves this queftion; How would Sir Richard have faid this? Do I express myself as fimply as Amb. Philips? Or flow my numbers with the quiet thoughtleffness of Mr. Welsted?

But it may seem somewhat strange to affert, that our Proficient should also read the works of those famous Poets who have excelled in the Sublime: Yet is not this a paradox? As Virgil is faid to have read Ennius, out of his dunghill to draw gold, fo may our author read Shakespear, Milton, and Dryden for the contrary end, to bury their gold in his own dunghil. A true Genius, when he finds any thing lofty' or fhining in them, will have the skill to bring it down, take off the glofs, or quite difcharge the colour, by fome ingenious Circumftance or Periphrafe, fome addition or diminution, or by fome of thofe Figures, the use of which we fhall fhew in our next chapter.

The book of Job is acknowledged to be infinitely fublime, and yet has not the father of the Bathos reduced it, in every page? Is there a paffage in all Virgil more painted up and laboured than the defcription of Ætna in the third

neid? Horrificis

Horrificis juxta tonat Etna ruinis, Interdumque atram prorumpit ad æthera nubem, Turbine fumantem piceo, et candente favilla, Attollitque globos flammarum, et fidera lambit. Interdum fcopulos avulfaque vifcera montis Erigit eructans, liquefactaque faxa fub auras Cum gemitu glomerat, fundoque ex aftuat imo.

(I beg pardon of the gentle English reader, and fuch of our writers as understand not Latin) Lo! how this is taken down by our British Poet, by the fingle happy thought of throwing the mountain into a fit of the colic.

* Etna, and all the burning mountains, find

Their kindled ftores with inbred ftorms of wind Blown up to rage; and, roaring out, complain, As torn with inward gripes, and tort'ring pain: Lab'ring, they caft their dreadful vomit round, And with their melted bowels fpread the ground.

Horace, in fearch of the Sublime, ftruck his head against the Stars † ; but Empedocles, to fathom the Profund, threw himself into Etna. And who but would imagine our excellent Modern had also been there, from this defcription?

Imitation is of two forts; the firft is when we force to our own purposes the Thoughts of others; the second confifts in copying the Imperfections,

or Blemishes of celebrated authors. I have seen a Play profeffedly writ in the ftyle of Skakespear; wherein the resemblance lay in one fingle line,

And fo good morrow t'ye, good mafter Lieutenant. And fundry poems in imitation of Milton, where with the utmoft exactness, and not fo much as one exception, nevertheless was conftantly nathless, em* Pr. Arthur, p. 75.

+ Sublimi feriam fidera vertice.

broider'd

broider'd was broider'd, hermits were eremites, difdain'd was 'fdeign'd, fhady umbrageous, enterprize emprize, pagan paynim, pinions pennons, sweet dulcet, orchards orchats, bridge-work pontifical; nay, her was hir, and their was thir thro' the whole poem. And in very deed, there is no other way by which the true modern poet could read, to any purpose, the works of fuch men as Milton and Shakespear.

It may be expected, that, like other Critics, I fhould next speak of the Paffions: But as the main end and principal effect of the Bathos is to produce Tranquillity of Mind, (and fure it is a better defign to promote fleep than madnefs) we have little to fay on this fubject. Nor will the fhort bounds of this discourse allow us to treat at large of the Emollients and Opiats of Poefy, of the Cool, and the manner of producing it, or of the methods ufed by our authors in managing the Paffions. I fhall but tranfiently remark, that nothing contributes fo much to the Cool, as the use of Wit in expreffing paffion: The true genius rarely fails of points, conceits, and proper fimiles on fuch occafions: This we may term the Pathetic epigrammatical, in which even puns are made ufe of with good fuccefs. Hereby our best authors have avoided throwing themselves or their readers into any indecent Transports.

But as it is fometimes needful to excite the paffions of our antagonist in the polemic way, the true ftudents in the law have conftantly taken their methods from low life, where they obferved, that, to move Anger, ufe is made of fcolding and railing; to move Love, of bawdry; to beget Favour and Friendship, of grofs flattery; and to produce Fear, of calumniating an adverfary with crimes obnoxious to the State. As for Shame, it is a filly pas

fion,