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diftinctly what these fecret ties and connexions are, which link the objects of fenfe together, and draw the imagination thus infenfibly from one fubject to another. The most obvious and natural is that of actual fimilitude, whether in shape, attitude, colour, or afpect. As when beroes are compared to gods,—a hero in act to strike åt bis foe, to a faulcon ftooping at a dove,blood running down the fkin, to the staining of ivory, corn waving with the wind, to water in motion. Sometimes the affociating caufe lies in the effect. As when the return of a good prince to his country is compared to the fun -a fresh gale to mariners, to the timely coming of a general to his troops, &c. more commonly, in fome property, attribute, or circumstance. Thus an intrepid hero fuggefts the idea of a rock, on account of its firmness and stability;of a lion, for his fiercenefs, of a deer encompaffed with wolves, for his fituation when Jurrounded with enemies. In fhort, for I pretend not to make a complete enumeration of the grounds of connexion, whatever the mind obferves in any object, that bears

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an analogy to fomething in any other, becomes the occafion of comparison betwixt them; and the fancy, which is ever, in a great genius, quick at efpying thefe traits of refemblance, and delights to furvey them, lets flip no opportunity of fetting them over-against each other, and producing them to obfervation.

But whatever be the causes, which affociate the ideas of the poet, and how fantaftic foever, or even cafual, may fometimes appear to be the ground of fuch affociation; yet, in refpect of the greater works of genius, there will ftill be found the most exact uniformity of allufion, the fame ideas and afpects of things conftantly admonishing the poet of the fame refemblances and relations. I fay, in the greater works of genius, which must be attended to; for the folly of taking refemblances for imitations, in this province of allufion, hath arifen from hence; that the poet is believed to have all art and nature before him, and to be at liberty to fetch his hints of fimilitude and correfpondence from every diftant and obfcure corner of the univerfe. That is, the genius

genius of the epic, dramatic, and univerfally of the greater, poetry hath not been comprehended, nor their diftinct laws and characters diftinguished from those of an inferior fpecies.

The mutual babitudes and relations (at least what the mind is capable of regarding as fuch), fubfifting between thofe innumerable objects of thought and fenfe, which make up the entire natural and intellectual world, are indeed infinite; and if the poet be allowed to affociate and bring together all thofe ideas, wherein the ingenuity of the mind can perceive any remote fign or glimpfé of refemblance, it were truly wonderful, that, in any number of images and allufions, there fhould be found a clofe conformity of them with those of any other writer. But this is far from being the cafe. For 1. the more august poetry disclaims, as unfuited to its state and dignity, that inquifitive and anxious diligence, which pries into Nature's retirements, and fearches through all her fecret and hidden haunts, to detect a forbidden · commerce, and expofe to light fome strange. VOL. III.

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unexpected conjunction of ideas. This quaint combination of remote, unallied imagery, conftitutes a fpecies of entertainment, which, for its novelty, may amuse and divert the mind in other compofitions; but is wholly inconfiftent with the reserve and folemnity of the graver forms. There is too much curiofity of art, too follicitous an affectation of pleafing, in thefe ingenious exercises of the fancy, to fuit with the fimple majefty of the epos or drama; which disclaims to caft about for forced and tortured allusions, and aims only to expose, in the faireft light, fuch as are most obvious and natural. And here, by the way, it may be worth obferving, in honour of a great Poet of the last century, I mean Dr, DONNE, that, though agreeably to the turn of his genius, and tafte of his age, he was fonder, than ever poet was, of these secret and hidden ways in his leffer poetry; yet when he had projected his great work "On "the progress of the Soul" (of which we have only the beginning), his good fenfe brought him out into the freer Spaces of nature and open day-light.

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Largior hic compos æther, et lumine vestit Purpureo: folemque fuum, fua fidera norunt. In this, the Author of GONDIBERT, and another writer of credit, a contemporary of DONNE, Sir FULK GREVIL, were not fo happy. 2. This work of indirect imagery is intended, not fo much to illuftrate and enforce the original thought, to which it is applied, as to amuse and entertain the fancy, by holding up to view, in these occafional digreffive reprefentations, the pictures of pleafing fcenes and objects. But this end of allufion (which is principal in the fublimer works of genius) restrains the poet to the use of a few felect images, for the most part taken from obvious common nature; these being always moft illuftrious in themselves, and therefore most apt to feize and captivate the imagination of the reader. Thus is the poet confined, by the very nature of his work, to a very moderate compafs of allufion, on both these ac-counts; first, as he muft employ the eafiest and most apparent refemblances: and fecondly, of thefe, fuch as imprefs, the most delightful images on the fancy.