I now propose to make some observations on, and illustrations of, such passages and precepts in this ESSAY, as, on account of their utility, novelty, or elegance, deserve particular attention; and, perhaps, I may take the freedom to hint at a few imperfections in this SENSIBLE performance. I shall cite the passages in the natural order, in which they successively occur. 1. In poets as true genius is but rare.* It is, indeed, so extremely rare, that no country in the succession of many ages, has produced above three or four persons that deserve the title. The "man of rhymes" may be easily found; but the genuine poet, of a lively plastic imagination, the true MAKER or CREATOR, is so uncommon a prodigy, that one is almost tempted to subscribe to the opinion of Sir William Temple, where he says, "That of all the numbers of mankind that live within the compass of a thousand years, for one man that is born capable of making * Ver. 11. making a great poet, there may be a thousand born capable of making as great generals, or ministers of state, as the most renowned in story. There are, indeed, more causes required to concur to the formation of the former, than of the latter, which necessarily render its production more difficult. 2. True taste as seldom is the critic's share.† "I will LA BRUYERE says very sensibly, allow the good writers are scarce enough; but then, I ask, where are the people that know how to read?" 3. Let such teach others who themselves excel, It is somewhere remarked by Dryden, I think, that none but a poet is qualified to judge of a poet. The maxim is, however, contradicted by experience. Aristotle is said, indeed, to have written one ode; but neither Bossu nor Hurd are poets. The penetrating author of the Reflections * Miscell. Essay iv. part. 2. ↑ Ver. 12. Ver. 15. tions on Poetry, Painting, and Music, will for ever be read with delight, and with profit, by all ingenious artists; "Nevertheless, (says Voltaire,) he did not understand music, could never make verses, and was not possessed of a single picture; but he had read, seen, heard, and reflected a great deal.”* And Lord Shaftesbury speaks with some indignation on this subject: "If a musician performs his part well in the hardest symphonies, he must necessarily know the notes, and understand the rules of harmony and music. But must a man, therefore, who has an ear, and has studied the rules of music, of necessity, have a voice or hand? Can no one possibly judge a fiddle, but who is himself a fiddler? Can no one judge a picture, but who is himself a layer of colours?"† Quintilian and Pliny, who speak of the works of the ancient painters and statuaries with so much taste and sentiment, handled not themselves either the pencil or the chissel, nor Longinus and Dionysius the harp. But although such as have actually Characteristics. Vol. 3. p. 190. Edit. 12ma. tually performed nothing in the art itself, may not, on that account, be totally disqualified to judge with accuracy of any piece of workmanship, yet, perhaps, a judgment will come with more authority and force from an artist himself. Hence the connoisseurs highly prize the treatise of Rubens concerning the imitation of antique statues, the Art of Painting by Leonardo da Vinci, and the Lives of the Painters by Vasari. As for the same reasons, Rameau's Dissertation on the thorough Bass, and the Introduction to a good Taste in Music, by the excellent, but neglected, Geminiani, demand a particular regard. The prefaces of Dryden would be equally valuable, if he did not so frequently contradict himself, and advance opinions diametrically opposite to each other. Some of Corneille's discourses on his own tragedies are admirably just. And one of the best pieces of modern criticism, the academy's observations on the Cid, was, we know, the work of persons who had themselves written well. And our author's own excellent preface to his translation of the Iliad, one * Yet our author was not satisfied with this preface: he used to say it was too pompous and poetical; too much on the great one of the best pieces of prose in the English language, is an example how well poets are qualified to be critics. 4. Some neither can for wits nor critics pass, These lines, and those preceding and following them, are excellently satirical; and were, I think, the first we find in his works, that give an indication of that species of poetry to which his talent was most powerfully bent, and in which, though not as we shall see in others, he excelled all mankind.* The simile of the mule heightens great horse, was his expression; and preferred his postscript to the Odyssey; and often talked of the excellence of Dryden's prose style. * Ver. 38. Atterbury and Bolingbroke had the very same opinion of the bent and turn of our author's genius. The former, on reading the famous character of Addison, wrote thus to his friend Let. 12. "Since you now, therefore, know where your |