without which a figure could not poffibly be graceful. When we entered the Gallery, I thought I could perceive him recollecting his Rules by which he was to criticize Raffaelle. I fhall pass over his obfervation of the boats being too little, and other criticisms of that kind, till we arrived at St. Paul preaching. "This, fays he, is esteemed the most excellent of all the Cartoons; what noblenefs, what dignity there is in that figure of St. Paul; and yet what an addition to that nobleness could Raffaelle have given, had the art of Contrast been known in his time; but above all, the flowing line, which conftitutes Grace and Beauty. You would not then have seen an upright figure ftanding equally on both legs, and both hands ftretched forward in the fame direction, and his drapery, to all appearance, without the leaft art of difpofition." The following Picture is the Charge to Peter. “Here, says he, are twelve upright figures; what a pity is is that Raffaelle was not acquainted with the pyramidal principle; he would then have contrived the figures in the middle to have been on higher ground, or the figures at the extremities ftooping or lying,

which would not only have formed the group into the shape of a pyramid, but likewise contrafted the ftanding figures. Indeed, added he, I have often lamented that fo great a genius as Raffaelle had not lived in this enlightened age, fince the art has been reduced to principles, and had had his education in one of the modern Academies ; what glorious works might we then have expected from his divine pencil ?"

I SHALL trouble you no longer with my friend's obfervations, which, I fuppofe, you are now able to continue by yourself. It is curious to obferve, that at the fame time that great admiration is pretended for a name of fixed reputation, objections are raised against those very qualities by which that great name was acquired.

THOSE Criticks are continually lamenting that Raffaelle had not the Colouring and Harmony of Rubens, or the Light and Shadow of Rembrant, without confidering how much the gay Harmony of the former, and Affectation of the latter, would take from the Dignity of Raffaelle; and yet Rubens had great Harmony,

Harmony, and Rembrant understood Light and Shadow; but what may be an excellence in a lower class of Painting, becomes a blemish in a higher; as the quick, spritely turn, which is the life and beauty of epigrammatick compofitions, would but ill fuit with the majesty of heroick Poetry.

To conclude; I would not be thought to infer from any thing that has been said, that Rules are abfolutely unneceffary, but to cenfure fcrupulofity, a fervile attention to minute exactness, which is fometimes inconfiftent with higher excellency, and is loft in the blaze of expanded genius.

I Do not know whether you will think Painting a general fubject. By inferting this letter, perhaps you will incur the cenfure a man would deserve, whose business being to entertain a whole room, fhould turn his back to the company, and talk to a particular perfon.

I am, Sir, &c.

N° 77.

N° 77. Saturday, October 6.

EASY Poetry is univerfally admired, but I

know not whether any rule has yet been fixed, by which it may be decided when Poetry can be properly called eafy; Horace has told us, that it is fuch as every reader hopes to equal, but after long labour finds unattainable. This is a very loose description, in which only the effect is noted; the qualities which produce this effect remain to be investigated.

EASY Poetry is that in which natural thoughts are expreffed without violence to the language. The difcriminating character of Ease confifts principally in the diction, for all true Poetry requires that thé fentiments be natural. Language fuffers violence by harsh or by daring figures, by tranfpofition, by unufual acceptations of words, and by any licence, which would be avoided by a Writer of Profe. Where any artifice appears in the conftruction of the verse, that verfe is no longer easy.

Any

Any epithet which can be ejected without diminution of the sense, any curious iteration of the fame word, and all unusual, tho' not ungrammatical structure of speech, destroy the grace of eafy Poetry.

THE first lines of Pope's Iliad afford examples of many licences which an easy Writer muft decline.

Achilles wrath, to Greece the direful Spring
Of woes unnumber'd, heav'nly Goddess fing,
The wrath which burl'd to Pluto's gloomy reign
The fouls of mighty chiefs untimely flain.

In the first couplet the language is distorted by inverfions, clogged with fuperfluities, and clouded by a harsh metaphor; and in the fecond there are two words ufed in an uncommon fenfe, and two epithets inferted only to lengthen the line; all these practices may in a long work eafily be pardoned, but they always produce fome degree of obfcurity and ruggedness.

EASY Poetry has been fo long excluded by ambition of ornament, and luxuriance of imagery, that its nature feems now to be forgotten.