bol of her eyes among other marks nion?" I rely, that this paffage in of divinity, Divini figna decoris Ardentefque notate oculos (En. 5. 648.) "We will now confider the fatal confequences arifing from the prefence of thefe divinities; and thefe were to be dreaded unless upon particular occafions, as Ion here qualifies the expreffion. This obfervation will enable us to anfwer a question, started by the English commentator on the following lines of the Odyfley, The prince o'eraw'd Scarce lifts his eyes, and bows as to a god. (B 16. v. 195.) Here Ulyffes, adorned by Minerva with divine graces difcovers himfelf in the lodge of Eumæus to his fon Telemachus, Θάμβησε δὲ μὲν φίλος υἱὸς Ταρβήσας δ' ετέρωσε βάλ' όμματα μὴ Θεὸς ἔτη. (Π. 16. v. 179.) The original expreffion literally implies, "that the fon is aftonifhed at him, and cafts his eyes through fear on the other fide, left he should be a God." But the commentator remarks, "This fear of Telemachus, according to Dacier, proceeds from the opinon of the ancients: when the gods came down vifibly, they thought themselves fo unworthy of fuch a manifeftation, that whenever it happened, they believed they fhould die, or meet with fome great calamity thus the Ifraelites addrefs Mofes, Speak thou to us, and we will hear; but let not the Lord fpeak to us, left we die.” Thus alto Gideon: "Alas! O Lord, my God, because I have feen an angel of the Lord face to face, and the Lord faid to him, fear not, thou shalt not die." Hence it is very evident that this notion prevailed among the Ifraelites but how does it appear that the Greeks held the fame opi Euripides, where Ion exclaims, "let us fly, Omother, that we may not behold the deity," demonstrates, that the Grecian idea of the danger of a divine prefence is fupported by evidence; nor is it irreconcileable with the following obfervations of the English commentator, who continues to affert," the contrary is manifeft almoft to a demonstration: the gods are introduced almoft in every book both of the Iliad and Odyffey; and yet there is not the leaft foundation for fuch an affertion : nay, Telemachus himself in the fecond book, returns thanks to Minerva for appearing to him, and prays for a fecond vifion. It is not to be imagined that Telemachus would have preferred this prayer, if the prefence of the deity denoted death, or fome great calamity; and all the heroes through out the Iliad efteem fuch intercourfes as their glory, and converfe with the gods without any apprehenfions." In anfwer to this objection we may reply, that thefe heathen deities when they honoured mortals with their vifits, generally divefted themfelves, as far as they were able, of their divine radiance, and of their formidable attributes: but I conceive, there always was a religious awe, accompa nied with a reverential fear, naturally attached to the fublime idea of the vifion of a fuperior being: thus Homer afferts, that the gods, when they appear manifeft, are dreadful, Χαλεποὶ δὲ θεοὶ φαίνεσθαι ἐναργεῖς. (ll. 20. v. 234.) *Ος κέ τιν ἀθανάτων, ὅκα μὴ θεὸς αὐτὸς ἔληται Αθρήσῃ, μισθῷ τότον ἰδεῖν μεγάλω. (V. 102.) That this was the Oriental notion appears from a variety of other paffages, befides thofe already cited by Dacier: "The Lord faid unto Mofes, Thou canst not fee my face, for there fhall no man fee me and live." "We fhall furely die, fays Manoah unto his wife, becaufe we have feen God: : a man of God came unto me, and his countenance was like the angel of God, very terrible." Thus Daniel fell upon his face, when he faw the vifion and Saul alfo fell to the earth, when fuddenly there thined round about him a light from heaven. According to this : "E Plan of the GEORGICS of VIRGIL. [From the late Mr. HARRIS'S PHILOLOGICAL INQUIRIES.] VERY legitimate work should be one, as much as a vegetable, or an animal: and, to be one like them, it fhould be a whole, confifting of parts, and be in nothing redundant, in nothing deficient. The difference is, the whole of an animal, or a vegetable, confifts of parts, which exist at once: the whole of an oration, or a poem, as it must be either heard or perufed, confifts of parts not taken at once, but in a due and orderly fucceffion. "The defeription of fuch a whole is perfectly fimple, but not, for that fimplicity, the lefs to be approved. "A whole, we are informed, fhould have a beginning, middle, and end. If we doubt this, let us fuppofe a compofition to want them: would not the very vulgar fay, it had neither head nor tail? "Nor are the conftitutive parts, though equally fimple in their de fcription, for that reafon lefs founded in truth. A beginning is that, which nothing neceflarily precedes, but which fomething naturally fol lows. An end is that, which nothing naturally follows, but which fomething neceffarily precedes. A middle is that, which fomething precedes, to diftinguish it from a beginning; and which fomething follows to diftinguish it from an end. "I might illuftrate this from a propofition in Euclid. The ftating of the thing to be proved, makes the beginning; the proving of it, makes the middle; and the afferting of it to have been proved, makes the conclufion, Sit pecori; (iv) apibus quanta experi Virg. Georg. I. In thefe lines, and fo on (if we confult the original) for forty-two lines inclufive, we have the beginning, which beginning includes two things, the plan and the invocation. "In the four first verses we have the plan, which plan gradually opens and becomes the whole work, as an acorn, when developed, becomes a perfect oak. After this comes the invocation, which extends to the last of the forty-two verfes above mentioned. The two together give us the true character of a beginning, which, as above defcribed, nothing can precede, and which 'tis neceffary that fomething fhould follow. "The remaining part of the first book, together with the three books following, to verfe the 458th of book the fourth, make the middle, which alfo has its true character, that of fucceeding the beginning, where we expect fomething farther; and that of preceding the end, where we expect nothing more. ning is fhort, and which preferves its real character by fatisfying the reader, that all is complete, and that nothing is to follow. The performance is even dated. It finishes like an epiftle, giving us the place and time of writing; but then giving them in fuch a manner, as they ought to come from Virgil. "But to open our thoughts into a farther detail. "As the poem from its very name refpects various matters relative to land (Georgica,) and which are either immediately or mediately connected with it: among the variety of thefe matters the poem begins from the loweft, and thence advances gradually from higher to higher, till having reached the higheft, it there properly stops. "The first book begins from the fimple culture of the earth, and from its humbleft progeny, corn, legumes, flowers, &c. Tis a nobler fpecies of vegetables which employs the fecond book, where we are taught the culture of trees, and among others, of that important pair, the olive and the vine. Yet it must be remembered, that all this is nothing more than the culture of mere vegetable and inanimate nature. ""Tis in the third book that the poet rifes to nature fenfitive and animated, when he gives us precepts about cattle, horfes, fheep, &c. "At length, in the fourth book, when matters draw to a conclufion, then 'tis he treats his fubject in a moral and political way. He no longer purfues the culture of the mere brute nature; he then defcribes, as he tells us, -Mores, et ftudia, et populos, et prælia, &c. The eight laft verfes of the poem make the end, which like the begin- for fuch is the character of his bees, thofe thofe truly focial and political animals. 'Tis here he first mentions arts, and memory, and laws, and families. 'Tis here (their great fagacity confidered) he fuppofes a portion imparted of a fublimer principle. 'Tis here that every thing vegetable or merely brutal feems forgotten, while all appears at least human, and fometimes even divine. His quidam fignis, atque hæc exempla fecuti, Effe apibus partem divinæ mentis, et hauftus Ætherios dixere: deum namque ire per omnes Terrafque tractufque maris,' &c. Geor. IV. 219. "When the subject will not permit him to proceed farther, he fuddenly conveys his reader, by the fable of Ariftus, among nymphs, heroes, demi-gods, and gods, and thus leaves him in company, fuppofed more than mortal. "This is not only a fublime conclufion of the fourth book, but naturally leads to the conclufion of the whole work; for he does no more after this than fhortly recapitulate, and elegantly blend his recapitulation with a compliment to Auguftus. "But even this is not all. "The dry, didactic character of the Georgics made it neceflary, they should be enlivened by epifodes and digreffions. It has been the art of the poet, that these episodes and digreffions fhould be homogeneous: that is, fhould fo connect with the fubject, as to become (as it were) parts of it. On thefe principles every book has for its end, what I call an epilogue; for its beginning, an invocation; and for its middle, the feveral precepts relative to its fubject, I mean hufbandry, Having a beginning, a middle, and an end, every part itfelt be comes a fmaller whole, though with refpect to the general plan it is no thing more than a part. Thus the human arin, with a view to its elbow, its hand, its fingers, &c. is as clearly a whole, as it is fimply but a part with a view to the entire body. "The fmaller wholes of this divine poem may merit fome attention; by thefe I mean each particular book. "Each book has an invocation. The first invokes the fun, the moon, the various rural deities, and lastly Auguftus; the fecond invokes Bacchus; the third Pales and Apolio; the fourth, his patron Mæcenas. I do not dwell on thefe invocations, much lefs on the parts which follow, for this in fact would be writing a comment upon the poem. But the epilogues, befides their own intrinfic beauty, are too much to our pur pofe, to be paft in filence. "In the arrangement of them the poet feems to have purfued fuch an order, as that alternate affections (hould be alternately excited; and this he has done, well knowing the impor tance of that generally acknowledged truth, the force derived to contraries by their juxta-pofition or fucceffion. The first book ends with thofe por traits and prodigies, both upon earth and in the heavens, which preceded the death of the dictator Cæfar. To thefe direful fcenes the epilogue of the fecond book oppofes the tranquility and felicity of the rural life, which (as he informs us) faction and civil difcord do not ufually impair Non res Romanæ, perituraque regna— In the ending of the third book we read of a peftilence, and of nature in devaftation; in the fourth, of nature restored, and, by help of the gods, replenished. "As this concluding epilogue (I men mean the fable of Ariftæus) occupies the most important place, fo is it decorated accordingly with language, events, places, and perfonages. "No language was ever more polifhed and harmonious. The descent of Ariftæus to his mother, and of Orpheus to the fhades, are events; the watery palace of the Nereids, the cavern of Proteus, and the scene of the infernal regions, are places; Ariftaus, old Proteus, Orpheus, Eurydice, Cyllene and her nymphs, are perfonages; all great, all striking, all fublime. "Let us view thefe Epilogues in the poet's order, I. Civil horrors. III. Nature laid waste. Here, as we have faid already, different paffions are, by the fubjects being alternate, alternately excited; and yet withal excited fo judicioufly, that when the Poem concludes, and all is at an end, the reader leaves off with tranquility and joy." DEFENCE of CRITICAL RULES. [From the fame Work.] AVING mentioned rules, "If we enlarge on one of these "Hand indeed out whole theo inftances, we fhall illuftrate the reff. ry having been little more than rules developed, we cannot but remark upon a common opinion, which feems to have arifen either from prejudice, or mistake. "Do not rules, fay they, cramp "Genius? do they not abridge it "of certain privileges." "Tis anfwered, if the obeying of rules were to induce a tyranny like this; to defend them would be abfurd, and against the liberty of genius. But the truth is, rules, fuppofing them good, like good government, take away no privileges. They do no more than fave genius from error, by fhewing it, that a right to err is no privilege at all. "Tis furely no privilege to violate in grammar the rules of fyntax; in poetry, thofe of metre; in mufic, thofe of harmony; in logic, thofe of fyllogifm; in painting, thofe of perfpective; in dramatic poetry, thole of probable imitation. "The probable imitation just now mentioned, like that of every other kind, is when the imitation refembles the thing imitated in as many circumstances as poffible; fo that the more of thofe circumftances are combined, the more probable the resemblance. "'Tis thus, in imitation by painting, the resemblance is more complete, when to the out-line we add light and fhade; and more complete ftill, when to light and shade we add the colours. "The real place of every drama is a ftage, that is, a fpace of a few fathoms deep, and a few fathoms broad. Its real time is the time it takes in acting, a limited duration, feldom exceeding a few hours. "Now imagination, by the help of fcenes, can enlarge this stage into a dwelling, a palace, a city, &c. and it is a decent regard to this, which conflitutes probable place. « Again, |