lemnity to all around them. This remark is from Quintilian; who adds, that they give to a compofition that caft and colour of antiquity, which in painting is fo highly valued, but which art can never effectually imitate *. Poetical words that are either not ancient, or not known to be fuch, have however a pleafing effect from affociation. We are accuftomed to meet with them in fublime and elegant writing; and hence they come to acquire fublimity and elegance: even as the words we hear on familiar occafions come to be accounted familiar; and as those that take their rife among pickpockets, gamblers, and gypfies, are thought too indelicate to be used by any person of taste or good manners. When one hears the following lines, which abound in poetical words, The breezy call of incenfe-breathing morn, -one is as fenfible of the dignity of the language; as one would be of the vileness or vulgarity of that man's fpeech, who fhould prove his acquaintance with Bridewell, by interlarding his discourse with such Lib. 8. cap. 3. § 3. VOL. II. I i term's terms as mill-doll, queer cull, or nubbing cheat*; or who, in imitation of fops and gamblers, fhould, on the common occafions of life, talk of being beat hollow, or faving his distance †. What gives dignity to perfons gives dignity to language. A man of this character is one who has borne important employments, been connected with honourable affociates, and never degraded himself by levity, or immorality of conduct. Dignified phrases are those which have been used to express elevated fentiments, have always made their appearance in elegant compofition, and have never been profaned by giving permanency or utterance to the paffions of the vile, the giddy, or the worthlefs. And as by an active old age, the dignity of fuch men is confirmed and heightened; fo the dignity of fuch words, if they be not suffered to fall into disuse, feldom fails to improve by length of time, See the Scoundrel's Dictionary, Language of Newmarket. SECT. SECT. III. Natural Language is improved in poetry, by means of Tropes and Figures. O much for the nature and use of those words that are poetical, and yet not figurative. But from Figurative Expreffion there arifes a more copious and important fource of Poetic Eloquence. Some forts of poetry are distinguished by the beauty, boldness, and frequency of the Figures, as well as by the measure, or by any of the contrivances above mentioned. And in profe we often meet with fuch figures and words, as we expect only in poetry; in which cafe the language is called Poetical: and in verse we fometimes find a diction fo tame, and fo void of ornament, that we brand it with the appellation of Profaic. As my defign in this difcourfe is, not to deliver a fyftem of rhetoric, but to explain the peculiar effects of poetry upon the mind, by tracing out the characters that distinguish this from other literary arts; it would be improper to enter here, with any degree of minuteness, into the philofophy of Tropes and Figures: these being ornamental, not to poetry only, but to human fpeech in general. I i 2 All All that the present occafion requires will be performed, when it is fhown, in what refpects tropical and figurative language is more neceffary to poetry than to any other fort of compofition. If it appear, that, by means of Figures, Language may be made more pleafing, and more natural, than it would be without them; it will follow, that to Poetic Language, whose end is to pleafe by imitating nature, Figures must be not only ornamental, but neceffary. I fhall therefore, firft, make a few remarks on the importance and utility of figurative language; fecondly, fhow, that Figures are more neceffary to poetry in general, than to any other mode of writing; and, thirdly, affign a reason why they are more neceffary in fome kinds of poetry than in others. I. I purpose to make a few remarks on the importance and utility of Figurative Expreffion, in making language more pleafing and more natural. 1. The first remark is, that Tropes and Figures are often neceffary to fupply the unavoidable defects of language. When proper words are wanting, or not recollected, or when we do not chufe to be always repeating them, we must have recourfe to tropes and figures. When philofophers began to explain the operations of the mind, they found, that moft of the words in common ufe, being framed to answer the more abvious exigencies of life, were in their pro per per fignification applicable to matter only and its qualities. What was to be done in this cafe? Would they think of making a new language to exprefs the qualities of mind? No: that would have been difficult, or impracticable; and granting it both practicable and eafy, they must have foreseen, that nobody would read or liften to what was thus spoken or written in a new, and, confequently, in an unknown, tongue. They therefore took the language as they found it; and, where-ever they thought there was a fimilarity or analogy between the qualities of mind and the qualities of matter, fcrupled not to use the names of the material qualities tropically, by applying them to the mental qualities. Hence came the phrafes, folidity of judgement, warmth of imagination, enlargement of understanding, and many others; which, though figurative, exprefs the meaning just as well as proper words would have done. In fact, numerous as the words in every language are, they must always fall fhort of the unbounded variety of human thoughts and perceptions. Taftes and smells are almost as numerous as the fpecies of bodies. Sounds admit of perceptible varieties that furpafs all computation, and the feven primary colours may be diverfified without end. If each variety of external perception were to have a name, language would be infurmountably difficult; nay, if men were to appropriate a clafs of names to each particular |