Parturiunt montes, nascitur ridiculus mus.

The mountains labour, and a mouse is born.

ROSCOMMON.

If all these observations are just, there must be some remarkable conformity between the sudden succession of night to day, the fall of an ox under a blow, and the birth of a mouse from a mountain; since we are told of all these images, that they are very strongly impressed by the same form and termina, tion of the verse.

We may, however, without giving way to en. thusiasm, admit that some beauties of this kind may be produced. A sudden stop at an unusual syllable may image the cessation of action, or the pause of discourse; and Milton has very happily imitated the repetitions of an echo:

I fled, and cried out death;

Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sigh'd
From all her caves, and back resounded death,

The measure of time in pronouncing may be varied so as very strongly to represent, not only the modes of external motion, but the quick or slow succession of ideas, and consequently the passions of the mind. This at least was the power of the spondaick and dactylick harmony, but our language can reach no eminent diversities of sound. We can indeed sometimes, by encumbering and retarding the line, show the difficulty of a progress made by strong efforts and with frequent interruptions, or mark a slow and heavy motion, Thus Milton has imaged the toil of Satan struggling through chaos;

So he with difficulty and labour hard

Mov'd on: with difficulty and labour he→

thus he has described the leviathans or whales;

Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait.

But he has at other times neglected such represent, ations, as may be observed in the volubility and le vity of these lines, which express an action tardy

and reluctant.

When the fierce foe hung on our broken rear
Insulting, and pursu'd us through the deep,
With what confusion and laborious flight
We sunk thus low? Th' ascent is easy then.

In another place, he describes the gentle glide of ebbing waters in a line remarkably rough and halting;

-Tripping ebb; that stole
With soft foot tow'rds the deep who now had stopp'd

His sluices.

It is not, indeed, to be expected, that the sound should always assist the meaning, but it ought never to counteract it; and therefore Milton has here certainly committed a fault like that of the player, who looked on the earth when he implored the hea vens, and to the heavens when he addressed the earth.

Those who are determined to find in Milton an assemblage of all the excellencies which have ennobled all other poets, will perhaps be offended that I do not celebrate his versification in higher terms; for there are readers who discover that; in this passage,

So stretch'd out huge in length the arch fiend lay,

a long form is described in a long line; but the truth is, that length of body is only mentioned in a slow line, to which it has only the resemblance of time to space, of an hour to a maypole.

The same turn of ingenuity might perform won. ders upon the description of the ark:

Then from the mountains hewing timber tall,
Began to build a vessel of huge bulk ;

Measur'd by cubit, length, and breadth, and height.

In these lines the poet apparently designs to fix the attention upon bulk; but this is effected by the enumeration, not by the measure; for what analogy can there be between modulations of sound, and corporeal dimensions?

Milton indeed seems only to have regarded this species of embellishment so far as not to reject it when it came unsought; which would often happen to a mind so vigorous, employed upon a subject so various and extensive. He had, indeed, a greater and a nobler work to perform; a single sentiment of moral or religious truth, a single image of life or nature, would have been cheaply lost for a thousand echoes of the cadence to the sense; and he who had undertaken to vindicate the ways of God to man, might have been accused of neglecting his cause, had he lavished much of his attention upon syllables and sounds.

No 95. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1751.

Parcus Deorum cultor, & infrequens,

Insanientis dum sapientiæ

Consultus erro; nunc retrorsum

Vela dare, atque iterare cursus

Cogor relictos.

A fugitive from heav'n and prayer,
I mock'd at all religious fear,
Deep scienc'd in the mazy lore
Of mad philosophy; but now
Hoist sail, and back by voyage plow

To that blest harbour, which I left before. FRANCIS.

TO THE RAMBLER.

SIR,

THERE are many diseases both of the body and mind, which it is far easier to prevent than to cure, and therefore I hope you will think me employed in an office not useless either to learning or virtue, if I describe the symptoms of an intellectual malady, which, though at first it seizes only the passions, will, if not speedily remedied, infect the reason, and, from blasting the blossoms of knowledge, pro. ceed in time to canker the root.

I was born in the house of discord. My parents were of unsuitable ages, contrary tempers, and dif. ferent religions, and therefore employed the spirit and acuteness which nature had very liberally be stowed upon both, in hourly disputes, and inces. sant contrivances to detect each other in the wrong;

so that from the first exertions of reason I was bred a disputant, trained up in all the arts of domestick sophistry, initiated in a thousand low stratagems, nimble shifts, and sly concealments; versed in all the turns of altercation, and acquainted with the whole discipline of fending and proving.

It was necessarily my care to preserve the kindness of both the controvertists, and therefore I had very early formed the habit of suspending my judg ment, of hearing arguments with indifference, inclining as occasion required to either side, and of holding myself undetermined between them till I knew for what opinion I might conveniently de

clare.

Thus, Sir, I acquired very early the skill of disputation; and, as we naturally love the arts in which we believe ourselves to excel, I did not let my abilities lie useless, nor suffer my dexterity to be lost for want of practice. I engaged in perpetual wrangles with my school-fellows, and was never to be convinced or repressed by any other arguments than blows, by which my antagonists commonly determined the controversy, as I was, like the Roman. orator, much more eminent for eloquence than courage,

At the university I found my predominant ambi tion completely gratified by the study of logick. I impressed upon my memory a thousand axioms, and ten thousand distinctions, practised every form of syllogism, passed all my days in the schools of dis, putation, and slept every night with Smiglecius* on my pillow.

* A Polish writer, whose "Logick" was formerly held in great estimation in this country, as well as on the continent.

C