most delightful to the Reader's Imagination. In a word, he has the modelling of Nature in his own Hands, and may give her what Charms he pleases, provided he does not reform her too much, and run into Absurdities, by endeavouring to excel.'1

Of the second operation—the action of the imagination of the hearer or reader whose mind is stimulated by the words of the poet-he says:

'Words, when well chosen, have so great a Force in them, that a Description often gives us more lively Ideas than the Sight of Things themselves. The Reader finds a Scene drawn in stronger Colours, and painted more to the Life in his Imagination, by the help of Words, than by an actual Survey of the Scene which they describe. In this case the Poet seems to get the better of Nature; he takes, indeed, the Landskip after her, but gives it more vigorous Touches, heightens its Beauty, and so enlivens the whole Piece that the Images which flow from the Objects themselves appear weak and faint, in Comparison of those that come from the Expressions. The Reason, probably, may be because in the Survey of any Object we have only so much of it painted on the Imagination, as comes in at the Eye; but in its Description the poet gives us as free a View of it as he pleases, and discovers to us several parts, that either we did not attend to, or that lay out of our Sight when we first beheld it. As we look on any Object, our Idea of it is, perhaps, made up of two or three simple Ideas; but when the Poet represents it, he may either give us a more complex Idea of it, or only raise in us such Ideas as are most apt to affect the Imagination.' '

It will be observed that here Addison again avails 1 Ib. 418. 2 Ib. 416.

himself of the results of Descartes' work in philosophy. He makes use of the Cartesian theory of association of ideas, to provide a psychological basis for the spiritual element which he has introduced into his account of the process of art. He afterwards dwells more at length on this theory, and uses it in particular to explain the fact that the pleasurable aspects of events or of objects which have been impressed upon the mind through the senses are uppermost in the picture which they leave behind in the mind. The sett of ideas,' he says, arising from a prospect have a 'sett of traces' belonging to them in the brain.

'But because the Pleasure we received from these Places far surmounted, and overcame the little Disagreeableness we found in them; for this Reason there was at first a wider passage worn in the Pleasure Traces, and, on the contrary, so narrow a one in those which belonged to the disagreeable ideas, that they were quickly stopped up, and rendered incapable of receiving any Animal Spirits, and consequently of exciting any unpleasant ideas in the Memory.'1

And this explanation is applied generally to all cases in which the mind acts as a sort of filter, when, for example, scenes of horror, or repulsive objects, as presented through the description of the poet, produce an agreeable instead of a disagreeable effect.

He sums up by the direct application of his psychological researches to literature, and it is this

1 Ib. 417.

application which introduced a new principle into criticism.

'It is this Talent of affecting the Imagination that gives an Embellishment to Good Sense, and makes one Man's Compositions more agreeable than another's. It sets off all Writings in general, but is the very Life and highest Perfection of Poetry: Where it shines in an eminent degree, it has preserved several Poems for many Ages, that have nothing else to recommend them; and where all the other Beauties are present, the Work appears dry and insipid, if this single one be wanting. It has something in it like Creation; it bestows a kind of Existence, and draws up to the Reader's View several Objects which are not to be found in Being. It makes Additions to Nature, and gives a greater Variety to God's works. In a word, it is able to beautifie and adorn the most illustrious Scenes in the Universe, or to fill the Mind with more glorious Shows and Apparitions than can be found in any Part of it.'1

1 Ib. 421.

CHAPTER VI

DEVELOPMENT OF ARTISTIC (OR ARISTOTELIAN)

CRITICISM BY LESSING

By the work of Addison criticism was brought into line with modern thought; and the critic was provided with a test which he could apply with equal success to every fresh form which literature had developed. Henceforth it was recognized that the primary appeal of poetry was addressed not to the understanding, nor to the senses, but to the imagination. It was soon admitted that the same thing was true, though in lesser degrees, of the Fine Arts. All that was required for the extension of the principle was to add definiteness to Addison's conception: to note the distinctions which marked the various methods severally employed by the arts, and the consequent limits within which the principle could in each case be applied; and to define and explain the character of the service performed by the imagination in the mind of the artist.

In

In order to do this a return was necessarily made to the methods of artistic (or formal) criticism. Germany, Lessing wrote his Laocoon, which was published in 1766, and showed how the method of

Painting, as typical of the plastic and graphic arts, differed from the method of Poetry, as representative of music and creative literature, 'in which the method of imitation is progressive.' And in thus distinguishing between the method of Painting and that of Poetry, he recognizes the appeal to the imagination as that by which the respective limits of the two typical arts are determined. For in order to know what this distinction is, it is necessary first to ascertain to what extent, and in what degree, each can rely upon the senses and the imagination respectively for its effects.

It is necessary to make this point clear at the outset of our consideration of Lessing's work, because, although it is nowhere definitely stated, as far as I know, in the Laocoon, it is nevertheless evident that his criticism is coloured throughout by the new principle of poetic appeal which was established by Addison. The sequel will, I think, make this plain : but in the meanwhile I draw the attention of the reader to two passages which directly illustrate the contention advanced.

The first of these passages occurs in the course of Lessing's comparison of Virgil's description of the death of Laocoon, with the sculptured representation of the same subject which gives the title to his treatise. He writes:

'Admitted that every detail which the word-painting poet uses cannot have an equally good effect on the plain surface of the painter's canvas, or in the sculptor's marble, is it not possible, on the other hand, that each detail of which the