The glance to catch, the patience to inquire, The sages temper and the poet's fire. In him, the wealth of Greece and Latium shone, And his, reveal'd in all their dazzling hues, But nobler cares are his: for human kind * He plies his restless energies of mind. Stung by that orb, beneath whose flaming ray With growing speed he presses to the goal, In law, pure reason's ripen'd progeny : x These studies surely, if we may adopt his own criterion of moral magnitude (as given in the Proem of the Commenta ries above referred to) place him among the very greatest of mankind. Si enim quæratur, Ecquis hominum sit maximus? Ille, inquam, qui optimus: si rursus interroger, Quis optimus bominum sit? respondeam, Is qui de humano genere sit optimè meritus. I cannot bear to subjoin his unaccomplished anticipations, which immediately follow, of a literary old age in the academia dilectissimi recessus! Law, which in heaven and earth holds sovereign sway; One vivid burst, to lighten and expire! In vain the Christian crown'd the learned name, And boundless knowledge form'd his meaner fame.— He falls!........ Bursts from yon valley's side the lightning's gleam, And sighing ask, "where now does Faredh stray, Still sheds the myrtle bough its silvery shower? In lightsome gambols fearless bounds the fawn, F. R. S. > The preceding six lines are omitted in Sir William Jones's Latin Version. N° XCVII. On the Government of Imagination. IMAGINATION, according as it is regulated, proves the bane or the blessing of life. Without it, all is "weary, flat, stale and unprofitable;" but with it, unless it is regulated by numberless auxiliary endowments and strenuous exertion, the spectre forms of dread reality are aggravated instead of being concealed, and the victim of genius perishes under the restless workings of his own phantasy. How contemptible is that intellect which cannot distinguish between culpable deception, and that delicious power by which a celestial colouring, a "sort of purple light," is thrown over the sad realities of life, by which vice and folly are for a while concealed from the view, and spectres and imagery of horror converted into "Elysian gardens," and angels of innocence and beauty! But how many cautions and auxiliary virtues are necessary for the preservation and due regulation of our imaginative powers! "The seasons of care, of grief, or of business," observes Mr. Alison," have other occupations, and destroy, for the time at least, our sensibility to the beautiful and sublime, in the same proportion that they produce a state of mind unfavourable to the indulgence of imagination." In order to avoid as much as possible the seasons of care and of grief," how indispensably requisite is prudence; and how difficult is it for an individual endowed with fancy and feeling, to possess at the same time in a high degree the reasoning powers! Yet these powers are indispensably requisite for the conservation of a highly endowed mind. The tranquil and cheerful performance of duty in whatever situation we are placed, by the conduct, whether prudent or imprudent, either of ourselves or of others, is also indispensable. But how difficult is cheerfulness when imagination aggravates every evil, and when the chilling realities of life force themselves on the view!-A genuine love of virtue and fame and duty, for their own sakes in the first place, and the soothing confidence so beautifully expressed by Dr. Beattie, that there is a future state where "all shall yet be well," in the second, afford the best consolations of which our present existence is capable. H. R. |