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particular expreffion attempted, of certain ob- LECT jects, by means of refembling founds. This can be, fometimes, accomplished in profe compofition; but there only in a more faint degree; nor is it fo much expected there. In poetry, chiefly, it is looked for; where attention to found is more demanded, and where the inverfions and liberties of poetical style give us a greater command of found; affisted, too, by the verfification, and that cantus obfcurior, to which we are naturally led in reading poetry. This requires a little more illuf

tration.

THE founds of words may be employed for reprefenting, chiefly, three claffes of objects; first, other founds; fecondly, motion; and, thirdly, the emotions and paffions of the mind.

FIRST, I fay, by a proper choice of words, we may produce a resemblance of other founds which we mean to defcribe; fuch as, the noise of waters, the roaring of winds, or the murmuring of streams. This is the simplest instance of this fort of beauty. For the medium through which we imitate, here, is a natural one; founds reprefented by other founds; and between ideas of the fame fenfe, it is easy to form a connection. No very great art is required in a poet, when he is defcribing VOL. I.

fweer

LECT. fweet and foft founds, to make use of such XIII. words as have moft liquids and vowels, and

glide the fofteft; or, when he is defcribing harfh founds, to throw together a number of harfh fyllables which are of difficult pronunciation. Here the common ftructure of Language affifts him; for, it will be found, that, in moft Languages, the names of many particular founds are fo formed, as to carry fome affinity to the found which they fignify; as with us, the whistling of winds, the buz and hum of infects, the bifs of ferpents, the crash of falling timber; and many other instances, where the word has been plainly framed upon the found it reprefents. I fhall produce a remarkable example of this beauty from Milton, taken from two paffages in Paradise Loft, defcribing the found made, in the one, by the opening of the gates of Hell; in the other, by the opening of those of Heaven. The contraft between the two, difplays, to great advantage, the poet's art.

of Hell's gates:

The first is the opening

On a fudden, open fly,

With impetuous recoil, and jarring found,

Th' infernal doors; and on their hinges grate

Harth thunder.

B. I.

Observe, now, the finoothness of the other:

Heaven opened wide

Her ever-during gates, harmonious found,

On golden hinges turning.

B. II.

The

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The following beautiful paffage from Taffo's LECT. Gierufalemme, has been often admired, on account of the imitation effected by found of the thing represented :

Chiama gli habitator de l'ombre eterne
Il rauco fuon de la Tartarea tromba:
Treman le fpaciose atre caverne,

Et l'aer cieco a quel rumor rimbomba;
Ni ftridendo cofi da le fuperne
Regioni dele cielo, il folgor piomba;
Ne fi fcoffa giammai la terra,
Quand i vapori in fen gravida ferra.

CANT. IV. Stanz. 4.

THE fecond clafs of objects, which the found of words is often employed to imitate, is, Motion; as it is fwift or flow, violent or gentle, equable or interrupted, easy or accompanied with effort. Though there be no natural affinity between found, of any kind, and motion, yet, in the imagination, there is a strong one; as appears from the connection between music and dancing. And, therefore, here it is in the poet's power to give us a lively idea of the kind of motion he would defcribe, by means of founds which correfpond, in our imagination, with that motion. Long fyllables naturally give the impreffion of flow motion; as in this line of Virgil:

Olli inter fefe magna vi brachia tollunt.

LECT. A fucceffion of fhort fyllables prefents quick motion to the mind; as,

Quadrupedante putrem fonitu quatit ungula campum.

BOTH Homer and Virgil are great masters of this beauty, and their works abound with inftances of it; most of them, indeed, so often quoted and fo well known, that it is needlefs to produce them. I fhall give one instance, in English, which feems happy. It is the defcription of a fudden calm on the feas, in a Poem, entitled, The Fleece.

With easy course

The veffels glide; unless their speed be stopp'd
By dead calms, that oft lie on these smooth seas
When ev'ry zephyr fleeps; then the shrouds drop;
The downy feather, on the cordage hung,
Moves not; the flat sea shines like yellow gold
Fus'd in the fire, or like the marble floor
Of fome old temple wide.

THE third fet of objects, which I mentioned the found of words as capable of reprefenting, confifts of the paffions and emotions of the mind. Sound may, at firft view, appear foreign to these; but, that here, also, there is föme fort of connection, is fufficiently proved by the power which mufic has to awaken, or to affift certain paffions, and, according as its ftrain is varied, to introduce one train of ideas, rather than another. This, indeed, logically speaking,

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fpeaking, cannot be called a refemblance be- LE C T. tween the sense and the found, feeing long or short fyllables have no natural resemblance to any thought or paffion. But if the arrangement of fyllables, by their found alone, recal one fet of ideas more readily than another, and difpofe the mind for entering into that affection which the poet means to raise, such arrangement may, juftly enough, be faid to resemble the fenfe, or be fimilar and correfpondent to it. I admit, that, in many inftances, which are fuppofed to display this beauty of accommodation of found to the fense, there is much room for imagination to work; and, according as a reader is struck by a paffage, he will often fancy a resemblance between the found and the fenfe, which others cannot discover. He modulates the numbers to his own difpofition of mind; and, in effect, makes the music which he imagines himself to hear. However, that there are real instances of this kind, and that poetry is capable of some fuch expreffion, cannot be doubted. Dryden's Ode on St. Cecilia's Day, affords a very beautiful exemplification of it, in the English Language. Without much study or reflection, a poet defcribing pleasure, joy, and agreeable objects, from the feeling of his fubject, naturally runs into fmooth, liquid, and flowing numbers.