A. Richardson; the author of Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison. POETRY. Q. What is Poetry? A. The language of passion, or of an enlivened imagination, formed, most commonly, into regular numbers. Q. To whom did the Greeks ascribe the origin of poetry? A. To Orpheus, Linus, and Musæus. A. No. Poetry is coeval with man. Q. It has often been said that Poetry is older than prose: What are we to understand by this, that men first talked in poetical numbers? A. No: but that poetry was committed to writing long before prose. Priests, Philosophers, and Statesmen, all, at first, delivered their instructions in poetry: until the age of Herodotus, history had appeared only in poetical tales. Q. To what was this owing? A. To the fact that plain discourse had not power to attract man in a rude, uncivilized state. Songs also could be better remembered and transmitted to posterity, than any other composition. Q. With what attention were the ancient bards treated? A. They were always kept near the person of the Sovereign; they recorded all his great exploits; they were employed as ambassadors; and their persons were held sacred. Q. What is the character of the Gothic poetry? A. Remarkably fierce, breathing nothing but slaughter and blood. Q. What cast did the poetry of the Greeks early receive? A. A philosophical cast. Orpheus, Linus, Musæus treated of creation and of chaos, and of the rise of things. Q. Who have been the greatest poets in the East? A. The Arabians and Persians; but their poetry did not assume as regular a structure as that of the Greeks. Q. Were the different kinds of poetry in the first ages properly separated from each other? A. No; they were all mingled in the same composition. Q. Was this the case also with history, eloquence, and poetry? A. Yes. All composition was blended in one mass, as all occupations were united in one person. Q. How came prose writing to assume the place of poetry? A. From a wish that men, occupied with the subjects of policy and useful arts, had to be instructed and informed, as well as moved. Q. What did Poetry thenceforth become? A. A separate art, calculated chiefly to please, and confined to such subjects as related to the imagination and passions. Q. What was the early companion of poetry? A. Music. The bard sung his verses, and played upon his harp or lyre at the same time. Q. What was the effect of this union? A. Music enlivened and animated poetry, and poetry gave force and expression to mu sic. Q. When instrumental music came to be studied as a separate art, divested of the poet's song, what was the consequence ? A. It lost all its ancient power of inflaming the hearers with strong emotions, and sunk into an art of mere amusement. Q. Does not poetry preserve, in all countries, some remains of its original connexion with music? A. Yes, in its versification or artificial arrangement of words and syllables to produce agreeable sound. Q. How was versification effected by the Greeks and Romans? A. By the use of metrical feet, dactyles, spondees, iambus, &c. Q. Are these introduced into English verse? A. No. The genius of our language does not admit them. Q. What is the structure of our English heroic verse? A. Iambic; composed of a succession, nearly alternate, of syllables unaccented and accented. Q. How many syllables are there in a line? A. Ten; four or five of which are accented. Q. What essential circumstance is there in the constitution of our verse? A. l'he cæsural pause, which falls towards the middle of each line. Q. Is not this found in other languages? A. Yes; but in the English it has this peculiar beauty, that it may fall after the 4th, the 5th, the 6th, or 7th syllable; while, in other languages, it is invariably after the 6th. Q. How does the cæsural pause affect the line? A. It gives it a sprightly air when it falls on the 4th syllable, and grave as it advances to the 7th.* Q. What is the principal defect in rhyme ? A. The full close which it forces upon the ear at the end of every couplet. *On the 4th On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore, Which Jews might kiss | and infidels adore. On the 5th Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, Each prayer accepted and each wish resign'd. On the 6th The wrath of Peleus' son | the direful spring On the 7th And in the smooth description | murmur still, Q. Is it favourable to the sublime? A. No; nor to the highly pathetic strain. An epic poem or a tragedy would be fettered and degraded by it. Q. To what is it best adapted? A. To compositions of a temperate strain; to pastorals, elegies, epistles, satires. Q. What advantages does blank verse possess? A. Great. It is a noble, bold, and disencumbered species of versification, particularly suited to subjects of dignity and force. Q. What was the measure generally used in the days of Queen Elizabeth and Charles I.? A. The stanza of eight lines; such as Spencer employs. Q. Who first brought couplets into vogue? A. Waller; but Dryden established their usage. Q. What change did Pope introduce? A. He abolished the triplets, or three lines rhyming together, in which Dryden abounded. PASTORAL POETRY-LYRIC POETRY. Q. When did Pastoral Poetry assume its present form? A. Not until men had begun to be assembled in large cities; to be fatigued with the bustle of courts; to look back to the more simple and innocent life of their ancestors, and |