THE PLEASURES OF THE IMAGINATION. A POEM. GENERAL ARGUMENT. THE pleasures of the imagination proceed either from natural objects, as from a flourishing grove, a clear and murmuring fountain, a calm sea by moonlight; or from works of art, such as a noble edifice, a musical tune, a statue, a picture, a poem. In treating of these pleasures, we must begin with the former class, they being original to the other; and nothing more being necessary, in order to explain them, than a view of our natural inclination toward greatness and beauty, and of those appearances, in the world around us, to which that inclination is adapted. This is the subject of the first book of the following poem. But the pleasures which we receive from the elegant arts, from music, sculpture, painting, and poetry, are much more various and complicated. In them (besides greatness and beauty, or forms proper to the imagination) we find interwoven frequent representations of truth, of virtue and vice, of circumstances proper to move us with laughter, or to excite in us pity, fear, and the other passions. These moral and intellectual objects are described in the second book, to which the third properly belongs as an episode, though too large to have been included in it. With the above mentioned causes of pleasure, which are universal in the course of human life, and appertain to our higher faculties, many others do generally occur, more limited, in their operation, or of an inferior origin: such are the novelty of objects, the association of ideas, affections of the bodily senses, influences of education, national habits, and the like. To illustrate these, and from the whole to determine the character of a perfect taste, is the argument of the fourth book. Hitherto the pleasures of the imagination belong to the human species in general. But there are certain particular men, whose imagination is endowed with powers, and susceptible of pleasures, which the generality of mankind never participate. These are the men of genius, destined by nature to excel in one or other of the arts already mentioned. It is proposed, therefore, in the last place, to delineate that genius which in some degrée appears common to them all; yet with a more peculiar consideration of poetry, inasmuch as poetry is the most extensive of those arts, the most philosophical, and the most useful. BOOK I. 1757. ARGUMENT. THE subject proposed. Dedication. The ideas of the Supreme Being the exemplars of all things. The variety of constitution in the minds of men, with its final cause. The general character of a tine imagination. All the immediate pleasures of the human imagination proceed either from Greatness or Beauty in external objects. The pleasure from Greatness, with its final cause. The natural connection of Beauty with truth and good. The different orders of Beauty in different objects. The infinite and all-comprehending form of Beauty, which belongs to the Divine Mind. The partial and artificial forms of Beauty, which belong to inferior intellectual beings. The origin and general conduct of beauty in man. The subordination of local beauties to the beauty of the Universe. Couclusion. WITH what enchantment Nature's goodly scene Truth is here taken, not in a logical, but in a mixed and popular sense, or for what has been called the truth of things; denoting as well their natural and regular condition, as a prover estimate or judgment concerning them. His doubtful step through many a solemn path, Of thine omniscient Father; known on earth By the still horror and the blissful tear 21 29 And with [thee She blends and shifts at will thro' countless forms, And join this happy train? for with thee comes 41 Be present, all ye Genii, who conduct Of youthful bards the lonely wandering step The pomp of nature, and before them place 50 Nor thou, my Dyson, to the lay refuse Thy wonted partial audience. What though first In years unseason'd, haply ere the sports Of childhood yet were o'er, the adventurous lay With many splendid prospects, many charms, Allur'd my heart, nor conscious whence they sprung, Nor heedful of their end? yet serious Truth Her empire o'er the calm, sequester'd theme Asserted soon; while Falsehood's evil brood, Vice and deceitful Pleasure, she at once Excluded, and my fancy's careless toil Drew to the better cause. Maturer aid Thy friendship added in the paths of life, The busy paths, my unaccustom'd feet Preserving; nor to Truth's recess divine, Through this wide argument's unbeaten space, Withholding surer guidance; while by turns We trac'd the sages old, or while the queen Of sciences (whom manners and the mind Acknowledge) to my true companion's voice Not unattentive, o'er the wintry lamp Inclin'd her sceptre, favouring. Now the fates Have other tasks impos'd:-to thee, my friend, The ministry of freedom and the faith |