reprefentation of the character as well as the figure of the man. He agreed it was very fine, but it wanted fpirit and contraft, and had not the flowing line, without which a figure could not poffibly be graceful. When we entered the gallery, I thought I could perceive him recollecting his rules by which he was to criticife Raffaelle. I fhalk pafs over his obfervation of the boats being too little, and other criticifms of that kind, till we arrived at St. Paul preaching. "This," fays he,

"is efteemed the most excellent of all the cartoons; what noblenefs, what dignity, there is in that figure of St. Paul! and yet what an addition to that nobleness could Raffaelle have given, had the art of contraft been known in his time! but, above all, the flowing line, which conftitutes grace and beauty! You would not then have feen an upright figure ftanding equally on both legs, and both hands ftretched forward in the fame direction, and his drapery, to all appearance, without the leaft art of difpofition." The following picture is the Charge to Peter. "Here," fays he," are twelve upright figures; what a pity it is that Raffaelle was not acquainted with the pyramidal prin.ciple! He would then have contrived the figures in the middle to have been on higher ground, or the figures at the extremities ftooping or lying, which would not only have formed the group into the fhape of a pyramid, but likewife contrafted the ftanding figures. "Indeed," added he, "I have often lamented that fo great a genius as Raffaelle had not lived in this enlightened age, fince the art

has

has been reduced to principles, and had had his education in one of the modern academies; what glorious works might we then have expected from his divine pencil!"

I fhall trouble you no longer with my friend's ob. fervations, which, I fuppofe, you are now able to continue by yourself. It is curious to obferve, that, at the fame time that great admiration is pretended for a name of fixed reputation, objections are raised against thofe very qualities by which that great name was acquired.

Thofe criticks are continually lamenting that Raffaelle had not the colouring and harmony of Rubens, or the light and fhadow of Rembrant, without confidering how much the gay harmony of the former, and affectation of the latter, would take from the dignity of Raffaelle; and yet Rubens had great harmony, and Rembrant underftood light and fhadow: but what may be an excellence in a lower clafs of painting, becomes a blemish in a higher; as the quick, fpritely turn, which is the life and beauty of epigrammatick compofitions, would but ill fuit with the majefty of heroick poetry.

To conclude; I would not be thought to infer, from any thing that has been faid, that rules are abfolutely unneceffary; but to cenfure scrupulofity, a fervile attention to minute exactnefs, which is fometimes inconfiftent with higher excellency, and is loft in the blaze of expanded genius.

I do not know whether you will think painting a general fubject. By inferting this letter, perhaps

you will incur the cenfure a man would deferve, whose business being to entertain a whole room, fhould turn his back to the company, and talk to a particular person.

I am, SIR, &c.

NUMB. 77. SATURDAY, October 6, 1759.

ASY poetry is univerfally admired; but I know

EAS

not whether any rule has yet been fixed, by which it may be decided when poetry can be properly called eafy. Horace has told us, that it is fuch as every reader hopes to equal, but after long labour finds unattainable. This is a very loose defcription, in which only the effect is noted; the qualities which produce this effect remain to be inveftigated.

Easy poetry is that in which natural thoughts are expreffed without violence to the language. The difcriminating character of ease confifts principally in the diction, for all true poetry requires that the fentiments be natural. Language fuffers violence by harsh or by daring figures, by tranfpofition, by unufual acceptations of words, and by any licence, which would be avoided by a writer of profe. Where any artifice appears in the conftruction of the verse, that verfe is no longer easy. Any epithet

which can be ejected without diminution of the fenfe, any curious iteration of the fame word, and all unusual, though not ungrammatical ftructure of fpeech, deftroy the grace of eafy poetry.

The first lines of Popes's Iliad afford examples of many licences which an eafy writer muft decline:

Achilles wrath, to Greece the direful spring
Of woes unnumber'd, heav'nly Goddefs fing,
The wrath which burl'd to Pluto's gloomy reign
The fouls of mighty chiefs untimely flain.

In the first couplet the language is diftorted by inverfions, clogged with fuperfluities, and clouded by a harsh metaphor; and in the fecond there are two words used in an uncommon fenfe, and two epithets inferted only to lengthen the line; all thefe practices may in a long work eafily be pardoned, but they always produce fome degree of obfcurity and ruggedness.

Easy poetry has been fo long excluded by ambition of ornament, and luxuriance of imagery, that its nature feems now to be forgotten. Affectation, however oppofite to cafe, is fometimes mistaken for it and thofe who afpire to gentle elegance, collect female phrafes and fashionable barbarisms, and imagine that ftyle to be eafy which cuftom has made familiar. Such was the idea of the poet who wrote the following verfes to a countess cutting paper:

Pallas grew vp'rish once and odd,

She would not do the leaft right thing

Either for Goddess or for God,

Nor work, nor play, nor paint, nor fing.
X 3

Love

Jove frown'd, and "Ufe (he cry'd) thofe eyes
"So kilful, and thofe hands fo taper;
"Do fomething exquifite and wife”—

She bow'd, obey'd him, and cut paper.
This vexing him who gave her birth,
Thought by all Heaven a burning shame,
What does he next, but bids on earth
Her Burlington do just the fame?
Pallas, you give yourself strange airs;

But fure you'll find it hard to fpoil
The fenfe and tafte of one that bears
The name of Savile and of Boyle.
Alas! one bad example shown,
How quickly all the fex purfue!
See, madam fee the arts o'erthrown
Between John Overton and you.

It is the prerogative of eafy poetry to be underftood as long as the language lafts; but modes of fpeech, which owe their prevalence only to modish folly, or to the eminence of thofe that use them, die away with their inventors, and their meaning, in a few years, is no longer known.

Eafy poetry is commonly fought in petty compofitions upon minute fubjects; but ease, though it excludes pomp, will admit greatnefs. Many lines in Cato's foliloquy are at once eafy and fublime:

'Tis the divinity that ftirs within us;
'Tis Heaven itself that points out an hereafter,
And intimates eternity to man.

If there's a power above us,

And that there is all nature cries aloud
Thro'all her works, he muft delight in virtue,
And that which he delights in must be happy.

Nor