with more glorious shows and apparitions, than can be found in any part of it.

We have now discovered the several originals of those pleasures that gratify the fancy; and here, perhaps, it would not be very difficult to cast under their proper heads those contrary objects, which are apt to fill it with distaste and terror; for the imagination is as liable to pain as pleasure. When the brain is hurt by any accident, or the mind disordered by dreams or sickness, the fancy is over-run with wild dismal ideas, and terrified with a thousand hideous monsters of its own framing.

Eumenidum veluti demens videt agmina Pentheus,
Et solem geminum, & duplices se ostendere Thebas:
Aut Agamemnonius scenis agitatus Orestes,
Armatam facibus matrem & serpentibus atris
Cum fugit, ultricesque sedent in limine Diræ.

Like Pentheus, when distracted with his fear,
He saw two suns, and double Thebes appear:
Or mad Orestes, when his mother's ghost
Full in his face infernal torches tost,
And shook her snaky locks: she shuns the sight,
Flies o'er the stage, surpriz'd with mortal fright;
The furies guard the door, and intercept his flight.

VIRG.

DRYDEN.

There is not a sight in nature so mortifying as that of a distracted person, when his imagination is troubled, and his whole soul disordered and confused. Babylon in ruins is not so melancholy a spectacle. But to quit so disagreeable a subject. I shall only consider by way of conclusion, what an infinite advantage this faculty gives an Almighty Being over the soul of man, and how great a measure of happiness or misery we are capable of receiving from the imagination only.

We have already seen the influence that one man has over the fancy of another, and with what ease he

conveys into it a variety of imagery; how great a power then may we suppose lodged in him, who knows all the ways of affecting the imagination, who can infuse what ideas he pleases, and fill those ideas with terror and delight to what degree he thinks fit? He can excite images in the mind without the help of words, and make scenes rise up before us and seem present to the eye without the assistance of bodies or exterior objects. He can transport the imagination with such beautiful and glorious visions, as cannot possibly enter into our present conceptions, or haunt it with such ghastly spectres and apparitions, as would make us hope for annihilation, and think existence no better than a curse. In short, he can so exquisitely ravish or torture the soul through this single faculty, as might suffice to make the whole heaven or hell of any finite being.

This essay on the pleasures of the imagination having been publish in several papers, I shall conclude it with a table of the principal contents of each paper.

THE CONTENTS.

PAPER I.

THE perfection of our sight above our other 'senses. The pleasures of the imagination arise ori'ginally from sight. The pleasures of the imagination 'divided under two heads. The pleasures of the ima'gination in some respects equal to those of the understanding. The extent of the pleasures of the imagi'nation. The advantages a man receives from a relish ' of these pleasures. In what respect they are preferable to those of the understanding.'

PAPER II.

Three sources of all the pleasures of the imagina❝tion, in our survey of outward objects. How what is

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'great pleases the imagination. How what is new 'pleases the imagination. How what is beautiful in 'our own species pleases the imagination. How what 'is beautiful in general pleases the imagination. What ' other accidental causes may contribute to the heightening of these pleasures.'

PAPER III.

The

'Why the necessary cause of our being pleased with 'what is great, new, or beautiful, unknown. Why the 'final cause more known and more useful. The final cause of our being pleased with what is great. 'final cause of our being pleased with what is new. The 'final cause of our being pleased with what is beautiful ❝in our own species. The final cause of our being pleas'ed with what is beautiful in general.

PAPER IV.

'The works of nature more pleasant to the imagina'tion than those of art. The works of nature still more 'pleasant, the more they resemble those of art. The 'works of art more pleasant, the more they resemble 'those of nature. Our English plantations and gardens 'considered in the foregoing light.

PAPER V.

'Of architecture, as it affects the imagination. Great'ness in architecture relates either to the bulk or to the 'manner. Greatness of bulk in the ancient oriental 'buildings. The ancient accounts of these buildings 'confirmed, 1. From the advantages for raising such 'works, in the first ages of the world, and in the east'ern climates: 2. From several of them which are still 'extant. Instances how greatness of manner affects 'the imagination. A French author's observation on 'this subject. Why concave and convex figures give 'a greatness of manner to works of architecture. Every

'thing that pleases the imagination in architecture, is ' either great, beautiful, or new.'

PAPER VI.

The secondary pleasures of the imagination. The 'several sources of these pleasures, statuary, painting, 'description, and music, compared together. The 'final cause of our receiving pleasure from these several sources. Of descriptions in particular. The power ' of words over the imagination. Why one reader more 'pleased with descriptions than another.'

PAPER VII.

'How a whole set of ideas hang together, &c. A 'natural cause assigned for it. How to perfect the 'imagination of a writer. Who among the ancient 'poets had this faculty in its greatest perfection. Ho< mer excelled in imagining what is great; Virgil in 'imagining what is beautiful; Ovid in imagining what 6 is new.

Our own countryman Milton very perfect in

♦ all three respects.'

PAPER VIII.

'Why any thing that is unpleasant to behold, pleases the imagination when well described. Why the 'imagination receives a more exquisite pleasure from 'the description of what is great, new, or beautiful. The pleasure still heightened, if what is described 'raises passion in the mind. Disagreeable passions 'pleasing when raised by apt descriptions. Why ter6 ror and grief are pleasing to the mind when excited by description. A particular advantage the writers in poetry and fiction have to please the imagination. "What liberties are allowed them.'

PAPER IX.

Of that kind of poetry which Mr. Dryden calls the 'fairy way of writing. How a poet should be qualified 'for it. The pleasures of the imagination that arise 'from it. In this respect why the moderns excel the 'ancients. Why the English excel the moderns. 'Who the best among the English. Of emblemati'cal persons.'

PAPER X.

'What authors please the imagination. Who have 'nothing to do with fiction. How history pleases the 'imagination. How the authors of the new philosophy please the imagination. The bounds and defects of 'the imagination. Whether these defects are essen'tial to the imagination.'

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PAPER XI.

'How those please the imagination, who treat of subjects abstracted from matter, by allusions taken 'from it. What allusions most pleasing to the ima'gination. Great writers how faulty in this respect. "Of the art of imagining in general. The imagination capable of pain as well as pleasure. In what degree 'the imagination is capable either of pain or plea'sure.'