OF

HISTORICAL INCIDENTS.

THE first object of the poet, who has the general end of his art in view, is to select a subject capable of contributing to the pleasure of his readers, and which it is his design to prosecute through the varieties of plain or embellished narration. But he cannot conceive in idea, much less proceed so far as to be informed from experiment, that a subject deficient in that importance which is suited to the length and dignity of the species of composition in which he engages, will be calculated to excite interest, and uphold attention, from the commencement to the close of his production. Unimportant incidents, which are not otherwise recommended to particular notice by some engaging quality, may, in a production of ordinary length or merit, pass without remark; but when they

are treated with that labour and embellishment of style, which is generally essential to poetry, and particularly to epick composition, they must create so disproportionate a difference between the subject and its decorations, as will offer much to excite disgust, but little surely to promote our pleasure.

It is more than probable, that the poet, with a view to securing those qualities of interest and importance, which are essential to the higher compositions of his art, applies to history for a subject suited to the exercise of his powers: or that some train of historical occurrence, from possessing those qualities, recommends itself to him who feels the inspiration of the art, as being highly adapted to his purposes. But however great the

events, and however exalted the characters which history exhibits, it rarely displays a continuity of action possessing that uniform elevation, and capable of upholding that uninterrupted interest, which the poet is called upon to maintain through the extent of his subject.

Where history is thus found to deny its support, invention offers its ready assistance; it opens a store of inexhaustible matter at

once within the poet's reach, and suited to his necessities. Even those persons who lay no claim to poetical inspiration, are observed, in relating any of the more trivial occurrences of life, to throw more interest into their account, by exaggerating what is unimportant, and supplying what is deficient in its matter. How much more then, must the artist be impelled to give a loose to his inventive powers, who may plead the immunities of poetical enthusiasm; who may receive a subject from history little calculated, from the blemishes that may deform, and the deficiencies that may mutilate it, to answer all that expectation may demand in his art? To the delicacy of his more refined sense, those flaws and imperfections, which escape the observation of grosser organs, must be particularly manifest: he must observe the necessity of polishing them down, or varnishing them over; and he must feel himself possessed of talents adequate to secure him success in such an undertaking. He must perceive himself endowed with the power of raising his conceptions beyond what he may observe in reality; of improving on what is beautiful, of elevating what is sublime, of

adding further ornament to what is embellished, and greater harmony to what is arranged.

We may hence look upon the poet as divided in his choice between opposing interests; as led, on the one hand, to maintain the importance of his subject by preserving its truth; and as induced, on the other, to heighten its beauty by increasing its embellishment. And whatever be the impulse to which he yields, his way lying through history, must either fall into the beaten track of reality, or deserting it, must pass into the confines of fiction. His course being thus prescribed, we may proceed to determine the nature and extent of those licences, in which he may be indulged in taking either direction.

Those places in which the poet does not conform to history, are evidently those alone in which his conduct in the present section demands any consideration. And here, since history is a science, there is a deviation from that standard, which, as has been observed, determines the nature of every licence, in as much as there is a deviation from history; for whatever fictitious matter is superadded