"ftrikes fo lively on the fancy, and is therefore fo acceptable to all people."

This is, I think, the best and most philofophical account that I have ever met with of Wit, which generally though not always, confifts in fuch a resemblance and congruity of ideas as this author mentions. I fhall only add to it, by way of explanation, that every refemblance of ideas is not that which we call Wit, unless it be such an one that gives delight and furprise to the reader. These two properties feem effential to Wit, more particularly the last of them. In order therefore that the resemblance in the ideas be Wit, it is neceffary that the ideas fhould not lie too near one another in the nature of things; for where the likeness is obvious, it gives no furprife. To compare one man's finging to that of another, or to reprefent the whiteness of any object by that of milk and fnow, or the variety of its colours by thofe of the rainbow, cannot be called Wit, unlefs befides this obvious refemblance, there be fome further congruity discovered in the two ideas, that is capable of giving the reader fome furprise. Thus when a poet tells us the bofom of his miftrefs is as white as fnow, there is no Wit in the comparison; but when he adds, with a figh, it is as cold too, it then grows into Wit. Every reader's memory may supply him with innumerable inftances of the fame nature. For this reafon, the fimilitudes in heroic poets, who endeavour rather to fill the mind with great conceptions, than to divert it with fuch as are new and furprifing, A a 4

have

have feldom any thing in them that can be called Wit. Mr. Locke's account of Wit, with this fhort explanation, comprehends most of the fpecies of Wit, as metaphors, fimilitudes, allegories, enigmas, mottos, parables, fables, dreams, vifions, dramatic writings, burlesque, and all the methods of allufion. There are many other pieces of Wit (how remote foever they may appear at first fight from the foregoing defcription) which upon examination will be found to

agree with it.

As True WIT generally confifts in this refemblance and congruity of ideas, Falfe WIT chiefly confifts in the resemblance and congruity fometimes of fingle letters, as in anagrams, chronograms, lipograms, and acroftics: fometimes of fyllables, as in echoes and doggerel rhymes: fometimes of words, as in puns and quibbles; and fometimes of whole fentences or poems, caît into the figures of Eggs, Axes, or Altars: nay, fome carry the notion of Wit fo far, as to afcribe it even to external mimicry; and to look upon a man as an ingenious perfon, that can refemble the tone, pofture, or face of another.

As True WIT confifts in the refemblance of ideas, and Falfe WIT in the resemblance of words, according to the foregoing inftances; there is another kind of Wit which confifts partly in the refemblance of ideas, and partly in the refemblance of words, which for diftinction fake I fhall call Mixt WIT. This kind of Wit is that which abounds in Cowley, more than in any author that ever wrote. Mr. Waller has like

wife a great deal of it. Mr. Dryden is very fparing in it. Milton had a genius much above it. Spenfer is in the fame class with Milton. The Italians, even in their epic poetry, are full of it. Monfieur Boileau, who formed himfelf upon the ancient poets, has every where reject

ed it with fcorn. If we look after Mixt WIT . among the Greek writers, we shall find it no where but in the epigrammatifts. There are indeed fome ftrokes of it in the little poem afcribed to Mufæus, which by that, as well as many other marks, betrays itfelf to be a modern compofition. If we look into the Latin writers, we find none of this Mixt WIT in Virgil, Lucretius, or Catullus; very little in Horace, but a great deal of it in Ovid, and scarce any thing else in Martial.

Out of the innumerable branches of Mixt WIT, I fhall choose one inftance which may be met with in all the writers of this clafs. The paffion of Love in its nature has been thought to refemble fire; for which reafon the words fire and flame are made ufe of to fignify Love. The Witty poets therefore have taken an advantage from the double meaning of the word fire, to make an infinite number of Witticifms. Cowley obferving the cold regard of his miftrefs's eyes, and at the fame time their power of producing Love in him, confiders them as burningglaffes made of ice; and finding himfelf able to live in the greatest extremities of Love, concludes the torrid zone to be habitable. When his mistress has read his letter written in juice

of

of lemon, by holding it to the fire, he defires her to read it over a fecond time by Love's Flames. When the weeps, he wishes it were inward heat, that distilled those drops from the limbec. When she is abfent he is beyond eighty, that is, thirty degrees nearer the pole than when fhe is with him. His ambitious Love is a fire that naturally mounts upwards; his happy Love is the beams of heaven, and his unhappy Love flames of hell. When it does not let him fleep, it is a flame that fends up no smoke; when it is oppofed by counfel and advice, it is a fire that rages the more by the winds blowing upon it. Upon the dying of a tree in which he had cut his Loves, he obferved that his written flames had burnt up and withered the tree. When he refolves to give over his paffion, he tells us that one burnt like him for ever dreads the fire. His heart is an Ætna, that inftead of Vulcan's shop, inclofes Cupid's forge in it. His endeavouring to drown his Love in wine, is throwing oil upon the fire. He would infinuate to his mistress, that the fire of Love, like that of the fun (which produces fo many living creatures) should not only warm, but beget. Love in another place cooks pleasure at his fire. Sometimes the poet's heart is frozen in every breast, and sometimes fcorched in every eye. Sometimes he is drowned in tears, and burnt in Love, like a ship set on fire in the middle of the fea.

The reader may obferve in every one of these instances, that the poet mixes the qualities of fire with those of Love; and in the fame fen

tence

tence speaking of it both as a paffion and as real fire, furprises the reader with thofe feeming refemblances or contradictions, that make up all the Wit in this kind of writing. Mixt WIT therefore is a compofition of pun and True WIT, and is more or lefs perfect, as the resemblance lies in the ideas or in the words. Its foundations are laid partly in falfhood and partly in truth; reafon puts in her claim for one half of it, and extravagance for the other. The only province therefore for this kind of Wit, is epigram, or those little occafional poems, that in their own nature are nothing elfe but a tiffue of epigrams. I cannot conclude this head of Mixt WIT, without owning that the admirable poet, out of whom I have taken the examples of it, had as much true Wit as any author that ever writ; and indeed all other talents of an extraordinary genius. It may be expected, fince I am upon this fubject, that I fhould take notice of Mr. Dryden's definition of Wit; which, with all the deference that is due to the judgment of fo great a man, is not fo properly a definition of Wit, as of good writing in general. Wit, as he defines it, is "a propriety of words and thoughts adapted to "the fubject." If this be a true definition of Wit, I am apt to think that Euclid was the greatest Wit that ever fet pen to paper. It is certain there never was a greater propriety of words and thoughts adapted to the fubject, than what that author has made ufe of in his ELEMENTS. I fhall only appeal to my reader, if this definition notion he has of Wit.

agrees with

any