butes, which are totally diftinct and perfectly the fame; which are juftly afcribed to God, being aferibed to him in fcripture, but do not belong to him; which are fomething and nothing, which are the figments of human imagination, mere chimeras, which are God himself, which are the actors of all things; and which, to fum up all, are themselves a fimple act! Who is this that darkeneth counsel by ⚫ words without knowledge ? Can the tendency of fuch teaching be any other than to perplex and to confound, and even to throw the hearers into univerfal doubt and fcepticism ? To fuch a ftyle of explication these lines of our British bard, addressed to the patronefs of> fophiftry as well as dulnefs, are admirably adapted:

Explain upon a thing, till all men doubt it;

And write about it, goddefs, and about it."

But tho fcholaftic theology be the principal, our author obferves, it is not only the fubject of learned nonfenfe. In other branches of pneumatology we meet with rhapsodies of the fame, kind; of which he give examples.

The two other fpecies of nonfenfe he explodes, are the profound and the marvellous. The famous treatise on the former, by Pope and Swift, is known to almost every reader; the examples adduced by thofe writers, however, are principally taken from the poets. Our author obferves, that this fpecies is most commonly to be met with in political writings.

"No where elfe, fays he, do we find the mereft nothings set off with an air of folemnity, as the refult of very deep thought and fager reflection. Of this kind, however, I fhall produce a fpecimen, which, in confirmation of a remark made in the preceding paragraph, shall be taken from a jufily celebrated tract, of a justly celebrated pen: 'Tis agreed fays Swift, that in all governments there is an abfolute and unlimited power, which naturally and originally feems to be placed in the whole body, wherever the executive part of it lies. This holds in the body natural; for wherever we place the beginning of motion, whether from the head or the heart, or the animal fpirits in general, the body moves and acts by a confent of all its parts.' The firft fentence of this paffage contains one of the most hackneyed maxims of the writers on politics; a maxim, however, of which it will be more difficult than is commonly imagined, to discover, I fay, not the juftnefs, but the fenfe. The illuftration from the natural body, contained in the fecond fentence, is indeed more glar ingly nonfenfical. What it is that conftitutes this confent of all the parts of the body, which must be obtained previously to every motion, is, I will take upon me to affirm, utterly inconceivable. Yet the whole of the paragraph from which this quotation is taken, hath such a fpecioufnefs in it, that it is a hundred to one, even a judicious reader will not, on the first perufal, be fenfible of the defect.

"The laft fpecies of nonfenfe to be exemplified I shall denominate the marvellous. It is the characteristic of this kind, that it aftonishes and even confounds by the boldness of the affirmations, which always appear

c. of the Contests and Diffenfions in Athens and Rome, first sentence.

appear flatly to contradict the plaineft dictates of common fenfe, and thus to involve a manifest abfurdity. I know no fort of authors that fo frequently abounds in this manner, as fome artifts, who have attempted to philofophife on the principles of their art. I shall give an example from the English tranflation of a French book*, as there is no example which I can remember at présent in any book written originally in our own language: Nature, fays this writer, in herfelf is unfeemly, and he who copies her fervilely, and without artifice, will always produce fomething poor, and of a mean taste. • What is called load in colours and lights, can only proceed from a profound knowledge in the value of colours, and from an admirable industry, which makes the painted objects appear more true, if I may fay fo, than the real ones. In this fenfe it may be afferted, that in Rubens pieces, Art is above Nature, and Nature only a copy of • that great mafter's works.' What a ftrange fubverfion, or inverfion, if you will, of all the moft obvious, and hitherto undisputed truths. Not fatisfied with affirming the unfeemlinefs of every production of Nature, whom this philofopher hath discovored to be an arrant bungler, and the immenfe fuperiority of human Art, whose humble fcholar dame Nature might be proud to be accounted, he rifeth to affeverations, which fhock all our notions, and utterly defy the powers of apprehenfion. Painting is found to be the original; or rather Rubens' pictures are the original, and Nature is the copy: and indeed very confequentially, the former is reprefented as the ftandard by which the beauty and perfections of the latter are to be estimated. Nor do the qualifying phrafes, if I may fay fo, and in this fenfe it may be afferted, make here the smallest odds. For as this fublime critic has nowhere hinted what sense it is which he denominates this fenfe, fo I believe no reader will be able to conjecture, what the author might have faid, and not abfurdly faid, to the fame effect. The misfortune is, that when the expreflion is ftript of the abfurd meaning, there remains nothing but balderdash, a jumble of bold words without meaning. Specimens of the fame kind are fometimes also to be met with in the poets.

Of these our author quotes two from Dryden, and might have cited a third of equal abfurdity, in Pope's epitaph on Sir Godfrey Kneller.

This writer's enquiry into the caufe, why nonfense so often efcapes being detected both by the writer and reader is curious and philofophical; indeed too much fo to prove entertaining to the generality of readers; the expediency of fuch an investigation, however, is obvious from the introductory paragraph.

Before quitting + the fubject of perfpicuity, fays he, it will not be amifs to inquire into the caufe of this firauge phenomenon; that

* De Piles' Principles of Painting.

even

This mode of expreflion is not quite idiomatical, if indeed it be strictly grammatical. Rev.

even a man of discernment should write without meaning, and not be fensible that he hath no meaning; and that judicious people should read what hath been written in this way, and not discover the defect. Both are surprising, but the first much more than the last. A certain remiffness will at times feize the most attentive reader; whereas an author of difcernment is fuppofed to have carefully digefted all that he writes. It is reported of Lopez de Vega, a famous Spanish poet, that the Bishop of Beller being in Spain, asked him to explain one of his fonnets, which he faid he had often read, but never unde: flood. Lopez took up the fonnet, and after reading it over and over several times, frankly acknowledged that he did not understand it himself; a discovery which the poet probably never made before."

In reply to the objections that may be made in favour of obfcurity in particular cafes, our author obferves, that

Delicacy often requires that certain fentiments be rather infinuated than expreffed; in other words, that they be not directly spoken, but that fufficient ground be given to infer them from what is spoken. Such fentiments are, though improperly, confidered as obfcurely expreffed, for this fpecial reafon, that it is not by the first operation of the intellect, an apprehenfion of the meaning of what is faid, but by a fecond operation, a reflection on what is implied or prefuppofed, that they are discovered; in which double operation of the mind, there is a faint resemblance to what happens in the cafe of real obfcurity. But in the cafe of which I am treating, it is the thought more than the expreffion that ferves for a veil to the fentiment fuggefted. If therefore in fuch inftances there may be faid to be obfcurity, it is an obfcurity which is totally diftinct from obfcurity of language.

"That this matter may be better understood, we must carefully diftinguish between the thought expreffed, and the thought hinted. The latter may be affirmed to be obfcure, because it is not expreffed, but hinted; whereas the former, with which alone perfpicuity of flyle is concerned, muft always be expreffed with clearness, otherwife the fentiment will never be confidered as either beautiful or delicate*. I fhall illuftrate this by examples.

"No fubject requires to be treated more delicately than praife, especially when it is given to a perfon prefent. Flattery is so naufeous to a liberal spirit, that even when praise is merited, it is difagreeable at least to unconcerned hearers, if it appear in a garb which adulation commonly affumes. For this reason, an encomium or compliment never fucceeds fo well as when it is indirect. It then appears to escape the speaker unawares, at a time that he feems to have no intention to commend. Of this kind the following ftory will ferve as an example: A gentleman who had an employment beftowed on him, without fo • much

• This will ferve to explain what Bouhours, a celebrated French critic, and a great advocate for perfpicuity, hath advanced on this fubject, Sonvenez-vous qui rien n'eft plus oppofé à la veritable delicateffe que d'exprimer trop les chofes, et que le grand art confifte à ne pas tout dire fur certains fujets; à gliffer deffus plutot que d'y appuyer; en un mot, à en laifer penfer aux autres plus que l'on n'eû dit.'—Maniere de bien penfer,&c.

*'

much as being known to his benefactor, waited upon the great man who was fo generous, and was beginning to fay, he was infinitely obliged- Not at all, fays the patron, turning from him to another: Had I known a more difcerning man in England, he should not • have had it Here the apparent intention of the minifter was only to excufe the perfon on whom the favour had been conferred, the trouble of making an acknowledgment, by affuring him that it had not been given from perfonal attachment or partiality. But whilft he appears intending only to fay this, he fays what implies the greatest praife, and, as it were, accidentally betrays the high opinion he entertained of the other's merit. If he had faid directly, You are the

most deferving man that I know in England,' the answer, though 'implying no more than what he did fay, would have been not only indelicate but intolerable. On fo flight a turn in the expreffion it frequently depends, whether the fame fentiment fhall appear delicate or grofs, complimental or affronting.

Sometimes praife is very fuccefsfully and very delicately conveyed under an appearance of chagrin. This conftitutes the merit of that celebrated thought of Boileau: To imagine in fuch a warlike age, which abounds in Achillefes, that we can write verfes as easily as they take towns!' The poet feems only venting his complaints against the unreasonable expectations of fome perfons, and at the fame time discovers, as by chance, the highest admiration of his monarch and the heroes who ferved him, by fuggefting the incredible rapidity of the fuccefs with which their arms were crowned.

6

"Sometimes alfo commendation will be couched with great delicacy under an air of reproach. An example of this I shall give from the paper lately quoted: My Lord, faid the Duke of Bm, after his libertine way, to the earl of O- -y, you will certainly be damn’d. How, my Lord, faid the earl, with fome warmth. Nay, replied the duke, there's no help for it, for it is pofitively faid, Gurfed is he of of whom all men speak well ‡.' A ftill ftronger example in this way we have from the Drapier, who, fpeaking to Lord Molefworth of the feditious expreffions of which he had himself been accused, says, I have witneffes ready to depofe, that your Lordfhip hath faid and writ fifty times worse, and what is ftill an aggravation, with infinitely more wit and learning, and ftronger arguments: So that as politics run, I do not know a perfon of more exceptionable principles than yourself: And if ever I fhall be discovered, I think you will be bound in honour to pay my fine and fupport me in prifon, or elfe I may chance to inform againft you by way of reprifal §.

、

"I fhall produce one other inftance from the fame hand, of an indirect, but fuccefsful manner of praising, by seeming to invert the courfe of the obligation, and to reprefent the perfon obliging as the perfon obliged. Swift, in a letter to the Archbishop of Dublin, speaking of Mr. Harley, then Lord High Treafurer, afterwards earl of Oxford,

Tatler, No. 17.

Et dans ce tems guerrier et fecond en Achilles
Croit que l'on fait les vers, comme l'on prend les villes,
Tatler, No. 17.
§ Drapier's Let. 5.

ford, by whose means the Irish clergy had obtained from the queen, the grant of the firft fruits and tenths, fays, I told him, that for my part, I thought he was obliged to the clergy of Ireland, for giving him an occafion of gratifying the pleasure he took in doing good to ⚫ the church*.'

Our author alfo juftly obferves on this head, that delicacy requires indirectness of manner no lefs in cenfure than praise; of which he gives examples; clofing his remarks on this fubject with the difcuffion of the question, Whether there may not be an excess of perfpicuity ?"

"It hath been faid, fays he, that too much of it has a tendency to cloy the reader, and, as it gives no play to the rational and active powers of the mind, will foon grow irkfome through excefs of facility. In this manner fome able critics have expreffed themselves on this point, who will be found not to differ in fentiment, but only in expreffion from the principles above laid down. The objection arifeth manifeftly from the confounding of two objects, the common and the clear, and thence very naturally their contraries, the new and the dark, that are widely different. If you entertain your reader folely or chiefly with thoughts that are either trite or obvious, you cannot fail foon to tire him. You introduce few or no new fentiments into his mind, you give him little or no information, and confequently afford neither exercife to his reafon, nor entertainment to his fancy. In what we read, and what we hear, we always feek for fomething in one respect or other new, which we did not know, or at leaft attend to before. The lefs we find of this, the fooner we are tired. Such a trifling minutencfs, therefore, in narration, defcription, or argument, as an ordinary apprehenfion would render fuperfluous, is apt quickly to difguft us. The reafon is, not because any thing is faid too perfpicuoufly, but because many things are faid which ought not to be faid at all. Nay, if thofe very things had been expreffed obfcurely (and the moft obvious things may be expreffed obfurely) the fault would have been much greater; because it would have required a good deal of attention to difcover what, after we had difcovered it, we fhould perceive not to be of fufficient value for requiting our pains. To an author of this kind, we fhould be apt to apply the character which Ballanio in the play gives of Gratiano's converfation: He fpeaks an infinite deal of nothing. His reafons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them, they are not worth the fearch, t' It is therefore futility in the thought, and not perfpicuity in the language, which is the fault of fuch performances. There is as little hazard that a piece fhall be faulty in this refpect, as that a mirror fhall be too faithful in reflecting the images of objects, or that the glaffes of a telefcope fhall be too tranfparent.

VOL. III.

Swift's Let. 10.

Y y

† Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice,

"At