fession of Virtue herself, the labour and fatigue which awaited her votaries. Virtue retorts with severity and justice. She triumphs over her rival, and prompts Hercules to undertake those great and meritorious achievements, which have rendered him the object of the admiration of all ages.

306. THE TABULATURE OF CEBES is constructed on a larger scale, and leads to allusions much more particular. It proceeds from the supposition, that some uncommon painting, alluding to the rarity of the knowledge and practice of virtue, of which few people understood the meaning, had been suspended in the temple of Saturn.

Illus. 1. The painting consisted of three compartments; one very large, comprehending the other two. The first compartment represented human life, into which all men enter; the other two compartments denoted the division of men into good and bad, the larger containing the bad and the lesser the good. Error and ignorance appear at the gate of the first compartment, and of their cup all men drink some portion. Prejudices, predilections, and pleasures, next succeed in the garb of harlots, to seduce; and by them also all mankind are more or less misled. If they are followed too far, they conduct their votaries into the larger compartment, and consign them to Extravagance, Luxury, Avarice, or Flattery, who soon commit them to Sorrow, Remorse, Punishment, and Despair. After wandering for some time in the regions of Folly, their ruin is completed, unless, by accident, they encounter the great physician Repentance, who, if they are willing to submit to his directions, undertakes their cure, and finally conducts them to the small compartment, and the happy abodes of Wisdom.

2. But though some men reach the regions of Wisdom by this route, it is not the most patent path; that path, much less frequented than it ought to be, stretches up an eminence so steep that many travellers approach and survey it, but never attempt to surmount it. On this, Temperance and Moderation have occupied stations, and are ready to succour every candidate who needs their assistance. Fortitude and Activity soon join them, after ascending the eminence, and lead them to the abodes of Wisdom and Happiness. Here they meet with Prosperity, Tranquillity, Satisfaction, and Health, in the first place; and afterwards, with a great group of the most pleasant and happy companions, Integrity, Contentment, Friendship, Knowledge, Wealth, Dignity, Fame. They are, in a word, rendered superior to the greater part of those misfortunes, which so much disturb the happiness of mankind; and experience as much of the enjoyments of gods as is competent to mortal men.

Corol. Such views of human life are extremely captivating, particularly to young minds. They array Virtue in the most charming colours. They engage the imagination, and even the passions, on her side, and form the most powerful bulwark against the encroachment of Iniquity and Folly.

307. The third sort of allegories are calculated both for ornament and instruction; and of this species may be accounted the allegorical personifications which are often introduced into epic poetry, and sometimes into tragedy.

Example 1. No picture can more forcibly impress the imagination, no reasoning can so effectually excite the aversion of the heart, as the allegories of Sin and Death, in Paradise Lost. The poet paints, first Sin, and then Death, guarding the gates of Hell at the fall of Adam and Eve.

"Before the gates there sat,

On either side, a formidable shape.
The one seemed woman to the waist, and fair,
But ended foul in many a scaly fold
Voluminous and vast, a serpent arm'd

With mortal sting; about her middle round
A cry of hel.-hounds, never ceasing, bark'd
With wide Cerberean mouths, full loud, and rung
A hideous peal; yet when they list, would creep,
If aught disturb'd their noise, into her womb,
And kennel there; yet there still bark and howl'd,
Within, unseen.""

"The other shape,

If shape it might be called that shape had none,
Or substance might be called that shadow seemed,
For each seemed either; black it stood as night,
Fierce as ten furies, terrible as Hell,

And shook a dreadful dart; what seemed his head
The likeness of a kingly crown had on."

Analysis. These allegorical figures are strongly marked, and the resemblance of their characters to the effects produced in life is too obvious to need any comment. The picture which Virgil exhibits of Fame, in the fourth Æneid, possesses similiar merit, and is deduced from the same principles.*

Example 2. The subsequent picture of Slander, resembles that of Fame in Virgil, and is drawn with great vigour of imagination, and much allegorical merit. It is found in Shakspeare's Cymbeline.

"No, 'tis Slander,

Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile, whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie

All corners of the world, kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons; nay, the secrets of the grave."

308. All the great poets have indulged in this species of figure. Homer personifies prayers, and converts them into amiable beings, under the feigned appellation of "Jove's Daughters," who are concerned for the happiness of mankind; and recommend attachment to the worship and service of the gods, as the best means of recovering or preserving that happiness.

* But Virgil's Fame is a mixed allegorical composition, which will stand the test of criticism in poetry; because, in writing, the allegory can easily be distinguished from the historical part. No person mistakes Virgil's Fame for a real being. Nor is the Tabulature of Cebes considered otherwise than a supposed picture. But in the History of Mary de Medicis, painted, in some pictures, which (in 1817) I have seen, decorating the gallery of the Louvre, a perpetual jumble of real and allegorical personages, that produce a discordance of parts, and an obscurity upon the whole, is before the spectator's eyes. Real personages, Nereids and Tritons, fiction and reality, are mixed in the same group; a moustrous composition, only outdone by Louis XIV's enormous chariot, intended to represent that of the sun surrounded with men and women, representing the four ages of the world, the celestial signs, the seasons, the hours, &c.

Scholia. 1. Allegory is not very common either for the purposes of ornament or instruction. An extraordinary share both of ingenuity and imagination is requisite to ensure success; and the rising genius, of generous heart, and promising parts, who feels an inclination for allegorical writing, must guard against quaint ornaments, and the extending of allusions to too great minuteness. Let him always study brevity, and remember, that resemblances which have cost him much time to devise, are likely to cost the reader as much time to perceive; the consequences of which need no illustration.

2. As allegories are in a great measure the work of imagination, they cannot be admitted into any species of writing much calculated to interest the passions. All the arguments against long metaphors, apply with double force against the allegories of the second and third kinds, which seldom can be formed with sufficient brevity for their admission. But the first species of allegories, which elevate and adorn a common sentiment, are of general use; and in employing them, care should be taken that the phraseology be all figurative, that the attributes of the primary and the secondary subject be not confounded and interchanged.

Example 1. The most correct writers are sometimes faulty in this particular; even Horace and Boileau are not unexceptionable. Horace, in the following example, applies two epithets to the subject of the allegory, which can be applicable only to the primary subject.

"Ferus et Cupido,

Semper ardentes acuens sagittas,
Cote cruenta."

Analysis. "Ardentes" is intelligible when applied to love, the prima ry subject, which, in a figurative sense, is often said to burn; but it has no meaning when applied to an arrow, which is never supposed to be hot. "Cruenta," also, may be significant figuratively of the distress of unsuccessful love, but nobody ever heard of a bloody whetstone. No admirer of Horace would defend him, by alleging the epithet was proper, because the stone made sharp the arrow which drew the blood. Horace himself would have been ashamed of such a defence.

Example 2. Boileau has introduced a strange mixture of figurative and literal signification in the subsequent example:

"Pour moi sur cette mer, qu'ici bas nous courons
Je songe a me pouvoir d'esquif et d'avirons
A regler mes desirs, a prevenir l'orage,

Et sauver s'il se peut, ma raison du naufrage."

Analysis. These lines exhibit human life under the notion of a voy age at sea; but instead of adhering to this view of the subject, the au thor changes the allegorical to the literal meaning, and, with abundance of inconsistency, speaks of preparing a boat and oars, to regulate his passions, and to save his reason from shipwreck. Reason can be shipwrecked figuratively only. The hypothesis, therefore, of a man's understanding taken up at sea, and saved from drowning in a storm, is somewhat more than ridiculous: it is not a little absurd. (See Analysis, Ex. 3. Art. 269.)

CHAPTER VI.

APOSTROPHE.

309. APOSTROPHE is a turning off from the regular course of the subject to address some person or thing. Apostrophe, derived from the same source with personification, is the joint work of imagination and passion, but demands not generally so bold an exertion of those faculties as personification. (Art. 290.)

Illus. 1. It is commonly satisfied with addressing living objects that are absent, or dead objects with which we were familiar while they were in life. Some of its boldest efforts exhaust the essence of personification, and call up and address the inanimate objects of nature.

2. A well-chosen comparison, an extended metaphor, or allegory, will please both the imagination and the passions, when gently agitated But let the passions rise to violence, and the gratifications of the imagination will yield them no satisfaction.

3. On this account, APOSTROPHES addressed to the imagination, are frequently extended to considerable length, and are not by being so the less agreeable: while those addressed to the passions, must all be short, to correspond to the desultory and distracted condition of the mind.

310. Our arrangement, then, of examples, will naturally fall into two classes; first, those more lengthened and picturesque apostrophes, in which the pleasure of the imagination has chiefly been consulted; and, secondly, those expressive of the violence of passion.

311. The bold and vigorous genius of Ossian delights in this figure, and affords many beautiful examples of the first species.

Example. His address to the Moon, is one of the most pleasant pictures of this sort, which, perhaps, any language can supply. It excites melancholy emotion, and charms the fancy, but it aims not to rouse strong passion.

Daughter of heaven, fair art thou! the silence of thy face is pleasant: thou comest forth in loveliness; the stars attend thy blue steps in the east. The clouds rejoice in thy presence, O Moon! and brighten their dark-brown sides. Who is like thee in heaven, daughter of the night? The stars are ashamed in thy presence, and turn aside their sparkling eyes. Whither dost thou retire from thy course, when the darkness of thy countenance grows? Hast thou thy hall like Ossian? Dwellest thou in the shadow of grief? Have thy sisters fallen from heaven? and are they who rejoiced with thee at night no more?—Yes, they have fallen, fair light! and often dost thou retire to mourn.-But thou thyself shalt one night fail, and leave thy blue path in heaven. The stars will then lift their heads; they who in thy presence were astonished will rejoice."

Analysis. The solution of the change of the moon, founded on the opinion that she retired from her course to lament the loss of her sisters, adds sympathy to the picture, and captivates the heart from the resemblance between her melancholy situation and that of the poet. In this example, the objects are striking, and tender, and elevated, and excite correspondent emotions in the mind, but they cannot be said to agitate it with passion.

312. The apostrophes of the second class are the offspring of deep agitation; and the subsequent instances will illustrate the nature of their influence and operation.

Example. In the tragedy of Douglas, Lady Randolph thus accounts for the loss of her son:

"That very night in which my son was born,
My nurse, the only confident I had,

Set out with him to reach her sister's house;
But nurse nor infant have I ever seen,

Nor heard of Anna since that fatal hour.

My murder'd child! had thy fond mother feared

The loss of thee, she had loud fame defied,

Despised her father's rage, her father's grief,

And wander'd with thee through the scorning world."

Analysis. The apostrophe of the mother to the child, as soon as it was mentioned-the exaggerated supposition, that the unfortunate nurse had murdered it, and made her escape to save herself—the resolution of the mother to have run every risk, had she suspected any part of the misfortune that happened--are all the expressions of nature, and of genuine passion.

313. A principal error in the use of apostrophe, is to deck the object addressed with affected ornaments. It is by these ornaments that authors relinquish the expression of passion, and substitute in its stead the language of fancy.

Example. What opinion will the reader of taste form of the following quaint and laboured address of Cleopatra to the serpent, with which she was about to poison herself? It is taken from Dryden's All for. Love.

"Welcome, thou kind deceiver,

Thou best of thieves, who, with an easy key,
Dost open life, and, unperceived by us,
Ev'n steal us from ourselves, discharging so
Death's dreadful office, better than himself,

Touching our limbs so gently into slumber,

That Death stands by, deceiv'd by his own image,
And thinks himself but sleep

Analysis. Such conceits would scarcely be endured in the most cool descriptive poem. They cannot be supposed more improper than where they are. They resemble some of the obscure and forced allusions of allegorical writers, which the reader has difficulty to understand.

314. Another frequent error is, to extend this figure to too great length. The language of violent passion is always concise, and often abrupt. It passes suddenly from one object to another. It often glances at a thought, starts from it,