No. 51. TUESDAY, MAY 1, 1753.

Si quid ex Pindari, Flaccive dictis fuerit interjectum, splendet oratio; et sordescit, si quid e sacris Psalmis aptè fuerit attextum? An Libri Spiritus cœlestis afflatú proditi sordent nobis præscriptis Homeri, Euripidis, aut Enii? ERASMUS.

Is a discourse beautified by a quotation from Pindar and Horace? and shall we think it blemished by a passage from the sacred Psalms aptly interwoven? Do we despise the books which were dictated by the spirit of God, in comparison of Homer, Euripides, and Ennis?

SIR,

TO THE ADVENTURER.

IN the library of the Benedictine monks at Lyons, has lately been discovered a most curious manuscript of the celebrated Longinus. As I know you will eagerly embrace every opportunity of contributing to promote, or rather revive, a reverence and love for the sacred writings, 1 send you the following extract, translated from this extraordinary work.

"MY DEAR TERENTIANUS,

"You may remember that in my treatise on the sublime, I quoted a striking example of it from Moses the Jewish lawgiver; 'Let there be light, and there was light.' I have since met with a large volume, translated into Greek by the order of Ptolemy, containing all the religious opinions, the civil laws and customs of that singular and unaccountable people. And to confess the truth, I am greatly astonished at the incomparable elevation of its style, and the supreme grandeur of its images; many of which excel the utmost efforts of the most exalted genius of Greece.

"At the appearance of God, the mountains and

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the forests do not only tremble as in Homer, but are melted down like wax at his presence.' He rides not on a swift chariot over the level waves like Neptune, but comes flying upon the wings of the wind: while the floods clap their hands, and the hills and forests, and earth and heaven, all exult together before their Lord.' And how dost thou con-ceive, my friend, the exalted idea of the universal presence of the infinite mind can be expressed, adequately to the dignity of the subject, but in the following manner? Whither shall I go from thy presence? If I climb up into heaven, thou art there! If I go down to hell, lo, thou art there also! If I take wings and fly toward the morning, or remain in the uttermost parts of the western ocean; even there also'- the poet does not say, 'I shall find thee,' but, far more forcibly and emphatically

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thy right hand shall hold me.' With what majesty and magnificence is the Creator of the world, before whom the whole universe is represented as nothing, nay, less than nothing, and vanity, introduced making the following sublime inquiry! Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with a span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?' Produce me, Terentianus, any image or description in Plato himself, so truly elevated and divine! Where did these barbarians learn to speak of God in terms that alone appear worthy of him? How contemptible and vile are the deities of Homer and Hesiod, in comparison of this Jehovah of the illiterate Jews! before whom, to use this poet's own words, all other gods are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance.'

"Had I been acquainted with this wonderful vo

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lume, while I was writing my treatise on the pathetic, I could have enriched work with many strokes of eloquence, more irresistibly moving than any I have borrowed from our three great tragedians, or even from the tender Simonides himself. The same Moses I formerly mentioned, relates the history of a youth sold into captivity by his brethren, in a manner so deeply interesting, with so many little strokes of nature and passion, with such penetrating knowledge of the human heart, with such various and unexpected changes of fortune, and with such a striking and important discovery, as cannot be read without astonishment and tears; and which I am almost confident Aristotle would have preferred to the story of his admired Edipus, for the artificial manner in which the recognition, avayvapios, is effected, emerging gradually from the incidents and circumstances of the story itself, and not from things extrinsical and unessential to the fable.

αναγνώρισις,

"In another part we are presented with the picture of a man most virtuous and upright, who, for the trial and exercise of his fortitude and patience, is hurried down from the summits of felicity into the lowest depths of distress and despair. Were ever sorrow and misery and compassion expressed more forcibly and feelingly than by the behaviour of his friends, who when they first discovered him in this altered condition, destitute, afflicted, tormented, 'sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights; and none spake a word unto him, for they saw that his grief was very great.' Let us candidly confess, that this noble passage is equal if not superior to that celebrated description of parental sorrow in Eschylus: where that venerable father of tragedy, whose fire and enthusiasm sometimes force him forwards to the very borders of improba

bility, has in this instance justly represented Niobe sitting disconsolately three days together upon the tomb of her children, covered with a veil, and observing a profound silence. Such silences have something more affecting and more strongly expressive of passion than the most artful speeches. In Sophocles, when the unfortunate Deianira discovers her mistake in having sent a poisoned vestment to her husband Hercules, her surprise and sorrow are unspeakable, and she answers not her son who acquaints her with the disaster, but goes off the stage without uttering a syllable. A writer unacquainted with nature and the heart would have put into her mouth twenty florid Iambics, in which she would bitterly have bewailed her misfortunes, and informed the spectators that she was going to die.

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In representing likewise the desolation and destruction of the cities of Babylon and Tyre, these Jewish writers have afforded many instances of true pathos. One of them expresses the extreme distress occasioned by a famine, by this moving circumstance: The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst; the young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them; the hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own children.' Which tender and affecting stroke reminds me of the picture of a sacked city by Aristides the Theban, on which we have so often gazed with inexpressible delight; that great artist has expressed the concern of a bleeding and dying mother, lest her infant, who is creeping to her side, should lick the blood that flows from her breast, and mistake it for her milk.

“In the ninth book of the Iliad, Homer represents the horrors of a conquered city, by saying that her heroes should be slain, her palaces overthrown, her matrons ravished, and her whole race

enslaved. But one of these Jewish poets, by a single circumstance, has more emphatically pointed out the utter desolation of Babylon: I will make a man more precious than fine gold; even a single person than the golden wedge of Ophir.'

"What seems to be particularly excellent in these writers is their selection of such adjuncts and circumstances upon each subject as are best calculated to strike the imagination and embellish their descriptions. Thus, they think it not enough to say, 'that Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, shall never more be inhabited; but they add a picturesque stroke, 'neither shall the Arabian pitch his tent there; the wild beasts of the island shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces.'

"You have heard me frequently observe, how much visions, or images, by which a writer seems to behold objects that are absent, or even nonexistent, contribute to the true sublime. For this reason I have ever admired Minerva's speech in the fifth book of the Iliad, where she tells her favourite Diomede, that she will purge his eyes from the mists of mortality, and give him power clearly to discern the gods that were at that time assisting the Trojans, that he might not be guilty of the impiety of wounding any of the celestial beings, Venus excepted.' Observe the superior strength and liveliness of the following image: Jehovah,' the tutelar God of the Jews, opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses, and chariots of fire round about him!'

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"Do we start, and tremble, and turn pale, when Orestes exclaims that the furies are rushing forward to seize him? and shall we be less affected with the writer, who breaks out into the following question? Who is this that cometh from Edom with dyed garments from Bosra; this that is glorious in his