pocket, was in a post-chaise on my road; between five and six in the morning, just at the dawn of day, I was within fourteen miles of Huntingdon. The sun rose in all its splendour; and it was not, I thought, the last time that it would rise upon these poor men." Let any Poet describe the joy of this traveller. It is the same with every other pleasure which we are formed to enjoy. The creations of man are not better than the creating of the Almighty. Effect of the Progress of Knowledge upon Imagination. By the progress of knowledge erroneous notions are eradicated. The stream is filtered. The atmosphere is purified. Vain fears and vain imaginations are dissipated: false notions of pleasure are destroyed, and real delights increased. Effect of the Progress of Knowledge upon Imagination in General. As the pleasures of imagination are very prevalent, and much cultivated during youth, so, if we consider mankind as one great individual, advancing in age perpetually, it seems natural to expect, that in the infancy of knowledge, in the early ages of the world, the taste of mankind would turn much upon the pleasures of this class. And agreeably to this it may be observed, that music, painting, and poetry, were much admired in ancient times; and the two last brought to great perfection.-HARTLY. Ignorance and credulity have ever been companions, and have misled and enslaved mankind; philosophy has in all ages endeavoured to oppose their progress, and to loosen the shackles they had imposed; philosophers have on this account been called unbelievers: unbelievers of what? of the fictions of fancy, of witchcraft, hobgoblins, apparitions, vampires, fairies; of the influence of stars on human actions, miracles wrought by the bones of saints, the flights of ominous birds, the predictions from the bowels of dying animals, expounders of dreams, fortune-tellers, conjurors, modern prophets, necromancy, chieromancy, animal magnetism, metallic tractors, with endless variety of folly? These they have disbelieved and despised, but have ever bowed their heads to truth and nature.-DARWIN'S ZOONOMIA. It cannot be concealed, however, that the progress of knowledge and refinement has a tendency to circumscribe the limits of the imagination, and to clip the wings of poetry. The province of the imagination is principally visionary, the unknown and undefined: the understanding restores things to their natural boundaries, and strips them of their fanciful pretensions.-HAZLET. Knowledge diminishes the Pains of Imagination. See ante 220, and the note. See also ante 166, as to Sorrow. Knowledge regulates the Pleasures of Imagination. At the mere touch of cold philosophy? There was an awful rainbow, once in heaven : So says the poet, ought it not to be-" Does not folly fly at the mere sight of sweet philosophy:" take for instance the very image which the poet has selected. Has the man of science less pleasure in contemplating this beauty of nature than is enjoyed by ignorance? Akenside, in his poem on the Imagination, says- The melting rainbow's vernal tinctur'd hues The hand of science pointed out the path In which the sun-beams gleaming from the west So, too, Wordsworth says My heart leaps up when I behold A rainbow in the sky : So was it when my life began: So is it now I am a man; So be it when I shall grow old, &c. Of the miseries attendant upon acting on imaginations, as if they were realities, life abounds with instances. How truly does Sir W. Raleigh say, in answer to the sweet ballad, "Come live with me and be my love:" Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses, The most common source of misery from this species of delusion is in marriage, of which there is an admirable description by Dr. Johnson in his Rasselas, the passage begins, "What can be expected." In a very interesting novel, entitled Marriage, there is the following dialogue between the couple. Douglas saw the storm gathering on the brow of his capricious wife, and clasping her in his arms :-" Are you indeed so changed, my Julia, that you have forgot the time when you used to declare, you would prefer a desert with your Henry, to a throne with another?" "No, certainly, not changed: but-I-I did not very well know then what a desert was; or at least, I had formed rather a different idea of it." "What was your idea of a desert?" said her husband, laughing; "do tell me, love?" "Oh! I had fancied it a beautiful place, full of roses and myrtles, and smooth green turf, and murmuring rivulets, and though very retired, not absolutely out of the world, where one could occasionally see one's friends and give déjeúnés and fêtes champêtres." Such are the miseries resulting from erroneous notions respecting love: misery of the same nature, although less in degree, attends erroneous notions respecting friendship. The advantages of friendship are peace in the affections, counsel in judgment, and assistance in distress; the heart, the hand, the head. Is it a cause of astonishment that disappointments attend most youthful friendships? Those truths are not confined to our affections, but extend to every event in life, when we venture to act either by supposing/ non-existencies to be existencies; or by omitting to take into consideration the want of some real cause of comfort. How truly is this described by Cowper in the story of the Peasant's Nest, in the Task: Oft have I wish'd the peaceful covert mine, * See ante 71 and 76. 7 Let us think for a moment of the sweet poet, Robert Burns, whose life was passed So sweetly in the morning Young fancy's rays the hills adorning. but when addressing us from his grave in his epitaph, he says, The poor inhabitant below Was quick to learn and wise to know, But thoughtless follies laid him low Reader, attend, whether thy soul Know, prudent, cautious, self-control Let us, therefore, enjoy the pleasures of imagination, but be not unmindful of their limits. Let us not be Misled by fancy's meteor ray, By passion driv'n; Although the light that leads astray Is light from heaven. THE END. C. Whittingham, Tooks Court, Chancery Lane. 39 |