This experience constantly evinces.The proper manner of conveying the affections of the mind from one to another,is by words;there is a great insufficiency in all other methods of communication;and so far is a clearness of imagery from being absolutely necessary to an influence upon the passions,that they may be considerably operated upon,without presenting any image at all,by certain sounds adapted to that purpose;of which we have a sufficient proof in the acknowledged and powerful effects of instrumental music.In reality,a great clearness helps but little towards affecting the passions,as it is in some sort an enemy to all enthusiasms whatsoever.
IV
The Same Subject Continued There are two verses in Horace's Art of Poetry,that seem to contradict this opinion;for which reason I shall take a little more pains in clearing it up.The verses are,Segnius irritant animos demissa per aures,Quam quae sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus.
On this the Abbe du Bos founds a criticism,wherein he gives painting the preference to poetry in the article of moving the passions;principally on account of the greater clearness of the ideas it represents.I believe this excellent judge was led into this mistake (if it be a mistake)by his system;to which he found it more conformable than I imagine it will be found by experience.I know several who admire and love painting,and yet who regard the objects of their admiration in that art with coolness enough in comparison of that warmth with which they are animated by affecting pieces of poetry or rhetoric.Among the common sort of people,I never could perceive that painting had much influence on their passions.It is true,that the best sorts of painting,as well as the best sorts of poetry,are not much understood in that sphere.But it is most certain,that their passions are very strongly roused by a fanatic preacher,or by the ballads of Chevy-chase,or the Children in the Wood,and by other little popular poems and tales that are current in that rank of life.I do not know of any paintings,bad or good,that produce the same effect.So that poetry,with all its obscurity,has a more general,as well as a more powerful,dominion over the passions,than the other art.And I think there are reasons in nature,why the obscure idea,when properly conveyed,should be more affecting than the clear.It is our ignorance of things that causes all our admiration,and chiefly excites our passions.Knowledge and acquaintance make the most striking causes affect but little.It is thus with the vulgar;and all men are as the vulgar in what they do not understand.
The ideas of eternity and infinity are among the most affecting we have;and yet perhaps there is nothing of which we really understand so little,as of infinity and eternity.We do not anywhere meet a more sublime deion than this justly celebrated one of Milton,wherein he gives the portrait of Satan with a dignity so suitable to the subject:
He above the rest In shape and gesture proudly eminent Stood like a tower;his form had yet not lost All her original brightness,nor appeared Less than archangel ruined,and th'excess Of glory obscured:as when the sun new risen Looks through the horizontal misty air Shorn of his beams;or from behind the moon In dim eclipse disastrous twilight sheds On half the nations;and with fear of change Perplexes monarchs.
Here is a very noble picture;and in what does this poetical picture consist?In images of a tower,an archangel,the sun rising through mists,or in an eclipse,the ruin of monarchs,and the revolutions of kingdoms.The mind is hurried out of itself,by a crowd of great and confused images;which affect because they are crowded and confused.For,separate them,and you lose much of the greatness;and join them,and you infallibly lose the clearness.The images raised by poetry are always of this obscure kind;though in general the effects of poetry are by no means to be attributed to the images it raises;which point we shall examine more at large hereafter.1But painting,when we have allowed for the pleasure of imitation,can only affect simply by the images it presents;and even in painting,a judicious obscurity in some things contributes to the effect of the picture;because the images in painting are exactly similar to those in nature;and in nature,dark,confused,uncertain images have a greater power on the fancy to form the grander passions,than those have which are more clear and determinate.But where and when this observation may be applied to practice,and how far it shall be extended,will be better deduced from the nature of the subject,and from the occasion,than from any rules that can be given.
[Footnote 1:Part V.]
I am sensible that this idea has met with opposition,and is likely still to be rejected by several.But let it be considered,that hardly anything can strike the mind with its greatness,which does not make some sort of approach towards infinity;which nothing can do whilst we are able to perceive its bounds;but to see an object distinctly,and to perceive its bounds,is one and the same thing.A clear idea is therefore another name for a little idea.There is a passage in the book of Job amazingly sublime,and this sublimity is principally due to the terrible uncertainty of the thing described:
