availing himself of that light which has been kindled by others, will rather feel pleasure in the opportunity afforded him of acknowledging the merit of living or departed worth. When we accuse men of stealing beautiful thoughts from others, and are, at the same time, obliged to acknowledge, that they have frequently reached the true sublime, where no sign of imitation appears, we endeavour to reconcile things as inconsistent in their own nature, as light is with darkness. Unless a writer possess genius, he can never, not even in one instance, attain to the true sublime without imitation. He, then, who said,

The lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
Are of imagination all compact:

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold—

That is the madman. The lover, all as frantic,

Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt.

The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;

And as imagination bodies forth

The form of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name,

would have proved himself to be a writer of genius, had he never written more; because, without genius, he could never have written this much, unless he had recourse to imitation. Lord Byron seems to have been fully aware of

this truth, when he says: "had Gray written nothing but his Elegy, high as he stands, I am not sure that he would not stand higher; it is the corner-stone of his glory: without it his odes would be insufficient for his fame."* Whenever it is, therefore, once ascertained, that a writer has reached the true sublime, not only in one, but in many original passages, we cannot hesitate to pronounce him a writer of genius; and when once we acknowledge him to be such, we shew our ignorance of the true and proper nature of genius, the moment we sit down to discover what he has borrowed from other writers, if we do so to insinuate, that he has imitated or borrowed through necessity, or through that sterility of intellect which can produce nothing of its own. A writer of genius, so far from going in search of the thoughts and sentiments of others, finds nothing more difficult than to reduce the copiousness of his own to order. This difficulty is never experienced by the writer of confined parts. His conceptions are few, and therefore he arranges them with ease. He has no difficulty to perceive which should come first and which last, and only regrets that he has not a few more to dispose of. But the writer of genius, so far from experiencing any

* Letter to

on the Reverend W. L. Bowles' Strictures on the Life and Writings of Pope.

barrenness of intellect, is obliged to omit a greater number of beautiful thoughts, and consign them, perhaps, to eternal oblivion, than the former can collect altogether, after the most painful and toilsome research. To suppose, then, that he who is allowed to possess this creative faculty, is still obliged to hunt after the thoughts and sentiments of others, when he has more of his own than he can make use of, is to acknowledge, that we neither possess genius ourselves, nor know how it operates in the minds of those on whom nature has conferred it. When writers of genius seem to imitate each other, it is only because, in the first place, similar subjects generally present themselves to penetrating and discerning minds in the same point of view: for, the more accurately we perceive all the qualities and properties of any subject, the more we agree in our ideas and sentiments regarding it; and the more correct our style is, the more apt we are to express these kindred conceptions, in the same, or synonymous terms; -and because, in the second place, a passage in another writer will sometimes present itself to a writer of genius the moment he comes to that part of his subject to which it is related; and though many other thoughts of his own may occur to him, at the same moment, it is an undoubted quality of genius, a quality peculiarly characteristic of all great minds, to prefer the beauties

of other writers to their own, and to set a value upon them, to which they do not imagine their own to be entitled.

It is, therefore, not only adhering more closely to the standard of true taste, but also more agreeable to the character of true genius, never to omit a beautiful expression, or sentiment, when no other is so peculiarly adapted to our subject, though a similar expression, or sentiment, has been already used by another writer. Words and expressions are common to all men; and those are always best which are most applicable to our subject, however frequently they may have been used before. While we do not bend our subject from its proper direction to make way for them, it is agreeable to the most correct, as well as to the most natural taste, to make use of them. Whenever, therefore, they happen to meet us in the way, let us not turn our subject aside in order to avoid them. They cannot become us worse than they became those who made use of them before. The worst, at least, that can befal us, is, that our vanity may be hurt by the reflection that we are not original; but even this loss could never be felt, if we could once become, like Swift, "too proud to be vain.”

Perhaps it may be asked, what need is there of looking up to the authority of established writers, if natural genius is so copious and fertile

in discovering such ideas, and perceiving such relations and differences, as properly belong to the subject of its contemplation? To what purpose do we cultivate our powers of discerning and distinguishing, if nature has already endowed us with that clear perception that seeks not to be enlightened by the experience of others? To this I reply, that all men do not possess this natural genius that is so fertile in the discovery of relations; and that all who are writers, so far from being men of genius, are not always men of ordinary talent. I believe, then, it will at least be admitted, that those who are thus partially provided for by nature, ought to look up to the authority of those to whom she has been more prodigal of her favours; and yet I believe, that, at their commencement in the literary world, these minor geniuses stand less in need of authority, than he who possesses the mind of Aristotle, Descartes, Locke, or Newton. He whose notions are limited, and whose perceptions are few, has not his attention distracted by a host of ideas, notions, distinctions, relations, conclusions, and probabilities. He sees an object only in two, three, or perhaps four points of view, and, if he compare it with another, he can only take these four points into consideration. The light of common sense, without any authority, will enable him to dispose of these few points as he ought, and to ex