[Footnote 1: "have been laid for them", corrected by an erratum in No.
161.]
* * * * *
No. 160. Monday, September 3, 1711. Addison.
'... Cui mens divinior, atque os
Magna sonaturum, des nominis hujus honorem.'
Hor.
There is no Character more frequently given to a Writer, than that of
being a Genius. I have heard many a little Sonneteer called a _fine
Genius_. There is not an Heroick Scribler in the Nation, that has not
his Admirers who think him a _great Genius_; and as for your Smatterers
in Tragedy, there is scarce a Man among them who is not cried up by one
or other for a _prodigious Genius_.
My design in this Paper is to consider what is properly a great Genius,
and to throw some Thoughts together on so uncommon a Subject.
Among great Genius's those few draw the Admiration of all the World upon
them, and stand up as the Prodigies of Mankind, who by the meer Strength
of natural Parts, and without any Assistance of Arts or Learning, have
produced Works that were the Delight of their own Times, and the Wonder
of Posterity. There appears something nobly wild and extravagant in
these great natural Genius's, that is infinitely more beautiful than all
the Turn and Polishing of what the _French_ call a _Bel Esprit_, by
which they would express a Genius refined by Conversation, Reflection,
and the Reading of the most polite Authors. The greatest Genius [which
[1]] runs through the Arts and Sciences, takes a kind of Tincture from
them, and falls unavoidably into Imitation.
Many of these great natural Genius's that were never disciplined and
broken by Rules of Art, are to be found among the Ancients, and in
particular among those of the more Eastern Parts of the World. _Homer_
has innumerable Flights that _Virgil_ was not able to reach, and in the
Old Testament we find several Passages more elevated and sublime than
any in _Homer_. At the same time that we allow a greater and more daring
Genius to the Ancients, we must own that the greatest of them very much
failed in, or, if you will, that they were very much above the Nicety
and Correctness of the Moderns. In their Similitudes and Allusions,
provided there was a Likeness, they did not much trouble themselves
about the Decency of the Comparison: Thus _Solomon_ resembles the Nose
of his Beloved to the Tower of _Libanon_ which looketh toward
_Damascus_; as the Coming of a Thief in the Night, is a Similitude of
the same kind in the New Testament. It would be endless to make
Collections of this Nature; _Homer_ illustrates one of his Heroes
encompassed with the Enemy by an Ass in a Field of Corn that has his
Sides belaboured by all the Boys of the Village without stirring a Foot
for it: and another of them tossing to and fro in his Bed and burning
with Resentment, to a Piece of Flesh broiled on the Coals. This
particular Failure in the Ancients, opens a large Field of Raillery to
the little Wits, who can laugh at an Indecency but not relish the
Sublime in these Sorts of Writings. The present Emperor of _Persia_,
conformable to this Eastern way of Thinking, amidst a great many pompous
Titles, denominates himself The Sun of Glory and the Nutmeg of Delight.
In short, to cut off all Cavilling against the Ancients and particularly
those of the warmer Climates who had most Heat and Life in their
Imaginations, we are to consider that the Rule of observing what the
_French_ call the _Bienséance_ in an Allusion, has been found out of
latter Years, and in the colder Regions of the World; where we would
make some Amends for our want of Force and Spirit, by a scrupulous
Nicety and Exactness in our Compositions.
Our Countryman _Shakespear_ was a remarkable Instance of this first kind
of great Genius's.
I cannot quit this Head without observing that _Pindar_ was a great
Genius of the first Class, who was hurried on by a natural Fire and
Impetuosity to vast Conceptions of things and noble Sallies of
Imagination. At the same time, can any thing be more ridiculous than for
Men of a sober and moderate Fancy to imitate this Poet's Way of Writing
in those monstrous Compositions which go among us under the Name of
Pindaricks? When I see People copying Works which, as _Horace_ has
represented them, are singular in their Kind, and inimitable; when I see
Men following Irregularities by Rule, and by the little Tricks of Art
straining after the most unbounded Flights of Nature, I cannot but apply
to them that Passage in _Terence_:
_... Incerta hæc si tu postules
Ratione certâ facere, nihilo plus agas,
Quàm si des operam, ut cum ratione insanias_.
In short a modern Pindarick Writer, compared with _Pindar_, is like a
Sister among the Camisars [2] compared with _Virgil_'s Sibyl: There is
the Distortion, Grimace, and outward Figure, but nothing of that divine
Impulse which raises the Mind above its self, and makes the Sounds more
than human.
[There is another kind of great Genius's which I shall place in a second
Class, not as I think them inferior to the first, but only for
Distinction's sake, as they are of a different kind. This [3]] second
Class of great Genius's are those that have formed themselves by Rules,
and submitted the Greatness of their natural Talents to the Corrections
and Restraints of Art. Such among the _Greeks_ were _Plato_ and
_Aristotle_; among the _Romans_, _Virgil_ and _Tully_; among the
_English_, _Milton_ and Sir _Francis Bacon_.
[4] The Genius in both these Classes of Authors may be equally great,
but shews itself [after [5]] a different Manner. In the first it is like
a rich Soil in a happy Climate, that produces a whole Wilderness of
noble Plants rising in a thousand beautiful Landskips, without any
certain Order or Regularity. In the other it is the same rich Soil under
the same happy Climate, that has been laid out in Walks and Parterres,
and cut into Shape and Beauty by the Skill of the Gardener.
The great Danger in these latter kind of Genius's, is, lest they cramp
their own Abilities too much by Imitation, and form themselves
altogether upon Models, without giving the full Play to their own
natural Parts. An Imitation of the best Authors is not to compare with a
good Original; and I believe we may observe that very few Writers make
an extraordinary Figure in the World, who have not something in their
Way of thinking or expressing themselves that is peculiar to them, and
entirely their own.
[6] It is odd to consider what great Genius's are sometimes thrown away
upon Trifles.
I once saw a Shepherd, says a famous _Italian_ Author, [who [7]] used to
divert himself in his Solitudes with tossing up Eggs and catching them
again without breaking them: In which he had arrived to so great a
degree of Perfection, that he would keep up four at a time for several
Minutes together playing in the Air, and falling into his Hand by Turns.
I think, says the Author, I never saw a greater Severity than in this
Man's Face; for by his wonderful Perseverance and Application, he had
contracted the Seriousness and Gravity of a Privy-Councillor; and I
could not but reflect with my self, that the same Assiduity and
Attention, had they been rightly applied, might have made him a greater
Mathematician than _Archimedes_.