Z.

[Footnote 1: The Prince, ch. xlv, at close.]

* * * * *

No. 409. Thursday, June 19, 1712. Addison.

'Musæo contingere cuncta lepore.'

Lucr.

Gratian very often recommends the Fine Taste, [1] as the utmost

Perfection of an accomplished Man. As this Word arises very often in

Conversation, I shall endeavour to give some Account of it, and to lay

down Rules how we may know whether we are possessed of it, and how we

may acquire that fine Taste of Writing, which is so much talked of among

the Polite World.

Most Languages make use of this Metaphor, to express that Faculty of the

Mind, which distinguishes all the most concealed Faults and nicest

Perfections in Writing. We may be sure this Metaphor would not have been

so general in all Tongues, had there not been a very great Conformity

between that Mental Taste, which is the Subject of this Paper, and that

Sensitive Taste which gives us a Relish of every different Flavour that

affects the Palate. Accordingly we find, there are as many Degrees of

Refinement in the intellectual Faculty, as in the Sense, which is marked

out by this common Denomination.

I knew a Person who possessed the one in so great a Perfection, that

after having tasted ten different Kinds of Tea, he would distinguish,

without seeing the Colour of it, the particular Sort which was offered

him; and not only so, but any two Sorts of them that were mixt together

in an equal Proportion; nay he has carried the Experiment so far, as

upon tasting the Composition of three different Sorts, to name the

Parcels from whence the three several Ingredients were taken. A Man of a

fine Taste in Writing will discern, after the same manner, not only the

general Beauties and Imperfections of an Author, but discover the

several Ways of thinking and expressing himself, which diversify him

from all other Authors, with the several Foreign Infusions of Thought

and Language, and the particular Authors from whom they were borrowed.

After having thus far explained what is generally meant by a fine Taste

in Writing, and shewn the Propriety of the Metaphor which is used on

this Occasion, I think I may define it to be that Faculty of the Soul,

which discerns the Beauties of an Author with Pleasure, and the

Imperfections with Dislike. If a Man would know whether he is possessed

of this Faculty, I would have him read over the celebrated Works of

Antiquity, which have stood the Test of so many different Ages and

Countries, or those Works among the Moderns which have the Sanction of

the Politer Part of our Contemporaries. If upon the Perusal of such

Writings he does not find himself delighted in an extraordinary Manner,

or if, upon reading the admired Passages in such Authors, he finds a

Coldness and Indifference in his Thoughts, he ought to conclude, not (as

is too usual among tasteless Readers) that the Author wants those

Perfections which have been admired in him, but that he himself wants

the Faculty of discovering them.

He should, in the second Place, be very careful to observe, whether he

tastes the distinguishing Perfections, or, if I may be allowed to call

them so, the Specifick Qualities of the Author whom he peruses; whether

he is particularly pleased with Livy for his Manner of telling a Story,

with Sallust for his entering into those internal Principles of Action

which arise from the Characters and Manners of the Persons he describes,

or with Tacitus for his displaying those outward Motives of Safety and

Interest, which give Birth to the whole Series of Transactions which he

relates.

He may likewise consider, how differently he is affected by the same

Thought, which presents it self in a great Writer, from what he is when

he finds it delivered by a Person of an ordinary Genius. For there is as

much Difference in apprehending a Thought cloathed in Cicero's Language,

and that of a common Author, as in seeing an Object by the Light of a

Taper, or by the Light of the Sun.

It is very difficult to lay down Rules for the Acquirement of such a

Taste as that I am here speaking of. The Faculty must in some degree be

born with us, and it very often happens, that those who have other

Qualities in Perfection are wholly void of this. One of the most eminent

Mathematicians of the Age has assured me, that the greatest Pleasure he

took in reading Virgil, was in examining Æneas his Voyage by the Map; as

I question not but many a Modern Compiler of History, would be delighted

with little more in that Divine Author, than in the bare Matters of

Fact.

But notwithstanding this Faculty must in some measure be born with us,

there are several Methods for Cultivating and Improving it, and without

which it will be very uncertain, and of little use to the Person that

possesses it. The most natural Method for this Purpose is to be

conversant among the Writings of the most Polite Authors. A Man who has

any Relish for fine Writing, either discovers new Beauties, or receives

stronger Impressions from the Masterly Strokes of a great Author every

time he peruses him; Besides that he naturally wears himself into the

same manner of Speaking and Thinking.

Conversation with Men of a Polite Genius is another Method for improving

our Natural Taste. It is impossible for a Man of the greatest Parts to

consider anything in its whole Extent, and in all its Variety of Lights.

Every Man, besides those General Observations which are to be made upon

an Author, forms several Reflections that are peculiar to his own Manner

of Thinking; so that Conversation will naturally furnish us with Hints

which we did not attend to, and make us enjoy other Men's Parts and

Reflections as well as our own. This is the best Reason I can give for

the Observation which several have made, that Men of great Genius in the

same way of Writing seldom rise up singly, but at certain Periods of

Time appear together, and in a Body; as they did at Rome in the Reign of

Augustus, and in Greece about the Age of Socrates. I cannot think that

Corneille, Racine, Moliere, Boileau, la Fontaine, Bruyere, Bossu, or the

Daciers, would have written so well as they have done, had they not been

Friends and Contemporaries.

It is likewise necessary for a Man who would form to himself a finished

Taste of good Writing, to be well versed in the Works of the best

Criticks both Ancient and Modern. I must confess that I could wish there

were Authors of this kind, who beside the Mechanical Rules which a Man

of very little Taste may discourse upon, would enter into the very

Spirit and Soul of fine Writing, and shew us the several Sources of that

Pleasure which rises in the Mind upon the Perusal of a noble Work. Thus

although in Poetry it be absolutely necessary that the Unities of Time,

Place and Action, with other Points of the same Nature, should be

thoroughly explained and understood; there is still something more

essential to the Art, something that elevates and astonishes the Fancy,

and gives a Greatness of Mind to the Reader, which few of the Criticks

besides Longinus have considered.

Our general Taste in England is for Epigram, Turns of Wit, and forced

Conceits, which have no manner of Influence, either for the bettering or

enlarging the Mind of him who reads them, and have been carefully

avoided by the greatest Writers, both among the Ancients and Moderns. I

have endeavoured in several of my Speculations to banish this Gothic

Taste, which has taken Possession among us. I entertained the Town, for

a Week together, with an Essay upon Wit, in which I endeavoured to

detect several of those false Kinds which have been admired in the

different Ages of the World; and at the same time to shew wherein the

Nature of true Wit consists. I afterwards gave an Instance of the great

Force which lyes in a natural Simplicity of Thought to affect the Mind

of the Reader, from such vulgar Pieces as have little else besides this

single Qualification to recommend them. I have likewise examined the

Works of the greatest Poet which our Nation or perhaps any other has

produced, and particularized most of those rational and manly Beauties

which give a Value to that Divine Work. I shall next Saturday enter upon

an Essay on the Pleasures of the Imagination, which, though it shall

consider that Subject at large, will perhaps suggest to the Reader what

it is that gives a Beauty to many Passages of the finest Writers both in

Prose and Verse. As an Undertaking of this Nature is entirely new, I

question not but it will be received with Candour.