triumphs of a sceptical philosophy, was also distinguished by a credulity so extraordinary, or rather so miraculous, as to encourage a greater number of visionaries and impostors than had appeared since the time of the revival of letters. The pretenders to animal magnetism, and the revivers of the Rosicrucian mysteries, are but two instances out of many that might be mentioned.

I have only to add further on this subject, that it is an enlightened philosophy alone which can guard the mind. effectually against those superstitious weaknesses which are often to be found in men remarkable, not only for their intrepidity amid the real difficulties and dangers of life, but for their fearless and heroic gallantry in the field of battle. Not to speak of Scipio's faith in dreams, and Cæsar's apprehension about the Ides of March, some of the greatest military characters in modern Europe have, even in our own times, allowed themselves to be imposed on by the artifices of astrologers, nay, of common fortune tellers. Frederick the Great (if we may credit the Marquis de Bouillé) was not without faith in the predictions of conjurers; and the late Gustavus of Sweden (we are positively assured by the same writer) was by no means free from this sort of superstition. He had always dreaded the month of March; and the first word he said to Armfeldt, on finding himself wounded, was to remind him of this circumstance. The ascendant gained by Rosicrucian Illuminati over the mind of the late Frederick William of Prussia (a prince of unquestionable intrepidity in all military operations) is matter of general notoriety.

Such, then, are the miseries of an ill regulated imagination, whether arising from constitutional biasses, or from the acquisition of erroneous opinions; and they are miseries which, when they affect habitually the state of the mind, are sufficient to poison all the enjoyments which fortune can offer. To those on the contrary, whose education has been fortunately conducted, this faculty opens inexhaustible sources of delight, presenting continually to their thoughts the fairest views of

Memoirs of the Marquis de Bouillé.

mankind and of Providence, and, under the deepest gloom of adverse fortune, gilding the prospects of futu rity.

I have remarked, in the first volume of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, that what we call sensibility depends in a great measure on the degree of imagination we possess; and hence, in such a world as ours, checquered as it is with good and evil, there must be in every mind a mixture of pleasure and of pain, proportioned to the interest which imagination leads it to take in the fortunes of mankind. It is even natural and reasonable for a benevolent disposition (notwithstanding what Mr. Smith has so ingeniously alleged to the contrary *) to dwell more habitually on the gloomy than on the gay aspect of human affairs; for the fortunate stand in no need of our assistance; while, amidst the distractions of our own personal concerns, the wretched require all the assistance which our imagination can lend them, to engage our attention to their distresses. In this sympathy, however, with the general sufferings of humanity, the pleasure far overbalances the pain; not only on account of that secret charm which accompanies all the modifications of benevolence, but because it is they alone whose prospects of futurity are sanguine, and whose confidence in the final triumpth of reason and of justice is linked with all the best principles of the heart, who are likely to make a common cause with the oppressed and the miserable. This, therefore, (although we frequently apply to it the epithet melancholy) is, on the whole, a happy state of mind, and has no connexion with what we commonly call low spirits,a disease where the pain is unmixed, and which is always accompanied, either as a cause or effect, by the most intolerable of all feelings, a sentiment of self-dissatisfaction; whereas the temper I have now alluded to is felt only by those who are at peace with themselves and with the whole world. Such is that species of melancholy which Thomson has so pathetically described as exerting a peculiar influence at that season of the year

* Theory of Moral Sentiments. Sixth Edition, Part iii. chap. iii.

(his own favorite and inspiring season) when the “dark winds of autumn return," and when the falling leaves and the naked fields fill the heart at once with mournful presages and with tender recollections.

"He comes! he comes; in every breeze the Power

Of philosophic melancholy comes!

His near approach, the sudden starting tear,
The glowing cheek, the mild dejected air,
The softened feature, and the beating heart,
Pierced deep with many a virtuous pang,
declare.
O'er all the soul his sacred influence breathes;
Inflames imagination; through the breast
Infuses every tenderness; and far
Beyond dim earth exalts the swelling thought.
Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such
As never mingled with the vulgar dream,
Crowd fast into the mind's creative eye.
As fast the correspondent passions rise,
As varied and as high: Devotion rais'd
To rapture and divine astonishment;
The love of nature unconfined, and chief
Of human race; the large ambitious wish

To make them blest; the sigh for suffering worth
Lost in obscurity; the noble scorn

Of tyrant pride; the fearless great resolve;
The wonder which the dying patriot draws,
Inspiring glory through remotest time;
The awakened throb for virtue and for fame;
The sympathies of love, and friendship dear;
With all the social offspring of the heart.

It will not, I think, be denied, that an imagination of the cast here described, while it has an obvious tendency to refine the taste and to exalt the character, enlarges very widely in the man who possesses it the sphere of his enjoyment. It is, however, no less indisputable, that this faculty requires an uncommon share of good sense to keep it under proper regulation, and to derive from it the pleasures it was intended to afford, without suffering it either to mislead the judgment in the conduct of life, or to impair our relish for the moderate gratifications which are provided for our present condition. I have treated at some length of this subject in the first volume of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, under the title of the "inconveniences resulting from an ill regulated imagination;" and shall content myself

here with a simple reference to that chapter, without attempting any recapitulation of its contents.

These inconveniences have appeared to some philosophers to be so alarming, that they have concluded it to be one of the most essential objects of education to repress as much as possible this dangerous faculty. But in this, as in other instances, it is in vain to counteract the purposes of nature; and all that human wisdom ought to attempt, is to study the ends which she has apparently in view, and to cooperate with the means which she has provided for their attainment. The very arguments on which these philosophers have proceeded justifies the remark I have now made, and encourages us to follow out the plan I have recommended; for surely the more cruel the effects of a deranged imagination, the happier are the consequences to be expected from this part of our constitution if properly regulated, and if directed to its destined purposes by good sense and philosophy. It is justly remarked by an author in the Tatler, as an acknowledged fact, that "of all writings licentious poems do soonest corrupt the heart. And why," continues he, "should we not be as universally persuaded that the grave and serious performances of such as write in the most engaging manner, by a kind of Divine impulse, must be the most effectual persuasive to goodness? The most active principle in our mind is the imagination. To it a good poet makes his court perpetually, and by this faculty takes care to gain it first. Our passions and inclinations come over next, and our reason surrenders itself with pleasure in the end. Thus the whole soul is insensibly betrayed into morality, by bribing the fancy with beautiful and agreeable images of those very things that, in the books of the philosophers, appear austere, and have at the best but a kind of forbidding aspect. In a word, the poets do, as it were, strew the rough paths of virtue so full of flowers, that we are not sensible of the uneasiness of them, and imagine ourselves in the midst of pleasures, and the most bewitching allurements, at the time we are making a progress in the severest duties of life.” *

• No. 98.

Hitherto we have been considering the connexion between imagination and happiness in those individuals over whose minds the influence of this faculty is increased by a liberal education beyond the ordinary standard. There is, however, no mind over which it has not some influence more or less; for there is no mind. whose estimates of external objects are not affected in some degree by casual associations, and of course none in which the conceptions of external objects are not in some degree modified by the power of imagination.

I have elsewhere remarked that the greater part of what Mr. Alison has so finely observed concerning the pleasures of Taste, may be applied to the various objects of our pursuit in life. Hardly any thing is appreciated according to its intrinsic value. Long before the dawn of reason and reflection, associations are formed in the minds of children, of happiness, of elegance, of gayety, of spirit, of fashion, of sensibility, as connected with particular pursuits or amusements, sometimes with particular animal gratifications. And it is a melancholy truth to add, that by such casual associations the choice of most individuals is determined, and the destiny of their lives decided.

Such associations, however, are not always a source of suffering. On the contrary, they often add much to the happiness of human life. With what satisfaction does the soldier submit to the hardships of his profession, who superadds to a sense of duty the enthusiasm which arises from the classical recollections of Greece and Rome, in comparison of him whose mind never wanders from the scenes and occupations which press upon his senses! Even the most trifling occurrences of the most common situation;-the insignificant objects which are scattered over the waste of human life, are embellished to those whose minds are stored with fortunate associations, with charms which are as inconceivable to the bulk of mankind as the raptures with which the poet surveys the face of Nature are to the tradesman and the peasant. This does not render the pleasures of life less real. On the contrary, it adds infinitely to their amount, and furnishes one of the strong67

VOL. V.