you will have diforder only without magnificence. There are, however, a fort of fire-works, and fome other things, that in this way fucceed well, and are truly grand. There are also many defcriptions in the poets and orators, which owe their fublimity to a richnefs and profufion of images, in which the mind is fo dazzled as to make it impoffible to attend to that exact coherence and agreement of the allufions, which we should require on every other occafion. I do not now remember a more ftriking example of this, than the description which is given of the king's army in the play of Henry the Fourth:

All furnish'd, all in arms,

All plum'd like oftriches that with the wind
Baited like eagles having lately bathed :
As full of fpirit as the month of May,
And gorgeous as the fun in midfummer,
Wanton as youthful goats, wild as young bulls.
I faw young Harry with his beaver on
Rife from the ground like feather'd Mercury;
And vaulted with fuch eafe into his feat
As if an angel dropped from the clouds
To turn and wind a fiery Pegafus.

In that excellent book, fo remarkable for the vivacity of its defcriptions, as well as the folidity and penetration of its fentences, the Wifdom of the fon of Sirach, there is a noble panegyric on the high priest Simon the fon of Onias; and it is a very fine example of the point before us:

How was be honoured in the midst of the people, in his coming out of the fanctuary! He was as the morning far in the midst of a cloud, and as the moon at the full; as the fun Shining upon the temple of the Most High, and as the rainbow giving light in the bright clouds: and as the flower of rofes

in the Spring of the year, as lilies by the rivers of waters, and as the frankincenfe tree in fummer; as fire and incenfe in the cenfer, and as a veffel of gold fet with precious stones; as a fair olive tree budding forth fruit, and as a cypress which groweth up to the clouds. When he put on the robe of honour, and was cloathed with the perfection of glory, when he went up to the holy altar, he made the garment of holiness honourable. He himself food by the hearth of the altar, compassed with his brethren round about; as a young cedar in Libanus, and as palm trees compassed they him about. So were all the fons of Aaron in their glory, and the oblations of the Lord in their bands, &c.

HAV

LIGHT.

AVING confidered extenfion, fo far as it is capable of raising ideas of greatnefs; colour comes next under confideration. All colours depend on light. Light therefore ought previously to be examined; and with it its oppofite, darkness. With regard to light, to make it a cause capable of producing the fublime, it must be attended with fome circumstances, befides its bare faculty of fhewing other objects. Mere light is too common a thing to make a strong impreffion on the mind, and without a ftrong impreffion nothing can be fublime. But fuch a light as that of the fun, immediately exerted on the eye, as it overpowers the fenfe, is a very great idea. Light of an inferior ftrength to this, if it moves with great celerity, has the fame power; for lightning is certainly productive of grandeur, which it owes chiefly to the extreme velocity of its motion. A quick tran

fition from light to darkness, or from darkness to light, has yet a greater effect. But darkness is more productive of fublime ideas than light. Our great poet was convinced of this; and indeed fo full was he of this idea, fo entirely poffeffed with the power of a well-managed darkness, that in describing the appearance of the Deity, amidst that profufion of magnificent images which the grandeur of his fubject provokes him to pour out upon every fide, he is far from forgetting the obfcurity which furrounds the most incomprehenfible of all beings, but

With the majesty of darknefs round
Circles his throne.

And what is no lefs remarkable, our author had the fecret of preserving this idea, even when he seemed to depart the farthest from it, when he describes the light and glory which flows from the divine prefence; a light which by its very excefs is converted into a species of darkness.

Dark with exceffive light thy fkirts appear.

Here is an idea not only poetical in an high degree, but ftrictly and philosophically just. Extreme light, by overcoming the organs of fight, obliterates all objects, fo as in its effect exactly to refemble darkness. After looking for fome time at the fun, two black spots, the impreffion which it leaves, feem to dance before our eyes. Thus are two ideas as opposite as can be imagined reconciled in the extremes of both; and both in fpite of their oppofite nature brought to concur in producing the fublime. And this is not the only inftance wherein the oppofite extremes operate equally in favour of the fublime, which in all things abhors mediocrity.

VOL. I.

U

SECT.

AS S the management of light is a matter of importance in architecture, it is worth inquiring, how far this remark is applicable to building. I think then, that all edifices calculated to produce an idea of the fublime, ought rather to be dark and gloomy, and this for two reasons; the first is, that darkness itself on other occafions is known by experience to have a greater effect on the paffions than light. The fecond is, that to make an object very ftriking, we should make it as different as poffible from the objects with which we have been immediately converfant; when therefore you enter a building, you cannot pass into a greater light than you had in the open air; to go into one fome few degrees lefs luminous, can make only a trifling change; but to make the tranfition thoroughly ftriking, you ought to pass from the greatest light, to as much darkness as is confiftent with the uses of architecture. At night the contrary rule will hold, but for the very fame reason; and the more highly a room is then illuminated, the grander will the paffion be.

SECT. XVI.

COLOUR CONSIDERED AS PRODUCTIVE OF THE SUBLIME.

AMONG colours, fuch as are soft or chearful (except perhaps a strong red which is chearful) are unfit to produce grand images. An immense mountain covered with a fhining

shining green turf, is nothing, in this respect, to one dark and gloomy; the cloudy sky is more grand than the blue; and night more fublime and folemn than day. Therefore in historical painting, a gay or gaudy drapery can never have a happy effect: and in buildings, when the highest degree of the fublime is intended, the materials and ornaments ought neither to be white, nor green, nor yellow, nor blue, nor of a pale red, nor violet, nor fpotted, but of fad and fufcous colours, as black, or brown, or deep purple, and the like. Much of gilding, mofaics, painting, or ftatues, contribute but little to the fublime. This rule need not be put in practice, except where an uniform degree of the most ftriking fublimity is to be produced, and that in every particular; for it ought to be observed, that this melancholy kind of greatness, though it be certainly the highest, ought not to be studied in all forts of edifices, where yet grandeur must be studied; in such cases the fublimity must be drawn from the other sources; with a strict caution however against any thing light and riant; as nothing fo effectually deadens the whole taste of the sublime.

SOUND AND LOUDNESS.

THE eye is not the only organ of sensation, by which a fublime paffion may be produced. Sounds have a great power in these as in most other paffions. I do not mean words, because words do not affect fimply by their founds, but by means altogether different. Exceffive loudness alone is sufficient to overpower the foul, to suspend its action, and to fill it with terror. The noise of vast cataracts, raging storms, thunder, or artillery, awakes a great and aw