Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 68, No 420, October 1850

Dies Boreales.

No. VIII.

CHRISTOPHER UNDER CANVASS

Camp at Cladich

Scene —The Wren's Nest

Time —Evening

North – Talboys – Seward – Buller

NORTH

Have you dined?

TALBOYS

That we have, sir.

NORTH

With me this has been Fast-day.

TALBOYS

We saw it was, at our breakfast. Your abstinence at that meal, and at luncheon, we knew from the composure of your features, and your benignant silence, was not from any disorder of material organisation, but from steady moral resolve; so his absence from the Dinner-Table gave us no uneasiness about Numa.

NORTH

No Nymph has been with him in the Grot.

TALBOYS

His Good Genius is always with him in Solitude. The form we observed stealing – no, not stealing – gliding away – was, I verily believe, but the Lady of the Wood.

NORTH

The Glen, you know, is haunted; and sometimes when the green umbrage is beginning to look grey in the still evening, I have more than a glimpse of the Faery Queen.

SEWARD

Perhaps we intrude on your dreams. Let us retire.

NORTH

Take your seats. What Book is that, beneath your arm, Talboys?

TALBOYS

The Volume you bid me bring with me this Evening to the Wren's Nest.

NORTH

Yes, yes – now I remember. You are here by appointment.

TALBOYS

Else had we not been here. We had not merely your permission, sir – but your invitation.

NORTH

I was expecting you – and by hands unseen this our Round Table has been spread for my guests. Pretty coffee-cups, are they not? Ask no questions – there they are – but handle them gently – for the porcelain is delicate – and at rude touch will disappear from your fingers. A Book. Ay, ay – a Quarto – and by a writer of deserved Fame.

SEWARD

We are dissatisfied with it, sir. Dugald Stewart is hard on the Poet, and we desire to hear a vindication from our Master's lips.

NORTH

Master! We are all pupils Of the Poet. He is the Master of us all. Talboys, read out – and begin at the beginning.

TALBOYS

"In entering on this subject, it is proper to observe, that the word Poet is not here used in that restricted sense in which it is commonly employed; but in its original acceptation of Maker, or Creator. In plainer language, it is used to comprehend all those who devote themselves to the culture of the Arts which are addressed to the Imagination; and in whose minds it may be presumed Imagination has acquired a more than ordinary sway over the other powers of the Understanding. By using the word in such a latitude, we shall be enabled to generalise the observations which might otherwise seem applicable merely to the different classes of versifiers."

NORTH

That Mr. Stewart should, as a Philosopher, mark the liberal and magnanimous, and metaphysical large acceptation of the Name is right and good. But look at his Note.

TALBOYS

"For this latitude in the use of the word Poet, I may plead the example of Bacon and d'Alembert, the former of whom (De Aug. Scient., lib. xi. cap. 1) comprehends under Poetry all fables or fictitious histories, whether in prose or verse; while the latter includes in it painting, sculpture, architecture, music, and their different divisions."

NORTH

"I may plead the example" appears to me a somewhat pompous expression to signify that you have (very properly) adopted one doctrine of one of the wisest, and another of one of the ablest of men. But he does not seem to know that d'Alembert might have "pleaded the example" of Aristotle in "including painting, sculpture," &c. "Poetry," says the Stagyrite, "consists in imitation, and the imitation may be by pictures, sculpture, and the like." It is μιμησις – and it is Man's nature to rejoice in imitation – χαιρειν τοις μιμημασιν. But a singular and illustrative trait in Mr Stewart's treatment of the subject is, that though he thus, at the outset, enlarges the Poet into the Painter, the Sculptor, &c., yet throughout the whole composition, (I know not if an incidental word may anywhere occur as an exception,) every point of the argument regards the Poet in words and verse! In what frame of understanding could – did he put this Head to these fragments of limbs?

BULLER

In the name of the Prophet – Figs!

NORTH

I am more than half disposed to hint an objection to the use of the words "sway over the other powers." We should have said – and we do say, "predominance amongst the other powers." I see in "sway" two meanings: first, a right meaning, or truth, not well expressed; to wit, in thinking poetically – for his art, whatever it may be – or out of his art – the Poet's other faculties minister to his Imagination. She reigns. They conform their operations to hers. This manner of intellectual action happens in all men, more or less, oftener or seldomer; in the Poet – of what Art soever – upon each occasion, with much more decision and eminence, and more habitually. But secondly, a wrong meaning, or error, is better expressed by the word "sway," to wit, that Imagination in the Poet illegitimately overbears the other intellectual powers, as judgment, attention, reflection, memory, prudence. Now, you may say that every power that is given in great strength, tends to overbear unduly the other powers. The syllogistic faculty does – the faculty of observation does – memory does – and so a power unbalanced may appear as a weakness – as wealth ruins a fool. But in the just dispensation of nature every power is a power, and to the mind which she constitutes for greatness she gives balanced powers. Giving one in large measure – say Imagination – she gives as large the directly antagonistic power – say the Intellective, the Logical; or she balances by a mass of powers. I suspect that the undue over-swaying was in Stewart's mind, and has probably distorted his language. I know that Genius is the combination of ten faculties.

SEWARD