_The Man that hath not Musick in his Soul, And is not mov'd with Concord of sweet Sounds; Is fit for Treasons, Stratagems, and Spoils; The Motions of his Spirit are dull as Night, And his Affections dark as Erebus: Let no such Man be trusted.----_[2]
And as Poetry was by the Heathen stiled the _Language of the Gods_; much the same may be said by a Christian of the one true Deity: Since a great part of the Holy Scriptures themselves is to the last degree Poetical, both in Sentiments, and Diction.
But among all the Species, or Kinds of Poetry; That which is distinguished by the Name of Epic, or Heroic, is beyond comparison the Noblest, and most Excellent. _An Heroic Poem, truly such, is undoubtedly the greatest Work which the Soul of Man is capable to perform._ These are the first Words of Mr. _Dryden_'s admirable Dedication of his _English Æneis_ to the present Duke of _Buckingham_: They are translated indeed from Monsieur _Rapin_; and are likewise the first Words of his Comparison between _Homer_ and _Virgil_.[3] "The Design of it (continues Mr. _Dryden_) is to form the Mind to Heroic Virtue by Example; 'Tis convey'd in Verse, that it may delight, while it instructs; The Action of it is always One, Entire, and Great. The least, and most trivial Episodes, or Under-Actions, which are interwoven in it, are Parts either necessary, or convenient; that no others can be imagined more suitable to the place in which they are. There is Nothing to be left void in a firm Building; even the Cavities ought not to be filled with Rubbish, which is of a perishable Kind, destructive of the Strength: But with Brick, or Stone, tho' of less pieces, yet of the same Nature, and fitted to the Cranies. Even the least Portions of them must be of the Epic kind; All Things must be Grave, Majestical, and Sublime: Nothing of a foreign Nature, like the trifling Novels, which _Ariosto_,[4] and others have inserted in their Poems. By which the Reader is misled into another sort of Pleasure, opposite to That which is designed in an Epic Poem. One raises the Soul, and hardens it to Virtue; the other softens it again, and unbends it into Vice." But what makes this Kind of Poem preferable to all others, is, that it virtually contains and involves them: I mean their Excellencies and Perfections, besides That which is proper, and peculiar to it self. This likewise is observed by Mr. _Rapin_ in the place above-cited: And by this Assertion I do not contradict what I have cited from Mr. _Dryden_; which I am supposed to approve, while I transcribe it. For besides that he does not speak, as I do, of the different _Turns_, and _Modifications_ of _Thinking_, and _Writing_, but of _trifling Episodes_, or _Under-Actions_, which he says are improper for this sort of Poetry, and in which I entirely agree with him; I say, besides This, I do not affirm that an Ode, or an Elegy, for example, can with propriety be _actually_, and _formally_ inserted in an Heroic Poem; But only that the regular Luxuriancy, and noble Excursions of _That_, and the pathetical and tender Complainings of _This_, are not always forreign to the Nature of an Epic Subject, but are sometimes very properly introduced to adorn it. The same may be said of the Poignancy of Satyr; and the natural Images of ordinary Life in Comedy. It is one Thing to say, that an Heroic Poem virtually includes These; and another, that it actually puts them into Practice, or shews them at large in their proper Forms, and Dresses. I do not mention Tragedy; because That is so nearly ally'd to Heroic Poetry, that there is no Dispute or Question concerning it. An Epic Poem then is the same to all the other Kinds of Poetry, as the _Primum Mobile_ is to the System of the Universe, according to the Scheme of the ancient Astronomy: That great Orb including all the heavenly Bodies in it's Circumference, and whirling them round with it's own Motion. And then the Soul of the Poet, or rather of Poetry, informing this mighty, and regular Machine, and diffusing Life and Spirit thro' the whole Frame, resembles that _Anima Mundi_, that Soul of the World, according to the _Platonic_, and _Pythagorean_ Philosophy, thus admirably represented in the Sixth _Æneid_: