III. 303. That Beauty is Truth, I. 142; III. 180, &c. Beauty of Virtue, I. 315. Scale of Beauty, III. 218. How attractive and enchanting, III. 216, 218. Its extent, II. 211, 212, 213.

It is scarcely possible to read the passages, here referred to, without recurring to Gray's poem, De Principiis cogitandi.

"Sapientia dia

Hinc roseum accendit lumen, vultuque sereno
Humanas aperit mentes, nova gaudia monstrans,
Deformesque fugat curas, vanosque timores;
Scilicet et rerum crescit pulcherrima virtus.”

Will the reader excuse me for introducing in this place a passage from the Harmonies of Nature? It belongs expressly to the subject.

"Every object, which awakens pleasure in the mind, is beautiful; since it produces the sensation of pleasure. Whatever excites agreeable emotion, therefore, possesses some intrinsic quality of beauty. Hence the term beauty may be applied to every thing, which gives pleasure to the mind; from a woman to a problem; from a planet to a tree or a flower. Hence arises the intimate connexion between beauty and virtue.

"In the spirit of this doctrine, WIELAND, the celebrated German poet, has written a dialogue, conceived in the manner, and executed with much of the sweetness and delicacy of Plato. He imagines SOCRATEs to surprise TIMOCLEA, a captivating Athenian virgin, at

her toilette; dressed for a solemn festival in honour of Diana; attired in all the beauty of Nature and all the luxuriance of art. His surprising her in this manner gives rise to a dialogue, in which the subject of real and apparent BEAUTY is philosophically discussed. The arguments are summed up by TiMOCLEA, at the end of the discourse, in which she declares herself a convert to that fine moral doctrine, which teaches, that nothing is beautiful, which is not good; and nothing good, but what is, at the same time, intrinsically beautiful."

"Unless the IMAGINATION be excited, as Mr. Alison observes*, the emotions of beauty and sublimity are unfelt. Hence, whatever increases the powers of that faculty, increases those emotions in like proportion; and no objects or qualities being felt, either as beautiful or sublime, but such as are productive of some simple emotion, no composition of objects, or qualities, produce emotions of taste, in which that unity is not preserved.'

"Not let the gleam

Of youthful hope," &c.

B. I. 387.

"

Akenside,-in his admiration of the Deity,-was an ardent and decided enemy to every species of superstition. In the MS. notes, attached to his own copy, stands the following alteration.

"Nor be the hopes

Which flatter youthful bosoms here appall'd,

Ch. i. sect. 2, 3; ch. ii. sect. 2, 3.

Nor let false terror urge you to renounce
This awful theme of undeceitful good,

And truth eternal. Though th' abhorred threats
Of sacred SUPERSTITION, in the quest

Of that kind pair, constrain her kneeling slave,
To quench, and set at nought the lamp of God
Within his frame:-through deserts, thorns, and mire,
Though forth she led him credulous and dark,
And awed with dubious motion; though at length
Benighted, terrified, afflicted, lost,

She leaves him to converse with cells, and graves,
And shapes of death; to listen all alone,
And by the screaming owl's accursed song,
To watch the dreadful workings of his heart;
Or talk with spectres on eternal woe,
Yet be not you dismay'd. A gentler star
Your lovely search enlightens."

This version is very different from those of the first and second poems; and much superior to both. The passage in the first poem (Book I. 387) is supposed to have been levelled at, Dr. YOUNG: and a similar application has been made of a stanza in his Preface to the Odes.

"Nor where the boding raven chaunts,
Nor near the owl's unhallow'd haunts,
Will she her cares employ;

But flies from ruins and from tombs,
From Superstition's horrid glooms,

To day-light and to joy."

“And wake the strong divinity of soul,
That conquers chance and fate," &c.

I. 431.

In the MS. corrected poem, we are directed to read:

"Which conquers change or fate; or whether tun'd
For triumph, on the summit to proclaim

Her toils; around her brow to twine the wreath

Of ever-lasting praise; through future worlds
To follow her interminated way.”

In the second poem:

"Which conquers chance or fate; or on the height
The goal assign'd her, haply to proclaim

Her triumph; on her brow to place the crown
Of uncorrupted praise.”

"As the pearl

Shines in the concave of its azure bed,

And painted shells indent their speckled wreath."

"Concharumque genus parili ratione videmus
Pingere telluris gremium."

I. 454.

LUCRETIUS, De Rer. Nat. II. 374. Mrs. Barbauld, in her essay on the poem of Akenside, makes an assertion, very extraordinary for a lady of her talents and observation. "In the Pleasures of Imagination only three similes are to be found; viz. that of Memnon's harp; that of the parhelion; and that of the needles." There are,

on the contrary, two in the first book, more than she alludes to; eight in the second; and six in the third. There are also ten more in the second poem.