DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.48955#0186
180 THE THREE UNITIES. Ch XXIII.
obstruitions, carry the reader into the heat of
ashon , the middle is properly where the action
is the most involved ; and the end is where
the event is brought about, and the plan accom-
plished.
A plan thus happily accomplissied after many
obslrucRions, affords wonderful delight to the read-
er; to produce which, a principle mentioned a-
bove1 mainly contributes, the same that disposes
the mind to complete every work commenced,
and in general to carry every thing to a conclu-
sion.
1 have given the foregoing example of a plan
crowned with success, because it affords the clear-
est conception of a beginning, a middle , and an
end, in which consists unity of adion; and in-
deed stricler unity cannot be imagined than in
that case. But an a&ion may have unity, or a
beginning, middle, and end, without so intimate a
relation- of parts; as where the catastrophe is dif-
ferent from what is intended or desired, which
frequently happens in our best tragedies. In the
JEneid, the hero, after many obstrudiions, makes
his plan effectual, dhe Iliad is formed upon a
different model: it begins with the quarrel be-
tween Achilles and Agamemnon ; goes on to de-
scribe the ‘several effects produced by that cause;
and ends in a reconciliation. Here is unity of ac-
* Chap; 8.
obstruitions, carry the reader into the heat of
ashon , the middle is properly where the action
is the most involved ; and the end is where
the event is brought about, and the plan accom-
plished.
A plan thus happily accomplissied after many
obslrucRions, affords wonderful delight to the read-
er; to produce which, a principle mentioned a-
bove1 mainly contributes, the same that disposes
the mind to complete every work commenced,
and in general to carry every thing to a conclu-
sion.
1 have given the foregoing example of a plan
crowned with success, because it affords the clear-
est conception of a beginning, a middle , and an
end, in which consists unity of adion; and in-
deed stricler unity cannot be imagined than in
that case. But an a&ion may have unity, or a
beginning, middle, and end, without so intimate a
relation- of parts; as where the catastrophe is dif-
ferent from what is intended or desired, which
frequently happens in our best tragedies. In the
JEneid, the hero, after many obstrudiions, makes
his plan effectual, dhe Iliad is formed upon a
different model: it begins with the quarrel be-
tween Achilles and Agamemnon ; goes on to de-
scribe the ‘several effects produced by that cause;
and ends in a reconciliation. Here is unity of ac-
* Chap; 8.