DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.69192#0049
[ XXXI J
manner the whole story is full of machinery, or
carried on by the interpofition of the gods.
Our modern poets seem not to have had any
right notion of the antient scheme of machinery,
till the middle of the last century ; and, even now,
very impersedi ideas. As they had not the same-
general plan, nor the same dodrines to go upon,
they committed' several errors about it, both in
their own practice, and in their sentiments of the
antients, which continue, in a great degree, to‘this
day. The chief os these errors were, first, that
machinery was used by the poets Only for orna-
ment, or to make a poem look more strange and
surprizing : secondly, that the poets were too apt
to introduce machinery (or supernatural causes)
where they could not naturally account for events ;
whereas, in the works of the antients, nature and
machinery generally go hand in hand, and serve
chiessy to manifeit each other. Thus, in the
storm above-mentioned, imaginary beings are in-
troduced ; but they are only such as are proper for
the part assigned them, and appear only to carry on
the true order of natural effects. The god of the
winds, at the request of the goddess of the air, lets
loose his turbulent subje&s, and the sea is instantly
in a tumult. The god of the sea appears to make
it calm again. There seem§ to be no other dif-
ference in this, and the natural account of the
thing, than if one should say, that all the parts of
matter tend towards each other ; and another
C 4. flxould
manner the whole story is full of machinery, or
carried on by the interpofition of the gods.
Our modern poets seem not to have had any
right notion of the antient scheme of machinery,
till the middle of the last century ; and, even now,
very impersedi ideas. As they had not the same-
general plan, nor the same dodrines to go upon,
they committed' several errors about it, both in
their own practice, and in their sentiments of the
antients, which continue, in a great degree, to‘this
day. The chief os these errors were, first, that
machinery was used by the poets Only for orna-
ment, or to make a poem look more strange and
surprizing : secondly, that the poets were too apt
to introduce machinery (or supernatural causes)
where they could not naturally account for events ;
whereas, in the works of the antients, nature and
machinery generally go hand in hand, and serve
chiessy to manifeit each other. Thus, in the
storm above-mentioned, imaginary beings are in-
troduced ; but they are only such as are proper for
the part assigned them, and appear only to carry on
the true order of natural effects. The god of the
winds, at the request of the goddess of the air, lets
loose his turbulent subje&s, and the sea is instantly
in a tumult. The god of the sea appears to make
it calm again. There seem§ to be no other dif-
ference in this, and the natural account of the
thing, than if one should say, that all the parts of
matter tend towards each other ; and another
C 4. flxould