The New-York Weekly Magazine, or Miscellaneous Repository Part 31

In works of art, thoughts are what remain of a performance, when stripped of its embellishments. Thus, a poet's thoughts are what remains of his poems, independently of the verification and of some ideas, merely serving for its decoration and improvement.

Thoughts, therefore, are the materials proposed and applied by art to its purposes. The dress in which they appear, or the form into which they are moulded by the artist, is merely accidental; consequently, they are the first object of attention in every work of art; the spirit, the soul of a performance, which, if its thoughts are indifferent, is but of little value, and may be compared to a palace of ice, raised in the most regular form of an habitable structure, but, from the nature of its materials, totally useless.

While, therefore, you are contemplating an historical picture, try to forget that it is a picture; forget the painter, whose magic art has, by lights and shades, created bodies where there are none. Fancy to yourself that you are looking at men, and then attend to their actions.

Observe whether they are interesting; whether the persons express thoughts and sentiments in their faces, att.i.tudes, and motions; whether you may understand the language of their airs and gestures; and whether they tell you something remarkable. If you find it not worth your while to attend to the persons thus realised by your fancy, the painter has thought to little purpose.

Whilst listening to a musical performance, try to forget that you are hearing sounds of an inanimate instrument, produced only by great and habitual dexterity of lips or fingers. Fancy to yourself, that you hear a man speaking some unknown language, and observe whether his sounds express some sentiments; whether they denote tranquility or disturbance of mind, soft or violent, joyful or grievous affections; whether they express any character of the speaker; and whether the dialect be n.o.ble or mean. If you cannot discover any of these requisites, then pity the virtuoso for having left so much ingenuity dest.i.tute of thought.

In the same manner we must judge of poems, especially of the lyric kind.

That ode is valuable, which, when deprived of its poetical dress, still affords pleasing thoughts or images to the mind. Its real merit may be best discovered by transposing it into simple prose, and depriving it of its poetical colouring. If nothing remains, that a man of sense and reflection would approve, the ode, with the most charming harmony, and the most splendid colouring, is but a fine dress hung round a man of straw. How greatly then are those mistaken, who consider an exuberant fancy, and a delicate ear, as sufficient qualifications for a lyric poet!

It is only, after having examined the thoughts of a performance in their unadorned state, that we can p.r.o.nounce whether the attire, in which they have been dressed by art, fits, and becomes well or ill. A thought whose value and merit cannot be estimated, but from its dress, is, in effect, as futile and insignificant as a man who affects to display his merit by external pomp.

[[Source:

Original (English translation): A General Theory of the Polite Arts, delivered in single Articles, and digested according to the Alphabetical Order of their technical Terms. By John George Sulzer, Fellow of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Berlin.

Possible sources: 1774: _The Critical review: or, Annals of literature_, Volume 38, ed. Tobias George Smollett 1774: The Monthly Miscellany, 1774.

1790: _The New magazine of knowledge concerning Heaven and h.e.l.l_, Vol. I. This seems the most likely direct source.]]

ACTIVITY.

An ACTIVE life increases not only the powers of the body, but also those of the mind; while indolence is the destruction of both. If a man love his neighbour in a certain degree, and take the first opportunity of putting that love into ACTION, he will then love his neighbour better than he did before, or in a higher degree; and will therefore be more ready to serve him on a future occasion, than if he had omitted the first ACT of benevolence. This is an invariable truth, provided the ACT proceed from disinterested motives; the reason of which is grounded in this immutable law, that all influx is proportioned to efflux; or in other words, That in proportion as man puts forth himself into ACTUAL uses, in the same proportion the life which flows into him from the Lord, becomes fixed within him, and forms a plane for the reception of more life. A life of ACTIVITY, therefore, when under the direction of genuine wisdom, enlarges every faculty of the human soul, and at the same time capacitates man for the most n.o.ble and exquisite enjoyments.

Interesting History Of THE PRINCESS DE PONTHIEU.

_Translated from the French._

(Continued from page 59.)

These a.s.surances entirely satisfied the Queen, and they consulted together on measures by which they might be at liberty to entertain the ill.u.s.trious slaves the next day. The Sultan's coming in, put an end to their conversation for this time. This Prince, who had no other defect than his being a Saracen, accosted her with that joy, which his having had it in his power to oblige her, gave him---"Well madam," said he, "can you doubt of my love!---may I flatter myself, that what I have done will dispel the grief and melancholy that has so long possessed you?"---"I owe you every thing, my lord," said she, "and my whole endeavours shall be to express my grat.i.tude." The Sultan, charmed to find her in so good a humour, entertained her a little longer, and then told her (for he was just come from council) that it was resolved to oppose vigorously an irruption that a neighbouring prince had made into his dominions, and that war was going to be declared immediately.

This news inspired the Queen with a thought, which succeeded to her wish; and being willing to take advantage of the disposition she found the Sultan in, of granting her every thing; "Heaven," said she, "favours me in an extraordinary manner, in giving me an opportunity of acknowledging your goodness. One of the captives, my lord, whom you have given me, is the most valiant man of his time, nor is his conduct in war inferior to his courage, which the wonders he has done evinces. I am almost a.s.sured you will have the victory, if you permit him to combat the enemy." The Sultan remonstrated to her the difference of their religions, and the little a.s.surance he could have in the faith of a Christian. "I'll be the pledge of his fidelity; and the better to a.s.sure you, I'll keep the two other captives, who are, I know, very dear to him, as hostages." The Sultan seemed satisfied with these words, and granted her request, leaving her absolute mistress to act in this affair as she pleased; and retired to his apartment, much more affected with the joy of obliging her, than disturbed at the success of the war.

The beautiful Queen pa.s.sed the night in very different emotions; love had renewed his forces in her soul, nature that did for a while revolt at the remembrance of the cruelty inflicted on her, returned to its obedience, and was wholly taken up with the fear of not being loved, and remembered enough to be acknowledged, when discovered, with the joy she wished.----The Counts of Ponthieu and St. Paul spent not their hours more quietly. Thibault found himself agitated with the perturbations of a dawning pa.s.sion; he accused himself of it as a crime. The Count was no less embarra.s.sed about his, tho' he was very well a.s.sured they proceeded not from love, but the prodigious resemblance he found between his daughter and this lovely Queen, reminded him of the barbarity he had been guilty of.----He could not imagine there had been a possibility of saving that unhappy princess; but the tenderness with which the Sultaness had inspired him, was so near that he felt for his daughter, that it gave him an astonishment not to be conceived.

Day appearing, they rose, and set themselves about preparing the fruit, as Sayda had ordered them; which done, they were not long before they received a command to bring it to the Queen. Nothing could be more pleasing than this commission; both found an undescribable impatience to see her again, and followed the faithful slave 'till they came into her presence. They found her dressed with an incredible magnificence, resplendent with an infinite number of diamonds; she was reclined on a sofa, and after having looked a moment on them, "Well," said she, "are you ready to satisfy me?---I will not give you the pains of relating your names and qualities, neither are unknown to me; only tell me by what strange adventure you arrived at this place.---Count de Ponthieu, it is to you in particular I address."

The Count was in a surprize which cannot be expressed, to hear himself named, and finding there was indeed no room for dissimulation, told his story with sincerity; but when he came to that part which concerned his daughter, his sighs made many interruptions in his discourse, yet did he forget no circ.u.mstance, but confessed the crime he had been guilty of, in putting her to death: "But alas!" added he, "with what remorse has my soul been torn since that fatal day!---my tenderness for her revived with fresh vigour, and the torments I have endured, have been such, that if her spirit has any knowledge of what is transacted in this lower world, she must believe my punishment at least equal to my guilt."---Then he told her of their vow, their voyage to Jerusalem, the tempest, and their slavery and condemnation.---"This, madam," said he, "is a faithful account of our misfortunes; and though they are of a nature beyond the common rank of woes, yet they receive no inconsiderable alleviation, by the concern your excessive goodness makes you take in them."---And, indeed, the fair Sultaness, during the latter part of his relation, had seemed drowned in tears, and was some time before she could recover herself enough to speak; but at last---"I own,"

said she, "that what you have told me, very much touches me.--I extremely pity the Princess of Ponthieu, she was young, her reason might have returned to her; the generous proceeding of her husband, would doubtless have reclaimed her in time: but Heaven has punished you for your cruelty, you must not therefore be any more reproached with it. But to prove your penitence sincere, what reception would you give that Princess if by any miracle, which I cannot at present conceive, she should have escaped that destiny your rashness exposed her to?" "Ah madam!" cried the Count, "were there a possibility of such a blessing, my whole life should be employed in rendering hers fortunate!" "And you," said she to Thibault, who she saw overwhelmed in tears, "would your wife be dear to you? Could you forgive her distracted behaviour?

Could you restore her to your heart, as fond, as tender as ever?--in short, could you still love her?"--"Question it not, madam," answered he, with a voice interrupted with sighs, "nothing but her presence can ever make me happy."--"Receive her, then," cried she, casting aside her veil, and throwing herself into his arms, "I am that unfortunate wife--I am that daughter," added she, running to her father, "that has cost you so many melancholy hours. Own her, my lord; take her to your breast, my dear Thibault, nor let the sight of her dissipate the tenderness you expressed for her when unknown."

Who can describe the joy and astonishment of these ill.u.s.trious persons!

their eyes were now opened, the secret emotions they had felt, were now easy to be accounted for.---She was acknowledged for the wife, blessed as the daughter, with a torrent of inexpressible delight. Thibault threw himself at her feet, bathing her hands in tears of joy; while the Count held her in his arms, without being able to utter more than---my daughter---my dear---my long lost daughter.---The young Prince kissed her robe; and Sayda, only witness of this moving scene, dissolved in tears of tenderness and joy.---At length the first surprise being over, this mute language was succeeded by all the fond endearing things that nature, wit, and love had the power of inspiring. The beautiful Queen had now time to return the caresses of the young Prince her brother, who, though she knew no otherwise than by her father's account, his youth and beauty had very much affected her from the first time she saw him.---After having a little indulged their transports, "It is time,"

said she, "to inform you of my adventures. The Sultan is taken up with making preparations for a war he is obliged to enter into, so that we may have the liberty of conversing, without the apprehension of being interrupted."----Then having seated themselves, and Sayda being placed on the outside of the cabinet, to give them notice if any suspicious person should appear, the charming Sultaness addressing herself to the Count, began her discourse in this manner:

"I will not repeat," said she, "the cause of your designing my death, you are but too sensible of it, and the loss of my reason is too well known to you for me to go about to renew the affliction it occasioned you: I shall only say, that it was excess of love which caused my distraction, and being prepossessed with an idea of being no longer worthy of my husband's affection, imagining that I saw him reproaching me with my misfortune, and endeavouring to get rid of me; I was so abandoned by my senses, as to wish his death, as the only thing that could restore me to my repose. This thought so wholly engrossed my soul, that I looked on the sentence you inflicted on me, as caused by him; my frenzy prevented the horror of my fate from making any impression on me; and you may remember, Sir, that I neither endeavoured by intreaties or strugglings to avert it, being rather in a state of insensibility than any thing else. Which course my little vessel steered, or how long I continued in it, I know not---all I can tell, is, that I found myself in a real ship, in the midst of a great many unknown persons, busily employed in bringing me to myself; but what is most surprising, I recovered my sight, memory and reason, at the same instant; whether it was owing to the common effect which the fear of death has, or to the property of the sea, or, to judge better, the work of heaven: but all I had said, or done, or thought, came into my mind, and I found myself so guilty against you and my husband, that the first sign of life that my deliverers perceived in me, was by shedding an excessive shower of tears; which was the more violent, because I had never wept since that fatal adventure in the forest: and indeed I thought, as did all about me, that they would have suffocated me; but so much care was taken of me, that without putting an end to my affliction, my life was out of danger.

(_To be continued._)

ANECDOTES OF DR. GOLDSMITH.

As Goldsmith wrote for the book-sellers, he was looked on by many of them as a literary drudge equal to the task of compiling and translating, but little capable of original, and still less of poetical composition: he nevertheless wrote one of the finest poems of the lyric kind that our language has to boast of; the ballad, "Turn gentle Hermit of the Dale;" and surprised his friends with "The Traveller," a poem that contains some particulars of his own history. Johnson was supposed to have a.s.sisted him; but he contributed to the perfection of it only four lines; his opinion of it was, that it was the best written poem since the time of Pope. The favourable reception which the essay of his poetical talent met with, soon after tempted Goldsmith to the publication of his "Deserted Village," the merits whereof, consist in beautiful descriptions of rural manners; are sufficiently known.

His poems are replete with fine moral sentiments, and bespeak a great dignity of mind; yet he had no sense of the shame, nor dread of the evils of poverty.

He was buried in the Poet's Corner, in Westminster Abbey, and the inscription on his monument was written by Johnson.

The Doctor used to say he could play on the German flute as well as most men; at other times, as well as any man living: but, in truth, he understood not the character in which music is written, and played on that instrument, as many of the vulgar do, merely by air. Roubiliac, the sculptor, a merry fellow, once heard him play; and minding to put a trick on him, pretended to be charmed with his performance; as, also, that himself was skilled in the art, and entreated him to repeat the air, that he might write it down. Goldsmith readily consenting, Roubiliac called for paper, and scored thereon a few five-lined staves, which having done, Goldsmith proceeded to play, and Roubiliac to write; but his writing was only such random notes on the lines and s.p.a.ces, as any one might set down who had ever inspected a page of music. When they had both done, Roubiliac shewed the paper to Goldsmith, who looking it over with great seeming attention, said it was very correct, and that if he had not seen him do it, he never could have believed his friend capable of writing music after him.

_For the +New-York Weekly Magazine+._

CONSCIENCE.

"Methought the billows spoke, and told me of it, "The winds did sing it to me, and the thunder, "That deep and dreadful organ-pipe, p.r.o.nounc'd "The name of prosper."

TEMPEST.

The loss of fortune, dignity, glory, and all the pageantry of earthly grandeur, is comparatively trifling when put in compet.i.tion to that of virtue: when the human mind first stoops to debas.e.m.e.nt, and wanders in the paths of impiety, its progress to misery, although gradual, is too fatally inevitable, the smallest crimes by becoming habitual increase in time to the crimson tints of attrocity; then O conscience! thou most incessant and excruciating torturer, thou never failing monitor, 'tis then thine admonitions wound with remorse the breast of conscious vice; thou establishest thine awful tribunal on the ruins of neglected virtue, there to inflict a punishment far more severe than aught invented by the ingenuity of man.

When lulled in apparent security, and revelling in the round of transitory pleasure, thine awful presence intrudes itself upon the harra.s.sed imagination, and bids the lofty sinner reflect on the acts of injustice of which he has been guilty. The veil of oblivion, which with all the precaution of vice, he has endeavoured to cast over his crimes, thou canst in one unguarded moment cause himself to remove; his deeds of darkness, so cautiously enveloped with the specious garb of dissimulation and hypocrisy, are frequently by thee laid open to the scrutinizing eye of justice. His most secret recesses thou canst penetrate, his every joy embitter, and render him who was once hardened in iniquity, susceptible to the slightest emotions of fear. The man who once was callous to the tender plaints of misery and injured innocence, will, when under thy powerful influence, start at a shadow, tremble at an "unreal mockery," and imagine the most trivial sound a solemn summons of retribution.--Such, O conscience! is the form in which thou visitest the child of iniquity; such the shape in which thou approachest the votary of vice; how happy then the man, who void of guile, dreads not thy reproaches: who, supported by the consciousness of unspotted innocence, enjoys uninterrupted serenity and peace of mind; whose slumbers are undisturbed by the phantoms of a disordered imagination, and who looks forward with the ardour of hope and expectation to the time when the virtues and vices of mankind shall receive their just reward.

ALEXIS.

NEW-YORK _Aug. 22, 1796_.

EXTRAORDINARY EFFECT OF JEALOUSY.

Justina was esteemed the finest woman in Rome, but had the misfortune to marry a jealous headed husband, who had no other cause of suspicion, but that she was very beautiful. His disease increasing, for want of prudence he grew desperate, and seeing her stoop at a certain time to pull off her shoe, showed her wonderful white neck, and a fit of jealousy seizing him, he drew his sword and at one blow cut off her head from her body.