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in profecuting discoveries, gives the defcription a confiderable appearance of propriety. Yet even here it has not entire propriety. A perfon may poffefs ftrength of judgment in a very high degree, and the kind of judgment perfectly adapted to science, and yet be deftitute of Scientific genius: he may be an accurate critic on the investigations of others, and yet himself no inventer. Many perfons who could never have made original discoveries, have explained the discoveries of others with great diftin&tnefs, and decided between contending theories with great acutenefs and folidity. On the contrary, a perfon who poffeffes that particular form of imagination which fits for scientifical discoveries, is never wholly deftitute of scientific genius; no such person is ever found without a degree of judgment fufficient for enabling him to make fome difcoveries. If his judgment be not fo deep and found as to prevent his falling into mistakes, yet his investigations will fhow ingenuity notwithstanding his -mistakes. The theories of Des Cartes, Leib:nitz,:Malebranche, Berkeley, must be acknowleged to be ingenious, though in many particulars they be not just these philofophers

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had genius, they poffeffed very confiderable powers of imagination, but not judgment proportionably piercing. Even in scientific genius, therefore, imagination is the leading faculty: where it prevails and is fuitably conftructed, fuch genius is never totally wanting; and without this, no degree of fuch genius ever can exist.

BUT in genius for the arts, an uncommon ftrength of judgment is fo far from being neceffary, that a degree of imagination which would have produced genius, if it had been joined to an ordinary judgment, may be rendered abortive, and unable to display itself, by being united to a very nice judgment. The great acuteness of this faculty will dif× cover every the smallest blemish in what fancy produces, and will, by fcrupulously canvaffing it and requiring greater excellence than the imagination can attain, extinguish its ardor, and make it give over attempting to invent, or else enervate its inventions, deprive them of force and fpirit, and substitute an -infipid correctness in its place (6). It is al

(3) Evenit plerumque ut hac diligentia deterior etiam fiat oratio.- Nam illa quæ curam fatentur, et ficta atque compofita videri etiam volunt, nec gratiam confequuntur, &c. QUINT, Int. Orat. lib. viii. procem. Nec promptum eft

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moft better to give fancy an uncontrouled range, than to break its vigour by the continual reftraint of an overfcrupulous judgment. Puntormo is faid to have possessed a degree of genius fufficient for producing pictures which obtained the approbation of Raphael and Michael Angelo; but the excefsive scrupulousness of his judgment rendered his genius in a great measure useless; he not only was extremely tedious, but also could never please himself, or be satisfied with any of his own works. It was the fame cause that made Virgil enjoin his friends to burn the Æneid; it was not finished with all the exactness that the nicety of his judgment required: had the injunction been obeyed, it would have been a striking instance of the effects of very great genius blasted by an exceffive degree of judgment (c). In the arts,

dicere, utros peccare validius putem, quibus omnia fua placent, an quibus nihil. Accidit enim etiam ingeniofis adolefcentibus frequenter ut labore confumantur, et in filentium ufque defcendant nimia bene dicendi cupiditate. Id. lib. x. cap. 3.

(c) Protogenes, whom Apelles blamed for hurting his works by correcting them too much, and Leonardi da Vinci, who left many of his pictures unfinished, because he could not finish them fuitably to his high idea of perfection, are appofite examples here; but having had occafion to quote them elsewhere, the former, Essay on Tafte, Part 11. fect. 6. the latter, Ibid. fect. 5. I was unwilling to use a repetition.

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then, an uncommon acuteness of judgment is fo far from conftituting genius, that it will abfolutely destroy genius, unless the imagi nation be as uncommonly comprehenfive. The former faculty muft not have greater ac curacy than is proportioned to the extent and vigour of the latter. Judgment must preferve imagination from lofing itfelf in its excurfions, without obftru&ting its vifiting freely all the regions of nature. It must prevent unnatural affociations, without checking fuch as are bold. It muft regulate, but not destroy the impetuofity and ardor of the foul. It has been obferved that, though fyftems of precepts in the arts, direct and improve the judgment, they rather curb and restrain genius. They render men fo ftudious to avoid faults, that they fearce aim at beauties. It is remarked that, when works of imagination have been brought to the utmost degree of correctness in any age or nation, there has been afterwards very little difplay of original or extenfive genius. This may have been owing in part to natural caufes, which feem never to suffer an age illuftrious for arts and sciences, to be of long continuance: but it has probably been owing in part like wife to

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the cause that is more commonly assigned; That a tafte for correctnefs being once gene-. rally established, the neceffity which artists were under of producing this quality, in order to gain approbation, cramped their imaginations and difpirited their works.

SECT. VI.

Taste essential to Genius for the Arts.

HE obfervations which were formerly

THE obfervatie diference between ge

made upon the difference between genius for the sciences, and genius for the arts, in respect of the affiftance which they receive from judgment, regarded chiefly the degree and manner in which judgment is exercised in their operations. But thefe two kinds of genius imply likewife different kinds of judg

ment.

SCIENTIFIC genius requires only that kind of judgment which has truth for its object; but it requires great ftrength of judgment in that kind. As that kind includes feveral fpecies, the predominance of one or another of these, will adapt genius to the correspondent fubject of investigation; but any one of Cc 4

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