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able in themselves, confiftent with melody and harmony, and affociated with agreeable affections and fentiments. Its merit is fo inconfiderable, that mufic purely instrumental is rather hurt than improved by it; and vocal mufic employs it only as a help to the expreffion, except in fome rare cafes, where the imitation is itself expreffive as well as agreeable, and at the fame time within the power of the human voice.

The best masters lay it down as a maxim, that melody and harmony are not to be deferted, even for the fake of expreffion itself *. Expreffion that is not confiftent with these is not mufical expreffion; and a composer who does not render them confiftent, violates the effential rules of his art +. If we com

• Avifon on Mufical Expreffion, page 56.

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+ Harmony and Melody are as effential to genuine mufic, as perfpective is to painting. However folicitous a painter may be to give expreffion to the figures in his back ground, he must not ftrengthen their colour, nor define their outlines, fo as to hurt the perfpective by bringing them too near. A mufician will be equally faulty, if he violate the harmony of his piece, in order to heighten the pathos. There is likewife in poetry fomething analogous to this. In thofe poems that require a regular and uniform verfification, a poet may perhaps, in fome rare inftances, be allowed to break through the rules of his verfe, for the fake of rendering his numbers more emphatical. Milton at least is intitled to take fuch a liberty:

Burn'd after them to the bottomlefs pit.

Eternal wrath

S 2

Parad. Loft.

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pare Imitation with Expreffion, the fuperiority of the latter will be evident. Imitation without Expreffion is nothing: Imitation detrimental to Expreffion is faulty: Imitation is never tolerable, at leaft in ferious mufic, except it promote and be fubfervient to Expreffion. If then the highest excellence may be attained in inftrumental mufic, without imitation; and if, even in vocal music, imitation have only a fecondary merit; it must follow, that the imitation of nature is not effential to this art; though fometimes, when judiciously employed, it may be ornamental.

Different paffions and fentiments do indeed give different tones and accents to the

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But thefe licences muft not be too glaring: and therefore I know not whether Dyer is not blameable for giving us, in order to render his numbers imitative, a Trochaic verfe of four feet and an half, instead of an Iambic of five:

The pilgrim oft

At dead of night, midft his oraison hears
Aghaft the voice of Time; difparting towers
Tumbling all precipitate, down dafb'd,
Rattling around, &c.

Ruins of Rome.

human

human voice. But can the tones of the most pathetic melody be faid to bear a resemblance to the voice of a man or woman fpeaking from the impulse of paffion?—The flat key, or minor mode, is found to be well adapted to a melancholy fubject; and, if I were dif posed to refine upon the imitative qualities of the art, I would give this for a reason, that melancholy, by depreffing the fpirits, weakens the voice, and makes it rife rather by minor thirds, which consist of but four femitones, than by major thirds, which confift of five. But is not this reafon more fubtle than folid? Are there not melancholy airs in the harp key, and chearful ones in the flat? Nay, in the fame air, do we not often meet with a tranfition from the one key to the other, without any fenfible change in the expreffion?

Courage is apt to vent itself in a strong tone of voice: but can no mufical ftrains infpire fortitude, but fuch as are fonorous? The Lacedemonians did not think fo; 0therwise they would not have used the mufic of foft pipes when advancing to battle *. If it be objected, that the firm deliberate valour, which the Spartan music was intended to infpire, does not exprefs itself in a bluftering, but rather in a gentle accent, refembling the music of foft pipes, I would recommend it to the objector to chufe, from

* Aulus Gellius, lib. 1. cap. 1.

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all the mufic he is acquainted with, fuch an air as he thinks would moft effectually awaken his courage; and then confider, how far that animating strain can be faid to refemble the accent of a commander complimenting his troops after a victory, or encouraging them before it. Shakespeare speaks of the " fpirit-ftirring drum;" and a most emphatical epithet it must be allowed to be. But why does the drum excite courage ? Is it because the found imitates the voice of a valiant man? or does the motion of the drumsticks bear any fimilitude to that of his legs or arms?

Many Christians (I wish I could fay all) know to their happy experience, that the tones of the organ have a wonderful power in raifing and animating devout affections. But will it be faid, that there is any refemblance between the found of that noble inftrument, or the fineft compofitions that can be played on it, and the voice of a human creature employed in an act of worship?

One of the most affecting styles in mufic is the Paftoral. Some airs put us in mind of the country, of rural fights and rural "founds," and difpofe the heart to that chearful tranquillity, that pleasing melancholy, that "vernal delight," which groves and ftreams, flocks and herds, hills and vallies, infpire. But of what are thefe paftoral airs imitative? Is it of the murmur of waters, the warbling of groves, the lowing of herds,

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the bleating of flocks, or the echo of vales and mountains? Many airs are pastoral, which imitate none of these things. What then do they imitate? the fongs of ploughmen, milkmaids, and fhepherds? Yes: they are fuch, as we think we have heard, or might have heard, fung by the inhabitants of the country. Then they must resemble country-fongs; and if fo, thefe fongs must alfo be in the paftoral ftyle. Of what then are these country-fongs, the fuppofed archetypes of paftoral mufic, imitative? Is it of other country-fongs? This fhifts the difficulty a step backward, but does not by any means take it away. Is it of rural founds, proceeding from things animated, or from things inanimate? or of rural motions—of men, beasts, or birds? of winds, woods, or waters? In a word, an air may be pastoral, and in the highest degree pleasing, which imitates neither found nor motion, nor any thing else whatever.

After all, it must be acknowledged, that there is fome relation at least, or analogy, if not fimilitude, between certain mufical founds, and mental affections. Soft mufic may be confidered as analogous to gentle emotions; and loud mufic, if the tones are fweet and not too rapid, to fublime ones; and a quick fucceffion of noify notes, like those we hear from a drum, feems to have fome relation to hurry and impetuofity of paffion. Sometimes, too, there is from na

ture,

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