A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes
him out of himself. That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment,
and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or
not is usually in our own power; but the Sublime, acting with an
imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or
no. Skill in invention, lucid arrangement and disposition of facts, are
appreciated not by one passage, or by two, but gradually manifest
themselves in the general structure of a work; but a sublime thought, if
happily timed, illumines[2] an entire subject with the vividness of a
lightning-flash, and exhibits the whole power of the orator in a moment
of time. Your own experience, I am sure, my dearest Terentian, would
enable you to illustrate these and similar points of doctrine.

[Footnote 2: Reading διεφώτισεν.]


II

The first question which presents itself for solution is whether there
is any art which can teach sublimity or loftiness in writing. For some
hold generally that there is mere delusion in attempting to reduce such
subjects to technical rules. “The Sublime,” they tell us, “is born in a
man, and not to be acquired by instruction; genius is the only master
who can teach it. The vigorous products of nature” (such is their view)
“are weakened and in every respect debased, when robbed of their flesh
and blood by frigid technicalities.”

2
But I maintain that the truth can be shown to stand otherwise in this
matter. Let us look at the case in this way; Nature in her loftier and