style enticed the poets and the public from the contemplation of
nobler and sterner models. In truth, though a rude state of
society is that in which great original works are most frequently
produced, it is also that in which they are worst appreciated.
This may appear paradoxical; but it is proved by experience, and
is consistent with reason. To be without any received canons of
taste is good for the few who can create, but bad for the many
who can only imitate and judge. Great and active minds cannot
remain at rest. In a cultivated age they are too often contented
to move on in the beaten path. But where no path exists they
will make one. Thus the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Divine Comedy,
appeared in dark and half barbarous times: and thus of the few
original works which have been produced in more polished ages we
owe a large proportion to men in low stations and of uninformed
minds. I will instance, in our own language, the Pilgrim's
Progress and Robinson Crusoe. Of all the prose works of fiction
which we possess, these are, I will not say the best, but the
most peculiar, the most unprecedented, the most inimitable. Had
Bunyan and Defoe been educated gentlemen, they would probably
have published translations and imitations of French romances "by
a person of quality." I am not sure that we should have had Lear
if Shakspeare had been able to read Sophocles.

But these circumstances, while they foster genius, are
unfavourable to the science of criticism. Men judge by
comparison. They are unable to estimate the grandeur of an
object when there is no standard by which they can measure it.
One of the French philosophers (I beg Gerard's pardon), who
accompanied Napoleon to Egypt, tells us that, when he first
visited the great Pyramid, he was surprised to see it so