but shows itself after a different manner. In the first it is like
a rich soil in a happy climate, that produces a whole wilderness of
noble plants rising in a thousand beautiful landscapes without any
certain order or regularity; in the other it is the same rich soil,
under the same happy climate, that has been laid out in walks and
parterres, and cut into shape and beauty by the skill of the
gardener.

The great danger in these latter kind of geniuses is lest they cramp
their own abilities too much by imitation, and form themselves
altogether upon models, without giving the full play to their own
natural parts. An imitation of the best authors is not to compare
with a good original; and I believe we may observe that very few
writers make an extraordinary figure in the world who have not
something in their way of thinking or expressing themselves, that is
peculiar to them, and entirely their own.

It is odd to consider what great geniuses are sometimes thrown away
upon trifles.

"I once saw a shepherd," says a famous Italian author, "who used to
divert himself in his solitudes with tossing up eggs and catching
them again without breaking them; in which he had arrived to so
great a degree of perfection that he would keep up four at a time
for several minutes together playing in the air, and falling into
his hand by turns. I think," says the author, "I never saw a
greater severity than in this man's face, for by his wonderful
perseverance and application he had contracted the seriousness and
gravity of a privy councillor, and I could not but reflect with
myself that the same assiduity and attention, had they been rightly