MISCELLANE
fion, a ftrong colouring, an un- common attitude of a worfe paint- er, feizes us at the firil glance, becaufe it is what we have not been ufed to fee. Raphael may be com- pared to Virgil, and the pointers of Venice with their forced attitudes to Lucan : Virgil, more natural, ftrikes lefs at Brii, to ftrike the more forcibly afterwards ; Lucan ftrikes more at firit, and affects us lefs afterwards.
The exaft proportion of the fa- mous church of Sr. Peter, makes it not appear at nrft fo great as it really is ; for we do not fee imme- diately where to fix ourfelves to judge of its greatnefs. If it was lefs in breadth, we mould be ftruck with the length ; if it was (horter, we fhould be ftruck with its breadth ; but as we continue our examination it grows upon the eye, and the afto- nilliment increafes. Itmaybecom- pared to the Pyrenees, where the eye that thinks it fees all at firft, difco- vers mountain behind mountain, and lofes itfelf more and more.
It often happens that our foul feels a pleafure when fhe has a fen- timent that fhe cannot herfelf un- fold, and that a thing feems to her abfolutely different from what it is, which gives her a fentiment of fur- prize, which (he cannot get out of. This is an example of it. It is known that Michael Angelo, feeing the Pantheon, which was the great- eft temple at Rome, faid he would make one like it, but that he would place it in the air. Upon this model then he made the dome of St. Peter ; but he made the pil- lars fo maflive, that that dome, which is like a mountain over one's head, appears light to the eye that confidersit. The mind at the time remains uncertain, between what fhe fees, and what fhe knows, and
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remains furprized to fee d mafs at once fo vaft, and fo lipht.
Of the beauties ivhich refuU from a certain embarrafment of the foul.
The foul is often furprized from not being able to reconcile what fhe now fees, with what fhe has feen. There is a great lake ia Italy called Lago iVIaggiore. It is a iirtle fea, whofe fhores fhew no- thing but what is entirely favage. Fifteen miles within the lake are two ifies of a quarter of a mile round, called the Barromes, which, in my opinion, is of all the world the fpoc the moft delightful ; the foul is aftonifhed in the romantic contraft, from a pleafing recollec- tion of the wonders of Romaaa, where having pafTed by rocks and a dry country, you find yourfelf in a fairy land. Contrafts alv/ays ftrike us, becaufe the two things always heighten or,e another.
Thefe forts of furprizes make the pleafure that is found in ail op- pofitions, in all antithefes, and fucii like figures. When Florus fays, " Sora ^ Algidum! who would be- lieve it had been formidable to us ! Saticula and Corniculum were once provinces. We blufti for the Bori- liansand Virulani, but we triumph- ed over them. In fhort, Tibur our fuburb, Prenefte where our houfes of pleafure are, were once the objecls of the vows v»e made at the Capitol." This author, I fay, fhews us at once the grandeur of the Romans, and the littlenefs of their beginnings, and thefe two things here raife oar wonder.
It may be here remarked, how wide the difference is between the antithefis of ideas, and the antithe- fis of exprefiion. The antithefis of expreffioa is never concealed; that
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