Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/323

Rh no longer the command of herself, every spring of her soul is in motion; she feels an irresistible impulse to compose, with quickness commits the thoughts to paper with which she is inspired; and, like a watch just wound up, as soon as her soul is put into motion by the impression the object has made, she expresses herself in poetry, without knowing in what manner the ideas and figures arise in her mind.

"Another and more nice observation of Plato's is, that the harmony and turn of the verse keep up the inspiration. Of this truth likewise our authoress is a living instance. No sooner has she hit upon the tone, as she calls it, and the foot of the verse, but the words go on fluently, and she is never at a loss for thought or imagery. The most delicate turns of the subject and expression arise in her mind (while she is yet writing) as if they were dictated to her."

Of her extempore performances, we have an excellent specimen in that beautiful Ode, Sacred to the Memory of her deceased Uncle, the Instructor of her Infancy, written in the Year 1761, at a time when she happened to be engaged in company of the first rank at Berlin: it consists of eight stanzas of six lines each, of which the third and sixth have nine syllables, the others ten. It seems, whilst she was in this select party, she was touched, by a sudden reflection, with a keen sense of the great difference between her present condition and the early part of her life, and of the great obligation she was under to the good old man, who, by his tender care and instruction, had laid the foundation of her present happiness. Overcome with the sense of this, and with a heart replete with gratitude, she could contain herself no longer, but, before all the company, poured forth the