Page:An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding - Hume (1748).djvu/50

 them, and delineates more distinctly those minute Circumstances, which, tho' to the Historian they seem superfluous, serve mightily to enliven the Imagery, and gratify the Fancy. If it be not necessary, as in the Iliad, to inform us each time the Hero buckles his Shoes, and ties his Garters, 'twill be requisite, perhaps, to enter into a greater Detail than in the Henriade; where the Events are run over with such Rapidity, that we scarce have Leizure to become acquainted with the Scene or Action. Were a Poet, therefore, to comprehend in his Subject any great Compass of Time or Series of Events, and trace up the Death of Hector to its remote Causes, in the Rape of Helen, or the Judgment of Paris; he must draw out his Poem to an immeasurable Length, in order to fill this large Canvas with just Painting and Imagery. The Reader's Imagination, enflam'd with such a Series of poetical Descriptions, and his Passions, agitated by a continual Sympathy with the Actors, must flag long before the Period of the Narration, and must sink into Lassitude and Disgust, from the repeated Violence of the same Movements.

. That an Epic Poet must not trace the Causes to any great Distance, will farther appear, if we consider another Reason, which is drawn from a Property of the Passions still more remarkable and singular. 'Tis evident, that, in a just Composition, all the Affections, excited by the different Events, de-