Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 17.djvu/25

Rh These are the chief characteristics of the bathos, and in each of these kinds we have the comfort to be blessed with sundry and manifold choice spirits in this our island.

E have already laid down the principles, upon which our author is to proceed, and the manner of forming his thought by familiarizing his mind to the lowest objects; to which, it may be added, that vulgar conversation will greatly contribute. There is no question, but the garret or the printer's boy may often be discerned in the compositions made in such scenes and company; and much of Mr. Curl himself has been insensibly infused into the works of his learned writers.

The physician, by the study and inspection of urine and ordure, approves himself in the science; and in like sort, should our author accustom and exercise his imagination upon the dregs of nature.

This will render his thoughts truly and fundamentally low, and carry him many fathoms beyond mediocrity. For, certain it is (though some lukewarm heads imagine they may be safe by temporizing between the extremes) that where there is not a triticalness or mediocrity in the thought, it can never be sunk into the genuine and perfect bathos by the most elaborate low expression: it can, at most, be only carefully Rh