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VII. The painter's researches for views, which by a sort of
irregular symmetry may affect the imagination strongly, or
may please the eye by richness of tints or variety of
shades, are generally gratified where the ruder boldness of
mountains is contrasted with the rich foliage of trees, or
with sheets or streams of water: or where clouds and vapours
intersperse varieties of aerial scenery, that change as it
were by magic, impressing on the objects within their effect
a hue and cast of appearance that scarce seems earthly. He
chuses his stations where these may not only meet at once,
but in such an arrangement as may strike the mind
powerfully, and leave their impression and image upon the
memory. Where painting goes, there generally goes poetry;
their walks are the same; their beloved scenes are similar,
and have always been so from the Grecian temple, to the
green glens of Britain.
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VIII. Wherever there are mountains, there are certain
changes of weather, quite dissimilar to those which are
experienced in leveller places; nay, there are diversities
of climate in places equally mountainous, arising from the
different directions of their hills, or the position of them
with respect to one another; for by the intervention of
hills, winds may be diverted from their original course, and
part of them so diverted as to cross and interrupt each
other; or they may be precipitated from the summits; or,
again, in some cases generated by a mere agglomeration of
clouds or mists. Now, it is well known what a material
effect winds have upon the weather, or rather how intimately
they are connected with it: and wherever the observers of
the seasons find their prognostics changed from those of the
low lands, where they are most commonly made, (because there
they can be made with more certainty, and earlier with
respect to their consequences,) there must be an amazing
tract for natural philosophy to walk in, and examine the
causes: yet this it may do with more ease in a hilly
country, than a level one; because amongst hills the effects
more immediately follow the cause, and both may be observed
almost at once. In either case, it may perhaps divert a
classic reader to compare the modern rustic method of
foretelling weather, with that of Hesiod and Virgil.
It will easily be seen, that the proceeding paragraphs have
no regular plan in themselves, nor dependence upon each
other: they are indeed only so many distinct themes on which
I mean to comment, without observing any order, or having
any other reference but what regards the plans. However, as
they are very diffuse in their nature, it may not be amiss
to subjoin a general application of each, and shew in what
manner they concern the business which I have undertaken.
I. With respect to the first, I cannot begin this subject
better than with an observation of Sir Walter Raleigh's.
Speaking of that passage in Herodotus, wherein he ascribes
the great wars between the Persians and Greeks to the vanity
of Atossa the Persian Queen, who being desirous of having
some Grecian bondwomen, teized her husband till he began
that terrible contest; Sir Walter says, "This I may boldly
affirm, (having, I think, in every estate some sufficient
witness,) that matters of much consequence, founded, in all
seeming, upon substantial reasons, have issued indeed from
such petty trifles, as no historian would either think upon,
or could well search out." To this sentiment I so entirely
accede, as to believe, that more than half of the great
affairs of this world might, had we but the proper clue, be
traced to some insignificancy or other as their origin: for
if we say that trifles affect the minds of men in the most
eminent stations, we may instance the proffer of assistance
made by the Grand Signior to Henry IV. of France, merely
because the former hated the word [League]. What
dreadful havoc was occasioned in England by a casual amour,
and subsequent marriage of Edward IV. Affairs purely
domestic made Henry VIII. shake off the Pope's supremacy;
and a ludicrous present of a few tennis-balls is said not a
little to have exasperated that
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