AND BODILY STATES UPON THE IMAGINATION. 185 



Other charms are not wanting to excite the imagination of the 

 dweller of the south ; and here heauty, combined with the subtle 

 and pleasing stimuli which are addressed to every sense, acts with a 

 power exemplified only in the histories of Sappho, and Hero, and 

 Leander. 



The mental constitution cannot bear much additional excitement 

 to that which is here woven round it in a state of nature. Neither 

 opium, nor intoxicating liquids, nor raw beef-steaks — as in the case 

 of IMrs. RadclifFe — are wanting to add vigour to the imagina- 

 tion. The quantity of liquor which scarcely ruffles the Norwegian's 

 blood, would scatter madness and fever through the brain of the 

 Italian or Hindoo. This depends upon the quality of the climate 

 and its products, and the peculiar physical and moral frame to 

 which that quality gives rise. 



The mental constitution of man is modified by other agents, 

 besides those resulting from climate and natural situation ; one of 

 the most powerful of which is ^litude. This tends, from circum- 

 stances I shall presently mention, to strengthen some of the facul. 

 ties of the mind, to the deterioration or weakening of others, — to 

 heighten the vigour of the imagination, and proportionally to de- 

 press the faculties of reason and judgment by which its flights are 

 controlled. The peculiar pleasures or pains which are the result 

 of an excited imagination, in solitude^ are regulated, in a great mea- 

 sure, by the previous natural bias of the mind, the pleasures which 

 most occupied it, and the pursuits to which it was most addicted. If 

 the poet turn recluse, his solitude will glow with visions of a 

 brighter hue than those which he called up when his imagination 

 was weakened by the impression of a variety of objects upon his 

 senses. If the painter, the pictures of his imagination in the garret, 

 the cell, or the dungeon will be brighter in their colours than any 

 scenery which nature ever presented to his view. If he be fanatic 

 or enthusiast, angels will visit his bed, and reveal to his disordered 

 fancy more absurdities than are to be found in the visions of Mo- 

 hammed, or the pages of the Koran. Owing to this, Cellini, (in the 

 prisons of the Vatican, with a mind previously enthusiastic on the 

 subject of religion), fancied himself visited with manifestations of 

 divine glory, and miraculous appearances and communications from 



