Water 37 



give imaginary extent, without inconvenience or con- 

 finement ; and every piece of artificial water, whether it 

 take the shape of a lake, a river, or a pool, must look 

 natural or it will fail to be agreeable. Nor is the im- 

 agination so fastidious as to take offence at any well- 

 supported deception, even after the want of reality is 

 discovered. When we are interested at a tragedy, we 

 do not inquire whence the characters are copied ; on 

 the contrary, we forget that we see a Garrick or a Sid- 

 dons, and join in the sorrows of a Belvidere or a 

 Beverley, though we know that no such persons ever 

 existed : it is enough if so much as we are shewn of 

 the character appears to be a just resemblance of nature. 

 In the same manner the magnificent water at Blen- 

 heim strikes with wonder and delight, while we neither 

 see its beginning nor end ; and we do not view it with 

 less pleasure after we are told that it was not originally 

 a natural lake, but that Mr. Brown, stopping the cur- 

 rent of a small river, collected this vast body of water 

 into the beautiful shape we now admire. 



Mr. Burke very justly observes "that a true artist 

 should put a generous deceit on the spectators, and 

 effect the noblest designs by easy methods. Designs 

 that are vast only by their dimensions are always the 

 sign of a common and low imagination. No work of 

 art can be great but as it deceives ; to be otherwise is 

 the prerogative of nature only."' 



