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"All this," said the Prince, "is much to be desired, but I am
afraid that no man will be able to breathe in these regions of
speculation and tranquillity. I have been told that respiration is
difficult upon lofty mountains, yet from these precipices, though
so high as to produce great tenuity of air, it is very easy to
fall; therefore I suspect that from any height where life can be
supported, there may be danger of too quick descent."

"Nothing," replied the artist, "will ever be attempted if all
possible objections must be first overcome. If you will favour my
project, I will try the first flight at my own hazard. I have
considered the structure of all volant animals, and find the
folding continuity of the bat's wings most easily accommodated to
the human form. Upon this model I shall begin my task to-morrow,
and in a year expect to tower into the air beyond the malice and
pursuit of man. But I will work only on this condition, that the
art shall not be divulged, and that you shall not require me to
make wings for any but ourselves."

"Why," said Rasselas, "should you envy others so great an
advantage? All skill ought to be exerted for universal good; every
man has owed much to others, and ought to repay the kindness that
he has received."

"If men were all virtuous," returned the artist, "I should with
great alacrity teach them to fly. But what would be the security
of the good if the bad could at pleasure invade them from the sky?
Against an army sailing through the clouds neither walls,
mountains, nor seas could afford security. A flight of northern
savages might hover in the wind and light with irresistible
violence upon the capital of a fruitful reason. Even this valley,
the retreat of princes, the abode of happiness, might be violated
by the sudden descent of some of the naked nations that swarm on
the coast of the southern sea!"

The Prince promised secrecy, and waited for the performance, not
wholly hopeless of success. He visited the work from time to time,
observed its progress, and remarked many ingenious contrivances to
facilitate motion and unite levity with strength. The artist was
every day more certain that he should leave vultures and eagles
behind him, and the contagion of his confidence seized upon the
Prince. In a year the wings were finished; and on a morning
appointed the maker appeared, furnished for flight, on a little
promontory; he waved his pinions awhile to gather air, then leaped
from his stand, and in an instant dropped into the lake. His
wings, which were of no use in the air, sustained him in the water;
and the Prince drew him to land half dead with terror and vexation.



CHAPTER VII-- THE PRINCE FINDS A MAN OF LEARNING.



The Prince was not much afflicted by this disaster, having suffered
himself to hope for a happier event only because he had no other
means of escape in view. He still persisted in his design to leave
the Happy Valley by the first opportunity.

His imagination was now at a stand; he had no prospect of entering
into the world, and, notwithstanding all his endeavours to support
himself, discontent by degrees preyed upon him, and he began again
to lose his thoughts in sadness when the rainy season, which in
these countries is periodical, made it inconvenient to wander in
the woods.

The rain continued longer and with more violence than had ever been
known; the clouds broke on the surrounding mountains, and the
torrents streamed into the plain on every side, till the cavern was
too narrow to discharge the water. The lake overflowed its banks,
and all the level of the valley was covered with the inundation.
The eminence on which the palace was built, and some other spots of
rising ground, were all that the eye could now discover. The herds
and flocks left the pasture, and both the wild beasts and the tame
retreated to the mountains.

This inundation confined all the princes to domestic amusements,
and the attention of Rasselas was particularly seized by a poem
(which Imlac rehearsed) upon the various conditions of humanity.
He commanded the poet to attend him in his apartment, and recite
his verses a second time; then entering into familiar talk, he
thought himself happy in having found a man who knew the world so
well, and could so skilfully paint the scenes of life. He asked a
thousand questions about things to which, though common to all
other mortals, his confinement from childhood had kept him a
stranger. The poet pitied his ignorance, and loved his curiosity,
and entertained him from day to day with novelty and instruction so
that the Prince regretted the necessity of sleep, and longed till
the morning should renew his pleasure.

As they were sitting together, the Prince commanded Imlac to relate
his history, and to tell by what accident he was forced, or by what
motive induced, to close his life in the Happy Valley. As he was
going to begin his narrative, Rasselas was called to a concert, and
obliged to restrain his curiosity till the evening.



CHAPTER VIII--THE HISTORY OF IMLAC.



The close of the day is, in the regions of the torrid zone, the
only season of diversion and entertainment, and it was therefore
midnight before the music ceased and the princesses retired.
Rasselas then called for his companion, and required him to begin
the story of his life.

"Sir," said Imlac, "my history will not be long: the life that is
devoted to knowledge passes silently away, and is very little
diversified by events. To talk in public, to think in solitude, to
read and to hear, to inquire and answer inquiries, is the business
of a scholar. He wanders about the world without pomp or terror,
and is neither known nor valued but by men like himself.

"I was born in the kingdom of Goiama, at no great distance from the
fountain of the Nile. My father was a wealthy merchant, who traded
between the inland countries of Africa and the ports of the Red
Sea. He was honest, frugal, and diligent, but of mean sentiments
and narrow comprehension; he desired only to be rich, and to
conceal his riches, lest he should be spoiled by the governors of
the province."

"Surely," said the Prince, "my father must be negligent of his
charge if any man in his dominions dares take that which belongs to
another. Does he not know that kings are accountable for injustice
permitted as well as done? If I were Emperor, not the meanest of
my subjects should he oppressed with impunity. My blood boils when
I am told that a merchant durst not enjoy his honest gains for fear
of losing them by the rapacity of power. Name the governor who
robbed the people that I may declare his crimes to the Emperor!"

"Sir," said Imlac, "your ardour is the natural effect of virtue
animated by youth. The time will come when you will acquit your
father, and perhaps hear with less impatience of the governor.
Oppression is, in the Abyssinian dominions, neither frequent nor
tolerated; but no form of government has been yet discovered by
which cruelty can be wholly prevented. Subordination supposes
power on one part and subjection on the other; and if power be in
the hands of men it will sometimes be abused. The vigilance of the
supreme magistrate may do much, but much will still remain undone.
He can never know all the crimes that are committed, and can seldom
punish all that he knows."

"This," said the Prince, "I do not understand; but I had rather
hear thee than dispute. Continue thy narration."

"My father," proceeded Imlac, "originally intended that I should
have no other education than such as might qualify me for commerce;
and discovering in me great strength of memory and quickness of
apprehension, often declared his hope that I should be some time
the richest man in Abyssinia."

"Why," said the Prince, "did thy father desire the increase of his
wealth when it was already greater than he durst discover or enjoy?
I am unwilling to doubt thy veracity, yet inconsistencies cannot
both be true."

"Inconsistencies," answered Imlac, "cannot both be right; but,
imputed to man, they may both be true. Yet diversity is not
inconsistency. My father might expect a time of greater security.
However, some desire is necessary to keep life in motion; and he
whose real wants are supplied must admit those of fancy."

"This," said the Prince, "I can in some measure conceive. I repent
that I interrupted thee."

"With this hope," proceeded Imlac, "he sent me to school. But when
I had once found the delight of knowledge, and felt the pleasure of
intelligence and the pride of invention, I began silently to
despise riches, and determined to disappoint the purposes of my
father, whose grossness of conception raised my pity. I was twenty
years old before his tenderness would expose me to the fatigue of
travel; in which time I had been instructed, by successive masters,
in all the literature of my native country. As every hour taught
me something new, I lived in a continual course of gratification;
but as I advanced towards manhood, I lost much of the reverence
with which I had been used to look on my instructors; because when
the lessons were ended I did not find them wiser or better than
common men.

"At length my father resolved to initiate me in commerce; and,
opening one of his subterranean treasuries, counted out ten
thousand pieces of gold. 'This, young man,' said he, 'is the stock
with which you must negotiate. I began with less than a fifth
part, and you see how diligence and parsimony have increased it.
This is your own, to waste or improve. If you squander it by
negligence or caprice, you must wait for my death before you will
be rich; if in four years you double your stock, we will
thenceforward let subordination cease, and live together as friends
and partners, for he shall be always equal with me who is equally
skilled in the art of growing rich.'

"We laid out our money upon camels, concealed in bales of cheap
goods, and travelled to the shore of the Red Sea. When I cast my
eye on the expanse of waters, my heart bounded like that of a
prisoner escaped. I felt an inextinguishable curiosity kindle in
my mind, and resolved to snatch this opportunity of seeing the
manners of other nations, and of learning sciences unknown in
Abyssinia.

"I remembered that my father had obliged me to the improvement of
my stock, not by a promise, which I ought not to violate, but by a
penalty, which I was at liberty to incur; and therefore determined
to gratify my predominant desire, and, by drinking at the fountain
of knowledge, to quench the thirst of curiosity.

"As I was supposed to trade without connection with my father, it
was easy for me to become acquainted with the master of a ship, and
procure a passage to some other country. I had no motives of
choice to regulate my voyage. It was sufficient for me that,
wherever I wandered, I should see a country which I had not seen
before. I therefore entered a ship bound for Surat, having left a
letter for my father declaring my intention."



CHAPTER IX--THE HISTORY OF IMLAC (continued).



"When I first entered upon the world of waters, and lost sight of
land, I looked round about me in pleasing terror, and thinking my
soul enlarged by the boundless prospect, imagined that I could gaze
around me for ever without satiety; but in a short time I grew
weary of looking on barren uniformity, where I could only see again
what I had already seen. I then descended into the ship, and
doubted for awhile whether all my future pleasures would not end,
like this, in disgust and disappointment. 'Yet surely,' said I,
'the ocean and the land are very different. The only variety of
water is rest and motion. But the earth has mountains and valleys,
deserts and cities; it is inhabited by men of different customs and
contrary opinions; and I may hope to find variety in life, though I
should miss it in nature.'

"With this thought I quieted my mind, and amused myself during the
voyage, sometimes by learning from the sailors the art of
navigation, which I have never practised, and sometimes by forming
schemes for my conduct in different situations, in not one of which
I have been ever placed.

"I was almost weary of my naval amusements when we safely landed at
Surat. I secured my money and, purchasing some commodities for
show, joined myself to a caravan that was passing into the inland
country. My companions, for some reason or other, conjecturing
that I was rich, and, by my inquiries and admiration, finding that
I was ignorant, considered me as a novice whom they had a right to
cheat, and who was to learn, at the usual expense, the art of
fraud. They exposed me to the theft of servants and the exaction
of officers, and saw me plundered upon false pretences, without any
advantage to themselves but that of rejoicing in the superiority of
their own knowledge."

"Stop a moment," said the Prince; "is there such depravity in man
as that he should injure another without benefit to himself? I can
easily conceive that all are pleased with superiority; but your
ignorance was merely accidental, which, being neither your crime
nor your folly, could afford them no reason to applaud themselves;
and the knowledge which they had, and which you wanted, they might
as effectually have shown by warning as betraying you."

"Pride," said Imlac, "is seldom delicate; it will please itself
with very mean advantages, and envy feels not its own happiness but
when it may be compared with the misery of others. They were my
enemies because they grieved to think me rich, and my oppressors
because they delighted to find me weak."

"Proceed," said the Prince; "I doubt not of the facts which you
relate, but imagine that you impute them to mistaken motives."

"In this company," said Imlac, "I arrived at Agra, the capital of
Hindostan, the city in which the Great Mogul commonly resides. I
applied myself to the language of the country, and in a few months
was able to converse with the learned men; some of whom I found
morose and reserved, and others easy and communicative; some were
unwilling to teach another what they had with difficulty learned
themselves; and some showed that the end of their studies was to
gain the dignity of instructing.

"To the tutor of the young princes I recommended myself so much
that I was presented to the Emperor as a man of uncommon knowledge.
The Emperor asked me many questions concerning my country and my
travels, and though I cannot now recollect anything that he uttered
above the power of a common man, he dismissed me astonished at his
wisdom and enamoured of his goodness.

"My credit was now so high that the merchants with whom I had
travelled applied to me for recommendations to the ladies of the
Court. I was surprised at their confidence of solicitation and
greatly reproached them with their practices on the road. They
heard me with cold indifference, and showed no tokens of shame or
sorrow.

"They then urged their request with the offer of a bribe, but what
I would not do for kindness I would not do for money, and refused
them, not because they had injured me, but because I would not
enable them to injure others; for I knew they would have made use
of my credit to cheat those who should buy their wares.

"Having resided at Agra till there was no more to be learned, I
travelled into Persia, where I saw many remains of ancient
magnificence and observed many new accommodations of life. The
Persians are a nation eminently social, and their assemblies
afforded me daily opportunities of remarking characters and
manners, and of tracing human nature through all its variations.

"From Persia I passed into Arabia, where I saw a nation pastoral
and warlike, who lived without any settled habitation, whose wealth
is their flocks and herds, and who have carried on through ages an
hereditary war with mankind, though they neither covet nor envy
their possessions."



CHAPTER X--IMLAC'S HISTORY (continued)--A DISSERTATION UPON POETRY.



"Wherever I went I found that poetry was considered as the highest
learning, and regarded with a veneration somewhat approaching to
that which man would pay to angelic nature. And yet it fills me
with wonder that in almost all countries the most ancient poets are
considered as the best; whether it be that every other kind of
knowledge is an acquisition greatly attained, and poetry is a gift
conferred at once; or that the first poetry of every nation
surprised them as a novelty, and retained the credit by consent
which it received by accident at first; or whether, as the province
of poetry is to describe nature and passion, which are always the
same, the first writers took possession of the most striking
objects for description and the most probable occurrences for
fiction, and left nothing to those that followed them but
transcription of the same events and new combinations of the same
images. Whatever be the reason, it is commonly observed that the
early writers are in possession of nature, and their followers of
art; that the first excel in strength and invention, and the latter
in elegance and refinement.

"I was desirous to add my name to this illustrious fraternity. I
read all the poets of Persia and Arabia, and was able to repeat by
memory the volumes that are suspended in the mosque of Mecca. But
I soon found that no man was ever great by imitations. My desire
of excellence impelled me to transfer my attention to nature and to
life. Nature was to be my subject, and men to be my auditors. I
could never describe what I had not seen. I could not hope to move
those with delight or terror whose interests and opinions I did not
understand.

Being now resolved to be a poet, I saw everything with a new
purpose; my sphere of attention was suddenly magnified; no kind of
knowledge was to be overlooked. I ranged mountains and deserts for
images and resemblances, and pictured upon my mind every tree of
the forest and flower of the valley. I observed with equal care
the crags of the rock and the pinnacles of the palace. Sometimes I
wandered along the mazes of the rivulet, and sometimes watched the
changes of the summer clouds. To a poet nothing can be useless.
Whatever is beautiful and whatever is dreadful must be familiar to
his imagination; he must be conversant with all that is awfully
vast or elegantly little. The plants of the garden, the animals of
the wood, the minerals of the earth, and meteors of the sky, must
all concur to store his mind with inexhaustible variety; for every
idea is useful for the enforcement or decoration of moral or
religious truth, and he who knows most will have most power of
diversifying his scenes and of gratifying his reader with remote
allusions and unexpected instruction.

"All the appearances of nature I was therefore careful to study,
and every country which I have surveyed has contributed something
to my poetical powers."

"In so wide a survey," said the Prince, "you must surely have left
much unobserved. I have lived till now within the circuit of the
mountains, and yet cannot walk abroad without the sight of
something which I had never beheld before, or never heeded."

"This business of a poet," said Imlac, "is to examine, not the
individual, but the species; to remark general properties and large
appearances. He does not number the streaks of the tulip, or
describe the different shades of the verdure of the forest. He is
to exhibit in his portraits of nature such prominent and striking
features as recall the original to every mind, and must neglect the
minuter discriminations, which one may have remarked and another
have neglected, for those characteristics which are alike obvious
to vigilance and carelessness.

"But the knowledge of nature is only half the task of a poet; he
must be acquainted likewise with all the modes of life. His
character requires that he estimate the happiness and misery of
every condition, observe the power of all the passions in all their
combinations, and trace the changes of the human mind, as they are
modified by various institutions and accidental influences of
climate or custom, from the sprightliness of infancy to the
despondence of decrepitude. He must divest himself of the
prejudices of his age and country; he must consider right and wrong
in their abstracted and invariable state; he must disregard present
laws and opinions, and rise to general and transcendental truths,
which will always be the same. He must, therefore, content himself
with the slow progress of his name, contemn the praise of his own
time, and commit his claims to the justice of posterity. He must
write as the interpreter of nature and the legislator of mankind,
and consider himself as presiding over the thoughts and manners of
future generations, as a being superior to time and place.

"His labour is not yet at an end. He must know many languages and
many sciences, and, that his style may be worthy of his thoughts,
must by incessant practice familiarise to himself every delicacy of
speech and grace of harmony."



CHAPTER XI--IMLAC'S NARRATIVE (continued)--A HINT OF PILGRIMAGE.



Imlac now felt the enthusiastic fit, and was proceeding to
aggrandise his own profession, when then Prince cried out:
"Enough! thou hast convinced me that no human being can ever be a
poet. Proceed with thy narration."

"To be a poet," said Imlac, "is indeed very difficult."

"So difficult," returned the Prince, "that I will at present hear
no more of his labours. Tell me whither you went when you had seen
Persia."

"From Persia," said the poet, "I travelled through Syria, and for
three years resided in Palestine, where I conversed with great
numbers of the northern and western nations of Europe, the nations
which are now in possession of all power and all knowledge, whose
armies are irresistible, and whose fleets command the remotest
parts of the globe. When I compared these men with the natives of
our own kingdom and those that surround us, they appeared almost
another order of beings. In their countries it is difficult to
wish for anything that may not be obtained; a thousand arts, of
which we never heard, are continually labouring for their
convenience and pleasure, and whatever their own climate has denied
them is supplied by their commerce."

"By what means," said the Prince, "are the Europeans thus powerful?
or why, since they can so easily visit Asia and Africa for trade or
conquest, cannot the Asiatics and Africans invade their coast,
plant colonies in their ports, and give laws to their natural
princes? The same wind that carries them back would bring us
thither."

"They are more powerful, sir, than we," answered Imlac, "because
they are wiser; knowledge will always predominate over ignorance,
as man governs the other animals. But why their knowledge is more
than ours I know not what reason can be given but the unsearchable
will of the Supreme Being."

"When," said the Prince with a sigh, "shall I be able to visit
Palestine, and mingle with this mighty confluence of nations? Till
that happy moment shall arrive, let me fill up the time with such
representations as thou canst give me. I am not ignorant of the
motive that assembles such numbers in that place, and cannot but
consider it as the centre of wisdom and piety, to which the best
and wisest men of every land must be continually resorting."

"There are some nations," said Imlac, "that send few visitants to
Palestine; for many numerous and learned sects in Europe concur to
censure pilgrimage as superstitious, or deride it as ridiculous."

"You know," said the Prince, "how little my life has made me
acquainted with diversity of opinions; it will be too long to hear
the arguments on both sides; you, that have considered them, tell
me the result."

"Pilgrimage," said Imlac, "like many other acts of piety, may be
reasonable or superstitious, according to the principles upon which
it is performed. Long journeys in search of truth are not
commanded. Truth, such as is necessary to the regulation of life,
is always found where it is honestly sought. Change of place is no
natural cause of the increase of piety, for it inevitably produces
dissipation of mind. Yet, since men go every day to view the
fields where great actions have been performed, and return with
stronger impressions of the event, curiosity of the same kind may
naturally dispose us to view that country whence our religion had
its beginning, and I believe no man surveys those awful scenes
without some confirmation of holy resolutions. That the Supreme
Being may be more easily propitiated in one place than in another
is the dream of idle superstition, but that some places may operate
upon our own minds in an uncommon manner is an opinion which hourly
experience will justify. He who supposes that his vices may be
more successfully combated in Palestine, will perhaps find himself
mistaken; yet he may go thither without folly; he who thinks they
will be more freely pardoned, dishonours at once his reason and
religion."

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