A Full Enquiry into the Nature of the Pastoral | Page 6

Action can be sufficient to constitute the Fable.
_Fourthly_, Another Quality which a Pastoral Fable should have to be the most compleat is a Moral Result.
I shall speak to all these Heads, except the first, concerning the _Unity_; for without that Quality, it's self-evident that 'tis no Fable. By Unity I mean the same with Aristotle.[A]
[Footnote A: _See his 6th
Chapter_
.]
SECT. 1.
What Length a perfect Pastoral should have.
All _Pastoral-Writers_ have used the same Length which Theocritus at first happen'd into. I shall be therefore obliged, I doubt, to dwell longer, on this Head, than the Importance of it may seem to require; and must premise, that tho' a Fable would need, finely carry'd on, to be three or four Hundred Lines, yet let no Writer be under any Concern about this: If a Fable have Unity, shews a delightful story, paints proper Characters, and contains a Moral, I shall not doubt to call the Poem a perfect and compleat _Pastoral_, tho' the Length exceeds not fifty Lines. But my Reasons for extending it are these:
Some Author I have seen, ingeniously observes, that even in telling common Stories, 'twere best to give some short Account of the Persons first, to be heard with Delight and Attention; For, says he, 'tis not so much this being said, but its being said on such a particular Occasion, or by such a particular Person. As this is true in a common Story, so 'tis more so in a Poem. The strongest Pleasure that the Mind receives from Poetry, flows from its being engaged and concerned in the Progress and Event of the Story. We naturally side in Parties, and interest our selves in their Affairs of one side or the other. Then 'tis, our Care pursues our Favourite Character, where're he goes. We anticipate all his Successes, and make his Misfortunes our own. Were the Catastrophe in a Tragedy to appear in the first Act, but little should we be moved by it, not having as yet imbibed a favourable Opinion of the Hero, nor learn'd to be in Pain as often as he is in Danger.
Now, we may read, I fear, some Number of the Pastorals of the ordinary Length, before we shall meet with this Pleasure. The Truth is, we are commonly past a hundred Lines, the length of these Pieces, before the Mind and Attention is entirely fix'd, and has lost all its former and external Thoughts. All the Pleasure therefore which proceeds from the Story is lost in these short Pieces.
'Tis true Indeed, I think it possible for a Novel, or perhaps a Poem, to contain a Story in a hundred Lines which shall be able to engage the Mind so as to delight it from the fable it self, stript of all its Ornaments. But how few in a hundred Ages have had Genius's capable of this. And if 'tis difficult in a Novel or Poem, which may couch the Circumstances close together, how much more Difficult must it be in Pastoral. In the former Pieces nothing is to be observed but the Story itself, in the latter a thousand Beauties are to be adjoyn'd and as many Rules observ'd.
SECT 2.
The proper Length of Pastoral further collected from the Consideration of the Characters.
Another Pleasure which the brevity of these Pieces robs us of, is this. The Characters cannot finely and distinctly be depainted in so short a Compass. And 'tis observable, we are concern'd for the Personages in no Poetry so much as those of Pastoral. Simplicity and Innocence have Charms for every Mind, and we pity most, where most our Pity's wanted.
So that the two noblest Beauties, and which constitute the main Difference between Poetry and Versification, between a perfect Poem and a Madrigal, Epigram or Elegy, are entirely lost in those Pieces, and the only Pleasure they can raise, must proceed alone from Sentiment and Diction.
SECT 3.
_The Length of Pastoral, yet further shown from the Passions it raises_.
In every rational and consistent Piece, the Writer has some Aim in View; as, to work every thing up to one End and a Moral Result; or to excite some Passion, or the like. Otherwise it is but an Assay of Wit, a Flirt of the Imagination, and no more. Too trifling to detain the rational Mind. Now, that these short Pieces are not capable of having a Moral, or raising any Passion, I need trouble my self for no other Proof than there never having been such one produced.
But give me leave to instance in the usual Method of forming a Pastoral. One Shepherd meets another; tells him some body is dead; upon which, they begin the mournful Dialogue, or Elegy. But in such an Elegy, there is but one thing can raise a fine Pleasure; which can be the only