Hold converse; grow familiar, day by day, With his conceptions, act upon his plan; And form to his, the relish of their souls. _NOTES_ * * * * * BOOK FIRST. ENDNOTE A. _'Say why was man'_, etc.--P.8. In apologising for the frequent negligences of the sublimest authors of Greece, 'Those godlike geniuses,' says Longinus, 'were well assured, that Nature had not intended man for a low-spirited or ignoble being: but bringing us into life and the midst of this wide universe, as before a multitude assembled at some heroic solemnity, that we might be spectators of all her magnificence, and candidates high in emulation for the prize of glory; she has therefore implanted in our souls an inextinguishable love of everything great and exalted, of everything which appears divine beyond our comprehension. Whence it comes to pass, that even the whole world is not an object sufficient for the depth and rapidity of human imagination, which often sallies forth beyond the limits of all that surrounds us. Let any man cast his eye through the whole circle of our existence, and consider how especially it abounds in excellent and grand objects, he will soon acknowledge for what enjoyments and pursuits we were destined. Thus by the very propensity of nature we are led to admire, not little springs or shallow rivulets, however clear and delicious, but the Nile, the Rhine, the Danube, and, much more than all, the Ocean,' etc. --_Dionys. Longin. de Sublim_. ss. xxiv. ENDNOTE B. _'The empyreal waste'_.--P. 9. 'Ne se peut-il point qu'il y a un grand espace au-dela de la region des etoiles? Que ce soit le ciel empyree, ou non, toujours cet espace immense qui environne toute cette region, pourra etre rempli de bonheur et de gloire. Il pourra etre concu comme l'ocean, ou se rendent les fleuves de toutes les creatures bienheureuses, quand elles seront venues a leur perfection dans le systeme des etoiles.' --_Leibnitz dans la Theodicee_, part i. par. 19. ENDNOTE C. _'Whose unfading light'_, etc.--P. 9. It was a notion of the great Mr. Huygens, that there may be fixed stars at such a distance from our solar system, as that their light should not have had time to reach us, even from the creation of the world to this day. ENDNOTE D. _'The neglect Of all familiar prospects'_, etc.--P. 10. It is here said, that in consequence of the love of novelty, objects which at first were highly delightful to the mind, lose that effect by repeated attention to them. But the instance of habit is opposed to this observation; for there, objects at first distasteful are in time rendered entirely agreeable by repeated attention.