Allan Ramsay. [A biography.] - National Library of Scotland

ALLAN RAMSAY 89
attempt to depreciate Ramsay's fame, by insinuating
that his friends and patrons composed the works
which pass under his name, ought first to prove that his
friends and patrons were capable of composing The
Gentle Shepherd.^ Not for a moment can the argument
be esteemed to possess logical cogency that, because
he never equalled the poem in question in any of his
other writings, he was therefore intellectually incapable
of composing that masterpiece which will be read
after his other productions are forgotten, as long, in
fact, as Scots poetry has a niche in the great temple of
English literature.
To define pastoral poetry, as Ramsay understood it,
without at the same time citing examples lying to hand
in the works of our author, is a somewhat difficult task.
But as reasons of space will not permit us to duplicate
extracts, and as it is proposed to relegate all criticism to
the closing chapters of the book, we shall, at present, only
glance in passing at the great principles of composition
Ramsay kept in view while writing his pastoral.
In the Guardian^ Addison has stated, with his wonted
lucidity and perspicuity, those mechanical rules to which,
in his idea, the type of poetry termed ' pastoral ' should
conform. He maintained it should be a reflection, more
or less faithful, of the manners of men ' before they were
formed into large societies, cities built, or communities
established, where plenty begot pleasure.' In other
words, that ' an imaginary Golden Age should be evolved
by each poet out of his inner consciousness.' Then the
Ursa Major of criticism, Dr. Johnson, after growling at
all preceding critics on the subject, and remarking that
'the rustic poems of Theocritus and the eclogues of