5thly, Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the Poet undertakes to illustrate.

And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more than its due.

By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3] The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms.

The moulds may be enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order.

1st, The Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical Novel.