The feeling of genius in Alfieri was suppressed for more than twenty years, by the discouragement of his uncle: but as the natural temperament cannot be crushed out of the soul of genius, he was a poet without writing a single verse; and as a great poet, the ideal presence at times became ungovernable, verging to madness.

In traversing the wilds of Arragon, his emotions would certainly have given birth to poetry, could he have expressed himself in verse.

It was a complete state of the imaginative existence, or this ideal presence; for he proceeded along the wilds of Arragon in a reverie, weeping and laughing by turns.

He considered this as a folly, because it ended in nothing but in laughter and tears.

He was not aware that he was then yielding to a demonstration, could he have judged of himself, that he possessed those dispositions of mind and that energy of passion which form the poetical character.
Genius creates by a single conception; the statuary conceives the statue at once, which he afterwards executes by the slow process of art; and the architect contrives a whole palace in an instant.