BOOK I PART III
ination. Poets have formed what they call a
poetical system of things, which though it be
believed neither by themselves nor readers, is
commonly esteemed a sufficient foundation for
any fiction. We have been so much accustomed
to the names ofMars, Jupiter, Venus, that in the
same manner as education infixes any opinion,
the constant repetition of these ideas makes
them enter into the mind with facility, and pre-
vail upon the fancy, without influencing the
judgment. In like manner tragedians always
borrow their fable, or at least the names of their
principal actors, from some known passage in
history; and that not in order to deceive the
spectators; for they will frankly confess, that
truth is not in any circumstance inviolably ob-
served: but in order to procure a more easy re-
ception into the imagination for those extraor-
dinary events, which they represent. But this