There are, indeed, but very few who know how to be idle and innocent, or have a Relish of any Pleasures that are not Criminal; every Diversion they take is at the Expence of some one Virtue or another, and their very first Step out of Business is into Vice or Folly.  A Man should endeavour, therefore, to make the Sphere of his innocent Pleasures as wide as possible, that he may retire into them with Safety, and find in them such a Satisfaction as a wise Man would not blush to take.  Of this Nature are those of the Imagination, which do not require such a Bent of Thought as is necessary to our more serious Employments, nor, at the same time, suffer the Mind to sink into that Negligence and Remissness, which are apt to accompany our more sensual Delights, but, like a gentle Exercise to the Faculties, awaken them from Sloth and Idleness, without putting them upon any Labour or Difficulty.

We might here add, that the Pleasures of the Fancy are more conducive to Health, than those of the Understanding, which are worked out by Dint of Thinking, and attended with too violent a Labour of the Brain.  Delightful Scenes, whether in Nature, Painting, or Poetry, have a kindly Influence on the Body, as well as the Mind, and not only serve to clear and brighten the Imagination, but are able to disperse Grief and Melancholy, and to set the Animal Spirits in pleasing and agreeable Motions.  For this Reason Sir Francis Bacon, in his Essay upon Health, has not thought it improper to prescribe to his Reader a Poem or a Prospect, where he particularly dissuades him from knotty and subtile Disquisitions, and advises him to pursue Studies that fill the Mind with splendid and illustrious Objects, as Histories, Fables, and Contemplations of Nature.

I have in this Paper, by way of Introduction, settled the Notion of those Pleasures of the Imagination which are the Subject of my present Undertaking, and endeavoured, by several Considerations, to recommend to my Reader the Pursuit of those Pleasures.  I shall, in my next Paper, examine the several Sources from whence these Pleasures are derived. [2]

O.

[Footnote 1:  [present to the]]

[Footnote 2:  From a MS. Note-book of Addison’s, met with in 1858, Mr. J. Dykes Campbell printed at Glasgow, in 1864, 250 copies of some portions of the first draught of these papers on Imagination with the Essay on Jealousy (No. 176) and that on Fame (No. 255).  The MS. was an old calf bound 8vo volume obtained from a dealer.  There were about 31 pages written on one side of each leaf in a beautiful print-like hand, which contained the Essays in their first state.  Passages were added by Addison in his ordinary handwriting upon the blank pages opposite to this carefully-written text, and there are pieces in a third hand-writing which neither the keeper of the MSS.  Department of the British Museum nor the Librarian of the Bodleian could identify.  The insertions in this third hand form part of the paper as finally published.