derived from the Latin imitare, to "represent or repeat," a sound or action, either exactly or nearly in the same manner as they were originally exhibited.

in Music, admits of two different senses. Sound and motion are either capable of imitating themselves by a repetition of their own particular modes, or of imitating other objects of a nobler and more abstrac... It is hoped, however, that in our article of Melody, Imitation, we have shown upon what principle musical imitation may be compatible with harmony; though we admit, that from melody it derives its most powerful energy, and its most attractive graces. Yet we must either be deceived beyond all possibility of cure, or we have felt the power of imitative harmony in a high degree. We are certain that the fury, the impetuosity, the rapid vicissitudes, of a battle, may be successfully and vividly represented in harmony. We have participated the exultation and triumph of a conquest, inspired by the sound of a full chorus. We have felt all the solemnity and grandeur of devotion from the slow movement, the deep chords, the swelling harmony, of a sentimental composition played upon the organ. Nor do we imagine harmony less capable of presenting the tender depression, the fluctuating and tremulous agitation, of grief. As this kind of imitation is the noblest effort of music, it is astonishing that it should have been overlooked by M. d'Alembert. He has indeed apologized, by informing us, that his treatise is merely elementary; but we are uncertain how far this apology ought to be regarded as sufficient, when it is at the same time considered, that he has given an account of imitation in its mechanical, or what Rousseau calls its technical, sense; which, however, to prevent ambiguity, we should rather choose to call mymefix, or anacephalofix. To Rousseau's account of the word in this acceptation, we return.

"Imitation (says he), in its technical sense, is a reiteration of the same air, or of one which is similar, in several parts where it is repeated by one after the other, either in unison, or at the distance of a fourth, a fifth, a third, or any other interval whatever. The imitation may be happily enough pursued even though several notes should be changed; provided the same air may always be recognized, and that the composer does not deviate from the laws of proper modulation. Frequently, in order to render the imitation more sensible, it is preceded by a general rest, or by long notes which seem to obliterate the impression formerly made by the air till it is renewed with greater force and vivacity by the commencement of the imitation. The imitation may be treated as the composer chooses; it may be abandoned, resumed, or another begun, at pleasure; in a word, its rules are as much relaxed as those of the fugue are severe; for this reason, it is despised by the most eminent masters; and every imitation of this kind too much affected, almost always betrays a novice in composition."

in Oratory, is an endeavour to resemble a speaker or writer in those qualities with regard to which we propose them to ourselves as patterns. The first historians among the Romans, says Cicero, were very dry and jejune, till they began to imitate the Greeks, and then they became their rivals. It is well known how closely Virgil has imitated Homer in his Aeneid, Hesiod in his Georgics, and Theocritus in his Eclogues. Terence copied after Menander; and Plautus after Epicharmus, as we learn from Horace, lib. ii. ep. ad August. who himself owes many of his beauties to the Greek lyric poets. Cicero appears, from many passages in his writings, to have imitated the Greek orators. Thus Quintilian says of him, that he has expressed the strength and sublimity of Demosthenes,