climates, into a foil lefs adapted to its nature, and lefs favourable to its increase.

Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows, And the fmooth ftream in fmoother numbers flows;

But when loud billows lafh the founding fhore,
The hoarfe rough verse should like the torrent roar.
When Ajax ftrives fome rock's vaft weight to
throw,

The line too labours, and the words move flow;
Not fo when swift Camilla fcours the plain,
Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the

main.

From thefe lines, laboured with great attention, and celebrated by a rival wit, may be judged what can be expected from the most diligent endeavours after this imagery of found. The verfe intended to reprefent the whisper of the vernal breeze, must be confeffed not much to excel in foftness or volubility; and the fmooth ftream runs with a perpetual clafh of jarring confonants. The noife and turbulence of the torrent is, indeed, distinctly imaged, for it requires very little skill to make our language rough; but in thefe lines, which mention the effort of Ajax, there is no particular heavinefs, obftruction, or delay. The fwiftnefs of Camilla is rather contrafted than exemplified; why the verfe fhould be lengthened to exprefs fpeed, will not eafily be discovered. In the dactyls ufed for that purpofe by the ancients, two fhort fyllables were pronounced with fuch rapidity, as to be equal only to one long; they therefore, naturally exhibit the act of paffing through a long fpace in a fhort time. But the Alexandrine, by its paufe in the midft, is a tardy and stately mea

fure;

fure; and the word unbending, one of the most fluggish and flow which our language affords, can

not much accelerate its motion.

These rules and thefe examples have taught our prefent criticks to enquire very ftudiously and minutely into founds and cadences. It is, therefore, ufeful to examine with what skill they have proceeded; what difcoveries they have made; and whether any rules can be established which guide us hereafter in fuch researches.

may

T1

NUMB. 93. TUESDAY, February 5, 1751.

-Experiar quid concedatur in illos

Quorum Flaminia tegitur cinis atque Latinâ.

More fafely truth to urge her claim prefumes,

On names now found alone on books and tombs.

Jov.

HERE are few books on which more time

is spent by young students, than on treatises which deliver the characters of authors; nor any which oftener deceive the expectation of the reader, or fill his mind with more opinions which the progrefs of his ftudies and the encreafe of his knowledge oblige him to refign.

Baillet has introduced his collection of the deci-fions of the learned, by an enumeration of the prejudices which mislead the critick, and raise the paffions in rebellion aginft the judgment. His catalogue, though large, is imperfect; and who can hope to complete it? The beauties of writing have been obferved to be often fuch as cannot in the prefent state of human knowledge be evinced

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by evidence, or drawn out into demonftrations; they are therefore wholly fubject to the imagination, and do not force their effects upon a mind preoccupied by unfavourable fentiments, nor overcome the counter-action of a falfe principle, or of stubborn partiality.

To convince any man against his will is hard, but to please him against his will is justly pronounced by Dryden to be above the reach of human abilities. Intereft and paffion will hold out long against the clofeft fiege of diagrams and fyllogifms, but they are abfolutely impregnable to imagery and fentiment; and will for ever bid defiance to the most powerful strains of Virgil or Homer, though they may give way in time to the batteries of Euclid or Archimedes.

In trufting therefore to the fentence of a critick, we are in danger not only from that vanity which exalts writers too often to the dignity of teaching what they are yet to learn, from that negligence which fometimes fteals upon the moft vigilant caution, and that fallibility to which the condition of nature has fubjected every human understanding; but from a thousand extrinsick and accidental caufes, from every thing which can excite kindnefs or malevolence, veneration or contempt.

Many of those who have determined with great boldness, upon the various degrees of literary merit, may be justly suspected of having paffed fentence, as Seneca remarks of Claudius,

Una tantum Parte audita,
Sæpe et nulla,

without much knowledge of the cause before them : for it will not easily be imagined of Langbane, Bor

richitus,

richitus, or Rapin, that they had very accurately perused all the books which they praise or cenfure; or that, even if nature and learning had qualified them for judges, they could read for ever with the attention neceffary to just criticism. Such performances, however, are not wholly without their ufe; for they are commonly just echoes to the voice of fame, and tranfmit the general fuffrage of mankind when they have no particular motives to fupprefs it.

Criticks, like the reft of mankind, are very frequently misled by intereft. The bigotry with which editors regard the authors whom they illuftrate or correct, has been generally remarked. Dryden was known to have written moft of his critical differtations only to recommend the work upon which he then happened to be employed; and Addison is fufpected to have denied the expediency of poetical justice, because his own Cato was condemned to perish in a good cause.

There are prejudices which authors, not otherwife weak or corrupt, have indulged without fcruple; and perhaps fome of them are fo complicated with our natural affections, that they cannot easily be difintangled from the heart. Scarce any can hear with impartiality a comparison between the writers of his own and another country; and though it cannot, I think, be charged equally on all nations, that they are blinded with this literary patriotism, yet there are none that do not look upon their authors with the fondnefs of affinity, and efteem them as well for the place of their birth, as for their knowledge or their wit. There is, therefore, feldom much respect due to compa

rative criticism, when the competitors are of different countries, unless the judge is of a nation equally indifferent to both. The Italians could not for a long time believe, that there was any learning beyond the mountains; and the French feem generally perfuaded, that there are no wits or reafoners equal to their own. I can fcarcely conceive that if Scaliger had not confidered himself as allied to Virgil, by being born in the fame country, he would have found his work fo much fuperior to thofe of Homer, or have thought the controversy worthy of fo much zeal, vehemence, and acrimony.

There is, indeed, one prejudice, and only one, by which it may be doubted whether it is any difhonour to be fometimes mifguided. Criticifm has so often given occafion to the envious and ill-natured of gratifying their malignity, that some have thought it neceffary to recommend the virtue of candour without restriction, and to preclude all future liberty of cenfure. Writers poffeffed with this opinion are continually enforcing civility and decency, recommending to criticks the proper diffi dence of themselves, and inculcating the veneration due to celebrated names.

I am not of opinion that these profeffed enemies of arrogance and feverity have much more benevo lence or modefty than the rest of mankind; or that they feel in their own hearts, any other intention than to diftinguifh themfelves by their foftnefs and delicacy. Some are modeft because they are timorous, and fome are lavish of praise because they hope to be repaid.

There is indeed fome tendernefs due to Hving writers, when they attack none of those truths which are of importance to the happiness of man