Mifs Pope.—Mrs. Green.-Clive's fuperior excellence.-Love for Love ;-its great me

rit.

Sir Sampfon Legend.— Forefight, a character of humour.- Ben a wit.- Pope. - Tattle.-Mrs. Frail.-Doris.-Angelica not amiable.

C

ONGREVE formed himself upon Wycherly; but his wit is more flowing, his fancy more exuberant, his knowledge more extensive, and his judgement more profound; though he is by no means a strict obferver of the unities, the conduct of his fables is well studied, and fometimes exact; his catastrophes are generally perplexed and fometimes improbable.

When Congreve began to write, the licentious manners, introduced by Charles II. were in full vigour; the paffion to establish popery, in the reign of his fucceffor, had not diminished the immorality of the people. The great view of James was the converting his fubjects to his own

fuperftition;

fuperftition; to which, I believe, he was the more devoted, as he fancied their imbibing his religious creed would render them more fubmiffive to his government. Papifts, like other diffenters, when in a state of perfecution, or deprived of benefits which they ought to enjoy, will endeavour to gain a mitigation of their hardships by contributing to fupport every scheme of government with their utmost weight and interest: remove the clogs that separate them from the rest of the people, and papists will be as staunch friends to liberty as any other fubjects.

Wycherly, it is plain, was the original which our young poet admired and copied. Wycherly faithfully tranfcribed the manners of the times when the king and his courtiers, in conjunction with the poets, were the pimps to debauch the morals of the people. Dr. Johnson ftyles Wycherly a fcribbler, from an honeft indignation at the impurity of his writings; but furely the comedies of Dryden, Otway, and others, are not lefs exceptionable

exceptionable than his. He, like others, was borne down by the common current, which was rendered irrefiftible by royal patronage and protection. To this, Dryden himself ascribes the vicious writings of the poets:

The poets, who muft live by courts, or flarve,
Were proud fo good a government to ferve;
And, mixing with buffoons and pimps profane,
Tainted the ftage for some small snip of gain ;
For they, like harlots under bawds profess'd,
Took all th'ungodly pains and got the leaft.
Thus did the thriving malady prevail;

The court its head, the poets but the tail.
Miffes there were, but modeftly conceal'd :
Whitehall the naked Venus firft reveal'd;
Where, ftanding, as at Cyprus, in her shrine,
The ftrumpet was ador'd with rites divine, &c.

*

Few men were fo admired, and beloved by his contemporaries, as Wycherly: he was esteemed the most accomplished gentleman

* Dryden's epilogue to the Pilgrim.

tleman of the age he lived in, and, as fuch, courted and careffed by his royal master.

Congreve was endowed with all the ftrong faculties of perception which enable the comic writer to defcribe the various characters of mankind. He feems to have known the foibles, paffions, humours, and vices, of the world by intuition. His Old Batchelor was acted when he was twenty-one; in his dedication, he tells Lord Clifford that it had lain by him al

most four years. Dryden and Southern were astonished when they perused this play, and pronounced it a prodigy of early genius. In the Old Batchelor, we perceive, that, from Ben Jonfon's Bobadil and Master Stephen, the author has formed his Captain Bluff and Sir Joseph Wittol. His gentlemen are partly his own and partly taken from Wycherly. Bellmour and Sharper are allied to Horner and Freeman, in the Country Wife and Plain Dealer. Vainlove, who loves no pleafure that is not to be obtained without

difficulty,

difficulty, is a character of humour; and fo, I think, is Heartwell, who refembles, in fome of his features, Pinchwife in the Country Wife.

I cannot think, with Dr. Johnson, thạt Heartwell is a fictitious character. Many fuch may be feen, who, having, from fpleen or pofitiveness of difpofition, denied themfelves, in early life, the pleasures of the conjugal union, growl out the remainder of their days in fatirical reflections on the happiness they have rejected, The fcene, between the Old Batchelor and Sylvia, in the third act, is a masterpiece. The audience, in Congreve's time, were particularly fond of having a city-cuckold dreffed out for their entertainment; and Fondlewife is ferved up with very poignant fauce, for the feveral incidents in the scene are extremely diverting. Lord Kaims finds fault with the dialogue, in the 1st act, between Bellmour, Sharper, and Heartwell, as if it was mere converfation, and

that