expose himself to the danger of an insipid and tiresome repetition: To add to his difficulties it so happens, that the present age, whilst it furnishes less variety to his choice, requires more than ever for its own amusement; the dignity of the stage must of course be prostituted to the unnatural resources of a wild imagination, and its propriety disturbed; music will supply those resources for a time, and accordingly we find the French and English theatres in the dearth of character feeding upon the airy diet of sound; but this, with all the support that spectacle can give, is but a flimsy substitute, whilst the public whose taste in the mean time becomes vitiated

-media inter carmina poscunt Aut Ursum aut Pugiles

the latter of which monstrous prostitutions we have lately seen our national stage most shamefully exposed to.

By comparing the different ages of poetry in our own country with those of Greece, we shall find the effects agree in each; for as the refinement of manners took place, the language of poetry became also more refined, and with greater correctness had less energy and force; the style of the poet, like the characters of the people, takes a brighter polish, which, whilst it smooths away its former asperities and protuberances, weakens the staple of its fabric, and what it gives to the elegance and delicacy of its complexion, takes away from the strength and sturdiness of its constitution. Whoever will compare Eschylus with Euripides, and Aristophanes with Menander, will need no other illustration of this remark.

Consider only the inequalities of Shakspeare's dramas examine not only one with another, but

compare even scene with scene in the same play. Did ever the imagination of man run riot into such wild and opposite extremes? Could this be done, or, being done, would it be suffered in the present age? How many of these plays, if acted as they were originally written, would now be permitted to pass? Can we have a stronger proof of the barbarous taste of those times, in which Titus Andronicus first appeared, than the favour which that horrid spectacle was received with? Yet of this we are assured by Ben Jonson. If this play was Shakspeare's, it was his first production, and some of his best commentators are of opinion it was actually written by him whilst he resided at Stratford upon Avon. Had this production been followed by the three parts of Henry the Sixth, by Love's Labour Lost, the two Gentlemen of Verona, the Comedy of Errors, or some few others, which our stage does not attempt to reform, that critic must have had very singular degree of intuition, who had discovered in those dramas a genius capable of producing the Macbeth. How would a young author be received in the present time, who was to make his first essay before the public with such a piece as Titus Andronicus? Now if we are warranted in saying there are several of Shakspeare's dramas, which could not live upon our present stage at any rate, and few, if any, that would pass without just censure in many parts, were they represented in their original state, we must acknowledge it is with reason that our living authors, standing in awe of their audiences, dare not aim at those bold and irregular flights of imagination, which carried our bard to such a height of fame; and therefore it was that I ventured awhile ago to say, there can be no poet in a polished and critical age like this, who can be brought into any fair comparison with so bold and

eccentric a genius as Shakspeare, of whom we may say with Horace

Tentavit quoque rem, si digne vertere posset,
Et placuit sibi, natura sublimis et acer:
Nam spirat tragicum satis, et feliciter audet:
Sed turpem putat in scriptis metuitque lituram.

When I bring to my recollection the several pe. riods of our English drama since the age of Shakspeare, I could name many dates, when it has been in hands far inferior to the present, and were it my purpose to enter into particulars, I should not scruple to appeal to several dramatic productions within the compass of our own times, but as the task of separating and selecting one from another amongst our own contemporaries can never be a pleasant task, nor one I would willingly engage in, I will content myself with referring to our stock of modern acting plays; many of which having passed the ordeal of critics, (who speak the same language with what I have just now heard, and are continually crying down those they live with) may perhaps take their turn with posterity, and be hereafter as partially over-rated upon a comparison with the productions of the age to come, as they are now undervalued when compared with those of the ages past.

• With regard to Milton, if we could not name any one epic poet of our nation since his time, it would be saying no more of us than may be said of the world in general, from the era of Homer to that of Virgil. Greece had one standard epic poet; Rome had no more; England has her Milton. If Dryden pronounced that the force of nature could no further go,' he was at once a good authority and a strong example of the truth of the assertion: If his genius shrunk from the undertaking, can we

wonder that so few have taken it up? Yet we will not forget Leonidas; nor speak slightly of its merit; and as death has removed the worthy author where he cannot hear our praises, the world may now, as in the case of Milton heretofore, be so much the more forward to bestow them. If the Sampson Agonistes is nearer to the simplicity of its Grecian original than either our own Elfrida or Caractacus, those dramas have a tender interest, a pathetic delicacy, which in that are wanting; and though Comus has every charm of language, it has a vein of allegory that impoverishes the mine

6

The variety of Dryden's genius was such as to preclude comparison; were I disposed to attempt it. Of his dramatic productions he himself declares, that he never wrote any thing in that way to please himself but his All for Love.' For ever under arms, he lived in a continual state of poetic warfare with his contemporaries, galling and galled by turns; he subsisted also by expedients, and necessity, which forced his genius into quicker growth than was natural to it, made a rich harvest but slovenly husbandry; it drove him also into a duplicity of character that is painful to reflect upon; it put him ill at ease within himself, and verified the fable of the nightingale, singing with a thorn at its breast.

Pope's versification gave the last and finishing polish to our English poetry: His lyre more sweet than Dryden's was less sonorous; his touch more correct, but not so bold; his strain more musical in its tones, but not so striking in its effect: Review him as a critic, and review him throughout, you will pronounce him the most perfect poet in our language; read him as an enthusiast and examine him in detail, you cannot refuse him your

approbation, but Dryden.

your rapture you will reserve for

But you will tell me this does not apply to the question in dispute, and that instead of settling precedency between your poets, it is time for me to produce my own: For this I shall beg your excuse; my zeal for my contemporaries shall not hurry them into comparisons, which their own modesty would revolt from; it hath prompted me to intrude upon your patience, whilst I submitted a few mitigating considerations in their behalf; not as an answer to your challenge, but as an effort to soften your contempt. I confess to you I have sometimes flattered myself I have found the strength of Dryden in our late Churchill, and the sweetness of Pope in our lamented Goldsmith: Enraptured as I am with the lyre of Timotheus in the Feast of Alexander, I contemplate with awful delight Gray's enthusiastic bard

On a rock, whose haughty brow

Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood,
Rob'd in the sable garb of woe,

With haggard eyes the poet stood;

(Loose his beard and hoary hair

Stream'd like a meteor to the troubled air)
And with a master's hand and prophet's fire
Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre.

Let the living muses speak for themselves; I have all the warmth of a friend, but not the presumption of a champion: the poets you now so loudly praise when dead, found the world as loud in defamation when living; you are now paying the debts of your predecessors, and atoning for their injustice; posterity will in like manner atone for your's.

• You mentioned the name of Addison in your list, not altogether as a poet I presume, but rather as the man of morals, the reformer of manners,