So ev'n and morn accomplish'd the fixth day: I cannot conclude this book upon the creation, without mentioning a poem which has lately appeared under that title. The work was undertaken with so good an intention, and is executed with so great a mastery, that it deferves to be looked upon as one of the most useful and noble productions in our English verse. The reader cannot but be pleased to find the depths of philosophy enlivened with all the charms of poetry, and to fee to great a strength of reason, amidst so beautiful a redundancy of the imagination. The author has shewn us that defign in all the works of nature, which neceffarily leads us to the knowledge of its first cause. In short, he has illustrated, by numberless and incontestable instances, that divine wisdom, which the son of Sirach has so nobly ascribed to the Supreme Being in his formation of the world, when he tells us, that He created ber, and faw her, and numbered her, and poured her out upon ali bis works... L Monday, N° 340 Monday, March 31. Quis novus hic nofiris fucceffit fedibus hofpes ? Virg. Æn. 4. V. 1ο. What chief is this that visits us from far, Whose gallant mien bespeaks him train'd to war! I Take it to be the highest instance of a noble mind, to bear great qualities without difcovering in a man's behaviour any consciousness that he is fuperior to the rest of the world. Or, to say it otherwise, it is the duty of a great person so to demean himself, as that whatever endowments he may have, he may appear to value himself upon no qualities but such as any man may arrive at: He ought to think no man valuable but for his publick spirit, justice and integrity; and all other endowments to be esteemed only as they contribute to the exerting those virtues. Such a man, if he is wife or valiant knows it is of no confideration to other men that he is so, but as he employs those high talents for their use and fervice. He who affects the applauses and addresses of a multitude, or assumes to himself a preeminence upon any other confideration, must soon turn admiration into contempt. It is certain, that there can be no merit in any man who is not conscious of it; but the sense that it is valuable only according to the application of it, makes that fuperiority amiable, which would otherwise be invidious. In this light it is confidered as a thing in which every man bears a share: It annexes the ideas of dignity, power, and fame, in an agreeable and familiar manner, to him who is poffeffor of it; and all men who are strangers to him are naturally incited to indulge a curiofity in beholding the perfon, behaviour, feature, and shape of him in whose character, perhaps, each man had formed something in common with himself. Whether Whether fuch, or any other, are the causes, all men have a yearning curiofity to behold a man of heroic worth; and I have had many letters from all parts of this kingdom, that request I would give them an exact account of the stature, the mien, the aspect of the Prince who lately visited England, and has done such wonders for the liberty of Europe. It would puzzle the most curious to form to himself the fort of man my several correfpondents expect to hear of, by the action mentioned, when they defire a description of him: There is always fomething that concerns themselves, and growing out of their own circumstances, in all their inquiries. A friend of mine in Wales beseeches me to be very exact in my account of that wonderful man, who had marched an army and all its baggage over the Alps; and, if poffible, to learn whether the peasant who fhewed him the way, and is drawn in the map, be yet living. A gentleman from the University, who is deeply intent on the study of humanity, defires me to be as particular, if I had opportunity, in observing the whole interview between his Highness and our late General. Thus do mens fancies work according to their several educations and circumstances; but all pay a respect, mixed with admiration, to this illustrious character. I have waited for his arrival in Holland, before I would let my.co I have not been so uncurious a Spectator, as not to have seen Prince Eugene. It would be very difficult, as I faid just now, to answer every expectation of those who have writ to me on that head; nor is it possible for me to find words to let one know what an artful glance there is in his countenance who surprised Cremona; how daring he appears who forced the trenches at Turin: But in general I can fay, that he who beholds him, will easily expect from him any thing that is to be imagined or executed by the wit or force of man. The Prince is of that ftature which makes a man most easily become all parts of exercise, has height to be graceful on occafions of state and ceremony, and no less adapted for agility and dispatch: his aspect is erect and compos'd; his eye lively and thoughtful, yet rather vigilant than sparkling; his action and address the most easy imaginable, and his behaviour in correspondents know, that an an affembly peculiarly graceful in a certain art of mixing infenfibly with the reft, and becoming one of the company, instead of receiving the courtship of it. The thape of his person, and compofure of his limbs, are remarkably exact and beautiful. There is in his looks fomething fublime, which does not seem to arife from his quality or character, but the innate disposition of his mind. It is apparent that he fuffers the prefence of much company, instead of taking delight in it; and he appeared in public while with us, rather to return goodwill, or fatisfy curiofity, than to gratify any taste he himself had of being popular. As his thoughts are never tumultuous in danger, they are as little discomposed on occafions of pomp and magnificence: A great foul is affected in either cafe, no farther than in confidering the propereft methods to extricate itself from them. If this Hero has the strong incentives to uncommon enterprises that were remarkable in Alexander, he profecutes and enjoys the fame of them, with the justness, propriety, and good fenfe of Cafar. It is eafy to obferve in him a mind as capable of being entertained with contemplation as enterprise; a mind ready for great exploits, but not impatient for occafions to exert itself. The Prince has wisdom and valour in as high perfection as man can enjoy it; which noble faculties, in conjunction, banish all vain glory, oftentation, ambition, and all other vices which might intrude upon his mind to make it unequal. 'These habits and qualities of foul and body render this personage so extraordinary, that he appears to have nothing in him but what every man fhould have in him, the exertion of his very felf, abstracted from the circumstances in which fortune has placed him. Thus were you to fee Prince Eugene, and were told he was a private gentleman, you would say he is a man of modesty and merit: Should you be told That was Prince Eugene, he would be diminished no otherwise, than that part of your diftant admiration would turn into familiar good-will. This I thought fit to entertain my reader with, concerning, an Hero who never was equalled but by one man: over whom also he has this advantage, that he has had an opportunity to manifest an esteem for him in his adverfity. T Tuesday, الله 2 Revocate animos, mæstumque timorem Mitite Virg. Æn. 1. v. 206. Refume your courage, and dismiss your care. AVING, to DRYDEN oblige my correfpondent Phyfibulus, printed his letter last Friday, in relation to the new epilogue, he cannot take it amiss, if I now publish another, which I have just received from a gentleman who does not agree with him in his fentiments upon that matter. ، SIR, Am amazed to find an epilogue attacked in your laft Friday's paper, which has been so generally applauded by the town, and received such honours as were never before given to any in an English theatre. • The audience would not permit Mrs. Oldfield to go • off the stage the first night, till the had repeated it twice; the second night the noife of Ancora's was as loud as before, and she was again obliged to speak it twice; the third night it was called for a fecond time; ⚫ and in short, contrary to all other epilogues, which are dropt after the third reprefentation of the play, this has already been repeated nine times. • I must own I am the more surprised to find this censure in opposition to the whole town, in a paper ' which has hitherto been famous for the candour of its ' criticisms. • I can by no means allow your melancholy corre. spondent, that the new epilogue is unnatural, because it is gay. If I had a mind to be learned, I could tell ' him that the prologue und epilogue were real parts of ⚫ the ancient tragedy; but every one knows that on the British stage they are diftinct performances by them• felves, |