arrange him with the most distinguished scholars. Nor must I forget Dr. Taylor, residentiary of St. Paul's; nor Mr. Upton, prebendary of Rochester. The former, by his edition of Demosthenes, (as far as he lived to carry it,) by his Lysias, by his comment on the Marmor Sandvicense, and other critical pieces; the latter, by his correct and elegant edition, in Greek and Latin, of Arrian's Epictetus, (the first of the kind that had any pretensions to be called complete ;) have rendered themselves, as scholars, lasting ornaments of their country. These two valuable men were the friends of my youth; the companions of my social as well as my literary hours. I admired them for their erudition; I loved them for their virtue: they are now no more. His saltem accumulem donis, et fungar inani Munere.

Virg.

CHAPTER VI.

CRITICISM MAY HAVE BEEN ABUSED YET DEFENDED, AS OF THE LAST IMPORTANCE TO THE CAUSE OF LITERATURE.

BUT here was the misfortune of this last species of criticism. The best of things may pass into abuse. There were numerous corruptions in many of the finest authors, which neither ancient editions nor manuscripts could heal. What, then, was to be done? Were forms so fair to remain disfigured, and be seen for ever under such apparent blemishes? "No, (says a critic,) conjecture can cure all: conjecture, whose performances are, for the most part, more certain than any thing that we can exhibit from the authority of manuscripts." We will not ask, upon this wonderful assertion, how, if so certain, can it be called conjecture? It is enough to observe, (be it called as it may,) that this spirit of conjecture has too often passed into an intemperate excess; and then, whatever it may have boasted, has done more mischief by far than good. Authors have been taken in hand, like anatomical subjects, only to display the skill and abilities of the artist; so that the end of many an edition seems often to have been no more than to exhibit the great sagacity and erudition of an editor. The joy of the task was the honour of mending; while corruptions were sought with a more than common attention, as each of them afforded a testimony to the editor and his art.

And here I beg leave, by way of digression, to relate a short story concerning a noted empiric. Being once in a ball-room crowded with company, he was asked by a gentleman, What he

• Plura igitur in Horatianis his curis ex conjectura exhibemus, quam ex codicum sub

sidio; et, nisi me omnia fallunt, plerumque certiora.-Bentleii Præfat. ad Horat.

thought of such a lady? was it not pity that she squinted? Squint! sir! replied the doctor, I wish every lady in the room squinted; there is not a man in Europe can cure squinting but myself."

But to return to our subject. Well, indeed, would it be for the cause of letters, were this bold conjectural spirit confined to works of second rate, where, let it change, expunge, or add, as happens, it may be tolerably sure to leave matters as they were; or if not much better, at least not much worse. But when the divine geniuses of higher rank, whom we not only applaud, but in a manner revere, when these come to be attempted by petulant correctors, and to be made the subject of their wanton caprice, how can we but exclaim, with a kind of religious abhorrence,

Procul! O! procul este profani!

These sentiments may be applied even to the celebrated Bentley. It would have become that able writer, though in literature and natural abilities among the first of his age, had he been more temperate in his criticism upon the Paradise Lost; had he not so repeatedly and injuriously offered violence to its author, from an affected superiority, to which he had no pretence. But the rage of conjecture seems to have seized him, as that of jealousy did Medea;P a rage which she confessed herself unable to resist, although she knew the mischiefs it would prompt her to perpetrate.

And now, to obviate an unmerited censure, (as if I were an enemy to the thing, from being an enemy to its abuse,) I would have it remembered, it is not either with criticism or critics that I presume to find fault. The art, and its professors, while they practise it with temper, I truly honour; and think that, were it not for their acute and learned labours, we should be in danger of degenerating into an age of dunces.

Indeed, critics (if I may be allowed the metaphor) are a sort of masters of the ceremony in the court of letters, through whose assistance we are introduced into some of the first and best company. Should we ever, therefore, by idle prejudices against pedantry, verbal accuracies, and we know not what, come to slight their art, and reject them from our favour, it is well we do not slight also those classics with whom criticism converses, becoming content to read them in translations, or (what is still worse) in translations of translations, or (what is worse even than that) not to read them at all. And I will be bold to assert, if that should ever happen, we shall speedily return into those days of darkness, out of which we happily emerged upon the revival of ancient literature.

P See the Medea of Euripides, v. 1078. See also Philosoph. Arrangements, p. 374.

CONCLUSION.

CHAPTER VII.

RECAPITULATION.

PREPARATION FOR THE SECOND PART.

AND SO much at present for critics and learned editors. So much also for the origin and progress of criticism; which has been divided into three species, the philosophical, the historical, and the corrective: the philosophical, treating of the principles and primary causes of good writing in general; the historical, being conversant in particular facts, customs, phrases, &c.; and the corrective, being divided into the authoritative and the conjectural; the authoritative, depending on the collation of manuscripts and the best editions; the conjectural, on the sagacity and erudition of editors."

As the first part of these inquiries ends here, we are now to proceed to the second part, a specimen of the doctrines and principles of criticism, as they are illustrated in the writings of the most distinguished authors.

PART II.

INTRODUCTION.

WE are, in the following part of this work, to give a specimen of those doctrines, which having been slightly touched in the first part, we are now to illustrate more amply, by referring to examples, as well ancient as modern.

a

It has been already hinted, that among writers the epic came first; it has been hinted likewise, that nothing excellent in a literary way happens merely by chance."

с

Mention also has been made of numerous composition, and the force of it suggested, though little said further.

d

To this we may add the theory of whole and parts, so essential to the very being of a legitimate composition; and the theory also of sentiment and manners, both of which naturally belong to every whole, called dramatic.

e

Nor can we on this occasion omit a few speculations on the

For the first species of criticism, see p. 388. For the second species, see p. 390. For the third species, see p. 396, to the end of the chapter following, p. 398.

There are a few other notes besides the preceding; but as some of them were long, and it was apprehended for that reason that

they might too much interrupt the continuity of the text, they have been joined with other pieces, in the forming of an Appendix.

a Page 388.
e Ibid.
e Ibid.

b Page 389.
d Ibid.

fable or action; speculations necessarily connected with every drama, and which we shall illustrate from tragedy, its most striking species.

And here, if it should be objected that we refer to English authors, the connection should be remembered between good authors of every country, as far as they all draw from the same sources, the sources I mean of nature and of truth. A like apology may be made for inquiries concerning the English tongue, and how far it may be made susceptible of classic decoration. All languages are in some degree congenial, and, both in their matter and their form, are founded upon the same principles.

What is here said, will, we hope, sufficiently justify the following detail; a detail naturally arising from the former part of the plan, by being founded upon expressions, not sufficiently there developed.

First, therefore, for the first: that the epic poets led the way; and that nothing excellent, in a literary view, happens merely by chance.

CHAPTER I.

THAT THE EPIC WRITERS CAME FIRST, AND THAT NOTHING EXCELLENT IN LITERARY PERFORMANCES HAPPENS MERELY FROM CHANCETHE CAUSES, OR REASONS OF SUCH EXCELLENCE, ILLUSTRATED BY EXAMPLES.

Ir appears, that not only in Greece, but in other countries, more barbarous, the first writings were in metre, and of an epic cast, recording wars, battles, heroes, ghosts; the marvellous always, and often the incredible. Men seemed to have thought, that the higher they soared, the more important they should appear; and that the common life which they then lived, was a thing too contemptible to merit imitation.

Hence it followed, that it was not till this common life was rendered respectable by more refined and polished manners, that men thought it might be copied, so as to gain them applause.

Even in Greece itself, tragedy had attained its maturity many years before comedy," as may be seen by comparing the age of Sophocles and Euripides with that of Philemon and Menander.

For ourselves, we shall find most of our first poets prone to a turgid bombast, and most of our first prosaic writers to a pedantic stiffness, which rude styles gradually improved, but

Hermes, p. 217.

h Aristot. Poet. c. 4. p. 227. edit. Sylb. 8 Temple's Works, vol. i. p. 239. fol. edit. Also Characteristics, vol. i. p. 244.

reached not a classical purity sooner than Tillotson, Dryden, Addison, Shaftesbury, Prior, Pope, Atterbury, &c. &c.

As to what is asserted soon after upon the efficacy of causes in works of ingenuity and art, we think in general, that the effect must always be proportioned to its cause. It is hard for him, who reasons attentively, to refer to chance any superlative production.i

Effects indeed strike us, when we are not thinking about the cause; yet may we be assured, if we reflect, that a cause there is, and that too a cause intelligent and rational. Nothing would perhaps more contribute to give us a taste truly critical, than on every occasion to investigate this cause; and to ask ourselves, upon feeling any uncommon effect, why we are thus delighted; why thus affected; why melted into pity; why made to shudder with horror?

Till this why is well answered, all is darkness, and our admiration, like that of the vulgar, founded upon ignorance.

To explain by a few examples, that are known to all, and for that reason here alleged, because they are known.

I am struck with the night-scene in Virgil's fourth Æneid: The universal silence throughout the globe; the sweet rest of its various inhabitants, soothing their cares and forgetting their labours; the unhappy Dido alone restless-restless, and agitated with impetuous passions.*

I am affected with the story of Regulus, as painted by West: The crowd of anxious friends, persuading him not to return; his wife, fainting through sensibility and fear; persons, the least connected, appearing to feel for him; yet himself unmoved, inexorable and stern.'

Without referring to these deeply tragic scenes, what charms has music, when a masterly band pass unexpectedly from loud to soft, or from soft to loud? When the system changes from the greater third to the less; or reciprocally, when it changes from this last to the former?

All these effects have a similar and well-known cause: the amazing force which contraries acquire, either by juxta-position, or by quick succession."

But we ask still further, why have contraries this force? We answer, because, of all things which differ, none differ so widely. Sound differs from darkness, but not so much as from silence; darkness differs from sound, but not so much as from light. In

γὰρ μᾶλλον τὰ ἐναντία γνωρίζεται: “ that contraries are better known, when set beside each other." Arist. Rhetor. lib. iii. p. 120, and p. 152. edit. Sylb. The same author often makes use of this truth in other places; which truth, simple as it seems, is the source of many capital beauties in all the fine arts.