muft appeal to Hamlet, that is, to Shakespeare himself in this matter; who, on the reflection he makes upon the player's emotion, in order to excite his own revenge, gives not the leaft hint that the player was unnaturally or injudiciously moved. On the contrary, his fine defcription of the actor's emotion fhews, he thought juft otherwife :

this player here,

But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his foul jo to his own conceit,
That from her working all his vifage wan'd:
Tears in his eyes, diffraction in his afpect,
A broken voice, &c.

And indeed had Hamlet efteemed this emotion any thing unnatural, it had been a very improper circumftance to spur him to his purpose.

As Shakespeare has here fhewn the effects which a fine defcription of nature, heightened with all the ornaments of art, had upon an intelligent player, whofe bufinefs habituates him to enter intimately and deeply into the characters of men and manners, and to give nature its free workings on all occafions; fo he has artfully fhewn what effects the very fame fcene would have upon a quite different man, Polonius; by nature, very weak and very artificial [two qualities, though commonly enough joined in life, yet generally fo much disguised as not to be seen by common eyes to be together; and which an ordinary poet durft not have brought fo near one another] by dif cipline, practifed in a fpecies of wit and eloquence, which was ftiff, forced, and pedantic; and by trade a politician, and therefore, of confequence, without any of the affecting notices of humanity. Such is the man whom Shakespeare has judicioufly chofen to reprefent the falfe tafte of that audience which had condemned the play here reciting. When the actor comes to the finest and most pathetic part of the fpeech, Polonius cries out, This is too long; on which Hamlet, in contempt of his ill judgment, replies, It shall to the barber's with thy beard [intimating that, by this judgment, it appeared that all his wildom lay in his length of beard,] Pry'thee, fay on. He's for a jig or a tale of bawdry [the common entertainment of that time, as well as this, of the people] or he fleeps, fay on. And yet this man of modern taite, who ftood all this time perfectly unmoved with the forcible imagery of the relator, no fooner hears, amongst many good things, one quaint and fantaflical word, put in, I fuppofe, purpofely for this end, than he profefies his approbation of the propriety and dignity of it. That's good. Mobled queen is good. On the whole then, I think, it plainly appears, that the long quotation is not given to be ridiculed and laughed at, but to be admired. The character given of the play, by Hamlet, cannot be iro

nical. The paffage itself is extremely beautiful. It has the effect that all pathetic relations, naturally written, fhould have; and it is condemned, or regarded with indifference, by one of a wrong, unnatural tafte. From hence (to observe it by the way) the actors, in their reprefentation of this play, may learn how this fpeech ought to be spoken, and what appearance Hamlet ought to affume during the recital.

That which fupports the common opinion, concerning this paffage, is the turgid expreffion in fome parts of it; which, they think, could never be given by the poet to be commended. We fhall therefore, in the next place, examine the lines moft obnoxious to cenfure, and fee how much, allowing the charge, this will make for the induction of their conclufion.

Pyrrhus at Priam drives, in rage ftrikes wide,
But with the whiff and wind of his fell fword
The unnerved father falls.

And again,

Out, out, thou ftrumpet fortune! All you gods,
In general fynod, take

away her power:
Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,
And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,

As low as to the fiends.

Now whether thefe be bombaft or not, is not the question; but whether Shakespeare efteemed them fo. That he did not fo efteem them appears from his having ufed the very fame thoughts in the fame expreffion, in his best plays, and given them to his principal characters, where he aims at the fublime. As in the following paffages.

Troilus, in Troilus and Creffida, far outftrains the execution of Pyrrhus's fword, in the character he gives of Hector's: When many times the cative Grecians fall

Even in the fan and wind of your fair fword,

You bid them rife and live.

Cleopatra, in Antony and Cleopatra, rails at fortune in the

fame manner :

No, let me fpeak, and let me rail fo high,

That the falfe hufwife Fortune break her wheel,
Provok'd at my offence.

But another ufe may be made of thefe quotations; a difcovery of the author of this recited play: which, letting us into a circumstance of our author's life (as a writer) hitherto unknown, was the reafon I have been fo large upon this question. I think then it appears, from what has been faid, that the play in difpute was Shakespeare's own and that this was the occafion of writing it. He was defirous, as foon as he had found his ftrength, of reftoring the chaftenefs and regularity of the ancient ftage; and therefore compofed this tragedy on the model of the Greek drama, as may be feen by throwing fo

much

much action into relation. But his attempt proved fruitless; and the raw, unnatural tafte, then prevalent, forced him back again into his old Gothic manner. For which he took this revenge upon his audience.

WARBURTON.

The

The praife which Hamlet beftows on this piece, is certainly diffembled, and agrees very well with the character of madness, which, before witneffes, he thought it neceffary to fupport. The fpeeches before us have fo little merit, that nothing but an affectation of fingularity could have influenced Dr. Warburton to undertake their defence. The poet, perhaps, meant to exhibit a juft refemblance of fome of the plays of his own age, in which the faults were too many in number to permit a few fplendid paffages to atone for a general defect. player knew his trade, and spoke the lines in an affecting manner, because Hamlet had declared them to be pathetic; or might be in reality a little moved by them: for," There "are lefs degrees of nature (fays Dryden) by which fome "faint emotions of pity and terror are raised in us, as a lefs "engine will raife a lefs proportion of weight, though not fo "much as one of Archimedes' making." The mind of the prince, it must be confeffed, was fitted for the reception of gloomy ideas, and his tears were ready at a flight folicitation. It is by no means proved, that Shakespeare has employed the fame thoughts cloathed in the fame expreffions, in his best plays. If he bids the falje bufwife Fortune break her wheel, he does not defire her to break all its Spokes; nay, even its periphery, and make use of the nave afterwards for juch an immeajureable caft. Though if what Dr. Warburton has faid fhould be found in any inftance to be exactly true, what can we infer from thence, but that Shakespeare was fometimes wrong in fpite of conviction, and in the hurry of writing committed thofe very faults which his judgment could detect in others? Dr. Warburton is inconfiftent in his affertions concerning the literature of Shakespeare.. In a note on Troilus and Creffida, he affirms, that his want of learning kept him from being acquainted with the writings of Homer; and, in this inftance, would fuppofe him capable of. producing a complete tragedy written on the ancient rules; and that the fpeech before us had fufficient merit to intitle it to a place in the fecond book of Virgil's Eneid, even though the work had been carried to that perfection which the Roman poet had con

ceived.

Had Shakespeare made one unfuccefsful attempt in the manner of the ancients (that he had any knowledge of their rules remains to be proved) it would certainly have been recorded by contemporary writers, among whom Ben Jonfon would have been the firft. Had his darling ancients been unfkilfully imitated by a rival poet, he would at least have preferved the memory of the fact, to fhew how unfafe it was for any one, who

was

was not as thorough a scholar as himself, to have meddled with their facred remains.

"Within that circle none durft walk but he." He has reprefented Inigo Jones as being ignorant of the very names of thofe ancients, whofe architecture he undertook to correct: in his Poet after he has in feveral places hinted at our poet's injudicious ufe of words, and feems to have pointed his ridicule more than once at fome of his defcriptions and characters. is true that he has praised him, but it was not while that praise could have been of any fervice to him; and pofthumous applaufe is always to be had on eafy conditions. Happy it was for Shakespeare, that he took nature for his guide, and, engaged in the warm purfuit of her beauties, left to Jonfon the repofitories of learning fo has he escaped a contest which might have rendered his life uneafy, and bequeathed to our poffeffion the more valuable copies from nature herfelf. STEEVENS.