quickened by anger; and perhaps the best advice to authors would be, that they hould keep out of the way of one an other. Rowe is chiefly to be confidered as a tragick writer and a tranflator. In his attempt at comedy he failed fo ignominiously, that his Biter is not inferted in his works; and his occafional poems and short compofitions are rarely worthy of either praise or cenfure; for they seem the cafual sports of a mind feeking rather to amufe its leisure than to exercife its powers. In the conftruction of his dramas, there is not much art; he is not a nice obferver of the Unities. He extends time and varies place as his convenience requires. To vary the place is not, in my opinion, any violation of Nature, if the change be made between the acts; for it is no less eafy for the spectator to fuppofe himself at Athens in the fecond act, than at Thebes in the firft; but to change the scene, as is done by Rowe, in the middle of an act, is to add more acts to the play, fince an act is fo much of the bufinefs business as is' tranfacted without interruption. Rowe, by this licence, eafily extricates himself from difficulties; as in Jane Grey, when we have been terrified with all the dreadful pomp of publick execution, and are wondering how the heroine or the poet will proceed, no fooner has Jane pronounced fome prophetick rhymes, thanpafs and be gone-the fcene closes, and Pembroke and Gardiner are turned out upon the stage. I know not that there can be found in his plays any deep fearch into nature, any accurate discriminations of kindred qualities, or nice display of paffion in its progrefs; all is general and undefined. Nor does he much interest or affect the auditor, except in Fane Shore, who is always feen and heard with pity. Alicia is a character of empty noise, with no resemblance to real forrow or to natural madness. Whence, then, has Rowe his reputation? From the reasonableness and propriety of fame of his fcenes, from the elegance of his diction, and the fuavity of his verse, He He feldom moves either pity or terror, but he often elevates the fentiments; he feldom pierces the breast, but he always delights the ear, and often improves the understanding. His tranflation of the Golden Verfes, and of the first book of Quillet's Poem, have nothing in them remarkable. The Golden Verfes are tedious. The verfion of Lucan is one of the greateft productions of English poetry; for there is perhaps none that fo completely exhibits the genius and spirit of the original. Lucan is diftinguished by a kind of dictatorial or philofophic dignity, rather, as Quintilian obferves, declamatory than poetical; full of ambitious morality and pointed fentences, comprised in vigorous and animated lines. This character Rowe has very diligently and fuccessfully preserved. His verfification, which is such as his contemporaries practised, without any attempt at innovation or improvement, seldom wants either melody or force. His author's fenfe is fometimes a little diluted by additional infufions, and fometimes weakened by too much expan fion. But fuch faults are to be expected in all translations, from the constraint of meafures and diffimilitude of languages. The Pharfalia of Rowe deferves more notice than it obtains, and as it is more read will be more esteemed. ADDISON. ADDISON. OSEPH ADDISON was born on the Jos first of May, 1672, at Milston, of which his father, Lancelot Addison, was then rec-/ tor, near Ambrofbury in Wiltshire, and appearing weak and unlikely to live, he was chriftened the fame day. After the usual domestick education, which, from the character of his father, may be reafonably supposed to have given him strong impreffions of piety, he was committed to the care of Mr. Naish at Ambrofbury, and afterwards of Mr. Taylor at Salisbury. Not to name the school or the masters of men illuftious for literature, is a kind of historical fraud, by which honest fame is in VOL. II. Y juriously |