battle; where the weak ftruggled for freedom, and the ftrong for dominion. The king was without power, and the nobles without principle; they were tyrants at home, and robbers abroad: nothing remained to be a check upon ferocity and violence. The Scythians in their deferts could not be lefs indebted to the laws of fociety, than the Europeans during the period under review. The people, the most numerous as well as the most useful clafs in the community, were either actual flaves, or expofed to fo many miferies, arising from pillage and oppreffion, to one or other of which they were a continual prey, and often to both, that many of them made a voluntary furrender of their liberty for bread and protection. What must have been the ftate of that government, where flavery was an eligible condition! • But conformable to the obfervation of the philofophic Hume, there is a point of depreffion, as well as of exaltation, beyond which human affairs feldom pafs, and from which they naturally return in a contrary progrefs. This utmost point of decline fociety feems to have attained in Europe, as I have alread faid, about the beginning of the eleventh century; when the diforders of the feudal government, together with the corruption of talte and manners confequent upon thefe, were arrived at their greateft excefs and accordingly from that æra, we can trace a fucceffion of caufes and events, which, with different degrees of influence, contributed to abolish anarchy and barbarism, and introduce order and politeness. : Among the first of thefe caufes we must rank Chivalry; which, as the elegant and inquifitive Dr. Robertfon remarks, though commonly confidered as a wild institution, the refult of caprice and the fource of extravagance, arofe naturally from the ftate of fociety in thofe times, and had a very serious effect in refining the manners of the European nations. The feudal ftate, as has been obferved, was a state of perpetual war, rapine, and anarchy. The weak and unarmed were exposed every moment to infults or injuries. The power of the fovereign was too limited to prevent thefe wrongs, and the legislative authority too feeble to redrefs them: there was scarce any fhelter from violence and oppreffion, except what the valour and generofity of private perfons afforded; and the arm of the brave was the only tribunal to which the helpless could appeal for justice. The trader could no longer travel in fafety, or bring to market his commodities, without which there was no fubfifting: every poffeffor of a castle pillaged them, or laid them under contribution; and many not only plundered the merchants, but carried off all the women that fell in their way. Slight inconveniencies may be overlooked or endured; but when abuses grow to a certain height, the fociety must reform, or go to ruin; it becomes the business of all to discover, and to apply fuch remedies as will moft effectually remove them. Humanity fprung from the bofom of violence, and relief from the hand of rapacity. Thofe licentious and tyrannic nobles, who had been guilty of every fpecies of outrage, and every mode of oppreffion; who, equally unjuft, unfeeling, and fuperftitious, had made pilgrimages, and had pillaged; who had maffacred, and done penance: touched at last by a fenfe of natural equity, and fwayed by the con viction viction of a common intereft, formed affociations for the redress of private wrongs, and the prefervation of public fafety. So honourable was the origin of an inftitution generally reprefented as whimfical! The young warrior among the ancient Germans, as well as among the modern knights, was armed, for the first time, with certain ceremonies proper to infpire martial ardour; but chivalry, confidered as a civil and military inftitution, is as late as the eleventh century. The previous difcipline and folemnities of initiation you will find in books of knighthood. Valour, humanity, courtesy, juftice, honour, were its characteristics: and to thefe were. added religion; which, by infusing a large portion of enthufiaftic zeal, carried them all to a romantic excess, wonderfully fuited to the genius of the age, and productive of the greatest and most permanent effects both upon policy and manners. War was carried on with lefs ferocity, when humanity, no lefs than courage, came to be deemed the ornament of knighthood, and knighthood a distinction fuperior to royalty, and an honour which princes were proud to receive from the hands of private gentlemen; more gentle and polished manners were introduced, when courtesy was recommended as the most amiable of knightly virtues, and every knight devoted himself to the fervice of a lady; violence and oppreffion decreased, when it was accounted meritorious to check and to punish them: a fcrupulous adherence to truth, with the most religious attention to fulfil every engagement, but particularly thofe between the fexes, as more eafily violated, became the diftinguishing character of a gentleman, because chivalry was regarded as the school of honour, and inculcated the most delicate fenfibility with refpect to that point; and valour, feconded by fo many motives of love, religion, and virtue, became altogether irrefittible. That the fpirit of chivalry fometimes rofe to an extravagant height, and had often a pernicious tendency, muft however be allowed. In Spain, under the influence of a romantic gallantry, it gave birth to a series of wild adventures, which have been deservedly ridiculed: in the train of Norman ambition, it extinguished the liberties of England, and deluged Italy in blood; and we fhall foon fee it, at the call of fuperftition, and as the engine of papal power, defolate Afia under the banner of the crofs. But thefe ought not to be confidered as arguments against an inftitution laudable in itself, and neceffary at the time of its foundation: and those who pretend to despise it, the advocates of ancient barbarism and ancient ruflicity, ought to remember, that chivalry not only first taught mankind to carry the civilities of peace into the operations of war, and to mingle politenefs with the ufe of the fword, but roufed the human foul from its lethargy, invigorated the human character, even while it foftened it, and produced exploits which antiquity cannot parallel. Nor ought they to forget, that it gave variety, elegance, and pleasure, to the intercourfe of life, by making woman a more effential part of fociety; and is therefore entitled to our gratitude, though the point of honour, and the refinements in gallantry, its more doubtful effects, should be excluded from the improvements in modern manners.' Our Our numerous engagements prevent our dwelling longer on this article, than to recommend it to the attention of inftructors of youth, as, with the aid of good chronological tables, a proper elementary work in this ufeful branch of knowledge." We are forry to obferve, however, that the Author has forgotten that neceffary article, efpecially in a work of this kind, a good alphabetical index. ART. IV. JOHNSON's Biographical Prefaces to the Works of the Englib Poets. Vols. III. and IV. Concluded. See laft Month's Re view. A' FTER the liberal attention that was bestowed upon the two former volumes of the prefent publication, it will be lefs neceffary to enlarge upon thofe which remain. The life of Dryden, the particulars of which are traced with great minuteness, contains, befide many curious and interesting anecdotes, much of the literary history of his time; and the critical labour and attention that have been devoted to his works, do credit as well to the diligence as to the abilities of his learned Reviewer. Dryden's merit as a profe writer having not, perhaps, been fufficiently attended to or remarked, it will be a gratification to our Readers to know Dr. Johnson's fentiments concerning it: Criticism, either didactic or defenfive, occupies almost all his profe, except thofe pages which he has devoted to his patrons; but none of his prefaces were ever thought tedious. They have not the formality of a fettled ftyle, in which the first half of the fentence betrays the other. The claufes are never balanced, nor the periods modelled; every word feems to drop by chance, though it falls into its proper place. Nothing is cold or languid; the whole is airy, animated, and vigorous; what is little, is gay; what is great, is fplendid. He may be thought to mention himself too frequently; but while he forces himself upon our esteem, we cannot refufe him to ftand high in his own. Every thing is excufed by the play of images and the fpriteliness of expreffion. Though all is easy, nothing is feeble; though all feems careless, there is nothing harth; and though, fince his earlier works, more than a century has paffed, they have nothing yet uncouth or obfolete. He who writes much, will not eafily escape a manner, fuch a recurrence of particular modes as may be easily noted. Dryden iş always another and the fame, he does not exhibit a fecond time the fame elegancies in the fame form, nor appears to have any art other than that of expreffing with clearness what he thinks with vigour. His ftyle could not easily be imitated, either feriously or ludicrously, for being always equable and always varied, it has no prominent or difcriminative characters. The beauty who is totally free from difproportion of parts and features cannot be ridiculed by an overcharged refemblance.' From From his profe, however, as Dr. Johnfon properly remarks, Dryden derives only his accidental and fecondary praise; the veneration, continues he, with which his name is pronounced by every cultivator of English Literature, is paid to him as he refined the language, improved the fentiments, and tuned the numbers of English Poetry. After about half a century of forced thoughts, and rugged metre, some advances towards nature and harmony had been already made by Waller and Denham; they had fhewn that long difcourfes in rhyme grew more pleafing when they were broken into couplets, and that verfe confifted not only in the number but the arrangement of fyllables. But though they did much, who can deny that they left much. to do? Their works were not many, nor were their minds of very ample comprehenfion. More examples of more modes of compofition were neceffary for the establishment of regularity, and the introduction of propriety in word and thought. Every language of a learned nation neceffarily divides itself into diation fcholaftic and popular, grave and familiar, elegant and grofs; and from a nice diftinction of thefe different parts, arifes a great part of the beauty of ftyle. But if we except a few minds, the favourites of nature, to whom their own original recitude was in the place of rules, this delicacy of felection was little known to our authors; our speech lay before them in a heap of confufion, and every man took for every purpose what chance might offer him. There was therefore before the time of Dryden no poetical diction, no fyftem of words at once refined from the groffnefs of domeftic ufe, and free from the harshness of terms appropriated to particular arts. Words too familiar, or too remote, defeat the purpofe of a poet. From thofe founds which we hear on fmall or on coarfe occafions, we do not easily receive ftrong impreffions, or delightful images, and words to which we are nearly ftrangers, whenever they occur, draw that attention on themselves which they should convey to things. • Thofe happy combinations of words which diftinguish poetry from profe, had been rarely attempted; we had few elegancies or flowers of speech, the rofes had not yet been plucked from the bramble, or different colours had not been joined to enliven one another. It may be doubted whether Waller and Denham could have overborn the prejudices which had long prevailed, and which even then were sheltered by the protection of Cowley. The new verfification, as it was called, may be confidered as owing its establishment to Dryden; from whofe time it is apparent that English poetry has had no tendency to relapfe to its former favageness.' At the clofe of this volume is a copy of an original letter from Dryden to his fons in Italy. The manufcript is preserved in the Lambeth Library. It is a curiofity, and as fuch we prefent it to our Readers: "Dear Sons, Sept. the 3d, our ftile. "Being now at Sir William Bowyer's in the country, I cannot write at large because I find myself somewhat indifpofed with a cold, and am thick of hearing, rather worfe than I was in town. I am glad to find, by your letter of July 26th, your ftyle, that you are both in health; but wonder you should think me fo negligent as to forget to give you an account of the fhip in which your parcel is to come. I have written to you two or three letters concerning it, which I have fent by fafe hands, as I told you, and doubt not but you have them before this can arrive to you. Being out of town, I have forgotten the fhip's name, which your mother will enquire, and put it into her letter, which is joined with mine. But the mafter's name I remember: he is called Mr. Ralph Thorp; the fhip is bound to Leghorn, configned to Mr. Peter and Mr. Tho. Ball, merchants. I am of your opinion, that by Tonfon's means almost all our letters have mifcarried for this laft year. But however he has miffed of his defign in the Dedication, though he had prepared the book for it; for in every figure of Eneas he has caufed him to be drawn, like K. William, with a hooked nofe. After my return to town, I intend to alter a play of Sir Robert Howard's, written long fince, and lately put by him into my hands: 'tis called the Conquest of China by the I Tartars. It will coft me fix weeks ftudy, with the probable benefit of an hundred pounds. In the mean time I am writing a fong for St. Cecilia's Feaft, who, you know, is the patronefs of mufic. This is trouble fome, and no way beneficial; but I could not deny the Stewards of the Feast, who came in a body to me to defire that kindnefs, one of them being Mr. Bridgman, whofe parents are your mother's friends. I hope to fend you thirty guineas between Michaelmafs and Chriflmafs, of which I will give you an account when I come to town. I remember the counsel you give me in your letter; but diffembling, though lawful in fome cafes, is not my talent; yet, for your fake, I will struggle with the plain openness of my nature, and keep in my juft refentments against that degenerate order. In the mean time, I flatter not myself with any manner of hopes, but do my duty, and fuffer for God's fake; being affured, beforehand, never to be rewarded, though the times fhould alter. Towards the latter end of this month, September, Charles will begin to recover his perfect health, according to his nativity, which, cafting it myfelf, I am fure is true, and all things hitherto have happened accordingly to the very time that I predicted them: I hope at the fame time to recover more health, according to my age. Remember me to poor Harry, whofe prayers I earnestly defire. My Virgil fucceeds in the world beyond its defert or my expectation. You know the profits might have been more; but neither my confcience nor my honour would fuffer me to take them: but I never can repent of my conftancy, fince I am thoroughly perfuaded of the juftice of the caufe for which I fuffer. It has pleafed God to raise up many friends to me amongst my enemies, though they who ought to have been my friends are negligent of me. I am called to dinner, and cannot go on with this letter, which I defire you to excufe; and am Your affectionate father, JOHN DRYDEN." This letter affords a confirmation of the ftories that are told by Dryden's former biographers, of his being addicted to aftrology; and that fome of his predictions, particularly those relative to the fate of his fon Charles, proved true. Neither wit nor |