Which I so lively acted with my tears,
That my poor mistress, moved therewithal,

Wept

authors draw the very picture, and give us all the circumstances of it, which S. never once ains at; wherefore the passages can never with any propriety be compared with one another, so as to fix the fuperiority of either: they are no more than different allusions to the same story; whose merits

may both be great, but diffimilar ; as Guido's would have been had he painted the distrelled king Lear; and Garrick's, when he represents to us those distrelles. Seward reads the 7th line, And you

fhall find all true-put 'm on th' wild ifand. " Because,” she says,“ she tells her maid, You'll find all true except the wild island, and instantly the is upon the island.” The wild illand, therefore, in our imagination, is as true as the rest. But it is plain by the text, Aspatia wanted no part to be done over again, except that of the lady: the tells her maid, “Me has failed in working Ariadne ; that her colours were not dull and pale enough to express that fad lady's misery ; which she bids ber do by her mistress, who was the life of that poor picture, and in whom she would find all the distresses of Ariadne exactly true, and most really figured, except that part of it which concerns the wild inand, where she was left by Theseus.” Aspatia indeed, was not.on such an island, but all her other distresses were like those of Ariadne. “Suppose that then,” says she,“ imagine me standing on the sea-beach, mine arms extended thus, and my hair blown with the wind, wild as that defart, and all let [loose ] about me, tell [fufficiently and in reality declare] I am forsaken," @ri Theabald alters, Tell I am forsaken, to Be teachers of my story: let all about me be teachers of my story. The reader need not, I suppose, be told, how frequently, let all about fignifies, let loose, diseveled, in S. and many other dramatic writers,-Seward proposes to read the last line in the text,

¢ If I in thought feel not her very sorrow; which, though an ingenious criticism, I cannot think quite agreeable to the text. Julia observes,--he acted the part so lively with her tears, that her mistress wept bitterly;

nay,

Wept bitterly; and, would I might be dead,
If I in thought felt not her very sorrow !

A CT V.. SCENE III.

Women sacred even to Banditti. Fear not, he bears an honourable mind, And will not use a woman (24) lawlessly.

A Lover

nay, she adds, I would I might be dead, If I did not really and truly (and not in diflimulation only) feel all her forrow, and actually then suffer all her miseries. I cannot think the author would have written-wou'd I might be dead -had he written, If I feel not. I hope that gentleman, who fhows so great candor and good-nature through all his criticisms, will excuse my differing from him, and expressing my sentiments so freely; a duty, which I think, his authors demand, truth will justify, and good sense approve. Let me conclude this long note with Ariadne's own description of herself, in her epistle to Theseus;

You cannot see, yet think you saw me now,
Fix'd to some rock, as if I there did grow,
And trembling at the waves which roll below.
Look on my torn and my disorder'd hairs,
Look on my robe, wet through with show'rs of tears;
With the cold blasts see my whole body shakes,
my numm'd hand unequal letters makes.

Ovid's Epistles. (24) Will not use a woman, &c.] Valentine makes it one of his terms, on becoming their captain,--that they do no outrages on filly women or poor passengers. Act 4. Sc. In See the last passage in this play,They say of them. felves,

Some of us are gentlemen,
Such as the fury of ungovern'd youth
Thrust from the company of lawful men.

}

And

A Lover in Solitude.

How use doth (25) breed a habit in a man!
This shadowy desart, unfrequented woods,
I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.
Here can I sit alone, unseen of any,
And to the nightingale's complaining notes

Tune my distresses, and record my woes.
O, thou (26) that doft inhabit in my breast,
Leave not the mansion so long tenantless ;
Left, growing ruinous, the building fall,
And leave no memory of what it was..
Repair me with thy presence, Silvia;
Thou gentle nymph, cherish thy forlorn swain.

Love unreturned.

What (27) dang'rous action, stood it next to death, Wou'd I not undergo for one calm look?

Oh, (25) How use dath, &c.] See As you like it, Act 2. Sc. i.

Now my co-mates, &c. (26) Othou, &c.] St. obferves very truly, that it is fcarce possible to point out four lines in any of our author's plays, more remarkable for ease and elegance than this and the three following.

(27) What, &c.] Ovid tells us, love is ever daring, and bold to undertake any thing.

Et nibil est quod non effræno captus amore
Auft.
What dang’rous actiod wou'd he not attempt,

Whom love's wild passion rules ?
As does Seneca in his Medea :

Amor timere neminem verus poteft,

True love can never fear.
VOL. II

F

Oh, 'tis the curse in love, and still approv'd,
When women cannot love when they're belov’d.
Infidelity in a Friend, and Reconciliation on Re-

pentance.
Val. Treacherous man !
Thou hast beguild my hopes ; nought but mine eye
Could have persuaded me; now I dare not say,
I have one friend alive : thou would'st disprove me.
Who should be trusted now, when one's own right

hand
Is perjur'd to the bosom? Protheus,
I am sorry, I must'never trust thee more,
But count the world a stranger for thy fake.
The private wound is deepeft...,

Pro. My shame, and guilt, confounds me :
Forgive me, Valentine : if hearty sorrow
Be a fufficient ransom for offence,
I tender it here; I do as truly suffer,
As e'er I did commit.

Val. Then I am paid :
And once again I do receive thee honest.-
(28) Who by repentance is not satisfy'd,
Is nor of heaven, nor earth.

Inconstancy in Man.

Oh heav'n! were mai
But constant, he were perfect: that one error
Fills him with faults.

A worthy

. Gentleman. Now by the honour (29) of my ancestry,

I do

(28) See Measure for Measure, Act 2. Sc. 7.
(29) Now by the bonour, &c.] What strikes me parti-

cularly,

I do applaud thy fpirit, Valentine,
And think thee worthy of an empress' love.
Know then, I here forget all former griefs,
Cancel all grudge, repeal thee home again,
Plead a new state in thy unrival'd merit,
To which I thus.subscribe.—Sir Valentine,
Thou art a gentleman, and well deriv'd;
Take thou thy Sylvia, for thou hast deferv'd her.

Reformed Exiles. These banished men, Are men endu'd with worthy qualities They are reformed, civil, full of good, And fit for great employment, worthy lord. 'cularly, says Mrs. G., in this speech, is the gallant duke's asseveration, in that truly noble expression,

Now, by the bonour of my ancestry. It was this generous, fpirited idea that continued down the race of heroes among us, while they did exist, and were the profession of heraldry never to be considered in any other light, than as a record of mens' worth, not titles, it would then both become a political and liberal science. Honours, as Selden fays, should be native only, and not dative: derived from merits, not from gifts. Our author, in the Winter's Tale, has a passage to this purpose :

As you are certain gentlemen; thereto
Clerk-like, experienc'd, which no less adorns
Our gentry, than our parents noble names,
In whose success we are gentle, I beseech you, &c.

General Observation. Julia's love-adventures being in some respects the same with those of Viola in Twelfth Night, the same novel might give rise to them both; and Valentine's falling amongst out-laws, and becoming their captain, is an incident that has some resemblance to one in the Arcadia (book 1, chap. 6.) where Pyracles heads the Helots: all the other

circum