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"if he heard I was going to be hanged."• Mr. Pope said, he could not deny but Mr. * Addison understood Rowe well."

This cenfure time has not left us the power of confirming or refuting; but obfervation daily fhews, that much ftrefs is not to be laid on hyperbolical accufations, and pointed fentences, which even he that utters them defires to be applauded rather than credited. Addison can hardly be fuppofed to have meant all that he faid. Few characters can bear the microfcopick fcrutiny of wit quickened by anger; and perhaps the beft advice to authors would be, that they fhould keep out of the way of one another.

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Rowe is chiefly to be confidered as a traick 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 fhort compofitions are rarely worthy of either praife or cenfure; for they feem the cafual fports of a mind feeking rather to amufe its leifure than to exercise its 19075m-sdick sit di flet mid Bostis bluow

e powers.

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In the conftruction of his dramas, there is is not a nice obferver of the not much art: b 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 lefs eafy for the fpectator to fuppofe himself at Athens in the second act, than at Thebes in the firft; but to change the fcene, 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 as is tranfacted without interruption. Rowe, by this licence, easily 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, than-pafs and be gone the fcene clofes, and Pembroke and Gardiner are turned out upon the stage. Betrorg adilo once

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alebknow not that there can be found in his

plays any deep fearch into nature, any ac@curate difcriminations of kindred qualities, -idq no Ishoufib to burd syd boringnifier sidqolol

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or nice difplay of paffion in its progress ; | is general and undefined. Nor does he much intereft or intereft or affect the auditor, except

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with pity.sk
pity. Alicia

jo Jane Shore, who is always feen and heard Alicia is a character of empty noife, with no refemblance to real forrow or to natural madness,

Whence, then, has Rowe his reputation? From the reasonableness and propriety of fome of his fcenes, from the elegance of his diction, and the fuavity of his verfe. He fel dom moves either pity or terrour, but he often elevates the fentiments; he feldom pierces the breaft, but he always delights the ear, and often improves the understanding. coluboke Hoifduq on His tranflation of the Golden Verses, and of the first book of Quillet's Poem, have nothing in them remarkable. The Golden Verfes are tedious.) big words busstola

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The version of Lucan is one of the greatest productions of English poetry for there is perhaps none that fo completely exhibits the genius and spirit of the original. lib Lucan is diftinguished by a kind of dictatorial or phi

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lofophic

lofophic 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 fuccefsfully preferved. preferved. His verfification, which is fuch as his contemporaries practifed, without any attempt at innovation or improvement, feldom wants either melody or force. His author's fenfe is fometimes a lit tle diluted by additional infufions, and fometimes weakened by too much expanfion. But fuch faults are to be expected in all tranflations, 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 efteemed,

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OSEPH ADDISON was born on

J the firft of May, 1672, at Miifton, of

which his father, Lancelot Addison, was then rector, near Ambrofebury in Wiltshire, and appearing weak and unlikely to live, he was 'chriftened the fame day. After the usual domeftick education, which, from the character of his father, may be reasonably fuppofed to have given him strong impressions of piety, he was committed to the care of Mr. Naith at Ambrofebury, and afterwards of Mr. Taylor at Salisbury.

Not to name the fchool or the mafters of men illuftrious for literature, is a kind of hiftorical fraud, by which honeft fame is injuriously diminished: I would therefore

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