lows its courfe with rapture and enthu fiafm. Having thus faintly expreffed the high reverence which I bear to one of fo fuperior an order, I will here close this long, 1 yet, may I hope? to you, not tedious difcuffion. Adieu. LETTER III. MY DEAR P. THE HE obfervations which I offered on two beautiful paffages, the one from Gray, the other from Horace, have not exhaufted the subject, on which I was then treating. Allow me to fubmit to your confideration another inftance of fimilar coincidence, which has always appeared to me very remarkable, though it seems to have escaped the notice of other readers. In the Bard we have a picture, exhibiting the death of Richard II. by famine, as recorded by * Archbishop Scroop and the older writers, executed by the boldest pencil of creative Fancy : Fill high the sparkling bowl, Reft Reft of a crown he still may share the feast. Fell Thirst and Famine fcowl A baneful fmile upon their baffled guest. Compare thefe fine lines with the fol lowing, equally fine, lines of Virgil: Lucent genialibus altis Aurea fulcra toris; epulæq. ante ora paratæ Accubat, et manibus prohibet contingere menfas, En. B. VI. L. 603. The two poets chanced to have the fame fubject in contemplation. Your attention will be caught at first view by a ftriking fimilarity of manner in the execu tion of their defign. It will be observed alfo, that this manner, fo admirably fuited to their purpose, is out of the common way, very far beyond the reach of common minds. In order to aggravate the diftrefs, and to render the inflicted torments more poignantly excruciating, a rich and luxurious banquet is, with exqui❤ fite refinement, previously prepared by each of these great mafters, and spread in fplendid fplendid array before the face of the unfortunate fufferers; the fight of which, while they are withheld from partaking it, irritates the cravings of hunger, even to agony. Their conftrained abftinence is enforced in both by the fame poetical machinery. In Gray, Fell Thirft and Famine exactly correfpond to the chief of the Furies in Virgil. The baneful fmile, fcowled on the baffled guest, in the former, carries with it, perhaps, more of fcorn and mortifying infult, than the more direct oppofition of the Fury, with her up-lifted torch and thundering voice, does in the latter. Still, however, the imagery-the turn of thought the plan and ftructure of the piece, and the difpofition of the parts, are in both instances precisely the fame. Whence this extraordinary congruity arofe, or by what means it was effected, I will not take upon me to determine. So far I will venture to fay, and I affure myfelf of your cordial concurrence, that Gray's charming ftanza, when feen by itself, has very much the air of an ori ginal. "Common sense," we are told on high authority, "directs us for the most part "to regard refemblances in great writers, "not as the pilferings, or frugal acquifi"tions of needy art, but as the honeft "fruits of genius, the free and liberal "bounties of unenvying nature. " The LEARNED CRITIC calls for this liberality of judgment in behalf of the Poets, with whom particularly he was concerned. I find myself, juft at this present, very much disposed to claim the fame confideration for the writers in Profe; having in my mind two paffages from two celebrated writers in that form, which I am ftrongly tempted to fend you. The late Dr. Ogden, who in my judgment holds the very highest rank amongst the most eminent preachers, in one of those excellent fermons on the fifth commandment, addreffing himself to a young man, whofe behaviour he supposes less correct than it ought to be, enforces the obli gations |