"bedchamber; all this appears to me to be improbable, incredible, impoffible."

6.6

Such is the cenfure of Dennis. There is, as Dryden expreffes it, perhaps too much horseplay in his raillery; but if his jests are coarse, his arguments are ftrong. Yet as we love better to be pleased than to be taught, Cato is read, and the critick is neglected,

Flushed with consciousness of these detections of abfurdity in the conduct, he afterwards attacked the fentiments of Cato; but he then amused himself with petty cavils, and minute objections.

Of Addison's smaller poems, no particular mention is neceffary; they have little that can employ or require a critick. The parallel of the Princes and Gods, in his verses to Kneller, is often happy, but is too well known to be quoted.

His tranflations, fo far as I have compared them, want the exactness of a fcholar. That he understood his authors cannot be doubted; but his verfions will not teach others to understand

Ff3

derstand them, being too licentiously paraphraftical. They are however, for the most part, fmooth and easy; and, what is the first excellence of a tranflator, fuch as may be read with pleasure by those who do not know the originals.

His poetry is polished and pure; the product of a mind too judicious to commit faults, but not fufficiently vigorous to attain excellence. He has fometimes a ftriking line, or a fhining paragraph; but in the whole he is warm rather than fervid, and fhews more dexterity than ftrength. He was however one of our earliest examples of correctness.

The verfification which he had learned from Dryden, he debased rather than refined. His rhymes are often diffonant; in his Georgick he admits broken lines. He uses both triplets and alexandrines, but triplets more frequently in his translations than his other works. The mere structure of verses seems never to have engaged much of his care. But his lines are very smooth in Rofamond, and too smooth in Cato.

Addifon

Addifon is now to be confidered as a critick; a name which the prefent generation is fcarcely willing to allow him. His criticifm is condemned as tentative or experimental, rather than fcientifick, and he is confidered as deciding by tafte rather than by principles.

It is not uncommon for thofe who have grown wife by the labour of others, to add a little of their own, and overlook their masters. Addison is now defpifed by fome who perhaps would never have feen his defects, but by the lights which he afforded them.

That he always wrote as he would think it necessary to write now, cannot be affirmed; his inftructions were fuch as the character of his readers made proper. That general knowledge which now circulates in common talk, was in his time rarely to be found. Men not profeffing learning were not ashamed of ignorance; and in the female world, any acquaintance with books was diftinguished only to be cenfured. His purpose was to infufe literary curiofity, by gentle and unfufpected conveyance, into the idle, and the wealthy; he thereFf4

the gay,

fore

fore prefented knowledge in the most alluring form, not lofty and auftere, but acceffible and familiar. When he fhewed them their defects, he fhewed them likewife that they might be eafily fupplied. His attempt fucceeded; enquiry was awakened, and comprehenfion expanded. An emulation of intellectual elegance was excited, and from his time to our own, life has been gradually exalted, and converfation purified and enlarged.

Dryden had, not many years before, fcattered criticifin over his Prefaces with very little parcimony; but, though he fometimes condefcended to be fomewhat familiar, his manner was in general too fcholaftick for those who had yet their rudiments to learn, and found it not eafy to understand their mafter. His obfervations were framed rather for thofe that were learning to write, than for those that read only to talk.

An inftructor like Addifon was now wanting, whofe remarks being fuperficial, might be easily understood, and being juft, might prepare the mind for more attainments.

Had

Had he prefented Paradife Loft to the publick with all the pomp of fyftem and feverity of science, he would perhaps have been admired, and the book ftill have been neglected; but by the blandishments of gentleness and facility, he has made Milton an univerfal favourite, with whom readers of every clafs think it neceffary to be pleased.

He defcended now and then to lower difquifitions; and by a ferious difplay of the beauties of Chevy Chafe, expofed himself to the ridicule of Wagstaff, who bestowed a like pompous character on Tom Thumb ; and to the contempt of Dennis, who, confidering the fundamental pofition of his criticism, that Chevy Chafe pleases, and ought to please, because it is natural, obferves, "that there is a way of deviating from nature, by bombaft or tumour, which foars above nature, and enlarges images beyond their real bulk; by affectation, which forfakes nature in quest of fomething unfuitable; and by imbecillity, which degrades nature by faintnefs and diminution, by obscuring images and weakening effects." In Chevy Chafe there is not much of either bombaft or affectation; but there is chill and lifelefs imbecillity. The

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story