easily be deceived in the effects, if we have judg ment enough but to draw the parallel.""

Hence, even at the early age of ten, he had read Polybius; and afterwards doubtless made himself master of the Greek, Roman, and modern historians. Horace, Virgil, Quintilian, Shakspeare, Montagne, and Tasso, appear to have been his favourite authors. The latter, whom he has styled the most excellent of all the modern poets, he tells us he reverenced next to Virgil. He had read a great many romances, in most of the modern languages; a taste which led him not only highly to estimate Don Quixote," but to peruse with pleasure even the History of Reynard the Fox, and the numerous collection of old English ballads possessed by his patron, the Earl of Dorset, in

6 Vol. ii. p. 397.

7 Vol. i. Part ii. p. 204.

Is it not great pity, that a man who hath read Don Quixote for the greatest part of his life, should pretend to interpret the Bible, or trace the footsteps of tradition, even in the darkest ages ?"-REFLECTIONS ON THE HIND AND THE PANTHER, by T. Brown, 4to. 1687.

9" I find, (says Gildon,) Mr. Bayes, the Younger, [Rowe,] has two qualities like Mr. Bayes, the Elder; his admiration of some odd books, as Reynard the Fox, and the old ballads of Jane Shore, &c.—Remarks on Mr. ROWE'S PLAYS, 12mo. 1715.

See also THE HIND AND THE PANTHER TRANSVERSED:

"Smith. You sometimes read as bad authors. I have heard you quote Reynard the Fox.

which Addison informs us they both took great delight.'

Though his morals were aspersed, and his writings censured and ridiculed, in innumerable libels,

"Bayes. Why there's it now: take it from me, Mr. Smith, there is as good morality and as sound precepts in the Delectable History of Reynard the Fox, as in any book I know, except Seneca."

SPECTATOR, No. 85.

"More libels," says he, "have been written against me, than almost any man now living; and I had reason on my side, to have defended my own innocence.-I speak not of my poetry, which I have wholly given up to the criticks: let them use it as they please: posterity perhaps may be more favourable to me; for interest and passion will lie buried in another age, and partiality and prejudice be forgotten. I speak of my morals, which have been sufficiently aspersed: that only sort of reputa tion ought to be dear to every honest man, and is to me. But let the world witness for me, that I have been often wanting to myself in this particular; I have seldom an swered any scurrilous lampoon, when it was in my power to have exposed my enemies; and being naturally vindicative, have suffered in silence, and possessed my soul in quiet." See vol. iii. p. 171.

The following passage on the same topick, in his letter to Dennis, written in 1694, exhibits some traits of his character, which have been already noticed:

"For my morals betwixt man and man, I am not to be my own judge; I appeal to the world, if I have deceived or defrauded any man:-and for my private conversation, they who see me every day can be the best witnesses, whether or no it be blameless and inoffensive. Hitherto I have no reason to complain, that men of either

he seldom condescended to mention his opponents: trusting, that the blameless tenour of his life would sufficiently confute his calumniators; and that when partiality and prejudice should be forgotten, posterity would be more favourable to him, and rightly appreciate his works. Of their great excellence he could not be ignorant; but it is no inconsiderable proof of both his genius and his candour, that he was not insensible to their defects. Whatever praises of his performances may have occasionally fallen from him, which were in some measure extorted by the ungenerous attempts of his adversaries to depreciate him,' he has himself told us, that he was rarely pleased with his own endeavours. His mind had too large a grasp, to permit him to be entirely satisfied with his compositions, "which seldom reached to those ideas that he had within him :" and hence probably it was, that he submitted many of his pieces in

party shun my company. I have never been an impu. dent beggar at the doors of noblemen. My visits have indeed been too rare, to be unacceptable; and but just enough to testify my gratitude for their bounty, which I have frequently received, but always unasked, as themselves will witness."

3" If a man can ever have reason to set a value on himself, it is, when his ungenerous enemies are taking the advantage of the times upon him, to ruin him in his reputation." Preface to DON SEBASTIAN; 1690. He elsewhere observes, that "a man may be just to himself, though he may not be partial."

Vol. ii. p. 54; vol. iii. p. 40,

manuscript to his friends, and read his works aloud to them for their judgment: and he was extremely patient of their observations and corrections. Like some other of our English poets, he read so ill, that his productions suffered greatly by his delivery; a circumstance in which he resembled Congreve,; Thomson, and Goldsmith, as on the other hand, Lee, Rowe, and Pope,'

The Earl of Dorset read DoN SEBASTIAN twice over, before it was acted. See also Dryden's Letter to Tonson, dated Wednesday Morning, desiring him to make a transcript of the Fourth Eneid, for the purpose of showing it to some of his friends; and another, dated Friday Forenoon, desiring him to carry the manuscript translation of the Seventh Eneid to Sir Robert Howard, that he might peruse it at leisure in the country. Congreve reviewed the whole Æneid in manuscript, and compared it with the original. "I shall never (says our author,) be ashamed to own, that this excellent young man has shewed me many faults, which I have endeavoured to correct."

• See his Note on the Ninth Æneid, v, 1095: "When I read this Æneid to many of my friends,. in company together, most of them quarreled at the word falsified, [his ample shield-is falsified—] as an innovation in our language."

7" Southerne (says Dr. Johnson,) used to relate of one comedy, probably of this, [THE OLD BACHELOR,] that when Congreve read it to the players, he pronounced it so wretchedly, that they had almost rejected it."-LIFE OF CONGREVE.

• Rowe's voice was so uncommonly sweet, his observations so lively, and his manner so engaging, that his friends delighted in his conversation.

Pope's voice was so naturally musical, that South

emulating the sweetness and skill of Virgil in the recital of his verses,' were highly distinguished for a correct and animated enunciation. "When Dryden, our first great master of verse and harmony, brought his play of AMPHITRYON to the Stage, I heard him (says Cibber,) give it his first reading to the Actors; in which, though it is true he delivered the plain sense of every period, yet the whole was in so cold, so flat, and unaffecting a manner, that I am afraid of not being believed, when I affirm it. On the contrary, Lec, far his

erne used to call him the little Nightingale. Remarks on the Life and Writings of Swift, by John, Earl of Orrery, P. 225.

Mr. Spence having asked Pope, whether he had ever learned any thing of musick, he replied, "Never; but I had naturally a very good ear, and have often judged rightly of the best compositions in musick, by the force of that."

'Donatus, in his Life of Virgil, quotes Seneca, as saying that Julius Montanus, a poet who lived to the time of Tiberius, and in his youth had heard Virgil pronounce some of his own verses, used to speak of his recitation with the highest praise." Pronunciabat autem maximâ cum suavitate, et lenociniis miris. Seneca tradidit, Julium Montanum poctam solitum dicere, involaturum se quædam Virgilio, si vocem possit, et os, et hypocrisim: eosdem enim versus, co pronuntiante, bene sonare; sine illo, inarescere, quasi mutos."-Seneca (EPISTOL. 122,) has mentioned Montanus, and quoted some of his verses; but the passage alluded to by Donatus is not now extant in Sencca's works.

Life of Colley Cibber, 8vo. 1740, p. 95.-See also THE CENSOR, (by Theobald.) No. 9, 12mo. 1717":