duction of the words sagacity and fidelity a little oftener than has become customary.

So numerous are the talents of the dog, that naturalists have written prolix volumes on the subject, collected from the experience of all nations. Yet it now appears that some of their more valuable qualities have been entirely overlooked. They have been renowned for watching a house, guarding a flock of sheep, leading the blind, catching a hare or fox, and many other tricks and stratagems becoming quadrupeds but what are these to that merit, hitherto not even hinted at by naturalists, which they have exhibited on the stage? There they have not only performed their part without the aid of a prompter, or the temptation of a salary, but have attracted the most numerous and brilliant audiences, at a season when the town is generally empty; and have drawn down bursts of applause, which the audience seem to think no other performers deserve in the same degree. It is surely no small merit to share that popularity which was once the exclusive property of the works of Shakspeare and Jonson, of Congreve and of Sheridan; and of the acting of Booth and Betterton, of Garrick and of Siddons. Did not our great moralist deserve the name of

Blinking Sam," when he could see no farther than the revolution prophesied in the following lines :

"But who the coming changes can presage,
And mark the future periods of the stage?
Perhaps where Lear has rav'd, and Hamlet dy'd,
On flying cars new sorcerers may ride:

Perhaps (for who can guess th' effects of chance?)
Here Hunt may box, or Mahomet

may dance." I have thus endeavoured to account for the conduct of the managers, in a matter which appears to have been misunderstood in its effects, although I agree with those who complain of its origin. I have discovered, without much research, a design in all this, which does not float on the surface; and I have explained it, however unpleasant that explanation may be to some performers. It is, on the part of the managers, an appeal to the town, to quicken the efforts of those who appear to have been remiss in their duty. It is an experiment, to try whether the places of those who cannot be softened by salaries and benefits, may be advantageously filled by those to whom salaries and benefits are unknown. The trial, however, is but begun; and one dog only has been formally engaged. Who can tell how

many of that species may yet be made substitutes for the best of our authors and actors? and, when dogs shall be exhausted, who shall fix bounds to the performances of cats, of monkies, and of baboons? Or, what sublimity of feeling, and what closeness of attention, can the present drama produce, compared to the hopes and fears of an audience, when they shall be treated with the novel spectacle of real tigers prowling for real prey, or the more extraordinary appearance of a real lion sparing a real virgin?

THE PROJECTOR. N° 28.

"Sæpe et multum hoc mecum cogitavi, boníve an mali plus attulerit hominibus et civitatibus COPIA DICENDI."

CICERO,

February 1804.

FROM the few words I have selected as the

motto of this it paper, appears that Cicero, the most eloquent of the Roman Orators, and of

whose eloquence we are in possession of a much larger proportion than of any antient orator, often perplexed himself with the question, Whether the faculty of Speech had done most good or evil? In what manner he determined this question, or whether he determined it at all, we cannot now ascertain: but as he was a lawyer, and much employed in very important and intricate causes, he undoubtedly knew enough both of the evil and good of speech, to qualify him for the discussion.

Our countryman LOCKE expresses the same doubt in, I think, the third book of his celebrated Essay on the Human Understanding, "He that shall well consider the errors and obscurity, the mistakes and confusion, that is spread in the world by an ill use of words, will find reason to doubt, whether language, as it has been employed, has contributed more to the improvement or hindrance of knowledge among mankind." Mr. Locke, like Cicero, here insinuates his doubt, without resolving it, although he unquestionably knew enough of the good and evil of metaphysical disputes to be a very proper judge of the matter.

It may be, perhaps, reckoned strange that Cicero should suggest a doubt which could not be resolved in the space of eighteen centuries

after his death; Mr. Locke, we see, takes it up, looks at it, and lays it down again. I strongly suspect Cicero was afraid to enter upon a decision which might be fatal to the gentlemen of the Law; and perhaps Locke was unwilling to interrupt the career of Metaphysicians, to whose theories he had given a new currency. Such is the imperfection of human nature, and the mixture of private interests with public professions, that in the writings of the most celebrated of mankind, we meet with something that, to use a city phrase, "smells of the shop."

I would not, however, have my readers imagine from this introduction, that I am about to discuss a question which two such men left unresolved. On the contrary, I hope it will ever remain in the same state, to be taken up occasionally, as I have taken it up, for the meditation of a few minutes, but never to be submitted to the discussion of "Cool Considerations"—"Doubts in Answer to Cool Considerations"—"Reply to Doubts in Answer to Cool Considerations"-" A Letter to the Author of Cool Considerations"-" Hints to the Author of the Letter"-" Veritas' Objections to the Cool Considerations"-" Philalethes' Rejoinder to Veritas' Objections"-"The