checks, and how the Paffions impel; and difplays to us the trepidations that precede, and the horrors that purfue acts of blood. No fpecies of dialogue, but that which a man holds with himself, could effect this. The Soliloquy has been permitted to all dramatic writers; but its true use seems to be understood only by our author, who alone has attained to a juft imitation of nature, in this kind of felf-conference.

It is certain, that men do not tell themfelves who they are, and whence they came, they neither narrate nor declaim in the folitude of the clofet, as Greek and French writers represent. Here then is added to the drama an imitation of the most difficult and delicate kind, that of representing the internal process of the mind in reasoning and reflecting; and it is not only a difficult, but a very useful art, as it beft affifts the Poet to expose the anguish of Remorse, to repeat every whisper of the internal monitor, Confcience, and, upon occafion, to lend her a voice to amaze the guilty and appal the free. As a man

is averse to expofe his crimes, and difcover the turpitude of his actions, even to the faithful Friend, and trufty Confident, it is more natural for him to breathe in Soliloquy the dark and heavy fecrets of the foul, than to utter them to the moft intimate affociate. The conflicts in the bofom of Macbeth, before he commits the murder, could not, by any other means, have been so well expofed. He entertains the prophecy of his future greatness with complacency, but very idea of the means by which he is to attain it fhocks him to the highest degree.

the

This fupernatural folliciting

Cannot be ill; cannot be good. If ill,
Why hath it giv❜n me the earnest of fuccefs,
Commencing in a truth? I'm Thane of Cawdor.
If good, why do I yield to that suggestion,
Whofe horrid image doth unfix my hair,
And make my feated heart knock at my ribs
Against the use of nature?

There is an obfcurity and ftiffness in part of these foliloquies, which I wish could be charged entirely to the confufion of Macbeth's

mind from the horror he feels, at the thought of the murder ; but our author is too much addicted to the obscure bombast, much affected by all forts of writers in that age. The abhorrence Macbeth feels at the fuggeftion of affaffinating his king, brings him back to this determination,

If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown

me,

Without my ftir.

After a pause, in which we may suppose the ambitious defire of a crown to return, fo far as to make him undetermined what he shall do, and leave the decifion to future time and unborn events, he concludes,

Come what come may,

Time and the hour runs thro' 'the roughest day. By which, I confefs, I do not with his two laft commentators imagine is meant either the tautology of time and the hour, or an Allufion to time painted with an hour-glass, or an exhortation to time to haften forward, but I rather apprehend the meaning to be, tempus & hora, time and occafion, will carry the thing through, and bring it to some determined point and end, let its nature be what it

will. In the next foliloquy, he agitates this great question concerning the propofed murder. One argument against it, is, that fuch deeds must be fupported by others of like nature.

But, in these cafes,

We ftill have judgment here; that we but teach Bloody inftructions, which, being taught, return To plague th' inventor; this even-handed juftice Commends th' ingredients of our poifon'd chalice To our own lips.

He proceeds next to confider the peculiar relations, in which he stands to Duncan.

He's here in double truft:

First as I am his kinsman and his subject,

Strong both against the deed; then, as his hoft,

Who should against his murd'rer fhut the door;
Not bear the knife myself.

Then follow his arguments against the deed, from the admirable qualities of the king. Befides, this Duncan

Hath borne his faculties fo meekly, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead, like angels, trumpet-tongu'd again

The deep damnation of his taking off.

So,

So, fays he, with many reasons to diffuade, I have none to urge me to this act, but a vaulting ambition; which, by a daring leap, often procures itself a fall. And thus having determined, he tells Lady Mac-. beth;

We will proceed no further in this business.

He hath honour'd me of late; and I have bought
Golden opinions from all forts of people,

Which would be worn, now in their newest glofs,
Not caft afide fo foon.

Macbeth, in debating with himself, chiefly dwells upon the Guilt, yet touches fomething on the Danger of affaffinating the king. When he argues with Lady Macbeth, knowing her too wicked to be affected by the one, and too daring to be deterred by the other, he urges with great propriety what he thinks may have more weight with one of her difpofition; the favour he is in with the king, and the esteem he has lately acquired of the people. In answer to her charge of cowardice, he finely distinguishes between manly courage and brutal ferocity.

MACBETH.