aptions Johnfon has been blamed; and when an English word could be found commenfurate in its meaning to the idea he would convey, and not debafed by vulgar ufe, he was, no doubt, blameable in reforting to another language. That he has fometimes juttly incurred this cenfure it were vain to deny: but it will be found, perhaps, on examination, that he did not often refort to exotic words, when he could have found English words of equal force and equal dignity. He did not generally, with the jealous policy of a conqueror, raife foreigners to favour to the exclufion of native worth; but in the true fpirit of a patriot, fought abroad for a fupply of thofe wants which he found to prevail at home.

"The English is, perhaps, the only language fprung from the Gothic ftock into which Greek and Latin words can easily be adopted, and it is to this facility of adoption that it owes its fuperior ftrength and richness. Johnfon, therefore, when he adopts from thofe languages words more appropriate to his meaning than the English language could furnish, does only that which had been done by others before him, only carries farther an improvement which he did not begin, and adds to thofe ftores which the induftry of others had begun to accumulate. This confideration however will not always bear him out blamelefs; fome words he has adopted, for the adoption of which he cannot plead either neceflity or ufe, for he could have found at home words of precifely the fame import and of not lefs dignity. But it is contended that he has not often thus erred; that on the whole he has enriched the English language, and that,

therefore, te deferves not merely impunity but praife.

"Befides thefe diftinguishing fea tures in the ftyle of Johnfon, by which he has varied the ftyle of English profe, there is another equally prominent, which it fhall fuffice barely to mention the frequent perfonification of virtues and vices, of habits and of actions.

"Subfequent to Johnson there does not feem to have occurred any variation in the style of Englith profe, notwithstanding the immenfe numbers of modern writers under whofe labours the prefs has groaned. Of thefe the greater num ber have no peculiar character in compofition; others have imitated, fome with more and fome with lefs fuccefs, the ftyle of Johnfon; and fome, as a Burke and a Reynolds, have rifen in fome inftances, perhaps, above him. Were we now confidering the abstract merits of the authors we mention, it would be unpardonable indeed not to beftow on the vivid energy of Burke, and the mild and chatte elegance of fir Jofhua, a large hare of attention and panegyric. But fuch is not the object of this effay: we must therefore pafs over thefe, as we have paffed over Goldfmith and others, in filence, because, though the excellence of their writings is fingularly great, that excellence does not confift in any variations which they have introduced into style, but in the height to which they have carried thofe principles of compofition which had been culțivated, though lefs fuccefsfully, by others before them.

"In treating of the various ftyles which have fucceffively appeared from the revolution to the present time, I have purpofely omitted fome which may be thought from G 2

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their fingularity to have deferved notice. Such, for inftance, is that of Mr. Sterne. This I have paffed over without remark, becaufe, in the first instance, it was merely the ftyle of an individual, and has never been generally adopted by English profe writers; and, in the fecond

place, because it seems to have been the emanation of an eccentric mind, conveying its thoughts in language as capricious, and, perhaps, affected, as the fentiments which fuggefted them, and as loose as the moral principles by which they were regulated."

66

"I

N no fpecies of poetry has imitation been carried on with greater fervility than in what is termed the eclogue; yet it might readily be fuppofed that he who was alive to the beauties of rural imagery; who poffeffed a juft tafte in felecting the more ftriking and picturefque features of the objects around him, would find in the inexhauftible ftores of nature ample materials for decoration, while in eidents of fufficient fimplicity and intereft, neither too coarfe on the one hand, nor too refined on the other, adapted to the country, and tinged with national manners and cuftoms, might with no great difficulty be drawn from fact, or arranged by the fancy of the poet. Such combinations, however, under the epithet of paftoral, have not frequently occurred, owing, I conceive, to the miftaken idea that one peculiar form, ftyle and manner, a tiflue of hackneyed fcenery and fentiment, cannot with propriety be deviated from. Under fach a prepoferous conception genius muft expire, a languid monotony pervade every effort, and the incongruity of the imagery and incident

excite nothing but contempt. The ocritus, the father of paftoral poetry, has done little more than paint the rich and romantic landicape of Sicily, the language and occupa tions of its ruftic inhabitants; a beautiful and original picture, and drawn from the very bofom of fimplicity and truth; and had fucceeding poets copied him in this refpect, and, instead of abfurdly introducing the coftume and fcenery of Sicily, given a faithful reprefentation of their own climate and rural character, our paftorals would not be the infipid things we are now, in general, obliged to confider them, but accurate imitat ons of nature herfelf, fketched with a free and liberal pencil, and glowing with appropriate charms.

Unfortunately, however, for thofe few authors who poflefs fome originality in paftoral compofition, the profeffed critics in this department, with the exception of one or two, have exclufively and perverfe ly dwelt and commented upon mere copyifts, to the utter neglect of poets who might juftly afpire to conteft the palm of excellence with the Grecian. In most of our differtations

differtations on paftoral poetry, after due encomium on the merits of the Sicilian bard, few authors, fave Virgil, Spenfer, Pope, Gay, and Phillips are noticed, all, except the second, tranflators, imitators, or parodifts, rather than original writers in this branch of poetry. If rural life no longer prefent us with fhep. herds finging and piping for a bowl or a crook, why perfift, in violation of all probability, to introduce fuch characters? If paftoral cannot exift without them, let us cease to compose it; for to Theocritus thefe perfonages were objects of hourly obfervation, and the peasants of Sicily a kind of improvifatori. I am perfuaded, however, that fimplicity in diétion and fentiment, a happy choice of rural imagery, fuch incidents and circumftances as may even now occur in the country, with interlocutors equally removed from vulgarity or confiderable refinement, are all that are effential to fuccefs. Upon this plan the celebrated Geffner has written his Idyllia, compofitions

which have fecured him immorta. lity, and placed him on a level with the Grecian. By many indeed. and upon no trifling grounds, he is preferred, having with much felicity affumed a medium between the rufticity of Theocritus, and the too refined and luxuriant imagination of Bion and Mofchus, preferving at the fame time the natural paints ing of the Sicilian, with the pathetic touches and exquifite fenfibility of the contemporary bards.

"One of the most harmonious and beautifully plaintive paffages perhaps in the whole compass of Grecian poetry, may be drawn from the " Epitaph on Bion" by Mofchus; the comparison between vegetative and human life, which, though in fome measure foreign to the purport of this paper, I cannot avoid indulging myfelf and my readers in quoting, with the addition of a couple of verfions, and one or two of the most happy imitations; they cannot fail of being acceptable to feeling and to taste.

85,

POLWHELE.'

"The beginning of the quotation from Jortin, and the two firft ftanzas from Dr. Beattie, are beautiful additions to the original idea. The lines of Beattie indeed flow with the most melancholy and musical expreffion, fteal into the heart itfelf, and excite a train of pleafing though gloomy affociation.

"Paftor Fido" were highly diftinguifhed in the literary world, Fletcher wrote his "Faithful Shepherdefs," a piece that rivals, and, perhaps, excels the boafted productions of the Italian mufe. Equally poffeffing the elegant fimplicity which characterifes the "Aminta," it has at the fame time a richer vein of wild and romantic imagery, and difdains thofe affected prettineffes which deform the drama of Guarini. This Arcadian comedy of Fletcher's was held in high eftimation by Milton; its frequent allufion, and with the fineft effect, to the popular fuperftitions, caught the congenial fpirit of our enthufiaftic bard. The "Sad Shepherd" of Jonfon likewife, Browne's “Britannia's Paftorals," and Warner's "Albion's England," may be mentioned as containing much paftoral defcription of the most genuine kind. Of the fingular production of Warner, there is, I bel eve, no modern edition, yer few among our elder poets more deferve the atten tion of the lover of nature and rural fimplicity. Some well-chosen extracts from this work are to be found in the collections of Percy and Headley, and his "Argentile and Curan" has been the mean of enriching our language with an admirable drama from the pen of Mafon. Scott too, in defcribing his favourite village of Amwell,

"Cloting, however, this long digreffion, let us return to our fubject, and here we may obferve, that fome time before the age of Spenfer, a model of paftoral fimplicity was given us in a beautiful poem entitled "Harpalus," and which is introduced by Dr. Percy into his "Reliques of ancient English Poetry." Had Spenfer attended more to the unaffected ease and natural expreffion of this fine old paftoral, he would not, I prefume, have interwoven theology with his eclogues, nor chofen such a barbarous and vulgar jargon to convey the fentiments of his fhepherds in. Few poets exceed Spenfer in the brilliancy of his imagination, and there is a tender melancholy in his compofitions which endears him to the reader; but elegant fimplicity, fo neceflary in bucolic poetry, was no characteristic of the author of the "Fairy Queen." In every requifite for this province of his divine art, he has been much excelled by Drayton, whofe " Nymphidia" may be confidered as one of the beft fpecimens we have of the paftoral eclogue. The prefent age feems to have forgotten this once popular poet; an edition indeed has been published of his "Heroical Epiftles," but various other po tions of his works, and more efpecially his "Nymphidia," merit republication.

"Afer the example of Taffo and Guarini, whofe Aminta" and

where fleeps our bard by fame 'forgotten,' has offered a due tribute to his memory. Numerous paffages eftimable for their fimple and pathetic beauty might be quot ed from his volume; the following will convince the reader, that harmony of verfification alfo, and a terfenefs and felicity of diction, are among his excellences,

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