All the inducements which the Greek tragèdians had to chufe their heroes from the works of the poets who had fung the wars of Troy, and the Argonautic expedition, were ftill in greater force with our countryman to take his fubjects from the history and traditions of thofe more recent transactions, in which the fpectator was informed and interested more perfonally and locally. There was not a family fo low, that had not had fome of its branches torn off in the ftorms of these inteftine commotions: nor a valley fo happily retired, that at fome time, the foot of hoftile paces had not bruis'd her flow'rets. In thefe characters the rudeft peafant read the fad hiftory of his country, while the better fort were informed of the most minute circumstances by our chronicles. The tragedians who took their fubjects from Homer, had all the advantage a painter would have, who was to draw a picture from a ftatue of Phidias or Praxiteles. Poor Shakespear from the wooden images

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images in our mean chronicles was to form his portraits. What judgment was there in discovering, that by moulding them to an exact resemblance he fhould engage and please! And what difcernment and penetration into characters, and what amazing fkill in moral painting, to be able, from fuch uncouth models, to bring forth not only a perfect, but, when occafion required, a graceful likeness!

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The patterns from whence he drew, were not only void of poetical spirit and ornament, but also of all hiftorical dignity. The histories of these times were a mere heap of rude undigested annals, coarfe in their style, and crouded with trivial anecdotes. Tacitus had investigated the obliquities of our statesmen, or by diving into the profound fecrets of policy had dragged into light the latent motives, the fecret machinations of our politicians: yet how does he enter into the deepest mysteries of state! There cannot be a ftronger proof of.

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the fuperiority of his genius over the historians of the times than the following instance.

The learned Sir Thomas More in his hiftory of Crook'd-Back Richard, tells, with the garrulity of an old nurse, the current ftories of this king's deformity, and the monstrous appearances of his infancy, which he seems with fuperftitious credulity to believe to have been the omens and prognostics of his future villainy. Shakespear, with a more philofophic turn of mind, confiders them, not as prefaging, but as inftigating his cruel ambition, and finely accounts in the following fpeeches for the asperity of his temper, and his fierce and unmitigated defire of dominion, from his being by his perfon difqualified for the fofter engagements of fociety.

GLOUCESTER.

Well, fay there is no kingdom then for Richard:

What other pleafure can the world afford?

I'll make my heaven on a lady's lap ;

And deck my body in gay ornaments,

And 'witch fweet ladies with my words and looks.
Oh! miferable thought! and more unlikely,
Than to accomplish twenty golden crowns.
Why, love forfwore me in my mother's womb,
And, for I should not deal in her foft laws,
She did corrupt frail nature with fome bribe
To fhrink my arm like to a wither'd fhrub;
To make an envious mountain on my back,
Where fits deformity to mock my body;
To fhape my legs of an uneven fize;
To difproportion me in every part :
Like to a chaos, or unlick'd bear-whelp
That carries no impreffion like the dam.
And am I then a man to be belov'd?

Oh monftrous fault to harbour fuch a thought!

Then fince the world affords no joy to me,
But to command, to check, to o'er-bear fuch
As are of better perfon than myfelf ;
I'll make my heav'n to dream upon the crown,
And while I live to account this world but hell,
Until the mishap'd trunk that bears this head

Be round impaled with a glorious crown.

[Henry VI. Act 3d, Scene 3d.

GLOUCESTER

GLOUCESTER.

The midwife wonder'd, and the women cry'd,
Oh Jefus blefs us, he is born with teeth!
And fo I was, which plainly fignified

That I should fnarl, and bite, and play the dog:
Then fince the heav'ns have fhap'd my body fo,
Let hell make crook'd my mind to answer it.
I have no brother, I am like no brother,
And that word, love, which grey-beards call divine,
Be refident in men like one another,

And not in me: I am myself alone.

[Henry VI. Act 5th, Scene 7th.

Our author by following minutely the chronicles of the times has embarraffed his drama's with too great a number of perfons and events. The hurley-burley of these plays recommended them to a rude illiterate audience, who, as he fays, loved a noife of targets. His poverty, and the low condition of the ftage (which at that time was not frequented by persons of rank) obliged him to this complaifance; and unfortunately he had not been tutored by any rules of art, or informed by acquaintance with just and regular drama's. Even the politer fort by reading

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