at all alarmed at the fight of the lady and her retinue, but thinking himself engaged in an action no way criminal, and even agreeable to justice and reafon, told the countefs, that the old man was his own father, but now paft labour, and unable to earn his bread; he therefore was going to commit him to the earth from whence he came, as a burden and a nuifance. The lady, fhocked at a fpeech which the thought fo unnatural, reproved the man for his impiety, and reprefented to him how contrary fuch an action was to the divine law, by which we are forbid to kill any man, much lefs our parent, whom we are bound to respect and honour. The man looking at her earneftly, faid, What muft I do, good lady, I have a house full of children, and I muft work hard to maintain them all, and scarce is my labour fufficient; now I cannot take the bread out of the mouths of my little babes, and fuffer them to ftarve, to give it to this old man, whofe life is no longer of any ufe, either to himself, or to my family. The countefs, fetching a deep figh, turned about to her attendants, "Behold, faid fhe, the miferable condition of thefe poor peafants. how lamentable their cafe, how hard their diftrefs, to be obliged to kill thofe who give them life, to prevent their offspring from starving! Yet the opulent and the great are infenfible to the mifery of thefe poor objects, and inftead of relieving their neceffities, every day aggravate their diftrefs, by new tyranny and oppreffion." Saying this, the generous lady drew out her purfe, and giving the man a confiderable fum, defired him to fpare his aged father's life. The man returned her thanks, and promifed to. provide for him as long as the money lafted. The lady declare ed he should have a further fupply when neceffary.'

This volume is embellished with the heads of Adolphus Frederic IV. the reigning duke of Mecklenburg Strelitz; and of Frederic II. duke of Mecklenburg Schwerin.

Dr. Nugent promifes the remaining volume next winter. N.

The Roman Hiftory, from the Foundation of the City of Rome, to the Dejruction of the wefern Empire. By Dr. Goldfmith. 8vo. 2 Vols, 12 s. Davies, &c. 1769.

TH

HE only aim of Dr. Goldsmith, in this work, as he acknowledges in the Preface, is to fupply a concife, plain, and unaffected narrative of the rife and decline of a well-known empire, the history of which has been fo often written both in ancient and modern languages, that it would be impofture to pretend new difcoveries, or to offer any thing which other works of the fame kind have not given.

The reafons that determined him to this undertaking were, that notwithstanding many Roman hiftories have been already

N 4

written,

written, there is none in our language that is not either too voluminous for common ufe, or too meanly written to please. He justly observes, that our translation of Catrou and Rouille, in fix volumes folio, by Bundy, is intirely unfuited to the time and expence that mankind ufually chufe to beflow upon this fubject; and that Rollin's Hiftory, continued by Crevier in thirty volomes 8vo, is liable to the fame objection, as well as Hook's, who has spent three quartos upon the republic alone. Echard, he fays, is the only author whofe plan feems to have coincided with his own, but that though he has comprifed his work in five volumes octavo, it is poorly wri ten, the facts are fo crouded, the narration is fo fpiritlefs, and the characters are fo indifinaly muked, that the m. ft ardent curiolity muit cool in the perufal, and the nobleft tranactions that ever warmed the human heart, as defcribed by him, muft cease to inter ft.'

I have endeavoured, fays izr. Goldfmith, to obviate the inconveniencies arifing from exuberance on one aard, and inelegance on the other. It was fuppofed that two voles es might be made to comprife all that was requifite to be known, or pleas fing to be read, by fuch as examined history only to prepare them for more important ftudies.'

He has felected, he fays, the most important facts, inftead of relating all with a minutenefs that has rendered the larger works of this kind languid; and he has endeavoured, in the relation of thofe that he has felected, to avoid fuch concifenefs as has rendered other epitomes dry and unentertaining.

It is common for men who read more than they think, to lay up in their minds oppofite opinions, without noting their incongruity, and to be betrayed into perpetual contradiction by expreffing fometimes one, and fometimes the other, as different occasions revive them separately in the memory. So Dr. Goldsmith, having fomewhere read that a dull narrative of the most important events would raise no interest, and somewhere else that important events would produce an intereft in the dulleft narrative, has adopted and applied both these opinions in the preface to this work, which confifts of no more than five pages.

When he is to depreciate Echard's Hiftory, he says, it is fo poorly written, that the nobleft transactions which ever warmed the human heart ceafe to intereft. When he is to apologize for his own, he fays, the fubject, inftead of requiring the Writer's aid, will even fupport him with its fplendor; and, mentioning the principal events which this history records, he fays it forms a picture which must affect us, however it be difpofed, and materials that must have their value under the hand of the meanest work

man.

He profeffes to take every thing as he found it, yet he should not have told us what others have written without diftinguish

ing

ing what must be falfe, from what may be true; this however be has frequently done, and what is yet lefs excufable, he fometimes reafons from fabulous facts. What an implicit obedience the Romans placed in their pontiffs, fays he, will evidently appear from the behaviour of Curtius, who, upon the opening of a gulph in the Forum, which the gods indicated would never clofe up, till the most precious thing in Rome was thrown into it, leaped with his horse and armour inftantly into the midft, faying, that nothing was more truly valuable than patriotifm and military virtue.'

Upon this paffage it may be observed, ift, that the fact brought to prove what the compiler calls "an implicit obedience placed in their priests' never happened, nor can, even by him, be believed to have happened; 2dly, that to place obedience in a priest, is a barbarous phrafe without a meaning 3dly, that the fact, if it had happened, would not have been a teft of obedience, for nothing was enjoined: 4thly, that although it would have proved an implicit belief of the prieft's declaration of the will of the gods, it is not here brought to prove fuch belief, at leaft if obedience and belief are not fynonymous terms; and fifthly, that the event itself is not properly related: Curtius is mentioned as already known to the Reader, though he is not before named in this hiftory, and the fuppofed facts which should have been diftinctly and directly stated, are introduced in a cafual and oblique manner.

Neither muft it be concealed, that many parts of the narrative are confufed, contradictory, and unintelligible. Having told us that Remus was taken prifoner as a plunderer, and that Romulus affembled a number of his fellow-fhepherds to rescue him from prison, and force the kingdom from the hands of an ufurper, he adds, Yet being too feeble to act openly, he di rected his followers to affemble near the place by different ways, while Remus with equal vigilance gained upon the citizens within. The words place and within, according to all rules of conftruction, must refer to the prison in which Remus was confined; the citizens within therefore must have been his fellow-prifoners, who were certainly well inclined towards any attempt to force the place of their confinement without the folicitation of Remus, but cannot be supposed to have had any power to affift it; for he that is confined against his will is neceffarily deprived of power to escape, or to act in concert with any who should attempt his deliverance from without. The obfcurity, and indeed abfurdity, of this paffage arifes from the Author's having mentioned an attempt to effect two purposes, and then having adapted what follows only to one of them: he fays Romulus affembled a number of his fellow-fhepherds to rescue Remus from prison, and force the kingdom from the hands of an ufurp

er ;

er; what immediately follows fhould relate to the delivery of Remus, whereas it relates wholly to the fubfequent attempt, and a neceffary part being left out in the compilation, the words place and within have no proper antecedents.

We are told, in page 5, that Romulus and Remus, not being agreed upon the fpot where their new city should fland, had recourfe to an omen, which being differently interpreted, produced a contest that ended in a battle, wherein Remus was killed by his brother for leaping contemptuously over the city wall: fo that, according to this account, Remus was killed for jumping over the walls of the city, in a conteft to determine where it should be built and the foundations of which, we are told in the very next paragraph of this compilation, were begun by Romulus, after Remus was dead, upon the fpot where he had taken his

This abfurdity arifes from the Compiler's having related one of two incompatible facts, as a mere circumftance of the other : if Remus fell in a contest where the city fhould ftand, he was no flain by his brother for leaping the walls of it; if he was flain for leaping the walls, the city was not begun after his death, upon the fpot where his brother had the omen.

The following obfervation, which concludes the first chapter, is no lefs curious than juft.

To have a juft idea of Rome in its infant ftate, we have' only to imagine a collection of cottages furrounded by a feeble wall, rather built to ferve as a military retreat, than for the purposes of civil fociety, rather filled with a tumultuous and vicious rabble, than with fubjects bred to obedience and controll; we have only to conceive men bred to rapine, living in a place that merely feemed calculated for the fecurity of plunder and yet, to our aftonifhment, we fhall foon find this tumultuous concourfe uniting in the ftricteft bonds of fociety; this lawless rabble putting on the moft fincere regard for religion, and though compofed of the dregs of mankind, fetting examples to all the world of valour and of virtue.'

In the 20 chapter we are told, that the first care of the new King, Romulus, was to attend to the interefts of religion, and to endeavour to humanize his fubjects by the notion of other rewards and punishments than those of human law." The purport of which is, that Romulus invented a religion for the people that he governed, and firft produced among them a notion of future or fupernatural rewards and punishments; but this is not true, nor is there the leaft colour for it in ancient hiftory: he found foothfayers already in high credit with the people, and the Compiler of this hiftory fays, that in a reliance upon the credit of foothfayers, the greatest part of the religion of that age confifted; how then could Romulus be the author of no

tions

tions concerning rewards and punishments inflicted by the gods, with a view to humanize a barbarous people? The fame fault that has been remarked in the preface is alfo to be found in every chapter of the hiftory: the Compiler has confidered it only by parts, and not as a whole. Romulus is in one place said to have inftituted a government with fuch wisdom, that numbers were induced to come and live under it; and in lefs than fix pages, ⚫ little more is faid to be seen in his character than might be expected in fuch an age, great temperance and great valour, which generally make up the catalogue of javage virtues. Thus was Romulus a wife legislator, though b's character comprised only temperance and valour, the virtues of a favage.

By the omiffion of an important circumftance in a narrative, the whole is rendered unintelligible: of this the following is an inftance. Tarquin undertook to build the capitol, the foundation of which had been laid in a former reign, and an extraordinary event contributed to haften the execution of his defign. A woman, in ftrange attire, made her appearance at Rome, and came to the king, offering to fell nine books, which she said were of her own compofing. Not knowing the abilities of the feller, and that she was in fact one of the celebrated fybils, whofe prophecies were never found to fail, Tarquin refufed to buy them. Upon this fhe departed, and burning three of her books, again demanded the fame price for the fix remaining; being defpifed as an impoftor, fhe again departed, and burning three more, returned with thofe remaining, ftill afking the fame as at first. Tarquin, furprifed at the inconfiftency of her behaviour, confulted the augurs, to advise him what to do. These much blamed him for not buying the nine, and commanded him to buy the three remaining, at whatsoever price the fhould demand. The woman, fays the hiftorian, after thus felling and delivering the three prophetic volumes, and advifing him to have a fpecial attention to what they contained, vanished from before him, and was never after feen. Upon this he chofe proper perfons to keep them, who, though but two at firft, were afterwards encreased to fifteen, under the name of quindecemviri. They were put into a stone cheft, and a vault in the newly defigned building. was thought the propereft place to keep them in fafety; Jo that the work went on with vigour.'

great

Can the Reader guefs from this paffage, what was that haftened the building the capitol, and caused the work to go on a th great vigour? Was it the purchafe of the fybil's books, the choice of perfons to keep them, or the placing them in a fone cheft and vault? Thefe particulars furely had no tendency to haften the building of the capitol. Was it then the contents of the books? Of this the Compiler has faid not a word.

In