the approbation of our own minds. We are pleased with ourselves, for feeling as we ought, and for entering, with proper sorrow, into the concerns of the afflicted. In tragedy, besides, other adventitious circumstances concur to diminish the painful part of sympathy, and to increase the satisfaction attending it. We are, in some measure, relieved, by thinking that the cause of our distress is feigned, not real; and we are also gratified by the charms of poetry, the propriety of sentiment and language, and the beauty of action. From the concurrence of these causes, the pleasure which we receive from tragedy, notwithstanding the distress it occasions, seems to me to be accounted for in a satisfactory manner. At the same time, it is to be observed, that, as there is always a mixture of pain in the pleasure, that pain is capable of being so much heightened, by the representation of incidents extremely direful, as to shock our feelings, and to render us averse, either to the reading of such tragedies, or to the beholding of them upon the stage. SEYMOUR'S NOTES UPON SHAKSPEARE, KING RICHARD II. "Some of those branches by the destinies cut." And again, "One flourishing branch of his most royal root." This is an exuberance of the metre, which, not too often recurring, is a grace, rather than a blemish, to the verse. Milton makes more frequent and happy use of it, than any other of our poets. "Desolate, desolate, will I hence and die." This line is inharmonious; and (without a redundant ending) comprises eleven syllables; yet the fault is not hypermetrical, for the addition of another syllable at the beginning, would render it unexceptionable. "(And) desolate, desolate, will I hence and die." "To wake our peace, which in our country's cradle, "Might fright fair peace," &c. This is sad confusion, which Mr. Steevens has not, I suspect, completely reconciled. "Gentle Sleep (says he) rouzed up, becomes discord; and under that metamorphose, is qualified to fright fair Peace." i. e. Peace changes, or is made to change her character, for the sake of frightening herself. The passage seems to be a ❝ravelled sleeve of ideas," which the poet did not take the trouble to "knit up." Both sense and concord require some arrrangement, like this "To wake our peace, which in our country's cradle, "O who can hold a fire in his hand, A sentiment resembling this, occurs in Romeo and Juliet : "The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.” The office, indeed, of the imagination in the distinct instances, is reversed; in one it is active, in the other passive-here it is required to produce an effect, there to resist a consequence. ACT II. "inky blots." Mr. Steevens wishes to read "bolts," but that meaning, besides the want of authority, seems very harsh; inky blots, I believe, refers to the disgraceful conveyance of the kingdom's revenues to the Earl of Wiltshire; to the "rotten parchment bonds." "That sun that warms you here, shall shine on me." A similar consolation did Richard the Third find, in contemplating the gloominess of the sky, previous to the battle of Bosworth Field. "what is that to me "More than to Richmond? for the self same Heaven "The fly-slow hours shall not determinate." Why the arbitrary change, by Mr. Pope, of" fly slow," from "slie slow," in the old copies, should be adopted by the last editor, I am at a loss to guess: there is a violent incongruity in the compound "fly-slow," slowness and flight being directly opposite ideas, whereas, "sly slow hours," is perfectly in our poet's manner: the hours which pass imperceptibly and deceitfully away, as in another place, (As you like it) we find, "the creeping hours of time," and again, more appositely, in King Richard the Third, “the stealing hours of time." "Live in thy shame, but die not shame with thee." i. e. continue to live in your infamy, but let not your infamy perish with your life. "And hope to joy is little less in joy, "Than hope enjoy'd-" The first "joy" in this passage is certainly, as Mr. Malone has remarked, a verb: hope, in the second line, for the sake of precious jingle, is put for the object of hope: we might perhaps read, "And hope t'enjoy, is little less in joy (i. e. in enjoyment) "Than hope, enjoyed." (i. e. in the accomplishment of hope.) Mr. Gray, who adopted this thought in his ode on the distant prospect of Eton College, has retained the inaccuracy. "Gay hope is theirs; by fancy fed, "Less pleasing when possess'd.” It was possessed, being theirs, but the poet has shifted from hope itself, to what was the object of hope. 66 ere the crown he looks for, live in peace, "Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons, "Shall ill become the flower of England's face." A contest for a crown can never be determined in these works, without a pun or two; but it is strange that Mr. Steevens should have gone so far out of the way, for the meaning of "the flower of England's face," which is clearly the chosen youth of England, and Richard only remarks, that those youths thus mangled and besmeared, will exhibit a pale, or white and ghastly countenance. "Awake, thou sluggard Majesty; thou sleep'st." I believe we should point, "Awake thou sluggard; Majesty, thou sleep'st." Ay, no, no, ay, for I must nothing be, From this and many other instances, it is clear that ay and I • were sounded alike; it also hence appears, that a double negative, sometimes, as now, formed an affirmative. Bolingbroke asks Richard if he is contented to resign the crown, to which Richard at last answers, I will say no twice; i. e. I will resign: this scene is not in the first quarto. CCVOL. XVI. ORIGINAL POETRY. SONNET: ON THE DEATH OF MR. JACKSON OF EXETER. By the Lady, Author of the preceding Series. ONE who can boast no deep discerning power II. With the sweet, tender, animated Note: Notes which the Mind's best faculties refine; Such as of late o'er SEVERN Us'd to float, And tune the soul to Concords sweet as thine. But those shall live through ages most remote. How blest the Poet's wreath, if with thy LYRE it twine! 26 Aug. 1803. S. W. L. TO JAMES BOADEN, ESQ. OCCASIONED BY A PASSAGE IN THE MAID OF BRISTOL. BOADEN! expect not critic praise Was borrow'd from thy own fire-side. No, Sir, the praise that we bestow, Is paid to nature, not to art; We think not of thy head, but heart. LINES Written on the back of a Picture, painted by J. Cranch, Honorary WHAT Steads the shiv'ring artist, Fancy's fires; Himself unclad, and, "mid the feast, unfed." J. C. ANSWER. WHY, Artist, should thy honest soul repine, At ragged coat, shin-beef, and vapid wine? Why waste thy rich-fraught hours in plaints to heaven Wits greatly starve to-gain immortal fame!、 S. Y--G. North Audley Street. MEMORANDA DRAMATICA, &c. DRURY-LANE OPENED on Saturday, the 10th of September, with Pizarro, for the Patriotic Fund. The receipts amounted to £.537 3 6. The alterations in the company are as we mentioned in a former number.Mr. Johnstone, and Mr. and Mrs. H. Johnston, are obtained in exchange for Mr. Charles Kemble, and Mrs. Glover. Sedgwick, who though not dead, as the papers announced, is in an alarming state of health, is succeeded by a Mr. Burrows, a good bass singer from the Circus. Mr. Johnstone made his appearance in Murtoch Delany, and was prodigiously applauded on his entrance. The Drury-Lane managers have certainly never made an acquisition of more real importance. Mr. H. Johnston appeared in Douglas, and his wife in Amelia Wildenhaim, the characters that first introduced them to the public. the Mr. Sheridan's farce of the Camp, so applicable at the present moment, and masque of Arthur and Emmeline, are announced for speedy performance. One of the earliest novelties, will most probably be a comedy from Mr. Allingham. Mr. Holman, we believe, has also a comedy accepted, and another is rather expected from the powerful pen of the author of Speed the Plough.-Cobb's opera will be composed by Mazzinghi, and not Mr. Kelly, as mentioned' in our last. Mr. Kelly, however, has some musical pieces in preparation. |
