The ingenious David Hume of Edinburgh has published an effay, which he calls A Differtation upon the fubject of which we now treat; but, instead of pursuing the point, and communicating to us that pleasure and instruction which we might reasonably hope for, he presents us with an enquiry very apt here, viz. "into the cause of that unaccountable pleafure which the spectators of a well-wrote Tragedy receive from forrow, terror, anxiety, and other paffions which are in themselves difagreeable and uneafy." In this differtation he follows the opinion of Fontenelle, who, in his Reflections fur la Poetique, observes, that in regard to Tragedy, whatever dominion the fenfes and imagination may ufurp over reason, there ftill lurks at the bottom a certain idea of falfehood in the whole of what we fee. This idea, tho' weak and disguised, fuffices to diminish the pain which we fuffer from the misfortunes of those whom we love; to bring that affliction to fuch a pitch as reduces it to a pleasure. We weep for the misfortunes of a great man, to whom we are, no matter from what principle, attached, in the fame instant we comfort ourselves with reflecting, that it

is nothing but a fiction; and it is precisely that mixture of fentiments which compofes an agreeable forrow, and supplies the tears that delight us. Lucretius has finely described this fatisfaction; and we shall furnish the English reader with his fenfe, as translated by Dryden.

'Tis pleasant safely to behold from shorè,
The rolling fhip, and hear the tempeft roar;
Not that another's pain is our delight;
But pains unfelt produce the pleafing fight.

To this it may be added, that the force of
eloquence contributes very much to thofe fen-
fations; and that the impulfe which we feel
of forrow, compaffion, indignation, &c. re-
ceives a more forceable direction from the fen-
timents of beauty. The latter, being the pre-
dominant emotions, feize the whole mind,
and convert the former into themselves, or at
least tincture them fo ftrongly as totally to
alter their nature; and the foul being at the
same time roused by paffion, and charmed by
eloquence, feels on the whole a strong move-
ment, which is altogether delightful. The
force of imagination, the energy of expref-
fion, the
power of verfification, and the charms

of imitation, all naturally delight the mind; and when to these are joined fome particular object that seizes on fome affection, the plea fure still rises upon us by the conversion of this fubordinate movement into that which predominates. Thus the paffion that may be painful, when excited by a real object, derives a foftening, a melioration, from the finer arts, fo as to afford the higheft entertainment.

In the rage of battle, or the blustering of a ftorm, all our thoughts recur to the prefervation of Self; and that concern which muft enfue from the apprehenfion of certain danger, occupies the whole foul; but he who undangered and safe fits near his little cottage on the brow of an inacceffible mountain, and thence beholds the havoc that ambition makes, or from a rock that overhangs the ocean, fees the labouring veffels contend with wind and waves, compaffion and pity for the sufferers warm his bofom, while, at the fame time, he has naturally an impulfe of pleasure from comparing his prefent ftate with theirs, and finding it fo much fuperior. Of the fame nature is that fenfation of pleasure which we feel at a Tragedy.

СНАР.

CHA P. IV.

Of Comedy; its end: of the Defign of the Play of Every Man in his Humour of the different fpecies of Comedy: of the Careless Hufband; how faulty; and how to be corrected: Terence and Steel compared.

COMEDY is an image of common life.

its intention is to reform the public fol

lies or correct the tafte, by throwing the vitiated or abfurd manners of individuals into lights of ridicule and entertainment. Dryden fomewhere says,

Of all Dramatic Writing, Comic Wit,
As 'tis the beft, fo'tis most hard to hit.

He who attempts it, ought to be well acquainted with mankind, the foibles of particulars, and the fprings that actuate their different paffions. Unless he also has from nature, as well as acquirement, a fund of wit and pleasantry that may not be easily exhausted, here he cannot hope to fucceed; for his exhibition ought to carry with it that force of perfuafion, that the spectator fhould be induced

to imagine himself abfolutely in company with the perfonages, whofe femblance only is before him; and that the Theatre was the World,

Comedy lofes much of its force, unless we can compare the characters it presents with its originals; for they ought to be drawn from the groups that daily fall under the obfervation of every one. Of these there ought to be a proper affemblage, ftill taking care not to transcend the bounds of reafon, truth, and probability. To this Menander owed his reputation in Greece: and Terence fucceeded at Rome, because his conversation was Roman; his characters fuch as were daily feen in the streets of the mistress of the world. Terence did not, however, please fo univerfally as Plautus, though, by the politer and more elegant of his countrymen, he was preferred, because the latter drew his images larger than the life, thereby making his impreffions deeper, fhewing ridicule and folly in a much ftronger light, yet not exceeding the bounds. of probability, which ought to be the comic Poet's infallible and conftant guide. Without probability all wears the face of falsehood,

and