How unfrequently does it happen, that very good natured endeavours ultimately produce effects precifely contrary to what is wifhed or expected! In this unfortunate predicament we conceive Mifs Seward to be in her friendly applaufes of Mr. Sneyd. Who Ir. Sneyd is, or what Mr. Sneyd he is, nobody knows, nor does any body wifh to know; but he produces the following animated apostrophe from his fentimental friend.

"Look at Mr. Sneyd, ye young meh of fortune, and reflect upon the robuft and happy confequence youthful fobriety, of religion, morality, and a cultivated mind!"

There is fomething wretchedly abfurd, and irrefifbly ridiculous, in thus dragging forth private individuals with fuch triumphant exultation as examples for the imitation of fociety. The prefent inftance reminded us ftrongly of fcolding wives, who, when they with to enforce their preceptive eloquence by the power of example, thunder in the ears of their trembling fpoufes. "Ah! look at Mr. Allfat, the butcher: you don't fee him go gadding to public boufes; you don't, you fot!"

In the name of the whole grimalkin race, and in your name, too, Mifs Seward, what have we to do, in a biography of Dr. Darwin, with the amatory correfpondence between his tom cat and your lady-one? Really, had you valued the memory of your deceafed illuftri ous friend, or, we will venture to fay, had you refpected your own literary reputation, you would have kept from the world this nonfenfical effufion. Authors and authoreffes may trifle between themfelves if they pleafe; but there is no neceffity that their abfurdities fhould be laid before the public; it is even an infult fo to do: as foon

hould we have looked for the love

letters of a cock flea and a hen one in the Commentaries of Cæfar, or in the Annals of Tacitus, as for this tirade in the life of a deceased poet!

In that great portion, however, of the volume which is occupied with criticif.ns on the poetry of Darwin, there is much to commend, and little to cenfure. O! f fic omnia! In general, fhe has formed a very juft eftimate of the genius and poetry of Dr. Darwin and he has affigned him an honourable place among the British. Bards, to which pofterity will doubtlefs recognife his rights. His poetry, notwithstanding its glaring fplendor, onerous ornament, and fometimes metaphorical confufion, certainly is not deftitute of that quality, imagination, without which men may write verfes, but ean never write poetry. We even think that this quality glowed with uncommon ardour in the Mufe of Darwin: it was gorgeous, but yet grand; it was profufe, but yet delicate, vivid, and comprehenfive. He viewed the works of art with the eye of a poet; he studied the productions of nature with the mind

of a philofopher; and he blended,

drew, and coloured them with the refplendent tints of genuine poetry. In the grand and fublime, dred element; he feizes with vi his foul expatiates as in its kingour and rapidity upon the bold and invariable characteristics of his figures, adorns them with gloomy tplendor, and leads them forth with terrific grandeur. The reader fees and feels, flaudders or fmiles, as the creative pencil of the artift places before him objects of terror or of delight. It was Dr. Darwin's peculiar talent to give the full effect of the picturesque to all his delineations: fometimes this betrays him into tedious minutiæ, but oftener it enables him to poffefs the whole foul of his

lovely" Mifs Sneyd, and her" beautiful" fifter: then we have the "blooming and lovely Mifs How ard"-and then the "beauteous" Sabrina, and a whole mufter-roll of fimilar unmeaning epithets. Indeed, we are compelled to fay, that Mifs Seward feems to have made the Life of Dr. Darwin in fome meature a vehicle for celebrating merely the Lichfieldian coterie; for few inftances can be adduced where the fteps beyond that circle.

ART. XXI. Letters on the Study and Uje of Antient and Modern Hiftory; containing Obfervations and Reflections on the Caufes and Confequences of thofe Events which have produced confpicuous Changes in the Afpect of the World and the general State of Human Affairs. By John Bigiand. 1804.

THOUGH we cannot fay to Mr. Bigland that he has by any means attained the utile dulci, yet we can affure him that he has laboured with fome degree of fuccefs in the stafk of compilation. Iis book will probably be read with a degree of pleature by thofe whom it can only remind, and perhaps with advantage by thofe who read to learn. We do not think he has preferved that relative proportion in narrating events which an intimate and comprehenfive knowledge of his fubject would have fuggefted to him ; for it appears to us that he did not write because he knew, but ftudied because he withed to write. The language is uncommonly diffufe, duli, and languid; which is the more to be regretted, as an abftract of general hiftory muft neceffarily be, to a great extent, dry and fyltematic, and therefore itands peculiarly in need of the embellish ments of phrafeology, both to render it palatable on the one hand, and uteful on the other.

We

as at p. 100, where the epithet great occurs no less than three times in four lines. We mention this only from a wifh that it may ftimulate Mr. B. ia future to greater accuracy and polish in his diction; for the dreis of language must form no inconfiderable attraction in a wri ter not gifted with great powers of mind; as an ugly woman becomes more tolerable when her manners are pleating and agreeable, even though her intellectual capacity fhould be wretchedly debafed.

ART. XXII. Epitome of the History of Malta and Gozo. By Charles Wilkinfon. 1804.

THIS is a uteful and a tolerably accurate performance. It is ftrictly what its title imports it to be; but we think it would have been better if there had been more of detail, for it is little better than a dry chronology of the fucceffive nations who have conquered Malta, and of the monuments of each nation fill exifting. Mr. Wilkinson's ftyle is neat and perfpicuous, and his mode of compreffiou good. There is a map of Malta and Gozo prefixed. How fmall a spot of earth does that ifland occupy which threatens oftendibly to deluge again with blood the face of Europe!

ART. XXIII. The Military Mentor; being a Series of Letters recently written by a General Officer to his Son on his entering the Army: comprijing a Course of Elegant Inftruction, calculated to unite the Characters and Accomplishments of the Gentleman and the Soldier. 2 vols. 12mo. 1804. ' FONTI nulla fides. Some "bookbuilder" (according to Goldfmith) has here been making dreadful depredations upon all the grandmothers' books in the kingdom, from the Whole Duty of Man down

to the renowned Hiftory of Goody Two Shoes; and he has farther carried his tremendous devaftations among jeft books, collectaneas, and every and, from the first published in France even down to the last that ified from St. Paul's Churchyard! In plain words, this farrago, which is intended to comprife a courfe of elegant instruction, confiits merely of mufty maxims of every-day morally, upon temperance, truth, and other goodly virtues, known to every child that ever went to fchool, and which ferve, like fo many ftitches, to keep fogether a body of common place ancedotes, extracted chiefly from the Military Library, a work which is thus made to be doubly useful to its proprietor! Such præcognita fhould be brought forward with lefs quackery, and not introduced into the world with the fame fwelling pompolity as we would announce the difcovery of a MS. of Milton, or an unp blithed play of Shakespear.

have chofen a more ungracious fubject than the prefent; unless, indeed, he were ambitious of rivalling Homer's Catalogue of Ships. It might almott be termed the Library Catalogue in verfe. Our readers will easily conceive that there is little fcope for the embellishments of poetry, or for the impetuous flow of genius in giving apophthegmical characters of the pincipal Englith authors; yet it is but juftice to Mr. Burton, to fay, that he has performed it as well, perhaps, as it can be performed; and, had he chofen a more propitious fubject, we think he would have appeared to much greater advantage. His verfe is tolerably exact, though we occa ally met with a few inhartno nious couplets and falfely accented fyllables; but fill we are indueed to hope that, at fome future period, Mr. B. may produce fomething not altogether unworthy ¡ublic notice.