abilities. Intereft and paffion will hold out long against the closeft fiege of diagrams and fyllogifms, but they are abfolutely impregnable to imagery and fentiment; and will for ever bid defiance to the most powerful strains of Virgil or Homer, though they may give way in time to the batteries of Euclid or Archimedes. In trufting therefore to the fentence of a critick, we are in danger not only from that vanity which exalts writers too often to the dignity of teaching what they are yet to learn, from that negligence which fometimes fteals upon the most vigilant caution, and that fallibility to which the condition of nature has fubjected every human understanding; but from a thousand extrinfick and accidental causes, from every thing which can excite kindness or malevo, lence, veneration or contempt. Many of those who have determined with great boldness upon the various degrees of literary merit, may be justly fufpected of having paffed fentence, as Seneca remarks of Claudius, Una tantum parte audita, without much knowledge of the cause before them: for it will not eafily be imagined of Langbaine, Borrichius, or Rapin, that they had very accurately perufed all the books which they praise or cenfure; or that, even if nature and learning had qualified them for judges, they could read for ever with the attention neceffary to just criticism. Such performances, however, are not wholly without their ufe; for they are commonly juft echoes to the voice of fame, and tranfmit tranfmit the general fuffrage of mankind when they have no particular motives to fupprefs it. Criticks, like the rest of mankind, are very fre quently misled by intereft. The bigotry with which editors regard the authors whom they illuftrate or correct, has been generally remarked. Dryden was known to have written moft of his critical differtations only to recommend the work upon which he then happened to be employed; and Addison is fufpected to have denied the expediency of poetical juftice, because his own Cato was condemned to perish in a good caufe, There are prejudices which authors, not otherwise weak or corrupt, have indulged without fcruple; and perhaps fome of them are fo complicated with our natural affections, that they cannot eafily be difentangled from the heart, Scarce any can hear with impartiality a comparifon between the writers of his own and another country; and though it cannot, I think, be charged equally on all nations, that they are blinded with this literary patriotifm, yet there are none that do not look upon their authors with the fondnefs of affinity, and efteem them as well for the place of their birth, as for their knowledge or their wit. There is, therefore, feldom much refpect due to comparative criticism, when the competitors are of different countries, unless the judge is of a nation equally indifferent to both, The Italians could not for a long time believe, that there was any learning beyond the mountains; and the French seem generally perfuaded, that there are no wits or reafoners equal to their own. I can scarcely conceive that if Scaliger had not confidered himself as allied to Vir gil, by being born in the fame country, he would have found his works fo much fuperior to those of Homer, or have thought the controverfy worthy of so much zeal, vehemence, and acrimony. There is, indeed, one prejudice, and only one, by which it may be doubted whether it is any difhonour to be fometimes mifguided. Criticifm has fo often given occafion to the envious and ill-natured of gratifying their malignity, that some have thought it neceffary to recommend the virtue of candour without restriction, and to preclude all future liberty of cenfure. Writers poffeffed with this opinion are continually enforcing civility and decency, recommending to criticks the proper diffidence of themfelves, and inculcating the veneration due to celebrated names. I am not of opinion that these profeffed enemies of arrogance and feverity have much more benevolence or modesty than the rest of mankind; or that they feel in their own hearts, any other intention than to distinguish themselves by their softness and delicacy. Some are modeft because they are timorous, and fome are lavish of praise because they hope to be repaid. There is indeed fome tendernefs due to living writers, when they attack none of those truths which are of importance to the happiness of mankind, and have committed no other offence than that of betraying their own ignorance or dulness. I should think it cruelty to crufh an infect who had provoked me only by buzzing in my ear; and would not willingly interrupt the dream of harmless ftupidity, or destroy the jest which makes its author laugh. Yet I am far from thinking this tenderness univerfally neceffary; for he that writes may be confidered as a kind of general challenger, whom every one has a right to attack; fince he quits the common rank of life, fteps forward beyond the lifts, and offers his merit to the publick judgment. To commence author is to claim praife, and no man can juftly afpire to honour, but at the hazard of disgrace. But whatever be decided concerning contemporaries, whom he that knows the treachery of the human heart, and confiders how often we gratify our own pride or envy under the appearance of contending for elegance and propriety, will find himself not much inclined to disturb; there can furely be no exemptions pleaded to fecure them from criticifm, who can no longer fuffer by reproach, and of whom nothing now remains but their writings and their names. Upon these authors the critick is undoubtedly at full liberty to exercise the stricteft feverity, fince he endangers only his own fame, and, like Eneas when he drew his fword in the infernal regions, encounters phantoms which cannot be wounded. He may indeed pay fome regard to established reputation; but he can by that fhew of reverence confult only his own fecurity, for all other motives are now at an end. The faults of a writer of acknowledged excellence are more dangerous, because the influence of his example is more extenfive; and the intereft of learning requires that they should be difcovered and ftigmatized, before they have the fanction of antiquity conferred upon them, and become precedents of indifputable authority. It has, indeed, been advanced by Addifon, as one of the characteristicks of a true critick, that he points out beauties rather than faults. But it is rather natural to a man of learning and genius to apply himself chiefly to the ftudy of writers who have more beauties than faults to be displayed: for the duty of criticism is neither to depreciate, nor dignify by partial reprefentations, but to hold out the light of reafon, whatever it may discover; and to promulgate the determinations of truth, whatever the fhall dictate. NUMB. 94. SATURDAY, February 9, 1751. Bonus atque fidus Judex per obftantes catervas Explicuit fua vidor arma. Perpetual magiftrate is he Who keeps ftrict juftice full in fight; Who bids the crowd at awful distance gaze, Har. FRANCIS. THE refemblance of poetick numbers to the fubject which they mention or describe, may be confidered as general or particular; as confifting in the flow and structure of a whole paffage taken together, or as comprised in the found of fome emphatical and descriptive words, or in the cadence and harmony of fingle verfes. The general refemblance of the found to the fenfe is to be found in every language which admits of |