Infernal Shades, and, as ufual, has infinitely improved what the Grecian had invented. If among a profufion of beauties I durft venture to point out the most striking beauties of the fixth Book, I should perhaps obferve, 1. That after accompanying the hero through the filent realms of Night and Chaos, we fee, with astonishment and pleasure, a new creation bursting upon us. 2. That we examine, with a delight which fprings from the love of virtue, the juft empire of Minos, in which the apparent irregularities of the prefent fyftem are corrected; where the patriot who died for his country is happy, and the tyrant who oppreffed it is miserable. 3. As we intereft ourselves in the hero's fortunes, we share his feelings :-the melancholy Palinurus, the wretched Deiphobus, the indignant Dido, the Græcian kings, who tremble at his prefence, and the venerable Anchifes, who embraces his pious fon, and displays to his fight the future glories of his race: all these objects affect us with a variety of pleasing fenfations. "Let us for a moment obey the mandate of our great Critic, and confider these aweful scenes as a mimic fhew, exhibited in the Temple of Ceres, by the contrivance of the priest, or, if he pleases, of the legiflaWhatever was animated (I appeal to every reader of taste) whatever was terrible, or whatever was pathetic, evaporates into lifeless, allegory. tor. Tenuem fine viribus umbram. Dat inania verba, Dat fine mente sonum, greffusque effingit euntis. The end of philofophy is truth; the end of poetry is pleasure. I willingly adopt any interpretation which adds new beauties to the original; I affist in perfuading myself that it is just, and could almost shew the fame indulgence to the Critic's as to the Poet's fiction. But should a grave Doctor lay out fourfcore pages in explaining away the fense and spirit of Virgil, I fhould have every inducement to believe that Virgil's foul was very different from the Doctor's." Having fhewn, in this spirited manner, how far the hypothesis of the Critic is inconfiftent with particular paffages, and with the genera character of the Poet, the Effayift proceeds to alledge" two fimple reafons, which perfuade him that Virgil has not revealed the fecret of the Eleufinian myfteries: the first is his ignorance, and the second bis difcretion." The author then proves, by very ingenious hiftorical arguments, 1ft, That it is probable the Poet was never initiated himfelf; and, 2dly, That if he were fo, it is more probable that he would not have violated the laws both of religion and of honour, in betraying the fecret of the Myfteries; particularly, as that fpecies of profanation is mentioned with abhorrence by a cotemporary Poet. When Horace compofed the Ode which contains the preceding paffage, "the Æneid (continues my author) and particularly the fixth Book, were already known to the public *. The deteftation of the wretch who reveals the Myfteries of Ceres, though expreffed in general terms, must be applied by all Rome to the author of the fixth Book of the Æneid. Can we feriously fuppofe that Horace would have branded with fuch wanton infamy one of the men in the world, whom he loved and honoured the most +? Nothing remains to fay, except that Horace was himself ignorant of his friend's allegorical meaning; which the Bishop of Gloucefter has fince revealed to the world. It may be fo; yet, for my own part, I fhould be very well fatisfied with understanding Virgil no better than Horace did." Such is the forcible reasoning of this ingenious and spirited writer, I have been tempted to tranfcribe these confiderable portions of his Work, by an idea (perhaps an ill-founded one) that the circulation of his little Pamphlet has not been equal to its merit. But if it has been in any degree neglected by our country, it has not escaped Donat. in Virgil. Propert. 1. ii. el. xxv. v. 66. the FIRST EPISTLE. 1317 the researches, or wanted the applaufe, of a learned and judicious foreigner. Profeffor Heyne, the late accurate and accomplished Editor of Virgil, has mentioned it, in his Comments to the fixth Book of the Æneid, with the honour it deferves. He remarks, indeed, that the Author has cenfured the learned Prelate with fome little acrimony; "Paullo acrius quam. velis." But what lover of poetry, unbiaffed by perfonal connection, can fpeak of Warburton without fome marks of indignation? If I have also alluded to this famous Commentator With a contemptuous afperity, it arifes from the perfuafion that he has fullied the page of every Poet whom he pretended to illuftrate; and that he frequently degraded the useful and generous profeffion of Criticism into a mean instrument of perfonal malignity: or (to ufe the more forcible language of his greatest antagonist) that he "invested himself in the high office of Inquifitor: General and Supreme Judge of the Opinions of the Learned; which he affumed and exercifed with a ferocity and defpotism without example in the Republic of Letters, and hardly to be paralleled among the difciples of Dominic *." It is the just lot of tyrants to be detested; and of all ufurpers, the literary defpot is the leaft excufable, as he has not the common tyrannical plea of neceffity or intereft to alledge in his behalf; for the prevalence of his edicts will be found to fink in proportion to the arbitrary tone with which they are pronounced. The fate of Warburton is a striking inftance of this important truth. What havock has the courfe of very few years produced in that pile of imperious criticism which he had heaped together! Many of his notes on Shakespeare have already refigned their place to the fuperior comments of more accomplished Critics; and perhaps the day is not far diftant, when the volumes of Pope himself will cease to be a repofitory for the lumber of his friend. The feverest enemies of Warburton muft indeed allow, that feveral of his remarks on his Poetical Patron are entitled to prefervation, by their use or beauty; but the greater part, I apprehend, are equally deftitute of both and how far the Critic was capable of difgracing the Poet, must be evident to every reader who recollects that the nonfenfe in the Effay on Criticism, where * Letter to Warburton by a late Profeffor, &c. page 9. 2d edition. Pegafus is made to fnatch a grace, which is juftly cenfured by Dr. Warton, was first introduced into the poem by an arbitrary transposition of the editor. Though arrogance is perhaps the most striking and characteristical defect in the compofition of this affuming Commentator, he had certainly other critical failings of confiderable importance; and it may poffibly be rendering fome little fervice to the art which he profeffed, to inveftigate the peculiarities in this fingular writer, which confpire to plunge him in the crowd of those evanescent critics (if I may use such an expreffion) whom his friend Pope beheld in fo clear a vision, that he feems to have given us a prophetical portrait of his own Commentator. Critics I faw, that others' names efface, And fix their own, with labour, in the place; I fhall therefore hazard a few farther obfervations, not only on this famous Critic of our age and country, but on the two greater names of antiquity, to each of whom he has been declared fuperior by the partial voice of enthufiaftic friendship. I with not to offend his most zealous adherents; and, though I cannot but confider him as a literary ufurper, I fpeak of him as a great Hiftorian faid of more exalted tyrants, fine ira et ftudio, quorum caufas procul habeo.-There seem to be three natural endowments requifite in the formation of an accomplished critic;-ftrong understanding, lively imagination, and refined sensibility. The first was the characteristic of Ariftotle, and by the confent of all ages he is allowed to have poffeffed it in a fuperlative degree. May I be pardoned for the opinion, that he enjoyed but a very moderate portion of the other two? I would not abfolutely fay that he had neither Fancy nor Feeling ;. but that his imagination was not brilliant, and that his fenfibility was not exquifite, may I think be fairly prefumed from the general tenor of his profe; nor does the little relique of his poetry contradict the idea.. The two qualities in which Ariftotle may be fuppofed defective, were the very two which peculiarly diftinguish Longinus; who certainly wanted not understanding, though he might not poffefs the philofophi cal cal fagacity of the Stagyrite. When confidered in every point of view, he appears the most confummate character among the Critics of antiquity. If Warburton wore any resemblance to either of these mighty names, I apprehend it must be to the former, and perhaps in imagination he was fuperior to Aristotle; but, of the three qualities which I have ventured to confider as requifite in the perfect Critic, I conceive him to have been miferably deficient in the laft, and certainly the most effential of the three; for, as the great Commentator of Horace has philofophically and truly remarked, in a note to that Poet, Feeling, or Sentiment, is not only the fureft, but the fole ultimate arbiter of works of genius *." A man may possess an acute understanding and a lively imagination, without being a found Critic; and this truth perhaps cannot be more clearly fhewn than in the writings of Warburton. His understanding was undoubtedly acute, his imagination was lively; but Imagination and Sentiment are by no means fynonymous; and he certainly wanted thofe finer feelings which conftitute accuracy of discernment, and a perfect perception of literary excellence. In confequence of this defect, instead of seizing the real fenfe and intended beauties of an author, he frequently followed the caprices of his own active fancy, which led him in quest of secret meanings and myfterious allufions;. these he readily found, and his powers of understanding enabled him to drefs them up in a plausible and fpecious form, and to perfuade many readers that he was (what he believed himself to be) the restorer of genuine Criticism. As a farther proof that he was deftitute. of refined fen-fibility, I might alledge the peculiarity of his diction, which, as Dr. Johnson has very juftly remarked, is coarse and impure. Perhaps it may be found, that in proportion as authors have enjoyed the quality which I suppose him to have wanted, they have been more or less diftinguished by the eafe, the elegance, and the beauty of their language: were I required to fortify this conjecture by examples, I should produce the names of Virgil and Racine, of Fenelon and Addifon-that Addifon, who, though infulted by the Commentator of Pope with the names of an indifferent Poet and a worfe Critic, was, I think, as much fuperior. to his infulter in critical tafte, and in folidity of judgment, as he conNotes on the Epiftle to Auguftus, ver. 210. feffedly |