work of genius, confidered without refpect to its good or bad tendency, I fhall in a few words give my opinion, drawn from the nature of the two works, and the qualifications they demand. Horace * proposes a queftion nearly of the fame kind: "It has been enquired, "whether a good poem be the work of art or nature: "for my part, I do not fee much to be done by art "without genius, nor by genius without knowledge. "The one is neceffary to the other, and the fuccefs de"pends upon their co-operation." If we fhould endeavour to accommodate matters in imitation of this decifion of Horace, it were easy to say at once, that fuppofing two geniuses equal, one tragic and the other comic, fuppofing the art likewise equal in each, one would be as eafy or difficult as the other; but this, though fatisfactory in the fimple queftion put by Horace, will not be fufficient here. Nobody can doubt but genius and industry contribute their part to every thing valuable, and particularly to good poetry. But, if genius and study were to be weighed one against the other, in order to discover which must contribute moft to a good work, the question would become more curious, and, perhaps, very difficult of folution. Indeed, though nature must have a great part of the expence of poetry, yet no poetry lafts long that is not very correct: the balance, therefore, feems to incline in favour of correction. For is it not known, that Virgil with lefs genius than Ovid, is yet valued more by men of exquifite judgment; or, without going fo far, Boileau, the Horace of our time, Poet. v. 407. who who compofed with fo much labour, and asked Moliere where he found his rhyme fo eafily, has faid, "If I "write four words, I fhall blot out three;" has not Boileau, by his polished lines, retouched and retouched a thousand times, gained the preference above the works of the fame Moliere, which are fo natural, and produced by fo fruitful a genius! Horace was of that opinion, for when he is teaching the writers of his age the art of poetry, he tells them in plain terms, that Rome would excel in writing as in arms, if the poets were not afraid of the labour, patience, and time required to polish their pieces. He thought every poem was bad that had not been brought ten times back to the anvil, and required that a work should be kept nine years, as a child is nine months in the womb of its mother, to reftrain that natural impatience which combine with floth and self-love to difguife faults; fo certain is it that correction is the touch-ftone of writing. The queftion propofed comes back to the comparison which I have been making between genius and correction, fince we are now engaged in enquiring whether there is more or lefs difficulty in writing tragedy or comedy for as we must compare nature and ftudy one with another, fince they must both concur more or less to make a poet; fo if we will compare the labours of two different minds in different kinds of writing, we must, with regard to the authors, compare the force of genius, and with respect to the compofition, the difficulties of the task. The genius of the tragic and comic writer will be eafily allowed to be remote from each other. Every per performance, be what it will, requires a turn of mind which a man cannot confer upon himfelf: it is purely the gift of nature, which determines those who have it, to pursue, almost in spite of themselves, the tafte which predominates in their minds. Pafcal found in his childhood, that he was a mathematician, and Vandyke that he was born a painter. Sometimes this internal direction of the mind does not make fuch evident difcoveries of itfelf; but it is rare to find Corneilles who have lived long without knowing that they were poets. Corneille having once got fome notion of his powers, tried a long time on all fides to know what particular direction he fhould take. He had firft made an attempt in comedy, in an age when it was yet fo grofs in France that it could give no pleasure to polite perfons. Melite was fo well received when he dreffed her out, that she gave rife to a new fpecies of comedy and comedians. This fuccefs, which encouraged Corneille to purfue that fort of comedy of which he was the first inventor, left him no reason to imagine, that he was one day to produce those masterpieces of tragedy, which his mufe difplayed afterwards with so much splendor; and yet lefs did he imagine, that his comic pieces, which, for want of any that were preferable, were then very much in fashion, would be eclipsed by another genius* formed upon the Greeks and Romans, and who would add to their excellencies improvements of his own, and that this modish comedy, to which Corneille, as to his idol, dedicated his labours, would quickly be forgot. He wrote firft Medea, and • Moliere. after afterwards the Cid, and, by that prodigious flight of his genius, he discovered, though late, that nature had formed him to run in no other course but that of Sophocles. Happy genius that, without rule or imitation, could at once take fo high a flight; having once, as I may fay, made himself an eagle, he never afterwards quitted the path, which he had worked out for himself, over the heads of the writers of his time: yet he retained fome traces of the falfe tafte which infected the whole nation; but even in this, he deserves our admiration, fince in time he changed it completely by the reflections he made, and those he occafioned. In fhort, Corneille was born for tragedy, as Moliere for comedy. Moliere, indeed, knew his own genius fooner, and was not lefs happy in procuring applaufe, though it often happened to him as to Corneille, L'Ignorance & l'Erreur à fes naissantes piéces But, without taking any farther notice of the time at which either came to the knowledge of his own genius, let us fuppofe that the powers of tragedy and comedy were as equally shared between Moliere and Corneille, as they are different in their own nature, and then nothing more will remain than to compare the feveral difficulties of each compofition, and to rate those difficulties together which are common to both. It appears, firft, that the tragic poet has in his fubject an advantage over the comic, for he takes it from history, and his rival, at least in the more elevated and fplendid comedy, is obliged to form it by his own invention. Now, it is not fo eafy as it might feem to find comic fubjects capable of a new and pleasing form; but history is a fource, if not inexhaustible, yet certainly fo copious as never to leave the genius a-ground. It is true, that invention feems to have a wider field than history: real facts are limited in their number, but the facts which may be feigned have no end; but though, in this refpect, invention may be allowed to have the advantage, is the difficulty of inventing to be accounted as nothing? To make a tragedy, is to get materials together, and to make use of them like a fkilful architect; but to make a comedy, is to build like fop in the air. It is in vain to boast that the compafs of invention is as wide as the extent of defire: every thing is limited, and the mind of man like every thing else. Besides, invention must be in conformity to nature; but distinct and remarkable characters are very rare in nature herself. Moliere has got hold on the principal touches of ridicule. If any man fhould bring characters less strong, he will be in danger of dulnefs. Where comedy is to be kept up by subordinate personages, it is in great danger. All the force of a picture muft arise from the principal perfons, and not from the multitude clustered up together. In the fame manner, a comedy, to be good, must be fupported by a single striking character, and not by under-parts. But, |