claiming; not free, natural, and eafy, as converfation fhould be, but precife, fet, formal argumenting, pro and con, like difputants in a fchool. In writing, like drefs, is it not poffible to be too exact, too ftarched, and too formal ? Pleafing negligence I have feen: who ever faw pleafing formality? In a word, all extremes are to be avoided. To be a French Puritan in the drama, or an English Latitudinarian, is taking different paths to be both out of the road. If the British Muse is too unruly, the French is too tame: one wants a curb, the other a spur. By pleading for fome little relaxation from the utmost feverity of the rules, where the fubject may seem to require it, I am not bespeaking any fuch indulgence for the prefent performance though the Ancients have left us no pattern to follow of this fpecies of tragedy, I perceive, upon examination, that I have been attentive to their ftricteft leffon's. The unities are religiously observed; the place is the fame, varied only into different profpects by the power of enchantment; all the incidents fall naturally within the very time of representation; the plot is one principal action, and of that kind which introduces variety of turns and changes, all tending to the fame point; the ornaments and decorations are of a piece with it, fo that one could not well fubfift without the other; every act concludes with fome unexpected revolution; and, in the end, vice is punished, virtue rewarded, and the moral is inftructive. Rhyme, which I would by no means admit into the dialogue of graver tragedy, seems to me the most proper ftyle for representations of this heroic romantic kind, and beft adapted to accompany mufic. The folemn language of a haughty tyrant will by no means become a pasfionate lover, and tender fentiments require the fofteft colouring. The The theme must govern the style; every thought, every character, every subject of a different nature, muft fpeak a different language. An humble lover's gentle addrefs to his mistress would rumble strangely in the Miltonic diale&; and the foft harmony of Mr. Waller's numbers would as ill become the mouths of Lucifer and Belzebub. The terrible and the tender must be fet to different notes of mufic. To conclude. This dramatic attempt was the first effay of a very infant Mufe, rather as a task at fuch hours as were free from other exercises, than any way meant for public entertainment: but Mr. Betterton, having had a cafual fight of it many years after it was written, begged it for the ftage, where it found fo favourable a reception as to have an uninterrupted run of at least forty days. The feparation of the principal actors, which foon followed, and the introduction of the Italian opera, put a stop to its farther appearance. Had it been compofed at a riper time of life the faults might have been fewer: however, upon revifing it now, at fo great a diftance of time, with a cooler judgement than the first conceptions of youth will allow, I cannot abfolutely say Scripfiffe pudet. ** *** A LET A LETTER WITH A CHARACTER OF MR. WYCHERLEY being the only living author eminent for his writings, with whom it is your misfortune to have no personal acquaintance, you defire me to give you some idea of him, in order to perfect a design you are about of celebrating fuch of the poets of the present age as you think have deserved any notice. My partiality to him as a friend might render what I fay of him fufpected, if his merit was not fo well and fo publickly established as to fet him above flattery. To do him barely justice, is an undertaking beyond my fkill: however, fince you defire it, I will do my beft, though under the disadvantage of a painter, who, in drawing a lady Sunderland, or a lady *Dutchefs of Montagu. Monthermer, might |