vened imagination, cannot be the language of anguish or diftrefs. Otway, fenfible of this, has painted a scene of diftrefs in colours finely adapted to the fubject: there is fcarce a figure in it, except a fhort and natural finiile with which the fpeech is introduced. Belvidera talking to her father of her husband: Think you faw what past at our last parting; For he yet lov'd, and that dear love preserv'd me I fear not death, but cannot bear a thought To preferve the forefaid refemblance between words and their meaning, the fentiments of active and hurrying paffions ought to be dressed in words where fyllables prevail that are pronoun ced ced short or faft; for these make an impreffion of hurry and precipitation. Emotions, on the other hand, that reft upon their objects, are best expreffed by words where fyllables prevail that are pronounced long or flow. A perfon affected with melancholy has a languid and flow train of perceptions: the expreffion beft fuited to that state of mind, is where words, not only of long but of many fyllables, abound in the compofition; and, for that reafon, nothing can be finer than the following paffage. In those deep folitudes, and awful cells, Pope, Eloifa to Abelard. To preserve the fame refemblance, another circumftance is requifite, that the language, like the emotion, be rough or fmooth, broken or uniform. Calm and fweet emotions are beft expreffed by words that glide foftly: furprise, fear, and other turbulent paffions, require an expreffion both rough and broken. It cannot have efcaped any diligent inquirer into nature, that, in the hurry of paffion, one generally expreffes that thing firft which is most at heart which is beautifully done in the following paffage. * Demetrius Phalereus (of Elocution, fect. 28.) juftly obferves, Me, me; adfum qui feci: in me convertite ferrum, O Rutuli, mea fraus omnis. Eneid ix. 427. Paffion has often the effect of redoubling words, the better to make them exprefs the ftrong conception of the mind. This is finely imitated in the following examples. -Thou fun, faid I, fair light! And thou enlighten'd earth, so fresh and gay! Paradife Loft, book viii. 273. -Both have finn'd! but thou Against God only; I, 'gainst God and thee: Me! Me! only juft object of his ire. Paradife Loft, book x. 930. Shakespeare is fuperior to all other writers in delineating paffion. It is difficult to say in what part obferves, that an accurate adjustment of the words to the thought, fo as to make them correfpond in every particular, is only proper for fedate fubjects; for that paffion speaks plain, and rejects all refinements. part he most excels, whether in moulding every paffion to peculiarity of character, in discovering the fentiments that proceed from various tones of paffion, or in expreffing properly every different fentiment: he disgufts not his reader with general declamation and unmeaning words, too common in other writers: his fentiments are adjusted to the peculiar character and circumftances of the speaker: and the propriety is no lefs perfect between his fentiments and his diction. That this is no exaggeration, will be evident to every one of taste, upon comparing Shakespeare with other writers in fimilar paffages. If upon any occafion he fall below himfelf, it is in those scenes where paffion enters not by endeavouring in that cafe to raise his dialogue above the ftyle of ordinary converfation, he fometimes deviates into intricate thought and obfcure expreffion*: fometimes, to throw Ii3 * Of this take the following specimen : They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase his From our atchievements, though perform'd at height, The pith and marrow of our attribute. So, oft it chances in particular men, That for fome vicious mole of nature in them, By the o'ergrowth of fome complexion Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reafon ; Or his language out of the familiar, he employs rhyme. But may it not in fome measure excufe Shakespeare, I fhall not say his works, that he had no pattern, in his own or in any living language, of dialogue fitted for the theatre? At the fame time, it ought not to escape obfervation, that the ftream clears in its progress, and that in his later plays he has attained the purity and perfection of dialogue; an obfervation that, with greater certainty than tradition, will direct us to arrange his plays in the order of time. This ought to be confidered by thofe who rigidly exaggerate every blemish of the finest genius for the drama ever the world enjoyed: they ought alfo for their own fake to confider, that it is easier to discover his blemishes, which lie generally at the furface, than his beauties, which cannot be truly relished but by those who dive deep into human nature. One thing must be evident to the meaneft capacity, that wherever paffion is to be difplayed, Nature fhews itself mighty in him, and is confpicuous by Or by fome habit, that too much o'er-leavens Shall in the general cenfure take corruption Hamlet, A 1. Sc. 7. |