houfes in this town, is faid to have purchafed the greateft part of them for half value from ruined undertakers, hath intelligence of all new houfes where the finithing is at a stand, takes the advantage of the builder's diftrefs, and by the advantage of ready money, gets fifty per cent. at least for his bargain. It is another undifputed maxim in government, that people are the riches of a nation; which is fo univerfally granted, that it will be hardly pardonable to bring it in doubt. And I will grant it to be fo far true, even in this ifland, that, if we had the African cuftom or privilege, of felling our ufelefs bodies for flaves to foreigners, it 'would be the moft ufeful branch of our trade, by ridding us of a moft unfupportable burthen, and bringing us money in the ftead. But, in our prefent fituation, at leaft five children in fix who are born lie a dead weight upon us for want of employment. And a very skilful computer affured me, that above one half of the fouls in this kingdom fupported themselves by begging and thievery, whereof two thirds would be able to get their bread in any other country upon earth where that fails, the poorer native must either beg, fteal, or ftarve, or be forced to quit his country. This hath made me often with, for fome years paft, that, inftead of difcouraging our people from feeking foreign foil, the public would rather pay for tranfporting all our unneceffary mortals, whether papifts or proteftants, to America, as drawbacks are fometimes allowed for exporting commodities where a nation is overftocked. I confefs myself to be touched with a very fenfible plea fure, when I hear of a mortality in any country - parish or village, where the wretches are forced to pay for a filthy cabin and two ridges of potatoes treble the worth, brought up to steal or beg, for want of work, to whom death would be the best thing to be wished for, on account both of themselves and the public. Among all taxes impofed by the legiflature, thofe upon luxury are univerfally allowed to be the most equitable and beneficial to the fubject; and the commoneft reafoner on government might fill a volume with arguments on the fubject. Yet here again, by the fingular fate of Ireland, this maxim is utterly falfe; and the putting of it in practice may have fuch a pernicious confequence, as I certainly believe the thoughts of the propofers were not able to reach. The miferies we fuffer by our abfentees are of a far more extenfive nature than feems to be commonly understood. I must vindicate myfelf to the reader so far, as to declare folemnly, that what I fhall fay of thofe lords and fquires doth not arife from the leaft regard I have for their understandings, their virtues, or their perfons. For, although I have not the honour of the leaft acquaintance with any one among them (my ambition not foaring fo high), yet I am too good a witnefs of the fituation they have been in for forty years past, the veneration paid them by the people, the high efteem they are in among the prime nobility. and gentry, the particular marks of favour and diftinction they receive from the court: the weight and confequence of their intereft, added to their great zeal and ap plications plications for preventing any hardhips their country might fuffer from England, wifely confidering that their own fortunes ar honours were embarked in the fame bottom. Letter from the dean to lord treasurer Oxford, on the death of his daugh. ter, the marchionefs of Caermarthen. My lord, Nov. 21, 1713. YOUR lordship is the perfon in the world to whom every body ought to be filent upon fuch an occafion as this, which is only to be supported by the greatest wifdom and strength of mind; wherein, God knows, the wifeft and beft of us, who would prefume to offer their thoughts, are far your inferiors. It is true, indeed, that a great misfortune is apt to weaken the mind, and disturb the understanding. This, indeed, might be fome pretence to us to adminifter our confolations, if we had been wholly strangers to the perfon gone. But, my lord, whoever had the honour to know her, wants a comforter as much as your lordfhip; because, though their lofs is not fo great, yet they have not the fame firmness and prudence, to fupport the want of a friend, a patronefs, a benefactor, as you have to fupport that of a daughter. My lord, both religion and reafon forbid me to have the leaft concern for that lady's death, upon her own account; and he must be an ill chriftian, or a perfect ftranger to her virtues, who would not with himfelf, with all fubmiffion to God Almighty's will, in her condition. But, your lordship, who hath loft fuch a daughter, and we, who have loft fuch a friend, and the world, which hath loft fuch an example; have, in our feveral deg egrees, greater caufe to lament, than, perhaps, was ever given by any private perfon before. For, my lord, I have fat down to think of every amiable quality that could enter into the compofition of a lady, and could not fingle out one, which the did not poffets in as high a perfection as human nature is capable of. But, as to your lordfhip's own particular, as it is an unconceivable misfortune to have loft fuch a daughter, so it is a posfeffion which few can boaft of, to have had fuch a daughter. I have often faid to your lordship, that I never knew any one, by many degrees, fo happy in their domeftic as you; and I affirm you are fo ftill, though not by fo many degrees; from whence it is very obvious, that your lordship should reflect upon what you have left, and not upon what you have loft. To fay the truth, my lord, you began to be too happy for a mortal; much more happy than is ufual with the difpenfations of Providence long to continue. You had been the great inftrument of preferving your country from foreign and domeftic ruin: you have had the felicity of establishing your family in the greatest luftre, without any obligation to the bounty of your prince, or any induftry of your own; you have triumphed over the violence and treachery of your enemies, by your courage and abilities: and, by the fteadiness of your temper, over the inconftancy and caprice of your friends. Perhaps your lordship X 3 has 1 has felt too much complacency within yourself, upon this univerfal fuccefs; and God Almighty, who would not difappoint your endeavours for the public, thought fit to punish you with a domeftic lofs, where he knew your heart was most exposed, and, at the fame time, has fulfilled his own wife purpofes, by rewarding, in a better life, that excellent creature he has taken from you. I know not, my lord, why I write this to you, nor hardly what I am writing. I am fure it is not from any compliance with form; it is not from thinking that I can give your lordship any ease. I think it was an impulfe upon me that I fhould fay fomething: and whether I fhall fend you what I have written, I am yet in doubt, &c. Reliques of ancient English poetry: confifting of cld Heroic Ballads, Songs, and other pieces of our earliest Poets (chiefly of the Lyric kind), together with fome few of later date; in 3 volumes octavo, London, 1765. I F works of literature are to be eftimated by the variety and richness of the entertainment they afford, the reverend Mr. Percy, collector of the pieces now before us, has a better title to the thanks of the public, than most of the authors who have gone before him in the fame walk. The people of England are particularly indebted to him, fince he has prevented the charge, to which a longer filence, after the late publications of Runic, Erfe, and Welsh poems, would have expofed their ancestors, of having been, for a long time, lefs favoured by the Mufes, under the fame degrees of cultivation, than any of their neighbours at a lefs or greater. diftance from the fuppofed abode of thefe goddeffes, fo as to make their country appear in maps of the human understanding, the chofen feat of dulness and indifference, and the inhabitants as deficient in mental, as they have ever been allowed to be accomplished in bodily perfections. Thefe pieces confift chiefly of fuch very fcarce ballads, or ex tracts from larger works, as are not only extremely valuable in themselves, but ferve to exhibit, by the manner in which the judicious author has arranged them, and the notes and differtations with which he has enriched them, the history of thought as well as fpeech in England, and that amongst all ranks; fince, whilft nations are in an improving ftate, thofe literary compofitions, thofe modes of thinking and speaking, which were peculiar to the highest ranks in one age, like fashions, generally defcend, by the next age, to the loweft. Much light, befides; as they may borrow from ancient writers of almost every denomi nation, and which Mr. Percy has fpared no pains to confult, by means of his curious additions they caft a great deal more upon them: upon Shakespeare especially, who now appears to have not only alluded to many paffages in them not to be found in other works, but to have even taken from them the fubject of fome of his best pieces. Το To the English ballads Mr. Percy has added many Scottish ones of the fame ages, and to the ancient many modern, by which the variety is greatly increased, and the antique roughness of the former, and the modern polish of the latter, are well contrafted, and confiderably heightened. He has, likewife, to make his work as compleat as poffible, obliged us with fome imitations of the ancients; amongst which, thofe by himself will, we fancy, be found in general to be the best executed. To give a particular account of the pieces which compose those three volumes, or even fpecimens of each particular kind of compofition, would lead us greater lengths than our plan will allow us to go. Befides, the extracts we have already given in our article of Antiquities, and that of Poetry, may be confidered as fuch; and though they fhould not, there feems to be little neceffity for any in this place. We cannot, in juftice to the good tafte of our readers, but fuppofe, that most of them are already poffeffed of this literary treafure; fo that what we have faid of it is to be confidered as done rather with a view of paying the tribute of praife, where praife is fo much due, than to recommend a work, whose merit alone must have univerfally recommended it long before thefe fheets can be fuppofed to reach the public. The plays of William Shakespeare, in eight volumes, with the corrections and illuftrations of various commentators; to which are added notes by Samuel Johnson. Eight volumes octavo. London, T HE lefs abilities feem requi fite for a due performance of the task Mr. Johnson has undertaken in regard to Shakespeare's works, or at least of that part of this task which he has thought proper to execute, the collating of the old copies in order to find out the genuine reading, and the comparing of former commentators on difficult paffages, and the examining of thefe paffages himself, in order to difcover the true meaning, of that great poet; the more Mr. John fon feems entitled to the thanks of the public; fince, at that rate, he might have employed his great talents more to his own honour, though not more, perhaps, to the gratification of others. But, as Mr. Johnson himself judicioufy obferves, however dull the duty of a collator may be, an emendatory critic would very ill discharge his duty without qualities very different from dulnefs. In perufing corrupted pieces, he must have before him all poffibilities of meaning, with all poffibilities of expreffion. Such must be his comprehenfion of thought, and fuch his copioufnefs of language. Out of many readings poffible, he must be able to felect that which beft fuits with the ftate, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and with his author's particular caft of thoughts and turn of expreffion. Such must be his knowledge, and fuch his tafte. Conjectural criticifm demands X 4 more more than humanity poffeffes; and he that exercises it with most praife, has very frequent need of indulgence. It is, therefore, by these rules that Mr. Johnson's merit in this edition of Shakespeare is to be tried; and, trying it by thefe rules, we are ftill of opinion, that, notwithstanding the long delay of the work, and his not complying altogether with the expectation of the public, the public will be found confiderably indebted to him; at leaft, till it can be proved, that the delay and deficiency have been owing to any wilful negligence on his part; a charge which it may not be fo easy to prove, confidering those viciffitudes to which, with regard to ftudy, though not difcernible, the mind of man is even more fubject than his body is, with regard to labour; and from which the minds of the greatest geniuses are often less exempt than those of the meaneft. The moft, we think, that can be faid of Mr. Johnson on this occafion, is, that he was rather rafh in promifing than backward in performing. It is, however, happy for the republic of letters, that he promifed as he did; fince, otherwife, we fhould, probably, never have received Shakespeare through his hands. Mr. Johnson sets out by a preface, in which he difcuffes the title of Shakespeare, and Shakefpeare's works, to that veneration now univerfally paid them; gives a fhort hiftory of the feveral editions thefe works have gone through; delivers his opinion of the feveral editors in the capacity of collators and commentators; and acquaints us with the ufe he has made of these editions, and what additions he has made to them. He then gives us Hemminge and Condell's dedication and preface to their edition. These are followed by Mr. Pope's, Mr. Theobald's, Sir Thomas Hanmer's, and Dr. Warburton's preface to theirs ; Mr. Rowe's life of Shakespeare ; an anecdote relating to Shakefpeare communicated by Mr. Rowe to Mr. Pope; and Ben Johnson's poem to his memory. We next have the plays themselves, with fuch notes of others as he has thought proper to retain, interspersed with his own notes upon them, as well as on the text itself. In these notes it was expected that Mr. Johnfon would have been particular in his examination of Shakefpeare's poetical beauties and blemishes; but he follows the example he had fet himself in his preface to the whole, by doing little elfe, in this respect, than giving the general character of every piece. But in thefe general characters he is univerfally allowed to have been peculiarly happy. This is far from being the cafe with regard to his preface, to which many objections have been raised; but most of them on fuch different accounts, that they ferve only to justify the common obfervation concerning the great difficulty of equally pleafing all taftes. For our part, we think, that if there is any fault in this piece it is the almost paradoxical manner into which Mr. Johnson has contrived to throw his fentiments. Read firft, what he fays of Shakespeare's beauties, and you will be apt to think he can have no blemishes, or only fuch as muft vanish in the blaze of his beauties. Read |