that part in fuch a manner as should give probability and even a plea to the temptation; this was only to be done by the ftrongeft touches and the highest colourings of a mafter; by hitting off a humour of fo happy, fo facetious and fo alluring a caft, as fhould tempt even royalty to forget itself and virtue to turn reveller in his company. His lies, his vanity and his cowardice, too grofs to deceive, were to be fo ingenious as to give delight; his cunning evafions, his witty refources, his mock folemnity, his vapouring felf-confequence, were to furnish a continual feaft of laughter to his royal companion; he was not only to be witty himself, but the cause of wit in other people; a whetstone for raillery; a buffoon, whose very person was a jeft: Compounded of these humours, Shakespear produced the character of Sir John Falstaff; a character, which neither ancient nor modern comedy has ever equalled, which was fo much the favourite of its author as to be introduced in three several plays, and which is likely to be the idol of the English stage, as long as it shall speak the language of Shakespear.

This character almoft fingly supports the whole comic plot of the first part of Henry the fourth; the poet has indeed thrown in fome auxiliary humours in the perfons of Gadshill,

Peto,

Peto, Bardolph, and Hostess Quickly; the two first ferve for little elfe except to fill up the action, but Bardolph as a butt to Falstaff's raillery, and the hostess in her wrangling scene with him, when his pockets had been emptied as he was afleep in the tavern, give occafion to fcenes of infinite pleasantry: Poins is contrafted from the reft of the gang, and as he is made the companion of the prince, is very properly represented as a man of better qualities and morals than Falftaff's more immediate hangers-on and dependants.

The humour of Falstaff opens into full display upon his very first introduction with the prince; the incident of the robbery on the highway, the scene in Eaftcheap in consequence of that ridiculous encounter, and the whole of his conduct during the action with Percy, are fo exquifitely pleafant, that upon the renovation of his dramatic life in the fecond part of Henry the fourth, I queftion if the humour does not in part evaporate by continuation; at least I am perfuaded that it flattens a little in the outfet, and though his wit may not flow lefs copiously, yet it comes with more labour and is farther fetcht. The poet feems to have been fenfible how difficult it was to preserve the vein as rich as at firft, and has therefore ftrengthened his comic plot in the

fecond play with feveral new recruits, who may take a fhare with Falstaff, to whom he no longer entrufts the whole burthen of the humour. In the front of thefe auxiliaries ftands Pistol, a character fo new, whimfical and extravagant, that if it were not for a commentator now living, whofe very extraordinary researches, amongst our old authors, have supplied us with paflages to illumnimate the strange rhapsodies which Shakespear has put into his mouth, I fhould for one have thought Antient Piftol as wild and imaginary a being as Caliban; but I now perceive, by the help of these difcoveries, that the character is made up in great part of abfurd and fuftian passages from many plays, in which Shakespear was versed and perhaps had been a performer: Piftol's dialogue is a tiffue of old tags of bombast, like the middle comedy of the Greeks, which dealt in parody. I abate of aftonishment at the invention and originality of the poet, but it does not leffen my respect for his ingenuity. Shakespear founded his bully in parody, Jonfon copied his from nature, and the palm feems due to Bobadil upon a comparison with Piftol; Congreve copied a very happy likenefs from Jonfon, and by the fairest and moft laudable imitation produced his Noll Bluff, one of the pleafanteft humourifts on the comic stage.

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Shallow and Silence are two very strong auxiliaries to this fecond part of Falstaff's humours, and though they do not abfolutely belong to his family, they are nevertheless near of kin, and derivatives from his flock: Surely two pleasanter fellows never trode the stage; they not only contraft and play upon each other, but Silence fober and Silence tipfey make the most comical reverse in nature; never was drunkenness so well introduced or fo happily employed in any drama: The dialogue between Shallow and Falstaff, and the description given by the latter of Shallow's youthful frolicks, are as true nature and as true comedy as man's invention ever produced: The recruits are alfo in the literal fenfè the recruits of the drama. Thefe perfonages have the further merit of throwing Falstaff's character into a new caft, and giving it the seasonable relief of variety.

Dame Quickly also in this second part resumes her rôle with great comic fpirit, but with fome variation of character for the purpose of introducing a new member into the troop in the perfon of Doll Tearfheet, the common trull of the times. Though this part is very strongly coloured, and though the fcene with her and Falftaff is of a loose as well as ludicrous nature, yet if we compare Shakespear's conduct of this in

cident with that of the dramatic writers of his time, and even fince his time, we must confefs he has managed it with more than common care, and exhibited his comic hero in a very ridiculous light, without any of those gross indecencies which the poets of his age indulged themselves in without reftraint.

The humour of the Prince of Wales is not fo free and unconstrained as in the firft part; though he ftill demeans himself in the course of his revels, yet it is with frequent marks of repugnance and felf-confideration, as becomes the conqueror of Percy, and we see his character approaching faft towards a thorough reformation; but though we are thus prepared for the change that is to happen, when this young hero throws off the reveller and affumes the king, yet we are not fortified against the weakness of pity, when the disappointment and banishment of Falftaff takes place, and the poet executes juftice upon his inimitable delinquent, with all the rigour of an unrelenting moralift. The reader or spectator, who has accompanied Falftaff through his dramatic story, is in debt to him for fo many pleasant moments, that all his failings, which fhould have raised contempt, have only provoked laughter, and he begins to think they are not natural to his character, but

affumed