affumed for his amufement. With thefe impreffions we see him delivered over to mortification and difgrace, and bewail his punishment with a fenfibility, that is only due to the sufferings of the virtuous.

As it is impoffible to ascertain the limits of Shakespear's genius, I will not prefume to fay he could not have fupported his humour, had he chosen to have prolonged his existence thro' the fucceeding drama of Henry the Fifth; we may conclude, that no ready expedient prefented itself to his fancy, and he was not apt to spend much pains in searching for fuch: He therefore put him to death, by which he fairly placed him out of the reach of his contemporaries, and got rid of the trouble and difficulty of keeping him up to his original pitch, if he had attempted to carry him through a third drama, after he had removed the Prince of Wales out of his company, and feated him on the throne. I cannot doubt but there were refources in Shakespear's genius, and a latitude of humour in the character of Falftaff, which might have furnished scenes of admirable comedy by exhibiting him in his difgrace, and both Shallow and Silence would have been acceffaries to his pleafantry: Even the field of Agincourt, and the diftrefs of the king's army

before

before the action, had the poet thought proper to have produced Falstaff on the fcene, might have been as fruitful in comic incidents as the battle of Shrewsbury; this we can readily believe from the humours of Fluellen and Piftol, which he has woven into his drama; the former of whom is made to remind us of Falstaff, in his dialogue with Captain Gower, when he tells him that As Alexander is kill his friend Clytus,

being in his ales and his cups, so alfo Harry Monmouth, being in his right wits and his goot judgements, is turn away the fat Knight with the great felly-doublet: He was full of jefts and gypes and knaveries, and mocks; I am forget his name.— Sir John Falstaff.-That is he.This paffage has ever given me a pleasing fenfation, as it marks a regret in the poet to part with a favourite character, and is a tender farewel to his memory: It is alfo with particular propriety that these words are put into the mouth of Fluellen, who ftands here as his fubftitute, and whofe humour, as well as that of Nym, may be faid to have arifen out of the ailes of Falstaff.

N° LXXXVII.

N° LXXXVII.

Singula lætus

Exquiritque, auditque, virûm monumenta priorum.

(VIRGIL.)

F all our dealers in fecond-hand wares,

few bring their goods to fo bad a market, as thofe humble wits who retail other people's worn-out jokes. A man's good fayings are fo perfonally his own, and depend fo much upon manner and circumstances, that they make a poor figure in other people's mouths, and fuffer even more by printing than they do by repeating: It is alfo a very difficult thing to pen a witticifm; for by the time we have adjusted all the defcriptive arrangements of this man faid, and t'other man replied, we have miferably blunted the edge of the repartee. These difficulties however have been happily overcome by Mr. Jofeph Miller and other facetious compilers, whose works are in general circulation, and may be heard of in moft clubs and companies where gentlemen meet, who love to say a good thing without the trouble of inventing it. We are alfo in a fair train of knowing every thing that a late celebrated author said, as well

as

as wrote, without an exception even of his moft fecret ejaculations. We may judge how valuable thefe diaries will be to pofterity, when we reflect how much we should now be edified, had any of the antients given us as minute a collectanea of their illuftrious contemporaries.

We have, it is true, a few of Cicero's tablejokes; but how delightful would it be to know what he faid, when nobody heard him! how piously he reproached himself when he laid in bed too late in a morning, or eat too heartily at Hortenfius's or Cafar's table. We are told indeed that Cato the Cenfor loved his jeft, but we should have been doubly glad to have partaken of it: What a pity it is that nobody thought it worth their while to record fome pleasanter fpecimen than Macrobius has given us of his retort upon Q. Albidius, a glutton and a fpendthrift, when his houfe was on fire-What he could not eat, he has burnt, faid Cato; where the point of the jeft lies in the allufion to a particular kind of facrifice, and the good-humour of it with himself. It was better faid by P. Syrus the actor, when he faw one Mucius, a malevolent fellow, in a very melancholy moodEither fome ill fortune has befallen Mucius, or fome good has happened to one of his acquaint

ance.

A man's

A man's fame fhall be recorded to posterity. by the trifling merit of a jeft, when the great things he has done would elfe have been buried; in oblivion: Who would now have known that L. Mallius was once the best painter in Rome, if it was not for his repartee to Servilius Geminus?--You paint better than you model, fays Geminus, pointing to Mallius's children, who were crooked and ill-favoured.-Like enough, replied the artist; I paint in the daylight, but I model, as you call it, in the dark.

Cicero it is well known was a great joker, and fome of his good fayings have reached us;: it does not appear as if his wit had been of the malicious fort, and yet Pompey, whofe temper could not ftand a jeft, was fo galled by him, that he is reported to have said with great bitternefs-Oh! that Cicero would go over to my enemies, for then he would be afraid of me.If Cicero forgave this sarcasm, I should call him not only a better-tempered, but a braver man than Pompey.

But of all the antient wits Auguftus feems to have had most point, and he was as remarkable for taking a jeft, as for giving it. A country fellow came to Rome, who was fo like the emperor, that all the city ran after him; Auguftus heard of it, and ordering the man into his pre

fence