the dazzling fplendour of imagery, and the feductive powers of eloquence. Never were penury of knowledge and vulgarity of fentiment fo happily dif guifed. The reader feels his mind full, though he learns nothing; and when he meets it in its new array, no longer knows the talk of his mother and his nurfe. When these wonder-working founds fink into fenfe, and the doctrine of the Effay difrobed of its ornaments, is left to the powers of its naked excellence, what fhall we difcover? That we are, in comparison with our Creator, very weak and ignorant; that we do not uphold the chain of existence, and that we could not make one another with more skill than we are made. We may

learn

Το

learn yet more; that the arts of human life were copied from the instinctive operations of other animals; that if the world be made for man, it may be faid that man was made for geefe. these profound principles of natural knowledge are added fome moral inftructions equally new; that felf-interest, well understood, will produce focial concord; that men are mutual gainers by mutual benefits; that evil is fometimes balanced by good; that human advantages are unstable and fallacious, of uncertain duration, and doubtful effects; that our true honour is not to have a great part, but to act it well; that virtue only is our own; and that happiness is always in our power.

Surely

Surely a man of no very comprehenfive fearch may venture to say that he has heard all this before; but it was never till now recommended by fuch a blaze of embellishment, or fuch sweetnefs of melody. The vigorous contraction of fome thoughts, the luxuriant amplification of others, the incidental illuftrations, and fometimes the dignity, fometimes the softness of the verses, enchain philofophy, fufpend criticism, and opprefs judgement by overpowering pleasure.

This is true of many paragraphs; yet if I had undertaken to exemplify Pope's felicity of compofition before a rigid critick, I should not felect the Essay on Man; for it contains more lines unfuc

cessfully

cessfully laboured, more harshness of diction, more thoughts imperfectly expreffed, more levity without elegance, and more heavinefs without ftrength, than will eafily be found in all his other works.

The Characters of Men and Women are the product of diligent fpeculation upon human life; much labour has been beftowed upon them, and Pope very feldom laboured in vain. That his excellence may be properly estimated, I recommend a comparison of his Characters of Women with Boileau's Satire; it will then be feen with how much more perfpicacity female nature is inveftigated, and female excellence felected; and he furely is no mean writer to whom Boileau. fhall

6.

fhall be found inferior. The Characters of Men, however, are written with more, if not with deeper, thought, and exhibit many paffages exquifitely beautiful. The Gem and the Flower will not cafily be equalled. In the women's part are fome defects; the character of Attoffa is not fo neatly finished as that of Clodio;

and fome of the female characters may be found perhaps more frequently among men; what is faid of Philomede was true of Prior.

In the Epiftles to Lord Bathurst and Lord Burlington, Dr. Warburton has endeavoured to find a train of thought which was never in the writer's head, and, to fupport his hypothefis, has printed that firft which was published