the work of Butler; for what poet has ever brought fo many remote images fo happily together? It is fcarcely poffible to perufe a page without finding fome affociation of images that was never found before. By the first paragraph the reader is amufed, by the next he is delighted, and by a few more frained to aftonishment; but aftonishment is a toilfome pleasure; he is foon weary wondering, and longs to be diverted. of Omnia vult belle Matho dicere, dic aliquando Imagination is useless without knowledge : nature gives in vain the power of combination, unless study and obfervation supply materials to be combined. Butler's treasures of knowledge appear proportioned to his expence whatever topick employs his mind, he fhews himself qualified to expand and illuftrate it with all the acceffories that books can furnish he is found not only to have travelled the beaten road, but the bye-paths. of literature; not only to have taken general furveys, but to have examined particulars with minute infpection. : 7 If the French boaft the learning of Rabelais, we need not be afraid of confronting them with Butler, But the most valuable parts of his performance are those which retired study and native wit cannot fupply. He that merely makes a book from books may be useful, but can scarcely be great. Butler had not fuffered life to glide befide him unfeen or unobferved. He had watched with great diligence the operations of human nature, and traced the effects of opinion, humour, intereft, and paffion. From fuch remarks proceeded that great number of fententious diftichs which have paffed into converfation, and are added as proverbial axioms to the general stock of practical knowledge. When any work has been viewed and admired, the first question of intelligent curiofity is, how was it performed? Hudibras was not a hafty effufion; it was not produced by a fudden tumult of imagination, or a fhort paroxyfm of violent labour. To accumulate fuch a mass of fentiments at the call of accidental dental defire, or of fudden neceffity, is be yond the reach and power of the most active and comprehensive mind. I am informed by Mr. Thyer of Manchester, the excellent editor of this author's reliques, that he could fhew fomething like Hudibras in profe. He has in his poffeffion the common-place book, in which Butler repofited, not fuch events or precepts as are gathered by reading; but fuch remarks, fimilitudes, allufions, affemblages, or inferences, as occasion prompted, or meditation produced; those thoughts that were generated in his own mind, and might be ufefully applied to fome future purpose. Such is the labour of thofe who write for immortality. But human works are not eafily found without a perishable part. Of the ancient poets every reader feels the mythology tedious and oppreffive. Of Hudibras, the manners, being founded on opinions, are temporary and local, and therefore become every day less intelligible, and lefs ftriking. What Cicero fays of philofophy is true likewife of wit and humour, that time effaces the fictions of "opinion, and confirms the determinations. P "of Nature." Such manners as depend upon ftanding relations and general paffions are coextended with the race of man; but those modifications of life, and peculiarities of prac tice, which are the progeny of error and per: verfenefs, or at beft of fome accidental influence or tranfient perfuafion, must perish with their parents. Much therefore of that humour which transported the last century with merriment is loft to us, who do not know the four folemnity, the fullen fuperftition, the gloomy morofenefs, and the ftubborn fcruples of the ancient Puritans; or, if we knew them, derive our information only from books, or from tradition, have never had them before our eyes, and cannot but by recollection and ftudy understand the lines in which they are fatirifed. Our grandfathers knew he picture from the life; we judge of the life by contemplating the picture. It is scarcely poffible, in the regularity and compofure of the prefent time, to image the tumult of abfurdity, and clamour of contradiction, which perplexed doctrine, difordered practice, practice, and disturbed both publick and pri◄ vate quiet, in that age, when fubordination was broken, and awe was hiffed away; when any unfettled innovator who could hatch a half-formed notion produced it to the publick; when every man might become a preacher, and almost every preacher could collect a congregation. The wisdom of the nation is very reafonably supposed to refide in the parliament. What can be concluded of the lower claffes of the people, when in one of the parliaments fummoned by Cromwell it was seriously propofed, that all the records in the Tower should be burnt, that all memory of things paft should be effaced, and that the whole system of life should commence anew? We have never been witneffes of animofities excited by the use of minced pies and plumb porridge; nor feen with what abhorrence those who could eat them at all other times of the year would fhrink from them in December. An old Puritan, who was alive in my childhood, being at one of the feasts of the church invited by a neighbour to par take |