piteous condition, whofe eyes have been torn from their fockets, together with a naked maniac, who is starting from the hovel, where he had housed himself during the tempeft: The effect of this figure is defcribed with rapture, for he is drawn in the prime of youth, beautiful and of a most noble air; his naked limbs difplay the fineft proportions of the human figure, and the muscular exertion of the fudden action he is thrown into furnish ample fcope to the anatomical science of the artift. The fable feigns him to be the fon of the blind old man above defcribed, and the fragment relates that his phrenfy being not real but affumed, Parrhafius availed himself of that circumstance, and touched the character of his madness with fo nice and delicate a difcrimination from that of Oedipus, that an attentive obferver might have difcovered it to be counterfeited even without the clue of the ftory, There are two other attendant characters in the group: One of thefe is a rough, hardy veteran, who feems to brave the storm with a certain air of contemptuous petulance in his countenance, that befpeaks a mind fuperior to fortune, and indignant under the vifitation even of the gods themselves. The other is a character, that feems to have been a kind of imaginary creature of the poet, and is a buffoon

or

or jefter upon the model of Homer's Therfites, and was employed by fchylus in his drama upon the old burlefque fyftem of the Satyrs, as an occafional chorus or parody upon the feverer and more tragic characters of the piece.

"The next picture in our author's catalogue was by the hand of Timanthes: This modeft painter, though refiding in the capital of Attica, lived in fuch retirement from fociety, and was fo abfolutely devoted to his art, that even his perfon was fcarce known to his competitors. Envy never drew a word from his lips to the difparagement of a contemporary, and emulation could hardly provoke his diffidence into a conteft for fame, which fo many bolder rivals were prepared to difpute.

' Efchylus, it is well known, wrote three plays on the fable of Prometheus; the fecond in this feries is the Prometheus chained, which happily furvives; the last was Prometheus delivered, and from the opening feene of this drama Timanthes formed his picture. Prometheus is here difcovered on the fea-fhore upon an ifland inhabited only by himfelf and his daughter, a young virgin of exquifite beauty, who is fuppofed to have feen none other of the human species but her father, befides certain imaginary beings, whom Prometheus had either created by his

ftolen

stolen fire, or whom he employed in the capacity of familiars for the purposes of his enchantments, for the poet very juftifiably fuppofes him endowed with fupernatural powers, and by that vehicle brings to pass all the beautiful and furprifing incidents of his drama. One of these aërial fpirits had by his command conjured up a most dreadful tempeft, in which a noble ship is reprefented as finking in the midst of the breakers on this enchanted fhore. The daughter of Prometheus is feen in a fupplicating attitude imploring her father to allay the ftorm, and fave the finking mariners from deftruction. In the back ground of the picture is a cavern, and at the entrance of it a mishapen favage being, whofe evil nature is depicted in the deformity of his perfon and features, and who was employed by Prometheus in all fervile offices, necessary for his accommodation in this folitude. The aërial fpirit is in the clouds, which he is driving before him at the behest of his great mafter. In this compofition therefore, although not replete with characters, there is yet fuch diversity of ftile and fubject, that we have all, which the majesty and beauty of real nature can furnish, with beings out of the regions of nature, as ftrongly contrafted in form and character, as fancy can devife: The fcenery alfo is of the fublimet caft,

and

and whilst all Greece refounded with applauses upon the exhibition of this picture, Timanthes alone was filent, and startled at the very echo of his own fame, fhrunk back again to his retirement."

As this fragment is now in the hands of an ingenious tranflator, I forbear for the prefent to intrude upon his work by any further anticipation of it, conscious withal as I am that the public curiofity will fhortly be gratified with a much more full and fatisfactory delineation of this interefting narrative, than I am able to give.

N° C.

SHALL now refume the plan I have purfued in the foregoing volumes and proceed with my review of the writers of the Greek flage.

In No LXXVIII. I took leave of what is properly called The Old Comedy; I am next to fpeak of that clafs of authors, who are generally filed writers of The Middle Comedy.

The fpirit of a free people will difcover itself

in

in the productions of their stage; the comic drama, being a profeffed representation of living manners, will paint these likenesses in ftronger or in fainter colours according to the degree of licence or restraint, which may prevail in different places, or in the fame place at different periods. We are now upon that particular æra in the Athenian conftitution, when it began to feel fuch a degree of controul under the rifing power of the Macedonian princes, as put a stop to the perfonal licentioufnefs of the comic poets: If we are to confider Athens only as the capital feat of genius, we muft bewail this declenfion from her former ftate of freedom, which had produced fo brilliant a period in the annals of her literature; but fpeak of her in a political sense, and it must be acknowledged that whatever reftraints were put upon her liberty, and however humbling the difgraces were which she incurred, they could not well be more than she merited by her notorious abuse of public profperity and most ingrateful treatment of her best and most deserving citizens. When the thunder of oratory was filenced, the flashes of wit were no longer displayed; death stopped the impetuous tongue of Demofthenes, and the hand of power controuled the acrimonious muse of Ariftophanes; obedient to the rein, the poet checked