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cipitate ours. His parliament and his people did all "they could to save themselves, by winning him. But "all was vain. He had no principle on which they "could take hold. Even his good qualities worked a"gainst them; and his love of his country went halves "with his bigotry. How he succeeded we have heard from 66 our fathers. The Revolution of one thousand six hun"dred and eighty-eight saved the nation, and ruined the King*."-Nothing can be more contemptuous, and, at the same time, less derisive, than this representation. We should readily say of it, that it is strongly animated, and happily expressed; but no man who understands English would say it is humorous. I shall add one example from Dr Swift. "I should be exceedingly sorry "to find the legislature make any new laws against the practice of duelling, because the methods are easy and many for a wise man to avoid a quarrel with honour, or engage in it with innocence. And I can discover "no political evil in suffering bullies, sharpers, and rakes, "to rid the world of each other by a method of their own, where the law hath not been able to find an ex"pedientt."

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For a specimen of the humorous, take as a contrast to the two last examples, the following delineation of a fop:

Sir Plume (of amber snuff-box justly vain,

And the nice conduct of a clouded cane)

With earnest eyes and round unthinking face,

He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case,

And thus broke out, " My Lord, why, what the devil?

"Z-ds!-damn the lock!-'fore Gad, you must be civil?

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Plague on't 'tis past a jest,-nay prithee,-pox!

“Give her the hair.”—He spoke and rapp'd his box.

"It grieves me much,” replied the peer again,
"Who speaks so well, should ever speak in vain:
66 But-

This, both in the descriptive and the dramatic part, particularly in the draught it contains of the baronet's mind, aspect, manner, and eloquence, (if we except the

A Letter to Sir William Wyndham.
+ Swift on Good Manners.
Rape of the Lock, Canto 4.

sarcastic term justly, the double sense of the word open'd, and the fine irony couched in the reply) is purely facetious. An instance of wit and humour combined, where they reciprocally set off and enliven each other, Pope hath also furnished us with in another part of the same exquisite performance.

Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,
Or some frail china jar receive a flaw;
Or stain her honour, or her new brocade;
Forget her prayers, or miss a masquerade;
Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball;

Or whether heaven has doom'd that Shock must fall +.

This is humourous, in that it is a lively sketch of the female estimate of mischances, as our poet's commentator rightly terms it, marked out by a few striking lineaments. It is likewise witty, for, not to mention the play on words like that remarked in the former example, a trope familiar to this author, you have here a comparison of a woman's chastity to a piece of procelain,-her honour to a gaudy robe,-her prayers to a fantastical disguise, her heart to a trinket; and all these together to her lap-dog, and that founded on one lucky circumstance (a malicious critic would perhaps discern or imagine more) by which these things, how unlike soever in other respects, may be compared, the impression they make on the mind of a fine lady.

Hudibras, so often above quoted, abounds in wit in almost all its varieties; to which the author's various erudition hath not a little contributed. And this, it must be owned, is more suitable to the nature of his poem. At the same time, it is by no means destitute of humour, as appears particularly in the different exhibitions of character given by the knight and his squire. But in no part of the story is this talent displayed to greater advantage than in the consultation of the lawyer, to which I shall refer the reader, as the passage is too long for my transcribing. There is, perhaps, no book in any language wherein the humorous is carried

Rape of the Lock, Canto 2.

+ Part iii. Cant. 3.

to a higher pitch of perfection, than in the adventures of the celebrated knight of La Mancha. As to our English dramatists, who does not acknowledge the transcendent excellence of Shakespeare in this province, as well as in the pathetic? Of the later comic writers, Congreve has an exuberance of wit, but Farquhar has more humour. It may, however, with too much truth, be affirmed of English comedy in general, (for there are some exceptions) that, to the discredit of our stage, as well as of the national delicacy and discernment, obscenity is made too often too supply the place of wit, and ribaldry the place of humour,

Wit and humour, as above explained, commonly concur in a tendency to provoke laughter, by exhibiting a curious and unexpected affinity; the first generally by comparison, either direct or implied, the second by connecting in some other relation, such as causality or vicinity, objects apparently the most dissimilar and heterogeneous; which incongruous affinity, we may remark by the way, gives the true meaning of the word oddity, and is the proper object of laughter.

The difference between these and that grander kind of eloquence treated in the first part of this chapter, I shall, if possible, still farther illustrate, by a few similitudes borrowed from the optical science. The latter may be conceived as a plain mirror, which faithfully reflects the object, in colour, figure, size, and posture. Wit, on the contrary, Proteus-like, transforms itself into a variety of shapes. It is now a convex speculum, which gives a just representation in form and colour, but withal reduces the greatest objects to the most despicable littleness now a concave speculum, which swells the smallest trifles to an enormous magnitude; now again a speculum of a cylindrical, a conical, or an irregular make, which, though in colour, and even in attitude, it reflects a pretty strong resemblance, widely varies the proportions. Humour, when we consider the contrariety of its effects, contempt and laughter, (which constitute what in one word is termed derision) to that sympathy and love often produced by the pathetic, may in re

spect of these be aptly compared to a concave mirror, when the object is placed beyond the focus; in which case it appears by reflection, both diminished and inverted, circumstances which happily adumbrate the contemptible and the ridiculous.

SECTION III.-Of Ridicule.

The intention of raising a laugh is either merely to divert by that grateful titillation which it excites, or to influence the opinions and purposes of the hearers. In this also, the risible faculty, when suitably directed, hath often proved a very potent engine. When this is the view of the speaker, as there is always an air of reasoning conveyed under that species of imagery, narration or description, which stimulates laughter, these, thus blended, obtain the appellation of ridicule, the poignancy of which hath a similar effect in futile subjects, to that produced by what is called the vehement in solemn and important matters.

Nor doth all the difference between these lie in the dignity of the subject. Ridicule is not only confined to questions of less moment, but is fitter for refuting error than for supporting truth, for restraining from wrong conduct, than for inciting to the practice of what is right. Nor are these the sole restrictions; it is not properly levelled at the false, but at the absurd in tenets ; nor can the edge of ridicule strike with equal force every species of misconduct: it is not the criminal part which it attacks, but that which we denominate silly or foolish. With regard to doctrine, it is evident that it is not falsity or mistake, but palpable error or absurdity, (a thing hardly confutable by mere argument) which is the object of contempt; and consequently those dogmas are beyond the reach of cool reasoning which are within the rightful confines of ridicule. That they are generally conceived to be so, appears from the sense universally assigned to expressions like these, Such a position is ridiculous-It doth not deserve a serious answer.' Every body knows that they import more than 'It is

'false,' being, in other words, This is such an extravagance as is not so much a subject of argument as of 'laughter.' And that we may discover what it is, with regard to conduct, to which ridicule is applicable, we need only consider the different departments of tragedy and of comedy. In the last, it is of mighty influence; into the first, it never legally obtains admittance. Those things which principally come under its lash are awkwardness, rusticity, ignorance, cowardice, levity, foppery, pedantry, and affectation of every kind. But against murder, cruelty, parricide, ingratitude, perfidy *, to attempt to raise a laugh, would show such an unnatural insensibility in the speaker, as would be excessively disgustful to any audience. To punish such enormities, the tragic poet must take a very different route.

Now from this distinction of vices or faults into two classes, there hath sprung a parallel division in all the kinds of poesy which relate to manners. The epopée, a picturesque, or graphical poem, is either heroic, or what is called mock-heroic, and by Aristotle iambic †, from the measure in which poems of this kind were at first composed. The drama, an animated poem, is either in the buskin, or in the sock; for farce deserves not a place in the subdivision, being at most but a kind of dramatical apologue, whereof the characters are monstrous, the intrigue unnatural, the incidents often impossible, and which, instead of humour, has adopted a spurious bantling called fun. To satisfy us that satire, whose end is persuasion, admits also the like distribution, we need only recur to the different methods pursued by the two famous Latin satirists, Juvenal and Horace. The one declaims, the

To this black catalogue an ancient Pagan of Athens or of Rome would have added adultery, but the modern refinements of us Christians (if without profanation we can so apply the name) absolutely forbid it, as nothing on our theatre is a more common subject of laughter than this. Nor is the laugh raised against the adulturer, else we might have some plea for our morals, if none for our taste; but to the indelible reproach of the taste, the sense, and the virtue of the nation, in his favour. How much degenerated from our worthier, though unpolished, ancestors, of whom Tacitus affirms, "Nemo illic vitia ridet; nec corrumpere et corrumpi sæculum vocatur." De mor. Germ. c. 19.

† Poet. 4.

F