In the prefent cafe the publick has decided. Cordelia, from the time of Tate, has always retired with victory and felicity. And, if my fenfations could add any thing to the general fuffrage, I might relate, I was many years ago fo fhocked by Cordelia's death, that I know not whether I ever endured to read again the last scenes of the play till I undertook to revise them as an editor..

There is another controverfy among the criticks concerning this play. It is difputed whether the predominant image in Lear's difordered mind be the lofs of his kingdom or the cruelty of his daughters. Mr. Murphy, a very judicious critick, has evinced by induction of particular paffages, that the cruelty of his daughters is the primary fource of his distress, and that the lofs of royalty affects him only as a fecondary and fubordinate evil. He obferves with great juftness, that Lear would move our compaffion but little, did we not rather confider the injured father than the degraded king.

The story of this play, except the epifode of Edmund, which is derived, I think, from Sidney, is taken originally from Geoffry of Monmouth, whom Holinfhed generally copied; but perhaps immediately from an old historical ballad. My reason for believing that the play was pofterior to the ballad, rather than the ballad to the play, is, that the ballad, has nothing of Shakespeare's nocturnal tempeft, which is too ftriking to have been omitted, and that it follows the chronicle; it has the rudiments of the play, but none of its amplifications: it firft hinted Lear's madness, but did not array it in circumstances. The writer of the ballad added fomething to the hiftory, which is a

proof that he would have added more, if more had occurred to his mind, and more muft have occurred if he had feen Shakespeare.

ROMEO AND JULIET.

This play is one of the most pleasing of our author's performances. The fcenes are bufy and various, the incidents numerous and important, the catastrophe irrefiftibly affecting, and the process of the action carried on with fuch probability, at leaft with fuch congruity to popular opinions, as tragedy requires.

Here is one of the few attempts of Shakespeare to exhibit the converfation of gentlemen, to reprefent the airy sprightlinefs of juvenile elegance. Mr. Dryden mentions a tradition, which might eafily reach his time, of a declaration made by Shakespeare, that he was obliged to kill Mercutio in the third act, left he Should have been killed by him. Yet he thinks him no fuch formidable perfon but that he might have lived through the play, and died in his bed, without danger to a poet. Dryden well knew, had he been in quest of truth, that, in a pointed fentence, more regard is commonly had to the words than the thought, and that it is very feldom to be rigorously underflood. Mercutio's wit, gaiety, and courage, will always procure him friends that with him a longer life; but his death is not precipitated, he has lived out the time allotted him in the conftruction of the play; nor do I doubt the ability of Shakespeare to have continued his existence, though fome of his fallies are perhaps out of the reach of Dryden; whofe genius

was

was not very fertile of merriment, nor ductile to humour, but acute, argumentative, comprehenfive, and fublime.

The Nurfe is one of the characters in which the author delighted; he has, with great fubtility of dif tinction, drawn her at once loquacious and fecret, obfequious and infolent, trufty and dishonest.

His comick fcenes are happily wrought, but his pathetick ftrains are always polluted with fome unexpected depravations. His perfons, however diftreffed, have a conceit left them in their mifery, a miferable conceit.

HAMLE T.

If the dramas of Shakespeare were to be characterifed, each by the particular excellence which diftinguishes it from the reft, we muft allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are fo numerous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The fcenes are interchangeably diverfified with merriment and folemnity; with merriment, that includes judicious and inftructive obfervations; and folemnity, not ftrained by poetical violence above the natural fentiments of man. New

characters appear from time to time in continual fucceffion, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of converfation. The pretended madness of Hamlet caufes much mirth, the mournful diftraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every perfonage produces the effect intended, from the apparition that in the first act chills the blood with hor

ror, to the fop in the laft, that expofes affectation to juft contempt.

The conduct is perhaps not wholly secure against objections. The action is indeed for the most part in continual progreffion, but there are fome fcenes which neither forward nor retard it. Of the feigned madness of Hamlet there appears no adequate cause, for he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of fanity. He plays the madman most, when he treats Ophelia with so much rudeness, which feems to be ufelefs and wanton cruelty.

Hamlet is, through the whole piece, rather an inftrument than an agent. After he has by the ftratagem of the play, convicted the king, he makes no attempt to punish him; and his death is at last effected by an incident which Hamlet had no part in producing,

The catastrophe is not very happily produced; the exchange of weapons is rather an expedient of neceffity, than a ftroke of art. A fcheme might easily have been formed to kill Hamlet with the dagger, and Laertes with the bowl,

The poet is accused of having fhewn little regard to poetical justice, and may be charged with equal neglect of poetical probability. The appariton left the regions of the dead to little purpofe; the revenge which he demands is not obtained, but by the death of him that was required to take it; and the gratification, which would arife from the deftruction of an ufurper and a murderer, is abated by the untimely death of Ophelia, the young, the beautiful, the harmlefs, and the pious,

OTHELLO.

OTHELLO.

The beauties of this play imprefs themfelves fo ftrongly upon the attention of the reader, that they can draw no aid from critical illuftration. The fiery openness of Othello, magnanimous, artlefs, and credulous, boundless in his confidence, ardent in his affection, inflexible in his refolution, and obdurate in his revenge; the cool malignity of Iago, filent in his refentment, fubtle in his defigns, and ftudious at once of his intereft and his vengeance; the foft fimplicity of Desdemona, confident of merit, and confcious of innocence, her artlefs perfeverance in her fuit, and her flowness to fufpect that the can be fufpected, are fuch proofs of Shakespeare's skill in human nature, as, I fuppofe, it is vain to feek in any modern writer. The gradual progrefs which Iago makes in the Moor's conviction, and the circumftances which he employs to inflame him, are fo artfully natural, that, though it will perhaps not be faid of him as he fays of himself, that he is a man not eafily jealous, yet we cannot but pity him, when at last we find him perplexed in the

extreme.

There is always danger, left wickedness, conjoined with abilities, fhould fteal upon esteem, though it miffes of approbation; but the character of Iago is fo conducted, that he is from the firft fcene to the last hated and defpifed.

Even the inferior characters of this play would be very confpicuous in any other piece, not only for their juftnefs, but their ftrength. Caffio is brave, benevolent, and honeft, ruined only by his want of ftubborn

nefs