much more dangerous to a Proteftant government, than those of the Proteftants are to a Popith one *) are treated in the United Provinces with more lenity and indulgence than they are in any other Proteftant country: they enjoy all the rights of citizens, except an admiffion to civil employments; and in this exception they are not diftinguifhed from feveral other Protestant communities, whofe members are excellent fubjects, fuch as the Lutherans, Arminians, and Anabaptifts. And yet our declamatory Author reprefents the Papifts in Holland, as reftrained, tormented, and facrificed, in his high-fwollen phrafeology. What would he fay, if they were tormented as the Proteftants are in France; i. e.. if their paftors were sent to the gallows or the gallies-their marriages confidered as acts of fornication, and their children declared, by law, baftards? We shall not continue this odious enumeration. Every one knows the tenderness and humanity of the French government, and the French tribunals, to the profeffors of the reformed religion in that country, fince the revocation of the edict of Nantes. Every one knows the infernal perfecution of the Calas and the Sirvens, perpetrated openly, in the midst of the eighteenth century; and therefore our zealous Count would do well to apply the firft efforts of his reforming Spirit at home, and then he would difplay, with a better grace, his zeal for the correction of his neighbours. Take the beam out of your own eye, &c.

His accounts of the Dutch commerce are the best part of this fpeckled difcourfe; and his obfervations on Belgic manners, induftry, ceconomy, and luxury are, for the most part, fenfible, judicious, and well expreffed: more efpecially, what he fays of the paft ftate of literature and arts in the United Provinces, is much more elegant, ample, and impartial, than what we find in fome other modern travellers. It is not fuperficial, confidering the compafs of the work; and it must be confeffed that the lift he prefents of the literati and artists that have flourished in the United Provinces, is highly refpectable, and does fingular honour to a country, fo limited in its extent, and fo little favoured by the liberality of nature.At the end of this fplendid lift, he tells us, that the fciences. have their flow and ebb, and that the most brilliant period of their profperity is the forerunner of their downfal, or at leaft, of their retrogradation to a state of mediocrity. Accordingly, he looks upon Dutch literature as, at prefent, under a total ecliple; and here again he exaggerates more or lefs for though

The religious principles of Proteftants are dangerous to no government; and the King of France has no better subjects in his kingdom than those of that perfuafion.

We

we perceive no more above the literary horizon of the United Provinces, ftars of the firft magnitude, fuch as a Grotius, a Gronovius, a Schultens, a Boerhaave, an Albinus, a Nieuwentyt, a Huygens, a s'Gravefande, and a Muffchenbroek; yet there are still many learned men; and the fpirit of literary improvement and philofophical inquiry is very far from being extinguifhed in the United Provinces, as appears from the numerous academies lately erected in that country for the improvement of experimental philofophy, natural hiftory, useful arts, and Dutch poetry; and from various teftamentary foundations left for prize difcourfes on metaphyfical, moral, and theological fubjects. We know not whether this fpirit of improvement and inquiry be owing to the difinterested zeal of individuals, or to the foftering protection and encouragement of government; and therefore we fball neither affirm nor refute what our Author fays of the ftate of obfcurity and nullity (as he calls it) in which the learned in Holland are at prefent funk.

Our Author's defcription of Switzerland, in the fourth Difcourfe, is picturefque and interefting; and his poetical ftyle is often happily employed in painting the romantic and ftupendous scenes that nature exhibits in that country. It is more particularly in reading this laft Difcourfe, that we regret Count D'Albon's proftitution of his pen to national prejudices, and narrow views, in the other parts of his work.

ITALY.

II. Configlio ad un Giovane Poeta, &c. i. e.. Counsel to a Young Poet. By MARTIN SHERLOCK. 8vo. Naples. 1779. This piece contains an ingenious investigation of Italian poetry, and comes from the pen of an Hibernian, who writes in the language of the country whofe bards he criticifes. Mr. SHERLOCK is a lively writer, and feems to poffefs a rich portion of taite and imagination. Farther, he discovers marks of judgment and folidity, when he fpeaks of objects which he has obferved with a deliberate affiduity and attention;-but he feems rather apt, fometimes, to take a part for the whole, and to be led a fairy dance after falle or ambiguous lights: as the reader will fee in the following article. In the work before us, he appears to advantage; and though both the work and the language in which it is written, render it peculiarly interefting to Italian readers, yet it is worthy of a much more univerfal reception.

Mr. SHERLOCK obferves, that harmony and colouring (by which laft, no doubt, he means ftyle and expreffion) are the parts of the poetic art, in which the Italians more especially fhine; while nature, truh, the fimple, and the pathetic, which characterife the great poet, are more or lefs neglected. Their productions are generally addreffed to the imagination,

rarely

rarely to reafon or to the heart. It is a juft and judicious remark of Mr. Sherlock's, that the very nobleft productions of the Italian poets have contributed to perpetuate this deviation from fimplicity and nature, by the admiration they have excited through fucceeding ages; an admiration that renders their very defects refpectable, and objects of imitation. The young Italian poets, accustomed to confider Dante, Petrarch, Arifto, and others approaching to that class, as models of perfection, beyond which the poetic art can make no farther progrefs, confine their imitation to thefe dangerous guides, and walk with a fervile admiration in the paths which they have opened. Mr. SHERLOCK combats with good fenfe, taste, and fpirit, this way of proceeding: he estimates the refpective merits of thefe immortal bards; but though he does this, for the most part, in a masterly manner, there is, nevertheless, fometimes more wit than truth in his decifions. For example, after having described Petrarch with accuracy, tafte, and senstbility, as an inventive genius, who created a new kind of poetry, who from a harp, which had but few ftrings, drew celeftial founds, and whofe tender heart spoke to hearts of the fame mold the language of nature, he adds, that 'Petrarch exhausted the fpecies of poetry which he had invented, and therefore could not form fucceffors.'We queftion much, whether Petrarch invented this kind of poetry: but we are fure he did not exhauft it, for true love and genuine nature are inexhauftible.

Mr. SHERLOCK is fevere on Ariofto: he confiders him, notwithstanding his beautiful descriptions, brilliant thoughts, and triking comparisons, as the great corrupter of tafte in Italy: because beauty is infeparable from truth, and nothing is more inconfiftent with the latter, than the abfurd relations, the fantastic prodigies, and the gigantic ideas and images, that are ever proceeding, like the explofions of a Volcano, from the fermenting brain of Ariofto. We fubfcribe to this judgment of Mr. SHERLOCK'S, but we are fomewhat furprised to fee him drawing a parallel between two such writers as Ariofto and Metaitafio. He will juftify the comparifon, perhaps, by obferving, that he only meant to exprefs the preference which he gives to the kind of poetry cultivated by the latter, above that which diftinguishes the former. In this cafe, however, he ought not to have faid, at the end of his parallel, that Metaflafio is fuperior to Ariofto, but that he liked the one better than the other: Superiority and Inferiority are gradations of diverfity that belong to objects of the same kind.

After pointing out the imperfection of the models which are imitated in Italy, our Author advises the young poet to turn his enthufiaftic eye from these fallacious guides, and to raise them

to

to the Greeks, Latins, and French. We think it liberal in Mr. SHERLOCK, to throw off the fhackles of political restraint in his literary judgments; and we are perfectly disposed to render juftice to the confiderable number of eminent writers in literature and philofophy, that do honour to the French nation at this day; but we think he overfhot the proper bounds of civility, when he held out the French as models in poetryand above all, when he placed them immediately after the Greeks and Romans, without drawing between them an horizontal line like this as who would say-pray keep your diftance.-The French themselves (we mean the founder part of them) acknowledge, that, however harmonious their language may be in profe (and fuch we ourselves think it to be, in a high degree), yet it has not that kind of harmony which is adapted to mufic and poetry.

GENE V A.

III. Lettres d'un Voyageur Anglois, i. e. Letters of an English Traveller. Geneva. 1779.-Here we have again Mr. SHERLOCK, who, from a great number of letters written during his travels, has felected twenty-feven of the beft, to regale the public. He has written two hundred-of which, we fuppofe, thefe are the quinteffence: they are dedicated (as is the preceding work) to the prefent Bishop of Derry, in whom are united all the qualities and powers of an elegant a ndlearned Maecenas; and they are published in French, that the connoiffeurs on the Continent might not be deprived of the pleasure of perufing them.

The first of these letters, which is dated from Berlin, contains a very magnificent eulogy of the King of Pruffia, and from the two firft pages the reader will form fome notion of the tone and manner that reign in these letters.

The King of Pruffia is univerfally known as a great prince, a great warrior, and a great politician;-but he is lefs generally known as a great poet, and a good-natured man*. Marcus Antoninus, Machiavel, (well paired, Mr. Sherlock!) Horace, and Cæfar, have been his models; and he has almoft furpaffed them all. I never heard of a human being who was perfect; but in a general point of view, the King of Pruffia is the greatest man that ever existed.

In the early part of his life, he published his Anti-Machiavel; and this was one of the most dextrous ftrokes of Machiavelian policy that he ever exhibited. It was a letter of re

* Mr. SHERLOCK's expreffion is bon homme, which, in French, fignifies a filly, open hearted, good natured man. How the French came to affociate the idea of filly with the term good, we shall not enquire: the affociation does them little honour. But as Mr. Sherlock could not apply the word good in this complex fenfe to the King. of Pruffia, we have taken the liberty to tranflate it as above. commendation,

commendation, which he wrote in favour of himself, to all the powers and people of Europe, while he was forming the project of making himself mafter of Silefia.

With refpect to his fubjects, he is the jufteft of monarchs; but in the eye of his neighbours, he is the most dangerous hero: he excites adoration in the former, and strikes terror into the latter. The Pruffians are proud of their Frederic the Great, as they always call bim. They fpeak of him with the utmoft freedom: and while they keenly cenfure his taste with refpect to certain objects, they bestow upon him the greatest encomiums.—

There is no character in modern times, concerning which men are so much deceived, as that of this monarch; and the reafon of this mistake is, their not confidering feparately two parts of his character, which require each a diftinet eftimation, but of which, nevertheless, they judge in the lump.' (Let us bear Mr. SHERLOCK out, for he is really a curious cafuift) The King of Pruffia has caufed the deftruction of thousands of men. -The King of Pruffia is, at the fame time, tender-hearted, humane, and full of clemency:-This appears a contradiction.Nevertheless, it is a certain truth.' (Here now comes the proof)

We must first confider him (continues Mr. SHERLOCK) as a conqueror, in which character, it is not allowable to liften to the voice of humanity:' (No-indeed?) But when beroifm is out of the queftion, we muft examine the man. This, perhaps, (fays our Author) will be called a fubtilty:' &c. No, Mr. SHERLOCK, for our part, we will give it no fuch appellation; for it is the very groffeft and most palpable paralogifm that could enter into the head of a fenfible man, or into the imagination of a humane man. If you feparate the hero from the man, the former becomes an affaffin, and the latter lofes much of his dignity, more especially if he be a prince. Befideit is not ufing the word hero in the fenfe it commonly bears, to make it exprefs the character of a bloody conqueror.-Your separation of the blood-breathing hero from the good-natured man, puts us in mind of a Curate in Ireland, who affirmed, fubtly, over a bowl of punch, that Judas Iscariot, though a bad man, was a good clergyman. The diftinction dazzled a great part of the company, when a plain fenfible man, who fat at table, addreffed to the Curate this puzzling queftion" When the bad man goes to hell, Mr. Curate, where will the good clergyman go poes

Befide-what is a mere conqueror, a character which Mr. SHERLOCK fo injudicioufly confounds with that of a hero? A mere conqueror is a man who robs and murders, and is above the reach of human laws; we do not, then, think, that our Author could have paid a worse compliment to the King of Pruffia, than to call him a conqueror.

4

Mr.