excelled, is much expofed to corruption and abufe. While the ancient manner of drawing characters is defective, by being too general, there is danger left this other fpecies become faulty, by being too particular. Men attentive to reprefent the minute lines, may neglect the more important, and, instead of representing a character which belongs to human kind, they may come to reprefent only thofe particular characters which diftinguish individuals. Thus, according to the phrafe, that extremes always agree, it may happen that the laft improvement in Comedy may degenerate into that very abufe for which the rudeft and most ancient may be cenfured. Particular perfons may come to be represented on the stage inftead of general characters. Something of this kind was fome time ago introduced on the English ftage; though it may be obferved, that this mode of writing owed its fuccefs more to the mimic qualities of its author, than to its being approved of by the taste of the audience.

But this is not the only thing to be feared from men's giving minute attention to the smaller parts of character; there is alfo a danger of its having an improper effect on their own character and conduct. When their attention is chiefly beftowed on the little parts of conduct, they may come to neglect or overlook the greater. Manner

may be put in the place of fubftance; and what is frivolous may be preferred to what is manly. As this fpecies of corruption may be confidered as the greatest in literary compofition, fo it is most certainly the greatest in morals. When what is trifling is only regarded, there never can be any fplendid exertions of genius, there never can be any real greatnefs of character. All fublime and manly efforts will be at an end; all noble exertions in the field, and all genuine eloquence in the fenate, will be extinguished. Our battles will be bloodlefs, and in our fpeeches prettiness will be preferred to fimplicity and force. 'Tis the leading object in a late series of Letters on Education, to represent the manner of doing a thing as preferable to the thing itself; to point out the frivolous and exterior accomplishments, the graces, as a furer road to advancement, than truth, integrity, or a spirit of independence, than the poffeffion of the greatest knowledge, or the exertion of the most illuftrious talents.

A.

N° 50. SATURDAY, Jan. 14. 1786.

"TRA

RAGEDY (according to the ancient definition quoted in a former paper), purges the paffions by exciting them." Comedy wishes to purge vices and follies by Ridicule. In a corrupt age, reason is fo weak as to be obliged to call in fuch allies to her affiftance: Let her beware that they do not, like the Saxon auxiliaries of our ancestors, ufurp the government which they were called to defend.

In the earliest periods of life, ridicule is naturally employed against reason and propriety.The child who obeys its mother, who is afraid of its governefs, who will not be concerned in little plots to deceive both, is laughed at by its bolder and lefs fcrupulous companions. At every age, reafon and duty are grave and serious things, in which ridicule finds a contraft that renders her attack more easy, and her fallies more poignant.

The refinement of polished times, as was obferved in the foregoing Number, does not allow them to find amusement in that grofs ridicule which

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which provokes the laughter of a ruder people. But from this very fource their fubjects of Comedy are often of a dangerous kind. They trench upon facred ground; I mean not as to religion, but in morals; they paint thofe nicer fhades of ridicule which are of an equivocal fort between virtue and vice, and often give the fpectator leave to laugh, according to his own humour, either at the first or the latter.

In the Ecole des Femmes, (and I fhall hardly be reckoned unfair when I make the reference to Moliere), moft of the maxims which Arnolphe makes Agnes read, are really good moral precepts, which a prudent wife would do well to follow, for her own fake as well as her husband's. There is just as much prudery and fufpicion thrown into them, as to allow thofe who would wish to be lefs guarded than a good wife ought to be, to hold them in derifion.

The George Dandin of the fame author has been already criticised in this moral view by a very able writer. But he has not attended, fay its defenders, to the proper moral of the piece; which is, to correct a very common piece of weakness, as well as of injuftice, in old men of low birth and great wealth, who purchase alliance with decayed nobility, and are vain enough to imagine, that a wife bought from her neceffi

ties, or from the neceffities of her family, is to love and respect the husband who has purchased her. But befides that this corrective is applied to the party who may be the weakest, but is certainly the least wicked of the two, fuch examples, conveyed through the medium of Comedy, are always more readily applied to those whom they may mislead, than to those whom they may reform. The images which Comedy presents, and the ridicule it excites, being almoft always exaggerated, their refemblance to real life is only acknowledged by thofe whose weakneffes they flatter, whofe paffions they excufe. They who ufe the example of the fcene for an apology, can eafily twift it into that form; they who wish to efcape its correction, eafily difcover the difference between the scenic fituation and theirs. The George Dandin, and the Cocu Imaginaire of real life, neither meet with Lubins nor Pictures to abuse them; but the girl who thinks herself intitled to be the Angelique of the piece, will find no difficulty in difcovering her good man to be a Dandin; fhe who wishes her husband to be blind, will never forget the prudent advice of Sganarelle,

"Quand vous verriez tout, ne croyez jamais.

"rien."

Harpagon