of its interpreters have been mifemployed in "picking out authorities, which were not wanted,

and in producing, or, more properly, by their "ftudied refinements in creating, conformities, "which were never defigned. Whence it hath "come to pass, that, inftead of inveftigating the "order of the Poet's own reflexions, and fcru"tinizing the peculiar state of the Roman Stage (the "methods, which common fenfe, and common "criticism would prefcribe) the world hath been "nauseated with infipid lectures on Ariftotle and "Phalereus; whofe folid fenfe hath been fo attenu "ated and fubtilized by the delicate operation of "French criticism, as hath even gone fome way to"wards bringing the art itself into disrepute.

2. But the wrong explications of this poem « have arisen, not from the misconception of the "fubject only, but from an inattention to the " METHOD of it. The latter was, in part, the ge"nuine confequence of the former. For, not fuf"pecting an unity of defign in the fubject, its interpreters never looked for, or could never find, a "confiftency of difpofition in the method. And "this was indeed the very block upon which "HEINSIUS, and, before him, JULIUS SCALIGER, " himself

himfelf ftumbled. These illuftrious Criticks, with "all the force of genius, which is required to dif

embarrass an involved subject, and all the aids of "learning, that can lend a ray to enlighten a dark "c one, have, notwithstanding, found themselves "utterly unable to unfold the order of this Epiftle ; "infomuch, that SCALIGER * hath boldly pro"nounced the conduct of it to be vicious; and HEIN"SIUS had no other way to evade the charge, than

by recurring to the forced and uncritical expedient "of a licentious tranfpofition. The truth is, they 66 were both in one common error, that the Poet's "purpose had been to write a criticism of the Art "of Poetry at large, and not, as is here fhewn, of "the Roman Drama in particular.'

The remainder of this Introduction, as well as the Commentary and Notes, afford ample proofs of the erudition and ingenuity of the Critick; yet I much doubt, whether he has been able to convince the learned world of the truth of his main propofition, "that it was the proper and fole purpose of the Author, fimply to criticife the ROMAN DRAMA." His Commentary is, it must be owned, extremely feducing; yet the attentive reader of Horace will perhaps

* Præf. in LIB. POET. et l. vi. p. 338.

often

often fancy, that he perceives a violence and conftraint offered to the compofition, in order to accommodate it to the fyftem of the Commentator; who, to fuch à reader, may perhaps seem to mark tranfitions, and point out connections, as well as to maintain a method in the Commentary, which cannot clearly be deduced from the text, to which it refers.

This very ingenious Commentary opens as follows:

σε

"The fubject of this piece being, as I fuppofe, one, viz. the state of the Roman Drama, and com

mon fense requiring, even in the freeft forms of "compofition, fome kind of method, the intelligent "reader will not be furprized to find the poet profe"cuting his fubject in a regular, well-ordered plan ; "which, for the more exact description of it, I "diftinguish into three parts:

"I. The firft of them [from 1. I to 89] is prepa<s ratory to the main fubject of the Epiftle, con"taining fome general rules and reflections on " poetry, but principally with an eye to the follow"ing parts by which means it ferves as an useful "introduction to the poet's defign, and opens with "that air of ease and elegance, effential to the epi"ftolary form.

<< II. The

« II. The main body of the Epiftle [from 1. 89 to 295] is laid out in regulating the Roman "ftage; but chiefly in giving rules for Tragedy; "not only as that was the fublimer fpecies of the "Drama, but, as it fhould feem, lefs cultivated " and understood.

III. The last part [from 1. 295 to the end] ex "horts to correctness in writing; yet ftill with an

66

eye, principally, to the dramatick species: and is “taken up partly in removing the causes, that pre"vented it; and partly in directing to the use of "fuch means, as might serve to promote it. Such "is the general plan of the Epistle.”

In this general fummary, with which the Critick introduces his particular Commentary, a very material circumftance is acknowledged, which perhaps tends to render the fyftem on which it proceeds, extremely doubtful, if not wholly untenable. The original Epiftle confifts of four hundred and feventyfix lines; and it appears, from the above numerical analyfis, that not half of those lines, only two hundred and fix verfes [from v. 89 to 295] are employed on the fubject of the Roman Stage. The firft of the three parts above delineated [from v. 1 to 89] cer

tainly.

tainly contains general rules and restrictions on poetry, but furely with no particular reference to the Drama, As to the fecond part, the Critick, I think, might fairly have extended the Poet's confideration of the Drama to the 365th line, feventy lines further than he has carried it: but the laft hundred and eleven lines of the Epiftle fo little allude to the Drama, that the only paffage in which a mention of the Stage has been supposed to be implied, [ludusque repertus,&c.] is, by the learned and ingenious Critick himself, particularly diftinguished with a very different interpretation. Nor can this portion of the Epiftle be confidered, by the impartial and intelligent reader, as a mere exhortation "to correctness in writing; taken up partly in removing the causes that prevented it; and partly in directing to the use of such means, as might ferve to promote it." Correctness is indeed here, as in many other parts of Horace's Satires and Epiftles, occafionally inculcated; but furely the main scope of this animated conclusion is to deter thofe, who are not bleft with genius, from attempting the walks of Poetry.

I much approve what this writer has urged on the unity of fubject, and beauty of epistolary method observed in this Work; but cannot agree that the main

subject