little obnoxious to the caprice of fashion, as our love of life, our fenfes of feeing and hearing, or the appetites of hunger and thirst. Rectitude of moral principle, and a fpirit of good-nature and humanity, are indeed eminently confpicuous in this wonderful poet; whose works, in whatever light we confider them, as a picture of paft ages, as a treasure of moral wifdom, as a fpecimen of the power of human genius, or as an affecting and inAtructive display of the human mind, are truly inestimable.

By afcribing fo many amiable qualities to Hector, and fome others of the Trojans, the poet interests us in the fate of that people, notwithstanding our being continually kept in mind, that they are the injurious party. And by thus blending good and evil, virtue and frailty, in the compofition of his characters, he makes them the more conformable to the real appearances of human nature, and more useful as examples for our improvement: and at the fame time, without hurting verifimilitude, gives every neceffary embellishment to particular parts of his poem, and variety, coherence, and animation, to the whole fable. And it may alfo be obferved, that though feveral of his characters are complex, not one of them is made up of incompatible parts: all are natural and probable, and fuch as we think we have met with, or might have met with, in our intercourfe with mankind.

VOL. II.

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From the fame extenfive views of good and evil, in all their forms and combinations, Homer has been enabled to make each of his characters perfectly diftinct in itself, and different from all the reft; infomuch that, before we come to the end of the Iliad, we are as well acquainted with his heroes, as with the faces and tempers of our most familiar friends. Virgil, by confining himself to a few general ideas of fidelity and fortitude, has made his fubordinate heroes a very good fort of people; but they are all the fame, and we have no clear knowledge of any one of them. Achates is faithful, and Gyas is brave, and Cloanthus is brave; and this is all we can fay of the matter *. We fee thefe heroes at a distance, and have fome

* I cannot, however, admit the opinion of those who contend, that there is nothing of character in Virgil. Turnus is a good poetical character, but borrowed from Homer, being an Achilles in miniature. Mezentius is well drawn, and of the poet's own invention :- a tyrant, who, together with impiety, has contracted intolerable cruelty and pride; yet intrepid in the field, and graced with one amiable virtue, fometimes found in very rugged minds, a tender affection to a moft deferving fon. In the good old King Evander, we have a charming picture of fimple manners, refined by erudition, and uncorrupted by luxury. Dido has been already analysed. There is nothing, I think, in Camilla, which might not be expected in any female warrior; but the adventures of her early life are romantic and interefting. The circumftance of her being, when an infant, thrown across a river, tied to a fpear, is fo very fingular, that it would feem to have had a foundation in fact, or in tradition. Something fimilar is related by Plutarch of King Pyrrhus,

notion of their shape and fize; but are not near enough to distinguish their features: and every face feems to exhibit the fame faint and ambiguous appearance. But of Ho

mer's heroes we know every particular that can be known. We eat, and drink, and talk, and fight with them: we see them in action, and out of it; in the field, and in their tents and houfes : - the very face of the country about Troy, we seem to be as well acquainted with, as if we had been there. Similar characters there are among these heroes, as there are fimilar faces in every fociety; but we never mistake one for another. Neftor and Ulyffes are both wife, and both eloquent; but the wisdom of the former seems to be the effect of experience; that of the latter, of genius: the eloquence of the one is sweet and copious, but not always to the purpose, and apt to degenerate into ftory-telling; that of the other is clofe, emphatical, and perfuafive, and accompanied with a peculiar modefty and fimplicity of manner. Homer's heroes are all valiant ; yet each displays a modification of valour peculiar to himself. One is valiant from principle, another from conftitution; one is rash, another cautious; one is impetuous and headstrong, another impetuous, but tractable; one is cruel, another merciful; one is infolent and oftentatious, another gentle and unaffuming; one is vain of his perfon, another of his strength, and a third of his family.

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mily. It would be tedious to give a complete enumeration. Almost every fpecies of the heroic character is to be found in Ho

mer.

The Paradife Loft, though truly Epic, cannot properly be called an Heroic poem; for the agents in it are not heroes, but beings of a higher order *. Of these the poet's plan did not admit the introduction of many; but most of those whom he has introduced are well characterised. I have already fpoken of his Satan, which is the highest imaginable fpecies of the diabolical character. The inferior fpecies are well diversified, and in each variety diftinctly marked: one is flothful, another avaricious, a third fophistical, a fourth furious; and though all are impious, fome are more outrageously and blafphemously fo, than others. Adam and Eve, in the ftate of innocence, are characters well imagined, and well fupported; and the different fentiments arifing from difference of fex, are traced out with inimitable delicacy, and philosophical propriety. After the fall, he makes them retain the fame characters, without any other change than what the transition from innocence to guilt

* Samfon, in the Agonistes, is a fpecies of the heroic character not to be found in Homer; diftinctly marked, and admirably fupported. And Delilah, in the fame tragedy, is perhaps a more perfect model of an alluring, infinuating, worthless woman, than any other to be met with in ancient or modern poetry.

might be fuppofed to produce: Adam has ftill that pre-eminence in dignity, and Eve in loveliness, which we should naturally look for in the father and mother of mankind.

Of the bleffed fpirits, Raphael and Michael are well diftinguished; the one for affability, and peculiar good-will to the human race; the other for majesty, but fuch as commands veneration, rather than fear. We are forry to add, that Milton's attempt to foar ftill higher, only fhows, that he had already foared as high, as, without being "blafted with excefs of light," it is poffible for the human imagination to rise.

I have been led further into this fubject of poetical characters than I intended to have gone, or than was necessary in the present investigation. For I prefume, it was long ago abundantly evident; - that the end of Poetry is to pleafe, and therefore that the most perfect poetry must be the most pleafing; that what is unnatural cannot give pleasure, and therefore that poetry must be according to nature;-that it must be either according to real nature, or according to nature fomewhat different from the reality;that if, according to real nature, it would give no greater pleasure than hiftory, which is a tranfcript of real nature;—that greater pleasure is, however, to be expected from it, because we grant it fuperior indulgence, in regard to fiction, and the choice of words; - and, confequently, that poetry muft be,

not