tality of the Soul. A drawn Sword on And bar each avenue; thy gath'ring fleets the Table, by him. O'erspread the sea, and stop up ev'ry port; Cato. It must be so-Plato thou reason'st Cato shall open to himself a passage, And mock thy hopes. well- Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror, The wide, the unbounded prospect lies be fore me: And that which he delights in must be happy. But when, or where?-this world was made for Caesar: Por. [Kneeling] Oh, sir! forgive your son, Whose grief hangs heavy on him. Oh, my father! How am I sure it is not the last time e'er shall call you so? Be not displeas'd, Oh, be not angry with me whilst I weep, And, in the anguish of my heart, beseech you To quit the dreadful purpose of your soul! Cato. Thou hast been ever good and duti[Embracing him. Weep not, my son, all will be well again; The righteous gods, whom I have sought to please, ful. Will succour Cato, and preserve his children. Por. Your words give comfort to my drooping heart. Cato. Portius, thou may'st rely upon my conduct: Thy father will not act what misbecomes him. and asks Enter MARCIA... Oh, Marcia! Oh, my sister, still there's hope I'm weary of conjectures- this must end them. But, ha! who's this? my son! Why this in- Were not my orders that I would be private? Por. Alas, my father! bers. [Exit. Marcia. Oh, ye immortal powers, that guard Watch round his couch and soften his repose, the just, Banish his sorrows, and becalm his soul With easy dreams; remember all his virtues, And show mankind that goodness is your care! Enter LUCIA. Lucia. Where is your father, Marcia, where is Cato? Marcia. Lucia, speak low, he is retir'd to rest. What means this sword, this instrument of Lucia, I feel a gentle dawning hope death? Let me convey it hence. Cato. Rash youth, forbear! Por. Oh, let the pray'rs, th' entreaties of your friends, Their tears, their common danger, wrest it from you! Cato. Wouldst thou betray me? Wouldst thou give me up A slave, a captive, into Caesar's hands? Retire, and learn obedience to a father, Or know, young man Rise in my soul-We shall be happy still. He is all goodness, Lucia, always mild; Por. Look not thus sternly on me; Who knows how yet he may dispose Portius, Or how he has determin'd of thyself? of Oh, Marcia, what we fear'd is come to pass! Marcia. Let him but live, commit the rest Hide all the horrors of the mournful tale, to heav'n. Enter LUCIUS. Luc. Sweet are the slumbers of the virtuous man! And let us guess the rest. And plac'd him in his chair; where, pale and faint, He gasps for breath, and as his life flows Demands to see his friends. weeping, Oh, Marcia, I have seen thy godlike father; hurt me. Marcia. His mind still labours with some dreadful thought. Enter JUBA. Juba. Lucius, the horsemen are return'd from viewing Obsequious to his order, bear him hither!— hour, CATO brought on in a Chair. Luc. Now is B he fall'n indeed! Cato. Here setie down Portius, come near me-Are my friends embark'd? The number, strength, and posture of our foes, helmets, Caesar is still dispos'd to give us terms, Enter PORTIUS. good- Let this our friendship live between our chil Make Portius happy in thy daughter Lucia. Oh, bend me forward!-Juba loves thee, Marcia. Portius, thy looks speak somewhat of impor- But Caesar's arms have thrown down all dis tance. What tidings dost thou bring? Methinks I see Por. As I was hasting to the port, where now tinction I'm sick to death-Oh, when shall I get loose And yet, methinks, a beam of light breaks in search Calls out for vengeance on his father's death, The heart of man, and weigh his inmost And rouses the whole nation up to arms. thoughts, Were Cato at their head, once more might If I have done amiss, impute it not The best may err, but you are good, and- A Roman breast:- Oh, Cato! oh, my friend! From hence, let fierce contending nations What dire effects from civil discord flow: CONGREVE. WILLIAM CONGREVE, descended from the Congreves in Staffordshire, who trace their ancestry as far back as before the conquest, first saw the light at Bardsa, near Leeds, Yorkshire, 1671. He was educated first at Kilkenny; and afterwards sent to the university in Dublin, under the direction of Dr. Ashe. His father, who was only a younger brother, and provided for in the army by a commission on the Irish establishment, had been compelled to undertake a journey thither in consequence of his command, being desirous his study should be directed to profit as well as improvement, sent him over to England, and placed him at the age of 16 as stadent in the Temple. Here he lived for several years, but with very little attention to statutes or reports. His disposition to become an author appeared very early; Johnson says, "Among all the efforts of early genius, which literary history records, I donbt whether any one can be produced that more surpasses the common limits of nature than the plays of Congreve." His first dramatic labour was The Old Batchelor, acted in 1693. This piece introduced him to Lord Halifax, the Maecenas of the age, who, desirous of raising so promising a genius above the necessity of too hasty productions, made him one of the commissioners for licencing backney-coaches. He soon after bestowed upon him a place in the Pipe-office, with one in the Customs of 600 pounds a year. 1694 Congreve produced The Double Dealer. The next year, when Betterton opened the new Theatre in Lincoln's-Inn Fields, he gave him his comedy of Love for Love. The Biographia Dramatica says, This met with so much success, that they immediately offered the author a share in the profits of the house, on condition of his furnishing them with one play yearly. This offer he accepted; but whether through indolence or that correctness which he looked on as necessary to his works, his Mourning Bride did not come out till 1697, nor his Way of the World till two years after that." He had been involved in a long contest with Jeremy Collier, a farious and implacable non-juror, who published A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, in which he had very severely attacked some of Congreve's pieces: this, added to the ill success his Way of the World though an exceeding good comedy, met with, completed his disgust and he made a resolution of never more writing for the stage. Johnson says, "At last comedy grew more modest, and Collier lived to see the reward of his labour in the reformation of the theatre." In 1714, Congreve was appointed Commissioner of Wine Licences, and 17. Dec. same year was nominated Secretary of Jamaica, making altogether a yearly income of 1200 pounds. Johnson says, "His honours were yet far greater than his profits. Every writer mentioned him with respect; and, among other testimonies to his merit, Steele made him the patron of his Miscellanys, and Pope inscribed to him his Translation of the Iliad. But he treated the Muses with ingratitude; for, having long conversed familiarly with the great, he wished to be considered rather as a man oi fashion than of wit; and, when he received a visit from Voltaire, disgusted him by the despicable foppery of desiring to be considered not as an author but a gentleman; to which the Frenchman replied, If he had been ouly a gentleman, he should not have.come to visit him.'" He died at his house in Surrey Street, in the Strand, January 29, Our limits will not allow us to give Johnson's account of this author; but every one agrees in considering him surprisingly eminent in his Theatrical pieces; at the same time, when be quitted this tract, he evidently failed; and, although his Miscellaneous Poems will ever maintain a respectable place in British literature, his crown was too closely wreathed for these to add one leaf to his poetical fame. THE MOURNING BRIDE, ACTED at Lincoln's-Inn Fields. 1697. This is the only Tragedy our author ever wrote, and it met with more access than any of his other pieces. Although Dr. Johnson accuses it of bombast and want of real nature; notwithstanding Dibdin says, that it is overcharged with imagery, as his comedies are with point, and if we try to conceive it, it is with an aching imagination, that may raise astonishment, but must destroy pleasure; it is to be considered that," the poet's eye in a fine phrenzy rolling," in embodying "airy nothing," raises his mind so high above the things of this world in his look "from earth to heaven," that his conceptions appear too hold for a cool, criticising genius. It is certain, that the language of passion, in real life, is boisterous and elevated; and, in persons of a certain cast, may go a step farther than what in cooler moments would appear, simple nature; and Dr. Johnson's criticism is evidently unprepared, for he says himself, he had not read Congreve's plays for many years. Could, the great critic have been raised by the same feelings that actuated Congreve in composing his tragedy, it is very sure, ha would not have pronounced so severe a sentence. We have not the smallest pretension to call in question the opinions of so great a man as Johnson on this play; knowing his attention was entirely directed to chasten the taste of the age; bat we do think (if we can judge by our own feelings), that he must have feit a secret delight himself in reading this piece; and hope we do not overstep the bounds of modesty in declaring the story to be extremely pleasing, affecting, and well told; the language, although extremely elevated, may be allowed to be this side of hombast, expressing the ideas perhaps in an impassioned manner; but we believe not beyond the limits of poetical nature; and will content ourselves with sometimes being astonished for pleasure. Dr. Johnson declares, that, "If he were to select from the whole mass of English poetry the most poetical paragraph, he knows not what he could prefer to au exclamation in this tragedy ("No, all is hush'd, and still as death-'tis dreadful!" to: "Thy voice-my own affrights me with is echoes!") Johnson continues, "He who reads these lines enjoys for a moment the powers of a poct; he feel. what he remembers to have felt before; but he feels it with great increase of sensibility; he recognises a familiar image, but meets it again amplified and expanded, embellished with beauty, and enlarged with majesty". ACT I. DRAMATIS PERSONAE. HELI. ALMERIA. SCENE-Granada. SCENE 1-4 Room of State. The Curtain rising slowly to soft discovers ALMERIA in Mourning, RA wailing. ALMERIA rises and forward. ZARA. LEONORA. Attendants, Guards, etc. Than trees or flint? O, force of constant woe! Tis not in harmony to calm my griefs. Music, Anselmo sleeps, and is at peace; last night LEONO-The silent tomb receiv'd the good old king; comes He and his sorrows now are safely lodg'd Within its cold, but hospitable bosom. Alm. Music has charms to sooth a savage Why am not I at peace? breast, To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak. Leon. Dear madam, cease, Or moderate your grief; there is no cause-- And misery eternal will succeed. Leon. Believe me, madam, I lament. Anselmo, Who knew our flight, we closely were pursu'd, And always did compassionate his fortune: Have often wept, to see how cruelly Your father kept in chains his fellow king; And oft at night, when all have been retir'd, Have stol'n from bed, and to his prison crept, Where, while his gaolor slept, I through the grate And almost taken; when a sudden storm Conducting them who follow'd us, to shun nature, He did endear himself to your affection, Alm. Why was I carried to Anselmo's court? Devouring seas have wash'd thee from my sight, Leon. Witness these tears The memory of that brave prince stands fair And I have heard imperfectly his loss; m. If for my swelling heart I can, tell thee. perish'd. Leon. Alas! Were you then wedded to Alm. That day, that fatal day, our hands For when my lord beheld the ship pursuing, Alm. 'Twas-as I have told thee- Leon. Hark! The distant shouts proclaim your father's tri- O cease for heav'n's sake, assuage a little tears, When joy appears in ev'ry other face. Alm. And joy he brings to ev'ry other heart, gave my dear Alphonso basely broken. (If such there be in angry heav'n's vengeance) My heart has some relief: having so well ly yours. I was a welcome captive in Valencia, Are wrapp'd aud busied in the general joy, And more at large since I have made this vow. Enter ALONZO. What, tears! my good old friend- Believe me, sir, to see you thus, has fill'd Alon. The lord Gonsalez comes to tell your To see thee weep on this occasion-some highness The king is just arrived. [Exit Alonzo. quence. Enter GONSALEZ. Here are, who seem to mourn at our success! Alm. Forgive me, sir, if I in this offend. stow'd Gon. Be ev'ry day of your long life like this. The sun, bright conquest, and your brighter eyes, Yet something too is due to me, who gave Have all conspir'd to blaze promiscuous light, That life which heav'n preserv'd. A day be And bless this day with most unequal lustre. Your royal father, my victorious lord, In filial duty, had aton'd and given Laden with spoils, and ever-living laurel, A dispensation to your vow--No more? Is ent'ring now in martial pomp the palace. Twas weak and wilful--and a woman's error. Five hundred mules precede his solemn march, Yet-upon thought, it doubly wounds my sight, Which groan beneath the weight of Moor-To see that sable worn upon the day Succeeding that in which our deadliest foe, Chariots of war, adorn'd with glitt'ring gems, Hated Anselmo! was interr'd-By heav'n! Suce and next, a hundred neighing steeds, It looks as thou didst mourn for him! just so Whit as the fleecy rain on Alpine hills; Thy senseless vow appear'd to bear its date, That bound and foam, and champ the gol-Not from that hour wherein thou wert pre ish wealth. den bit, As they disdain'd the victory they grace. The swarming populace spread every wall, twice The multitude should gaze) in absence of your eyes. Alm. My lord, mine eyes ungratefully behold Or pompous phrase; the pageantry of souls. Gon. Excellent princess! But 'tis a task unfit for my weak age serv'd, But that wherein the curs'd Alphonso perish'd. Ila! What! thou dost not weep to think of that? Gon. Have patience, royal sir; the princess To have offended you. If fate decreed, King. I tell thee she's to blame, not to have When my first foe was laid in earth; such Such detestation bears my blood to his: And all this high and ample roof to ring Then, then to weep, and pray, and grieve There's not a slave, a shackled slave of mine, But should have smil'd that hour, through all Alm. I doubt not of the worth of Garcia's And shook his charms. deeds, Which had been brave, though I had ne'er been born. Leon. Madam, the king. Symphony of warlike Music. Enter the Gon. What his care, chains in transport and rude harmony! she has done was in excess of Betray'd by too much piety, to seem KING, attended by GARCIA and several Of- rise |