animated fcene; the paffions have their full vent, and the clofe is pleasingly affecting. Dryden has the entire merit of it, there being no hint of it in the original. But, when we have faid the best we can of it, ftill art predominates over nature.

The

I am still more pleased with the same author's interview between Mark Antony and Ventidius, where the honeft hardy veteran ftrives to rouse his emperor and friend from his indolence and difpondence, and awaken him to a fenfe of honour. combat between confcious fhame and acknowledgment of error is nobly nobly fought, nor do I think any thing in all Dryden's plays fo truly dramatic as this. Had fuch a masterly scene, inftead of being placed in the firft, been reserved to the fourth or fifth act, All for Love would have challenged immortality; but, not being supported by any thing equal in the fucceeding parts of the play, it is now generally neglected.

But Dryden valued himself more highly on the reconciliation-fcene between Dorax and Sebaftian in the play of that name;

and

and I believe that the tragedy was written for the fake of the fentiments introduced in it. But the upbraidings of Dorax to his royal master are coarse, indecent, and brutal. Who can be interested greatly for a man who turns a rebel to his prince and an apostate to his faith, because a rival-courtier is preferred to him? Many elevated thoughts with fome warm conflicts of paffion, we muftallow, the scene doesnot want. But there is in it too much fwell of diction, and too great parade and pomp of action; nature is stifled by art, and art too difcernible.

The only scene which in my opinion can be compared with that of Shakspeare's Brutus and Caffius, for natural dialogue and truth of paffion, is that admirable one between Agamemnon and Menelaus in the Iphigenia in Aulis, of Euripides. The story is well known. The Grecian fleet is detained at Aulis by contrary winds: Calchas declares Diana will not grant a fair wind unless the general's daughter is facrificed to her. Agamemnon fends for Iphi

genia, under the pretence of matching her to Achilles; but afterwards, in the dif traction of paternal feelings, he dispatches

a trufty meffenger to forbid her coming. Menelaus meets the fervant and forces the letter from him. He upbraids his brother in the harpest terms for his duplicity; the quarrel proceeds to extremity; when, on a sudden, a mellenger enters, and acquaints Agamemnon that Clytemneftra and Iphigenia are just arrived. The distress of the father roufes all the affection of Menelaus, who, after filently contemplating the fufferings of his unhappy brother, approaches him with unspeakable tenderness, and begs his hand.

Αδελφε, δος μοι δεξιας της σης θίγειν.

The last act of Julius Cæfar has nothing either in action or fentiment that is very remarkable. Mark Antony's character of Brutus has been often quoted and much celebrated.

This was the nobleft Roman of them all :
All the confpirators, fave only he,

Did that they did in envy of great Cæfar;

He only, in a general good to all, made one of them:

His life was gentle, and the elements

So mix'd in him, that nature might ftand úp And fay to all the world, this was a man.* Brutus was extremely unfit to be a ringleader in a confpiracy; his amiable and genthe fpirit could not encounter the rough and thorny bufinefs neceffary to bring about a revolution in the ftate. The times he lived in were too degenerate and corrupt for fo mild a reformer. His great ancestor, Lucius Junius Brutus, could not have effected, in the days of Caefar, what his hardy virtue and perfevering fpirit fo nobly accomplished in an age undebauched by luxury.

Julius Cæfar, though now laid afide and almoft forgotten, was long the favourite of an English audience; though

the

It must be confeffed that Brutus, after the battle of Pharfalia, too haftily forfook the cause he had espouseit: he not only made his peace immediately with Cæfar; but, by his advice, the conqueror determined to follow Pompey into Egypt.

the fubject did not invite Shakspeare to afcend the brightest heaven of his invention, though it afforded no place for magical inchantment, nor any strong and powerful exhibition of the tumultuous or fofter paffions of the heart, yet the poet has kept faithfully to the object he had in view. Roman manners and characters are reprefented with great energy and gravity of fentiment, with fuperior grace and dignity of action. The hot and selfish Caffius is finely contrasted with the philofophic and generous Brutus. The art of Mark Antony is skilfully unfolded; his oration over the dead body of Cæfar is such a masterpiece of eloquence as is not to be matched in any play antient or modern.

For a more complete view of the merits of this tragedy, I muft refer my reader to the judicious remarks of the accomplished Mrs. Montague, in her excellent Effay on the Genius and Writings of Shakspeare.