All fprings reduce their currents to mine eyes, That I, being govern'd by the wat'ry moon, May fend forth plenteous tears to drown the world. Ah, for my husband, for my dear Lord Edward. King Richard III. at 2. fc. 2. Jane Shore. Let me be branded for the public fcorn, Turn'd forth, and driven to wander like a vaga bond, Be friendlefs and forfaken, seek my bread Give me your drops, ye foft-defcending rains, Give me your streams, ye never-ceafing springs, That my fad eyes may ftill fupply my duty, And feed an everlasting flood of forrow. Jane Shore, alt 5. Jane Shore utters her laft breath in a witty conceit. Then all is well, and I shall fleep in peace 'Tis very dark, and I have loft you now Was Was there not fomething I would have bequeath'd you? But I have nothing left me to bestow, Nothing but one fad figh. Oh mercy, Heav'n! [Dies. Act 5. Gilford to Lady Jane Gray, when both were condemned to die: Thou ftand'st unmov'd; Calm temper fits upon thy beauteous brow; Lady Jane Gray, alt 4. near the end. The concluding fentiment is altogether finical, unfuitable to the importance of the occafion, and even to the dignity of the pasfion of love. Corneille, in his Examen of the Cid*, an *Page 316. VOL. II. A a fwering swering an objection, that his fentiments are sometimes too much refined for perfons in deep distress, obferves, that if poets did not indulge fentiments more ingenious or refined than are prompted by paffion, their performances would often be low; and extreme grief would never fuggeft but exclamations merely. This is in plain language to affert, That forced thoughts are more relished than fuch as are natural, and therefore ought to be preferred. The fecond clafs is of fentiments that may belong to an ordinary paffion, but are not perfectly concordant with it, as tinctured by a fingular character. In the last act of that excellent comedy, The Careless Hufband, Lady Easy, upon Sir Charles's reformation, is made to exprefs more violent and turbulent fentiments of joy, than are confiftent with the mildness of her character. Lady Eafy. O the foft treasure! O the dear reward of long-defiring love Thus thus to have you mine, is fomething more than happiness, 'tis double life, and madness of abounding joy. If the sentiments of a paffion ought to be fuited to a peculiar character, it is still more necessary that fentiments devoid of paffion be fuited to the character. In the 5th act of the Drummer, Addifon makes his gardener act even below the character of an ignorant credulous ruftic: he gives him the behaviour of a gaping idiot. The following inftances are defcriptions rather than fentiments, which compofe a third class. Of this descriptive manner of painting the paffions, there is in the Hippolytus of Euripides, act 5. an illuftrious inftance, viz. the speech of Thefeus, upon hearing of his fon's dismal exit. In Racine's tragedy of Efther, the Queen hearing of the decree iffued against her people, instead of expreffing fentiments fuitable to the occafion, turns her attention upon herself, and describes with accuracy her own fituation. Jufte Ciel? Tout mon fang dans mes veines fe glace. ·Act 1. Sc. 3. Again, Aman. C'en eft fait. Mon orgueil eft forcé de plier, L'inexorable Aman eft reduit a prier. Efther, at 3. fc. 50 Athalie. Quel prodige nouveau me trouble et m'embarraffe? La douceur de fa voix, fon enfance, fa grace, Succéder Je ferois fenfible a la pitié? Athalie, at 2. sc. 7. Titus. O de ma passion fureur desesperée! Brutus of Voltaire, a&t 3. sc. 6. What other are the foregoing inftances than describing the paffion another feels? An example is given above of remorse and despair expreffed by genuine and natural fentiments. In the fourth book of Paradife Loft, Satan is made to express his remorfe and defpair in fentiments, which though beautiful, are not altogether natural. They are rather the fentiments of a spectator, than of a perfon who actually is tormented with these paffions. The |