dwelt fo forcibly on the defcription of a man refolved

in fpite

Of nature and his ftars to write.

"To conclude, if I have not contemplated my fyftem, till I am become blind to its imperfections, this view of the Epistle not only preferves to it all that unity of fubject, and elegance of method, fo much infifted on by the excellent critic, to whom I have fo often referred; but by adding to his judicious general abflract the familiarities of perfonal addrefs, fo ftrongly marked by the writer, not a line appears idle or mifplaced while the order and difpofition of the Epiftle to the Pifos appears as evident and unembarraffed as that of the Epistle to Auguftus; in which laft, the actual ftate of the Roman drama feems to have been more manifeftly the ob

"AN

ject of Horace's attention, than in the work now under confideration. "Before I leave you to the farther examination of the original of Horace, and fubmit to you the tranflation, with the notes that accompaný it, I cannot help obferv. ing, that the fyftem, which I have here laid down, is not fo entirely new, as it may perhaps at first appear to the reader, or as I myself originally fuppofed it. No critic indeed has, to my knowlege, directly confidered the whole Epiftle in the fame light that I have now taken it: but yet particular paffages feem fo ftrongly to enforce fuch an interpretation, that the editors, tranflators, and commentators, have been occafionally driven to explana tions of a fimilar tendency; of which the notes annexed will exhi bit feveral striking instances."

M. Racine, qui les [choeurs] a fait reviver dans Athalie et dans Efter, devroit, il femble, nous avoir detrompez fur cet article. [P. Bru moi, vol. i. p. 105.] And before him, our Milton, who, with his other great talents, poffeffed a fupreme knowlege of antiquity, was fo ftruck with its great ufe and beauty, as to attempt to bring it into our language. His Samfon Agoniftes was, as might be expected, a mafter-piece. But even his credit hath not been fufficient to refitore the chorus. Hear a late profeffor of the art declaring, de choro nihil differui, quia non eft effentialis dramati, atque à neotericis penitus, et, me judice, merito repudiatur.

[Prælat.

make for the ancient chorus." Notes on the Art of Poetry.

"Though it is not my intention to agivate, in this place, the long difputed queftion concerning the expediency, or inexpediency, of the chorus; yet I cannot dimifs the above note without fome farther obiervation. In the first place, then, I canot think that the judgment of two fuch critics as Ariftotle and Horace, can be decifively quoted, as concurring with the practice of wife antiquity, to eftablifh the chorus. Neither of thefe two critics have taken up the queftion; each of them giving directions for the proper conduct of the chorus, confidered as an established and received part of tra

ور

gedy, and indeed originally, as they both tell us, the whole of it. Απί. fotle, in his Poetics, has not faid' much on the fubject ; and from the hittle he has faid, shore arguments might perhaps be drawn, in favour of the omiffion, than for the intro duction of the chorus. It is true' that he fays, in his 4th chapter, that "tragedy, after many changes, paufed, having gamed its natural form: * πολλοί μεταβολὰς μεταβαλέσα ή τραγωδια επαύσατο· ἐπεὶ ἔσχε τὴν Eauns plow. This might, at firft fight, feem to include his approbation of the chorus, as well as of all the other parts of tragedy then in ufe: but he himself exprefsly tells us in the very fame chipter, that he had no fuch meaning; faying, that " to. enquire whether tragedy be perfect in its parts, either confidered in itself, or with relation to the theatre, was foreign to his prefent purpose. To οὖν επισκοπεῖν, ἐν ἄρα έχει ήδη ή διὰ τῆς ἱκανῶς ἡ οὐ, αυτό τε και αυτό κρινόμενον, καὶ πρὸς τὰ θεατρα, άλλος λόγος. In the paffage from which Horace has, in the verfes now before us, defcribed the office, and laid down the duties of the chorus, the paflage

on n Tpayw

referred to by the learned critic, the words of Ariftotle are not particu larly favourable to the inftitution, or much calculated to recommend the use of it. For Ariftotle there informs us, "that Sophocles alone, of all the Grecian writers, made the chorus conducive to the progrefs of the fable: not only even Euripides being culpable in this inftance; but other writers, after the example of Agathan, introducing odes as little to the purpofe, as if they had borrowed whole fcenes from another play." Kal Tov xwfòv de eva dei ὑπολαβεῖν τῶν ὑποκριτῶν. Καὶ μόριον εἶναι τὸ ὅλο καὶ συναγωνίζεσθαι, μὴ ὥσπερ παρ' Ευριπίδη, ἀλλ ̓ ὥσπερ παρὰ Σοφοκλεί. Τοῖς δὲ λοιποῖς τὰ διδομένα μᾶλλον το μύθο, ή άλλης Τραγωδίας επὶ δι κεμθό λιμα άδεσι, πρώτε ἀρξαντος Αγάθωνος το τείετε. Καὶ τοι τι γράφε σει, ή εμβόλιμα αδειν, η ῥῆσιν ἐξ ἀλλὰ εἰς ἀλλὰ ἁρμόττειν, ἤ ἐπεισόδιον ολον. [περ. on.a. in.]

τα

"On the whole, therefore, whatever may be the merits, or advan tages of the chorus, I cannot think that the judgment of Ariftotle or Horace can fe produced in recommendation of it. As to the proba bility given to the reprefentation, by the chorus interpofing and bearing a part in the action; the public who have lately feen a troop of fingers affembled on the ftage, as a chorus, during the whole reprefentations of Elfrida and Caractacus, are competent to decide for themfelves, how far fuch an expedient, gives a more friking refemblance of human life, than the common ufage of our drama. As to its importance in a moral view, to correat the evil impreffion of vicious fentiments, imputed to the fpeakers, the flory told, to enforce its ufe for this purpofe, conveys a proof of its ineffi

cacy.

To give due force to fenti ments, as well as to direct their pro

per tendency, depends on the fkill and addrefs of the poet, independently of the chorus.

"Monfieur Dacier, as well as the author of the above note, cenfures the modern ftage for having rejected the chorus, and having loft thereby at least half its probability, and its greatest ornament; fo that our tragedy is but a very faint fhadow of the old. Learned critics, however, do not, perhaps, confider, that if it be expedient to revive the chorus, all the other parts of the ancient tragedy must be revived a long with it. Ariftotle mentions mufic as one of the fix parts of tragedy, and Horace no fooner intro

duces the chorus, but he proceeds to the pipe and lyre. If a chorus be really neceffary, our dramas, like thofe of the ancients, fhould be rendered wholly mufical; the dancers alfo will then claim their place, and the pretenfions of Veftris and Noverre must be admitted as claffical. Such a fpectacle, if not more natural than the modern, would at least be confiftent; but to introduce a groupe of fpectatorial actors, speaking in one part of the drama, and finging in another, is as ftrange and incoherent a medley, and full as unclaffical, as the dialogue and airs of the Beggar's Opera."

"H

IS poems contained deferiptions of nature, not fuch as the poets have to frequently and uniformly painted her, fich as formerly defcribed by Homer, and diffigured by his imitators; but nature in the dreis in which Haller himfelf had obferved her; when climbing up the rocks, and traverting the eternal ice of the Aips, he endea voured to difcover her fecret opera tions; poems in which he inveftigated the depths of the most abstract and infoluble questions in mathe matics and morals; epiftles in which he paints the fweets of friendship and pastoral life, the pleafures at tending on fimplicity of manners, the foft and tranquil charms of virtue, and the happiness enfuing from the facrifices, which the more strong and auftere virtues demand of us. Such are the poems of Haller. While he ridicules and reprobates the corruption of morals, he places

hypocrify in the most odious point or view he fings the benefits of religion, which teaches us to love and to bear with each other; and he exclaims against the crimes of intolerance, with that horror, which muft be always ftrongly felt by every vir tuous mind, however fincerely attached to particular modes of religion. We might almost fuppofe that we at once heard Fenelon celebrating the delights of divine love, and the author of the Henriade thundering against fanaticifm.

"Mr. Haller had formed a friendfhip with his two countrymen, Mr. Stahalin, who was afterwards profeffor at Bafil, and Mr. Gefner, profeffor and canon at Zurich, whose character is as amiable as his knowlege in phyfics is profound. He has recorded their friendship in his poems; and it is to their encouragement we are obliged for the first perfect fruits of his poetic genius.

F4

"His.

"His poems were foon tranflated into French: the nations of Europe faw, with astonishment, the German poetry, which had been hitherto unknown, produce works of fo capital a kind, as might even excite the jealoufy of nations, who for feveral years had difputed, amongst themselves, the empire of letters. Happy in her latter birth, the united, at her first outfet, that profound philofophy, which diftinguifhes the more enlightened ages, and that richness of imagination, which was the happy attendant on the earliest æras of poetry. Perhaps, if we may be permitted to hazard the remark, the German literature owes that juftice, which foreign nations have fo readily rendered her, and Haller fome part of his fuccefs as a poet, to the reputation which he had acquired as a philofopher. The literary world heard, with furprife, that the author of thefe delightful and amiable poems, was a phyfician, who paffed his life in the midst of diffections, employed in fearching out the moit fecret fources of organization and life; and the learned faw, with pleasure, that in the few moments that M. de Haller could afford to dedicate to the Mufes, he

had, by his merit, acquired a place among the first poets of his nation.

"Some, perhaps too fevere, critics, have objected to his poems, as too clofely imitating the oriental ftyle. This lofty and fublime mode of writing pleafes in the original authors, because it appears to be the natural expreffion of the poet's ideas, ftriking even by its lingu larity, and tranfporting us to the ages of ftrong but uncultivated nature, which afford us fuch exquifite delight whenever we recur to them. But pleating, as it may be in them, it often offends us in the hands of imitators; for it should seem that the moderns, who differ fo much from the ancients in their manners and opinions, fhould neither poffefs the fame ideas, nor ufe the fame me thod of communicating them; and we are induced to fufpect that these oriental imitations are merely the effect of art, in the poet, who wishes to difguife thoughts, which would otherwife appear trite and common, by pompous diction, and a peculiar turn of his periods. No one had ever lefs occafion for fuch an expedient than Haller, and this style has rather ferved to cover beauties in his poems, than conceal defects."

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