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dice, and his judgment is infenfibly warped by the particularity of his private opinion: These obfervations apply to his Life of Savage, the most finished of his biographical difquifitions; and his Lives of leveral other eminent men, which were originally printed in the "Gentleman's Magazine," and in other periodical publications, and afterwards collected by Mr. Davies, in his "Mifcellaneous and Fugitive Pieces," and to his Lives of the Poets.

As a critic, he is entitled to the praise of being the greatest that our nation has produced. He has not, like his prodeceffors, tried merely to learn the art, and not to feel it. He has not gone to Dacier or to Boffu, to borrow rules to fetter genius by example, and impart diftinctions which lead to no end; but, poffeffed of two qualities, without which a critic is no more than a caviller, ftrong fenfe, and an intimate knowledge of human nature, he has

followed his own judgment, unbiaffed by authority, and has adopted all the good fenfe of Ariftotle, untrammelled by his forms. This praise he has merited by his Preface to Shakspeare, and the detached pieces of criticism which appear among his works. But his critical powers fhine with more concentrated radiance in the Lives of the Poets. These compofitions, abounding in strong and just illuftrations of criticism, evince the vigour of his mind, and that happy art of moralization, by which he gives to well-known incidents the grace of novelty and the force of inftruction; and " grapples the attention," by expreffing common thoughts with uncommon ftrength and elegance. Of many" paffages, it is fcarcely hyperbolical to affirm, that they are executed with all the skill and penetration of Aristotle, and animated and embellished with all the fire of Longinus. The Lives of Cowley, Milton,

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Butler, Waller, Dryden, Addison, and Pope, are elaborately composed, and exhibit the nobleft fpecimens of entertaining and folid criticism, that ancient or modern times have produced. The differtation in the Life of Cowley, on the metaphyfical poets of the last century, has all the attraction of novelty, as well as found obfervation. In the review of his works, falfe wit is detected in all its shapes; and the Gothic tafte for glittering conceits, and far-fetched allufions, is exploded, never, it is hoped, to revive again. The "Paradife Loft," is a poem which the mind of Milton only could have produced; the criticifm upon it is fuch as, perhaps, the pen of Johnson only could have written. His estimate of Dryden and Pope, challenges Quintilian's remarks upon Demofthenes and Cicero, and rivals the fineft fpecimens of elegant compofition and critical acutenefs in the English language. Some caution, however, is

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required to peruse these admirable com

pofitions with advantage.

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writer means not to say that they are perfect, or that, on the whole, they are executed with propriety. If they be regarded merely as containing narrations of the lives, delineations of the characters, and ftrictures of the feveral authors, they are far from being always to be depended upon. Johnson, as he has had occafion to remark, in reviewing his judgments of the feveral poets who have fallen under his confideration, brought to the production of this work ideas already formed, opinions tinctured with his ufual hues of ty and prejudice, and the rigid unfeeling philofophy, which could neither bend to excufe failings, or judge of what was not capable of a dispaffionate difquifition.

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To think for himself in critical, as in all other matters, is a privilege to which every one is undoubtedly entitled. This privi

lege of critical independence, an affectation of fingularity, or fome other principle not immediately vifible, is frequently betraying into a dogmatical spirit of contradiction to received opinion. Of this there need no further proofs, than his almost uniform attempt to depreciate the writers of blank verfe, and his degrading estimate of the exquifite compofitions of Prior, Hammond, Collins, Gray, Shenstone, and Akenfide, and his pronouncing the "Paradife Loft" "one of those books which the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take it up again." In his judgments of these poets, he may be juftly accused of being inflamed by prejudice, refolutely blind to merit. His rigorous condemnation, and puerile criticisms upon Gray, and his faftidious judgment of Shenftone, have drawn down upon him the united cenfures of those who admire

poetry in her moft daring attitudes and gorgeous at

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