Yea, beg a hair of him for memory, (a)
And, dying, mention it within their wills,
Bequeathing it, as a rich legacy,

Unto their issue.

(Here they wish Antony to read the Will.)
Have patience, gentle friends, I must not Read it;
It is not meet (b) you know how Cesar loved you:
You are not wood, you are not stones, but Men
And being Men, hearing the Will of Cesar,
It will inflame you! it will make you mad!
"Tis good you know not that you are his heirs;
For, if you should, O, what would come of it!
(Here they call for the Will.)

Will you be patient? will you stay awhile?
I have o'ershot myself, (c) to tell you of it.
I fear, I wrong the honorable men,
Whose daggers have stabbed Cesar

I do fear it.

(Here they clamor for the Will.)

You will compel me then to Read the Will
Then make a ring about the Corpse of Cesar,
And let me show you Him that made the Will.
Shall I descend? And will you give me leave?

(Here Antony descends from the Rostrum, and stands by the Corpse of Cesar) If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.

You all do know this Mantle: I remember

The first time ever Cesar put it on;

'Twas on a Summer's evening, in his tent That day he overcame the Nervii.

Look, in this place, ran Cassius's dagger through;
See, what a rent the envious Casca made;
Through this, the well-beloved Brutus stabbed
And, as he plucked his cursed steel away,
Mark, how the blood of Cesar followed it
As rushing out of doors, to be resolved
If Brutus so unkindly knocked, or no —
For Brutus, as you know, was Cesar's angel:
Judge, O ye Gods, how dearly Cesar loved him!
This was the most unkindest cut of all:

For when the noble Cesar saw Him stab,
Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms,
Quite vanquished him: then burst his mighty heart!
(a) Memory, gedachtenis,, (b) Meet, geschikt.

(2) I have offshot myself, ik ben te ver gegaan.

And, in his mantle, muffling up his face -
Even at the base of Pompey's statue

Which all the while ran blood, great Cesar fell!

O, what a fall was there, my countrymen !
Then I, and You, and All of us, fell down,
Whilst bloody treason flourished over us.
O, now you weep, and, I perceive, you feel
The dint (a) of pity: these are gracious drops. (b)
Kind souls, what, weep you, when you but behold
Our Cesar's Vesture wounded? Look you here,

(Here Antony exposes the Body.)

Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny:

They, that have done this deed, are honorable;
What private griefs they have, alas! I know not,
That made them do it; they are wise and honorable,
And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you.
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts;
I am no Orator, as Brutus is:

But, as you know me all, a plain, blunt man

That loves my friend; and that they know full (d) well
Who gave me public leave to speak of him

For I have neither writ (e), nor words, nor worth,
Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech.

To stir men's blood; I only speak right on;

I tell you that, which you yourselves do know;

Show you sweet Cesar's wounds, poor, poor dumb mouths,
And bid them speak for me: but were I Brutus
And Brutus Antony there were an Antony

Would ruffle (f) up your spirits, and put a tongue
In every wound of Cesar, that should move

The Stones of Rome to rise and mutiny!

SHAKESPEARE's Julius Cesar, Act. III.

(a) Dint, kracht. (b) Gracious drops, beminnelyke tranen. (c) Marred, mishandeld, opgereten. (d) Full, zeer.

Writ, schrift.

(f) Ruffle, is opwinden, ontvlammen, opbruischen, &c. but none of these words express ruffle.

LECTURE II.

An Historical account of the English Language, down to the Age of Elizabeth.

FIELDING and SMOLLETT,

Compared.

In leaving Smollett's personal for his literary character, it is impossible not to consider the latter as contrasted with that of his eminent contemporary Fielding. It is true, that such comparisons, though recommended by the example of Plutarch, are not in general the best mode of estimating individual merit. But in the present case, the history, accomplishments, talents, pursuits, and, unfortunately, the fates of these two great authors, are so closely allied, that it is scarcely possible to name the one without exciting recollections of the other. Fielding and Smollett were both born in the highest rank of society, both educated to learned professions, yet both obliged to follow miscellaneous literature as the means of subsistence. Both were confined, during their lives, by the narrowness of their circumstances, both united a humorous cynicism with generosity and good nature, both died of the diseases incident to a sedantary life, and to literary labor, and both drew their last breath in a foreign land, * to which they retreated under the adverse circumstances of a decayed constitution, and an exhausted fortune.

Their studies were no less similar than their lives. They both wrote for the Stage, and neither of them succesfully. They both meddled in Politics; they both wrote Travels, in which they showed that their good humor was wasted under the sufferings of their disease; and, to conclude, they were both so eminently successful as Novelists, that no other English author, of that class, has

* Fielding died, in his 48th year, in October 1754, at Lisbon ; Smollett died at Leghorn, in October 1771, in his 42nd year.

a right to be mentioned in the same breath with Fielding and Smollett.

If we compare the works of these two great masters yet more closely, we may assign to Fielding, with little hesitation, the praise of a higher and a purer taste than was shown by his rival; more elegance of composition and expression; a nearer approach to the grave irony of Swift and Cervantes; a great deal more address or felicity in the conduct of his story; and, finally, a power of describing amiable and virtuous characters, and of placing before us heroes, and especially heroines, of a much higher as well as pleasing character than Smollett was able to present. &c.

But the deep and fertile genius of Smollett afforded resources sufficient to balance these deficiencies; and when the full weight has been allowed to Fielding's superiority of Taste and Expression, his northern contemporary will still be found fit to balance the scale with his great rival. If Fielding had superior taste, the palm of more Brilliancy of genius, more inexhaustible richness of Invention, must, in justice, be awarded to Smollett. &c.

Every successful Novelist must be more or less a Poet, even although he may never have written a line of Verse. The quality of Imagination is absolutely indispensable to him: his accurate power of examining and embodying hu man character and human passion, as well as the external face of nature, is not less essential; and the talent of describing well what he feels with accuteness, added to the above requisites, goes far to complete the poetic character. Smollett was, even in the ordinary sense, which limits the name to those who write Verses, a Poet of distinction; and, in this particular, superior to Fielding, who seldom aims at more than a slight Translation from the classics. Accordingly, if he is surpassed by Fielding in moving pity, the northern novelist soars far above him in his powers of exciting terror. &c.

an

It is, however, chiefly in his profusion, which amounts almost to prodigality, that we recognise the superior richness of Smollett's fancy. He never shows the least desire to make the most either of a character, or a situation, or adventure, but throws them together with a carelessness which argues unlimited confidence in his own powers. Fielding pauses to explain the principles of his art, and to congratulate himself and his readers on the felicity with which he constructs his narrative, or makes his characters evolve themselves in the progress. These appeals to

the reader's judgement, admirable as they are, have sometimes the fault of being diffuse, and always the great disadvantage, that they remind us we are perusing a work of fiction, and that the beings with whom we have been conversant during the perusal, are but a set of evanescent phantoms, conjured up by a magician for our amusement. Smollett seldom holds communication with his readers in

his own person. He manages his delightful puppet-show without thrusting his head beyond the curtain, to explain what he is doing; and hence, besides that our attention to the story remains unbroken, we are sure that the author, fully confident in the abundance of his materials, has no occasion to eke them out with extrinsic matter. &c. In the Comic part of their writings, we have already said, Fielding is pre-eminent in grave irony; a Cervantic species of pleasantry, in which Smollett is not equally successful. On the other hand, the Scotchman (notwithstanding the general opinion denies that quality to his countrymen) excels in broad and ludicrous humor. His fancy seems to run riot in accumulating ridiculous circumstances one upon another, to the utter destruction of all power of gravity; and perhaps no books ever written, have excited such peals of inextinguishable laughter as those of Smollett. Smollett may be said to resemble Rubens. His pictures are often deficient in grace; sometimes coarse, and even vulgar in conception; deficient too in keeping, and in the due subordination of parts to each other, and intimating too much carelessness on the part of the artist. But these faults are redeemed by such richness and brilliancy of colors; such a profusion of imagination now bodying forth the grand and terrible; now the natural, the easy, and the ludicrous; there is so much of life, action, and bustle in every group he has painted; so much force and individuality of character, that we readily grant to Smollett an equal rank with his great rival Fielding — while we place both far above any of their successors in the same line of fictious composition. Sir W. SCOTT.

The Essay on Criticism, which was published some months since, is a master-piece in its kind. The observations follow one another like those in Horuce's Art of Poetry, without that methodical regularity which would have been requisite in a prose writer. They are some of them uncom mon, but such as the reader must assent to when he sees them explained with that ease and perspicuity in which they are delivered. As for those which are the most known and the most received, they are placed in so beautiful a light, and illustrated with such apt allusions, that they have