Mr. Warton's verfion.

"Haft thou a living rill, or ftagnant lake?
With willows and huge ftones the waters break;
On which the wand'rers fafely may alight,
When rains or winds retard their deftin'd flight,
On which emerging from the waves, may land,
And their wet wings to tepid funs expand."
Mr. Neville gives this tranflation.

In the mid water, if it ftand, or flow,
Stones of large fize, and tranfverfe willows throw,
To ferve as bridges, where the bees may land,
And to the folar gleam their wings expand,
Shou'd fome late loit'rers rue bleak Eurus' blast,
Scatter'd, and whelm'd beneath the watry waste.

The first three lines are unexceptionable; the fourth is equal to the original; the two laft are ftiff and affected.

From these instances, the reader may perceive how difficult it is to preserve the genuine graces, the purity and fimplicity of the original. The story of Orpheus and Eurydice is told with inimitable delicacy by the Roman poet; but we see the tranflator like the unhappy lover-

"Prenfantem NEQUIQUAM umbras."

The reader fhall judge for himself.

And now had Orpheus, meafuring back his way,
Efcap'd all perils: to the realms of day
Preffing his steps advanc'd Eurydice;
Of Pluto's confort fuch was the decree :
When strait a madness seiz'd the Lover's mind ;
Venial, in Hell were faults of venial kind:
Juft at the light he ftopt; in thoughtless trance
Wrapt, and by paffion quite o'erpow'r'd, a glance,
Turning, on his Eurydice he caft :

Vain from that moment every labour past;
The Tyrant's league was void, and thrice around
Avernus' pool was heard a fullen found.
Orpheus! The cry'd, what Dæmon could infpire,
To curfe us both, fo frantic a defire ?
Again I go; Fate calls me from the skies,
And fleep eternal feals my fwimming eyes:
Adieu! with deepeft darkness cover'd o'er

I ftretch my feeble hands, thy wife, alas! no more.
These words fcarce finifh'd, fudden from his view,
Like smoke with thin air mixt, fhe diverse flew ;

Νο

No more to meet her Orpheus, who effay'd
Oft to reply, and catch her fleeting shade.
What, what remain'd? Hell's ferry-man deny'd
A fecond paffage o'er th' opponent tide.

His wife twice loft, ah! whither fhall he rove?
What plaint, what ftrain, the Ghosts, the Gods shall move?
Plac'd in the Stygian bark she shivering fail'd:
He, as fame tells, fev'n months fucceflive wail'd,
By Strymon's unfrequented wave, his woes,
Where a bleak rock's aerial manfion rofe;
In chilly caves he mus'd, and by his fong
Sooth'd the fierce beafts, and drew the trees along,
So Philomela in the poplar bow'r

Laments her offspring, loft in luckless hour,
Which fome rude Ruftic, callow as they lay,
From their warm neft obfervant fnatcht away:
Percht on a bough, all night the weeps, her ftrains
Renews, and with fad wailings fills the plains.

No love, no joys connubial touch'd his foul;
Forlorn he roam'd, where Tanais' white waves roll,
O'er Hyperborean ice, o'er tracts of ground
Throughout the year in frofts Riphæan bound,
Mourning Dis' fruitlefs boon, and his loft Bride:
When, ftung with rage at his difdainful pride
The Thracian matrons, 'mid the rites divine,
And midnight orgies of the God of wine,
Spread o'er the fields the Poet, piecemeal torn:
Then as his head by Hebrus' flood was borne,
Rent from the marble neck, ev'n the cold tongue
And fault'ring voice Eurydice ftill fung;

Ah poor Eurydice! with laft breath cry'd ;
Eurydice the diftant banks reply'd.

X. Lorfe Remarks on Certain Pofitions to be found in Mr. Hobbes's Philofophical Rudiments of Government and Society. With a fort Sketch of a Democratical Form of Government. In a Letter to Signior Paoli. 8vo. Pr. 15. Cadell.

W

7E are fingular enough to confefs ourselves unable, from perufing the works of Mr. Hobbes, to difcern where that fund of knowledge lies, which has procured him fo. con fiderable a rank among modern philofophers. Those who are acquainted with his private hiftory know him to have been vain and peevish, and fo inconftant in his principles, that from a violent republican even to democracy, he became a mo

narch ift

narchist even to tyranny. It is, however, justly doubted, whe ther this veering from one extreme to another did not proceed from venality more than inconftancy.

In this pamphlet he is attacked as a monarchist. He has afferted, that man is not a creature fit for fociety, and endea vours to prove it by arguments which, according to this writer, are equally abfurd as the following ftring of fyllogifms.

New-born infants are incapable of walking;

Therefore man, being born an infant, is not born a creature fit for walking.

But infants are born with two legs, and the power of motion, which are the means for that action when it becomes neceffary to their ftate;

Therefore man, by being born with the neceffary means, cannot be faid to be born unfit for walking.

-And infants, tho' born incapable of reafon, by being born with human attributes, are born with the means neceffary for attaining it;

Therefore man, by being born with the neceffary means, is born a creature apt for reafon; and a creature apt for rea fon is a creature apt for fociety.

We apprehend Mr. Hobbes's reafoning is mere quibbling ; and this, because it is obvious that the meaning of the philofophers whom Mr. Hobbes attempts to confute, is, that man is born a creature fit for fociety, notwithstanding his reafoning faculties do not immediately arrive at maturity. In his infant state, society is the only means of preferving his being; this makes him love it. In his maturer age, what Mr. Hobbes calls the dictate of right reafon makes him capable of it. This reafon, according to the fame author, is given by God to every man for the rule of his actions; therefore no man is exempt from this capability. This amounts to what the philofophers have advanced, that man is born a creature fit for fociety.'

Our limits will not admit multiplying quotations from this excellent pamphlet;, and it becomes the lefs neceffary, as the principles of liberty are now fo well understood, that Hobbifm is every where fufficiently exploded; but at the fame time this author's precifion and accuracy in confuting it cannot be fufficiently commended. We should be forry if the revival of any arbitrary principles in government fhould render this publication particularly feasonable at this time; and we conjecture, that it is chiefly defigned to remove any objections which may be formed against the short Sketch of a Democratical Form of Government, in a Letter to Signior Paoli.

In this sketch the democratical fyftem is recommended, becaufe, in the author's opinion, when rightly balanced, it is the

only

only one which can fecure the virtue, liberty, and happiness of fociety. The sketch is divided into two parts: the first treats of those things effential to the proper form of this fpecies of government; and the fecond explains that part of the conftitution which defends it from corruption. The fenate and the people are the two capital effentials of the former, for obvious reasons which our author has explained. It is propofed that the debate (by which we imagine the writer means the deliberation upon public affairs) be in the fenate, and the refult in the people, with a power of debating likewife. The number of the fenators is limited to fifty, to prevent confufion; and the ifland of Corfica is propofed to be divided into certain diftricts, and the people reprefented by a certain number of men, not under two hundred and fifty. Generals, admirals, civil magiftrates, and great officers, are to be taken from those who have ferved in the fenate; and though not elected fenators, they are to remain fo ex officio; but the election of all officers and magiftrates is to be vested in the reprefentative body. The fenate, or its committee, is to meet thrice every week, or oc cafionally, and the representatives of the people occafionally. An appeal may lie to the fenate, and from thence to the reprefentatives of the people.

'Let the affairs of commerce, fays this author, and all matters relative to the ftate and executive powers of government, be determined by the reprefentative body, after they have been first debated in the fenate; but let not the reprefentative affembly have the power of determining peace and war, impofing taxes, the making and altering laws, till these subjects have been first debated by the fenate, and proposed by them to the collective body of the people. Let these proposals be promulged a fortnight before the meeting of the reprefentatives towards the paffing them; that the people may have time to deliberate on them, and give what directions they shall judge proper to their representatives.'

The defence of this conftitution against corruption is next confidered under two articles, viz. the rotation of all places of truft, and the fixing the Agrarian on a proper balance. The author thinks, that the Romans, difpenfing with the rotation of power, thereby ruined their republic; witnefs the prolongation of the commands of Marius, Sylla, Pompey, and Cæfar. The Agrarian, according to this writer, was never fixed on a proper balance, under the Roman republic; and had the generous efforts made by the Gracchi to remove this defect prevailed, their republic must have been as immortal as time itself. The beft method of fixing the rotation and proper Agrarian is thus explained by our author.

• Firit,

First, the rotation. Let the whole fenate be changed once in three years, by a third part at a time yearly. Let the vacant pofts be fupplied from the body of the representatives, by the election of the people. Let that body undergo the fame rotation, and be fupplied from the people. If any of the reprefentative members fhould be elected into the fenate, that are not by the courfe of the rotation to go out of the representative council, their places must be supplied from the people. Let no member of either the fenatorial or representative body, be capable of re-election under the space of three years. Let the admirals, generals, civil magiftratès, and all the officers of im portant pofts, lay down their commiffion at the end of the year, nor be capable of re-election under the aforefaid time of probation. The rotation thus fettled, we come to the fecond confideration, viz. the proper Agrarian.

Let the Agrarian be settled in fuch a manner, that the balance of land inclines in favor of the popular fide. To prevent the alteration which time would make in this balance, let the landed and perfonal effects of every man be equally divided at his decease, between the males, heirs of his body; in default of fuch heirs, between his male heirs in the first and fecond degree of relationship.

6

If any man during his life-time, by gift, make a diftribution of his eftate or effects contrary to the meaning of this law; let his heirs, by fuit in the proper courts of justice, obtain a lawful diftribution, and let the penalty incurred by the offender be an immediate difpoffeffion of his estate and effects to his lawful heirs.

Let no females be capable of inheriting or bringing any dower in marriage.

The provision for every female, who, through any natural defect, is not capable of marriage, muft be made by way of annuity by the male heirs nearest of kin. These, I think, are irresistible bars to the alteration which time would otherwise make in the balance.

If the exigencies of the republic fhould ever find it neceffary to lodge the executive powers of government in the hands of one perfon, let there be a law made to limit it to one month. Let the reprefentative affembly have the power of nominating the person, and continuing this command from month to month, if the exigencies of the itate demands it; but let not any one perfon be capable of holding this office above a

year.

The remedy of a dictator fhould never be made use of, but in the most defperate cafes; and, indeed, it is not probable that fuch a government should ever be in a fituation to want it.'

Such