The action began with giving one another the lye in the most reproachful terms, Then, Bolingbroke, as low as to thy heart, The vanquished were always deem'd guilty, and deferving their punishment. In the fecond part of K. Henry VI. there is exactly fuch a duel fought, as, 8 in Don Quixote, the fquire of the knight of the wood propofes between himself and Sancho. For the plebeians, not being allowed the use of the fword or lance, fought with wooden ftaves, at the end of which they tied a bag filled with fand and pebbles. When poor Peter is killed with this weapon by his master, K. Henry makes this reflection, Go take hence that traitor from our fight, When our judges now a days afk the accused perfon, how he will be tryed; they would hardly I belive allow his appealing to his fword or his fandbag to prove his innocency. Our Gothic chivalry Shakespeare has likewise touched on, in his K. Henry VIII. Hall and Holingshed, whom our poet has followed, tells 8 Don Quixote, vol. 2. chap. 14. us, us, that in the year 1520 a king of arms from France came to the English court, with a folemn proclamation, declaring, that in June enfuing, the two kings, Henry and Francis, with fourteen aids, would in a camp, between Ardres and Guifnes, anfwer all comers that were gentlemen, at tilt, tourney and barriers. The like proclamation was made by Clarencieux in the French court: and thefe defiances were fent likewife into Germany, Spain and Italy. Knights and fquires accordingly affembled, All clinquant, all in gold, as our poet has it: And the two kings, especially our fturdy Henry, performed wonders equal to any knight-errant in fairy land. The ladies were not only fpectators of these knightly jufts and fierce encounters, but often the chief occafion of them for to vindicate their unspotted honours and beauty, what warrior would refuse to enter the lifts? The witty Earl of Surry, in Henry the eighth's reign, like another Don Quixote, travelled to Florence, and there, in honour of a fair Florentine, challenged all nations at fingle combat in defence of his Dulcinea's beauty. The more witty and wife Sir Philip Sydney, Yclad in mightie arms and fylver fhield, in honour of his royal mistress, fhewed his knight-errant chivalry before the French nobles, who came here on an embaffy about the marriage of Elizabeth with the duke of Anjou. Would it not be unjuft to ridicule our forefathers for their aukward manners, and at the fame time have no other teft of ridicule but mode or fashion? For we, of a modern date, may poffibly appear, in many refpects, equally ridiculous to a critical and philosophical inquirer, who takes no other criterion and standard to judge from, than truth and nature. We want natural and rightly improved manners: for these our poets muft go abroad; and from the Attic and Roman flowers collect their honey; and they should give a new fashion and dress, not contradicting however probability and fame, to whatever is meerly of a British and barbarous growth, agreeable to their imagination and creative fancy. Shakespeare never writes fo below himself, as when he keeps clofeft to our most authentic chronicles, and fights over the battles between the houfes of York and Lancafter. Not that he is to blame for following fame in known characters, but in the ill choice of his fubject; 10 for 10 Αὐτῆς δὲ τῆς ποιητικής διττή ή εμαρτία. Ἡ μὲν γὰρ καθ ̓ αὐτὴν, ἡ δὲ κατὰ συμβεβηκός. Ἡ μὲν γὰρ προείλετο μιμή σασθαι for he should have rejected what was incapable of embelishment. But in thofe ftories where his imagination has greater fcope, and where he can ye without being contradicted, there he reigns without a rival. SECT. σασθαι ἀδυναμίαν αὐτῆς, ἡ ἁμαρτία. Ἡ δὲ τὸ προελέσθαι μὴ ὀρθῶς, καλὰ συμβεβηκός. After ή αμαρτία, by the tranfcriber's negligence, καθ' αυτήν is omitted. The paffage I would thus read, Αὐτῆς δὲ τῆς ποιητικῆς διπλὴ ἡ ἁμαρτία ἡ μὲν καθ ̓ αὐτὴν, ἡ δὲ κατὰ συμβεβηκός. Εἰ μὲν γὰς προείλετο μιμήσασθαι κατ' ἀδυναμίαν αὐτῆς, ἡ ἁμαρτία καθ' αυτήν ἡ δὲ τὸ προελέσθαι μὴ ὀρθῶς, καλὰ συμβεβηκός. Ariftot. περὶ ποιητ. κεφ. κε. In poetry there are two defects, the one arifes from itfelf, [per fe,] the other is accidental : [per accidens :] for if it chufes fubjelts for imitation, out of its power and reach, the fault is from itfelf ; [per fe,] but when it chules not rightly, the fault is accidental [per accidens.] Το illufrate from Shakefpeare. The αμαρτία καθ' αὐτὴν, is the historical transactions of York and Lancaster: the making choice of fuch a fory as the Winter's Tale, &c. The ἁμαξία καλὰ συμβεβηκός, is where Shakefpeare, not heeding geography, or blindly following the old ftory books, calls Delphi an isle, in the Winter's Tale, A& III. Not knowing physic says pleurifie, instead of plethory, in Hamlet, A&t IV. With others of the like nature. 11 Homer knew the whole art of lying, and has taught other poets the way. Δεδίδαχε δὲ μάλισα Ομηρον καὶ τὰς ἄλλες ψευδῆ λέγειν ὡς δεῖ. Ariftot. περὶ ποιητ. κεφ. κδ. Horace has given this an elegant turn in his art of poetry, 4. 151. Atque BU SECT. V. UT perhaps our poet's art will appear to poet's art will greater advantage, if we enter into a detail, and a minuter examination of his plays. There are many who, never having red one word of Ariftotle, gravely cite his rules, and talk of the unities of time and place, at the very mentioning Shakespeare's name; they don't seem ever to have given themselves the trouble of confidering, whether or no his story does not hang together, and the incidents follow each other naturally and in order; in fhort whether or no he has not a beginning, middle and end. If you will not allow that he wrote ftrictly tragedies; yet it may be granted that he wrote dramatic heroic poems; in which, is there not an imitation of one action, ferious, entire, and of a juft length, and which, without the help of narration, excites pity and terror in the beholders breast, and by the means of these refines fuch Atque ita mentitur, fic veris falfa remiscet, The trueft poetry is the moft feigning.' fays the Clown in Shak. As you like it, A&t III. |