tion. Nor can we approve those long digressions introduced with the view of displaying his own knowledge, and defending his work from the assaults of criticism. Whatever merit these may possess in themselves, they are here greatly out of place; as tending to dissipate that impression of reality, which it ought to be the great object of the writer to keep up.

The novels of Fielding are generally allowed to be in some respects exceptionable; nevertheless there runs throngʼn them a very noble and beautiful vein of morality. Benevolence, generosity, disinterestedness, are strongly inculcated throughout. Several perfect characters are even introduced; as Allworthy in Tom Jones, and Harrison in Amelia. Yet though these be extremely well drawn, they are not likely to become, in any great degree, the objects of imitation. They are men advanced in life; they are not the leading characters, nor those into whose views and sentiments the reader is disposed to enter with the greatest interest.

Fielding is blamable chiefly in the cha

racter of his heroes, where he has united many agreeable and truly estimable qualities, with a very considerable degree of profligacy. There is great danger, therefore, that, in the minds of youthful readers, the two may be confounded together, and the latter seem thus excusable, and even graceful. The same objection does not apply to his heroines, though their character does not con-tain any thing very marked or interesting. We except Amelia, who affords an admirable picture of sweetness and conjugal affection.

Joseph Andrews, his first production, contains the history of a young man in the lowest rank of life. Fielding, like Richardson, seems to have begun there, and to have gradually ascended. With the exception of some indecent passages, it seems to be, upon the whole, unexceptionable, and even of a good tendency. There is little or nothing in the conduct of Joseph, which might not be recommended to the imitation of any one who is placed in the same circumstances. I disapprove, however, in the same manner,

and for the same reasons, as in Pamela, of the hacknied incident of a discovery of noble birth and consequent removal into a diferent station. Had the two lovers been settled respectably and comfortably in their original station, the effect would, in my opinion, have been better, and even more agreeable to a reader of correct taste.

It is in Tom Jones that both the strength of Fielding's genius and his moral defects are most strikingly conspicuous. The character of the hero abounds with generosity and other amiable qualities, but tends at the same time to represent these as connected with thoughtles.ness and irregularity of conduct; an idea already too common, and which has been the ruin of thousands. That such a character does not unfrequently occur in real life, can be no sufficient reason for introducing it here, and for embellishing it in a manner which must captivate every youthful reader. The species of reformation which takes place at the end, a common tribute to virtue on these occasions, cannot compensate for the course of

conduct which has been uniformly persc vered in through the rest of the story; nor will any one acquainted with the power of habit be very sanguine as to its continuance. The character of Blifil, too, is no less excep tionable than that of his opponent. Its evi dent tendency to represent regularity and prudence as intimately connected with deceit and malignity.

Booth seems to be formed nearly after the model of his predecessor Tom Jones, though He does not act so distinguished a part. The most interesting object in this pleasing novel· is Amelia herself.

In the representation of manners, particu larly in the dramatic part, I believe the writer will always be found to excel most in regard to those classes of men with whom he has been most in the habit of conversing. This will not give us any very high idea of Fielding's companions. Innkeepers, rogues, and female demireps, are the characters with ▾ whom he seems most completely at home. A just picture of fashionable life was reserved · for the pens of our female novelists.

SMOLLET.

Smollet is still coarser than Fielding, and does not possess the same intimate knowledge of the human heart. As a painter of manners, however, he is little, if at all, inferior. He excels particularly in those of seamen, chiefly, no doubt, from having been once engaged in that profession himself. But his most striking talent seems to be humour, the exhibition of odd and eccentric characters. Of these he has assembled, in Humphrey Clinker, the most ludicrous and amusing collection that is anywhere to be found.

In a moral view, Smollet is inferior to Fielding. The vices of his heroes are, at least as great, without the same good qualities to counterbalance them. We meet rothing of that refined generosity, and those just sentiments, at least, of moral conduct, which Fielding's heroes discover. Indeed, Smollet, in regard to his, seems to make hardly any distinction between their best