opinion it was natural for them, in the day of our diftrefs, to com bine together that we fhould poffefs it no more. -Though fome things in our Civil, and fome in our Ecclefiaftical Conftitution, may not be fo perfect as to admit of no improvement; yet, in both refpects, we are an happy people, when compared with most of the other nations around us.

But great and happy as we are, there is much room left for thofe whom it may concern, to make the attempt of rendering us greater and happier; and we fincerely pray to God that all parties may be difpofed to do this, not by facrificing public confidence to private animolity; the ftability of government to feifith or ambitious truggles for power; not by indulging a proud propenfity to em brace the first favourable opportunity of regaining our glory, as it is called, by the renewal of war; not by profecuting unjuft views of commercial monopoly, or territorial conqueft, in diftant countries; but by taking the most prudent measures at home, to heal our divifions, to encrease our numbers, and to amend our morals; for the Strength, foreign and domeftic, of every nation upon Earth, muft ultimately, under God, depend on the Union, and on the Number of its inhabitants, and its Happiness on their VIRTUE.'

With refpect to the author of this fermon, we are much inclined to join our voice with that of the public, in allowing him to be the man of the first abilities upon the bench of bishops. His ftyle of compofition is manly, fimple and perfpicuous. His reflections do ufually bear a very strong impreffion of a clear and penetrating underftanding. His manner of thinking is full of candour and enlargedness, and truly worthy of a citizen of the world. We give him all poffible credit for integrity, fortitude, and difinterestedness. We must however have leave to fay, that the perfections we admire in him are more thofe of judgment, than of feeling. He is a gentleman in the beft fenfe of the word, but he preferves the coolnefs and elevation of that character fomething too uniformly. He feldom unbends from the inflexibility of dictation. He does not fport in the fields of fancy, nor is his heart often overflowed with that generous and involuntary fenfibility, that rifes fuperior to the minuter laws, and the nicer fhades of decorum. We are also apprehenfive, that this character grows daily more fit for him. In the prefent compofition, there is more feverity and lefs eloquence than in any with which his Lordship has hitherto prefented us. There is a fashion, getting ground among us, of clipping away all the exuberancies of genius, and reducing the standard of fine writing to nothing more than the perfection of perfpicuity and grammatical purity. Dr. Watfon is a man to give the vogue amongst us; and he must therefore excufe us, if we are forward to animadvert upon

what

what we apprehend to be a wrong propenfity in him, which we should probably have passed over in a meaner writer. 0.

ART. VII. The Reparation, a Comedy, as performed at the TheatreRoyal in Drury Lane. By Miles Peter Andrews, Efq. Octavo Is. 6d. Lowndes. 1784.

HE performance before us, is a fresh acceffion to the

THE ftock we already poffefs, of comedies, written in that

ferious vein, which has been the fubject of fo much altercation in the critical world. To this kind of writing we profefs ourselves to be by no means fo univerfally inimical as fome critics have affected to be. It is not at all neceffary that the comedy of wit and humour, which is certainly one of the moft agreeable fruits of human invention, should be excluded. The mufes, whatever fome of their followers' have pretended to be, are, we believe, in no degree fubject to thofe littleneffes, which are the fource of jealoufy and envy. Comedy indeed, it has been faid, is a name that implies fport and laughter; for which reafon feriousness and pathos must be very foreign to it. We will not dispute about a name; but we are firmly perfuaded, that a dramatic compofition, that draws its character from common life, that is written as nearly as poffible in the ftyle of converfation, that exhibits a pathetic and interefting event, and that terminates happily, is not neceffarily either abfurd or contemptible.

The incident upon which Mr. Andrews has founded his drama, is by no means ill chofen. It exhibits a gentleman, who, having, fome years before the commencement of the piece, drawn in a very amiable woman by a pretended marriage, at length repents of his folly, and finding her chaste, virtuous, and irreproachable, affords her all the compenfation in his power. The repentance of the hero is not of that fudden kind, founded upon fome unexpected furprize, which is frequently introduced upon the ftage, and is neither refpectable in itself, nor likely, from the nature of the human mind, to be of any long duration. The author, with a judgment that does him honour, has represented it as a fixed and habitual feeling; a remorfe that communicates gravity to the temper and gives a fting to every enjoyment.

Having been thus fuccefsful in forming his principal outline, Mr. Andrews had certainly an additional chance for the turning out a valuable play. We will first just present the reader with a sketch of his leading incidents, and then enquire into the execution.

Julia,

Julia, the deceived, deferted heroine, difmayed in the ex-, tremeft degree at the perfidy and inconftancy of Loveless, flies from her father's houfe, and obtains admiffion, under a feigned name, into the house of fir Gregory Glovetop, a caft gentleman uther. Here he is addreffed, in a very dif honourable style, by lord Hectic, a neighbour of fir Gregory. Difgufted with this incident, fir Gregory difmisses her from his roof, and the being now deprived of every refource, refolves to return and caft herself at the feet of her father. Loveless however, who by accident had come down' into the country at this time upon a vifit, now discovers the loft miftrefs, of whom he had been fo long engaged in the fruitless purfuit, and the confequence is a general eclairciffement and reconciliation.

The chief beauties of the ferious comedy we apprehend to be these probability of incident; anxiety and doubtfulness of event; and a pathetic dialogue. The performance before us, is by no means unexceptionable in any of these refpects. That Julia fhould engage the protection of Mifs Glovetop, and by that means obtain a refidence in the house of her father, though abfolutely unknown to him, is very uncongenial with the character of fir Gregory. That when deftitute of any refidence, the fhould become the tenant of a house of lord Hectic, her infolent admirer, without knowing to whom it belonged, muft alfo be acknowledged extremely miraculous and poetical. Other improbabilities are equally obvious, but we will not overcharge this part of the fubject.

The piece will appear ftill more deficient if we feek in it for fufpence and perplexity. This is the very foul of the ferious comedy. The vulgar objection to it is, that it is fit only for a foporific. But if the story be well digested; if incident rise above incident in juft progreffion; if the diftrefs heighten from fcene to fcene, and from act to act; if the fituations be well imagined, affecting and picturesque; if the fimple labyrinth be fo artfully contrived, that no one can foresee the next event from that which preceded it, and yet all fhall appear natural, cafy and obvious: if then the fpectator can fleep, we can have nothing for it but to pity him. A fpectator of feeling and tafte can at no time find the encroachments of fleep fo effectually propelled. When Mr. Andrews is the artist however, we will not engage for him. In the principal ftory of his performance we trace no luckiness of invention, no ingenious embarraffinent, no admirable and unexpected evolution. The play is opened by Lovelefs with the ftory of his crime, and though it be neceffary that he and Julia fhould remain concealed from each

other

other till the close of the performance, every fpectator is acquainted who they are, and concludes from the first how the ftory will terminate. An attempt indeed is made to create the most obvious kind of entanglement, by exciting the jealoufy of Lovelefs, upon finding his mistress in a fufpicious fituation with lord Hectic; but it is in the utmost degree feeble and frigid, and is not introduced till the fifth act is fomewhat advanced.

With refpect to the cafe and pathos of his dialogue, we are ftill lefs fatisfied with Mr. Andrews. The reader may perhaps have obferved, that when we talked of this particu lar fpecies of comedy, we did not employ the epithet fentimental. The ideas have been fometimes knowingly, and fometimes artfully confounded. But friends as we are to the ferious, we have no toleration for the fentimental comedy. And fuch a comedy is the Reparation. Truth and nature are here never confulted. The tenour of the dialogue stalks upon the ftilts of blank verfe, and the bufinefs of the perfonages is fimply that of ftringing fentences. If, encouraged by the fuccefs of his performance, Mr. Andrews should give the public another in the fame line, we would recommend it to him as an exercise of his ingenuity, to take for the ground work the Diftichs of Cato. We have no doubt that he would find them, under his management, fall into a very pretty lovefick ftory, with the fingular good fortune at once of inftructing the philofopher, compofing the beau, and exciting the obftreperous applaufe of the ladies and gentlemen in the two-fhilling gallery.

quid fit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non, Planius ac melius Chryfippo & Crantore dicet.

So much for the ferious part of the drama. But Mr. Andrews does not reft his claim to applaufe upon this only. His friend, the prologue, calls his production a tragi-comedy. We do not admit of the appellation; but from what has been faid, we fuppofe the reader will understand it. In that part of the piece which is intended to be humourous, we find ftill lefs to applaud than in that which has been already difcuffed. The comic draughts are made up of harth and exaggerated outlines, with no flexure to give beauty, and with no humour to foften and mellow their extravagances. All here is cold, meagre, and infipid. When Mr. Andrews unwittingly ftumbles upon a fituation, that would acquire grace and fplendour in any other hand, he appears to fly from it with inftinctive trepidation. If in this refpect. the Reparation has met with any fuccefs, it must certainly be ascribed to the trick of the actor, not the skill of the poet.

Lord

Lord Hectic is a valetudinarian, and makes his first appearance feated upon a chamber horfe, that he may, as he expreffes it," get air and exercife at his leifure, by letters

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patent, like a gentleman; without being obliged to leave "his own chamber, and fcour across the country for it, "like a poft-boy." He is however continually boafting of the vigour of his conftitution, and his prowess among the fair fex.

Of the character of fir Gregory Glovetop the reader may form fome idea from the following fpecimen. The knight being interrogated by lord Hectic, in defence of his purfuit of Julia, "have you no respect for the affections of a man of fashion?" fir Gregory replies,

Certainly nothing pleafes me more than to fee a man of fashion in love, in a gallant gentleman-like manner. But then I expect forms; no clandeftine vifits in my houfe. When a proper equipage is prepared a number of out-riders-with an avant-courier-his lordfip's chaplain attending-due notice given-and approbation afked-no man more ready in his place than Sir Gregory Glovetop at the head of the great stairs, in point ruffles and clock'd tockings.'

But befides these characters, Mr. Andrews has introduced by way of episode, a lady Betty Wormwood, fifter to lord Hectic, Mifs Penelope Zodiac, and colonel Quorum. Lady Betty is intended to be very fatirical in her temper, and farcaftic in her obfervations. But of Mr. Andrews that may be affirmed, which Dryden has faid of Shadwell,

With whate'er gall thou fett'ft thyself to write,
Thy inoffenfive fatires never bite.

Mifs Zodiac is a character formed upon the idea of Armande, in Les Femmes Savantes of Moliere; an idea which poor Cibber has frittered away in his Ladies Philofophy. Moliere and Cibber have both one advantage over Mr. Andrews. Their female philofopher is young and beautiful; and in the follies of the young and beautiful, audiences of former times were apt to intereft themselves. But Mifs Zodiac is fuppofed to be a wrinkled old maid.

But of all the fketches that are given in the Reparation, the most impotent and abortive is colonel Quorum. He is an officer in the army, and a juftice of the peace; and from this collifion of characters, humour appears to be meaned to be ftruck out. His converfation is liberally larded with oaths;-but in this there is no humour at all. He is alfo an admirer of the heroine; and as foon as fhe disappears, he

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dispatches his clerk with a fearch warrant and two field"pieces! to fir Gregory Glovetop's." But the following example of his behaviour after having quarrelled with a

petty