·Tooth'd briars, fharp furzes, pricking gofs and thorns Which enter'd their frail skins. And the touching a raw part being very painful, he might well cry out, "Touch me not,' WARB. &c. Ibid.] Staffilato fignifies fimply lafhed, not well lafhed, much less flayed: but this it muft fignify, fays Dr. Warburton, and this too must be the real cafe of thefe varlet: ; the one, in defiance of the Italian language; and the other, in defiance of Shakespeare, who fully explains their punishment, and this confequence of it, in Profpero's commiffion to Ariel, Go charge my goblins, that they grind their joints With aged cramps; and more pinch-spotted make them I cannot help taking notice here of the unfair arts Dr. Warburton ufes, to make his fufpicion pafs on his readers for truth. He firft, to the word lafhed, which ftaffilato does fignify, tacks flayed, which it does not fignify, as if they were the fame thing; and then to prove, that this (flaying) was the real cafe of these varlets, he misquotes Shakespeare pricking gofs and thorns, Which enter'd their frail skins infinuating as if they were torn and raw all over : whereas Shakespeare fays, Which enter'd their frail bins. Nor let Mr. Warburton cavil, that their fhins could not be fcratched without the thorns entering their skins; fince fcratched fhins can never put a man in the condition which Stephano here represents himself in, or which he would have to be meant by the word faffilato. CAN. OF CRIT.* P. 82. 1. 15. And my ending is Despair,] The allufion is very well kept up in this Epilogue. And the actor here is not only applying to the audience for favour, in behalf of the Author; but Profpero speaks in the character of a Magician; and fo (as Mr. Warburton hinted to me) alludes to the old stories told of the Necromancers' defpair in their last moments, and the prayers of their friends for them. THEOB. & WARB. It is obferved of the Tempeft that its plan is regular. This I think an accidental effect of the story, not intended or regarded by the author. HOLT. & REVIS.* THE ADVENTURER, No. 93-97. A CRITICISM on THE TEMPEST, by Mr. WARTON. Irritat, mulcet, falfis terroribus implet Ut MAGUS; & modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis. HOR. To Thebes, to Athens, when he will, and where. POPE. WRITERS of a mixed character, that abound in transcendent beauties and grofs imperfections, are the most proper and moft pregnant fubjects for criticism. The regularity and correctnefs of a Virgil or Horace, almoft confine their commentators to perpetual panegyric, and afford them few opportunities of diverfifying their remarks by the detection of latent blemishes. For this reafon I am inclined to think, that a few observations on the writings of Shakespeare will not be deemed useless or unentertaining, because he exhibits more numerous examples and faults, of every kind, than are, perhaps, to be difcovered in any other author. I fhall, therefore, from time to time, examine his merit as a poet, without blind admiration, or wanton invective. As Shakespeare is sometimes blameable for the conduct of his fables, which have no unity; and fometimes for his diction, which is obfcure and turgid; fo his characteristical excellencies may poffibly be reduced to these three general heads: "His lively creative imagination; his strokes of nature and paffion; and his preservation of the confiftency of his characters." Thefe excellencies, particularly the laft, are of fo much importance in the drama, that they amply compenfate for his tranfgreffions against the rules of Time and Place, which being of a more mechanical nature, are often strictly observed by a genius of the lowest order; but to pourtray characters naturally, and to preserve them uniformly, requires fuch an intimate knowledge of the heart of man, and is fo rare a portion of felicity, as to have been enjoyed, perhaps, only by two writers, Homer and Shakespeare. Of all the plays of Shakespeare, the Tempeft is the most ftriking inftance of his creative power. He has there given the reins to his boundless imagination, and has carried the romantic, the wonderful, and the wild, to the most pleasing extravagance. The fcene is a defolate island, and the cha racters the most new and fingular that can well be conceived; a prince who practises magic, an attendant spirit, a monfter the son of a witch, and a young lady who had been brought to this folitude in her infancy, and had never beheld a man except her father. As I have affirmed that Shakespear's chief excellence is the confistence of his characters, I will exemplify the truth of this remark, by pointing out fome mafter-ftrokes of this nature in the drama before us. The poet artfully acquaints us, that Profpero is a magician, by the very first words which his daughter Miranda speaks to him: If by your art, my deareft father, you have Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them. Which intimate, that the tempeft described in the preceding fcene was the effect of Prospero's power. The manner in which he was driven from his dukedom of Milan, and landed afterwards on this folitary island, accompanied only by his daughter, is immediately introduced in a short and na tural narration. The offices of his attendant spirit, Ariel, are enumerated with amazing wildness of fancy, and yet with equal propriety: his employment is said to be, To tread the ooze Of the falt deep; To run upon the sharp wind of the north; to dive into the fire; to ride On the curl'd clouds In defcribing the place in which he has concealed the Neapolitan fhip, Ariel expreffes the fecrecy of its fituation by the following circumftance, which artfully glances at another of his fervices: In the deep nook, where once Thou call'dft me up at midnight, to fetch dew Ariel, being one of thofe elves or fpirits, "whose pastime is to make midnight mushrooms, and who rejoice to listen to the folemn curfew;" by whose affistance Prospero has "bedimm'd the fun at noon-tide," And 'twixt the green fea and the azur'd vault, Set roaring war ; has a fet of ideas and images peculiar to his ftation and office; a beauty of the fame kind with that which is so justly admired in the Adam of Milton, whofe manners and fentiments are all paradifaical. How delightfully and how fuitably to his character are the habitations and pastimes of this invifible Being pointed out in the following exquifite fong! Where the bee fucks, there lurk I; In a cowflip's bell I lie; There I couch when owls do cry. After fun-fet, merrily. Merrily, merrily fhall I live now Under the bloffom that hangs on the bough. Mr. Pope, whose imagination has been thought by fome the leaft of his excellencies, has, doubtlefs, conceived and carried on the machinery in his Rape of the Lock, with vaft exuberance of fancy. The images, cuftoms, and employments of his Sylphs, are exactly adapted to their natures, are peculiar and appropriated, are all, if I may be allowed the expreffion, fylphish. The enumeration of the punishments they were to undergo if they neglected their charge, would, on account of its poetry and propriety, and especially the mixture of oblique fatire, be fuperior to any circumftances in Shakespear's Ariel, if we could fuppofe Pope to have been unacquainted with the Tempeft, when he Into a cloven pine; within which rift A dozen years: within which space she dy'd, If thou more murmur'ft, I will rend an oak, For this, befure, to-night thou fhalt have cramps, As thick as honey-combs, each pinch more stinging If thou neglect'ft, or doft unwillingly What I command, I'll rack thee with old cramps; SHAKESPEARE. Whatever spirit, careless of his charge, POPE. The method which is taken to introduce Ferdinand to believe that his father was drowned in the late tempeft, is exceeding folemn and ftriking: he is fitting upon a folitary rock, and weeping, over-against the place where he ima |