ed, by a law which gave birth to what is called the middle comedy, and which provided that no man's name should be mentioned on the stage, under severe penalties; and public censors were appointed to make reports of all who should offend in this particular.

But it unfortunately happens, that when abuses are found profitable, or gratifying to human malignity, art and chicanery are exerted to cover them, notwithstanding any law which can be made to the contrary. Thus the poets of those times were not long in finding out the secret of defeating this regulation, by attaching fictitious names to well-known and real characters: so that now they had the superior advantage of giving a more exquisite gratification to their own vanity, and the malice of the spectators; by affording to the former the pleasure of imposing upon the latter the task of discovering the real individuals pourtrayed by the different personages which passed in review before them.

When pictures so much resemble their originals that the names are unnecessary,

nobody inscribes them. The consequence of this law, therefore, was merely to cause that to be done with some delicacy, which before was done more grossly; and the art which it was intended to confine within the limits of propriety, was still transgressed, but with more ingenuity.

Before our entering into the merits of Foote as a dramatic writer, it will be necessary to discuss how far he was justifiable in adopting this particular species of the drama, and whether the practice is reconcilable to the rules of justice and the genuine laws of comedy.

The advocates for this personal satire (and in this number must be included almost all those who have touched upon the life and character of Foote) urge, "that when hypocrisy and dissimulation would insidiously contaminate the principles of mankind, it is but doing justice to the world to withdraw the mask, and expose to public view the natural features in all their distortions and deformities: or when affectation and singularity overcloud the more valuable parts of characters, which, divested of these foi

bles, might claim additional value and respect in society, it is themselves alone who act the ridiculous part; and it should be deemed rather an act of kindness both to them and their friends, to set up such a mirror before them, as would give them the hint and opportunity of correction. In a word," say they, "if a Sir Penurious Trifle, a Peter Paragraph, and a Cadwallader, have ever had their prototypes in real life, let them keep their own secret, and reform their respective follies: nor can we help being of opinion, that an author of this kind is, in some respects, more useful to the age in which he lives, than he who only ranges abroad in the various scenes of life for general character."

On the other hand, and with much more reason, many who readily agree as to the necessity and uses of reforming the vices. and follies of mankind, yet totally differ about the means. In every well regulated government men give up a certain part of their rights in order to form that subordination and discipline by which the society is held together, and without which all

would be lawless confusion. Now if every man who thinks he has abilities and candour for the office of a reformer, undertakes to correct his neighbour's vices and follies, he assumes an actual part in the government of the country with which he is not entrusted; and being in this under the sanction or direction of no specific law as to the execution of such an office, he finds himself at liberty to act according to the arbitrary dictates of his own malice, his interest, or his mistaken good intentions.

To this it is no answer to say, that " as the law takes no particular cognizance of these subjects, individuals may, in so doing, produce benefit to society:" most certainly they may not: for though the law, for wise and salutary purposes, is silent in attaching punishments to some things not strictly moral, or suppressing others that may be merely ridiculous, yet it will punish men who merely by their own authority usurp this office; whenever the parties attacked can prove their injuries in point of fortune, character, peace of mind, or any other respect.

But to come more immediately to the case in point before us,-how, in reality, did our author, with all his wit, judgment, and knowledge of the world, either benefit the age he lived in, or reform the individual, by the few instances which he has left us of his strong personal satire? Why, in one example, by ridiculing a very virtuous man, because he had the misfortune of losing a leg? in another, by trampling on the laws of friendship and hospitality, in order to expose a respectable individual, merely because he laboured under some personal defects, or might have a little too much family pride? and in a third, by attacking a woman already under a criminal prosecution, and opening a side-battery of ridicule upon her private follies and vices?

If the advocates for this kind of satire are not satisfied with modern instances, let us. trace it back to its fountain-head, and there we shall see it in its very source as foul as its remotest currents. History informs us, that its original introduction, far from mending the morals of the Athenians, operated quite the reverse; for the poets, finding