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that of his wiso Daedalis i Sho is lockod in her long-lost satho sarmsi Gripus Leeps up a running comment, With many aruosul malison upon himself and others. Nothing can be more lati able than the turiis he gives to every rem k and incident. The bag and chost taken Dona him, he thinks that nothing belloris toti sor him than to go home and hang himself privately,-buton reconsideration, he adds, for a litile While, untii I got ovorthis vexation. Here ali Ahould have been concludod with tho just additions that Gripus be nee and Labrax punished: Pleusidippus be married, and perhaps Ampelisca piar Osr With tho ood Trachalio. But the action tollers for the purpose of verbal conceiis put into Trachalio, mouth, Who at once becomes adraWleros one Word or one sentence, Unlike any thing he hashithorto prouod himself to be. The fortunate lover is justseen in his Way to the home of Palaestra. But though Hl thointerest is exhausted, and ali the materials should noW have been Worked up, the Fifth Act Rulo, of whicli tho Grooks
Neve minor, neu sit quinto productior actu Fabula, quae posci vult, et spectata reponi. '
The execrable Labrax, on Whom the thunderblast should havo Struch, appears at the beginning of the last Act, deploring that the veritici has gone against hini, but coniserting himself that stili the other Woman was his property. Retiring a litile, Gripus ad vinces still Weeping for his bag, and threateninganother sulcide. The leno Overhears, and matters are quicklyeXplained. Gripus promises to produce it on the pledge, sanctified into an oath, that he shali obtain sor it a talent. The higgling of the parties is jocose enough. DaemoneS gene- rotasty gives Up the treasure. LabraX assecis an equat gen rosi ty in resigning his davgliter, Whom the laW had set Deo. Ho thon multos light of his Oath to Gripus and refuses thotalent. But Daemones noW proiecis his flave. What Wasdue to a flave Was a debl to his master. He urges ii as his demand. But Gripus Wanis to receive it himself. The wholo
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concludes With the remission of half the talent for the Doedom of Ampelisca, and by Daemones Pocketing the other fortho liboration of his flave. Labrax fares better than Gripus,and, Wonderful to relate, Daemones, the aggrieved fallier, theirritated proprietor, invites the purioiner of his child, and thostave whose head he has been threatening to breali sor tho lasthalf hour, to talio supper with him lI had intondod to divaricato a play or tWo of Terence: but our limits sorbid. His style and dialogue are more bUoyant and sprightly than those of Plautus: and he is a more generat favourite. He is preserred sor his hi ser and nobior sentiments. Others may think disserent ly, hoWever, concerning this particular plea. The language of Chremes in the Heautontimorumenos is admired and repeatod far and wide: ερ Homo sum: humani nihil a me alienum puto.'' But scarcely inferioris the passage in the Trinummus of Plautus, whoro Philto SVs to Lesbonicus. Who thinh s he is deriding his titio :
Homo ego sum: homo tu est ita me amabet Iupiter lNeque te derisum veni, neque dignum puto.
The flave, too, in Plautus, eXcites more pity than those of Tereiice. The Davus' and Syrus' and Getae, do not aWahen soacute a commiSeration. Who does not sympathise With Syra in the Μercator p
Dorippa: Quid oneris 3 Sy r Annos octoginta et quatuor et Et eodem accedic servitus lV
Strobilus, also, in the Aulularia, spealis to eVery heart -- omnes Natura parit liberos, Et omnes libertati natura Student. Omni malo, omni exitio, prior Servitus. Et quem Iupiter odit, servum hunc primum facit.
It is an extraordinary transition Which We must noW maheto a distant country and people, and to an unrivalled genius trained up among them. When Aristophanes convulsed Athensmitti laughter, When the Ne Comedy of Attica walhed thostage With a more gracemi Step,-When Plautus and Tereiice
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transplanted and acclimated this second species into Rome, and delighted patrician and vulgar eyes and ears,-Who Were theoccupants of this land, the inhabitants of this country Θ Who-eVer may have been our ancestors, their history is tost amorigitiose mighty and mysterious emigrations which brohe Dom timoto time, out of the norit, and east, and spread over this portionos the worid. Our nation, composed of the most opposite miX- tures, Was not consolidaled then, nor had developed iis character. Our language, Whicli noW contains such stores of knowledge and literature, and whicli is now the chosen voice of Deedom and religion, had not then a structure or exiStence. That banner,
of the most perfeci description. They are supernatural Without being utinaturai. In the former ESSU We considered his apparitions froni tho dead. The ghost of Darius in the Perstans of Eschylus,-and the ghost os Polydorus in the Hecuba os Euri pides -were compared With the Phantom of the Royal Dano. Wo also dwelt upon the beldame Sorceries of Μacbeth, and folithat nothing could bo assimilated to those Wild appalling incantatioris. But there is a merry Speil Whicli our enchanter caninvoke. Sprite and lairy revel in the circle of his Wand. Cloudsof elves come sporting to his bidding. Ariel, that creature of
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to possess and use the machinery these imaginary beings gavehim, whicli ho could do Without one intrusion os a profaneor jarring thought,-than the ancient Writers who had nothingbetWeen Olympus and the worid, and brought their very deitiesto breali j okes for them on the sceno i Hesides what We haveseen in the Frogs, Aristophanes brings forward Plutus as a principes actor in another play, Which bears indeed his name. Minerva takes part in the Rhesus of Euripides, and Neptune in his Troades. In the Amphitruon os Plautus, Μercvry,
declaring himself to be a god in the prologue, takes his regulardialogiae in the piece; and actualty Iupiter, after a place in
the scene, appears in the last act in character and Winds up theplot. It sussiced for our poet to select his invisibie agenis Domthe muShroom-t te, and the ringi et-tust : and though in the Tempest he introduces the Pagan deities, it is in a masque,
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comedy. We laugh, but we are angry that We can. Horror more frequently shalles us. The conception is So Strange, So
cries ring among iis rocks, his misshapen feet imprint their tracetapon iis sands, he haunis iis caves. Deformed in figure and Dature, he is an abortion of humanity, borroWing a disguise Dom the sea. His arnis are sitis, his pores are Scales, his nailsare claWs, his Det are Webs. His mollier Was SycoraX, thewitch of Africa, and lis is the fruit of her fovi commerce Withsomo sond of holl. He rises like a gnome besore US, Vile, Unnaturat, disgusting. Ηe is the grotesque of evit. Such a creature should have dwelt alone, like a monster in iis den, or a reptile in iis roch. Prospero finiis him sciscoly distinguishable om tho lowest bruto. He could articulate no speech. He Nould gabbl0. ' Ho must bE stroked. Yet he could remember some of the spelis of his banished parent. Thero
Were capacities, ulso, sor a mental devel opinent. He could
Ηρ is keenly sensibi e to every jest raised against his person and importance. Ηe is Stung by any ridicule thrown upon him :
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He is provoked by his presumed Wrongs into no independence. Sensual as malignant, the botile of Stephano purchases his service. Ηe looks up to him as his god. The question then is, What is the morat of this conception 8 It is dolabiless to fhowin - - this thing of darkness, the conquest and OVerpoWering ofa struggling intellect by licentious and truculent passions,-that in this effect the aWAening mind of the demon lapses in to thogross carnality of the beast. Any additiones vice tonds but
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accompanies his fine delineation. He held in deo devotion male simplicity and worth. Is his story should requiro him
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to hoighten our admiration ; and many a perilous chance, more frightful than the storm Whicli ine narroWly eScaped. Herimprudent disguise hecomes her coat of mail.-The Princessand the three dames of France Engage in a critical eXpedition,
in this fort. Where Woman has somo sauit, Without ulter aban-donment, he loves to redeem her. Who does not admire Emilia Whon her honest indignation buriis against the traducers of hermistross 8 And even in higher characters is the fame chivalrous display. Constance, the braWl, is largoiten and sorgiven in Constance, Arthur's mollier. Beatrice, the Lady Disdian, becomestrue and nobis in repelling the foui standers atmed against Hero. But how disserent is the conception of the semiae character intho classical Conisedyl How osten are iis grossest fornis introduced on the Roman scenet How loW an opinion would beformed of the bovy of Athonian lair ones, froin the descriptions of Aristophanes in his Thesmophoriagousai and Ecclesiagousai l But is Socrates could converse Willi Theodota, as Xenophon represenis him, litile can We exaggerate the condition os public morais, and stili tess blamo tho dramatist Who had to potirix them in his representations l
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and then promises as a moralist, on the condition he may
of this species, the Fool in Lear is the most touching
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instance. He quite divides the pathos of the scene. Thoughit might subjeci me to the charge of misnomer and Solecism, I must consider that he comes more Within the tragic categorythan the humorous. He stands almost alone in the palace, whoro irascibio land old ago holds iis Deble sceptre, incap te ofhousAold and royal sWay.