lic fociety, but to be ever ready, according to our rank, to act either the magistrate or the private citizen: that their apathy was no more than a freedom from perturbation, from irrational and exceffive agitations of the foul: and confequently that the strange apathy, commonly laid to their charge, and in the demolishing of which there have been fo many triumphs, was an imaginary apathy, for which they were no way accountable." 26. LOVE, HOPE, and Joy, fair PLEASURE's smiling train, HATE, FEAR, and GRIEF, the family of PAIN. THIS beautiful group of allegorical perfonages, fo ftrongly contrafted, how do they act? The profopopeia is unfortunately dropped, and the metaphor changed immediately in the fucceeding lines. These mix'd with art, and to due bounds confin'd, Make, and maintain the balance of the mind *. 27. On different fenfes different objects ftrike +. A didactic poet who has happily indulged himself in bolder flights of enthu • Ver. 120. G4 + Ver. 127. fiafm, fiafm, fupported by a more figurative stile, than our author used, has thus nobly illuftrated this very doctrine. Diff'rent minds Incline to diff'rent objects: one pursues, And gentlest beauty. Hence when lightning fires All on the margin of fome flow'ry stream We have here a friking example of that poetic fpirit, that harmonious, and varied verfification, and that strength of imagery, which confpire to excite our admiration of this beautiful poem*. 28. Proud of an easy conqueft all along, She but removes weak paffions for the strong †. • The Pleasures of Imagination, Book iii. v. 546. + Ver, 157. THIS THIS is from the Duke de la Rochefoucault. Whenever we get the better of our paffions it is more owing to their weakness than our own strength. And again, there is in the heart of man a perpetual fucceffion of paffions, infomuch that the ruin of one is always the rife of another*. 29. Let pow'r, or knowledge, gold or glory, please, Or oft more ftrong than all, the love of case †. An acute observation plainly taken from La Rochefoucault. " "Tis a mistake to believe that none but the violent paffions, fuch as ambition and love, are able to triumph over the other paffions. Laziness, as languid as it is, often gets the mastery of them all, ufurps over all the designs and actions of life, and infenfibly confumes, and destroys both paffions and virtues ‡.” 30. Virtuous and vicious ev'ry man muft be, Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree: • Max. x. † Max. CCLXVI. + Ver. 170. § Ver. 233. A fine A fine reflection, and calculated to fubdue that petulant contempt and unmerited averfion which men too generally entertain against each other, and which diminish and destroy the focial affections. Our emulation, fays one of the best-natured philofophers, our jealoufy or envy, should be restrained in a great measure, by a constant refolution of bearing always in our minds the lovely fide of every character *. The compleatly evil are as rare as the perfectly virtuous, there is fomething amiable almost in every one, as Plato obferves in his Phædon. THIS charitable doctrine of putting candid conftructions on those actions that ap Hutchefon's Nature and Conduct of the Paffions, p. 190. Ο ουν αδελφος εαν αδικη εντευθεν αυτο κ λαμβάνης, ότι αδικει αύτη γαρ λαβη εςιν αυτε ο φορητη αλλ' εκείθεν μάλλον, ότι αδελφός, ότι συντροφος. See Epicteti Enchiridion, alfo. Many leffons on this useful species of humanity, tending to foften the difgust that arises from a prospect of the abfurdity and wickedness of human nature, are to be found in Marcus Antoninus; and many noble Precepts in the New Teftament rightly understood have the fame tendency, but are delivered with more dignity and force, and demand certainly a deeper attention and more implicit regard. pear pear most blameable, nay, most deteftable and most deformed, is illuftrated and enforced with great strength of argument and benevolence by KING, in his fifth chapter on the origin of evil; where he endeavours to evince the prevalence of moral good in the world, and teaches us to make due allowances for mens follies and vices. 31. What crops of wit, and honefty appear, Au Cid perfecuté Cinna doit sa naissance, 32. Heav'n forming each on other to depend, A mafter, or a fervant, or a friend, Bids each on other for affistance call, 'Till one man's weakness grows the ftrength of all. IT • See also to this purpose a sensible paffage in Hutchefon's Conduct of the Paffions, pag. 183. + Ver. 185. + Boileau, Epiftre vii. a M. Racine, pag. 57 "In rerum fyftemate vel optimè conftituto, debent effe diverfa animantium genera fuperiora, et inferiora, ut locus |