whether one individual among all his readers will accept his arrangement, without material alteration. Will it be believed that this arrangement places Butler, with all his force of intellect, his wit, his vividness of description and his wide command of imagery, in the third, that is the lowest of the three classes of which Mason, Grainger, &c. are in the second, and Cowper is in the first, with Spenser, Milton, &c. &c.

Our author appears to us very sensible and equitable in his free censure of Johnson's extreme illiberality and injustice in his estimates of some of the poets, and of his almost equal deviation from rectitude of judgment on the favourable side in his praise of the poetry of Savage, which the public never has been and never will be persuaded to admit into its approved literature, though certainly the utterly worthless and disgusting character of the man, even as delineated by his partial friend, and in some measure apologist, has com bined with the indifference of his verses to provoke this total and irreversible rejection. Very justly too, Dr. Drake animadverts on the gross defect of judgment, more in the booksellers than in Johnson, though in some degree attributable to him also, in the selection of the poets whose lives he was engaged to write, that selection having admitted some names on inuch slighter claims than those which might have been made for others who are omitted.

In his observations on Johnson's labours in editing Shakespeare, he is led into a very pertinent remonstrance in the name of common sense, against the obstinate absurdity of editors in retaining among the great poet's performances, a number of dramas confessedly not his, and loaded too with the same bulk of annotations as the bard's own pieces.

Why in the name of common sense, should such plays as Titus Andronicus, and the First Part of Henry the Sixth, which are now clearly ascertained not to have a single sentence of Shakespeare in their composition, any longer be suffered to encumber and to enhance the price of his genuine productions? I would again enquire if any favour be conferred on the public by the insertion of plays among his works which were originally written by others, and which are in themselves truly contemptible; but have been attributed to Shakespeare merely because, in deference to the wretched taste of the times, he contributed to their illacquired popularity by the contribution of a score or two of lines or phrases? In this predicament stand Love's Labour Lost, the Comedy of Errors, and Pericles Prince of Tyre; productions which are a disgrace to the name of Shakespeare.' The originals of these miserable plays were, probably, according to the custom of the theatre at that period, placed by the manager in the hands of Shakespeare for the purpose of slight amendment; I call it slight, for, if from the first of these dramas about

fifty lines and the song at the close were withdrawn, nothing indicative of the genius of Shakespeare would remain. The Comedy of Errors, which has been partly taken, by some wretched playwright, from the Menæchmi of Plautus, is still more intolerably stupid." Vol. I. p.

392.

With regard to Johnson's artificial and too pompous stile, as displayed especially in the Rambler, it will easily be believed that Dr. Drake's censure of it is too forbearing, when it is found that his own words get into such positions relatively to one another as in the following instances; Of the poemata of Johnson, I know not that much can be said;'"No man than Johnson was a greater lover of truth.'-It would be well for authors to be reminded that time has now carried them too far away from under the mighty wing of Johnson to have any protection in the use of his dialect. And indeed we are very glad to see that our language is recovering fast from that temporary depravation which he and his imitators succeeded to a considerable extent in forcing upon it; at the same time that it will retain, we should hope, the benefit of that grammatical correctness, and that completeness in the organization of sentences, in which he so much surpassed all his predecessors. Notwithstanding, however, the too evident influence of this powerful and perverted style on that of Dr. Drake, he has retained a grammatical negligence which could not be pardoned, even if he had not bad the benefit of so perfect an example of grammatical accuracy.

Every candid reader will agree with our author in attribut ing some portion of Johnson's perpetual horror of death to his wretchedly morbid mental and corporeal constitution; but at the same time, supposing (if we are correct in sup posing) our author's opinion to be, that had his mind been less morbid it would have vanquished the fear of death on the ground of meritorious virtue, we own this would seem to us, after we have read Boswell's book, to imply no very high standard of morality in estimating his character, to say nothing of the erroneous theology. Surely no light share of culpability weighed on his conscience, and this powerfully combined with a melancholy temperament, to oppress a mind which had at the same time but very confused and unsatisfactory views of another, and the only ground on which death can rationally or safely be set at defiance. On this ground it is set at defiance by many of the very humblest persons on earth; and it must be owing to ignorance of such examples, as well as an inconsideration of a most essential article of the Christian faith, that Dr. D. can so easily and VOL. VIII. 4 I

positively pronounce, not only without any suspicion of error, but even without being apparently sensible of any thing gloomy and dismal in the assertion, that 'to be confident of acceptance hereafter would certainly be presumption.' Vol. I. p. 461.

We have not left ourselves space for any thing like an adequate notice of the long sequel of the work before us, and must be content to commend it strongly, in general terms, as a very entertaining miscellany of literary history and biography. The enumerated periodical works subsequent to. the Rambler amount to considerably more than a hundred; and the entire list, beginning with the Tatler, which commenced April 12th, 1709, and ending with the Burnisher, published at the end of 1801, comprizes no less than two hundred and twenty one. The works marked as most distinguished since the Rambler, are the Adventurer, the World, the Connoisseur, the Idler, the Mirror, the Lounger, the Ob server, and the Looker-On. In following down this train, in chronological order, though a period of half a century, with meritorious industry of research, and a pleasing vivacity of narration, our author has furnished a vast number of particulars which every reader will be glad to know, concerning a multitude of scholars, wits, and geniuses, of various magnitudes, some of whom have established themselves in permanent possession of the public knowledge and friendship, while others are likely to be indebted for any acquaintance or kindness they may recover and retain among us, much more to what has here been written by Dr. Drake, than to any thing they wrote or did themselves.

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Art. XII. Devout Meditations, from the Christian Oratory, by the Rev. Benjamin Bennet; with an Introduction on retired Devotion in general: abridged and newly arranged in four parts, with Memoirs of the Author, by S. Palmer. 12mo. pp. xxii. 345. Gale, Curtis and Fenner, 1812.

THE venerable author of this edition of Bennet's Christian Oratory

has already discovered his qualifications for this species of labour, by publishing several excellent devotional works, and abridgments, that have been very acceptable to the religious public. Of the present work, in its original state, Dr. Doddridge had said, It had been better had it been less; and the author confessed himself, in his preface, that he had exceeded all due bounds.' Mr. Palmer has corrected many inaccuracies, pared away excrescences, condensed parts that were by far too diffuse, transposed some paragraphs, and even sections, and, by prefixing to the whole a short but satisfactory account of Mr. Bennet's life and character, made a portable volume, which all Christians, who wish to cherish a de◄ votional spirit, will find it profitable to peruse.

Art. XIII. The substance of a Conversation with John Bellingham, the assassin of the late Right Hon. Spencer Perceval, on Sunday, May 17, 1812, the day previous to his execution: together with some general remarks. By Daniel Wilson, A. M. Minister of St. John's Chapel. Bedford Row; and Vice-Principal of St. Edmund Hall, Oxford. 8vo. pp. 60. Hatchard, 1812.

A Publication from this most excellent writer cannot fail of receiving a cordial welcome from all who have the slightest acquaintance with the few performances he has already given to the public; nor will the present very interesting pamphlet disappoint their expectations. The interview to which the title page refers took place, it appears, at the suggestion of a distinguished member of parliament, a friend of the late deeply lamented Chancellor of the Exchequer ; and was undertaken on the part of Mr. W. from a truly benevolent Christian anxiety to awaken the mind of the pri soner to a sane contemplation of the question at issue between his passions and his conscience. So effectually, however, had he submitted to the former the strong workings of his powerful mind, that the latter appeared to be nearly extinct within him, and the impressive and evangelical appeals of his visitor were either repelled, evaded, or more frequently admitted with a quiet apathy of assent, which shewed most clearly the unmoved depravity of his heart. It is not practicable to abridge a conversation, of which every part bore directly upon the awful state of the criminal. He was pressed forcibly, faithfully, and eloquently, by his excellent monitor; but he was uniformly insensible-ready in his answers-and singularly apt in his references to Scripture. The following passage will serve to convey some idea of the extraordinary disposition of the criminal, and the earnest endeavours of the preacher to awaken him to a sense of his guilt.

I thought it now proper, as every other mode of address had failed, and his last direful crime had been introduced, to turn the conversation towards it; and as I found he spoke on the subject with the same calm indifference and monstrous apathy as on the general topics of religion, I conceived I could not begin with any thing more calculated to soften him, than a most interesting and affecting circumstance with which I had been furnished the moment before I went to the prison. I accordingly told him I had an anecdote to relate to him, which was sufficient, I thought, to melt a heart of stone; and then read to him a letter, stating, that the afflicted Mrs. Perceval, with her orphan children, had knelt round the corpse of her murdered husband, and had put up earnest prayers to God for his murderer, "Thus," said I," while you, on a mere presumption of injury in your own mind, have assassinated a man who had never personally injured you, and whose amiable and benevolent character you cannot but acknowledge, his widowed partner, whose injuries from you are incalculably greater than any you can even pretend to have received from Mr. Perceval, has, in all the poignancy of her anguish, been offering up prayers to God on your behalf.'

As I was standing up to read the letter by a dimly burning candle

against the wall of the cell, my friend took particular notice of the murderer's countenance, and distinctly observed, that, on hearing this touching account, he hung down his head for an instant (for he had before been stedfastly looking at us), as though he was much affected. He soon however, resumed his former attitude, and said, as one recollecting himself, "This was a Christian spirit! she must be a good woman. Her conduct was more like a Christian's than my own, certainly" I cannot doubt that, though this answer was made nearly in his usual manner, and was in itself a proof of a deplorable impenitence, he was still at this instant convinced in his conscience of the abominable nature of his crime, and found some difficulty in suppressing the voice of truth.'

The comments which follow this statement are admirably appropriate. They are a kind of clinical lecture on a diseased heart. Indeed, this is, altogether, a remarkable and interesting document. It exhibits a singular instance of mental depravity, in a man whose talents, if rightly and perse veringly exerted, might make him respectable and happy; and yet in whose mild courtesy of manner, and tranquil, dignified demeanor, we seem rather to trace the conduct and character of the gentleman, than the desperate malignity of the assassin.

On a review of all the circumstances connected with this awful transaction, no doubt remains on our minds of the insanity of Bellingham-an insanity. however, which would not afford him any adequate defence at the public or the internal tribunal-an insanity induced and confirmed by: the indulgence of bad and malignant passions.

Art. XIV. Memoirs of the Caledonian Horticultural Society. No. I. 1812. 8vo. price 3s. Longman and Co.

THIS Society appears to have been originally instituted in 1809, in

imitation of the London Horticultural Society, the Earl of Dalkeith being appointed first president, and Sir James Hall, Dr. Rutherford, Dr. Coventry, and Mr. Hunter, vice-presidents. The members meet quarterly, for the purpose of reading communications, adjudging prizes, electing members, and of proposing a list both of the questions to be solved, and of the prizes for horticultural productions, suited to the seasons of the different meetings. As the utility to the public of such societies depends on the manner in which they are conducted, and their enquiries directed it is gratifying that there is no reason to apprehend the Caledonian Horticultural Society will prove a mere gooseberry show. the intention, we find, from Dr. Duncan's Discourse, at the Quarterly Meeting, December 3, 1811, of putting proposed improvements to the test of experiment; a caution which the fondness of projectors for the offspring of their own fancy renders highly necessary, before such a society can recommend them to general adoption.

It has

In the present number of the Society's memoirs, the two most important papers are, on the Disease in the Potato, but too well known by the name of the Curl; the former by Mr. T. Dickson, the latter by John Shirreff, Esq. Both admit the correctness of Mr. Knight's discovery,