or in the Medea such puppyism as Jason ne fit jamais de communes maitresses; Il est né seulement pour charmer des princelles. or in the Oedipus such extravagance as Periffe l'univers, pourvû que Dircé vive! Periffe le jour même avant qu'elle s'en prive! or in the Rodogune such Quixotifm as L'amour, l'amour doit vaincre, et la triste amitié

Ne doit etre à tous deux qu'un object de pitié. Un grand cœur cede un trone, et le cede avec gloire;

Cet effet de vertu couronne fa memoire :

Mais lorsq' un digne object a fû nous enfiam

II. When I read an epigram of Martial, fays Hume, the first line recalls the whole ; and I have no pleasure in repeating to my. felf what I know already; but each line, each word in Catullus bas its merit; and I am never tired with the perusal of him. This panegyric induced a reading of Catullus; the Elegy on a dead Sparrow, a few of the voluptuous odes, the Complaint of Atys, and the Vigil of Venus, gave high pleasure; but in general the poems have neither the grace, nor the neatness, nor the elegance of Anacreon or Horace; there is plenty of nastiness, and plenty of infipidity. So far from each line and each word having its merit, nearly half the complaint of Atys might be omitted with advantage; and in particular the image of Atys drumming is repeated fix times in a page. The ode to some superior who had proposed himself as a guest to the poet, beginning, Cœnabis vene, mi Fabulle, may be fuperior to Horace's Vile potabis modicis Sabinum, which had a fimilar provocation; but it is a very imperfect composition. The fi tibi din favent of the fecond line, if not an ex ictive, is an incivility. The fi tecum attuleris bonam atque magnam cænam is cold profe; the poet should have felected

the more pleasing component parts of a good and great fupper, and have presented fingly to the imagination the Ortolans and the Falernian, which he intended to have fet on. He does, indeed, ask, in anti-climax, for a girl and wine, and falt and laughter: if he means mineral falt, this substance is not enough pleating to the senses to become beautiful when described; if he means At tic-falt, this he ought himself to furnish: Catullus, fince he is not visited for his feast, is vifited for his converse. The bac fi, inquam, attuleris is a feeble tautological fentence, a repetition, in so short a poem, not excufable. And in return for the ex. acted entertainment, physical and intellectual, what does the poet promise? love and goodwill, and fome foft pomatum, belonging to his mistress, which was to make reviewer would laugh at a modern poet for fuch a compofition; yet this is a favourable specimen of Catullus.

Fabullus with himself all nose! How a

III. It is fufficient, says Hume, to run over Cowley once: but Parnel after the fiftieth reading is as fresh as at the first. Parnel writes, no doubt, with unaffected propriety, but, furely, with hacknied triviality. How little wit, vivacity, or in genuity is displayed in the attempt to mo, dernize the story of Pandora: and how absurdly, or unintelligibly, connected is the death of Hefiod. The tranflations are,

only, pretty well done. The night-piece, on Death, has been fuperfeded by Gray's Elegy. Edwin of the Green, and the Hermit, are still read: yet even there, how frequently are the epithets unpicturesque, and the conftructions ungrammatical! Parnel was the friend, the admirer, the studier, the imitater of Pope; but what in Pope is strong tea, is in Parnel colourless flop; he weakens by diffusion the fame flavour into maukishness.

SAYING OF HOEBES.

The fatirical faying is supposed to have originated with Hobbes, "That religion is a fuperftition in fashion; and fuperftition a religion out of fashion." For a political philofopher, the criterion is ill chofen; more in character would have been the definition: Religion is useful fuperftition, and fuperßition is useless religion.

DOUBTFUL SENTIMENT OF JEREMY

TAYLOR.

Those moralifts please me best, who take it for granted, that a benevolent God muft delight in the felicity of his creatures; who teach man to be happy in this world, in order to fit him for the next; and who maintain, with the poet, that to enjoy is to obey. Gratifications, which interfere, with the welfare of others, are, no doubt, to be forborne; but, benevolence and prudence permitting, it is, furely, as much a fin to lose an opportunity of doing oneself a pleafure, or to feize an opportunity of doing oneself a pan, as if any other fenfi tive being were in question. This was not the system of Bishop J remy Taylor; witness the follow ng remarkably beauti ful period: "He that takes off the yoke of obedience, and unties the bands of difcipline, and preaches a cheap religion, and presents heaven in the midst of flowers,

and strews carpets softer than the Afian luxury in the way, and fets the songs of Sion to the tunes of Perfian and lighter airs, and offers great liberty in bondage under affections and fins, and reconciles eternity with the present enjoyment, he shall have his schools filled with difciples: but, he that preaches the cross, and the severities of chriftianity, and the strictnesses of a holy life, shall have the lot of his bieffed Lord, he shall be thought ill of, and deserted."

ACCOUNT of THOMAS WILLIAMS MALKIN, a CHILD of extraordinary ATTAINMENTS, who lately died at HACK

I

NEY.

N

had occafion

a former Obituary we to notice the death of Thomas Williams Malkin, at the early age of fix years and nine months. The bare mention of fuch an event would, in an ordinary cafe, be deemed sufficient: but we cannot pass over a circumstance which equally arrests the attention of the moralift and the sympathy of the philanthropist, without obferving how fuddenly and unexpectedly the brightest profpecas vanish, h, which de. pend on the precarious tenure of human life, however bright and promiting the dawn of intellect-however encouraging the appearances of corporeal stability. With respect to the uncommon child whose early fate we have to lament, the extent of his attainments may excite furprize, and poffibly in fome minds doubt. Yet we have well-authenticated accounts of juvenile proficiency; and in the prefent inftance there are many and molt refpectable witnesses to attest, that amiable difpofitions and fuperior talents were never united in a more diftinguished manner, than in the fubject of this biographical sketch. His knowledge of the English language was correct and copious; and his expression, whether in fpeaking or writing, remarkable as well for fertility as selection. In the Latin he had proceeded fo far, as to read with ease the more popular parts of Cicero's works. He had made fome progress in French; and was so thorough a proficient in geography, as not only to be able, when questioned, to particularize the situation of the principal countries, cities, rivers, &c. but to draw maps from memory,

with a neatness and accuracy which would scarcely be credited but by those who are in poffeffion of the specimens. Without any professional afsistance, he had acquired considerable execution in the art of drawing; and fome of his copies from Raphael's heads, though wanting the precision of the Academy students, evinced a fellow-feeling with the stile and fentiment of the originals, which seemed likely, had he pursued it, to have ranked him with the more eminent profeffors of the art.

But the most striking feature in his character was a strength of intellect, and rapidity of comprehenfion on all fubjects, independent of those to which his studies were immediately directed, which, increasing with his growth, seemed likely in manhood to have placed more within his reach than it usually falls to the lot of humanity to grafp at. He united, in a remarkable manner, the folid and the brilliant; for the powers of his memory kept pace with those of his understanding and imagination; ande character of his character mind may be comprized in these few but comprehenfive words that he remembered whatever he had once known, and could do whatever he had once feen done. But it may not be uninteresting to par ticularize the periods of his short life, at which the leading traits of his character first presented themselves to observation. He was familiar with the alphabet long before he could speak, not only as exhibited on counters, a practice very judicious, because very enticing to children, but as expressed in books, to which, from feeing them constantly about him, he shewed a very early partiality. At the age of three years, on his birth-day, he wrote his first letter to his mother; and though it contained nothing but fort expreffions

Tta

pressions of affection, he foon afterwards began to write in a style and on fubjects to which childhood in general is a total stranger: and this practice of writing his sentiments on all subjects he persevered in with a continually increasing expanfion and improvement, both as to matter and manner, which we regret that our limits will not allow us to authenticate by fpecimens. At the time of which we are speaking, three years old, he could not only read and fspell with unfailing accuracy, but knew the Greek characters, and would have attempted the language, had not the caution of his parents, in this instance, discouraged the forwardness of his inclination. When he was five, he had made confiderable advances in Latin, as well as in all the other studies which he pursued fo fuccefsfully for nearly wo years longer. His study of Latin in particular was far removed from that mecha nical routine, by which scholars of more advanced age too frequently proceed. His comparison of the idiom and construction with those of his own and the French languages, his acuteness in tracing the etymology, and detecting the component parts of words, hunting them through English and French, and inquiring the forms they aflumed in Greek and Italian, with which he was unacquainted, proved him to have poffeffed a mind peculiarly calculated for philological inquiries. Nor was his attention confined to words: he never pafled over any passage, the style or fubject of which was obfcure or difficult, without fuch an explanation as fatisfied his doubts: nor did he ever fuffer errors of the prefs, even the trifling ones of punctuation, to escape, without detecting and correcting them with a pencil he kept for the purpose. Notwithstanding these stu dious inclinations, he was a child of manly corporeal structure, of unusual liveliness and activity. He was by no means grave in his difpofition, except in the purfuit of knowledge, from which, however, active fports were generally fuccessful in detaching him: but the bane of all improvement, both of mind and body, indolence, and the habit of lounging, were totally excluded from the catalogue of his plenfures.

draw as much as he pleased, he faid, "I wish to morrow would come directly." After a short pause, he added, "Where can to-morrow be now? It must be fomewhere; for every thing is in fome place." After a little further reflection, he said, "Perhaps to-morrow is in the fun." On meeting with the following aphorifm: "Learning is not so much efteemed by wife men, as it is despised by fools;" he said: "I think the perfon who wrote that fentence was himself very foolish; for wife men esteem learning as much as possible, and fools cannot despise it more."

But the most fingular instance in which he displayed fertility of imagination, united with the power of making every thing he met with in books and converfation his own, was his invention of an imaginary country called Allestone, of which he confidered himself as king. It resembled Utopia, though he had never heard of that celebrated political Romance. Of this country he wrote the history, and drew a most curious and ingenious map, giving names of his own invention to the principal cities, mountains, rivers, &c. And as learning was always the object of his highest respect, he endowed it most liberally with universities, to which he appointed profeffors by name, with numerous statures and regulations, which would have reflected no disgrace on graver foun. ders.

But though in the progress of his short life he was continually employed in lay. ing up ftores of knowledge, apparently for purposes which, the event proved, were never to be fulfilled; his last illness, which he supported with a patience and fortitude almost unexampled, amply evinced that he knew how to apply the treasures he had acquired to the folace and relief of his own mind, under circumstances of trial and fuffering. He frequently beguiled the tedious hours of a fick-bed with the recollection of what he had read, feen, or done, in the days of health: and little points of intereft or information, which might have been supposed to have made a tranfient impreffion, were as much present to his mind as when they first engaged his attention. When a blifter had been applied to his stomach, he observed, that from the appearance of it he supposed it correfponded with what he had feen called a cataplafm: and one day, when he was at the woift, he defired to know the meaning of the phrase "a ftill-born child," which he had once seen in an infcription remembering. He often talked of the period of his recovery, but never with impatience; and the triumph of mind over body continued to complete to the laft, that he looked with interest and pleasure at his dissected maps within half an hour of his diffolution. Without entering with unneceffary minuteness into the nature of his disorder, it will be interesting to parents in general to be informed, that it afforded no confirmation of the common idea, that early expansion of intellect is unfavourable to the continuance of life. In consequence of the remarkable form of his head, which had been much admired, especially by artists, some doubts had been fuggefted, that rendered it defirable to have the head as well as body examined. From the result of this investigation it appeared, that the brain was unusually large, and in the most perfect and healthy ftate: that the disorder, as it was uniformly confidered to have been, was in the stomach, and had received all the relief that medical skill and the most anxious at tention could afford and that there was more than ordinary probability, from the vigour of his conftitution, and the wellproportioned formation of his body, of his arriving at manhood, but for one of those accidents in the system, to which the old and young, the healthy and infirm, are equally exposed.

His illness lasted from the first to the thirty-first of July; a period which, under such severe fufferings, none but a naturally ftrong patient could have reached. On the morning of the thirty first his medical friends, Dr. Lifter and Mr. Toulmin, faw him, and converfed with him, as he with them, after their ufual manner: and though they had given little or no encouragement for many days, they

did not, on their last visit, fuch was the collected state of his mind, and strength of his spirits, apprehend his dissolution to be so near. Soon after eleven o'clock he ap. peared much exhausted; his breathing became very difficult, and his voice, which through his illness had been strong and clear, began to falter. Still, however, he was firm and compofed, wi hout the flightest appearance of diffatisfaction or alarm: he talked at intervals with the most perfect confiftency with his accuftomed powers, and usual kindness for those about him, till he could no longer utter a found. In a few minutes after he had ceased to articulate, and a little before twelve o'clock, he funk without a struggle or a groan, exciting more admiration under circumstances from which human nature is apt to revolt, than when in the full career of mental and bodily improve

ment.

Thus ends this short history of a child, whose mind, though his years were few, seemed to have arrived at maturity. His powers of understanding, of memory, of imagination, were all remarkable; and the reafonableness of his mind was such, that he always yielded his own to the wishes of his friends, as much from conviction as compliance: his difpofitions were as generous and amiable, as his talents were brilliant and universal; and there can be little doubt, that in after-life, whether he had devoted the powers of his nend to the fine arts, to belles-lettres, or to the feverer studies, his success would have been pre-eminent, and would have placed him, in the estimation of the wife, whatever might have been his external condition, high in the catalogue of worthy and useful members of fociety.

Reading. Singing. A Pair of Prints. Maria Spilfoury pinxit. Charles Turner sculpfit.

W

E have had painters, and those of no mean reputation, who, instead of attempting to give that expression which arrests the foul-instead of giving mind to their characters, and lighting up the features with the spirit which should animate their hearts, have aimed at daz

or

zling the eye with a glare of drapery, and preposterous inundation of light; forgetting that colouring, without character drawing, is imagination without judgment. Very different has been the aim of the young Lady who made these two designs, which augur great future excellence. In fome little points the drawing is incorrect; but they are conceived with truth, taste, feeling,

feeling, and delicacy. They represent two ruftic families engaged in their devotional exercises, and reminded us of that admirable poem by Robert Burns-"The Cotter's Saturday Night." The young man reading, in the first, exhibits a countenance of peculiar interest. In it are united innocence, fimplicity, and devotion; and the faces of the rest of this happy family are marked with mute attention, internal cheerfulness, and religious comfort. The other fubject is an old man, who has just left off reading in the Bible to fing a pfalm, his whole family joining with him in chorus. With these two prints we are much better pleased than we have been with many that amateurs would place in a very fuperior class. An inexpreffible Sweetness and gentleness of conception pervades the whole. The devotion of these two ruftic families is marked by that general unaffe@ed fimplicity which diftinguishes genuine piety, and feems to be the emanation of gratitude, rather than the compulfion of duty; every countenance and every attitude contributes to impress this idea.

The Favourite Lamb; and Going to the HayIvetfon pinxit.

field. A Pair of Prints. Gerimia fculpt.

The late Horace Walpole remarked that Watteau's pictures displayed a kind of imp. ffible pastoral, a rural life led by those oppofites of rural fimplicity, people of fashion. His shepherdeffes, nay, his very theep, are coquettes. Watteau's trees are copied from those of the Tuilleries and villas near Paris-a strange scene to study nature in; but there were the originals of those tufts of plumes, and fans, and trimmed-up groves, that nod to one another like the scenes of an opera. Fantastic people! who range and fashion their trees, and teach them to hold up their heads as a dancing-mater would, if he expected Orpheus should return to play a minuet to

them.

That men who take such models, should make fuch designs, is not to be wondered at; but that the inhabitants of an island so diversified with the amenities of nature as Great Britain, should fo frequent ly disgust the eye of taste with fuch fantaftic fopperies, is astonishing. We have been often compelled to notice the terdency fome of our artists (who have merit, if they properly applied it) display to this frippery French manner, which may not improperly be denominated the land

scape a-la-mode. This pair of prints is well enough engraved in the chalk man

ner.

His Royal Highness Prince William Frederick. Sir William Beechey, R. A. pinxit. Thomas Hardy Sculpt.

Of Sir William Beechey's portraits it is not easy to speak in higher terms than they deserve. The artist is faithful to character, and his portraits are usually in a very good taste, and have an eafy and natural air. This comes into the class of his other delineations, and is very well engraved.

The House in Portman-square of His Excellency L. G. Otto, Minister Plenipotentiary from the French Republic, as it appeared on the Night of the General Illumination for Peace, May 29th, 1802; most respectfully inscribed to His Excellency, by bis most obedient bumble Ser vant Auguflus Pugen. J. C. Stadler aque tint. Sculpt.

For fireworks and illuminations the French have always had a pre-eminence over every other country. The magnifique and blazing exhibition of which this is a copy, excited great attention at the time it was displayed. As far as we recollect, this is a correct reprefentation of the general effect, and infinitely fuperior. to any print of the kind we ever faw.Perhaps, on the whole, it is as well as the fubject would poffibly admit.

The TRANSIT, a new-constructed vefsel with four mafts, invented and built by Captain Gower, is now in the Mediterranean, and gives perfect fatisfaction to the proprietors. Mr. Jeakes is engraving a very fine print of it, from a picture painted by Holkham, and, from its present appearance, we think it will very much excite the attention of the amateurs of shipbuilding.

Mr. Gilray, who has a larger portion of the mantle of William Hogarth than has often fallen to the lot of any other man, haslately exhibited fome fingular fatires on the crop of absurdities which are now fo abundant. This gentleman aims at delineating character a little heightened, and he generally fucceeds. The productions of fome of his contemporaries are coarfe and vulgar caricature. In one of his portraits of a gentleman of high rank, he does not thew a feature of the face; but the outline and air is fo correct, that whoever has seen the man, must know the mirror. Paris, where are now concentrated many of the fine specimens of ancient art