A CONCE

CONCERN for the literary reputation of our country is one of the leaft fufpicious forms, in which true patriotifm difplays itfelf. Whoever feels this concern will not take up a poetical volume, the production of his fellow citi zen, but with livelieft emotions. Our country has its character to form. We are yet in our literary infancy, juft «lifping in numbers," juft preffing, with faint and faultering voice, our new and doubtful claim to literature and science. Terrible Tractoration has therefore been read with peculiar intereft, and the general fentiment will warrant us in faying, with equal fatisfaction.

In commending CHRISTOPHER CAUSTIC, we are only fubfcribing to the opinions, expreffed by the people of another country. To be behind that country in our appreciation of his merits were a ftigma; it is very pardonable to go beyond it. National vanity may be a folly; but national in gratitude is a crime. Terrible Tractoration was fuccefsful in England on its first appearance, and as yet feems to have loft none of its popularity. It belongs to Vol. II. No. 4. Y

that clafs of productions, which have the good fortune to escape what Johnfon angrily, but too juftly, denominates "the general confpiracy of human nature againft contemporary merit." It has already been re-printed a fecond time; the impreffion which is read in Bofton being a revifed and corrected copy of the fecond London edition. The occafion of the work feems to have been accidental, and its defign, originally, nothing more than to ridicule the overglowing zeal, with which certain English phyficians perfecuted the reputation of Perkins' metallick tractors. But the work grew beneath the author's hand. He found that Quackery was not confined to Medicine. He traced it with his eye, and followed it with his fcourge, into the regions of Philofophy, Natural History, Politicks, Morality, and Poetry; till, in the end, a fcanty newfpaper effay grew to be a volume of fatire, on various fubjects. In the profecution of his views the author has confined himself to legitimate means. While pursuing humorous affociations he never grows intemperate, immoral, or inde

corous. On this point he is entitled to every commendation. His wit is neither embittered with the malice of Pindar, nor corrupted with the fenfuality of Moore.* The first canto, and that to which all particular remarks in this paper are confined, is entitled OURSELF!-and is, what it fhould be, a neat and compact defcription of the defign of the canto. As a fair fpecimen of the author's manner, we tranfcribe the eight first lines, which are neither the best nor the worst

to be found in it.

The writer forefees that he fhall be charged with puritanism, for objecting to the delicious verfes of the Tranflator of Anacreon. Be it fo. In his opinion the author, who cannot please, without endangering the morals of his readers, had better study ethicks, than write poetry. On the restraints which youth, with infinite pains, imposes on its paffions, Mr. M. breathes the effufions of licentious ingenuity, and they diffolve like fcorched flax. The aflociation of impure, unhallowed fentinents, with the enchanting power of genius and poetry, is one of the most fatal poffible combinations against human happiness.

Grown giddy himfelf by this inhalation, he chooses to confider the poetical giddinefs of Southey as produced by the fame caufe; thence exculpating Apollo from having any thafe in the infpiration of that poet.

In the following ftanza the author contrives to compliment himfelf, by a pretty fuccefsful play upon words; a fpecies of wit, at which an unfortunate attempt creates great disgust.

But Beddoes fays that I am nervous,
How thefe confounded gaffes ferve us!
And that this oxyd gas of nitre
Is bad for fuch a nervous writer!

Dr. Anderfon, in the "Recreations in Agriculture and Natural Hiftory," had faid with great "that the mathematician gravity, can demonftrate with the most decifive certainty, that no fly can alight on this globe which we ininhabit without communicating motion to it." This important difcovery, and others of the fame learned Doctor, are very properly ridiculed.

-Could tell how far a careless fly Might chance to turn this globe awry, If flitting round, in giddy circuit, With leg or wing, he kick or jerk it.

The follies which difgrace the affected lovers of natural history receive no small fhare of Cauftic's derifion. It is indeed time, high time that they were hooted from fociety, loaded with the reprobation and contempt of every man of fenfe. Among the crowds of men there is no one more defpicable, than he who thinks it an object to rear a race of rabbits with one ear; unlefs it be another, who laments the extinction of a breed of dogs with three legs.

The whimfies of St. Pierre, the deiftical and atheistical fpeculations of Darwin, that herefiarch in poetry and philofophy, and the fooleries of William Godwin, are affaulted in the canto with much fpirit and fuccefs. There are two schools in religion and literature, as well as in politicks. It is gratifying to the difciples of the old, that the author of Tractoration displays wit, and fenfe, and poetry on its fide, against the pride and the folly, the ridicule and the ribaldry, the pitiable ignorance and the hateful malignity of philofophifts, deifts, atheifts, and reformers. He believes that the harvest of infidelity and French Philofophifm is forrow and delufion; that they who fow the wind, fhall thereof reap the whirlwind.

The verfification of the firft canto is uncommonly harmonious. It might be difficult to felect, from the fame compass of Hudibraftick poetry, more unexceptionable lines. To fome of the rhymes, however, aftute criticiẩm might object. Defcription is made to rhyme with fubfcription; problematic with fymtomatic; elated with inoculated. In these cafes, the two last fyllables of the words, and thofe which form the rhyme, are not only fimilar in found, but precisely the fame. Such rhymes may have precedents in books of authority, and in long works it may be difficult to avoid them; but to the ear of the writer of this article they give no delight; and, as no poetry can be neutral, they of courfe difpleafe. Johnfon objects to one of the epitaphs of Pope, that light is made to rhyme with night,

Nor can I fay that I receive pleafure from rhymes, when the correfponding founds are farther from the end of the line than the penult fyllable. Therefore, when electricity chimes with duplicity, propriety with fociety, utility with perfectibility, the pleasure arifing from fimilarity of founds is destroyed. In heroicks the rule imperiously fixes the rhyme to the last fyllable. In Hudibrafticks, a poet's licenfe will permit him to vibrate be tween the final and the penult. This, it may be faid, is catching at fmall or doubtful errours. it fo. But unless we can give form and fubftance to thefe, we fhall ceafe to be the author's critick, and become his eulogift.

Be

If Terrible Tractoration be confidered a fatire, it is formed rather after the example of Horace, than of Juvenal and Pope. There are exceptions, but as a general rule it may be faid to be rather a laugh at the follies, than a cenforious reproof of the vices of mankind. To the first canto this obfervation applies ftrictly. All is gay, pleafant, and playful. There is no angry fatire in the poetry, no indignant declamation in the notes.

In point of scholarship, the author appears not to be deficient. In the phrafeology of Burnet, he has "laid out his learning with as much fuccefs as he laid it in."

On opening the book one is reminded of the elegant alliterative metaphor of Sheridan, "a neat rivulet of text murmuring through a meadow of margin." This is certainly matter of queftionable propriety, but it is the tafte of the times. Modern poets determine to be their own commentators,