tranfplants, or the philofopher whofe inference he impreffes. Allufions to the claffical pages of any period are always gratifying; for the reputation of diftinguifhed writers being in this cafe affociated with their expreffions, the inherent effect of thefe is thus ftrengthened :-but allufions to fecondary authors, known only from circumftances, appear pedantic as foon as their notoriety expires; and very many fuch occur amid the inlaid phrases of WIELAND. He has been charged with inculcating religious opinions verging on a hopeless epicurifm, and is juttly reprehenfible for the frequent introduction of fcenery licentiously voluptuous. To borrow the words of a foreign critic: "On retrouve chez lui les idées grivoifes de Crebillon les plaifanteries de Hamilton. Il vous fait e cadrer dans fa mofarque les plus beaux vers de Colardeau, de Pezay, de orat, & il fe donne par fois un air de fageffe qui grouppe à merveille avec ces images libertines. On l'appelle le Petrone du Nord, mais il a bien plus de gout & de fineffe. On cache fon livre aux demoiselles, qui ont grand foin de le favoir par coeur.

Among the writers who have moft fenfibly contributed to tinge the mind of WIELAND with its peculiar hues, and of whofe perufal the most frequent traces occur in his compofitions, may be numbered Lucian, whom he has tranflated in a manner only to be compared with that of Belin de la Ballue ;-Horace, whofe epiftle to the Pifos he has rendered with not lefs felicity than Mr. Colman ;-and the younger Crebillon, the delicacy of whofe pencil is no apology for its extreme lafciviousness.

Forty-five years have now elapfed fince WIELAND first entered the lifts of authorship: his career began with the dawn, and has perhaps extended to the funfet of German literature. He had (as he himfelt expreffes it,) the heart exalting fatisfaction of being the cotemporary of all the German poets and writers, in whofe works breathes the genius of immortality, and the rival of none: most of them were his friends, not one of them was his foe.

The five volumes before us form the firft livraifon (lot?) of one of the four new and only complete editions of the works of WIELAND, which are republifhing with profufe alterations, under the author's infpection. We fhall give fome account of each of his principal productions in the order in which they are. here arranged. Agathon ocupies the firft three volumes. This novel has for many years been known in England (ince 7773) by a good tranflation from one of the early editions: fome omiflions and many extenfive changes have fince been made, and three new chapters have been inferted between the penulti

M. Rev. vol. 50. p. 176.

mate

mate and concluding fetion. It may feem needlefs, at this time, to ftate that it contains the hiftory of nearly twenty years of the life of a young Greek fuppofed to flourish about the hundredth olympiad; who, having been educated, like the ion of Euripides, in religious purity, and having imbibed the fublime fpeculations of the Orphic theofophy, is fuddenly thrown on the world, and expofed to its temptations. His innocence, affailed at once by the philofophy of Hippias and the attractions of Dance, is overpowered; and the fine enthufiaft finks for a while into the contented voluptuary. At length he breaks Joofe; is engaged in active life at Athens, and at the court of Syracufe, where he philofophizes with Ariftippus and Plato; and, having corrected by experience his notions of mankind, he at laft fixes at Tarentum, where the converfations and examples of the excellent Archytas reftore to unifon bis fpeculation and his practice, and complete the fashion of his virtue.

This hiftory, which, when denuded of its trappings, is that of a confiderable number of men, difplays a deep knowlege of the human heart, and of the caufes and means by which one growth of character and opinion comes gradually to fucceed another. Neither has any part of the hiftory been laboured fo attentively by the author as the full difplay of Agathon's mind, as the analyfis of its feveral pfychological phænomena, as the ftudious demonftration that thus, and no other wife, could fuch a perfon be actuated by the circunftances fuppofed,-in fhort, as the folution of every moral difficulty. in this confift the characterific excellence and peculiar perfection of the work fo that it offers a gratification analogous to studying a character of Shakspeare anatomized by Richardfon. It alfo difplays an intimacy with Greek manners and Greek philofophy, which has only been rivalled in the long fubfequent travels of Anacharlis. The mode of narration, pleafing as it is, would be more agreeable, if all direct allufions to modern perfonages and writings were expunged; and if the imagination were never recalled from among the claffical perfonages of the narrative, by the incongruous mention (p. 246) of Molly Seagrim, by the allufion (p. 264) to Rouffeau, by the quotation (p. 306) from Mentefquieu, &c. If the author fcrupled to borrow a thought without indicating its fource, he might at least have referved the acknowlegement for a note.-The fummary of opinions which Agathon is reprefented as bringing home from his travels, and which may undoubtedly be confidered as the perfonal fentiments of a writer whofe long life has been patled in a skilful obfervation of mankind, have in this edition been retouched. We tranflate them;

• He

He departed with few prejudices, and returned without thofe few. During his philofophic pilgrimage, he remained a mere fpectator of the stage of things, and was the more at leifure to judge of the performance.

His obfervations on others completed what his own reflections and experience had begun. They convinced him that men in the average are what Hippias paints them, although they should be what Archytas exhibits.

He faw every where-what may yet be feen-that they are not fo good as they might be if they were wifer: but he alfo faw that they cannot become better until they are wifer; and they cannot become wifer unless fathers, mothers, nurses, teachers, and priests, with their other everlookers, from the conftable to the king, fhall have become as wife as it belongs to each in his relative fituation to be, in order to do his duty and to be truly useful to the human race.

He faw, therefore, that information favourable to moral improvement is the only ground on which the hope of better times, that is of better men, can rationally be founded. He faw that all nations, the wildeft barbarian as well as the most refined Greek, honour virtue; and that no fociety, not even a horde of Arabian robbers, can fubfift without fome degree of virtue. He found every town, every province, every nation, fo much happier, the better the morals of the inhabitants were; and, without exception, he faw moft corruption amid extreme poverty or extreme wealth.

He found, among all the nations whom he vifited, religion muffled up in fuperftition, abused to the injury of fociety, and converted by hypocrify, or open force, into an inftrument of deception, ambition, avarice, voluptuoufnels, or lazinefs. He faw that individuals and whole nations can have religion without virtue, and that thereby they are made worfe: but he alfo faw that individuals and whole nations, if already virtuous, are made better by piety.

He faw legiflation, administration, and police, every where full of defects and abufes: but he alfo faw that men without laws, adminiflration, or police, were worfe and more unhappy. Every where. he heard abuses cenfured, and found every one defirous that the world fhould be mended; he faw many willing to toil at its improvement, and inexhaustible in their projects- but not one who was willing to begin the amendment on himself. Hence he eafily conceived why nothing grows better.

He faw men every where influenced by two oppofite inftincts, the defire of equality and the defire of domineering without restraint over others: which convinced him that, unless this evil can be fubdued, much may not be expected from changes in governments; that man muft revolve in an eternal circle from royal defpotifm and aristocratic infolence, to popular licentioufnefs and mob-tyranny; and from these back to thofe, unless a legiflation deduced from the first principles of

Here the author does not exprefs himself with precision. The love of domineering and the impatience of controul are the two contending inftincts. The defire of equality is the equitable compromife between them, is the just mean, is the virtue which inclines to neither vice (Rev.)

the

the pureft religion and morality, and an education correfponding with them, fhail in moft men curb the animal defire of domineering with out restraint.

He faw that everywhere arts, induftry, and economy, are fol lowed by riches, riches by luxury, luxury by corrupt manners, and corrupt manners by the diffolution of the ftate :-but he also saw that the arts, under the guidance of wisdom, embellish, evolve, and ennoble mankind; that art is the half of our nature, and that man without art is the most miferable of animals.

He faw throughout the whole economy of fociety the limits of the true and falfe, of the good and bad, of the right and wrong, imperceptibly melting into each other; and he thereby convinced himself ftill more of the neceflity of wile laws, and of the duty of a good citizen rather to trust the law than his own preconceptions.

All that he had feen confirmed him in the opinion that man-in one respect allied to the beails of the field, in another to fuperior beings and even to the Deity himfelf-is no lefs incapable of being a mere beaft than a mere fpirit: that he only lives conformably to his nature, when he is ever afcending that each higher ftep towards wildom and virtue increases his happiness: that wildom and virtue have at all times been the true gage of public and private happiness among men; and that this experienced truth, which no fceptic can weaken, is fufficient to blow away all the fophiftries of a Hippias, and irreverfa bly to confirm Archytas's theory of living wifely.'

Thus terminates the third volume. The fourth introduces the reader to a fpecies of epic poetry, of which it is difficult to give either a definition or an example. The Modern Amadis is one of thofe freaks of fancy infpired by a wanton laughter-loving mufe, which is at once a moft fingular and moft amufing fpecimen of heroi-comic narrative. The perfonages are Knights errant, Princeffes, Saracens; and the machinery, wizards, fairies, monsters; fuch as occur in the fongs of Ariosto or rather of Carteromaco*. The manners, however, are not those of the age of chivalry, but thofe of the court of Paris in its most luxurious period, while it was the pink of etiquette, the cornucopia of compliment, and the bower of gallantry. The ludicrous effect of this whimfical combination may be imagined, when it is added that the incidents are varied with felicity, and are fuch as Lafontaine would not difdain to defcribe. They are told, however, more in the manner of Prior's tales, with his eafe, his grace, his parenthefis, his profufion of learned difplay, witty allufion, and Horatian morality. An extract in profe would appear flat, and we have not fufficient confidence in our rhiming powers to attempt one in metre, The poem confiits of eighteen cantos, which are broken into ftanzas of ten lines each, and the verfes are fometimes iambic and fometimes ana

* An Italian poet, author of Il Ricciardetto, a burlefque epic.

pæftic:

paftic: a practice introduced by WIELAND into the poetry of his country, and now become highly agreeable to the German ear. The profufe notes which accompany this poem furnish a very agreeable literary defert.

Cupid accufed, an entertaining mythological allegory, in five books, (written alfo much in Prior's manner,) completes the fifth volume.

This edition, with refpect to orthography, differs confiderably from all preceding impreffions. In the German, fome analogis have been extended, and fome filent confonants fuppreffed; by which means the language appears, to a foreigner, at first fight, more intelligible and lefs rugged than before: ftill the practice has been continued of expreffing, by fch, the articulation which other European nations exprefs by fb. The Roman character has been employed. In words derived from the Greek, the cappa is expreffed by k, the phi by f, but not the chi by q: as if we wrote Faidra, Filoktetes, Filofofy, Fantafy: a practice refembling that of the Italians. The ftyle itself has throughout been delicately retouched. It has gained in precifion, abounds more with compounds, and lefs with exotics; yet realifieren for verwirklichen, and fome others, no doubt for good reafons, remain. It probably poffeffes the highest degree of elegance and polifh to which the German language has attained. A fpirit of innovation in dialect is however till afloat in that Country: new words, provided they obey the established analogies, are continually received, and anomalies are gradually fubjected to the more prevalent rules of the language: fo that the beauty of fill greater precifion, regularity, and melody, may perhaps yet be obtainable.

ART. VII. Profe Varie, &c. i. e. Various Difcourfes, chiefly delivered at different Meetings of the Academy of the Arcades at Rome. By FELIX MARIOTTINI. 8vo. pp. 220. Naples.

T HE dedication of thefe difcourfes to the Marquis Ercolani is of confiderable length, and contains a kind of history of the author's great acquaintance, and little profit, from a refidence of fome years at Rome; where his literary talents appear to have been laudably employed, and his hopes of preferment, though unfuccefsful, to have been founded on no unpromifing bafis. We are unable to judge of caufe and effect from one fide of a question: but we must allow that the narrative is eloquently drawn up, and that the author feems to have equal ground of complaint againft his friends and his fortune. The titles of thefe difcourfes are the following: Of the Roman inflitute of science. Pronounced in the antiroom of the academy of the Arcades in that city, April 6, 1786.

Of