rience, and the refult of his own feelings, would make the same impreffion, if uttered by a set of speculative fages in the episode of a chorus.

WOLSEY.

So farewell to the little good you bear me !
Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness!
This is the state of man; to-day he puts forth.
The tender leaves of hopes, to-morrow bloffoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him,
The third day comes a froft, a killing froft,
And when he thinks, good eafy man, full surely
His greatness is a ripening, nips his root;
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventur'd,
Like little wanton boys, that fwim on bladders,
These many fummers in a fea of glory,

But far beyond my depth; my high blown pride
At length broke under me, and now has left me,
Weary and old with service, to the mercy

Of a rude ftream, that must for ever hide me.

Vain pomp
and glory of this world, I hate ye;
I feel my heart new open'd. Oh, how wretched
Is that poor man, that hangs on princes' favours!
There is, betwixt that fmile we would aspire to,
That fweet afpect of princes, and our ruin,

More

More

pangs and fears than war or women have :

And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer,

Never to hope again.

And in another place,

Let's dry our eyes, and thus far hear me, Cromwell
And when I am forgotten, as I fhall be,

And fleep in dull cold marble, where no mention
Of me muft more be heard, fay then, I taught thee,
Say, Wolfey, that once trod the ways of glory,
And founded all the depths and fhoals of honour,
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rife in;
A fure and safe one, though thy mafter mifs'd it.
Mark but my fall, and that which ruin'd me;
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition,
By that fin fell the angels; how can man then,
The image of his maker, hope to win by't?

Love thyself laft; cherish those hearts, that hate

thee;

Corruption wins not more than honesty.

Still in thy right-hand carry gentle peace,

To filence envious tongues, be juft, and fear not.
Let all the ends, thou aim'ft at, be thy country's,

Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fall'ft, O Crom

well,

Thou fall'ft a bleffed martyr. Serve the king;

And pr'ythee, lead me in;

There take an inventory of all I have,

To the last penny, 'tis the king's. My robe,
And my integrity to heav'n, is all

I dare now call mine own. O Cromwell, Cromwell,
Had I but ferv'd my God with half the zeal

I ferv'd my king, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies,

I felect these two paffages as containing reflections of fuch a general kind, as might be with least impropriety transferred to the chorus; but if even these would lofe much of their force and pathos, if not spoken by the fallen ftatefman, how much more would those do, which are the expreffions of some instantaneous emotion, occafioned by the peculiar fituation of the person by whom they are uttered! The felf-condemnation of a murderer makes a very deep impreffion upon us, when we are told by Macbeth himfelf, that hearing, while he was killing Duncan, one of the God bless us grooms cry and Amen the other, he durft not say Amen. Had a formal chorus obferved, that a man in

fuch

such a guilty moment, durft not implore that
mercy
of which he stood fo much in need,
it would have had but a flight effect. All
know the deteftation, with which virtuous
men behold a bad action. A much more
falutary admonition is given, when we are
fhewn the terrors that are combined with
guilt in the breaft of the Offender.

Our author has fo tempered the conftitutional character of Macbeth, by infufing into it the milk of human kindness, and a ftrong tincture of honour, as to make the moft violent perturbation, and pungent remorfe, naturally attend on those steps to which he is led by the force of Temptation. Here we must commend the Poet's judgment, and his invariable attention to confiftency of character; but more amazing still is the art with which he exhibits the movement of the human mind, and renders audible the filent march of thought: traces its modes of operation in the course of Deliberating, the paufes of Hefitation, and the final act of Decifion; fhews how Reafon

1

checks, and how the Paflions impel; and difplays to us the trepidations that precede, and the horrors that purfue acts of blood. No fpecies of dialogue, but that which a man holds with himself, could effect this. The Soliloquy has been permitted to all dramatic writers; but its true ufe feems to be understood only by our author, who alone has attained to a just imitation of nature, in this kind of felf-conference.

It is certain, that men do not tell themfelves who they are, and whence they came, they neither narrate nor declaim in the folitude of the clofet, as Greek and French writers reprefent. Here then is added to the drama an imitation of the most difficult and delicate kind, that of representing the internal process of the mind in reafoning and reflecting; and it is not only a difficult, but a very useful art, as it beft affifts the Poet to expose the anguish of Remorse, to repeat every whifper of the internal monitor, Confcience, and, upon occafion, to lend her a voice to amaze the guilty and appal the free. As a man