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a fwell of language, often out of all proportion to the fentiment; but there is, in general, a fullness of mind, and the thought feems to expand with the found of the words. Determined to discard colloquial barbarisms and licentious idioms, he forgot the elegant fimplicity that distinguishes the writings of Addison. He had what Locke calls a round-about view of his fubject; and, though he was never tainted, like many modern wits, with the ambition of fhining in paradox, he may be fairly called an ORIGINAL THINKER. His reading was extenfive. He treasured in his mind whatever was worthy of notice, but he added to it from his own meditation. He collected, quæ reconderet, auctaque promeret. Addison was not fo profound a thinker. He was born to write, converfe, and live with ease; and he found an early patron in Lord Somers. He depended, however, more upon a fine tafte, than the vigour of his mind His Latin Poetry fhews, that he relished, with a juft felection, all the refined and delicate beauties of the Roman claffics; and when he cultivated his native language, no wonder that he formed that graceful style, which has been fo juftly admired; fimple, yet elegant;

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elegant; adorned, yet never over-wrought; rich in allufion, yet pure and perfpicuous; correct, without labour, and, though fometimes deficient in ftrength, yet always musical. His essays, in general, are on the furface of life; if ever original, it was in pieces of humour. Sir Roger de Coverley, and the Tory Fox-hunter, need not to be mentioned. Johníon had a fund of humour, but he did not know it, nor was he willing to defcend to the familiar idiom and the variety of diction which that mode of compofition required. The letter, in the Rambler, N° 12, from a young girl that wants a place, will illuftrate this obfervation. Addifon poffeffed an unclouded imagination, alive to the first objects of nature and of art. He reaches the fublime without any apparent effort. When he tells us, "If we confider the fixed ftars as

fo many oceans of flame, that are each of "them attended with a different fet of planets; "if we ftill difcover new firmaments and new

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lights, that are funk further in thofe unfathomable depths of æther, we are loft in a labyrinth of funs and worlds, and con"founded with the magnificence and immenfity of nature;" the eafe, with which this

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paffage rifes to unaffected grandeur, is the fecret charm that captivates the reader. Johnfon is always lofty; he feems, to use Dryden's phrafe, to be o'er-inform'd with meaning, and his words do not appear to himself adequate to his conception. He moves in ftate, and his periods are always harmonious. His Oriental Tales are in the true ftyle of Eastern magnificence, and yet none of them are fo much admired as the Vifions of Mirza. In matters of criticifm, Johnfon is never the echo of preceding writers. He thinks and decides for himself. If we except the Effays on the Pleasures of Imagination, Addison cannot be called a philofophical critic. His moral Effays are beautiful; but in that province nothing can exceed the Rambler, though Johnfon used to say, that the Effay on The burthens of mankind (in the Spectator, N° 558) was the most exquifite he had ever read. Talking of himself, Johnson said, Topham Beauclerk has wit, and every thing "comes from him with eafe; but when I fay a

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good thing, I feem to labour." When we compare him with Addifon, the contraft is ftill ftronger. Addifon lends grace and ornament to truth; Johnfon gives it force and energy. Addi

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fon makes virtue amiable; Johnfon reprefents it as an awful duty. Addifon infinuates himself with an air of modefty; Johnson commands like a dictator; but a dictator in his fplendid robes, not labouring at the plough. Addifon is the Jupiter of Virgil, with placid ferenity talking to Venus:

"Vultu, quo cœlum tempeftatefque ferenat."

Johnfon is JUPITER TONANS: he darts his lightning, and rolls his thunder, in the caufe of virtue and piety. The language feems to fall short of his ideas; he pours along, familiarizing the terms of philosophy, with bold inverfions, and fonorous periods; but we may apply to him what Pope has faid of Homer: "It is "the fentiment that fwells and fills out the

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diction, which rifes with it, and forms itself "about it; like glafs in the furnace, which

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grows to a greater magnitude, as the breath "within is more powerful, and the heat more “intense."

It is not the defign of this comparison to decide between those two eminent writers. VOL. I.

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matters of taste every reader will chufe for himself. Johnson is always profound, and of courfe gives the fatigue of thinking. Addifon charms while he inftructs; and writing, as he always does, a pure, an elegant, and idiomatic ftyle, he may be pronounced the safest model for imitation.

The effays written by Johnfon in the Adventurer may be called a continuation of the Rambler. The IDLER, in order to be confiftent with the affumed character, is written with abated vigour, in a ftyle of ease and unlaboured elegance. It is the Odyssey after the Iliad. Intense thinking would not become the IDLER. The firft number prefents a welldrawn portrait of an Idler, and from that character no deviation could be made. Accordingly, Johnfon forgets his auftere manner, and plays us into fenfe. He ftill continues his lectures on human life, but he adverts to common occurrences, and is often content with the topic of the day. An advertisement in the beginning of the first volume informs us, that twelve entire Effays were a contribution from different hands. One of thefe, N° 33, is the

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