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But, though we are not to lookoned, tro fpecies of humour, before-mentioned, in the fame perfection on the fimpler stages of Greece and Rome, as in our improved Theatres, yet the first of them was clearly feen and fuccefsfully practifed by the an tient comic mafters; and there are not wanting in them fome few examples even of the last." The old man in the Mother. "in-Law fays to his Son, Mooq stod Tum tu igitur nihil adtulisti huc plus unâ sententiâ. "This, as an excellent perfon obferved to « me, is true h true humour. For his character, "which was that of a lover of money, “ drew the observation naturally and forci"bly from him. His difappointment of a "rich fucceffion made him fpeak contempti

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bly of a moral leffon, which rich and ❝ covetous men, in their best humours, have no high reverence for. And this too without defign; which is important, and "fhews the diftinction of what, in the more "reftrained fenfe of the word, we call hu"mour, from other modes of pleafantry. "For had a young friend of the fon, an unconcerned fpectator of the fcene, made

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"the obfervation, it had then, in another's 4 mouth, been wit, or a defigned banter on "the father's difappointment. As, on the ❝ other hand, when fuch characteristic qua “lities are exaggerated, and the expression "of them ftretched beyond truth, they be come buffoonry, even in the perfon's own." This is an inftance of the fecond fpecies of humour, under its idea of exciting ridicule. But it may, alfo, be employed with the ut most seriousness; as being only a method of expreffing the truth of character in the most firiking manner. This fame old man in the Hecyra will furnish an example. Though a lover of money, he appears, in the main, of an honeft and worthy nature, and to have born the trueft affection to an amia ble and favourite fon. In the perplexity of the scene, which had arifen from the fuppofed misunderstanding between his fon's wife and his own, he propofes, as an expe dient to end all differences, to retire with his wife into the country. And to enforce this propofal to the young man, who had his reafons for being against it, he adds,

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odiofa haec eft aetas adolefcentulis Emedio aequum excedere eft: poftremo nos jam fabula Sumus, Pamphile, fenex atque anus. Todos There is nothing, I fuppofe in these words, which provokes a fmile. Yet the humour is ftrong, as before. In his folicitude to promote his fon's fatisfaction, he lets fall a fentiment truly characteristic, and which old men ufually take great pains to conceal; I mean, his acknowledgment of that fufpicious fear of contempt, which is natural to old age. Sa true a picture of life, in the reprefentation of this weakness, might, in other circumftances, have created fome pleafantry; but the occafion, which forced it from him, difcovering, at the fame time, the amiable difpofition of the fpeaker, covers the ridicule of it, or more properly converts it into an object of our esteem.

We have here, then, a kind of intermediate fpecies of humour betwixt the ridi culous and the grave; and may perceive how infenfibly the one becomes the other, by the accidental mixture of a virtuous quality, attracting efteem. Which may ferve to seconcile the reader to the appli04 cation

sation bof this term even to fuch expression of the manners, as is perfectly ferious? that is, where the quality reprefented is entirely, and without the leaft touch of ats tending ridicule, the object of moral appro bation to the mind. As in that famous affeveration of Chremes in the Self-tor

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4 Homo fum: bumani nihil à me alienum puto. This is a ftrong expreffion of character and, coming unaffectedly from him in anfwer to the cutting reproof of his friend,

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Chreme, tantumne ab re tuâ'ft oti tibi tibii. Aliena ut cures; ea quae nihil ad te adtinent? hath the effence of true humour, that is, is a lively picture of the manners without defign.

Yet in this inftance, which hath not been obferved, the humour, though of a fe rious caft, is heightened by a mixture o fatire. For we are not to take this, as hath conftantly been done, for a fentiment of pure humanity and the natural ebullition of benevolence. We may observe in a defigned ftroke of fatirical refentment.

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The Self-tormentor, as we faw, had hidicated Chremes? curigfity by a feverem reproof. Chremes, to be even with him, reflects upon the inhumanity of his tempers* You, "fays he, feem fuch a foe to humanity, "that you fpare it not in your felf; I, on the other hand, am affected, whenol feev it "fuffer in another."

Whence we learn, that, though all which is requifite to constitute comic humour, be a just expreffion of character without defign, yet fuch expression is felt more fenfibly, when it is further enlivened by ridicule, or quickened by the poignancy of fatire.

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From the account of comedy, here given, it may appear, that the idea of this drama is much enlarged beyond what it was in Ariftotle's time; who defines it to be, an imitation of light and trivial actions, provoking ridicule. His notion was taken from the ftate and practice of the Athenian stage; that is, from the old or middle comedy, which answers to this defeription. The great revolution, which the introduction of the new comedy made in the dra ma, did not happen till afterwards. This propofed

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