that your mines of Golconda can boast; these, I fear, would be sullied if I were to accept your favours." "What gems?"

"I mean," continued Nadir, my piety and my honour. You, Ismael, are, however you may have attempt ed to disguise that circumstance, a very young man; therefore, when you produce such immense riches, and wish to apply them in favour of so slight an acquaintance, I, who am apt to look below the surface of things, may very well doubt the correctness of their acquisition."

"You think," said Ismael," that this paltry purse contains immense riches! I could very easily produce fifty times the sum! Nay, start not, Nadir! I honour you for your delicacy as much as I do for your sagacity. To piety and honour I am as much devoted as yourself: I therefore know, that these virtues produce in the human mind a generosity of thinking and acting, which frequently rises superior even to the general dictates of frigid caution, contracted philosophy, or commercial calculation. I seek you as an adviser; I address you as a friend: receive these tomans; as a loan if you please let me place others in your hands for security; banish suspicion, and have the generosity to believe me for the moment to be what I appear. Let this evening be devoted to rest on my part, to relaxation from the fatigues of study on yours; a short time will probably explain the motives that ed me to seek this interview."

"At which of the four caravansaries in the Bazar do you lodge?" said Nadir.

"I have no lodging in Ispahan," replied Ismael; and as I will fairly state to you, that from the professional inquisitiveness of heir keepers, and the officers of the police stationed at those places, with respect to strangers, it would be extremely inconvenient to go to either of them, I hope you will suffer me to lodge with you."

"But your habit," said Nadir.
"My habit," continued Ismael,

"

may cover me in your house, but it would probably discover me there; therefore I hope you will comply with my request."

"That," said Nadir," is presuming a good deal upon my credulity; I am inclined to trust you; but, alas! although I have rooms, they are unfurnished, consequently I have no accommodations; however, Abud my neighbour has, where I will be answerable for your safety."

Whether the appearance and frankness of the faquir; whether the means of indulging his appetite, which the tomans, still lying on the counter, presented; or that curiosity which is natural to the Persians, and was also professionally incident to Nadir; whether one or all these causes operated is uncertain. The sage of Zulpha, who first recorded this story, was not, like many European sages, gifted with that omniscient power which enables them in a moment to pervade the recesses, and develope the foldings of the human heart. He, therefore, has not stated more than he knew; which was, that the apothecary placed the tomans in his till, which till that time had never inclosed the twentieth part of so much wealth, and subtracting one from the heap, he gave it to Tamira, telling her to hasten to the market, and purchase materials for an entertainment worthy of a guest who seemed possessed of the riches of Golconda, and the generosity of Aurengzebe.

Here let us pause a little, in order, in the first instance, to mention that useful, but too much neglected," part of the human species, who are never courted except upon the stimulations of pain, or at the suggestions of interest, and whom we chris tians, at least out of their hearing, have agreed to term old women; and in the second, to observe, that this appellation has been known to take a wider range, and mount to situations in which no female, old or young, except Pope Joan or Joan of Arc, ever sat or acted.

It has, to continue the pecula

thought that he had never seen a set so truly agreeable. In this disposition were all the parties, when the deities that presided over darkness let fall their sable curtains before the towers of Ispahan; a hint to our company, in common with the other inhabitants of this populous city, to retire to their repose.

To be continued.

For the Literary Magazine.

CHARACTERS OF THE MOST EMINENT FRENCH DRAMATIC POETS.

By a Frenchman.

P. Corneille.

CORNEILLE had the sole and singular glory of creating his art, and fixing its limits.

He has been imitated by many; he has been surpassed by none.

He found no models, but he will serve as a model to the latest posterity.

In creating him, Nature made an effort, from which she will perhaps rest for many ages.

To his genius alone he owed his productions and their success.

He was obliged to invent his pieces, to form actors, and to create an audience.

He preceded the splendid age of Louis XIV, which but for him would perhaps never have existed.

In Richelieu he first found a patron, and afterwards a rival. But the minister was always obliged to do homage to the writer. His works extorted admiration, and his person esteem.

Corneille lived and died poor, because genius, which produces wonders of excellence, knows not how to solicit pensions. He had, however, a pension, without asking for it, and and which, but for Despreaux, he would have lost by a court intrigue. It is perhaps to the tragedies of Corneille that revolution is to be ascribed, which regenerated the minds of the French; that public

fermentation, which at the death of Louis XIII had nearly changed the face of the kingdom.

Corneille

possessed that great character which does not always accompany eminent talents, but which is the seal stamped by nature on the man of genius.

Posterity has not yet decided between Cinna, Polieucte, Le Cid, Rodogune, and Horaces. Any one of these pieces would establish the reputation of a great writer; all of them constitute but a part of that of Corneille.

In Nicomede he created a species of dramatic writing in which he has had no imitators.

It was reserved for this great man to be the father of both species of dramatic composition, and the same hand which wrote La Mort de Pompée wrote also Le Menteur.

The Menteur is the first piece of character that appeared in France, and the only comedy before Moliere entitled to a continuance of the public esteem.

Corneille was sometimes the friend of the great, but never their slave. He could resist cardinal Richelieu, who made Europe tremble. Power shrinks before genius.

Corneille is the only writer who obtained with universal consent the surname of Great, a title that had before been conferred solely on princes and heroes.

All the audience rose up when Corneille, loaded with years and with glory, entered the theatre, and the great Condé himself did homage to the author of Cinna.

He lived to a considerable age without surviving his talents, and in his last works we frequently perceive the same flashes of genius which blaze forth in his first.

circumstance we conclude our eulogium.

Racine.

Racine was one of the first ornaments of the most splendid age of the universe.

The faithful adorer of the ancients, he learned in their school to subjugate the admiration of the moderns. No person knew better than Racine all the labyrinths of the human heart. Its impenetrable folds were like a book always open to his view. He could touch the finest feelings with a delicacy peculiar to himself, and those who have since attempted to imitate him in this respect, have only displayed his superiority in more striking colours.

Racine does not lay hold of the heart at once; he insinuates himself by degrees; but, once established there, he reigns omnipotent.

Before Racine, we knew nothing of those sweet emotions, those deli cious chords of sensibility on which he played; we shed no real tears over imaginary misfortunes.

The heroes whom he paints are in a manner like ourselves. We are interested warmly in their fate; they become our fathers, our brothers, our friends; we participate in all the sentiments they experi

ence.

Racine paints with equal superiority the rage of love and the workings of ambition, paternal tenderness and the torments of jealousy, the simplicity and candour of infancy, and the magnanimity of heroism; all the passions are at his command; nothing is beyond his genius.

It is not in reading Racine that we perceive the weakness and sterility of the French language. Nothing equals the harmony of his verses, unless it be the justness of his thoughts.

It is not by a multiplicity of events, by theatrical trick, or by the number of his personages, that he pleases and interests us. Action is the soul of tragedies in general; the

VOL VIII. NO. XLVI.

genius of Racine could do without it. It is not the interest of curiosity that prevails in his pieces: we enjoy the present without thinking of the future; we wish to dwell on every scene, and we lament the rapidity of time.

Of all the tragedies that have appeared on the stage, that of Berenice has perhaps the least action; and who will say that it is not one of the most interesting.

Racine is perhaps the only dramatic author who gains by being read, because the stage, while it hides the defects of style, prevents at the same time many beauties from being discovered.

The mind of Racine was mild, gentle, and sensible, yet he had from his infancy a taste for epigram, and it required some effort to give his genius a different turn.

I pity those who do not relish Racine; they are barbarians unworthy the name of men of letters.

Racine has secured to the French theatre a superiority which all nations acknowledge, and which they dare not contest.

The respect which Racine entertained for the ancients proves how worthy he was of being added to their number.

There is more philosophy in one tragedy of Racine than in all the works of our modern reformers, who have dared to accuse him of want of philosophy.

Louis XIV gave a proof of his judgment, in continuing to encourage Racine; and he thus honoured that talent which gave the greatest lustre to his reign.

Some verses of Britannicus were a lesson to the monarch, and caused him to sacrifice one of his fondest propensities. We know not which to admire most in this, the docility of the sovereign, or the courage of the poet.

Racine, sought after, honoured, entertained by the first personages of the age, preferred the society of his friends to that of the great. He refused an entertainment at the great Conde's to dine on a carp with his

2

family; an anecdote that proves the goodness of his heart, and is not unworthy of a place in his history,

Despreaux taught Racine with difficulty to make easy verses; he was his constant admirer and friend, and said that his Athalie, though it had no success at court, was his best .work.

Corneille quarrelled with Racine for one line of the comedy of the Plaideurs, a circumstance not at all to his honour.

Moliere, La Fontaine, and Despreaux were the constant friends of Racine; they polished their talents together, and perfected their works by the mutual severity of their criticisms.

Racine ceased to write for the theatre at the age of thirty-eight years. There were twelve years between his Phedre and his Esther; and when we reflect, that in this space of time he produced six chef d'œuvres, we cannot but detest the envy of those who sow with bitterness the career of genius.

We are indebted to madame de Maintenon for his Esther and Athalie, which Racine composed for S. Cyr, and for this benefit I can pardon in her a number of infirmities and errors.

The prefaces of Racine are models of style, of conciseness, and modesty. It is to be regretted that he did not write more in prose, as there is in it a neatness and elegance which few writers have equalled.

Racine died in his fifty-ninth year, of an excess of sensibility, of which his love of humanity was the cause. He was the glory of his age and nation, and to the shame of both, the monument is yet to be found that contains his ashes.

Moliere.

If I were asked who was the greatest preacher of the last age, I would answer, without hesitation, Moliere.

The comedies of Moliere have operated more reforms than the sermons

of Bourdaloue have made converts.

The thundering voice of the christian orator terrified the vicious without eradicating their vices; the inimitable pencil of the comic poet forced vice and absurdity to conceal themselves, to avoid the resemblance of his paintings.

The first work of Moliere was a comedy of character, and if it be not a chef-d'œuvre, it at least surpasses all that had preceded it, with the exception of the Menteur.

Moliere was thirty-eight years old when he began to write; he died at fifty-three; it is difficult to conceive how he could in so few years furnish so many admirable pieces.

Louis XIV predicted that Moliere would give lustre to his reign. He was his constant protector and support. He defended him against devotees, physicians, and fops. But for the firmness of Louis XIV the Tartuffe would never have appeared on the stage.

The Tartuffe is without dispute the sublimest work that ever came from the hands of man. The tears start from my eyes when I think of Moliere's reply to Despreaux, who congratulated him on this play: "Patience, my friend, you shall one day see something much superior." He died six years after, and his occupations as a comedian and manager of the company prevented his fulfilling his intention. It is supposed that he referred to L'Homme de Cour, a subject which engaged his attention till his death, but of which no fragment could be found among his papers. What a loss for the dramatic art! and who will dare attempt a character which Moliere himself placed above his. Tartuffe. I am almost tempted to reproach. the memory of Louis XIV for not freeing Moliere from the which, necessary to his fortune, hindered the exertions of his genius.

cares

Moliere derived from the ancients some of his works, and it was giving them new life; but he borrowed from no source but his mind, the Misanthrope, Tartuffe, and Les Femmes Savantes.