ly observed. To make my notions clear,-suppose truth to be a straight line; imagine to yourself a fallacious proposition, branching from it with so slight a deviation as not to be immediately perceptible; then ridicule, protracting the line of deviation into its direct and fair result, shews at once the folly of the first error. But while this power is conceded to ridicule, we must cautiously beware of admitting parallels of her forming; they are almost universally fallacious, even her protractions are sometimes deceitful, and her separate efforts, drawn from an independent use of her powers, prove nothing, and can neither establish nor destroy a system. For instance, one of Dryden's heroes said

"My wound is great, because it is so small."

The absurdity of the proposition might not have struck the generality of hearers, who were in habitual ecstasy at heroic nonsense, but the Duke of Buckingham instantly exposed it, by pursuing the thought into its inevitable consequence, and exclaiming

"Then 'twould be greater were it none at all.”

But the same nobleman was not equally happy when he attempted a parallel in the way of ridicule, even though he had greater leizure for premeditation. In the Conquest of Grenada, Dryden wrote As some fair tulip, with a storm opprest,

"Shrinks up, and folds her silken arms to rest.”

The Duke of Buckingham, essaying to render this beautiful thought ridiculous by parody, introduces, in the Rehearsal, a simile of oak" speading his worsted arms unto the skies." Now ridicule is not, in this instance, a test of truth, nor is truth a test of ridicple ; the contest is between good and bad taste; a person endued with the former will allow the silken arms of a personified flower an excellent flight of poetry; a person influenced only by the latter will say that the branches of an oak are as much like worsted arms, as the leaves of a tulip are like silken arms.

you must

An instance occurs to me in which the protraction of a small ab surdity, by means of ridicule, tended, probably, to a great injustice. It was this: an actress on the French stage began a play by saying"At length I have proceeded on foot into the centre of the Arabian desart."" Then, Madam," said one of the audience, " be very much fatigued; pray take a chair and sit down." this case, truth and ridicule were not in the least at issue. tuation were supposed real, the wit could not offer a chair in the desarts of Arabia; if notoriously fictitious, and the actress and playhouse so completely present to the minds of the audience that no il

Now in If the si

lusion was to take place, then the actress could not be tired. The fact, as related of the person whom the actress represented, might be true, yet the ridicule of the critic obtained a complete triumph, though not founded in truth, nor intended as a test of it: the Parterre damned the play by incessant laughing and shouting.

Nor is moral, political, or religious truth at all to be tried by the test of ridicule, which often begets odium where none is due, and is tried in vain on objects which have no foundation for their claims to notice but arrogant pretensions and overweening self-sufficiency.— Bentley has been ridiculed out of his reputation as a critic, and Blackmore, by force of ridicule, lost his character as a physician; yet the ridicule was, in both cases, misapplied. On the contrary, it is now about fifty years since Foote, the prince of the powers of ridicule, assailed, with his best forces, the doctrines and manners of Whitefield; yet his proselytes have not decreased in number, nor are men wanting who boldly assert that legs of mutton, pounds of tea, leather breeches, and even bricks and timber, may be obtained without any other expence than a draft on the "Bank of Faith." Do you think that Dr. Brodum

Here our conversation was interrupted, and took another course. On my return home, I put my friend's discourse on paper, thinking it contained some reason, and perhaps some novelty. I thought, too, it might be worthy of a place in some periodical publication; and as it happened that the illustrations of my friend's reasoning were all drawn from the theatre, your miscellany, where that mimic world is so judiciously displayed, occurred to me as the most eligible. I am, Mr. Editor,

Your humble Servant,

RETROSPECT OF NEW PERFORMERS.

H. N.

MR. CHERRY, FROM BATH.

THE Drury Lane Company which of late years has been so lamentably deficient in good comedians, and which has been still more impoverished by the recent retirement of KING, has reason to be proud of such an accession as Mr. Cherry is likely to prove to it. He made his appearance in Sir Benjamin Dove, in Mr. Cumberland's comedy of the Brothers, and Lazarillo in Jephson's Farce of Two Strings to your Bow.

In person this gentleman is extremely small; but, in Sir Benjamin

B B-VOL. XIV.

Dove, this was rather an advantage to him, and there are numerous characters on the stage of which the comic effect may be heightened by the diminutiveness of his figure.-He is an actor of real genius, who seems to enter into the true spirit of character ;-correct without dulness, rich without mummery, studiously attentive to nature, and yet not disdaining the allowable artifices of the stage.

Sir Benjamin Dove is a henpecked husband, who, for peace sake,' yields, with the most patient submissiveness, to the authority of his wife, and is obliged even to wink at her intrigues, till a circumstance occurs, by which he is wrought into a supposed opinion of his own courage; and then he exercises the prerogatives of a husband with as much decision as he before had pusillanimously resigned them. The character is not very natural, and the whole play is improbable and uninteresting; but there are still some opportunities for the actor of Sir Benjamin to display his skill, and Mr. Cherry certainly availed himself of them to their full extent. Through the whole character he evinced superior ability, and in the scene in the fourth act, in which he makes an effort to be courageous, nothing could be more completely in character, nor more irresistibly comic than his manner of addressing Young Belfield-his hesitation before he accosted him, and the cowardly tremors which shook his little frame, upon Belfield's turning round to reply to him, accompanied by a ridiculous affectation of spirit that served only to give a stronger and more ludicrous colouring to his fears.

His Lazarillo was also a very clever performance, but not quite equal to his acting in the Play. Perhaps the excellence of Munden was a little prejudicial to him in this part. We should observe that we think his manner is sometimes not unlike that of Munden, particularly in his bye-play, and that his articulation and style of enunciating brings Mr. King rather forcibly to recollection. But this may be merely accidental-he has vis comica that is truly his He is no actor's shadow. His conceptions are original, and the general effect of his acting is new.

own.

His features are expressive of drollery ;-his voice too has some very comic turns, though the tones are a little harsh. His tout ensemble is certainly calculated to excite merriment. In fact, he is a comedian of sterling value, and will grow upon the good opinion of the town in proportion as he has opportunities of cultivating it. Sir Peter Teazle must be his of course; and we think the simplicity of Scrub would sit well upon him.

ORIGINAL POETRY.

SIR,

MARY'S EVENING SIGH.

[TO THE EDITOR OF THEe mirror.
Near the Shepherd and Shepherdess
City Road, Sept. 1, 1802.

Not having for a long time past contributed to your publication, I here send you a trifle, which I do not esteem to be any way striking or novel. If you give place to it, it is much at your service, with my most sincere acknowledgment to your more constant correspondents.

The news of Dermody's death is truly afflicting; and glad am I to find the literary worthies were not backward in relieving his distress, however his distress came. I have not composed any small pieces lately, and the enclosed was written in May last, without any thought of publication. I stumbled upon it yesterday, and, lo! here it is.

Yet, why a lonely wanderer stray?
Alone the joy pursue?

The glories of the closing day
Can charm thy Mary too.

IV.

O Edward, when we strolled along
Beneath the waving corn,

And both confess'd the power of song,
And bless'd the dewy morn ;
To thy fond words my heart replied,
(My presence then could move,)
"How sweet, with Mary by my side,
To gaze and talk of love."

V.

Thou art not false;—that cannot be !
Yet I my rivals deem

Each woodland charm, the moss, the tree,

The silence, and the stream.

If these, my love, detain thee now,

I'll yet forgive thy stay;

But with to-morrow's dawn come thou

We'll brush the dews away.

LINES

ON VISITING THE TOMB OF DERMODY,

In Lewisham Church-Yard.

[These lines were composed, at the tomb of the poet, on the 8th of September, 1802. The apostrophe to the robin is not a fiction, "conjured up to serve occasion of poetic pomp ;" that sweet bird," most musical, most melancholy," was indeed warbling in a tree near the grave of poor DERMODY! Whether by accident or design I know not; but never were the remains of a bard deposited in a spot more calculated to inspire a contemplative mind with congenial and interesting feelings.]

STILL, Red-breast, o'er the tuneful dead,

That sweetly-soothing dirge prolong;

For his, who owns this earthy bed,

H's was as sad, as sweet a song!

Unhappy Bard the scene is past;

At length thy mortal struggle's o'er :