Mad. de Staël ascribes it chiefly to the influence of their copious mythology; and the eternal presence of those Gods-which, though always about men, were always above them-and gave a tone of dignity or elegance to the whole scheme of their existence. Their tragedies were acted in temples-in the presence of the Gods, the fate of whose descendants they commemorated, and as a part of the religious solemnities instituted in their honour. Their legends, in like manner, related to the progeny of the immortals; And their feasts-their dwellings-their farming—their battles—and every incident and occupation of their daily life being under the immediate sanction of some presiding deity, it was scarcely possible to speak of them in a vulgar or inelegant manner; and the nobleness of their style therefore appeared to result naturally from the elegance of their mythology.

Now, even if we could pass over the obvious objection, that this mythology was itself a creature of the same poetical imagination which it is here supposed to have modified, it is impossible not to observe, that though the circumstances here alluded to may account for the raised and lofty tone of the Grecian poetry, and for the exclusion of low or familiar life from their dramatic representations, it will not explain the far more substantial indications of pure taste afforded by the absence of all that gross exaggeration, violent incongruity, and tedious and childish extravagance which are found to deform the primitive poetry of most other nations. The Hindoos, for example, have a mythology at least as copious and still more constantly interwoven with every action of their lives: But their legends are the very models of bad taste, and unite all the detestable attributes of obscurity, puerility, insufferable tediousness, and the most revolting and abominable absurdity. The poetry of the Northern bards is not more commendable: But the Greeks are wonderfully rational and moderate in all their works of imagination; and speak, for the most part, with a degree of justness and brevity, which is only the more marvellous, when it is considered how much religion had to do in the business. A better explanation, perhaps, of their super riority, may be derived from recollecting that the sins of affectation, and injudicious effort, really cannot be committed where there are no models to be at once copied and avoided. The first writers naturally took possession of what was most striking, and most capable of producing effect in nature and in incident. Their successors consequently found these occupied; and were obliged, for the credit of their originality, to produce something which should be different, at least, if not better, than their originals. They had not only to adhere to nature, therefore, but to avoid representing her exactly as she had been represented by the antients,

and when they could not accomplish both these objects, they contrived, at least, to make sure of the last. The Greeks had but one task to perform: They were in no danger of comparisons, or imputations of plagiarism; and wrote down whatever struck them as just and impressive, without fear of finding that they had been stealing from a predecessor. The wide world, in short, was before them, unappropriated and unmarked by any preceding footstep; and they took their way, without hesitation, by the most airy heights and sunny valleys; while those who came after, found it so seamed and crossed with tracks in which they were forbidden to tread, that they were frequently driven to make the most fantastic circuits and abrupt descents

to avoid them.

The characteristic defects of the early Greek poetry, are all to be traced to the same general causes,--the peculiar state of society, and that newness to which they were indebted for its principal beauties. They describe every thing, because nothing had been previously described; and incumber their whole diction with epithets that convey no information. There is no reach of thought, or fineness of sensibility, because reflection had not yet awakened the deeper sympathies of their nature; and we are perpetually shocked with the imperfections of their morality, and the indelicacy of their affections, because society had not subsisted long enough in peace and security to develop those finer sources of emotion. Those defects are most conspicuous in every thing that relates to women. They had absolutely no idea of that mixture of friendship, veneration, and desire, which is indicated by the word Love, in the modern languages of Europe. The love of the Greek tragedians, is a species of insanity or frenzy, -a blind and ungovernable impulse inflicted by the Gods in their vengeance, and leading its humiliated victim to the commission of all sorts of enormities. Racine, in his Phædre, has ventured to exhibit a love of this description on a modern stage; but the softenings of delicate feeling-the tenderness and profound affliction which he has been forced to add to the fatal impulse of the original character, show, more strongly than any thing else, the radical difference between the antient and the modern conception of the passion.

The political institutions of Greece, had also a remarkable effect on their literature; and nothing can show this so strongly as the striking contrast between Athens and Sparta-placed under the same sky-with the same language and religion-and yet so opposite in their government and in their literary pursuits. The ruling passion of the Athenians was that of amusement; for, though the emulation of glory was more lively a

mong them than among any other people, it was still subordi nate to their rapturous admiration of successful talent. Their law of ostracism is a proof, how much they were afraid of their own propensity to idolize. They could not trust themselves in the presence of one who had become too popular. This propensity also has had a sensible effect upon their poetry; and it should never be forgotten, that it was not composed to be read and studied, and criticized in the solitude of the closet, like the works that have been produced since the invention of printing; but to be recited to music before multitudes assembled at feasts and high solemnities, where every thing favoured the kindling and diffusion of that enthusiasm, of which the history now seems to us so incredible.

There is a separate chapter on the Greek drama-which is full of brilliant and original observations ;-though we have already anticipated the substance of many of them. The great basis of its peculiarity, was the constant interposition of the Gods. Almost all the violent passions are represented as the irresistible inspirations of a superior power ;-almost all their extraordinary actions as the fulfilment of an oracle-the accomplishment of an unrelenting destiny. This probably added to the awfulness and terror of the representation, in an audience which believed implicitly in the reality of those dispensations. But it has impaired their dramatic excellence, by dispensing them too much from the necessity of preparing their catastrophes by a gradation of natural events, the exact delineation of character,-and the touching representation of those preparatory struggles which precede a resolution of horror. Orestes kills his mother, and Electra encourages him to the deed,-without the least indication, in either, of that poignant remorse which afterwards avenges the parricide. No modern dramatist could possibly have omitted so important and natural a part of the exhibition ;-but the explanation of it is found at once in the ruling superstition of the age. Apollo had commanded the murder and Orestes could not hesitate to obey. When it is committed, the Furies are commissioned to pursue him; and the audience shudders with reverential awe at the torments they inflict on the murderer, Human sentiments, and human motives, have but little to do in bringing about these catastrophes. They are sometimes suggested by the Chorus ;-but the heroes themselves act always by the order of the Gods. Accordingly, the authors of the most atrocious actions are seldom represented in the Greek tragedies 'as guilty, but as piacular ;-and their general moral is rather, that the Gods are omnipotent, than that crimes should give rise to punishment and detestation.

A great part of the effect of these representations, must have depended on the exclusive nationality of their subjects, and the extreme nationality of their auditors; though it is a striking remark of Mad. de Staël, that the Greeks, after all, were more national than republican,—and were never actuated with that profound hatred and scorn of tyranny which exalted the Roman character. Almost all their tragic subjects, accordingly, are taken from the misfortunes of kings;-of kings descended from the Gods, and upon whose genealogy the nation still continued to value itself. The fate of the Tarquins could never have been regarded at Rome as a worthy occasion either of pity or horror. Republican sentiments are occasionally introduced into the Greek Choruses ;-though we cannot agree with Mad. de Staël in' considering these musical bodies as intended to represent the people.

It is in their Comedy, that the defects of the Greek literature are most conspicuous. The world was then too young to supply its materials. Society had not existed long enough, either to develop the finer shades of character in real life, or to generate the talent of observing, generalizing, and representing them. The national genius, and the form. of government, led them to delight in detraction and popular abuse; for though they admired and applauded their great men, they had not in their hearts any great respect for them; and the degradation or seclusion in which they kept their women, took away almost all interest or elegance from the intercourse of private life, and reduced its scenes of gaiety to those of coarse debauch, or broad and humorous derision: The extreme coarseness and vulgarity of Aristophanes, is apt to excite our wonder, when we first consider him as the contemporary of Euripides, and Socrates, and Plato ;-but the truth is, that the Athenians, after all, were but a common populace as to moral delicacy and social refinement. Enthusiasm, and especially the enthusiasm of superstition and nationality, is as much the passion of the vulgar, as a delight in ribaldry and low buffoonery. The one was gratified by their tragedy;-and the comedy of Aristophanes was exactly calculated to give delight to the other. In the end, however, their love of buffoonery and detraction nnfortunately proved too strong for their nationality. When Philip was at their gates, all the eloquence of Demosthenes. could not rouse them from their theatrical dissipations. The great danger which they always apprehended to their liberties, was from the excessive power and popularity of one of their own great men; and, by a singular fatality, they perished, from a profligate indifference and sensibility to the charms of patriotism and greatness.

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In philosophy, Mad. de Staël does not rank the Greeks very high. The greater part of them were orators and poets, rather, than profound thinkers, or exact inquirers. They discoursed rhetorically upon vague and abstract ideas; and, up to the time of Aristotle, proceeded upon the radical error of substituting hypothesis for observation. That eminent person first showed the use and the necessity of analysis; and did infinitely more for posterity than all the mystics that went before him. As their states were small, and their domestic life inelegant, men seem to have been considered almost exclusively in their relation to the public. There is, accordingly, a noble air of patriotism and devotedness to the common weal in all the morality of the ancients; and though Socrates set the example of fixing the principles of virtue for private life, the ethics of Plato, and Xenophon, and Zeno, and most of the other philosophers, are little else than treatises of political duties. In modern times, from the prevalence of monarchical government, and the great extent of socie ties, men are very generally quite loosened from their relations with the public, and are but too much engrossed with their private interests and affections. This may be venial, when they merely forget the state, by which they are forgotten; but it is base and fatal, when they are guided by those interests in the few public functions they have still to perform. After all, the morality of the Greeks was very clumsy and imperfect. In political science, the variety of their governments, and the perpetual play of war and negociation, had made them more expert. Their historians narrate with spirit and simplicity; and this is their merit. They make scarcely any reflections; and are marvellously indifferent as to vice or virtue. They record the most atrocious and most heroic actions-the most disgusting crimes and most exemplary generosity-with the same tranquil accuracy with which they would describe the succession of storms and sunshine. Thucydides is somewhat of a higher pitch; but the, immense difference between him and Tacitus proves, better. perhaps than any general reasoning, the progress which had been made in the interim in the powers of reflection and observation, and how near the Greeks, with all their boasted attainments, should be placed to the intellectual infancy of the species. In all their productions, indeed, the fewness of their ideas is remarkable; and their most impressive writings may be compared to the music of certain rude nations, which produces the most astonishing effects by the combination of not more than four or five simple notes.

Mad. de Staël now proceeds to the Romans-who will not detain us by any means so long. Their literature was confessedly