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In Bufiris there are the greatest ebullitions of imagination; but the pride of Bufiris is fuch as no other man can have, and the whole is too remote from known life to raife either grief, terror, or indignation. The Revenge approaches much nearer to human practices and manners, and therefore keeps poffeffion of the stage: the first design seems suggested by Othello; but the reflections, the incidents, and the diction, are original. The moral obfervations are fo introduced, and fo expreffed, as to have all the novelty that can be required. Of The Brothers I may be allowed to say nothing, fince nothing was ever faid of it by the Publick.

It must be allowed of Young's poetry, that it abounds in thought, but without much accuracy or selection. When he lays hold of an illuftration, he purfues it beyond expectation, fometimes happily, as in his parallel of Quickfilver with Pleafure, which I have heard repeated with approbation by a Lady, of whofe praise he would have been justly proud, and which is very ingenious, very fubtle, and almoft exact; but fometimes he is less lucky, as when, in his Night

Thoughts,

Thoughts, having it dropped into his mind, that the orbs, floating in fpace, might be called the cluster of Creation, he thinks on a clufter of grapes, and fays, that they all hang on the great Vine, drinking the nectareous juice of immortal Life.

His conceits are fometimes yet lefs valuable; in the Last Day, he hopes to illustrate the re-affembly of the atoms that compose the human body at the Trump of Doom, by the collection of bees into a fwarm at the tinkling of a pan.

The Prophet fays of Tyre, that her Merchants are Princes; Young fays of Tyre in his Merchant,

Her merchants Princes, and each deck a Throne. Let burlesque try to go beyond him.

He has the trick of joining the turgid and familiar to buy the alliance of Britain, Climes were paid down. Antithefis is his favourite. They for kindness hate; and because fhe's right, he's ever in the wrong.

His verfification is his own, neither his blank nor his rhyming lines have any refem

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blance to those of former writers: he picks up no hemiftichs, he copies no favourite expreffions; he seems to have laid up no ftores of thought or diction, but to owe all to the fortuitous fuggeftions of the prefent moment. Yet I have reason to believe that, when once he had formed a new defign, he then laboured it with very patient industry, and that he composed with great labour, and frequent revifions.

His verfes are formed by no certain model; for he is no more like himself in his different productions than he is like others. He seems never to have ftudied profody, nor to have had any direction but from his own car. But, with all his defects, he was a man of genius and a poet.

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MALLET.

MALLET.

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F DAVID MALLET, having no written memorial, I am able to give no other account than fuch as is fupplied by the unauthorised loquacity of common fame, and a very flight perfonal knowledge.

He was by his original one of the Macgregors, a clan that became, about fixty years ago, under the conduct of Robin Roy, fo formidable and fo infamous for violence and robbery, that the name was annulled by a legal abolition; and when they were all to denominate themselves anew, the father, I fuppofe, of this author called himself Malloch.

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David Malloch was, by the penury of his parents, compelled to be Janitor of the High School at Edinburgh; a mean office, of which he did not afterwards delight to hear. But he furmounted the disadvantages of his birth and fortune; for when the Duke of Montrose applied to the College of Edinburgh for a tutor to educate his fons, Malloch was recommended; and I never heard that he dishonoured his credentials.

When his pupils were fent to see the world, they were entrusted to his care, and having conducted them round the common circle of modifh travels, he returned with them to London, where, by the influence of the family in which he refided, he naturally gained admiffion to many perfons of the highest rank, and the highest character, to wits, nobles, and ftatefmen.

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Of his works, I know not whether I can trace the feries. His firft production was William and Margaret*; of which, though

*Mallet's William and Margaret was printed in Aaron Hill's Plain Dealer, N° 36, July 24, 1724. In its original state it was very different from what it is in the last edition of his works.

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