Haud aliter, cum cæca foror, Fortuna, gubernat, The beauties of the foregoing quotation are too evident to escape the notice of the intelligent reader: Jam Dea per varias difpenfans munera gentes,' is a happy adoption of Ovid's 'Ofcula difpenfat natos fuprema per omnes,' Metam. lib. vi. l. 278. As Exquiritque, auditque viros, et facta recenfet,' is of Virgil's "Exquiritque auditque virum monimenta priorum,' Æneid. lib. viii. 7. 312. not to mention others of a fimilar kind. Our Author has added elegant tranflations of the Odes, "Happy the man, whofe wifh and care, &c.' and Bufy, curious, thirty fly, &c.' in the ftyle of Horace; and he concludes his collection of Latin tranflations with Gray's Elegy in a Country Church-yard, of which the first stanza is, Eheu! fugaces præcipiti rota Arva mihi tenebris cedens. Opaca lentis jugera paffibus Signat humum pedibus colonus.' A new tragedy called THE RIVAL SISTERS clofes the prefent edition of Mr. Murphy's works. It was written originally' for the ftage, but was not acted; and the following reafon for this, is affigned in the Preface: When the piece was finished, the Author had his moments of felf-approbation, and in his first ardour, hinted to a friend, that he intended to give it to the stage. But felf-approbation did not last long-that glow of imagination, which (to fpeak the truth) is fometimes heated into a pleafing delirium with its own work, fubfided by degrees, and doubt and diffidence fucceeded. In this irrefolute state of mind the Author's refpect for the Public, who have done him, upon former occafions, very particular honour, increased his timidity: he was unwilling to appear a candidate for their favour, when he was not sure of adding to their pleasure.' The play is built on the fame foundation with the ARIANE of the younger Corneille, whofe defects drew down the judgment of that enlightened critic Madame de Sévigné. Mr. Murphy has given us a very different performance. The conflict, the vehemence, and the various tranfitions of the paffions are painted in higher colours than are ufual with French authors; and thofe languid scenes which weaken the intereft, and are tainted with the familiarity of comedy, feem to have been carefully avoided. Some the difgraced, and fome with honours crown'd Unlike fucceffes equal merits found. Thus her blind fifter, fickle Fortune, reigns, And undifcerning scatters crowns and chains.” Bb 4 We We do not lay before our Readers the fable of Ariadne, of which we cannot fuppofe them ignorant; it forms, beyond doubt, as Voltaire fays, the happieft fubject for tragedy that has come down to us from antiquity; and Mr. Murphy has not done it injuftice. We are now arrived at the end of this collection, which we cannot quit without thanking the Author for the entertainment which the perufal of it hath afforded us; nor ought we to close the article, without informing our Readers that a good likeness of Mr. Murphy, engraved by Cook, is given, by way of frontif.. piece to the first volume. ART. XIV. FOREIGN LITERATURE. ITALY. Art. 1. ELOGIO, &c. i. e. The Eulogy of the celebrated Abbé FRISI, delivered at a public meeting of the Arcadian Academy. By F. JAQUIER. Rome. 1786.-The Abbé Frifi was, without doubt, one of the moft eminent mathematicians of the prefent age, and had he not been tormented with an infatiable thirst for literary fame, which was not feldom difagreeably felt both by his friends and adverfaries, his character and converfation (this is faid in confequence of a perfonal acquaintance) would have been as amiable and interefting, as his genius was vaft, and his knowledge extenfive. The learned and refpectable orator, who here offers the tribute due to his memory, exhibits to our view both the mathematician and the man; and we obferve a beautiful mixture of the generous friend, and the equitable and impartial biographer, in this moral and literary portrait. Praife is adopted without fufpicion of exaggeration, when cenfure is, at the fame time, administered with justice and candour. No panegyrift could be better qualified to appreciate the merit of Abbé FRISI, as a mathematician, than Father JAQUIER, whofe eminence in that branch of fcience, as well as in many others, is fufficiently known; and accordingly his ample and learned account of his philofophical hero, confidered in this point of view, will afford fingular pleasure to the mathematical reader. We have here alfo an account of the Manfredis, and other eminent Italian mathematicians, who were connected with the Abbé FRISI. 2. Saggio, &c. i. e. Mineralogical Obfervations. By F. SCIPIO BREISLAC. 8vo. Rome. 1786.-This is a very accurate and clear defcription of the fofils and minerals, that the learned traveller, in his excurfions through the Ecclefiaftical State, or Pope's Patrimony, obferved in that extenfive diftrict. His defcription is accompanied with explications and remarks on the alums, alums, the alum-ftone, the bafaltes, and other natural curiofities that he met with in this excurfion. In that confiderable space (of 110 Italian miles in length, and 50 in breadth) that lies between the Appenines and the Mediterranean, and comprehends the greateft part of the Pope's territories, there are evident marks of the ravages of fire, as volcanic productions of every kind are found in this extenfive tract of land, wherever the obferver turns his view. But that which principally merits attention, according to our Author, is the formation or ftructure of thefe volcanic hills and rifing grounds, their fituation, the fubftances that compofe them, and the pofition of their ftrata. All thefe announce vifibly the violent action of fire, combined with the permanent and regular action of water, and induce our traveller to think, that the fea formerly covered thefe regions; that rocks and ifles arofe from it by the efforts of fubmarine volcanos; and that these volcanic eruptions removed, by their volume, the watery element. When the fea retired, the volcano gradually loft it activity, and was at length totally extinguished. Thus one of the most beautiful diftricts of Italy was formed by the reciprocal efforts of two difcordant elements ! 3. Lettera, &c. i. e. A Letter from the Abbé Fontana to the Chevalier de Lorgna. Florence. 1786.-This Letter contains new experiments, defigned to confirm the learned Abbé's opinion, that water, paffing through hot tubes, which have not a red heat, does not undergo any decompofition. He repeated the experiments of M. Lavoifier, and other French philofophers; but he has not drawn from them the fame conclufions, nor explained the phenomena they exhibit, in the fame manner. He found, indeed, as they had done, that water, paffing over the interior surface of an iron tube well heated, loft a part of its volume; and that, on the other hand, a certain portion of inflammable air was formed by this paffage: he alfo found, that the iron had gained in weight the fame quantity which the water had loft, after a deduction made of what had been converted into inflammable air. But, inftead of concluding from thence, as has been done, that water is a mixed body, compofed of inflammable air, which it yields in effect, and of dephlogisticated air, which is fuppofed to have entered into the hot iron, whose weight is increafed, our ingenious Abbé explains the phenomenon in a very different manner. He confiders the heated iron as in a state, of all others, the most adapted to make it lofe its phlogifton, and it is to this that he attributes the formation and developement of the inflammable air in the experiment under con fideration. He confiders, moreover, the existence of dephlogifti. cated air as an element of the water, and its entrance into the iron, as merely imaginary and as it was a portion of water, and not of dephlogisticated air, that was wanting, he thinks it much much more natural to fuppofe, that it was confequently this portion of water, which had entered into the iron.-We think fo too. But however that may be, this letter is well worth perufal. The penetrating eye of the Abbé de FONTANA is fingularly adapted to obferve nature in her real forms, and to perceive the illufions that fo often accompany the fubtile experiments, that are, at this day, made in natural philofophy, and his reafoning is as juft as his eye is quick and piercing. 4. Trattato, &c. i. e. An hiftorical and critical Treatife concerning the epidemical Disorder among the Horned Cattle, in the Year 1784. By M. ZENO BUONGIOVANNI, M. D. at Verona *.-The mortality raged fo violently among the cattle in feveral parts of Italy, in the year 1784, that the inhabitants, and particularly those who lived in the country and the villages, were under the alarming apprehenfions of fatal confequences to themselves from this epidemical diforder, especially as the cattle infected with it were frequently flaughtered and used for food. The Author of this treatise, affifted by other phyficians of Verona, made feveral experiments in order to difpel the anxiety of the Public. Among other trials, they contrived a method of making dogs and other animals fwallow the infected fluids of the cows and oxen, and even their bile, which was fufpected to be the principal feat of the disease; the result of these trials anfwered their wishes, for to none of these animals was the contagion communicated. The detail of thefe experiments, together with the fymptoms of the disease, its progress, and the remedies employed in the cure, are related with order, perfpicuity, and judgment, in this useful work. 5. Flora Pedemontana, &c. i. e. The Piedmontefe Flora; or a methodical Enumeration of the native or indigenous Plants of the Duchy of Piedmont. By M. ALLIONI. 3 Vols. Folio, enriched with 92 Plates. Turin. 1785.-The Author of this fplendid work is confidered as one of the most celebrated Naturalifts in Italy. His Effays on Natural Hiftory, which are publifhed in the Memoirs of the Academy of Turin, are well known, and highly applauded by the connoiffeurs in that line of science and the prefent important work, which is the fruit of long labour and ftudy, will, no doubt, add confiderably to his reputation. He has defcribed in this work 2813 plants, which he found growing wild in the duchy of Piedmont; thofe contained in the third volume are the new ones difcovered by him ; those that are already known acquire a kind of novelty by his defcription, which is drawn from nature, and not from books. 6. ΗΣΙΟΔΟΥ το Ασκραιο τα Ευρισκομενα, &c. i. e. The Works • See our account of an epidemical disease among the cattle, with an anatomical defcription of its feat, in our laft Appendix, p. 535. of of Hefiod, published in large Octavo, at the Royal Printingprefs at Parma. 1785. This edition, which is remarkable for its typographical beauty and fplendor, does honour to the munificence and good taste of the Archduke Ferdinand, under whose protection it is published. The original Greek is printed in the fame beautiful characters with the Anacreon, of which we gave an account when it appeared. It is accompanied with an elegant tranflation in Latin verfe, by the Abbé Zamagna, who has alfo enriched it with critical Notes, and a learned Preface. 7. Varia Lectiones Veteris Teftamenti ex immenfa MSS. editorum Codicumque Congerie haufta, et ad Samarit. Textum, ad vetustissimas Verfiones, ad accuratiores facræ Critica Fontes ac Leges examinate, Opera et Studio JOH. BERN. de Rossi, S. T. P. &c. VOLUMENII. Parmæ. 1785. 4to. 262 pages.-This fecond volume contains the books of Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings. We formerly mentioned the first volume of this important work; a third, &c. are foon expected to bring it to a conclufion. 8. Lettere Odeporiche, &c. i. e. Letters of a Traveller, or Travels through the Peninsula of Cizicum, Bruffa, and Nice. By the Abbé DOMINIC SESTINI, Member of the Academy of Florence. 2 Vols. 8vo. Leghorn. 1785.-We have had feveral times + occafion to make honourable mention of the itinerary Letters of this inftructive and entertaining traveller. The principal objects in the prefent publication are the cities of Bruffa and Nice in Bythinia, of which our Author's defcription will be read with pleasure. 9. Differtazioni, Lettere, e altre Operette, &c. i. e. Differtations, Letters, and other Pieces, compofed by the celebrated P. ANT. MARIA LUPI of Florence; revised, digefted, and now published, for the first time, by FRAN. ANT. ZACCARIA. 2 Vols. 4to. Faenza. 1785.-The first of thefe volumes contains twelve Dif fertations (of which a few were formerly published) on the Baptifmal Fonts, and other ancient monuments, relative to the reli❤ gious customs and worship of the early profeffors of Chriftianity, and alfo on a great variety of infcriptions and fymbols, that are connected with the hiftory of the Chriftian church. In the fecond volume there are fifteen Differtations and twenty-three Letters on ancient remains, relative to profane hiftory. 10. La Vita di Taffo. i. e. The Life of Taffo, compofed by the Abbé P. ANT. SERASSI, and dedicated to her Royal Highnefs Maria Beatrix d'Efte, Archduchefs of Auftria. 4to. Rome. 1785. This mafterly piece of biography is a new and valuable acquifition to the literary hiftory of Italy. It has long been looked for with impatience, and its appearance has fully anfwered the expectations of the Public. The life, the adventures, * Vid. Rev. vol. lxxiii. p. 536. + Vid. particularly vol. Ixxi. p. 584. the |