Laws of Poetry, stiles Mr. Otway a Poet of
the first Magnitude, and tells us, and with great justice, that he was
perfect master of the tragic passions, and draws them every where with
a delicate and natural simplicity, and therefore never fails to raise
strong emotions in the soul. I don't know of a stronger instance of
this force, than in the play of the Orphan; the tragedy is composed of
persons whose fortunes do not exceed the quality of such as we
ordinarily call people of condition, and without the advantage of
having the scene heightened by the importance of the characters; his
inimitable skill in representing the workings of the heart, and its
affection, is such that the circumstances are great from the art of
the poet, rather than from the figure of the persons represented. The
whole drama is admirably wrought, and the mixture of passions raised
from affinity, gratitude, love, and misunderstanding between brethren,
ill usage from persons obliged slowly returned by the benefactors,
keeps the mind in a continual anxiety and contrition. The sentiments
of the unhappy Monimia are delicate and natural, she is miserable
without guilt, but incapable of living with a consciousness of having
committed an ill act, though her inclination had no part in it. Mrs.
Barry, the celebrated actress, used to say, that in her part of
Monimia in the Orphan, she never spoke these words, Ah! poor Castalio,
without tears; upon which occasion Mr. Gildon observes, that all the
pathetic force had been lost, if any more words had been added, and
the poet would have endeavoured, in vain, to have heightened them, by
the addition of figures of speech, since the beauty of those three
plain simple words is so great by the force of nature, that they must
have been weakened and obscured by 'the finest flowers of rhetoric.

The tragedy of the Orphan is not without great blemishes, which the
writer of a criticism on it, published in the Gentleman's Magazine,
has very judiciously and candidly shewn. The impetuous passion of
Polydore breaks out sometimes in a language not sufficiently delicate,
particularly in that celebrated passage where he talks of rushing upon
her in a storm of love. The simile of the bull is very offensive to
chaste ears, but poor Otway lived in dissolute times, and his
necessity obliged him to fan the harlot-face of loose desire, in
compliance to the general corruption. Monimia staying to converse with
Polydor, after he vauntin