rally tedious, as it is unanimated
and inactive, and obstructs the progress of the action; it should,
therefore, always be rapid, and enlivened by frequent interruption.
Shakespeare found it an incumbrance, and instead of lightening it by
brevity, endeavoured to recommend it by dignity and splendour.

His declamations or set speeches are commonly cold and weak, for his
power was the power of nature; when he endeavoured, like other tragick
writers, to catch opportunities of amplification, and instead of
inquiring what the occasion demanded, to show how much his stores of
knowledge could supply, he seldom escapes without the pity or resentment
of his reader.

It is incident to him to be now and then entangled with an unwieldy
sentiment, which he cannot well express, and will not reject; he
struggles with it a while, and, if it continues stubborn, comprises it
in words such as occur, and leaves it to be disentangled and evolved by
those who have more leisure to bestow upon it.

Not that always where the language is intricate, the thought is subtile,
or the image always great where the line is bulky; the equality of words
to things is very often neglected, and trivial sentiments and vulgar
ideas disappoint the attention, to which they are recommended by
sonorous epithets and swelling figures.

But the admirers of this great poet have most reason to complain when he
approaches nearest to his highest excellence, and seems fully resolved
to sink them in dejection, and mollify them with tender emotions, by the
fall of greatness, the danger of innocence, or the crosses of love. What
he does best, he soon ceases to do. He is not long soft and pathetick
without some idle conceit, or contemptible equivocation. He no sooner
begins to move, than he counteracts himself; and terrour and pity, as
they are rising in the mind, are checked and blasted by sudden
frigidity.

A quibble is to Shakespeare, what luminous vapours are to the traveller;
he follows it at all adventures it is sure to lead him out of his way,
and sure to ingulf him in the mire. It has some malignant power over his
mind, and its fascinations are irresistible. Whatever be the dignity or
profundity of his disquisitions, whether he be enlarging knowledge or
exalting affection, whether he be amusing attention with incidents, or
enchaining it in suspense, let but a quibble spring up before him, and
he leaves his work unfinished. A quibble is the golden apple for which