urt.
Some explanation seems to be required of an arrangement which allots
extraordinarily high promotion in the State of Dulness to a real and
prodigious effort of mental energy. What explanation can be given? Are
the affairs of Dulness conducted, in some respects, by the same rules
which obtain in the Commonwealth of Wit? Is it held there, as here, that
the first step to be taken, in order to forming a judgment of any book,
is to read it? Was it prudently considered that the dullest of critics
can read only as long as his eyes are open? and that the function of
judge must incessantly bring under his cognisance papaverous volumes,
with which only a super-human endowment of vigilance could hope
successfully to contend? so that the goddess is driven, by the necessity
of the game, to admit within the circuit of her somnolent sway, a virtue
to which she is naturally and peculiarly hostile? Or are we mistaken in
supposing that vigour of mind really qualifies for hearing a dull book
through? Is it dulness itself that the most ably listens to dulness? We
are out of our element, we presume, for we arrive at no satisfactory
solution.

Be all this as it may, the method of competition fails of accomplishing
its end; and the chair, after all, is left vacant. Not that the divinity
has in the least misjudged the way of operation proper to her beloved
tomes; but she has miscalculated the strength of her sons. Every dull
head of the congregated multitude--of the illustrious competitors--and
of the two officiating readers, bows overcome. There is, perforce, an
end; and the chair is yet open to the whole kingdom.

The trial involves another matter of some doubt. Do the two clerks read
aloud at one and the same time? and to the same audience? The
description conveys the impression that they do. If so, one might have
been tempted to fear that the sermon and the poem might have neutralized
each other; but, on the contrary, the mixture worked like a patent.

Where has Cibber been all the while, and what has he been doing? "_What
su'd he hae been doin'? Sittin' on his nain lowpin'-on-stane--lukin'
frae him._" Joe Warton complains that he is too much of a passive hero.
Why, he is not so active as Achilles, or even Diomed; yet in Book Second
he is equal to AEneas. He is almost as long-winded, and excels the Pious
in this, that he braves a fire of his own raising, whereas the other
flies from one kindled much against his will--

"High on a