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EXAMIN'D:

O R;

ANIMADVERSIONS

ON THE

FABLE or PLOT, Manners, Sentiments, and Diction

OF THE

New Tragedy of Cato.

WITH A

Comparison of the CHARACTERS of the Dramatical and Hiftorical HER O.

Necessary for the Perufal of not only the Readers of CATO, but of all other Tragedies.

Dedicated to FOSEPH ADDISON, Efq;

LONDON:

Printed for JOHN PEMBERTON, at the Buck and Sun against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetftreet. MDCCXIII.

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HE great Succefs of your Play has drawn this Dedication upon you, as well as the Trouble of the following Reflections, if you fall think fit to give them a Perufal. If the general Applause of the Audience can give a fincere Merit, yours is beyond Controverfy in the Writing of Cate; fince it is so great, that it may look like a fort of fingular Affurance to bring it to a nicer Examination. But I affure my felf, that Mr. Addison is too sensible of the frail Foundation of a Fame built on the Voice of the Million, to be fatisfied with that alone which has been equally indulgent even to Durfey and Settle, and fome others of no higher Defert. The Quixots and the Empress of Morocco, are mortifying Inftances bow little real Value there is in Success on the Stage, which cannot preferve the Author from After Neglect and Infamy, if bis Performance will not ftand the Cenfure of the Learned in that Art of the Drama

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The Month's Run of the Emprefs of Morocco will not now prevail with an Audience to fee it one Night with Patience, tho' it was once thought worthy the Labour of Three Poets to expose and condemn it.

No Play in France ever met with a more General, and Violent Applause than the Cid; fo that it past into a Proverb---More Beautiful than the Cid-hen the French wou'd give an Hyperbolical Praife to any thing they admir'd. Yet we find Corneille was not protected by this from the Cenfure of the Academy, whofe Members enquir'd into his Abfurdities and Errors against the Rules of Art; which has ever fince put that Play in a very low Clafs among the Men of Fudgment and Art. Tho' we have had a Player of ours, and one of the Di rectors of the House, to fpew the Fineness of bis Fudgment and Tafte, presume to give us a wretched and lame Imitation of it in his Heroic Daughter; which with all bis Intereft and good Affurance, be bas not been able to Impofe on the Town.ld do is tud

I am very fenfible, that Criticifm lies under a very bard Name among our ignorant Poetafters, as the Effect of Ill Nature; but that can have no manner of Influence on me at this time, fince I write to and on a Perfon, that is too well acquainted with the Antients, and their Beau ty and Excellence, not to allow them our Masters in Poetry and Oratory; and that whoever cannot be tryed by their Rules, has no just Claim to the Titles of Poets. The Praife of the Ignorant is but a Reproach, if incon fiftent with the Approbation of the Knowing Lucian fbews bis Refentment against fuch a falfe Applause in bis

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Zeuxis; and Horace advises bis Pupil not to labour to plefae the Many. The Chace of that in Works of this Nature, is like making the Wapping Picture-Sellers and Daubers Fudges of Titian and Raphael: For none in reality can judge of the Excellence of a Performance in any fuch as are perfectly skilled in that Art. Art b The Million happen fometimes to be in the Right, but it is by Accident alone, and therefore they are not to be depended upon.

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Suffer your felf therefore, Sir, to be brought to that Examination, which can only determine your Fate. If have performed like an Artift, your Glory will be as Great as Sincere ; if you have not, you lose only the Vanity of a Day, in the Artless Applaufes you have met with in the Reprefentation.

But it will be faid, that you have met with Success with all Degrees, with the Quality as well as People, and therefore it may with Juftice be depended on. By no means, Sir; Arts are not conveyed by Titles; nor are Dignities and Eftates capable of raifing Ignorance above the Vulgar. There is the Great Vulgar as well as the Small, as Cowly bas diftinguifbed them:

Begon; Prophane! I hate you all;

Both the Great Vulgar, and the Small.

The little Encouragement Men of Art meet with among our Great Men, is a certain Proof, that they are but ill Judges of Merit, and have no fine Tafte in the Politer Studies; their Applaufe will not therefore fe

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