tation was confiderably raifed. The extent of the doctor's abilities, in appropriating to his own profit the fermons of others, is, indeed, pretty notorious; but this is the first inftance we can remember of an original coming from his pen.-How much foever we may have feen reafon to applaud the pious preacher for his other productions, the prefent, in our judgment, furpaffes all praise. The confiderations of grammar, orthography, and fenfe, are trifles, indeed, to which the doctor difdains to defcend. His aim is at a loftier quarry, which the paffages that follow will abundantly fhew:

St Paul, who was the firft preacher in the Chriftian world, read the effects of his fermons in the faces of his hearers. If he fpoke fo as to be understood, it was all he withed, he knew the power of the Chriftian doctrine, he felt its efficacy, and enforced it on his auditors with thofe powers of elocution, as reached to the conviction of those who heard him.'

Be well aware, gentle readers, of your obligation to this learned divine. Perhaps, till Dr. Trufler informed you, you foolish-' ly thought with us, that Chrift had preached before St. Paul, or was a fuperior preacher. We further imagined that this apoftle read the effects of his fermons in the conduct, rather than in the faces, of his hearers, all of whom he wished to make anderftand him.-Gracious doctor! from what errors have you freed us?-But let us hear you again :

It is this St. Paul who preaches to you to-day. His words I have read to you, would I had his language to explain them! But why should I exprefs fuch a wifh? His eloquence was but argument and reafon, mine fhall be the fame.

Modeft Dr. Trufler! Had the poet Cowper but known as much, when he wrote the following lines:

• Would I describe a preacher, fuch as Paul,
Were he on earth, would hear, approve,

Paul fhould himself direct me.'

Without fearching for the apostle in perfon, he might have been certain to find him in you: but it is evident that, at this rime, the poet knew you no further than your advertisements defcribed,

• But hark-the doctor's voice-faft wedg'd between
Two empirics he ftands, and with fwoln cheeks
Infpires the news, his trumpet. Keener far
Than all invective is his bold harangue,
While, through that public organ of report,
He hails the clergy; and, defying fhame,
Announces to the world his own and theirs.
He teaches thofe to read, whom schools difinifs'd‚·

And

And colleges untaught; fells accent, tone,
And emphafis in fcore, and gives to pray'r
Th' adagio and andante it demands ;
He grinds divinity of other days

Down into modern ufe; transforms old print
To zig zag manufcript, and cheats the eyes
Of gall'ry critics by a thousand arts.--
Are there who purchase of the doctor's ware ?
Oh name it not in Gath!—it cannot be,

That grave and learned clerks fhould need fuch aid.
He doubtless is in fport, and does but droll,
Affuming thus a rank unknown before,

Grand-caterer, and dry nurfe of the church.'

These fix last lines, with an expreffion or two before, are not to be confidered as a real difparagement of what the doctor has thus ingeniously fabricated; but mult be imputed to the author's afcribed fingularity of opinion. From the infinitude, may we not fay? of Dr. Trufler's occupations, we must conclude that able coadjutors will be acceptable to him; we have no doubt therefore of obtaining his thanks for taking the liberty to hint that Mr. John Hill, philologus, and Mr. James Spilling the feer, appear to us to be poffeffed of talents which, if united with thofe of Dr. Trufler, would form as extraordinary a trio in the literary hemifphere as ever raifed the wonder of astonished beholders.

The doctor's text is: Who giveth us richly all things to enjoy. And one of the particular exemplifications to the farmers. of thefe enjoyables in this fermon is the game-laws, with their. confequent bleffings. We are no longer furprised that col. Thornton and his party, on bearing thefe with other relative doctrines of the gofpei, fo eloquently fet forth by this another St. Paul, fhould carneftly requeft their publication from the prefs. Entered at STATIONER's Hall,' as printed by the doctor, we apprehend fhould have been noticed amongst the errata; SPORTSMAN's Hall, noubt being meant.

The Seducer, or, Edward and Fidelia, a Poem. 4to. 25. 6.: Rider. 1793.

The Seducer, fair ladies, is a mifnomer, for Fidelia was fo good a girl, and fo attentive to the advice her prudent mother gave her, that, though defperately in love with Edward, he found it in poffible to prevail upon her to confent to any thing amifs. If you engaire then what was her adventure, we beg leave to `inform you, in the words of Okid, who has told a fimilar misfortune very. nearly in two lines,

Ver erat, errabam, zephyrus confpexit, abibam,
Infequitur, fugio, fortior ille uit.'

If

If the author of Edward and Fidelia, had confined his story within the fame compass, he would have told it more concisely; confequently, in our opinion, more delicately; and moreover would have faved us the reading of 3 or 400 lines of bad verfe. Flora, indeed, did not die upon the occafion, whereas the faid Fidelia runs mad and dies, and her pall is held up by fix young maidens, clothed in white.

Poverig triumphant; a Poem written after the Peace of 1763. By Thomas Roftarreck, a Marine. Verfified and enlarged by an Canto I. 4to. 1s. 6d. Fox. 1793.

other Hand.

Small as this poem is, it is the joint concern of two authors; the hiftory of it is as follows. An old marine, returning to his native place, a town in the weft of England, after the peace of 1763, endeavoured to gain his livelihood by following his original trade of a taylor; but not meeting with encouragement, he indulged his verfifying humour (which, whether it were the cause or effect of his bad fuccefs in his handicraft employment we prefume not to determine) in writing a ballad, complaining of the miferies of penury, the first stanza of which ran thus:

• Kind reader attend; the words I have penn'd,

The miferies that I endure;

The grief that's fo great, if kindly you weigh 't,
I truft will fome pity procure.'

This ballad the present editor has taken the trouble of verfifying anew, and prefenting' to the public in its prefent drefs. In his task, in which he may be faid to have acted as journeyman under honeft Snip, he profeffes to have found much entertainment. It is, however, to us a proof that he profeffes much more leisure than tafe; nor can we honeftly recommend his production to our readers, except they fhould, any of them, happen to be in the fame predicament.

Fables in Verfe: or, prefent Life under different Forms. 8vo. 1s. 6d. Murray. 1793.

To invent and to tell a fable well, requires a talent fo peculiar, that there are fewer good fabulifts than epic poets. Our author, therefore, might have failed in his attempt, even had his fancy been more brilliant, his language more correct, his moral more pointed, and his poetry more harmonious than, unfortunate ly, his readers will find them to be. One of the Fables, by a common mifnomer, is a Tale; but we were furprised to fee among them a Song, written for a particular occafion, and inferted here, we fuppofe, purely because the anthor in his parental tenderness, thought it too good to be loft.-The following defcription of Flora, when defcended upon the earth to try a cause between the Rofe and the Lily, is fanciful and rather pretty :

C. R. N. AR. (IX.) Dec. 1793.

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The

The goddess had her court difplay'd
Beneath a blooming jefs'min's fhade;
A verdant bank was there prepar'd,
And butterflies thick mounted guard;
Carnations flock'd about her feat,
And humble dai fies clafp'd her feet;
Convolvulus, by tendrils, clung

From bough to bough, where blackbirds fung
Crocus with hyacinth had join'd

To paint her robe, which grac'd the wind,
Or, falling, mantled round her ftate,
As thron'd the fat to utter fate.

And, that no tumult might be found,
Six giant funflowers kept the ground
While holyhocks, employ'd to fcout,
O'erlook'd the diftant rabble rout.
The cooing doves were told to cease,
Birds to be hush-all folemn peace.
(Iris came down to view the crowd
And left her rainbow with a cloud,
That, lightly purple, hover'd nigh,
And render'd mild the azure sky.)
fuit in that inftant to arrive
Did Mab, the fairy queen contrive;
And lighted from her filmy car,
Which glitter'd various colours far.'

The Lady's Mifcellany; or, pleafing Effays, Poems, Stories, and
Examples, for the Inftruction and Entertainment of the Female
Sex in general, in every Station of Life. By George Wright, Efq.
Author of the Rural Chriftian, Pleafing Melancholy, &c. &c.
12mo. 35. Chapman and Co. 1793.

We were by no means ftruck with admiration of Mr. Wright's poetical talents; at least, when we perufed in the title page, the fol→ Jowing lines

In this fmall tract intended for the fair,
Pleasure and profit truly blended-are.'

We muft, indeed, admit that he has brought together a variety of extracts and paffages, which, if not very fuperior in point of compofition, have at leaft the merit of being of a ftrictly moral tendency. We cannot, however, rank amongst those pieces which deferve approbation, the following abfurd and superstitious ftory, entitled,

A Warning to young Ladies of a gay and thoughtless Turn of

Mind.

The late rev. Mr. Evans, of Bristol, called, a few months

7

before

before he died, to fee one of his people (he being minifer to a congregation in that city) and faw a young lady in the parlour, who came to the Hot-Wells for the benefit of her health, and lodged there.

Mr. Evans obferving her unufually penfive, took the liberty to ask the caufe.

She answered, "Sir, I will think no more of it; it was only a dream! I will not be fo childish as to be alarmed at a dream! However, I will tell it you.

"I dreamed that I was at the ball; where I intend going this night. I thought that, foon after I was in the room, I was taken very ill; that they gave me a fmelling-bottle; and that I was brought home into this room, and placed in that chair, (pointing to an elbow chair,) and that I fainted, and died!

"I then thought that I was carried to a place where angels and holy people were finging hymns and praifing God. I thought I found myself very unhappy, and defired to go from them.

"My conductor faid, " If you do go, you will never come here again."

"I thought I was then whirled out with great violence, and fell down-down-down-through darkness, and thunders, into fulphurous flames!-With the fcorching flames, and hideous cries, I awaked.”.

Mr. Evans made fome ferious remarks on the fubject, and advised the young lady not to go to the ball that night.

She faid the would; for fhe was more of a woman than to mind dreams!

• Accordingly fhe went; was taken ill; a fmelling-bottle was given to her; he was brought home, placed in the chair before mentioned; fainted; and died!'

We will fum up our opinion of this work, by fuggefting a triAing alteration in the motto above quoted, which we think should run thus:

In this dull volume publish'd for the fair,
Morality and nonfenfe-blended are.'

NOVEL S.

Henry, a Novel. By the Author of the Cypher; or, World as it 2 Vols. 12mo. 6. Lane. 1793.

goes.

In all our drudgery through the flimzy compofitions from Leadenhall-street, we have fcarcely met with any tak more difficult, than the patient though fruitless fearch after fomething to commend in this novel. The author of it feems perfectly qualified for this kind of writing, from the happy talent he poffeffes, fpreading a very scanty portion of ideas over a prodigious fur face of paper, In the very first chapter, which confits of ten pages, we are merely

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