painting; which shows a great genius, because, if I am not misinformed, he had nothing of this peculiarity in his character. There remains to fhow, by examples, the manner of treating fubjects fo as to give them a ridiculous appearance. Il ne dit jamais, je vous donne, mais, je vous prete le bon jour. Orleans. I know him to be valiant. Moliere.. Conftable. I was told that by one that knows him better than you. Orleans. What's he? Conftable. Marry he told me fo himself; and he faid, he car'd not who knew it. Henry V. Shakespear. He never broke any man's head but his own, that was against a post when he was drunk. and Ibid. Millament. Sententious Mirabell! pr'ythee don't look with that violent and inflexible wife face, like Solomon at the dividing of the child in an old tapeftry hanging. Way of the World. A true critic in the perufal of a book, is like a dog at a feast, whofe thoughts and ftomach are wholly fet upon what the guests fling away, and confequently is apt to fnarl moft when there are the feweft bones. Tale of a Tub. In the following inftances the ridicule is made to appear from the behaviour of the perfons introduced. Mafcarille. Te fouvient-il, vicomte, de cette demi-lune, que nous emportâmes fur les ennemis. au fiege d'Arras ? Fodelet. Que veux tu dire avec ta demi-lune ? c'etoit bien une lune toute entiere. Moliere les Precieuses Ridicule, fc. 11. Slender. I came yonder at Eaton to marry Mrs. Anne Page; and fhe's a great lubberly boy. Page. Upon my life then you took the wrong. Slender. What need you tell me that? I think fo, when I took a boy for a girl: if I had been marry'd to him, for all he was in woman's apparel, I would not have had him. Merry Wives of Windsor. Valentine. Your bleffing, Sir, Sir Sampfon. You've had it already, Sir: I think I fent it you to day in a bill for four thoufand pound; a great deal of money, Brother Forefight. Forefight. Ay indeed, Sir Sampfon, a great deal of money for a young man: I wonder what can he do with it. Love for Love, act 2. fc.7. Millamant. I naufeate walking; 'tis a countrydiverfion; I lothe the country, and every thing that relates to it. Sir Wilful. Indeed! hah! look ye, look ye, you do? nay, 'tis like you may-here are choice of paftimes here in town, as plays and the like e; that must be confefs'd indeed. Millamant. Ah l'etourdie! I hate the town too. Sir Wilful. Dear heart, that's much-hah! that you should hate 'em both! hah! 'tis like you may; there are fome can't relish the town, and others others can't away with the country-'tis like you may be one of those, Coufine. Way of the world, act 4. fc. 4. Lord Froth. I affure you, Sir Paul, I laugh at no body's jeft but my own, or a lady's: I affure you, Sir Paul. Brifk. How? how, my Lord? what, affront my wit! Let me perith, do I never say any thing worthy to be laugh'd at? Lord Froth. O foy, don't mifapprehend me, I don't fay fo, for I often fmile at your conceptions. But there is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality, than to laugh; 'tis fuch a vulgar expreffion of the paffion! every body can laugh. Then especially to laugh at the jest of an inferior person, or when any body elfe of the fame quality does not laugh with one; ridiculous! To be pleas'd with what pleases the crowd! Now, when I laugh I always laugh alone. Double Dealer, act 1. fc. 4.. So fharp-fighted is pride in blemishes, and fo willing to be gratified, that it will take up with the very flightest improprieties; fuch as a blunder by a foreigner in fpeaking our language, especially if the blunder can bear a fenfe that reflects upon the fpeaker : Quickly. The young man is an honest man. Caius. What fhall de honeft man do in my clofet; dere is no honest o man dar n clofet. fhall com come in my Merry Wives of Windfor. Love-fpeeches are finely ridiculed in the following paffage. Quoth he, My faith as adamantine, True True as Apollo ever spoke, And if you'll give my flame but vent, All fpices, perfumes, and fweet powders, And take all lives of things from you; Hudibras, part 2. canto 1. Irony turns things into ridicule in a peculiar manner. It confifts in laughing at a man under difguife, by appearing to praise or fpeak well of him. Swift affords us many illuftrious examples of this fpecies of ridicule. Take the following example. "By these methods, in a few weeks, "there starts up many a writer, capable of managing the profoundest and most universal subjects. "For "For what though his head be empty, provided "his common-place book be full? And if you "will bate him but the circumstances of me"thod, and style, and grammar, and invention; "allow him but the common privileges of trans cribing from others, and digreffing from him"felf, as often as he fhall fee occafion; he will de"fire no more ingredients towards fitting up a trea"tife that fhall make a very comely figure "on a bookfeller's fhelf, there to be preferved neat and clean, for a long eternity, adorned "with the heraldry of its title, fairly inferibed on a label; never to be thumbed or greased by ftu"dents, nor bound to everlasting chains of dark"nefs in a library; but when the fullness of "time is come, fhall happily undergo the trial of purgatory, in order to afcend the sky *" following paffage from Arbuthnot is not lefs ironi cal. The "If the Reverend clergy showed more concern than others, I charitably impute it to their great charge of fouls; and what confirmed me in "this opinion was, that the degrees of apprehenfi"on and terror could be diftinguished to be greater or lefs, according to their ranks and degrees in "the church t. A parody must be distinguished from every fpecies of ridicule. It enlivens a gay fubject by imitating fome important incident that is ferious. It is ludicrous, and may be rifible. But ridicule is not a neceffary ingredient. Take the following examples, the first of which refers to an expreffion of Mofes. Tale of a Tub, fe&t. 7. The † A true and faithful narrative of what paffed in London during the general confternation of all ranks and degrees of mankind. |