232 CHA&ACTER'-OF GEOkGE BUCHANAN. OQ. iC^j, 



fore, he leaves every poet ancient and modern, at an 

 immenfe diilance •, and as if the genius of Rome had not 

 fufficiently extended the hmits of her language, he 

 has employed a fpecies of verfe, which is faid never to 

 have been attempted by any former writer. He is 

 conftantly attentive to claflic;il dignity of character. — 

 Good fenfe predominates in every fentence. He is 

 not one of thofe thoughtlefs compiiers, in whom, to 

 perufe twenty pages of elegance, or wit, we muft wade 

 through whole volumes of bombaft, or buffoonery. 

 'Vi''e can never fay Interdum bonus dcrniitat Buchananus ; 

 for in the whole wildernefs of his poetry, there are 

 not, I believe, ten lines which his moil judicious ad- 

 mirer could wifh to be forgotten. I here fpeak of the 

 intrinfic merit of the verfes, without endeavouring to 

 juflify on every occafion, either his panegyric, or his 

 ccnfure. 



As an herald of civil and religious liberty, our au- 

 thor deferves an ample {hare of the gratitude of nations. 

 Never did the " rights of man" meet with a more ar- 

 dent partifan, an advocate more acute, eloquent, phi- 

 lofophical, and fublime ||. The truly virtuous charac- 

 ters of antiquity he mentions with the veneration they 

 dcferve. But judgement never drops the reins to 

 fancy. From his eye the fplendour of conqueft could 

 not hide its deformity ; and when there fell in his way 

 a Ca;lar, an Alexander, a Xerxes, or a Charles the 

 Fifth, the moralift fet fto bounds to his fcorn and de- 

 teilation. When, in 1552, the emperor was re- 



|[ On this head the public will liften with refpe<5l to a writer who 

 lia» lately deferved and acquired their approbation. " The firft man at 

 " lilt revival of letters, who united elegant learning to original and mal- 

 " cidine thought was Buchanan, and lie too feems to have been the firfl 

 " fcho'-drwho c-iu<;'ht from the.ancicnts the noble fiame of republican en- 

 " tbufialin. I'his praii'e is merhed by his negleclcd, though incompar- 

 " able traft, Da 'Jure Rcgui, in which the principles of popular politics, 

 " and the maxiiii!) of a free government, arc delivered with a preciiion 

 " and enforced with an energy, which no former uge had equalled, and 

 ■• ao fucceeding has furpalTed." 



VinJiciw Calllcx, p. 309 a edit. 



