174 APPENDIX, 



were. Euripides altered nothing in the character, but made 

 them fuch as they were reprefented by Hiftory, Epic Poetry, 

 or Tradition. Of the three, the draught of Sophocles is 

 moft commended by Ariftotle. I have followed it in that 

 part of Oedipus which I writ ; though, perhaps, I have made 

 him too good a man. But my characters of Anthony and 

 Cleopatra, though they are favourable to them, have nothing 

 of outrageous panegyric ; their pafiions were their own, and 

 fuch as were given them by Hiitory, only the deformities of 

 them were can: into madows, that they might be objects of 

 compaffion : .whereas, if I had, choieri a noon-day light for 

 them, xfomewhat mud have been difcovered, which would ra- 

 ther have moved our hatred than our pity. 



" The Gothic manner, and the barbarous ornaments which 

 are to be avoided in a pidure," are juft the fame with thofe in 

 *m ill-ordered Play. For example; our Englifh Tragi-comedy 

 muft be confefled to be wholly Gothic, notwithstanding the 

 foccefs. which it has found upon our theatre; and in the P aft or 

 Ftdo of Guarini, .even though Corifca and the Satyr contribute 

 fotnewhat to the main adion : Neither can I defend my Spanijh 

 Friar, as fond as otherwife I am of it, from this imputation ; 

 for though the comical parts are diverting, and the ferious 

 moving, yet they are of an unnatural mingle : for mirth and 

 gravity deftroy each other, and are no more to be allowed for 

 decent, than a gay widow laughing in a mourning habit. 



I had almoft forgot one confiderable refemblance. Du 

 Frefnoy tells us, " That the figures of the groupes muft not 

 be all on a fide, that js, with their faces and bodies all turned 

 the fame way, but .muft contraft each other by their feveral 

 petitions." Thus in a Play, fome characters muft be raifed 

 to oppofe others, and to fet them off the better, according to " 



the 



