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writer in that age, I fhould make no fcruple of giving the honour 

 of that performance to him. 



Muf.~\ Well, this is one way of getting rid of the charge; and 

 I will not infill upon many arguments that might be produced 

 againft this liberty of difowning whatever makes for our own dis- 

 credit. Father Hardouin, you know, will carry this farther, 

 and prove that none of the tragedies afcribed to Euripides were 

 written by him. I will not fay of the Alceftis that the fubjedt 

 is uninterefting ; but I believe I may fay, that it is a very im- 

 proper one for a tragedy ; at leaft as Euripides hath managed it. 

 A wife that refolves to fave her hufband by her own death, 

 will certainly always prejudice the audience in her favour ; but 

 I believe no woman, under thofe circumftances ever occafioned 

 fo little pity as Alceftis, which proceeds entirely from the impro- 

 bability and abfurdity of the whole ltory ; fuch a one I think as 

 a judicious writer would never have pitched upon. The rule of 

 Horace, 



Ficta voluptatis causa, fint proxima veris. 



can never be too much attended to ; Euripides however feems 

 in this play not to have the leaft confide red it. The piece 

 throughout is confiftent (if I may be allowed f the expreffion) in 

 impropriety ; for I do not recollect a fingle incident in the 

 whole which doth not mock, as being improbable. The even- 

 ing advances ; but as we return to the houfe I mall ftate, for 

 your confideration another objection to parts of the dialogue in 



f So great an anachronifm is not by this incurred, as to fuppofe that 

 Euripides could really have attended to this rule, as laid down by the 

 Koman Poet ; but as the maxim is founded on common fenie, whether 

 it was at that time or no an axiom, every writer of tragedy fhould not 

 have neglected it. 



moil 



