nocent and examples of it, but neither fay nor allow that they were finful before they knew any thing. • The qualifications always required before baptifm are repentance and faith, and that both at the first preaching the gospel, and after the establishment of the churches; nor is there any mention of perfons baptized without them, or that for hafte they baptized any not properly qualified, or in an imperfect manner. When houfholds are faid to be buptized, it does not follow that infant children were fo, for the fame word is used in cafes plainly inconfiftent with infancy; and the jaylor's, who only are faid to be all baptized at once, did alfo all hear and believe: children however seem probably to have been baptized before manhood, though not before understanding. The text else were your children unclean but now are they boly, is neither fufficient to prove that they need no baptifm against universal practice from the firft, nor that they are fit for it from birth, for the fame argument will prove that the unbelieving party is alfo fit; befide being bred by Chriftians will fit them for it more than birth: Paul's meaning seems to be, that though he would not have Chriftians marry heathens, yet they should not forfake thofe married before converfion. There is no hint in the Gospel that the children brought to Christ were baptized, therefore no proof can thence arise that they should: their innocence which he commends rather makes their baptifm needlefs, which fuppofes fins to be repented of and forgiven, nor may the confeffion of faith be done by deputy, nor was Chriftian baptism then appointed; so that on the whole there feems neither need, nor indeed room for baptizing of infants. The priest was probably the perfon who baptized; if a fuperior was there he did not always perform the office, yet he compleated it by laying on his hands; but it is doubtful whether a deacon could regularly perform it. The perfon was baptized into the name, that is into the belief of God the creator, Jefus Chrift the redeemer, and the Holy Ghoft the comforter. Jews and Gentiles were all baptized in the fame manner, being baptized in the name of the Lord, meaning nothing different from the command in Mat. xxviii. 19. They entirely dipped the perfon baptized, and probably three times at the three diftin&t names. • Their being dipped in water, and rifing out of it again, figured to them that as Chrift died, was buried and rose again, fo they also muft die to, that is forfake, their former fins, and rife again to a new and holy life; this was further represented by their putting off their cloaths, and being cloath'd with a white garment. They profefs'd their belief in Jefus Chrift as F2 the times, to say, that it is fashionable thus to write, and thus to admire. It gives us pleasure to have it in our power to praise; it is painful to us to be obliged to reprehend; yet as publications are now very numerous, we must neceffarily meet with more fubjects of cenfure than of commendation. The book on which we are now animadverting, deferves no quarter. It contains no ftriking, or agreeable character; it has no grada tion, or artful connexion of incidents, to engage the attention: it is neither poetry nor profe; but a distortion of sentiment and language; it often violates the most obvious rules of grammar, and, what is worse, the facred rules of decency. We shall give one instance of this man's indelicacy. • Flora now smiles upon her lover; a more than lively emotion is in its warmeft colours painted on the countenance of the goddess she refufes to grant one favour to this fhepherd, and yet bestows a thousand others: at length, with one deep figh, her tenderness breaks forth. Lo! the immortal falls a victim to all-conquering love. This little god firft fteals into her heart, thence fubtly tingles through her veins, and riots in her fparkling eyes; the happy Mirtil is no less inflamed. Their fighs are intermingled, their careffes are together blended, and their fouls diffolve away together, undistinguished in this blissful conflict: but foon, alas! fucceeds a fenfelefs languor to the ardent tranfports of the fhepherd: the goddess feems amaz'd, forgetful of her lover's mortal state. Mirtil, with a figh, laments his cruel fate, and Flora fympathizes with her thepherd.' We could give a groffer quotation than this; but pudency, to ufe the words of our author, reftrains our pen. No book ever gave rise to a greater number of wretched imitations than the Telemaque of the famous Fenelon. He was fo happy as to give us poetical profe, not cramped with ftiffness, nor bloated with bombaft. But from the many unfuccefsful attempts of the fame kind which have been made after him, we may conclude, that his fpecies of writing is only adapted to the genius of a few. There is not the least refemblance betwixt him and the German poets, the Klopstocks, the Gefners, and this anonymous high-prieft of Venus. paintings are drawn by the delicate hand of a Raphael; theirs are glaring, incoherent, unaffecting Chinese crudities. 11. Party Diffected: or Plain Truih. A Poem. 4to. 25. Bell To this poem the author prefixes an apology to the Reviewers; from the ftrain of which apologs, we ought in candour to infer his modelty and integrity; qualities which al His ways ways entitle a man to respectful treatment. We fhall give the reader a part of what he says in his own defence. Altho' to merit he has no pretence, Admit a word by way of felf defence: No views lucrative, this young writer knows, There are good lines, and good pictures in this poem ; though it is not without grammatical errors, and false rhymes. His accent must be provincial, as appears from the profody of fome of his verfes. The word lucrative, is pronounced lucrative; induftry, induftry; epicurean, epicurean ;-not, lucrative, induftry, epicurean, as he makes them found in his measure. The leaders in the oppofition are not fuch worthies in his opinion as they are esteemed to be by their adherents. Th' unhallow'd parfon ceases to preach peace, The city patriot, infamously base, In him behold the drift of all the tribe; The following characters of the inferior patriots will, per haps, not be thought unentertaining. The rueful barber, with dejected face, F 3 La justified in asserting, that our tranflator has by no means difgraced fo illuftrious a patron. Mr. Jones's fkill in the Oriental languages has indisputably entitled him to the reputation by which he is diftinguished; and, if we are not misinformed, the world will foon be laid under yet greater obligations to him for having furnished an eafy key to the fame ftores as thofe from which he derived the prefent Hiftory of Nader Chah, better known to European ears, under the name of Thahmas Kuli Khan. It is not very common to find an Englishman writing with elegance and perfpicuity in the French language. Mr. Jonės, however, feems to have been born with all the powers requifite to conquer literary difficulties; and, as we are affured, would find his tongue at liberty in a greater variety of foreign countries than almost any other person, whether educated here or abroad. Though we are not much disposed to be lavish in our commendations of the Hiftory before us, yet we must do our very spirited, though faithful, tranflator the juftice to confefs, that we believe him, when he affures us that all its faults are the faults of the original; we mean fuch as arise from inequalities of stile, and the alternate pomp and meanness of expreffion. Of the author of this Hiftory, little appears to be known. Mr. Jones conceives him to have been a scholar and a reclufe; Mr. Hanway is of opinion, that he was a warrior, and engaged in the public fervice. Thefe fuppofitions, however, are founded on mere conjecture. An affected tumour of ftile, which, in our opinion, but ill fuits with the fedate majesty of hiftoric annals, is the characteriftic of this author. Even his fentiments in general are very disproportionate in dignity to the cumbrous train of words by which they are attended. We do not at all difcover in him the skilful politician or the acute reafoner. Though his battles are fometimes picturesque, yet he seems himself to have been aware that a perpetual fucceffion of fcenes of blood and horror muft fatigue the reader, and has therefore often strove to render them less burthenfome by the introduction of fome pieces of poetry, which are not deftitute of merit. To this work are added explanatory notes by the translator, which at once do honour to his fagacity and extensive skill in Oriental literature; while his Effay on the Poetry of the Eastern Nations is no mean proof of his tafte in the more elegant and ornamental studies. MONTHLY MONTHLY CATALOGUE. POETRY. 15. Almida, a_Tragedy, as it is now Alted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. 8vo 1s. 6. Becket. TH HIS piece is no unanimated tranflation of the Tancrede of monfieur de Voltaire, who is faid to have finished the original in the space of a fortnight. We are not always apt to give credit to the degree of hafte with which many works of the fame kind are faid to be produced. On this occafion, however, we find ourselves well enough inclined to believe our celebrated Frenchman; especially as his plot gave him no great trouble in its formation, the circumstance on which all the tragic distress is built, being borrowed from a former play of his own. directed letter, which decides the fate of Zayre, is as destructive to the peace of Amenoide, who is called Almida in the prefent performance. As for Tancred, the hero of it, he is fo eafily jealous, and takes fo little pains to get rid of his fufpicions, that we do not greatly feel for him when he is perplexed in the extreme through three acts, and forfeits his life in the laft. The un Before the reprefentation of this piece, Billy Whitehead, (who feems to have been a kind of dry nurfe to it) fent Mr. Reddish to the audience, with a mefs of watergruel, which, out of compliment to the bearer, and the innocence of the ingredients, they confented to fwallow. Mrs. Barry appeared af ter the play with a falver of Mr. Garrick's champagne in her hand, which needed not her graceful miniftry to procure it a triumphant acceptance. 16. The Father, a Comedy, tranflated from the French of Monf. Diderot, by the Tranflator of Dorval, &c. 410, 2s. 6d. Baldwin. A very good tranflation of this celebrated piece, which abounds with delicacy and fentiment, though it is not fufficiently pantomimical for the tafte of our English audiences; who generally prefer an escape through a window, or an intrigue carried on by the affiftance of a moveable pannel, to the most elegant and natural dialogue that ever was uttered on the stage. 17. A Poetical Effay on the Existence of God. Part I. By the Rev. W. H. Roberts of Eton. 15. T. Payne. We have not received greater entertainment from any poetical piece that has made its appearance for fome time paft, than from Mr. Roberts's Efay on the Existence of God. Though we are no friends to blank verfe, and believe rhime to be effential to poetry in our language, yet we cannot refuse our warmeft approbation to this performance, which is written in Miltonics, and is, we hope, the forerunner of many other parts on the fame fub F ject, |