indulge in forced metaphors, harsh inversions of language, and other faults of that nature, which render his verses, at times, too obscure to be pleasing. When we read Euripides we are delighted, and our thoughts and feelings are free from restraint; when we peruse Sophocles we seem to engage in severe literary study. The choruses too of Sophocles, though much easier to be understood than those of Eschylus, are by no means free from obscurity. But the practice of Euripides, in using fewer tumid expressions and sesquipedalian words than Sophocles, may, I think, be readily excused, or rather defended; for by this means assuredly he approaches nearer to the truth of nature, and the usage of real life. If we could imagine a style formed of the excellences of both these poets; a style which should retain nothing of the prosaic phraseology of Euripides, and nothing of the stiffness of Sophocles, we should have perhaps such a style as would approach the perfection of tragic language. Meanwhile I admit that I receive greater pleasure from the natural grace and unaffected simplicity of Euripides than from the studied dignity and artificial accuracy of Sophocles. Sophocles, perhaps, has written better tragedies, but Euripides more pleasing poems. We approve Sophocles more than Euripides, but love Euripides more than Sophocles. Sophocles we praise, but Euripides we read." In the conclusion of this passage Porson seems to have had in his mind the admirable judgment of Johnson on Dryden and Pitt as translators of Virgil. "If the two versions are compared, perhaps the result would be that Dryden leads the reader forward by his general vigour and sprightliness, and Pitt often stops him to contemplate the excellence of a single couplet; that Dryden's faults are forgotten in the hurry of delight, and that Pitt's beauties are neglected in the languor of a cold and listless perusal; that Pitt pleases the critics, and Dryden the people; that Pitt is quoted, and Dryden read."* The manuscript of this lecture, written in Porson's own neat hand, the only copy that he ever wrote, is now in the library of Trinity College. For some time previous to his election to the professorship, his health had not been good. "Porson," writes Burney to Parr in December, "is in much better health than he has been for several months. His fancy, memory, taste, and philological powers are in as high vigour as ever; though in a conversation lately, on the subject of the Greek Professorship, he complained of the difficulty of recalling the mind to a pursuit from which it has been torn; and how hard a task it was, when a man's spirit had once been broken, to renovate it." This statement seems to show that Beloe's assertion of Porson's despondency on the loss of his fellowship is nearer to the truth than Kidd's affirmation of his equanimity. Parr, in his reply to Burney, says, "Why does Porson talk about resuming studies which, in fact, have never been interrupted? and what is there in his professorship to call into action a sixth part of what he has read, or a third part of what he remembers? If the Duke of Brunswick, at the head of his Huns and Vandals, were to burn every book of every library in Cambridge, Porson, being, as Longinus was said to be, a living library, would make the University hear without books more than they are likely to read with books. Again, injured as he has been, and persecuted, he ought not to let his spirits sink. His very enemies have never dared to quit their ranks as his admirers, and his friends *Parr's Works, vol. vii. p. 413. deserve to be weighed rather than to be numbered. Come, come, he will now have the supoia of life, and to this stoical abundance of the rà let him add the Epicurean soupía, and then he will have no reason to complain of the rà ow. Tell me, not in little broken sentences, but in detail, all the news about the professorship. The Cantab deva preferred his o relation to Porson, and perhaps he might not wish Porson to interfere in college affairs as a fellow; but when these two points [the annuity and the professorship] are secured, he will find himself no longer disposed to do evil, or prevented from doing good. Undoubtedly he [deva, Postlethwaite] is a man of sense, and, as times go, of virtue; and though I never can approve, nor suffer others to extenuate, his conduct, I hope to retain some esteem for the man himself."* "The distinction of this appointment was grateful to Porson," says his biographer in the Gentleman's Magazine. "The salary is but 40l. a year. It was his wish, however, to have made it an active and efficient office; and it was his determination to give an annual course of lectures in the college, if rooms had been assigned him for the purpose. These lectures, as he designed, and had in truth made preparations for them, would have been invaluable; for he would have found occasion to elucidate the languages in general, and to have displayed their relations, their differences, their near and remote connexions, their changes, their structure, their principles of etymology, and their causes of corruption. If any one man was qualified for this gigantic task, it was Mr. Professor Porson; but his wishes were counteracted." How many languages the writer thinks that Porson would have thus illustrated, in "this gigantic task," I know not; but he seems to have thought him much nearer to omniscience in language than he really was. Porson could have told much about etymology, but his encomiast appears to have fancied that he could have told everything. That he intended to give lectures when he entered on the professorship, he assured Mr. Maltby, who afterwards asked him why he had not given them. Porson replied, "Because I have thought better on it; whatever originality my lectures might have had, people would have cried out, We knew all this before." This was probably only a jocular reason; among the real causes want of rooms might have had some influence, and Porson's own indolence, and reluctance to begin, had probably more. Lectures would doubtless have greatly increased the income of his professorship, but would have infinitely increased its labour. It is no great honour to so wealthy a country as this, that it should provide for the Greek professor of one of its greatest universities, a man whom it necessarily acknowledges among the most eminent of its scholars, no larger an annual income than 40l. At that sum the salary still stands; but there has recently been attached to the office a canonry at Ely of 600l. a year, from a desire, apparently, that the professor should not again be a layman. CHAP. IX. PORSON'S REVIEW OF EDWARDS'S EDITION OF THE TREATISE ON EDUCA- NOTHING more appeared from Porson's pen till July 1793, when he published in the "Monthly Review" notice of Dr. Edwards's edition of the Treatise on Education attributed to Plutarch; a work which Muretus suspected, and which Wyttenbach pronounced, to be spurious. Dr. Edwards, however, without noticing these adverse opinions, published it as the genuine production of Plutarch. The notes to this edition were partly in English and partly in Latin. On this mixture of languages Porson says, "This is a practice which we shall never fail to reprehend. When an editor produces any observations which merit the notice of the learned (and every editor ought to believe at least as much), let him converse in the common language of the learned; but when an author writes on a subject of learning chiefly for the benefit of his countrymen, let him compose wholly in his mother tongue. Perhaps Dr. Edwards was induced to write his notes in this piebald and patchwork man I |