Page:Osorio; a tragedy, as originally written in 1797 (IA cu31924105501831).pdf/25

 branches of the art. With the mere poet, time is as nothing,—he may wonder and rest, and indulge his eye—like a pilgrim offer his hymn at every shrine by the way and then resume his sandals and his staff, and pace onward to the altar of his patron. To the dramatist, time is as everything. He has not a moment to waste,—he carries an important mission,—life and death are hanging on his steps,—and he must speed forward without venturing to turn his eye from that spot in the horizon which at every moment enlarges as he speeds, and where his coming is to agitate or appease so many hearts. We are slow to speak of faults as applied to this writer: but he has not yet learned this value of time. His plot is intolerably curved and circuitous, indistinct beyond all power of pleasurable apprehension, and broken beyond all reach of continued interest

"The Prologue was, we hope, by some 'dd good-natured friend,' who had an interest in injuring the play; it was abominable. The