Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/319

Rh When Phædra is made acquainted with the ruin of Hyppolitus, the poet makes her utter the following beautiful ſpeech, which, however, is liable to the ſame objection as the former, for it ſeems rather a ſtudied declamation, than an expreſſion of the moſt agonizing throes ſhe is then ſuppoſed to experience.

No man had a juſter notion of the difficulty of compoſing, than Mr. Smith, and he ſometimes would create greater difficulties than he had reaſon to apprehend. Mr. Smith had, indeed, ſome defects in his conduct, which thoſe are more apt to remember, who could imitate him in nothing elſe. Amongſt the blemiſhes of an innocent kind, which