* Criticks are useful, that's moft certain, fo are Executioners and Informers: But what Man did ever envy the condition of Jack Ketch, or Jack

* How can we love the Man, whofe Office is to torture and execute other Men's Reputation. *After all, a Critick is the laff Refuge of a pretender to Wit.

"Tis a great piece of Affurance in a profeft "Critick to write Plays, for if he does, he muft expect to have the whole Club of Wits, scanning "his Performances with utmost Severity, and mag"nifying his Slips into prodigious Faults.

* I don't wonder Men of Quality and Estate refort to Will's, for really they make the best Figure there; an indifferent thing from 'em, paffes for a Witty Jeft, and fets presently the whole Company a Laughing. Thus we admire the pert Talk of Children, because we expected nothing from 'em.

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There are many impertinent Witlings at Will's, that's certain; but then your Retailers of Politicks, or of fecond-hand Wit at Tom's, are ten "times more intolerable.

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*Wits are generally the most dangerous Company a Woman can keep, for their Vanity makes Sem brag of more Favours than they obtain.

"Some Women care not what becomes of their "Honour, fo they may fecure the Reputation of "their Wit.

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"Thofe People generally talk moft, who have "the leaft to fay; go to Will's, and you'll hardly "hear the Great Wycherley fpeak two Sentences in a quarter of an Hour, whilft Blatero, Hamilus, Turpinus, and twenty more egregious Coxcombs, "deafen the Company with their Political Non" sense.

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"There are at Will's fome Wit-carriers, whofe "bufinefs is, to export the fine Things they hear, "from one Room to another, next to a Reciting"Poet, thefe Fellows are the moft exquifite Plague "to a Man of Senfe.

"In fpight of the intrinfick Merit of Wit, we "find it feldom brings a Man into the Favour, or even Company of the Great, and the Fair, unless "it be for a Laugh and away; never thought on, "but when prefent; nor then neither, for the fake "of the Man of Wit, but their own Diverfion. "The infallible way to ingratiate ones felf with "Quality, is that dull and empty Entertainment, "called Gaming, for Picket, Ombre, and Basset, keep ઉં always Places even for a quondam Foot-man, or a "Drawer at the Affemblies, Apartments, and Vifitingdays. If you lofe, you oblige with your Money; "if you Win, you command with your Fortune; "the Lord is your Bubble, and the Lady what you please to make her.

Flattery of our Wit, has the fame Power over Us, which Flattery of Beauty has over a Woman, it keeps up that good Opinion of our felves which is neceffary to beget Affurance and Affurance produces fuccefs both in Fortune and Love.

* Some Men take as much Pains to perfuade the World that they have VVit, as Bullies do that they have Courage, and generally with the fame Succefs; for they feldom deceive any one but themfelves.

* Some pert Coxcombs, fo violently affect the Reputation of Wits, that not a French Journal, Mercury, Farce,or Opera, can efcape their Pillaging: yet the utmoft they arrive at, is but a fort of Jacka-lanthorn Wit, that like the Sun-fhine which wanB 4

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ton Boys with fragments of Looking-glafs reflect in Men's Eyes, dazles the Weak-fighted, and trou bles the ftrong. Thefe are the Mufes Black-Guard, that like thofe of our Camp, tho' they have no fhare in the Danger or Honour, yet have the greateft in the Plunder; that indifferently ftrip all that lie before 'em, dead or alive, Friends or Enemies: Whatever they light on, is Terra incognita, and they claim the right of Difcoverers, that is, of giving their Names to it.

I think the Learned, and Unlearned Blockhead pretty Equal For 'tis all one to me, whether a Man talk Nonfenfe, or Unintelligible Senfe.

There is nothing of which we affent to speak with more Humility and Indifference than our own Senfe, yet nothing of which we think with more Partiality and Prefumption. There have been fome fo bold, as to affume the Title of the Oracles of Reafon to themselves, and their own Writings; and we meet with others daily, that think themfelves Oracles of VVit. These are the most vexatious Animals in the World, that think they have a privilege to torment and plague every Body; but those most who have the best Reputation for their Wit and Judgment.

* There's fomewhat that borders upon Madness in every exalted VVit.

* One of the most remarkable Fools that refort to VVill's, is the Fop-Poet, who is one that has always more Wit in his Pockets than any where elfe, yet feldom or never any of his own there. fop's Daw was a Type of him, for he makes himself fine with the Plunder of all Parties: He is a smuggler of Wit, and fteals French Fancies, without paying the cultomary Duties:

Verfe is his Manufacture; for it is more the Labour of his Fingers,than his Brain: He spends much time in writing, but ten times more in reading what he has written: He asks your Opinion, yet for fear you fhould not jump with him, tells you his own firft: He défires no Favour, yet is difappointed if he is not Flatter'd, and is always offended at the Truth. He is a Poetical Haberdasher of fmall VVares, and deals very much in Novels, Madrigals, Funeral and Love Odes, Panegyricks, Elegies, and other Toys of Parnaffus, which he has a Shop fo well. furnish'd with, that he can fit you with all forts in the twinkling of an Eye. He talks much of VVycherley, Garth, and Congreve, and protefts, he can't help having fome Refpect for them, becaufe they have fo much for him and his Writings, otherwife he could make it appear that they underftand little of Poetry in comparison of himself, but he forbears 'em meerly out of Gratitude and Compaffion. He is the Oracle of thofe that want VVit, and the Plague of thofe that have it; for he haunts their Lodgings, and is more terrible to them than their Duns.

* Brutus for want of VVit, fets up for Criticifm; yet has fo much ambition to be thought a VVit, that he lets his Spleen prevail against Nature, and turns Poet. In this Capacity he is as juft to the World as in the other injurious. For, as the Critick wrong'd every Body in his Cenfure, and fnarl'd and grin'd at their Writings, the Poet gives 'em opportunity to do themselves Juftice, to return the Compliment, and laugh at, or defpife his. He takes his Malice for a Mufe, and thinks himfelf Infpir'd, when he is only Poffefs'd, and blown up with a Flatus of Envy and Vanity. His Works are Libels upon others, bnt Satyrs upon himself

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and while they bark at Men of Senfe, call him Fool that writ 'em. He has a very great Antipathy to his own Species, and hates to fee a Fool any where but in his Glafs, for, as he fays, they provoke bim, and offend his Eyes. His Fund of Criticifin, is a fet of Terms of Art, pick'd out of the French Criticks, or their Tranflators; and his Poetical Stock, is a common Place of certain Forms and manners of Expreffion. He writes better in Verfe than Profe; for in that there is Rhime, in this, neither Rhime nor Reafon. He rails both at the French Writers, "whom he does not underftand, and at thofe English "Authors, whofe Excellencies he cannot reach; "with him Voiture is flat and dull, Corneille a "ftranger to the Paffions, Racine, Starch'd and Af"fected, Moliere, Jejune, la Fontaine a poor Teller "of Tales; and even the Divine Boileau, little "better than a Plagiary. As for the English Poets, "he treats almoft with the fame Freedom; ShakeSpear with him has neither Language nor Man* ners; Ben. Fonfon is a Pedant, Dryden little more than a tolerable Verfifier; Congreve a labori"ous Writer; Garth, an indifferent imitator of Boi"leau. He traduces Oldham, for want of Breeding "and good Manners, without a grain of either,and "steals his own Wit to befpatter him with, but "like an ill Chymift,he lets the Spirit fly off in the "drawing over and retains only the Phlegm. He Cen"fures Cowley for too much Wit, and corrects him "with none. He is a great Admirer of the incom"parable Milton, but while he fondly endeavours "to imitate his Sublime, he is blown up with "Bombaft and puffy Expreffions. He is a great ftick"ler for Euripides, Sophocles, Horace, Virgil, Ovid, "and the reft of the Ancients; but his ill and "lame Tranflations of 'em, ridicule those he would "commend

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