characters that ought to have appear’d with more decency, stands upon the stage and encourages her brother in the parricide. What horror does this not raise! _Clytemnestra_ was a wicked woman, and had deserv’d to die; nay, in the truth of the story, she was kill’d by her own son; but to represent an action of this kind on the stage, is certainly an offence against those rules of manners proper to the persons, that ought to be observ’d there. On the contrary, let us only look a little on the conduct of _Shakespear_. _Hamlet_ is represented with the same piety towards his father, and resolution to revenge his death, as _Orestes_; he has the same abhorrence for his mother’s guilt, which, to provoke him the more, is heighten’d by incest: But ’tis with wonderful art and justness of judgment, that the Poet restrains him from doing violence to his mother. To prevent any thing of that kind, he makes his father’s Ghost forbid that part of his vengeance. But howsoever thou pursu’st this Act, Taint not thy mind; nor let thy soul contrive Against thy mother ought; leave her to Heav’n, And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, To prick and sting her. This is to distinguish rightly between _Horror_ and _Terror_. The latter is a proper passion of Tragedy, but the former ought always to be carefully avoided. And certainly no dramatick Writer ever succeeded better in raising _Terror_ in the minds of an audience than _Shakespear_ has done. The whole Tragedy of _Macbeth_, but more especially the scene where the King is murder’d, in the second Act, as well as this Play, is a noble proof of that manly spirit with which he writ; and both shew how powerful he was, in giving the strongest motions to our souls that they are capable of. I cannot leave _Hamlet_ without taking notice of the advantage with which we have seen this Master-piece of _Shakespear_ distinguish it self upon the stage, by Mr. _Betterton_’s fine performance of that part: A man who, tho’ he had no other good qualities, as he has a great many, must have made his way into the esteem of all men of letters, by this only excellency. No man is better acquainted with _Shakespear_’s manner of expression, and indeed he has study’d him so well, and is so much a master of him, that whatever part of his he performs, he does it as if it had been written on purpose for him, and that the Author had exactly conceiv’d it as he plays it. I must own a particular obligation to him, for the most considerable part of the passages relating to this life, which I have here transmitted to the publick; his veneration for the memory of _Shakespear_ having engaged him to make a journey into _Warwickshire_, on purpose to gather up what remains he could of a name for which he had so great a value. Since I had at first resolv’d not to enter into any critical controversie, I won’t pretend to enquire into the justness of Mr. _Rhymer_’s Remarks on _Othello_; he has certainly pointed out some faults