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short-lived celebrity, the satirist Aretine, whose own Letters amount to six volumes. Aretine prides himself on being the first publisher of familiar Letters; a distinction that some writers had endeavoured to take from him. But to this distinction, his very learned and judicious biographer, Mazzuchelli, though by no means partial to Aretine, has candidly vindicated his title. Montaigne represents the Italians as the chief publishers of Letters; and says, he possessed in his own library, a hundred volumes of such publications; and that he esteemed the Letters of Annibal Caro as the best of all.

The literature of Italy has been enriched with many excellent collections of Letters since the days of Montaigne: and with one peculiarly interesting to those, who delight in anecdotes relating to painting and sculpture: a collection, in seven quarto volumes, of Letters written by the most eminent artists, and relating to works of art.

In the Spanish language, there is a copious volume of Letters by Don Antonio de Guevara, a prelate, who held the office of historiographer to the emperor Charles the Fifth; and a prelate of so nice a conscience, that he directed by his will a part of his salary to be restored to his majesty, for a year, in which he had added nothing to his chronicle. His style, as an historian, has been generally censured; but if we may judge of his personal character from his Letters, he appears to have been an amiable man. In one he reproves a female relation, with good-nature, for intemperate sorrow on the death of a little dog; and in another he draws the character of a true friend, with great energy of sentiment, and expression.

The scholars of Spain wrote and printed Letters in their own language, before the polished age of the emperor Charles the Fifth. There is a collection of Spanish Letters by Fernan Gomez de Ciudareal, the first edition of which is said to have been printed in 1499. The author was physician to John the Second, king of Castile-they contain some entertaining particulars relating to the history, and manners of that time. It appears from one of them, that the king amused himself in improving a Spanish couplet of his poet and historiographer, Juan de Mena, who seems to have been very highly esteemed, as a friend, by the author of these Letters.

The last of the collection, dated July 1454, contains an account of the king's death-he said to his physician, three hours before he expired: :-"I wish I had been born the son of

a mechanic, and not king of Castile."

The physician seems to have had a personal regard for his sovereign, as he intimates, in the close of his Letter, that he might be retained in the court of his successor, but that he felt too old to attach himself to a new master.

The French have undoubtedly many collections of Lettérs, that deserve high commendation; but their two celebrated Letter-writers, who were for some time the favorites of Europe, Voiture and Balzac, lost much of their celebrity, when taste grew more refined, and learned to value ease and simplicity, as graces essential to a good epistolary style. They had however the merit of giving an early polish to the language of their country:They introduced into French prose, a degree of fluency, and force, which it had not before, but which subsequent wri

ters have carried to much greater perfection. Every modern nation might exhibit a collection of interesting Letters, so judiciously formed, as to display, in a very agreeable manner, the rise and gradual progress of improvement in its language. In France the writers of printed Letters are so numerous, that the difficulty of selection would arise from their multitude. Lord Orrery, the translator of Pliny, bestows singular commendation on the epistolary language of Pelisson, and Dr. Warton has justly said, in a remark prefixed to the Letters of Pope, that the Letters of Voltaire, amounting to eighteen volumes; "contain a variety of literary history and criticism, written also to the most celebrated persons of the age, hardly to be equalled or excelled."

The Letters of Voltaire are indeed admirable for their gaiety, and their wit: there is also a rich vein of tender, bold, and generous humanity, running through his extensive correspondence, that may sometimes almost lead a reader to exclaim, in the words of his own Zara, as she speaks in English

"Were he but Christian, what could man be more !"

But the bitter leaven of sarcastic infidelity predominates so frequently in his Letters, that it excites, in a Christian reader, pain proportioned to the admiration awakened by the versatile powers of a man, unrivalled in the variety, and in the vivacity of his talents.

If the Letters of any French poet are worthy of being compared with the Letters of Cowper, for purity and tenderness

of sentiment, they must be the Letters of Racine to his friend Boileau, and those addressed to his own son.

If among the popular authors of other nations, we should seek for the individual, who may be mentioned as a parallel to Cowper, in the simplicity, the sweetness, and the sanctity of his character, both as a man, and a poet, perhaps we might most properly fix on the amiable Gellert, the favorite of Germany! Though not equal to the author of the Task, in the energy of his poetical powers, he excited in his countrymen, of all ranks, that enthusiastic regard, which England, to her own honour, has felt for the character of Cowper..

The Letters of Gellert display an uncommon share of that tender melancholy, that religious fervor, that innocent playfulness of fancy, and that spirit of genuine friendship, which give such attraction to the correspondence of Cowper, who in these qualities, and in the elegant simplicity of his style, has hardly an equal, and certainly not a superior, among the most celebrated Letter-writers of England.

It is remarkable, though I do not recollect to have seen it observed by those, who have lately enumerated our early epistolary writers, that Bishop Hall, who spoke of himself, with complacency, as the first of English satirists, has taken a laudable pride in declaring himself the first publisher of English Epistles.

There is a little volume neatly printed in 1608, containing four decads of Epistles, by this patriotic and memorable divine. To these he added two decads more in 1611.

says:

In dedicating his book to Prince Henry, the author "Further, (which these times account not the least praise) your grace shall herein perceive a new fashion of discourse, by Epistles, new to our language, usual to others; and (as novelty is never without some plea of use) more free, more familiar. Thus we do but talk with our friends by our pen, and express ourselves no whit less easily, somewhat more digestedly."

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Many of Hall's Epistles may be considered as brief, and excellent sermons, being full of religious admonition: there are however a few of them, that seem fairly entitled to the name of familiar Letters; particularly the fifth Epistle of the first decad -to Sir Thomas Challoner, a report of some observations in my travell." Sir Edmund Bacon was Hall's fellow-traveller. The eighth Epistle in the same decad: to the young Earl of Essex," advice for his travels." And the second Epistle of the second decad: "of the benefit of retirednesse, and secrecy," to Sir Edmund Bacon.

In a passion for retirement, in vivacity of imagination, and purity of heart, this exemplary prelate seems to have resembled the more illustrious poetical recluse of Weston; and considering the age in which the Bishop wrote, it is paying a very high, and a just compliment to his epistolary language, to say, it has several passages, which might be almost mistaken for the language of Cowper.

This remark leads me to return to the Letters of my friend.I have so warmly expressed my opinion of their singular excellence, that it is unnecessary to add any words in their praise. The peculiar ease, harmony, and grace of Cowper's

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