s _Caesar_ afterwards very
well saw and experienc'd. So that this Injustice of the Tribunes was the
original Cause of the Calamity which afterwards befel their Country, by
the Invasion of the _Volscians_, under the Conduct of _Coriolanus_. And
yet these Tribunes at the end of the Play, like _Aufidius_, remain
unpunish'd. But indeed _Shakespear_ has been wanting in the exact
Distribution of Poetical Justice not only in his _Coriolanus_, but in most
of his best Tragedies, in which the Guilty and the Innocent perish
promiscuously; as _Duncan_ and _Banquo_ in _Mackbeth_, as likewise Lady
_Macduffe_ and her Children; _Desdemona_ in _Othello_; _Cordelia_, _Kent_,
and King _Lear_, in the Tragedy that bears his Name; _Brutus_ and _Porcia_
in _Julius Caesar_; and young _Hamlet_ in the Tragedy of _Hamlet_. For tho'
it may be said in Defence of the last, that _Hamlet_ had a Design to kill
his Uncle who then reign'd; yet this is justify'd by no less than a Call
from Heaven, and raising up one from the Dead to urge him to it. The Good
and the Bad then perishing promiscuously in the best of _Shakespear_'s
Tragedies, there can be either none or very weak Instruction in them: For
such promiscuous Events call the Government of Providence into Question,
and by Scepticks and Libertines are resolv'd into Chance. I humbly
conceive therefore that this want of Dramatical Justice in the Tragedy of
_Coriolanus_ gave occasion for a just Alteration, and that I was oblig'd
to sacrifice to that Justice _Aufidius_ and the Tribunes, as well as
_Coriolanus_.

Thus have we endeavour'd to shew that, for want of the Poetical Art,
_Shakespear_ lay under very great Disadvantages. At the same time we must
own to his Honour, that he has often perform'd Wonders without it, in
spight of the Judgment of so great a Man as _Horace_.

Natura fieret laudabile carmen, an arte,
Quaesitum est: ego nec studium sine divite vena,
Nec rude quid prosit video ingenium; alterius sic
Altera poscit opem res, & conjurat amice.

But from this very Judgment of _Horace_ we may justly conclude that
_Shakespear_ would have wonderfully surpass'd himself, if Art had been
join'd to Nature. There never was a greater Genius in the World than
_Virgil_: He was one who seems to have been born for this glorious End,
that the _Roman_ Muse might exert in him the utmost Force of her Poetry:
And his admirable and divine Beauties are manifestly owing to the happy
Confederac