able genius. Antony is throughout the piece what
the author meant him to be; a victim to the omnipotence of love, or
rather to the infatuation of one engrossing passion[1].

In the Cleopatra of Dryden, there is greatly less spirit and
originality than in Shakespeare's. The preparation of the latter for
death has a grandeur which puts to shame the same scene in Dryden, and
serves to support the interest during the whole fifth act, although
Antony has died in the conclusion of the fourth. No circumstance can
more highly evince the power of Shakespeare's genius, in spite of his
irregularities; since the conclusion in Dryden, where both lovers die
in the same scene, and after a reconciliation, is infinitely more
artful and better adapted to theatrical effect.

In the character of Ventidius, Dryden has filled up, with ability, the
rude sketches, which Shakespeare has thrown off in those of Scaeva and
Eros. The rough old Roman soldier is painted with great truth; and the
quarrel betwixt him and Antony, in the first act, is equal to any
single scene that our author ever wrote, excepting, perhaps, that
betwixt Sebastian and Dorax; an opinion in which the judgment of the
critic coincides with that of the poet. It is a pity, as has often
been remarked, that this dialogue occurs so early in the play, since
what follows is necessarily inferior in force. Dryden, while writing
this scene, had unquestionably in his recollection the quarrel betwixt
Brutus and Cassius, which was justly so great a favourite in his time,
and to which he had referred as inimitable in his prologue to
"Aureng-Zebe.[2]"

The inferior characters are better supported in Dryden than in
Shakespeare. We have no low buffoonery in the former, such as
disgraces Enobarbus, and is hardly redeemed by his affecting
catastrophe. Even the Egyptian Alexas acquires some respectability,
from his patriotic attachment to the interests of his country, and
from his skill as a wily courtier. He expresses, by a beautiful image,
the effeminate attachment to life, appropriated to his character and
country:

O, that I less could fear to lose this being,
Which, like a snow-ball in my coward hand,
The more 'tis grasped, the faster melts away.

The Octavia of Dryden is a much more important personage than in the
"Antony and Cleopatra" of Shakespeare. She is, however, more cold and
unamiable; for, in the very short scenes in which the Octavia of
Shakespeare appears, she is pl