nay, even tho' his person, if not a deformed one, has not all that symmetry, or advantageous stature, which we oftener wish to fee than we meet with.

Among this writer's general rules, some are as exceptionable as they are new. Thus, when he says, ' in astonishment • and surprize, arifing from terror, the left leg is drawn back 6 to some distance from the other;' &c. he does not seem to have confidered what might be the actor's casual situation on the stage; for, if placed on the right-hand side of the stage, he would, by fuch a pofition as the author directs, turn his back to the audience: which would prove very unpicturesque, and all expreffion of feature would be loft.

When he says, ' impatience and regret at being detected in an iniquitous design, may be heightened by shuffling of the • feet, without moving from the spot,' he seems to have forgot he was speaking of tragedy only; consequently of serious characters, in which no such movement could be made, without a cast of the ridiculous, improper for the occafion. Such behaviour in an Iago, or a Renault, when under the reproach of an Othelio, or a Pierre, would give too comic a turn to the scene: might we not say, with the poet,

-Non erat hic locus.

Yet this action is not unnatural, when properly made use of, as it has often very happily been, by two celebrated performers of the present time, in expreffing the sneaking fear, and aukward confusion of an Abel Drugger, when introduced to the folemn and tremendous Dr. Subtle, the conjuror.

In fect. 8. this gentleman, in treating of the management

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of the hands and arms, has the following remarks. • come now,' says he, 'to a very critical article in the actor's conduct. There is scarce a line to be uttered by himself, or to be attended to when spoken by others, which does not require a particular movement; nay even in plain narrative of common incidents, they must be far from idle.

• But as to the expreffion of the passions, there is not one of • them that does not demand the justest emphasis in their move⚫ment and attitudes; and all of these are to vary according to • the several turns the poet may give to one and the fame paffion.

What a noble attitude may cach hand and arm be thrown into, by a general giving his command at the head of his troops? The right hand extended in a direct line from the • articulation of the shoulder-blade, and the truncheon placed ⚫ by the hand into nearly the same direction, while the left • supports his robe, half thrown back, from the ground.

He

He is certainly right as to what he delivers in the two first paragraphs, and his direction in the third shews a good taste. But, caveat actor! lest, when he chuses that attitude, (from the want of a natural manner of coming to it, and a graceful execution in the use of it) instead of the dignity and ease of a hero, he afford us a spectacle as stiff, unfeeling, and lifeless, as the wooden layman of a painter, placed in that pofition by the artist, to hang a piece of drapery on; from whence he purposes to catch the lights and shades in the various foldings thereof; but from whence he will never think of drawing his figure *.

In the same section he recommends to actors the study of paintings, statues, and prints, which that great performer, Mr. Booth, used to confult, to very good purpose t. Our author, however, seems too particular in his directions, for the movement of the head, arms, legs, &c. and for the expreffion of the face and eyes. The best instructions for graceful positions, &c. are doubtless to be gathered from the study of the capital drawings; whence the young actor may greatly improve his natural talents: but he must take care, lest any positions or a titudes thus acquired seem too mechanical; which they certainly will, unless strong natural feelings, and a found judgment, direct him in the use of them. In expreffions of the face they are certainly to be consulted with great caution. If the actor conceives properly, his expression of countenance will be answerable: the eye will be rightly directed, if the mind is not idle, or uninformed. We have school-drawings that very well express the different paffions of love, hatred, rage, fear, pity, contempt, joy, grief, pain, pleasure, &c.

* Which Hogarth, and other deservedly eminent professors of that art, have frequently acknowledged they should have been glad to have caught from the late Mr. Booth.

+ Mr. Booth's attitudes were all picturesque. He had a good tafte • for statuary and painting; and where he could not come at original pictures, he spared no pains or expence to get the best drawings and prints. These he frequently studied, and sometimes borrowed 'attitudes from, which he so judiciously introduced, so finely executed, and fell into them with so easy a transition, that these mafter-pieces of his art seemed but the effect of nature.

• Let not the reader imagine, from what I have faid, that all his actions were studied; tho study improved him in many. His motions, in his most indolent and unguarded hours, were naturally graceful: but, on the stage, they were at once the refult of na. ture, warmed by passion heightened by grace, and improved by taste. CIBBER'S Lives of the Actors, Part I.

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But were a man to work up his features into the several indications of them, merely from these copies, he would be in danger of giving us only a fet of grimaces.-All countenances express not alike; but if the player feel the paffion, and understand the character, he will not fail to look and act it properly. -Some eyes, fome tones of voice, fome features, may be peculiarly formed to express particular paffions more happily than others; but where the mind is rightly impressed, tho' the actor should not be so advantageoufly formed by nature as another, he will, nevertheless, give fatisfaction to the judicious'. spectator.

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As our author observes, volumes might be written on this fubject; but it is time for us to have done with it. Perhaps his performance will be thought the more valuable, for his having brought a great deal into a small compafs. Tho' we differ from him in a few things, we cannot, upon the whole, but recommend his pamphlet to the perusal of men of tafte Yet we could wish he had not thrown in a trite observation relating to the cast of parts, which feems to hint at a particular actor, whose age renders him unfit for the youthful lover; and which, by fome readers, may be mistaken as an invidious reflection on his appearance on the stage, in general; a fort of cruelty too much given way to, and too much indulged by managers. Where softness and youth are not effential to the character, there are certainly many parts he might oftner appear in, and give not a jot less satisfaction, than fome younger raw performers, who seem to have ufurped and taken them from him. His constitution is good, his faculties strong; at his time of life, those excellent actors Wilks and the present laureat, were no ways unfit for any part they had ever played. Their perfons genteel as ever; their countenances as lively; their fpirits as much awake; their voices as strong and clear; and their judgments riper. To have feen them in their grand climacteric, in the gay gentleman, and genteel coxcomb, would have fhamed our present theatrical gentry, with all their fancied advantages, as younger men: those excellent. performers retained the fire of youth at thrice the young man's age,

by the late Mr Proger Pickering

ART..

ART. II. An Historical Differtation on the Books of the New Testament: or, an enquiry into their authority and particular character; with a history of the methods by which these facred writings have been preserved and conveyed down to us. Composed from original authors. Vol. I. 8vo. 5s. Printed in the year 1755. [But without either name of place, printer, or bookfeller *.]

T

HE author of this differtation appears, from a Latin de-, dication prefixed thereto, to be one Rob. Cockburne; but what his profession is, does not appear, tho' we have been informed, that he is a layman, and a native of North Britain; which feems to be confirmed, by fome peculiar turns of porafeology, now and then to be met with in the work. In his Introduction, he observes, that the Christian religion being calculated for people of the lowest understandings, the evi• dences for it must be of such a kind as are level to every apprehenfion; for which reason the proofs of its truth and ⚫ certainty are founded, not on abstracted and speculative notions, but on facts of which every one is capable to form a < judgment.'-' According to this view of our religion, it is ⚫ certainly no improper method to recommend it to the thinking, tho' uneducated, part of mankind, to make them acquainted with that feries of events which introduced it into • the world, and attended the first appearance of the sacred books of the New Testament; the united testimony of fo many writers, who lived at different times, and who were, ⚫ otherwise so much divided in their religious opinions as to, agree almost in nothing else, to their genuineness and authority; the general and particular character of the first propagators of our faith; and the excellent tendency of their writings; all these are matters of common and very important instruction.'

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In order to give the reader a general view of his intended enquiry, Mr. Cockburne proposes to manage it in the follow-. ing method:

1. To prove that the books of the New Testament have

⚫ been acknowledged as the genuine writings of the apoftles, by.. a conftant and uniform teftimony of the church inall ages.'

2. To make some historical reflections on the character

⚫ of the apostles, and on fome marks of their divine authority

• and miffion, exhibited to us in their own writings.'

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3. To reprefent in a true light fome remarkable events

• which accompanied the propagation of the gospel, and which

› were the means of recommeding the books of the New Teftament to a general notice.'

* It is fold by Mr. Millar, in the Strand.

4. Το

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4. To give the reader a separate account of the particular • design and import of each of these books, with some history ⚫ of the writers, illustrated with such remarks as may be proper to promote a serious and rational regard to them.

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5. To prove that these books, whatever changes they

⚫ might have suffered by common accidents in a course of many ages, have been so well preserved as to have undergone no < material alterations.

• 6. To furnish the reader with a particular history of the ⚫ various methods of Providence by which these writings have • been preserved and transmitted down to us.'

The two last mentioned articles of this enquiry are wholly reserved for a second volume, as well as part of the fourth.

The first chapter of the first part of this work contains a proof, that there has been a constant agreement among Chrif tians, concerning the books of [the] New Testament. For, as Mr. Cockburne observes, whatever differences Chriftians ' might have had, concerning matters of particular belief or • practice, it is certain, that every sect of this profession, who • could deserve the name, in every age of the church, have ⚫ agreed to acknowledge a certain number of books as the genuine writings of the apostles: these were not only allowed to contain an authentic account of our Saviour's life and • doctrine, but were confidered in a higher rank of authority, as being of a divine original, and composed under an infal• lible direction, and were in this character diftinguished from mere human productions.'-In order to prove this uniform and conftant belief concerning the books of the New Testament, he produces evidence of it,

1. From the decisions of councils :

2. From the concurrent teftimony of particular writers,

• and those most approved, in every age of the church.'

In producing the decisions of councils, in confirmation of the canon of the New Testament, as we now receive it, our author traces the proofs thereof backwards, from the time of the reformation, through many other intermediate ones, up to the council of Carthage, which met anna 397, and is supposed to be the third of that name, This fynod, confifting of 217 bishops of the church of Africk, he observes, reckoned the books of the New Testament as we now receive them, but is the first which mentioned the Revelation in this number, tho' retained in all succeeding ones without exception.-He adds, we have the same catalogue of the canonical books of the New Testament, in the 60th canon of the council of Laodicea, held between the years 360 and 370, with this difference,