Influence in Greece much more completely, and put their commonwealth altogether in a much more splendid situation, by the peace which had its name from Antalcidas, than by that which had concluded the Peloponnesian war; and it is remarkable that he attributes the advantage, on the first mentioned occasion, to their having presided in the business (modern language will scarcely render his expression more exactly) under a commission from the Persian king. So much, however, if we may trust Plutarch for the anecdote, was Agesilaus persuaded that the interest of Lacedæmon was well considered in the treaty, that when somebody, reviling the peace of Antalcidas, said that Lacedæmon was gone over to the Persian interest, Rather,' he answered, Persia to the Lacedæmonian;' and so in truth it seems to have been.'

6

These observations have the merit of novelty; nearly all writers, antient and modern, concurring in describing the peace of Antalcidas as highly disgraceful and injurious to the interests of Lacedæmon.

One of the most striking passages in the volume before us is the account given by the author of the battle of Leuctra: we regret that we have not room to insert it.

Mr. Mitford gives the following account of Xenophon in his retirement, which every classical reader will peruse with delight for where is the scholar, to whom attic elegance is dear, who does not take an interest in what befals the most attic of writers? and who will not with real pleasure see him conducted, with great comfort and dignity, to the close of life?

The advantages of the situation of Scillus, for Xenophon, seem to have been many, and some of them very important. He was there under the immediate protection of the Lacedæmonian government, and yet he was beyond the sphere of its Lycurgian rule, its censorial inspection, and its more important jealousy. Separated by. lofty mountains from the countries most likely to be the seats of war, and far out of any expected line of march of contending armies, he was yet, by his neighbourhood to Olympia, in the way of communication with all parts, with every distant member of the Greek nation. Every fourth year Greece was in a manner assembled in his immediate neighbourhood; and in case of pressing danger, arising from any unforeseen turn in Grecian affairs, the sanctity of the Olympian altars, at hand, might be a valuable refuge. Dependant then as he was upon Lacedæmon, yet far removed from the great seats of contention of oligarchy and democracy, perhaps no man of his time in Greece enjoyed great fortune with so many of the advantages of independancy. The circumstances of the country itself, moreover, seem to have been for a man of his turn singularly pleasant, According to antient accounts (modern are yet wanting) all the various beauties of landscape appear to have met in the neighbourhood of Scillus. Immediately about the town and the adjacent temple, with their little river Selenus, inclosed between the hilly woodlands, Diana's. property, and the barren crags of Typæum, whence, according to

the Olympian law, it is said, women intruding at the games were to be precipitated, we may conceive the finest classical compositions of the Poussins. Up the course of the Alpheius and its tributary streams, toward Erymanthus and the other loftier Arcadian mountains, the sublimest wildness of Titian and Salvator could not fail to abound; while the Olympian hill, with its splendid buildings among its sacred groves, the course of the Alpheius downward, the sandy plain, stretching toward Pylus, Nestor's antient seat diversified with its pi nasters, the sea in distance one way, and all the Arcadian mountains the other, would offer the various beauty, the rich grandeur, and the mind-filling expanse of Claud.

In his declining age, Corinth probably might be a residence preferable to Scillus. That his connection with that city, and at least his occasional residence there, were of some duration, is implied in an epigram, preserved by Laertius, apparently selected from many relating to him. It runs thus: "Tho', Xenophon, the Athenians banished you, for the friendship with which you were distinguished by Cyrus, yet hospitable Corinth received you. There you were kindly treated; there you found satisfaction; and there finally you resolved to reside."

Occasionally perhaps visiting his estate in Tryphilia, but mostly under the liberal aristocracy of Corinth, he seems to have passed, in a dignified ease, the remainder of a life by all accounts long, and, ac. cording to the report of Lucian, protracted beyond his goth year.

4

The estimation in which, living, as well as afterward, Xenophon was extensively held, is marked by some pleasing testimonies. The death of Gryllus gave occasion to many. Epitaphs and panegyrics upon that young man, as Laertius reports from Aristotle, principally intended as compliments to his father, were numerous. The Mantineian state rewarded his merit with more costly honors: an equestrian statue of him, placed near the theatre in Mantineia, remained in the time of Pausanias, who travelled through Greece between and 500 years after. Even to that time the fame of Gryllus was cherished among the Mantincian people. They attributed to him the first merit in the great battle in which he fell; the second to Cephisodorus, who commanded the Athenian cavalry; and the third only to their own highly respected fellow-citizen Podares. Among the Athenians, already in Xenophon's age, the practice was growing, in paying compliments, and in every thing, to run into extravagance. The Attic cavalry, having been the only victorious part of the army of their confederacy at the battle of Mantineia, had a fair claim to public honor. A picture of the battle was therefore placed in the Cerameicus, which Pausanias mentions as remaining perfect when he visited Athens. In this picture it was resolved to honor the memory of Gryllus; and, whether with fair picturesque licence may perhaps be disputed, but against all authority in history, Gryllus was represented giving the mortal wound to Epameinondas. Pausanias also found the memory of Xenophon's residence preserved by tradition among the Tryphylians, and cherished among the most informed of the Eleians; Scillus was then again in ruin, but the temple of Diana remained; and near it a monument of marble, which Pausanias knew to be from

the

the quarries of mount Pentelicus in Attica, with a figure, which the neighbouring inhabitants asserted to be of Xenophon."

In our reviews of the former parts of this History, we have allowed the author great praise for his industry, for his critical acumen, and for the general perspicuity and precision of his narrative. Those qualities are not less discoverable in the present volume; and it deserves particular praise for the judicious and skilful arrangement of its contents. From the conclusion of the Peloponnesian war to the interference of Philip of Macedon with the affairs of Greece, or, in other words, from the age of Pericles to the age of Demosthenes, there is little to attract the generality of readers, besides the expulsion of the Thirty Tyrants, and the victories of Epaminondas at Leuctra and Mantinæa. The other part of this æra of the Grecian history consists of intrigues, which were important, it may be said, in their consequences, but none of which immediately produced those striking events that enliven narration, and give splendor to history. These, however, Mr. Mitford has simplified; and, in a judicious and masterly manner, he has shewn their consequences immediate and remote. He has thus made his history interesting and instructive in a very high degree. This is his praise; and so far he has an unquestionable claim to approbation, and to a situation of considerable eminence among the historic writers of his nation.

We cannot dissemble, however, that Mr. M. exposes himself to much observation on two accounts, the peculiarity of his language, and his unusual manner of spelling. In those compositions in which the author does not profess to rise to the sublime, it is a matter of praise, if he have other means of engaging the reader, that he does not divert general attention by any particular beauty of expression. This is the merit of Herodotus among the Greeks, and of Cæsar among the Latins. None of their expressions strike by particular felicity; nothing falls from them that places them between the book and the reader. They always use the proper word, and use it in its proper place. Thus, considered separately, nothing which they say is remarkable, but the whole is most beautiful; and, from the first to the last of their periods, the reader is carried without any effort on his part,-never ardently admiring,sometimes, perhaps, delighted,-but always pleased. Now, if a peculiar beauty of expression be so much misplaced, in this mode of style, as to be a defect merely from its particularity, what must be the effect of that particularity which is not beautiful, and which only strikes because it is particular? The least that can be said of it is, that the frequent repetition of it is very unpleasant.-Expressions of this nature abound in the

work

work before us. There is scarcely a peculiar mode of phrase
ology to be found in any former writer, that is not used by our
author; and he has many similar expressions of his own form-
ation. His manner of spelling is not less extraordinary. He
has adopted many of the fanciful innovations of modern writers
in this respect, and has invented others. When he first brought
us before the Areiopagus, or took us into the Aigospotamos, or
presented us to Epameinondas, we had nearly the same sensations
with those which the Romans felt, according to Catullus,
Quum subito adfertur nuntius horribilis:

Ionios fluctus, postquam illuc Arrius esset,
Jam non Ionios esse, sed Hionios.

Mr. Mitford should recollect that the omnipotence of Augustus did not, by his own confession, enable him to introduce one new word into the language of Rome; and that Voltaire, to whom

Phabi chora assurexerit omnis,

failed in all his attempts to innovate the spelling of his countrymen, except in their name; which, after a labor of more than half a century, and with the co-operation and united efforts of all the Academicians, all the Encyclopedists, all the Economists, all the Deists and all the Atheists, in France, and all the writers in French out of France, he contrived to change from François. to Français; an event as memorable in the French literature, as the change from monarchy to a republic is in French politics.

ART. VII. Jonah, a faithful Translation from the Original: with philological and explanatory Notes. To which is prefixed, a preliminary Discourse, proving the Genuineness, the Authenticity, and the Integrity of the present Text. By George Benjoin, of Jesus College, Cambridge. 4to. pp. 198. 10s. 6d. Cambridge. Deighton, &c. 1796.

A

PRELIMINARY discourse introduces this work, which Mr. Benjoin commences by bespeaking the sanction of the learned for this his attempt to propagate a general knowlege of the Hebrew tongue: the great aim of his performance being to shew the facility of acquiring that language; to prove that it is now in as pure a state as ever; to evince, by a translation of a part of the Bible, the necessity and usefulness of an authorized new version of the whole; and to facilitate so important an undertaking. He is at a loss, however, how to apologize for his seeming presumption, when he considers the eminent and venerable characters that have copiously treated on these subjects, who must have been endowed with talents so greatly superior to his; when he reflects on his own insufficiency; on the difficulties which he has to encounter when writing in a language not native to him; and that the Hebrew has for above

three

three thousand years been very little cultivated. In this arduous enterprise he throws himself on the candour and indulgence of the learned world, and proceeds to the perilous. adventure.

We now turn over 88 pages of prolegomena, containing arguments to shew the want of a true and faithful translation of the sacred volume; biographical and literary accounts of the several persons who have favoured the world with particular versions; together with copious extracts from Fuller, Dr. Geddes, Bp. Newcome, Blackwall, Bp. Lowth, Dr. Durell, Dr., Blayney, Dr. Symonds, Dr. Sharpe, &c.; and, after all, we find, alas! in the true style of Hebrew mysticism, that no translation whatever can give us a just view of the native beauty and intrinsic excellence' of the original.

Mr. B. can think of but two chief causes that have, for many years past, prevented the cultivation of Hebrew learning; the first he finds in the unjustifiable and hypothetical arguments against the points, usually termed masoretic. Dr. Sharpe, it seems, is so wicked as to call them "provoking, vexatious, mortifying. dots, totally useless and foreign to the language." Another writer even has the assurance to dedicate to Bp. Lowth a book. wherein he gives his pupil this rule for reading the Hebrew: "If no vowel is written between two consonants, utter them quick and light, and some vowel, no matter which, will naturally fall in," or " drive the consonants together into one syllable, like knight, strength, &c. in English.' Mr. B. however, cannot persuade himself to believe that the then Bishop of Oxford could have seen these absurdities, before he gave the Hebrew grammarian (Dr. Anselm Bayly) leave to dedicate his grammar to his Lordship.

The other cause to which, according to Mr. B., the want of this important knowlege may be imputed, is, that very few men are possessed of the capacity of conveying it to the learner in a proper manner. He therefore wishes that there were proper institutions in our universities for promoting the study of the sacred language;-and men duly qualified for that important purpose might probably present themselves.-The world is not destitute of such persons, says Mr. B.; certainly not. It is extremely rare for professorships to go a-begging. It is at any rate a good hint; and if our translator can make room for a superannuated reviewer or two, as his minor prophets, the chewing of Hebrew roots may be good employment for their de cayed teeth.

It is to be seriously regretted (adds our author) that the Hebrew language has been considered, by many men of learning, as an almost unattainable science.' Disposed as we are to

lament