Page:Modern Literature Volume 3 (1804).djvu/167

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his views of dramatic literature, he betakes himself to the Garrick's Head, and becomes a humble listener of the players, afterwards retails their jokes as his own; there he forms his estimate of dramatic poetry, studies the dramatic censor, and becomes a theatrical critic. Perhaps now he may rise to be a parliamentary reporter, and if he do, of course he becomes a political philosopher and a statesman; and in those days when debating societies were in vogue, he was also an orator, or we still may be if admissible to public meetings, especially those in which dinner and wine precede deliberation and eloquence. Now he undertakes political essays, or even pamphlets; behold our journeyman, without any learning, human or divine, set up for an author, and many are such members of the republic of letters.

Another sets out from a point somewhat