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ADVERTISEMENT.
aim. He emulates his author’s eloquence and fervour, whenever
1eligion and humanity are imprefled on the mind. Nor do we recol-
left an infiance, where he has fubiiituted an idea of his own for one
of his mailer, or where the fenfe of the original has efcaped him.
With regard to the plates, the Artiit who engraved them, or fuper-
intended thofe engraved by others, has endeavoured, in the firlt in-
liance to execute, or to have them executed, with the moil difcrimi-
Dating exaanefs and attention; and it is hoped, that on comparifon
with the Originals, they will fiand the teft of minute infpeaion and of
the moi’r critical eye. With the faithful performance of this talk he
might have contented himfelf-the public could require no more:
but as he confidered that the advanced Rate of taiie for the arts in
this country demanded all the fplendour in the publication that was
not incompatible with the defign of the book, he has done more.
Befrdes a conflderable number of elaborate and elegant duplicates on
large plates, he has improved many fubjefts from drawings made on
purpofe after originals procured from different colleEtions; the arti-
cles of Raphael and Fufelii“ efpecially, have been rendered much
more initruEtive and complete in plates and vignettes, than they will
be found in the French edition.
" A new plate, rather than a duplicate, having been given of the Younger Herodias, introduced in a mutilated
and altogether deformed outline in the French edition, the Editors have thought it proper to acquaint the reader
with the Artifl’s reafons for reprefenting the Nymph and her Companion in the attire and with the attributes of
Bacchantes. The atrocity of the requeft which the Damfel made, fo incompatible with the cheerful and loofely-
humane train of ideas that were likely to poffefs at that moment Herod and his guefls, had they been impreil'ed
only by the fofter charms of dignified, or the petulant allurements of merely licentious graces, forced on his mind
the conjedture, that the daughter, tutored by her Grecian dam, for fuch her name befpeaks her, had with her
companions danced the orgic ballet of dimmer, who, with her fillers Inc and Agave, tore off the head, and into
fragments the body of their own fan and relation, the prying Pentlmu. The Baccha: of Euripides is known; and
the ftory is told with fubmifiive and religious awe by Neutrino in his Lent. The ballet of Antone: is mentioned
by juvenaI in his fixth, and probably referred to by Pew?“ in his firil: fatire, in the pompous lines commonly afcribed
to Ntro. The tumult of ideas excited, the hints probably thrown out in the drama, allufive to the (imilarity of
the infult offered by John to Herod’s love and the profanenefs of Pentheus, the prefence of the Qleen herfelf,
aided by the tempeiluous graces of the aCtrefs, at once aHailing and imperiouily fubduing the King to comply in
the inebriated moment with the horrid demand, make requeft and grant perfealyin unifon with the terrible fcene
attempted by the Artift.
CONTENTS.
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