Nothing will contribute to this
more, than the Observance of a strict Unity in the very Conception of
a Character: For Characters are Descriptions of Persons and Things, as
they are such: And, as [O]Mr. _Budgell_ has very judiciously observ'd,
"If the Reader is diverted in the midst of a Character, and his
Attention call'd off to any thing foreign to it, the lively Impression
it shou'd have made is quite broken, and it loses more than half its
Force." But if this Doctrine be applied to the Practice of Mr. _de la
Bruyere_, it will find him Guilty. He sometimes runs his Characters
to so great a Length, and mixes in 'em so many Particulars and
unnecessary Circumstances, that they justly deserve the Name, rather
of Histories than Characters.--Such is the [P]Article concerning
_Emira_. 'Tis an artful Description of a Woman's Vanity, in pretending
to be insensible to the Power of Love, merely because she has never
been exposed to the Charms of a lovely Person; and there is nothing in
this Character, but what is agreeable to Nature, and carried on with a
great deal of Humour. But the many Particulars which Mr.
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