To compleat the whole,—­you have in this Character of Falstaff, not only a free Course of Humour, supported and embellish’d with admirable Wit; but this Humour is of a Species the most jovial and gay in all Nature.—­Sir Jobn Falstaff possesses Generosity, Chearfulness, Alacrity, Invention, Frolic and Fancy superior to all other Men;—­The Figure of his Person is the Picture of Jollity, Mirth, and Good-nature, and banishes at once all other Ideas from your Breast; He is happy himself, and makes you happy.—­If you examine him further, he has no Fierceness, Reserve, Malice or Peevishness lurking in his Heart; His Intentions are all pointed at innocent Riot and Merriment; Nor has the Knight any inveterate Design, except against Sack, and that too he loves.—­If, besides this, he desires to pass for a Man of Activity and Valour, you can easily excuse so harmless a Foible, which yields you the highest Pleasure in its constant Detection.

If you put all these together, it is impossible to hate honest Jack Falstaff; If you observe them again, it is impossible to avoid loving him; He is the gay, the witty, the frolicksome, happy, and fat Jack Falstaff, the most delightful Swaggerer in all Nature.—­ You must love him for your own sake,—­At the same time you cannot but love him for his own Talents; And when you have enjoy’d them, you cannot but love him in Gratitude;—­He has nothing to disgust you, and every thing to give you Joy;—­His Sense and his Foibles are equally directed to advance your Pleasure; And it is impossible to be tired or unhappy in his Company.

This jovial and gay Humour, without any thing envious, malicious, mischievous, or despicable, and continually quicken’d and adorn’d with Wit, yields that peculiar Delight, without any Alloy, which we all feel and acknowledge in Falstaff’s Company.—­Ben Johnson has Humour in his Characters, drawn with the most masterly Skill and Judgment; In Accuracy, Depth, Propriety, and Truth, he has no Superior or Equal amongst Ancients or Moderns; But the Characters he exhibits are of satirical, and deceitful, or of a peevish or despicable Species; as Volpone, Subtle, Morose, and Abel Drugger; In all of which there is something very justly to be hated or despised; And you feel the same Sentiments of Dislike for every other Character of Johnson’s; so that after you have been gratify’d with their Detention and Punishment, you are quite tired and disgusted with their Company:—­Whereas Shakespear, besides the peculiar Gaiety in the Humour of Falstaff, has guarded him from disgusting you with his forward Advances, by giving him Rank and Quality; from being despicable by his real good Sense and excellent Abilities; from being odious by his harmless Plots and Designs; and from being tiresome by his inimitable Wit, and his new and incessant Sallies of highest Fancy and Frolick.