No More Learning

He left the university without a degree, and pursued his studies in
London and at home; that he studied, in whatever place, is apparent from
the effect, for he became, in Mr. Dryden's opinion, "the best critick in
the nation. "

He was not, however, merely a critick or a scholar, but a man of fashion,
and, as Dennis remarks, ostentatiously splendid in his dress. He was,
likewise, a member of parliament and a courtier, knight of the shire for
his native county in several parliaments; in another the representative
of Richmond in Yorkshire; and gentleman of the horse to queen Anne, under
the duke of Somerset.

Some of his verses show him to have been a zealous friend to the
revolution; but his political ardour did not abate his reverence
or kindness for Dryden, to whom he gave a Dissertation on Virgil's
Pastorals, in which, however studied, he discovers some ignorance of the
laws of French versification.

In 1705, he began to correspond with Mr. Pope, in whom he discovered very
early the power of poetry. Their letters are written upon the pastoral
comedy of the Italians, and those pastorals which Pope was then preparing
to publish.

The kindnesses which are first experienced are seldom forgotten. Pope
always retained a grateful memory of Walsh's notice, and mentioned him,
in one of his latter pieces, among those that had encouraged his juvenile
studies:

Granville the polite,
And knowing Walsh, would tell me I could write.

In his Essay on Criticism he had given him more splendid praise; and,
in the opinion of his learned commentator, sacrificed a little of his
judgment to his gratitude.

The time of his death I have not learned. It must have happened between
1707, when he wrote to Pope, and 1711, when Pope praised him in his
Essay. The epitaph makes him forty-six years old: if Wood's account be
right, he died in 1709.

He is known more by his familiarity with greater men, than by any thing
done or written by himself.

His works are not numerous. In prose he wrote Eugenia, a Defence of
Women; which Dryden honoured with a preface.

Esculapius, or the Hospital of Fools, published after his death.

A Collection of Letters and Poems, amorous and gallant, was published in
the volumes called Dryden's Miscellany, and some other occasional pieces.

To his poems and letters is prefixed a very judicious preface upon
epistolary composition and amorous poetry.

In his Golden Age Restored, there was something of humour, while the
facts were recent; but it now strikes no longer. In his imitation of
Horace, the first stanzas are happily turned; and, in all his writings,
there are pleasing passages. He has, however, more elegance than vigour,
and seldom rises higher than to be pretty.




DRYDEN[92].


Of the great poet whose life I am about to delineate, the curiosity which
his reputation must excite, will require a display more ample than can
now be given. His contemporaries, however they reverenced his genius,
left his life unwritten; and nothing, therefore, can be known beyond what
casual mention and uncertain tradition have supplied.

John Dryden was born August 9, 1631[93], at Aldwinkle, near Oundle,
the son of Erasmus Dryden, of Titchmersh; who was the third son of
sir Erasmus Dryden, baronet, of Canons Ashby. All these places are in
Northamptonshire; but the original stock of the family was in the county
of Huntingdon[94].

He is reported by his last biographer, Derrick, to have inherited, from
his father, an estate of two hundred a year, and to have been bred, as
was said, an anabaptist. For either of these particulars no authority is
given[95]. Such a fortune ought to have secured him from that poverty
which seems always to have oppressed him; or, if he had wasted it, to
have made him ashamed of publishing his necessities. But, though he
had many enemies, who, undoubtedly, examined his life with a scrutiny
sufficiently malicious, I do not remember that he is ever charged with
waste of his patrimony. He was, indeed, sometimes reproached for his
first religion. I am, therefore, inclined to believe that Derrick's
intelligence was partly true and partly erroneous[96].

From Westminster school, where he was instructed, as one of the king's
scholars, by Dr. Busby, whom he long after continued to reverence,
he was, in 1650, elected to one of the Westminster scholarships at
Cambridge[97].

Of his school performances has appeared only a poem on the death of
lord Hastings, composed with great ambition of such conceits as,
notwithstanding the reformation begun by Waller and Denham, the example
of Cowley still kept in reputation. Lord Hastings died of the smallpox;
and his poet has made of the pustules first rosebuds, and then gems; at
last exalts them into stars; and says,

No comet need foretell his change drew on,
Whose corpse might seem a constellation.

At the university he does not appear to have been eager of poetical
distinction, or to have lavished his early wit either on fictitious
subjects, or publick occasions. He probably considered, that he, who
proposed to be an author, ought first to be a student. He obtained,
whatever was the reason, no fellowship in the college. Why he was
excluded cannot now be known, and it is vain to guess; had he thought
himself injured, he knew how to complain. In the life of Plutarch he
mentions his education in the college with gratitude; but, in a prologue
at Oxford, he has these lines:

Oxford to him a dearer name shall be
Than his own mother-university:
Thebes did his rude, unknowing youth engage;
He chooses Athens in his riper age.

It was not till the death of Cromwell, in 1658, that he became a publick
candidate for fame, by publishing Heroick Stanzas on the late Lord
Protector[98]; which, compared with the verses of Sprat and Waller, on
the same occasion, were sufficient to raise great expectations of the
rising poet.

When the king was restored, Dryden, like the other panegyrists of
usurpation, changed his opinion, or his profession, and published Astrea
Redux; a poem on the happy Restoration and Return of his most sacred
Majesty King Charles the second.

The reproach of inconstancy was, on this occasion, shared with such
numbers, that it produced neither hatred nor disgrace! if he changed, he
changed with the nation. It was, however, not totally forgotten when his
reputation raised him enemies.

The same year he praised the new king in a second poem on his
restoration. In the Astrea was the line,

An horrid _stillness_ first _invades_ the _ear_,
And in that silence we a tempest fear--

for which he was persecuted with perpetual ridicule, perhaps with
more than was deserved. _Silence_ is, indeed, mere privation; and, so
considered, cannot _invade_; but privation, likewise, certainly is
_darkness_, and probably _cold_; yet poetry has never been refused the
right of ascribing effects or agency to them as to positive powers. No
man scruples to say that _darkness_ hinders him from his work; or that
_cold_ has killed the plants. Death is also privation; yet who has made
any difficulty of assigning to death a dart, and the power of striking?

In settling the order of his works there is some difficulty; for, even
when they are important enough to be formally offered to a patron, he
does not commonly date his dedication; the time of writing and publishing
is not always the same; nor can the first editions be easily found, if
even from them could be obtained the necessary information[99].

The time at which his first play was exhibited is not certainly known,
because it was not printed till it was, some years afterwards, altered
and revived; but since the plays are said to be printed in the order in
which they were written, from the dates of some, those of others may
be inferred; and thus it may be collected, that in 1663, in the
thirty-second year of his life, he commenced a writer for the stage;
compelled, undoubtedly, by necessity, for he appears never to have loved
that exercise of his genius, or to have much pleased himself with his own
dramas.

Of the stage, when he had once invaded it, he kept possession for many
years; not, indeed, without the competition of rivals who sometimes
prevailed, or the censure of criticks, which was often poignant, and
often just; but with such a degree of reputation as made him, at least,
secure of being heard, whatever might be the final determination of the
publick.

His first piece was a comedy called the Wild Gallant[100]. He began with
no happy auguries; for his performance was so much disapproved, that he
was compelled to recall it, and change it from its imperfect state to the
form in which it now appears, and which is yet sufficiently defective to
vindicate the criticks.

I wish that there were no necessity of following the progress of his
theatrical fame, or tracing the meanders of his mind through the whole
series of his dramatick performances; it will be fit, however,
to enumerate them, and to take especial notice of those that are
distinguished by any peculiarity, intrinsick or concomitant; for the
composition and fate of eight-and-twenty dramas, include too much of a
poetical life to be omitted.

In 1664, he published the Rival Ladies, which he dedicated to the earl of
Orrery, a man of high reputation both as a writer, and a statesman. In
this play he made his essay of dramatick rhyme, which he defends in his
dedication, with sufficient certainty of a favourable hearing; for Orrery
was himself a writer of rhyming tragedies.

He then joined with sir Robert Howard in the Indian Queen, a tragedy in
rhyme. The parts which either of them wrote are not distinguished.

The Indian Emperor was published in 1667. It is a tragedy in rhyme,
intended for a sequel to Howard's Indian Queen. Of this connexion notice
was given to the audience by printed bills, distributed at the door; an
expedient supposed to be ridiculed in the Rehearsal, where Bayes
tells how many reams he has printed, to instil into the audience some
conception of his plot.

In this play is the description of night, which Rymer has made famous by
preferring it to those of all other poets.

The practice of making tragedies in rhyme was introduced soon after the
restoration, as it seems, by the earl of Orrery, in compliance with the
opinion of Charles the second, who had formed his taste by the French
theatre; and Dryden, who wrote, and made no difficulty of declaring that
he wrote, only to please, and who, perhaps, knew that by his dexterity of
versification he was more likely to excel others in rhyme than without
it, very readily adopted his master's preference. He, therefore, made
rhyming tragedies, till, by the prevalence of manifest propriety, he
seems to have grown ashamed of making them any longer.

To this play is prefixed a very vehement defence of dramatick rhyme, in
confutation of the preface to the Duke of Lerma, in which sir Robert
Howard had censured it.

In 1667, he published Annus Mirabilis, the Year of Wonders, which may be
esteemed one of his most elaborate works.

It is addressed to sir Robert Howard by a letter, which is not properly
a dedication; and, writing to a poet, he has interspersed many critical
observations, of which some are common, and some, perhaps, ventured
without much consideration. He began, even now, to exercise the
domination of conscious genius, by recommending his own performance:
"I am satisfied that as the prince and general [Rupert and Monk] are
incomparably the best subjects I ever had, so what I have written on
them is much better than what I have performed on any other. As I have
endeavoured to adorn my poem with noble thoughts, so much more to express
those thoughts with elocution. "

It is written in quatrains, or heroick stanzas of four lines; a measure
which he had learned from the Gondibert of Davenant, and which he then
thought the most majestick that the English language affords. Of this
stanza he mentions the incumbrances, increased as they were by the
exactness which the age required. It was, throughout his life, very much
his custom to recommend his works, by representation of the difficulties
that he had encountered, without appearing to have sufficiently
considered, that where there is no difficulty there is no praise.

There seems to be, in the conduct of sir Robert Howard and Dryden towards
each other, something that is not now easily to be explained[101].
Dryden, in his dedication to the earl of Orrery, had defended dramatick
rhyme; and Howard, in the preface to a collection of plays, had censured
his opinion. Dryden vindicated himself in his Dialogue on Dramatick
Poetry: Howard, in his preface to the Duke of Lerma, animadverted on the
vindication; and Dryden, in a preface to the Indian Emperor, replied to
the animadversions with great asperity, and almost with contumely. The
dedication to this play is dated the year in which the Annus Mirabilis
was published. Here appears a strange inconsistency; but Langbaine
affords some help, by relating that the answer to Howard was not
published in the first edition of the play, but was added when it was
afterwards reprinted; and, as the Duke of Lerma did not appear till 1668,
the same year in which the dialogue was published, there was time enough
for enmity to grow up between authors, who, writing both for the theatre,
were naturally rivals.

He was now so much distinguished, that, in 1668[102], he succeeded sir
William Davenant as poet laureate. The salary of the laureate had been
raised in favour of Jonson, by Charles the first, from a hundred marks
to one hundred pounds a year, and a tierce of wine; a revenue, in those
days, not inadequate to the conveniencies of life.

The same year he published his Essay on Dramatick Poetry, an elegant and
instructive dialogue; in which we are told, by Prior, that the principal
character is meant to represent the duke of Dorset. This work seems to
have given Addison a model for his Dialogues upon Medals.

Secret Love, or the Maiden Queen, 1668, is a tragicomedy. In the preface
he discusses a curious question, whether a poet can judge well of his
own productions? and determines very justly, that, of the plan and
disposition, and all that can be reduced to principles of science, the
author may depend upon his own opinion; but that, in those parts where
fancy predominates, self-love may easily deceive. He might have observed,
that what is good only because it pleases, cannot be pronounced good till
it has been found to please.

Sir Martin Mar-all, 1668, is a comedy published without preface or
dedication, and at first without the name of the author. Langbaine
charges it, like most of the rest, with plagiarism; and observes, that
the song is translated from Voiture, allowing, however, that both the
sense and measure are exactly observed.

The Tempest, 1670, is an alteration of Shakespeare's play, made by Dryden
in conjunction with Davenant; "whom," says he, "I found of so quick a
fancy, that nothing was proposed to him in which he could not suddenly
produce a thought extremely pleasant and surprising; and those first
thoughts of his, contrary to the Latin proverb, were not always the least
happy; and as his fancy was quick, so, likewise, were the products of it
remote and new. He borrowed not of any other; and his imaginations were
such as could not easily enter into any other man. "

The effect produced by the conjunction of these two powerful minds was,
that to Shakespeare's monster, Caliban, is added a sister monster,
Sycorax; and a woman, who, in the original play, had never seen a man,
is, in this, brought acquainted with a man that had never seen a woman.

About this time, in 1673, Dryden seems to have had his quiet much
disturbed by the success of the Emperess of Morocco, a tragedy written
in rhyme, by Elkanah Settle; which was so much applauded, as to make him
think his supremacy of reputation in some danger. Settle had not only
been prosperous on the stage, but, in the confidence of success, had
published his play, with sculptures and a preface of defiance. Here was
one offence added to another; and, for the last blast of inflammation, it
was acted at Whitehall by the court ladies.

Dryden could not now repress those emotions, which he called indignation,
and others jealousy; but wrote upon the play and the dedication such
criticism as malignant impatience could pour out in haste.

Of Settle he gives this character: "He's an animal of a most deplored
understanding, without reading and conversation. His being is in a
twilight of sense, and some glimmering of thought, which he can never
fashion into wit or English. His style is boisterous and rough-hewn,
his rhyme incorrigibly lewd, and his numbers perpetually harsh and
ill-sounding. The little talent which he has, is fancy. He sometimes
labours with a thought; but, with the pudder he makes to bring it into
the world, 'tis commonly stillborn; so that, for want of learning and
elocution, he will never be able to express any thing either naturally or
justly. "

This is not very decent; yet this is one of the pages in which criticism
prevails most over brutal fury.

He proceeds: "He has a heavy hand at fools, and a great felicity in
writing nonsense for them. Fools they will be, in spite of him. His king,
his two emperesses, his villain, and his sub-villain, nay, his hero, have
all a certain natural cast of the father--their folly was born and bred
in them, and something of the Elkanah will be visible. "

This is Dryden's general declamation; I will not withhold from the reader
a particular remark. Having gone through the first act, he says: "To
conclude this act with the most rumbling piece of nonsense spoken yet:

"To flatt'ring lightning our feign'd smiles conform,
Which, back'd with thunder, do but gild a storm.

"_Conform a smile to lightning_, make a _smile_ imitate _lightning_, and
_flattering lightning_: lightning, sure, is a threatening thing. And
this lightning must _gild a storm_. Now, if I must conform my smiles to
lightning, then my smiles must gild a storm too: to _gild_ with _smiles_,
is a new invention of gilding. And gild a storm by being _backed with
thunder_. Thunder is part of the storm; so one part of the storm must
help to _gild_ another part, and help by _backing_; as if a man would
gild a thing the better for being backed, or having a load upon his back.
So that here is _gilding_ by _conforming, smiling, lightning, backing_,
and _thundering_. The whole is as if I should say thus: I will make my
counterfeit smiles look like a flattering stonehorse, which, being backed
with a trooper, does but gild the battle. I am mistaken, if nonsense is
not here pretty thick sown. Sure the poet writ these two lines aboard
some smack in a storm, and, being sea-sick, spewed up a good lump of
clotted nonsense at once. "

Here is, perhaps, a sufficient specimen; but as the pamphlet, though
Dryden's, has never been thought worthy of republication, and is not
easily to be found, it may gratify curiosity to quote it more largely:

"Whene'er she bleeds,
He no severer a damnation needs,
That dares pronounce the sentence of her death,
Than the infection that attends that breath.

"_That attends that breath_. The poet is at _breath_ again; _breath_
can never scape him; and here he brings in a _breath_ that must be
_infectious_ with _pronouncing_ a sentence; and this sentence is not to
be pronounced till the condemned party _bleeds_; that is, she must be
executed first, and sentenced after; and the _pronouncing_ of this
_sentence_ will be infectious; that is, others will catch the disease of
that sentence, and this infecting of others will torment a man's self.
The whole is thus: when she bleeds, thou needest no greater hell or
torment to thyself, than infecting of others by pronouncing a sentence
upon her. What hodge-podge does he make here! Never was Dutch grout such
clogging, thick, indigestible stuff. But this is but a taste to stay the
stomach; we shall have a more plentiful mess presently.

"Now to dish up the poet's broth, that I promised:

"For when we're dead, and our freed souls enlarg'd,
Of nature's grosser burden we're discharg'd,
Then gently, as a happy lover's sigh,
Like wand'ring meteors through the air we'll fly,
And in our airy walk, as subtle guests,
We'll steal into our cruel fathers' breasts,
There read their souls, and track each passion's sphere:
See how revenge moves there, ambition here!
And in their orbs view the dark characters
Of sieges, ruins, murders, blood, and wars.
We'll blot out all those hideous draughts, and write
Pure and white forms; then with a radiant light
Their breasts encircle, till their passions be
Gentle as nature in its infancy;
Till, soften'd by our charms, their furies cease,
And their revenge resolves into a peace.
Thus by our death their quarrel ends,
Whom living we made foes, dead we'll make friends.

"If this be not a very liberal mess, I will refer myself to the stomach
of any moderate guest. And a rare mess it is, far excelling any
Westminster white-broth. It is a kind of giblet porridge, made of the
giblets of a couple of young geese, stodged full of meteors, orbs,
spheres, track, hideous draughts, dark characters, white forms, and
radiant lights; designed not only to please appetite, and indulge luxury,
but it is also physical, being an approved medicine to purge choler: for
it is propounded by Morena, as a receipt to cure their fathers of their
cholerick humours; and, were it written in characters as barbarous as
the words, might very well pass for a doctor's bill. To conclude: it is
porridge, 'tis a receipt, 'tis a pig with a pudding in the belly, 'tis
I know not what: for, certainly, never any one that pretended to write
sense, had the impudence before to put such stuff as this into the mouths
of those that were to speak it before an audience, whom he did not take
to be all fools; and, after that, to print it too, and expose it to the
examination of the world. But let us see what we can make of this stuff:

"For when we're dead, and our freed souls enlarg'd--

"Here he tells us what it is to be _dead_; it is to have _our freed souls
set free_. Now, if to have a soul set free, is to be dead; then to have a
_freed soul_ set free, is to have a dead man die.

"Then gentle, as a happy lover's sigh--

"They two like one _sigh_, and that one _sigh_ like two wandering
meteors,

"Shall fly through the air--

"That is, they shall mount above like falling stars, or else they shall
skip like two Jacks with lanterns, or Will with a wisp, and Madge with a
candle.

"_And in their airy walk steal into their cruel fathers' breasts, like
subtle guests_. So that their _fathers' breasts_ must be in an _airy
walk_, an airy _walk_ of a _flier. And there they will read their souls,
and track the spheres of their passions_. That is, these walking fliers,
Jack with a lantern, &c. will put on his spectacles, and fall a _reading
souls_, and put on his pumps and fall a _tracking of spheres_; so that he
will read and run, walk and fly, at the same time! Oh! Nimble Jack! _Then
he will see, how revenge here, how ambition there_--The birds will hop
about. _And then view the dark characters of sieges, ruins, murders,
blood, and wars, in their orbs: track the characters_ to their forms! Oh!
rare sport for Jack! Never was place so full of game as these breasts!
You cannot stir, but flush a sphere, start a character, or unkennel an
orb! "

Settle's is said to have been the first play embellished with sculptures;
those ornaments seem to have given poor Dryden great disturbance. He
tries, however, to ease his pain by venting his malice in a parody:

"The poet has not only been so impudent to expose all this stuff, but so
arrogant to defend it with an epistle; like a saucy booth-keeper, that,
when he had put a cheat upon the people, would wrangle and fight with
any that would not like it, or would offer to discover it; for which
arrogance our poet receives this correction; and, to jerk him a little
the sharper, I will not transpose his verse, but by the help of his own
words transnonsense sense, that, by my stuff, people may judge the better
what his is:

"Great boy, thy tragedy and sculptures done,
From press and plates, in fleets do homeward come;
And in ridiculous and humble pride,
Their course in ballad-singers' baskets guide,
Whose greasy twigs do all new beauties take,
From the gay shows thy dainty sculptures make.
Thy lines a mess of rhyming nonsense yield,
A senseless tale, with flattering fustian fill'd.
No grain of sense does in one line appear,
Thy words big bulks of boist'rous bombast bear,
With noise they move, and from play'rs' mouths rebound,
When their tongues dance to thy words' empty sound.
By thee inspir'd the rumbling verses roll,
As if that rhyme and bombast lent a soul:
And with that soul they seem taught duty too;
To huffing words does humble nonsense bow,
As if it would thy worthless worth enhance,
To th' lowest rank of fops thy praise advance,
To whom, by instinct, all thy stuff is dear:
Their loud claps echo to the theatre:
From breaths of fools thy commendation spreads,
Fame sings thy praise with mouths of loggerheads.
With noise and laughing each thy fustian greets,
'Tis clapt by choirs of empty-headed cits,
Who have their tribute sent, and homage given,
As men in whispers send loud noise to heaven.

"Thus I have daubed him with his own puddle: and now we are come from
aboard his dancing, masking, rebounding, breathing fleet; and, as if we
had landed at Gotham, we meet nothing but fools and nonsense. "

Such was the criticism to which the genius of Dryden could be reduced,
between rage and terrour; rage with little provocation, and terrour with
little danger. To see the highest minds thus levelled with the meanest,
may produce some solace to the consciousness of weakness, and some
mortification to the pride of wisdom. But let it be remembered, that
minds are not levelled in their powers but when they are first levelled
in their desires. Dryden and Settle had both placed their happiness in
the claps of multitudes.

An Evening's Love, or the Mock Astrologer, a comedy, 1671, is dedicated
to the illustrious duke of Newcastle, whom he courts by adding to his
praises those of his lady, not only as a lover but a partner of his
studies. It is unpleasing to think how many names, once celebrated,
are since forgotten. Of Newcastle's works nothing is now known but his
Treatise on Horsemanship.

The preface seems very elaborately written, and contains many just
remarks on the fathers of English drama. Shakespeare's plots, he says,
are in the hundred novels of Cinthio; those of Beaumont and Fletcher in
Spanish Stories; Jonson only made them for himself. His criticisms upon
tragedy, comedy, and farce, are judicious and profound. He endeavours to
defend the immorality of some of his comedies by the example of former
writers; which is only to say, that he was not the first, nor, perhaps,
the greatest offender. Against those that accused him of plagiarism he
alleges a favourable expression of the king: "He only desired that they,
who accuse me of thefts, would steal him plays like mine;" and then
relates how much labour he spends in fitting for the English stage what
he borrows from others.

Tyrannick Love, or the Virgin Martyr, 1672, was another tragedy in rhyme,
conspicuous for many passages of strength and elegance, and many of empty
noise and ridiculous turbulence. The rants of Maximin have been always
the sport of criticism; and were, at length, if his own confession may be
trusted, the shame of the writer.

Of this play he takes care to let the reader know, that it was contrived
and written in seven weeks. Want of time was often his excuse, or,
perhaps, shortness of time was his private boast, in the form of an
apology.

It was written before the Conquest of Granada, but published after it.
The design is to recommend piety: "I considered that pleasure was not the
only end of poesy; and that even the instructions of morality were not
so wholly the business of a poet, as that precepts and examples of piety
were to be omitted; for to leave that employment altogether to the clergy,
were to forget that religion was first taught in verse, which the laziness
or dulness of succeeding priesthood turned afterwards into prose. " Thus
foolishly could Dryden write, rather than not show his malice to the
parsons.

The two parts of the Conquest of Granada, 1672, are written with a
seeming determination to glut the publick with dramatick wonders; to
exhibit, in its highest elevation, a theatrical meteor of incredible love
and impossible valour, and to leave no room for a wilder flight to the
extravagance of posterity. All the rays of romantick heat, whether
amorous or warlike, glow in Almanzor, by a kind of concentration. He is
above all laws; he is exempt from all restraints; he ranges the world at
will, and governs wherever he appears. He fights without inquiring the
cause, and loves, in spite of the obligations of justice, of rejection by
his mistress, and of prohibition from the dead. Yet the scenes are, for
the most part, delightful; they exhibit a kind of illustrious depravity,
and majestick madness; such as, if it is sometimes despised, is often
reverenced, and in which the ridiculous is mingled with the astonishing.

In the epilogue to the second part of the Conquest of Granada, Dryden
indulges his favourite pleasure of discrediting his predecessors; and
this epilogue he has defended by a long postscript. He had promised a
second dialogue, in which he should more fully treat of the virtues and
faults of the English poets, who have written in the dramatick, epick, or
lyrick way. This promise was never formally performed; but, with respect
to the dramatick writers, he has given us in his prefaces, and in this
postscript, something equivalent; but his purpose being to exalt
himself by the comparison, he shows faults distinctly, and only praises
excellence in general terms.

A play thus written, in professed defiance of probability, naturally drew
down upon itself the vultures of the theatre. One of the criticks that
attacked it was Martin Clifford, to whom Sprat addressed the Life of
Cowley, with such veneration of his critical powers as might naturally
excite great expectations of instruction from his remarks. But let honest
credulity beware of receiving characters from contemporary writers.
Clifford's remarks, by the favour of Dr. Percy, were, at last, obtained;
and that no man may ever want them more, I will extract enough to satisfy
all reasonable desire.

In the first letter his observation is only general: "You do live," says
he, "in as much ignorance and darkness as you did in the womb: your
writings are like a Jack-of-all-trades' shop; they have a variety, but
nothing of value; and if thou art not the dullest plant-animal that ever
the earth produced, all that I have conversed with are strangely mistaken
in thee. "

In the second, he tells him that Almanzor is not more copied from
Achilles than from Ancient Pistol: "But I am," says he, "strangely
mistaken if I have not seen this very Almanzor of yours in some disguise
about this town, and passing under another name. Pr'ythee tell me true,
was not this Huffcap once the Indian Emperor? and, at another time, did
he not call himself Maximin? Was riot Lyndaraxa once called Almeira?
I mean under Montezuma the Indian Emperor. I protest and vow they are
either the same, or so alike that I cannot, for my heart, distinguish one
from the other. You are, therefore, a strange unconscionable thief; thou
art not content to steal from others, but dost rob thy poor wretched self
too. "

Now was Settle's time to take his revenge. He wrote a vindication of his
own lines; and, if he is forced to yield any thing, makes reprisals upon
his enemy. To say that his answer is equal to the censure, is no high
commendation.
To expose Dryden's method of analyzing his expressions, he
tries the same experiment upon the description of the ships in the Indian
Emperor, of which, however, he does not deny the excellence; but intends
to show, that, by studied misconstruction, every thing may be
equally represented as ridiculous. After so much of Dryden's elegant
animadversions, justice requires that something of Settle's should be
exhibited. The following observations are, therefore, extracted from a
quarto pamphlet of ninety-five pages:

"Fate after him below with pain did move,
And victory could scarce keep pace above.

"These two lines, if he can show me any sense or thought in, or any
thing but bombast and noise, he shall make me believe every word in his
observations on Morocco sense.

"In the Empress of Morocco were these lines:

"I'll travel then to some remoter sphere,
Till I find out new worlds, and crown you there.

"On which Dryden made this remark:

"'I believe our learned author takes a sphere for a country: the sphere
of Morocco; as if Morocco were the globe of earth and water; but a globe
is no sphere neither, by his leave,' &c. So _sphere_ must not be sense,
unless it relate to a circular motion about a globe, in which sense the
astronomers use it. I would desire him to expound those lines in Granada:

"I'll to the turrets of the palace go,
And add new fire to those that fight below.
Thence, hero-like, with torches by my side,
(Far be the omen though) my love I'll guide.
No, like his better fortune I'll appear,
With open arms, loose veil, and flowing hair.
Just flying forward from my rowling sphere.

"I wonder, if he be so strict, how he dares make so bold with _sphere_
himself, and be so critical in other men's writings. Fortune is fancied
standing on a globe, not on a _sphere_, as he told us in the first act.

"Because 'Elkanah's similes are the most unlike things to what they are
compared in the world,' I'll venture to start a simile in his Annus
Mirabilis: he gives this poetical description of the ship called the
London:

"The goodly London in her gallant trim,
The phoenix-daughter of the vanquisht old,
Like a rich bride does on the ocean swim,
And on her shadow rides in floating gold.
Her flag aloft spread ruffling in the wind,
And sanguine streamers seem'd the flood to fire:
The weaver, charm'd with what his loom design'd,
Goes on to sea, and knows not to retire.
With roomy decks, her guns of mighty strength,
Whose low-laid mouths each mounting billow laves,
Deep in her draught, and warlike in her length,
She seems a sea-wasp flying on the waves.

"What a wonderful pother is here, to make all these poetical
beautifications of a ship! that is a _phoenix_ in the first stanza, and
but a _wasp_ in the last: nay, to make his humble comparison of a _wasp_
more ridiculous, he does not say it flies upon the waves as nimbly as a
wasp, or the like, but it seemed a _wasp_. But our author at the writing
of this was not in his altitudes, to compare ships to floating palaces: a
comparison to the purpose, was a perfection he did not arrive to till his
Indian Emperor's days. But, perhaps, his similitude has more in it than
we imagine; this ship had a great many guns in her, and they, put all
together, made the sting in the wasp's tail; for this is all the reason I
can guess, why it seem'd a _wasp_. But, because we will allow him all we
can to help out, let it be a _phoenix sea-wasp_, and the rarity of such
an animal may do much towards heightening the fancy.

"It had been much more to his purpose, if he had designed to render the
senseless play little, to have searched for some such pedantry as this:

"Two ifs scarce make one possibility.
If justice will take all and nothing give,
Justice, methinks, is not distributive.
To die or kill you, is the alternative.
Rather than take your life, I will not live.

"Observe how prettily our author chops logick in heroick verse. Three
such fustian canting words as _distributive, alternative_, and _two ifs_,
no man but himself would have come within the noise of. But he's a man of
general learning, and all comes into his play.

"'Twould have done well too if he could have met with a rant or two,
worth the observation; such as,

"Move swiftly, sun, and fly a lover's pace,
Leave months and weeks behind thee in thy race.

"But surely the sun, whether he flies a lover's or not a lover's pace,
leaves weeks and months, nay, years too, behind him in his race.

"Poor Robin, or any other of the philo-mathematicks, would have given him
satisfaction in the point:

"If I could kill thee now, thy fate's so low,
That I must stoop, ere I can give the blow.
But mine is fixt so far above thy crown,
That all thy men,
Piled on thy back, can never pull it down.

"Now where that is, Almanzor's fate is fixt, I cannot guess; but,
wherever it is, I believe Almanzor, and think that all Abdalla's
subjects, piled upon one another, might not pull down his fate so well as
without piling: besides, I think Abdalla so wise a man, that, if Almanzor
had told him piling his men upon his back might do the feat, he would
scarce bear such a weight, for the pleasure of the exploit; but it is a
huff, and let Abdalla do it if he dare.

"The people like a headlong torrent go,
And ev'ry dam they break or overflow.
But, unoppos'd, they either lose their force,
Or wind in volumes to their former course.

"A very pretty allusion, contrary to all sense or reason. Torrents, I
take it, let them wind never so much, can never return to their former
course, unless he can suppose that fountains can go upwards, which is
impossible; nay, more, in the foregoing page he tells us so too; a trick
of a very unfaithful memory:

"But can no more than fountains upward flow;

"which of a _torrent_, which signifies a rapid stream, is much more
impossible. Besides, if he goes to quibble, and say that it is possible
by art water may be made return, and the same water run twice in one and
the same channel: then he quite confutes what he says; for it is by being
opposed, that it runs into its former course; for all engines that make
water so return, do it by compulsion and opposition. Or, if he means a
headlong torrent for a tide, which would be ridiculous, yet they do riot
wind in volumes, but come foreright back, (if their upright lies straight
to their former course,) and that by opposition of the sea-water, that
drives them back again.

"And for fancy, when he lights of any thing like it, 'tis a wonder if it
be not borrowed. As here, for example of, I find this fanciful thought in
his Ann. Mirab.

"Old father Thames rais'd up his rev'rend head;
But fear'd the fate of Simoeis would return:
Deep in his ooze he sought his sedgy bed;
And shrunk his waters back into his urn.

"This is stolen from Cowley's Davideis, p. 9.

"Swift Jordan started, and strait backward fled,
Hiding amongst thick reeds his aged head.
And when the Spaniards their assault begin,
At once beat those without and those within.

"This Almanzor speaks of himself; and, sure, for one man to conquer an
army within the city, and another without the city, at once, is something
difficult; but this flight is pardonable to some we meet with in Granada:
Osmin, speaking of Almanzor,

"Who, like a tempest that outrides the wind,
Made a just battle, ere the bodies join'd.

"Pray, what does this honourable person mean by a 'tempest that outrides
the wind? ' a tempest that outrides itself. To suppose a tempest without
wind, is as bad as supposing a man to walk without feet; for if he
supposes the tempest to be something distinct from the wind, yet, as
being the effect of wind only, to come before the cause is a little
preposterous; so that, if he takes it one way, or if he takes it the
other, those two _ifs_ will scarce make one _possibility_. " Enough of
Settle.

Marriage a-la-mode, 1673, is a comedy dedicated to the earl of Rochester;
whom he acknowledges not only as the defender of his poetry, but the
promoter of his fortune. Langbaine places this play in 1673. The earl of
Rochester, therefore, was the famous Wilmot, whom yet tradition always
represents as an enemy to Dryden, and who is mentioned by him with some
disrespect in the preface to Juvenal.

The Assignation, or Love in a Nunnery, a comedy, 1673, was driven off the
stage, "against the opinion," as the author says, "of the best judges. "
It is dedicated, in a very elegant address, to sir Charles Sedley; in
which he finds an opportunity for his usual complaint of hard treatment
and unreasonable censure.

Amboyna, 1673, is a tissue of mingled dialogue in verse and prose, and
was, perhaps, written in less time than the Virgin Martyr; though the
author thought not fit, either ostentatiously or mournfully, to tell how
little labour it cost him, or at how short a warning he produced it. It
was a temporary performance, written in the time of the Dutch war,
to inflame the nation against their enemies; to whom he hopes, as he
declares in his epilogue, to make his poetry not less destructive than
that by which Tyrtaeus of old animated the Spartans. This play was
written in the second Dutch war, in 1673.

Troilus and Cressida, 1679, is a play altered from Shakespeare; but so
altered, that, even in Langbaine's opinion, "the last scene in the third
act is a masterpiece. " It is introduced by a discourse on the grounds
of criticism in tragedy, to which I suspect that Rymer's book had given
occasion.

The Spanish Fryar, 1681, is a tragicomedy, eminent for the happy
coincidence and coalition of the two plots. As it was written against the
papists, it would naturally, at that time, have friends and enemies; and
partly by the popularity which it obtained at first, and partly by the
real power both of the serious and risible part, it continued long a
favourite of the publick.

It was Dryden's opinion, at least for some time, and he maintains it in
the dedication of this play, that the drama required an alternation of
comick and tragick scenes; and that it is necessary to mitigate, by
alleviations of merriment, the pressure of ponderous events, and the
fatigue of toilsome passions. "Whoever," says he, "cannot perform both
parts, is but half a writer for the stage. "

The Duke of Guise, a tragedy, 1683, written in conjunction with Lee, as
Oedipus had been before, seems to deserve notice only for the offence
which it gave to the remnant of the covenanters, and in general to the
enemies of the court, who attacked him with great violence, and were
answered by him; though, at last, he seems to withdraw from the conflict,
by transferring the greater part of the blame or merit to his partner. It
happened that a contract had been made between them, by which they were
to join in writing a play; and "he happened," says Dryden, "to claim the
promise just upon the finishing of a poem, when I would have been glad of
a little respite. _Two_-thirds of it belonged to him; and to me only the
first scene of the play, the whole fourth act, and the first half, or
somewhat more, of the fifth. "

This was a play written professedly for the party of the duke of York,
whose succession was then opposed. A parallel is intended between the
leaguers of France, and the covenanters of England: and this intention
produced the controversy.

Albion and Albanius, 1685, is a musical drama or opera, written, like
the Duke of Guise, against the republicans. With what success it was
performed, I have not found[103].

The State of Innocence and Fall of Man, 1675, is termed, by him, an
opera: it is rather a tragedy in heroick rhyme, but of which the
personages are such as cannot decently be exhibited on the stage. Some
such production was foreseen by Marvel, who writes thus to Milton:

Or if a work so infinite be spann'd,
Jealous I was, lest some less skilful hand
(Such as disquiet always what is well,
And by ill-imitating would excel,)
Might hence presume the whole creation's day
To change in scenes, and show it in a play.

It is another of his hasty productions; for the heat of his imagination
raised it in a month.

This composition is addressed to the princess of Modena, then dutchess of
York, in a strain of flattery which disgraces genius, and which it was
wonderful that any man, that knew the meaning of his own words, could use
without self-detestation. It is an attempt to mingle earth and heaven, by
praising human excellence in the language of religion.

The preface contains an apology for heroick verse and poetick license; by
which is meant not any liberty taken in contracting or extending words,
but the use of bold fictions and ambitious figures.

The reason which he gives for printing what was never acted, cannot be
overpassed: "I was induced to it in my own defence, many hundred copies
of it being dispersed abroad without my knowledge or consent, and every
one gathering new faults, it became, at length, a libel against me. "
These copies, as they gathered faults, were apparently manuscript; and
he lived in an age very unlike ours, if many hundred copies of fourteen
hundred lines were likely to be transcribed. An author has a right to
print his own works, and needs not seek an apology in falsehood; but he
that could bear to write the dedication, felt no pain in writing the
preface.

Aureng Zebe, 1676, is a tragedy founded on the actions of a great prince
then reigning, but over nations not likely to employ their criticks upon
the transactions of the English stage. If he had known and disliked
his own character, our trade was not in those times secure from his
resentment. His country is at such a distance, that the manners might be
safely falsified, and the incidents feigned; for remoteness of place is
remarked, by Racine, to afford the same conveniencies to a poet as length
of time.

This play is written in rhyme; and has the appearance of being the
most elaborate of all the dramas. The personages are imperial; but the
dialogue is often domestick, and, therefore, susceptible of sentiments
accommodated to familiar incidents. The complaint of life is celebrated;
and there are many other passages that may be read with pleasure.

This play is addressed to the earl of Mulgrave, afterwards duke of
Buckingham, himself, if not a poet, yet a writer of verses, and a
critick. In this address Dryden gave the first hints of his intention to
write an epick poem. He mentions his design in terms so obscure, that he
seems afraid lest his plan should be purloined, as, he says, happened to
him when he told it more plainly in his preface to Juvenal. "The design,"
says he, "you know is great, the story English, and neither too near the
present times, nor too distant from them. "

All for Love, or the World well Lost, 1678, a tragedy, founded upon the
story of Antony and Cleopatra, he tells us, "is the only play which
he wrote for himself:" the rest were given to the people. It is, by
universal consent, accounted the work in which he has admitted the fewest
improprieties of style or character; but it has one fault equal to many,
though rather moral than critical, that, by admitting the romantick
omnipotence of love, he has recommended as laudable, and worthy of
imitation, that conduct which, through all ages, the good have censured
as vitious, and the bad despised as foolish.

Of this play the prologue and the epilogue, though written upon the
common topicks of malicious and ignorant criticism, and without any
particular relation to the characters or incidents of the drama, are
deservedly celebrated for their elegance and sprightliness.

Limberham, or the kind Keeper, 1680, is a comedy, which, after the third
night, was prohibited as too indecent for the stage. What gave offence,
was in the printing, as the author says, altered or omitted. Dryden
confesses that its indecency was objected to; but Langbaine, who yet
seldom favours him, imputes its expulsion to resentment, because it "so
much exposed the keeping part of the town. "

Oedipus, 1679, is a tragedy formed by Dryden and Lee, in conjunction,
from the works of Sophocles, Seneca, and Corneille. Dryden planned the
scenes, and composed the first and third acts.

Don Sebastian, 1690, is commonly esteemed either the first or second of
his dramatick performances. It is too long to be all acted, and has many
characters and many incidents; and though it is not without sallies
of frantick dignity, and more noise than meaning, yet, as it makes
approaches to the possibilities of real life, and has some sentiments
which leave a strong impression, it continued long to attract attention.
Amidst the distresses of princes, and the vicissitudes of empire, are
inserted several scenes which the writer intended for comick; but which,
I suppose, that age did not much commend, and this would not endure.
There are, however, passages of excellence universally acknowledged; the
dispute and the reconciliation of Dorax and Sebastian has always been
admired.

This play was first acted in 1690, after Dryden had for some years
discontinued dramatick poetry.

Amphitryon is a comedy derived from Plautus and Moliere. The dedication
is dated Oct. 1690. This play seems to have succeeded at its first
appearance; and was, I think, long considered as a very diverting
entertainment.

Cleomenes, 1692, is a tragedy, only remarkable as it occasioned an
incident related in the Guardian, and allusively mentioned by Dryden in
his preface. As he came out from the representation, he was accosted thus
by some airy stripling: "Had I been left alone with a young beauty, I
would not have spent my time like your Spartan. " "That sir," said Dryden,
"perhaps, is true; but give me leave to tell you, that you are no hero. "

King Arthur, 1691, is another opera. It was the last work that Dryden
performed for king Charles, who did not live to see it exhibited; and
it does not seem to have been ever brought upon the stage[104]. In the
dedication to the marquis of Halifax, there is a very elegant character
of Charles, and a pleasing account of his latter life. When this was
first brought upon the stage, news that the duke of Monmouth had landed
was told in the theatre; upon which the company departed, and Arthur was
exhibited no more.

His last drama was Love Triumphant, a tragicomedy. In his dedication to
the earl of Salisbury he mentions "the lowness of fortune to which he
has voluntarily reduced himself, and of which he has no reason to be
ashamed. "

This play appeared in 1694. It is said to have been unsuccessful. The
catastrophe, proceeding merely from a change of mind, is confessed by the
author to be defective. Thus he began and ended his dramatick labours
with ill success.

From such a number of theatrical pieces, it will be supposed, by most
readers, that he must have improved his fortune; at least, that such
diligence, with such abilities, must have set penury at defiance. But
in Dryden's time the drama was very far from that universal approbation
which it has now obtained. The playhouse was abhorred by the puritans,
and avoided by those who desired the character of seriousness or decency.
A grave lawyer would have debased his dignity, and a young trader would
have impaired his credit, by appearing in those mansions of dissolute
licentiousness. The profits of the theatre, when so many classes of the
people were deducted from the audience, were not great; and the poet had,
for a long time, but a single night. The first that had two nights was
Southern; and the first that had three was Howe. There were, however, in
those days, arts of improving a poet's profit, which Dryden forbore to
practise; and a play, therefore, seldom produced him more than a hundred
pounds, by the accumulated gain of the third night, the dedication, and
the copy.

Almost every piece had a dedication, written with such elegance and
luxuriance of praise, as neither haughtiness nor avarice could be
imagined able to resist. But he seems to have made flattery too cheap.
That praise is worth nothing of which the price is known.

To increase the value of his copies, he often accompanied his work with a
preface of criticism; a kind of learning then almost new in the English
language, and which he, who had considered, with great accuracy, the
principles of writing, was able to distribute copiously as occasions
arose. By these dissertations the publick judgment must have been much
improved; and Swift, who conversed with Dryden, relates that he regretted
the success of his own instructions, and found his readers made suddenly
too skilful to be easily satisfied.

His prologues had such reputation, that for some time a play was
considered as less likely to be well received, if some of his verses did
not introduce it. The price of a prologue was two guineas, till, being
asked to write one for Mr. Southern, he demanded three: "Not," said he,
"young man, out of disrespect to you; but the players have had my goods
too cheap[105]. "

Though he declares, that in his own opinion, his genius was not
dramatick, he had great confidence in his own fertility; for he is said
to have engaged, by contract, to furnish four plays a year.

It is certain, that in one year, 1678[106], he published All for Love,
Assignation, two parts of the Conquest of Granada, sir Martin Mar-all,
and the State of Innocence, six complete plays; with a celerity of
performance, which, though all Langbaine's charges of plagiarism should
be allowed, shows such facility of composition, such readiness of
language, and such copiousness of sentiment, as, since the time of Lopez
de Vega, perhaps no other author has possessed.

He did not enjoy his reputation, however great, nor his profits, however
small, without molestation. He had criticks to endure, and rivals to
oppose. The two most distinguished wits of the nobility, the duke of
Buckingham and earl of Rochester, declared themselves his enemies.

Buckingham characterized him, in 1671, by the name of Bayes, in the
Rehearsal; a farce which he is said to have written with the assistance
of Butler, the author of Hudibras; Martin Clifford, of the Charter-house;
and Dr. Sprat, the friend of Cowley, then his chaplain. Dryden and his
friends laughed at the length of time, and the number of hands, employed
upon this performance; in which, though by some artifice of action it yet
keeps possession of the stage, it is not possible now to find any thing
that might not have been written without so long delay, or a confederacy
so numerous.

To adjust the minute events of literary history, is tedious and
troublesome; it requires, indeed, no great force of understanding, but
often depends upon inquiries which there is no opportunity of making, or
is to be fetched from books and pamphlets not always at hand.

The Rehearsal was played in 1671[107], and yet is represented as
ridiculing passages in the Conquest of Granada and Assignation, which
were not published till 1678; in Marriage a-la-mode, published in 1673;
and in Tyrannick Love, in 1677. These contradictions show how rashly
satire is applied[108].

It is said that this farce was originally intended against Davenant, who,
in the first draught, was characterized by the name of Bilboa. Davenant
had been a soldier and an adventurer.

There is one passage in the Rehearsal still remaining, which seems to
have related originally to Davenant. Bayes hurts his nose, and comes in
with brown paper applied to the bruise; how this affected Dryden, does
not appear. Davenant's nose had suffered such diminution by mishaps among
the women, that a patch upon that part evidently denoted him.

It is said, likewise, that sir Robert Howard was once meant. The design
was, probably, to ridicule the reigning poet, whoever he might be.

Much of the personal satire, to which it might owe its first reception,
is now lost or obscured. Bayes, probably, imitated the dress, and
mimicked the manner, of Dryden: the cant words which are so often in
his mouth may be supposed to have been Dryden's habitual phrases, or
customary exclamations. Bayes, when he is to write, is blooded and
purged: this, as Lamotte relates himself to have heard, was the real
practice of the poet.

There were other strokes in the Rehearsal by which malice was gratified:
the debate between love and honour, which keeps prince Volscius in a
single boot, is said to have alluded to the misconduct of the duke
of Ormond, who lost Dublin to the rebels, while he was toying with a
mistress.

The earl of Rochester, to suppress the reputation of Dryden, took Settle
into his protection, and endeavoured to persuade the publick that its
approbation had been to that time misplaced. Settle was awhile in high
reputation: his Empress of Morocco, having first delighted the town, was
carried in triumph to Whitehall, and played by the ladies of the court.
Now was the poetical meteor at the highest; the next moment began its
fall. Rochester withdrew his patronage; seeming resolved, says one of his
biographers, "to have a judgment contrary to that of the town;" perhaps
being unable to endure any reputation beyond a certain height, even when
he had himself contributed to raise it.

Neither criticks nor rivals did Dryden much mischief, unless they gained
from his own temper the power of vexing him, which his frequent bursts of
resentment give reason to suspect. He is always angry at some past, or
afraid of some future censure; but he lessens the smart of his wounds by
the balm of his own approbation, and endeavours to repel the shafts of
criticism by opposing a shield of adamantine confidence.

The perpetual accusation produced against him, was that of plagiarism,
against which he never attempted any vigorous defence; for, though he
was, perhaps, sometimes injuriously censured, he would, by denying part
of the charge, have confessed the rest; and, as his adversaries had the
proof in their own hands, he, who knew that wit had little power against
facts, wisely left in that perplexity which generality produces a
question which it was his interest to suppress, and which, unless
provoked by vindication, few were likely to examine.

Though the life of a writer, from about thirty-five to sixty-three,
may be supposed to have been sufficiently busied by the composition of
eight-and-twenty pieces for the stage, Dryden found room in the same
space for many other undertakings. But, how much soever he wrote, he was
at least once suspected of writing more; for, in 1679, a paper of verses,
called an Essay on Satire, was shown about in manuscript; by which the
earl of Rochester, the dutchess of Portsmouth, and others, were so much
provoked, that, as was supposed, (for the actors were never discovered,)
they procured Dryden, whom they suspected as the author, to be
way-laid and beaten. This incident is mentioned by the duke of
Buckinghamshire[109], the true writer, in his Art of Poetry; where he
says of Dryden:

Though prais'd and beaten for another's rhymes,
His own deserve as great applause sometimes.

His reputation in time was such, that his name was thought necessary to
the success of every poetical or literary performance, and, therefore,
he was engaged to contribute something, whatever it might be, to many
publications. He prefixed the Life of Polybius to the translation of sir
Henry Sheers; and those of Lucian and Plutarch, to versions of their
works by different hands. Of the English Tacitus he translated the first
book; and, if Gordon be credited, translated it from the French. Such a
charge can hardly be mentioned without some degree of indignation; but
it is not, I suppose, so much to be inferred, that Dryden wanted the
literature necessary to the perusal of Tacitus, as that, considering
himself as hidden in a crowd, he had no awe of the publick; and, writing
merely for money, was contented to get it by the nearest way.

In 1680, the Epistles of Ovid being translated by the poets of the time,
among which one was the work of Dryden[110], and another of Dryden and
lord Mulgrave, it was necessary to introduce them by a preface; and
Dryden, who on such occasions was regularly summoned, prefixed a
discourse upon translation, which was then struggling for the liberty
that it now enjoys. Why it should find any difficulty in breaking the
shackles of verbal interpretation, which must for ever debar it from
elegance, it would be difficult to conjecture, were not the power of
prejudice every day observed. The authority of Jonson, Sandys, and
Holiday, had fixed the judgment of the nation; and it was not easily
believed that a better way could be found than they had taken, though
Fanshaw, Denham, Waller, and Cowley, had tried to give examples of a
different practice.

In 1681 Dryden became yet more conspicuous by uniting politicks with
poetry, in the memorable satire, called Absalom and Achitophel, written
against the faction which, by lord Shaftesbury's incitement, set the duke
of Monmouth at its head.

Of this poem, in which personal satire was applied to the support of
publick principles, and in which, therefore, every mind was interested,
the reception was eager, and the sale so large, that my father, an old
bookseller, told me, he had not known it equalled but by Sacheverell's
Trial.

The reason of this general perusal Addison has attempted to derive from
the delight which the mind feels in the investigation of secrets; and
thinks that curiosity to decipher the names, procured readers to the
poem. There is no need to inquire why those verses were read, which, to
all the attractions of wit, elegance, and harmony, added the cooperation
of all the factious passions, and filled every mind with triumph or
resentment.

It could not be supposed that all the provocation given by Dryden, would
be endured without resistance or reply. Both his person and his party
were exposed, in their turns, to the shafts of satire, which, though
neither so well pointed, nor, perhaps, so well aimed, undoubtedly drew
blood.

One of these poems is called, Dryden's Satire on his Muse; ascribed,
though, as Pope says, falsely, to Somers, who was afterwards chancellor.
The poem, whosesoever it was, has much virulence, and some sprightliness.
The writer tells all the ill that he can collect both of Dryden and his
friends.

The poem of Absalom and Achitophel had two answers, now both forgotten;
one called Azaria and Hushai; the other, Absalom senior. Of these hostile
compositions, Dryden apparently imputes Absalom senior to Settle, by
quoting in his verses against him the second line. Azaria and Hushai was,
as Wood says, imputed to him, though it is somewhat unlikely that he
should write twice on the same occasion. This is a difficulty which
I cannot remove, for want of a minuter knowledge of poetical
transactions[111].

The same year he published The Medal, of which the subject is a
medal struck on lord Shaftesbury's escape from a prosecution, by the
_ignoramus_ of a grand jury of Londoners.

In both poems he maintains the same principles, and saw them both
attacked by the same antagonist. Elkanah Settle, who had answered
Absalom, appeared with equal courage in opposition to The Medal, and
published an answer called, The Medal Reversed, with so much success
in both encounters, that he left the palm doubtful, and divided the
suffrages of the nation. Such are the revolutions of fame, or such is
the prevalence of fashion, that the man, whose works have not yet been
thought to deserve the care of collecting them, who died forgotten in
an hospital, and whose latter years were spent in contriving shows for
fairs, and carrying an elegy or epithalamium, of which the beginning and
end were occasionally varied, but the intermediate parts were always the
same, to every house where there was a funeral or a wedding, might with
truth have had inscribed upon his stone:

Here lies the rival and antagonist of Dryden.

Settle was, for this rebellion, severely chastised by Dryden, under the
name of Doeg, in the second part of Absalom and Achitophel; and was,
perhaps, for his factious audacity, made the city poet, whose annual
office was to describe the glories of the mayor's day. Of these bards he
was the last, and seems not much to have deserved even this degree of
regard, if it was paid to his political opinions; for he afterwards wrote
a panegyrick on the virtues of judge Jefferies; and what more could have
been done by the meanest zealot for prerogative?

Of translated fragments, or occasional poems, to enumerate the titles, or
settle the dates, would be tedious, with little use. It may be observed,
that, as Dryden's genius was commonly excited by some personal regard, he
rarely writes upon a general topick.

Soon after the accession of king James, when the design of reconciling
the nation to the church of Rome became apparent, and the religion of the
court gave the only efficacious title to its favours, Dryden declared
himself a convert to popery. This, at any other time, might have passed
with little censure. Sir Kenelm Digby embraced popery; the two Reynolds's
reciprocally converted one another[112]; and Chillingworth himself was
awhile so entangled in the wilds of controversy, as to retire for quiet
to an infallible church. If men of argument and study can find such
difficulties, or such motives, as may either unite them to the church of
Rome, or detain them in uncertainty, there can be no wonder that a man,
who, perhaps, never inquired why he was a protestant, should, by an
artful and experienced disputant, be made a papist, overborne by the
sudden violence of new and unexpected arguments, or deceived by a
representation which shows only the doubts on one part, and only the
evidence on the other.