MAC-FLECNOE.
The enmity between Dryden and Shadwell at first probably only sprung from some of those temporary causes of disgust, which must frequently divide persons whose lives are spent in a competition for public applause. That they were occasionally upon tolerable terms is certain, for Dryden has told us so; and Shadwell, in 1676, when expressing his dissent from one of our author's rules of theatrical criticism, industriously and anxiously qualifies his opinion, with the highest compliments to our author's genius.[411] They had formerly even joined forces, and called in the aid of another wit, to overwhelm the reputation of no less a person than Elkanah Settle.[412] But, between the politics of the stage and of the nation, the friendship of these bards, which probably never had a very solid foundation, was at length totally overthrown. It is not very easy to discover who struck the first blow; but it may be suspected, that Dryden was displeased to see Shadwell not only dispute his canons of criticism in print, but seem to establish himself as an imitator of the old school of dramatic composition, and particularly of Jonson, on whom Dryden had thrown some censure in his epilogue to "The Conquest of Grenada," and in the Defence of these verses. It seems certain, that the feud had broke out in 1675-6; for Shadwell has not only made some invidious allusions to the success of "Aureng-Zebe," which was represented that season, but has plainly intimated, that he needed only a pension to enable him to write as well as Dryden himself.[413] This assault, however, seems to have been forgiven; for Dryden obliged Shadwell with an epilogue to the "True Widow," acted in 1678. But their precarious reconcilement did not long subsist, when political animosity was added to literary rivalry. Shadwell not only wrote the "Lancashire Witches," in ridicule of the Tory party, but entered into a personal contest with our author on the subject of "The Medal," which he answered by a clumsy, though venomous, retort, called "The Medal of John Bayes." In the preface he asserts, that no one can think Dryden "hardly dealt with, since he knows, and so do all his old acquaintance, that there is not one untrue word spoke of him." Neither was this a single offence; for Dryden, in his "Vindication of the Duke of Guise," says, that Shadwell has repeatedly called him Atheist in print. These reiterated insults at length drew down the vengeance of our poet, who seems to have singled Shadwell from the herd of those who had libelled him, to be gibbetted in rhyme while the English language shall last. Neither was Dryden satisfied with a single attack upon this obnoxious bard; but, having divided his poetical character from that which he held as a political writer, he discussed the first in the satire which follows, and the last, with equal severity, in the Second Part of "Absalom and Achitophel." These two admirable pieces of satire appeared within less than a month of each other; and leave it a matter of doubt, whether the bitter ridicule of the anointed Prince of Dulness, or the sarcastic description of Og, the seditious poetaster, be most cruelly severe.
"Mac-Flecnoe" must be allowed to be one of the keenest satires in the English language. It is what Dryden has elsewhere termed a Varronian satire;[414] that is, as he seems to use the phrase, one in which the author is not contented with general sarcasm upon the object of attack, but where he has woven his piece into a sort of imaginary story, or scene, in which he introduces the person, whom he ridicules, as a principal actor. The position in which Dryden has placed Shadwell is the most mortifying to literary vanity which can possibly be imagined, and is hardly excelled by the device of Pope in the "Dunciad," who has obviously followed the steps of his predecessor. Flecnoe, who seems to have been universally acknowledged as the very lowest of all poetasters, and whose name had passed into a proverb for doggrel verse and stupid prose, is represented as devolving upon Shadwell that pre-eminence over the realms of Dulness, which he had himself possessed without a rival. The spot chosen for this devolution of empire is the Barbican, an obscure suburb, in which it would seem that there were temporary theatrical representations of the lowest order, among other receptacles of vulgar dissipation, for the amusement of the very lowest of the vulgar. Here the ceremony of Shadwell's coronation is supposed to be performed with an inaugural oration by Flecnoe, his predecessor, in which all his pretensions to wit and to literary fame are sarcastically enumerated and confuted, by a counter-statement of his claims to distinction by pre-eminent and unrivalled stupidity. In this satire, the shafts of the poet are directed with an aim acutely malignant. The inference drawn concerning Shadwell's talents is general and absolute; but in the proof, Dryden appeals with triumph to those parts only of his literary character which are obviously vulnerable. He reckons up among his titles to the throne of Flecnoe, his desperate and unsuccessful attempts at lyrical composition, in the opera of "Psyche;" the clumsy and coarse limning of those whom he designed to figure as fine gentlemen in his comedies; the false and florid taste of his dedications; his presumptuous imitation of Jonson in composition, and his absurd resemblance to him in person. But the satirist industriously keeps out of view those points, in which perhaps he internally felt some inferiority to the object of his wrath. He mentions nothing that could recal to the reader's recollection that insight into human life, that acquaintance with the foibles and absurdities displayed in individual pursuits, that bold though coarse delineation of character, which gave fame to Shadwell's comedies in the last century, and renders them amusing even at the present day. This discrimination is an excellent proof of the exquisite address with which Dryden wielded the satirical weapon, and managed the feelings of his readers. We never find him attempting a desperate or impossible task; at least in a way which seems, in the moment of perusal, desperate or impossible. He never wastes his powder against the impregnable part of a fortress, but directs all his battery against some weaker spot, where a breach may be rendered practicable. In short, by convincing his reader that he is right in the examples which he quotes, he puts the question at issue upon the ground most disadvantageous for his antagonist, and renders it very difficult for one who has been proved a dunce in one instance to establish his credit in any other.
I have had so frequently to call the attention of my reader to the sonorous and emphatic effect of Dryden's versification, that it is almost ridiculous to repeat epithets which apply to every poem which succeeded his Annus Mirabilis; yet I cannot but remark, that the mock heroic may be said to have owed its rise to our author, and that there is hardly any poem, before "Mac-Flecnoe," in which it has been employed with all its qualities of grave and pompous irony, expressed in solemn and sounding verse.
It is no inconsiderable part of the merit of "Mac-Flecnoe," that it led the way to the "Dunciad:" yet, while we acknowledge the more copious and variegated flow of Pope's satire, we must not forget, that, independent of the merit of originality, always inestimable, Dryden's poem claims that of a close and more compact fable, of a single and undisturbed aim. Pope's ridicule and sarcasm is scattered so wide, and among such a number of authors, that it resembles small shot discharged at random among a crowd; while that of Dryden, like a single well-directed bullet, prostrates the individual object against whom it was directed. Besides, the reader is apt to sympathise with the degree of the satirist's provocation, which, in Dryden's case, cannot be disputed; whereas Pope sometimes confounds those, from whom he had received gross incivility, with others who had given him no offence, and with some whose characters were above his accusation. To posterity, the "Mac-Flecnoe" possesses a decided superiority over the "Dunciad," for a very few facts make us master of the argument; while that of the latter poem, excepting the Sixth Book, where the satire is more general, requires a note at every tenth line to render it even intelligible.
Mr Malone has given us the title of the first edition of "Mac-Flecnoe," which the present Editor has never seen, as indeed it is of the last degree of rarity. It was published not by Tonson, but by D. Green, and entitled, "Mac-Flecnoe, or a Satire on the True-blue[415] Protestant Poet, T. S.; by the Author of Absalom and Achitophel." It consisted only of one sheet and a half, and was sold for twopence. The satire was too personal, and too poignant, to fail in attracting immediate attention, and accordingly the poem was quickly sold off. It was not republished until it appeared in Tonson's first Miscellany, in 1684, with a few slight alterations, intended either to point particular verses, or to correct errors of the press, or pen. It must have been generally known, that Dryden was the author of this satire, both because it is stated in the title-page to be by the author of "Absalom and Achitophel," and because there existed no contemporary poet to whom so masterly a production could have been ascribed, even with remote probability; yet Shadwell, in his dedication of the tenth satire of Juvenal, (a most miserable performance,) says, that Dryden, when he taxed him with being the author, "denied it with all the execrations he could think of;" an accusation which was echoed by Brown, though apparently upon the authority of Shadwell alone.[416] From this averment, which is probably made far too broadly, we can only infer, that Dryden, like Swift in the same predicament, left his adversary to prove what he had no title to call upon him to confess; for that he seriously meant to disavow a performance, of which he had from the very beginning sufficiently avouched himself the author, can hardly be supposed for a moment. It has indeed been noticed, that our author has omitted this poem, as well as the "Eulogy on Cromwell," in a list of his plays and poems subjoined to one of his plays; but Dryden might not think fit to admit a personal, and what he probably considered as a fugitive satire, into a formal list of his poetry. We know he entertained a conscious sense of his dignity in this respect; for, excepting in a slight and passing sarcasm, he never deigned to answer any of his literary adversaries, excepting Settle and Shadwell; and he might possibly think, on reflection, that he had done the latter too much honour in making him the subject of a separate and laboured poem. Mr Malone also conceives, that he might be with-held from inserting this poem in an authoritative list of his works, by delicacy towards Dorset, his recent benefactor, who had thought Shadwell worthy of the laurel of which our poet had been divested at the Revolution. Be it as it may, he was afterwards so far from disowning the poem, that, in the Essay on Satire, he gives it, with "Absalom and Achitophel," as instances of his own attempts at the Varronian satire.
The purpose and scope of "Mac-Flecnoe" was strangely misconstrued by the object of it, and by our poet's editors. Shadwell took it into his head, that Dryden meant seriously to tax him with being an Irishman; a charge which he seems more anxious to refute than seems necessary. Cibber, or whoever wrote Dryden's Life in the collection bearing his name, supposes, that Flecnoe, who died in 1678, had actually succeeded our author in the office of poet-laureat. Derrick, though he corrects this error, has fallen into another, in which he is followed by Dr Johnson, who considers "Mac-Flecnoe" as written in express ridicule of Shadwell's inauguration as court poet. The scarcity of the first edition of "Mac-Flecnoe" might have been some excuse for these errors, had not the piece been printed in the first Miscellany, in 1684, four years before Dryden's being deposed, and Shadwell succeeding him. Certainly the two events tallied strangely; and the friends of Shadwell might have considered the substantial office which he gained by the downfall of Dryden, as a just compensation for the ludicrous and mock dignity with which his foe had invested him.
MAC-FLECKNOE.
All human things are subject to decay,
And, when fate summons, monarchs must obey.
This Flecknoe found,[417] who, like Augustus, young
Was called to empire, and had governed long;
In prose and verse was owned, without dispute,
Through all the realms of Nonsense, absolute.
This aged prince, now flourishing in peace,
And blest with issue of a large increase,
Worn out with business, did at length debate
To settle the succession of the state;
And, pondering which of all his sons was fit
To reign, and wage immortal war with wit,
Cried,—'Tis resolved! for nature pleads, that he
Should only rule, who most resembles me.
Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,
Mature in dulness from his tender years;[418]
Shadwell alone, of all my sons, is he,
Who stands confirmed in full stupidity.
The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,
But Shadwell never deviates into sense;
Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through, and make a lucid interval;
But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day.
Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye,
And seems designed for thoughtless majesty;
Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain,
And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.
Heywood and Shirley[419] were but types of thee,
Thou last great prophet of tautology!
Even I, a dunce of more renown than they,
Was sent before but to prepare thy way;
And, coarsely clad in Norwich drugget,[420] came
To teach the nations in thy greater name.
My warbling lute,—the lute I whilom strung,
When to king John of Portugal I sung,—
Was but the prelude to that glorious day,
When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way,
With well-timed oars, before the royal barge,[421]
Swelled with the pride of thy celestial charge;
And big with hymn, commander of an host,—
The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost.[422]
Methinks I see the new Arion sail,
The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.[423]
At thy well-sharpened thumb, from shore to shore,
The trebles squeak for fear, the basses roar;
Echoes, from Pissing-Alley, Shadwell call,
And Shadwell they resound from Aston-Hall.
About thy boat the little fishes throng,
As at the morning toast that floats along.
Sometimes, as prince of thy harmonious band,
Thou weild'st thy papers in thy threshing hand;
St André's[424] feet ne'er kept more equal time,
Not even the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme,
Though they in number as in sense excel;[425]
So just, so like tautology, they fell,
}
That, pale with envy, Singleton[426] forswore }
The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore, }
And vowed he ne'er would act Villerius more.— }
Here stopt the good old sire, and wept for joy,
In silent raptures of the hopeful boy.
All arguments, but most his plays, persuade,
That for anointed dulness he was made.
Close to the walls which fair Augusta bind,
(The fair Augusta much to fears inclined,[427])
An ancient fabric raised to inform the sight,
There stood of yore, and Barbican it hight;
A watch-tower once, but now, so fate ordains,
Of all the pile an empty name remains;
From its old ruins brothel-houses rise,
Scenes of lewd loves, and of polluted joys;
Where their vast courts the mother-strumpets keep,
And, undisturbed by watch, in silence sleep.[428]
Near these a nursery erects its head,
Where queens are formed, and future heroes bred;
}
Where unfledged actors learn to laugh and cry; }
Where infant punks their tender voices try, }
And little Maximins the gods defy. }
Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,
Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear;
But gentle Simkin[429] just reception finds
Amidst this monument of vanished minds;
Pure clinches the suburbian muse affords,
And Panton[430] waging harmless war with words.
Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,
Ambitiously designed his Shadwell's throne.
}
For ancient Decker[431] prophesied long since, }
That in this pile should reign a mighty prince, }
Born for a scourge of wit, and flail of sense; }
To whom true dulness should some Psyches owe,
But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;
Humorists, and Hypocrites, it should produce,
Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.[432]
Now empress Fame had published the renown
Of Shadwell's coronation through the town.
Roused by report of fame, the nations meet,
From near Bunhill, and distant Watling-street.
No Persian carpets spread the imperial way,
But scattered limbs of mangled poets lay;
From dusty shops neglected authors come,
Martyrs of pies, and relics of the bum;
Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,
But loads of Shadwell almost choked the way;
Bilked stationers for yeomen stood prepared,
And Herringman[433] was captain of the guard.
The hoary prince in majesty appeared,
High on a throne of his own labours reared.
At his right hand our young Ascanius sate,
Rome's other hope, and pillar of the state;
His brows thick fogs, instead of glories, grace,
And lambent dulness played around his face.
As Hannibal did to the altars come,
Swore by his sire, a mortal foe to Rome,
So Shadwell swore, nor should his vow be vain,
That he till death true dulness would maintain;
And, in his father's right, and realm's defence,
Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense.
The king himself the sacred unction made,
As king by office, and as priest by trade.
In his sinister hand, instead of ball,
He placed a mighty mug of potent ale;
"Love's kingdom"[434] to his right he did convey,
At once his sceptre, and his rule of sway;
Whose righteous lore the prince had practised young,
And from whose loins recorded Psyche sprung.
His temples, last, with poppies were o'erspread,[435]
That nodding seemed to consecrate his head.
Just at the point of time, if fame not lie,
On his left hand twelve reverend owls did fly;—
So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tyber's brook,
Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.
The admiring throng loud acclamations make,
And omens of his future empire take.
The sire then shook the honours of his head,
And from his brows damps of oblivion shed
}
Full on the filial dulness: long he stood, }
Repelling from his breast the raging god; }
At length burst out in this prophetic mood:— }
Heavens bless my son! from Ireland let him reign,
To far Barbadoes on the western main;
Of his dominion may no end be known,
And greater than his father's be his throne;
Beyond love's kingdom let him stretch his pen!—
He paused, and all the people cried, Amen.—
Then thus continued he: My son, advance
Still in new impudence, new ignorance.
Success let others teach, learn thou from me
Pangs without birth, and fruitless industry.
Let Virtuosos in five years be writ,
Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit.[436]
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,[437]
And in their folly show the writer's wit;
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their author's want of sense.
Let them be all by thy own model made
Of dulness, and desire no foreign aid;
That they to future ages may be known,
Not copies drawn, but issue of thy own:
Nay, let thy men of wit too be the same,
All full of thee, and differing but in name;
But let no alien Sedley interpose,
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.[438]
And when false flowers of rhetoric thou would'st cull,
Trust nature; do not labour to be dull,
But write thy best, and top; and, in each line,
Sir Formal's oratory will be thine:
Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy northern dedications fill.[439]
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Jonson's hostile name;[440]
Let father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise,
And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.
Thou art my blood, where Jonson has no part:
What share have we in nature, or in art?
Where did his wit on learning fix a brand,
And rail at arts he did not understand?
Where made he love in Prince Nicander's vein,
Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?
Where sold he bargains, "whip-stitch, kiss my arse,"[441]
Promised a play, and dwindled to a farce?
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whole Etheridge dost transfuse to thine?
But so transfused, as oil and waters flow,
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
This is thy province, this thy wonderous way,
New humours to invent for each new play:[442]
This is that boasted bias of thy mind,
By which one way to dulness 'tis inclined;
Which makes thy writings lean on one side still,
And, in all changes, that way bends thy will.
Nor let thy mountain-belly make pretence
Of likeness; thine's a tympany of sense.
A tun of man in thy large bulk is writ,
But sure thou'rt but a kilderkin of wit.
Like mine, thy gentle numbers feebly creep;
Thy tragic muse gives smiles, thy comic sleep.
With whate'er gall thou sett'st thyself to write,
Thy inoffensive satires never bite;
In thy felonious heart though venom lies,
It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies.
Thy genius call thee not to purchase fame
In keen iambics, but mild anagram.
Leave writing plays, and choose for thy command,
Some peaceful province in Acrostic land.
There thou may'st wings display, and altars raise,[443]
And torture one poor word ten thousand ways;
Or, if thou would'st thy different talents suit,
Set thy own songs, and sing them to thy lute.—
}
He said:—but his last words were scarcely heard; }
For Bruce and Longvil had a trap prepared, }
And down they sent the yet declaiming bard.[444] }
Sinking he left his drugget robe behind,
Borne upwards by a subterranean wind.
The mantle fell to the young prophet's part,
With double portion of his father's art.
NOTES
ON
MAC-FLECKNOE.
This Flecknoe found.—P. [433].
Richard Flecknoe, the unfortunate bard whom our author has damned to everlasting fame, was by birth an Irishman, and by profession a Roman Catholic priest. Marvel, who seems to have known him at Rome, describes his person as meagre in the extreme, and his itch for scribbling as incessant. The poem, in which Marvel depicts him, is in the old taste of extravagant burlesque, and the lines are as rugged as Flecknoe could himself have produced. It contains, however, some witty and some humorous description, and the reader may be pleased to see a specimen:
Flecknoe, an English Priest at Rome.
Obliged by frequent visits of this man,
Whom, as a priest, poet, musician,
I for some branch of Melchizedec took,
Though he derives himself from my Lord Brooke,
I sought his lodging, which is at the sign
Of the sad Pelican, subject divine
For poetry. There, three stair-cases high,
Which signifies his triple property,
I found at last a chamber, as 'twas said,
But seemed a coffin set on the stair's head,
Not higher than seven, nor larger than three feet;
There neither was a ceiling, nor a sheet,
Save that the ingenious door did, as you come,
Turn in, and show to wainscot half the room;
Yet of his state no man could have complained,
There being no bed where he entertained;
And though within this cell so narrow pent,
He'd stanzas for a whole apartement.
— — — — — —
————Nothing now, dinner staid,
But till he had himself a body made;
I mean till he were dressed; for else, so thin
He stands, as if he only fed had been
With consecrated wafers; and the host
Hath sure more flesh and blood than he can boast.
This basso-relievo of a man,
Who, as a camel tall, yet easily can
The needle's eye thread without any stitch;
His only impossible is to be rich.
Lest his too subtle body, growing rare,
Should leave his soul to wander in the air,
He therefore circumscribes himself in rhymes,
And, swaddled in's own paper seven times,
Wears a close jacket of poetic buff,
With which he doth his third dimension stuff.
Thus armed underneath, he over all
Doth make a primitive sotana fall;
And over that, yet casts an antique cloak,
Worn at the first council of Antioch,
Which, by the Jews long hid and disesteemed,
He heard of by tradition, and redeemed;
But were he not in this black habit decked,
This half transparent man would soon reflect
Each colour that he past by, and be seen
As the camelion, yellow, blue, or green.
It appears that Flecknoe either laid aside, or disguised, his spiritual character, when he returned to England; but he still preserved extensive connections with the Roman Catholic nobility and gentry.[445] He probably wrote upon many occasional subjects, but his poetry has fallen into total oblivion. I have particularly sought in vain for his verses to King John of Portugal, to which Dryden alludes a little lower. Langbaine mentions four of his plays, namely, "Damoiselles a la Mode," "Erminia," "Love's Dominion," and "Love's Kingdom," (of which more hereafter;) but none of these were ever acted, excepting the last. This gave Flecknoe great indignation, which he thus vents against the players in his preface to "Damoiselles a la Mode." "For the acting of this comedy, those who have the governing of the stage have their humour, and would be entreated; and I have mine, and won't entreat them: and were all dramatic writers of my mind, they should wear their old plays thread-bare before they should have any new, till they better understood their own interest, and how to distinguish betwixt good and bad." Notwithstanding this ill usage, he honoured the players so far, as to prefix to each character, in the dramatis personæ of his pieces, the name of the actor, by whom, had the managers been less inexorable, he meant it should have been performed. But this he did for the sake of the gentle reader, whom he assures, that a lively imagination being thus assisted in bodying forth the character, he may receive as much pleasure from the perusal as from the actual representation of the performance. Flecknoe bore the damnation of the only one of his plays which was represented, with the same valiant indifference with which he supported the rebuffs of the players. In short, he seems to have been fitted for an incorrigible scribbler, by a happy fund of self-satisfaction, upon which neither the censures of criticism, nor the united hisses of a whole nation, could make the slightest impression. When or how Flecknoe died is uncertain, and of very little consequence; I presume, however, that he was dead when this satire was published. I am uncertain whether the reader will think, that this poor poetaster merited mercy at the hands of Dryden, for the following lines which he had written in his praise, and which, at any rate, may serve as a specimen of Flecknoe's poetry:
Dryden, the muses darling and delight,
Than whom none ever flew so high a flight:
Some have their veins so drossy, as from earth,
Their muses only seem to have ta'en their birth.
Other but water-poets are, have gone
No farther than to the fount of Helicon:
And they're but airy ones, whose muse soars up
No higher than to mount Parnassus top;
Whilst thou, with thine, dost seem to have mounted higher
Than he who fetch from heaven celestial fire;
And dost as far surpass all others, as
Fire does all other elements surpass.
Flecknoe's memory being only preserved by this satire, his very name came to be identified with its title. King, in "A Dialogue in the Shades," introduces him under the name of Mac-Flecknoe; and Derrick falls into the same error.
Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,
Mature in dulness from his tender years.—P. [433].
Thomas Shadwell was born at Santon-hall, in Norfolk, in which county his father represented a very ancient family. He was educated at Caius College, in Cambridge, and placed in the Middle Temple to study law; but, like many of the inhabitants of these buildings, he preferred the smoother paths of literature. He made several essays in heroic verse, all of which are deplorably bad. They are chiefly occasional pieces; as, an Address to the Prince of Orange on his Landing, another to Queen Mary, and a Translation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal; which, though prefaced by a violent refutation of our author's attacks upon him, is so execrable, as fully to confirm Dryden's censures of the author's poetical talents. But, in comedy, he was much more successful; and, in that capacity, Dryden does him great injustice in pronouncing him a dunce. On the contrary, I think most of Shadwell's comedies may be read with great pleasure. They do not, indeed, exhibit any brilliancy of wit, or ingenuity of intrigue; but the characters are truly dramatic, original, and well drawn; and the picture of manners which they exhibit gives us a lively idea of those of the author's age. As Shadwell proposed Jonson for his model, peculiarity of character, or what was then technically called humour, was what he chiefly wished to exhibit; and in this, it cannot be denied that he has often succeeded admirably. His powers, as a dramatist, are highly rated by Rochester, who imputes his coarseness to rapidity of composition:
}
Of all our modern wits, none seem to me }
Once to have touched upon true comedy, }
But hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley. }
Shadwell's unfinished works do yet impart
Great proofs of force of genius, none of art;
With just bold strokes he dashes here and there,
Showing great mastery with little care;
Scorning to varnish his good touches o'er,
To make the fools and women praise them more.
Allusion to Tenth Satire of Horace.
Shadwell's plays are seventeen in number, and were published, in four volumes, under the inspection of his son, Sir John Shadwell, M. D.
Shadwell's life was chequered with misfortune. As he espoused the party of the Duke of Monmouth, to whom he dedicated "Psyche," and of Shaftesbury, he thought himself obliged to draw the quill in defence of their cause. Accordingly, as we have seen, he attempted to answer "The Medal" on the one hand, and, on the other, accused our author of intending a parallel between Monmouth and the Duke of Guise, in the play so entitled. This zeal seems to have cost Shadwell dear; for, besides undergoing the severe flagellations administered by Dryden, in the "Defence of the Duke of Guise," in "Absalom and Achitophel," and in the present poem, he complains, that his ruin was designed, and his life sought; and that, for near ten years, he was kept from the exercise of that profession which had afforded him a competent subsistence.[446] It is no wonder, therefore, he was among the first to hail the dawn of the Revolution, by the address already mentioned, of which the full title is, "A Congratulatory Poem on his Highness the Prince of Orange his coming into England. Written by T. S. (Thomas Shadwell,) a True Lover of his Country, (10th January) 1689;" and that King William distinguished him by the honours of the laurel. Dorset, who was high chamberlain, answered, to those who remonstrated on Shadwell's lack of poetical talent, that, without pretending to vouch for Mr Shadwell's genius, he was sure he was an honest man. Shadwell did not long enjoy this triumph over his great enemy. He died 19th November, 1692,[447] in the fifty-second year of his age. It is said, this event was hastened by his taking an over dose of opium, to the use of which he was inordinately addicted. "His death," says Dr Nicholas Brady, who preached his funeral sermon, "seized him suddenly; but he could not be unprepared, since, to my certain knowledge, he never took a dose of opium but he solemnly recommended himself to God by prayer." In person, Shadwell was large, corpulent, and unwieldy; a circumstance which our author generally keeps in the eye of the reader. He seems to have imitated his prototype, Ben Jonson, in gross and coarse sensual indulgence, and profane conversation. But, if there be truth in a funeral sermon, he must have corrected these habits before his death; for Dr Brady tells us, "that our author was a man of great honesty and integrity, and inviolable fidelity and strictness in his word; an unalterable friendship wherever he professed it; and however the world may be mistaken in him, he had a much deeper sense of religion than many who pretended more to it. His natural and acquired abilities," continues the Doctor, "made him very amiable to all who knew and conversed with him, a very few being equal in the becoming qualities which adorn and set off a complete gentleman; his very enemies, if he has now any left, will give him this character, at least if they knew him so thoroughly as I did."—Cibber's Lives of the Poets, Article Shadwell, Vol. III.
Heywood and Shirley.—P. [434].
Voluminous dramatic authors, who flourished in the beginning of the 17th century. There were no less than four Heywoods who wrote plays; so that, Winstanley says, the name of Heywood seemed to be destinated to the stage. But he whom Dryden here means, is Thomas Heywood, a person rather to be admired for the facility, than for the excellence of his compositions. Every place and situation was alike to him while composing; and the favourite register of his scenes was the back of a tavern bill. Far the greater part of his labours are now lost; and yet there remain, in the libraries of the curious, twenty-four printed plays by Thomas Heywood. He was an actor by profession, and a good scholar, as is evinced by several of his classical allusions. His plays may be examined with advantage by the antiquary, but afford slender amusement to the lovers of poetry. The following character of him, by an old poet, is preserved by Langbaine:
———————Heywood sage,
The apologetic Atlas of the stage;
Well of the golden age he could entreat,
But little of the metal he could get.
Threescore sweet babes be fashioned at a lump,
For he was christened in Parnassus pump,
The muses' gossip to Aurora's bed;
And ever since that time his face was red.
If we cannot call Heywood a second Lope de Vega, in point of the extent of his dramatic works, he overtops most English authors; since he assures us, in his preface to the "English Traveller," that it was one reserved among two hundred and twenty plays, in which he had either had "a whole hand, or, at the least, a main finger." It is a pity, as Johnson said of Churchill, so fruitful a tree should have borne only crabs.
James Shirley, whom our author most unjustly couples with Heywood, to whom, as well as to Shadwell, he was greatly superior, was born in 1594, and, although for some time a schoolmaster, appears to have lived chiefly by the stage. When the civil wars broke out, he followed the fortune of William, Earl of Newcastle. During the usurpation, when theatres were prohibited, he returned to his original profession of a schoolmaster. He died of fatigue and distress of mind during the great fire of London, in 1666. He wrote forty-two plays, and there are thirty-nine in print; a complete set of which is much esteemed by collectors. Dr Farmer has traced, to this neglected bard, an idea, which Milton thought not unworthy of adoption.
Shirley is spoken of with contempt in "Mac-Flecknoe," but his imagination is sometimes fine to an extraordinary degree. I recollect a passage in the Fourth Book of the "Paradise Lost," which hath been suspected of imitation, as a prettiness below the genius of Milton: I mean, where Uriel glides backward and forward to heaven on a sun-beam. Dr Newton informs us, that this might possibly be hinted by a picture of Annabal Caracci, in the king of France's cabinet; but I am apt to believe, that Milton had been struck with a portrait in Shirley. Fernando, in the comedy of the "Brothers," 1652, describes Jacinta at vespers:
Her eye did seem to labour with a tear,
Which suddenly took birth, but overweighed
With its own swelling, dropped upon her bosom;
Which, by reflection of her light, appeared
As nature meant her sorrow for an ornament':
After, her looks grew cheerfull, and I saw
A smile shoot graceful upward from her eyes,
As if they had gained a victory o'er grief;
And with it many beams twisted themselves,
Upon whose golden threads the angels walk
To and again from heaven.
Essay on the Learning of Shakespeare.
Coarsely clad in Norwich drugget.—P. [434].
This stuff appears to have been sacred to the use of the poorer votaries of Parnassus; and it is somewhat odd, that it seems to have been the dress of our poet himself in the earlier stage of his fortunes. An old gentleman, who corresponded with the "Gentleman's Magazine," says, he remembers our author in this dress. Vol. XV. p. 99.
When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way,
With well-timed oars, before the royal barge.—P. [434].
I confess myself, after some research, at a loss to discover the nature of the procession, in which Shadwell seems to have acted as leader of the band. One is at first sight led to consider the whole procession as imaginary, and preliminary to his supposed coronation; but, on closer investigation, it appears, that Flecknoe talks of some real occurrence, on which Shadwell preceded the royal barge, at the head of a boat-load of performers. We may see, in the seventh note, that he professed to understand music, and may certainly have been called upon to assist or direct the band during some entertainment upon the river, an amusement to which King Charles was particularly addicted.
The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost.—P. [434].
This seems to be in ridicule of the following elegant expression which Shadwell puts in the mouth of a fine lady: "Such a fellow as he deserves to be tossed in a blanket." This, however, does not occur in "Epsom-Wells," but in another of Shadwell's comedies, called "The Sullen Lovers."
Methinks I see the new Arion sail,
The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.—P. [434].
Shadwell appears to have been a proficient in music, and to have himself adjusted that of his opera of "Psyche," which Dryden here treats with such consummate contempt. Indeed, in the preface of that choice piece he affected to value himself more upon the music than the poetry, as appears from the following passage in the preface: "I had rather be author of one scene of comedy, like some of Ben Jonson's, than of all the best plays of this kind, that have been, or ever shall be written; good comedy requiring much more wit and judgment in the writer, than any rhiming, unnatural plays can do. This I have so little valued, that I have not altered six lines in it since it was first written, which (except the songs at the marriage of Psyche, in the last scene) was all done sixteen months since. In all the words which are sung, I did not so much take care of the wit or fancy of them, as the making of them proper for music; in which I cannot but have some little knowledge, having been bred, for many years of my youth, to some performance in it.
"I chalked out the way to the composer, (in all but the song of Furies and Devils, in the fifth act,) having designed which line I would have sung by one, which by two, which by three, which by four voices, &c. and what manner of humour I would have in all the vocal music."
Not even the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme,
Though they in number as in sense excel.—P. [435].
This unfortunate opera was imitated from the French of Moliere, and finished, as Shadwell assures us, in the space of five weeks. The author having no talents for poetry, and no ear for versification, "Psyche" is one of the most contemptible of the frivolous dramatic class to which it belongs. It was, however, got up with extreme magnificence, and received much applause on its first appearance, in 1675. To justify the censure of Dryden, it is only necessary to quote a few of the verses, taken at random as a specimen, of what he afterwards calls "Prince Nicander's vein:"
Nicander. Madam, I to this solitude am come,
Humbly from you to hear my latest doom.
Psyche. The first command which I did give,
Was, that you should not see me here;
The next command you will receive,
Much harsher will to you appear.
Nic. How long, fair Psyche, shall I sigh in vain?
How long of scorn and cruelty complain?
Your eyes enough have wounded me,
You need not add your cruelty.
You against me too many weapons chuse,
Who am defenceless against each you use.
The poet himself seems so conscious of the sad inferiority of his verses, that he makes, in the preface, a half apology, implying a mortifying consciousness, that it was necessary to anticipate condemnation, by pleading guilty. "In a thing written in five weeks, as this was, there must needs be many errors, which I desire true critics to pass by; and which, perhaps, I see myself, but having much business, and indulging myself with some pleasure too, I have not had leisure to mend them; nor would it indeed be worth the pains, since there are so many splendid objects in the play, and such variety of diversion, as will not give the audience leave to mind the writing; and I doubt not but the candid reader will forgive the faults, when he considers, that the great design was to entertain the town with variety of music, curious dancing, splendid scenes, and machines; and that I do not, nor ever did intend, to value myself upon the writing of this play."
Shadwell, however, had no right to plead, that this affected contempt of his own lyric poetry ought to have disarmed the criticism of Dryden; because, in the very same preface, he sets out by insinuating, that he could easily have beaten our author on his own strong ground of rhyme, had he thought such a contest worth winning. So much, at least, may be inferred from the following declaration:
"In a good-natured country, I doubt not but this, my first essay in rhyme, would be at least forgiven, especially when I promise to offend no more in this kind; but I am sensible that here I must encounter a great many difficulties. In the first place, (though I expect more candour from the best writers in rhyme,) the more moderate of them (who have yet a numerous party, good judges being very scarce) are very much offended with me, for leaving my own province of comedy, to invade their dominion of rhyme: but, methinks, they might be satisfied, since I have made but a small incursion, and am resolved to retire. And, were I never so powerful, they should escape me, as the northern people did the Romans; their craggy barren territories being not worth conquering."
——Pale with envy, Singleton forswore
The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore,
And vowed he ne'er would act Villerius more.—P. [435].
Singleton was a musical performer of some eminence, and is mentioned as such in one of Shadwell's comedies.—"'Sbud, they are the best music in England: there's the best shawm and bandore, and a fellow that acts Tom of Bedlam to a miracle; and they sing Charon, oh, gentle Charon! and, Come, my Daphne, better than Singleton and Clayton did."—Bury Fair, Act III. Scene I. Villerius, the grand master of the knights hospitallers, is a principal character in "The Siege of Rhodes," an opera by Sir William D'Avenant, where great part of the dialogue is in a sort of lyrical recitative; in the execution of which Singleton seems to have been celebrated. The first speech of this valorous chief of the order of St John runs thus:
Arm, arm! let our drums beat,
To all our outguards, a retreat;
And to our main-guards add
Files double lined; from the parade
Send horse to drive the fields,
Prevent what ripening summer yields;
To all the foe would save
Set fire, or give a secret grave.
The combination of the lute and sword, which Dryden alludes to, is ridiculed in "The Rehearsal," where Bayes informs his critical friends, that his whole battle is to be represented by two persons; "for I make 'em both come forth in armour cap-a-pee, with their swords drawn, and hung with a scarlet ribband at their wrists, (which, you know, represents fighting enough,) each of them holding a lute in his hand.—Smith. How, sir; instead of a buckler?—Bayes. O Lord, O Lord! instead of a buckler! Pray, sir, do you ask no more questions. I make 'em, sir, play the battle in recitativo; and here's the conceit: Just at the very same instant that one sings, the other, sir, recovers you his sword, and puts himself into a warlike posture; so that you have at once your ear entertained with music and good language, and your eye satisfied with the garb and accoutrements of war."—Rehearsal, Act V. The adverse generals enter accordingly, and perform a sort of duet, great part of which is a parody upon the lyrical dialogue of Villerius and the Soldan Solyman, in the "Siege of Rhodes."
Ancient Decker.—P. [436].
Decker, who did not altogether deserve the disgraceful classification which Dryden has here assigned to him, was a writer of the reign of James I., and the antagonist of Jonson. I suspect Dryden knew, or at least recollected, little more of him, than that he was ridiculed, by his more renowned adversary, under the character of Crispinus, in "The Poetaster." Indeed, nothing can be more unfortunate to an inferior wit, than to be engaged in controversy with an author of established reputation; since, though he may maintain his ground with his contemporaries, posterity will always judge of him by the character assigned in the writings of his antagonist. Decker was admitted to write in conjunction with Webster, Ford, Brome, and even Massinger; and though he was only employed to fill up the inferior scenes, he certainly displays some theatrical talent. Indeed he was judged, by many of his own time, to have retaliated Jonson's satire with success, in "The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet;" where Ben is designed under the character of Horace Junior. Besides, Decker possessed some tragic powers: "The Honest Whore," which is altogether his own production, has several scenes of great merit.
But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;
Humorists, and Hypocrites, it should produce,
Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.—P. [436].
Shadwell translated, or rather imitated, Moliere's "L'Avare," under the title of "The Miser." In Langbaine's opinion, he has greatly improved upon his original; but in this, as in other cases, the critic is probably singular. "The Miser" was printed in 1672.
"The Humorists" was a play professedly written to expose the reigning vices of the age; but as it was supposed to contain many direct personal allusions, it was unfavourably received by the audience. Shadwell, by way, I suppose, of insinuating to the readers an accurate notion of the characters, or humours, which he means to represent, is, in this and other pieces, at great pains to give a long and minute account of each individual in the dramatis personæ. Thus we have have in "The Humorists,"
"Crazy,—One that is in pox, in debt, and all the misfortunes that can be; and, in the midst of all, in love with most women, and thinks most women in love with him.
"Drybob,—A fantastic coxcomb, that makes it his business to speak fine things and wit, as he thinks; and always takes notice, or makes others take notice, of any thing he thinks well said.
"Brisk,—A brisk, airy, fantastic, singing, dancing coxcomb, that sets up for a well-bred man, and a man of honour; but mistakes in every thing, and values himself only upon the vanity and foppery of gentlemen."
I do not know what to make of the "Hypocrites." Shadwell wrote no play so entitled; nor is it likely he gave any assistance to Medbourne, who translated the famous "Tartuffe" of Moliere, for they were of different opinions in religion and politics. Perhaps Dryden means the characters of the Irish priest and Tory chaplain in "The Lancashire Witches."
Raymond is a character in "The Humorists," described in the dramatis personæ as a "gentleman of wit and honour." Bruce a similar person in "The Virtuoso," characterized as a "gentleman of wit and sense." In these, and in all other characters where wit and an easy style were requisite, Shadwell failed totally. His forte lay in broad, strong comic painting.
Ogleby.—P. [436].
This gentleman, whose name, thanks to our author and Pope, has become almost proverbial for a bad poet, was originally a Scottish dancing-master, when probably Scottish dancing was not so fashionable as at present, and afterwards master of the revels in Ireland. He translated "The Iliad," "The Odyssey," "The Æneid," and "Æsop's Fables," into verse; and his versions were splendidly adorned with sculpture. He also wrote three epic poems, one of which was fortunately burned in the fire of London. Moreover, he conducted the ceremony of Charles the Second's coronation,[448] and erected a theatre in Dublin.
Note XII.
"Love's Kingdom."—P. [437].
This was a play of Flecknoe's. The full title is, "Love's Kingdom, a Pastoral Tragi-Comedy; not as it was acted at the theatre, near Lincoln's-Inn, but as it was written, and since corrected by Richard Flecknoe; with a short treatise of the English stage, &c. by the same author. London, printed by R. Wood for the author, 1664."
The author's account of this piece, in the advertisement, is, "For the plot, it is neat and handsome, and the language soft and gentle, suitable to the persons who speak; neither on the ground, nor in the clouds, but just like the stage, somewhat elevated above the common. In neither no stiffness, and, I hope, no impertinence nor extravagance, into which your young writers are too apt to run, who, whilst they know not well what to do, and are anxious to do enough, most commonly overdo."
THE PROLOGUE.
Spoken by Venus from the Clouds.
If ever you have heard of Venus' name,
Goddess of beauty, I that Venus am;
Who have to day descended from my sphere,
To welcome you unto "Love's Kingdom" here;
Or rather to my sphere am come, since I
Am present no where more nor in the sky,
Nor any island in the world than this,
That wholly from the world divided is:
For Cupid, you behold him here in me,
(For there where beauty is, Love needs must be,)
Or you may yet more easily descry
Him 'mong the ladies, in each amorous eye;
And 'mongst the gallants may as easily trace
Him to their bosoms from each beauteous face.
May then, fair ladies, you
Find all your servants true;
And, gallants, may you find
The ladies all as kind,
As by your noble favours you declare
How much you friends unto "Love's Kingdom" are;
Of which yourselves compose so great a part,
In your fair eyes, and in your loving heart.
This specimen of "Love's Kingdom" is extracted from the "Censura Literaria," No. IX.; to which publication it was communicated by Mr Preston of Dublin. To "Love's Kingdom" Flecknoe subjoined a Discourse on the English Stage, which is sometimes quoted as authority.
Let Virtuosos in five years be writ,
Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit.—P. [438].
Shadwell's comedy called "The Virtuoso," was first acted in 1676 with great applause. It is by no means destitute of merit; though, as in all his other pieces, it is to be found rather in the walk of coarse humour than of elegance, or wit.
The character of Sir Nicholas Gimcrack, the Virtuoso, whose time was spent in discoveries, although he had never invented any thing so useful as an engine to pare a cream cheese with, is very ludicrous. I cannot, however, but notice, that some of the discoveries, which are ridiculed with so much humour, as the composition of various kinds of air, for example, have been realized by the philosophers of this age. As the whole piece seems intended as a satire on the researches of the Royal Society, its scope could not be very pleasing to Dryden, a zealous member of that learned body; even if he could have forgiven some hits levelled against him personally in the preface and the epilogue, which have been quoted in the introduction to Mac-Flecknoe.
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit.—P. [438].
The plays of Sir George Etherege were much admired during the end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th century, till the refinement of taste condemned their indecency and immorality. Sir George himself was a courtier of the first rank in the gay court of Charles II. Our author has addressed an epistle to him, when he was Resident at Ratisbon. Etherege followed King James to France, according to one account; but others say he was killed at Ratisbon by a fall down stairs, after he had been drinking freely. Sir Fopling Flutter, Dorimant, and Loveit, are characters in his well-known comedy, "The Man of Mode." Cully and Cockwood occur in "Love in a Tub," another of his plays.
But let no alien Sedley interpose,
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.—P. [438].
The first edition bears Sydney, which is evidently a mistake. Shadwell's comedy of "Epsom Wells" was very successful; which was imputed by his enemies to the assistance he received from the witty Sir Charles Sedley. This he attempts to refute in the following lines of the second prologue, spoken when the piece was represented before the king and queen at Whitehall:
If this for him had been by others done,
After this honour sure they'd claim their own.
But it is nevertheless certain, that Shadwell acknowledges obligations of the nature supposed, in the Dedication of the "True Widow" to Sir Charles Sedley. "No success whatever," he there says, "could have made me alter my opinion of this comedy, which had the benefit of your correction and alteration, and the honour of your approbation. And I heartily wish you had given yourself the trouble to have reviewed all my plays, as they came inaccurately, and in haste, from my hands: it would have been more to my advantage than the assistance of Scipio and Lelius was to Terence; and I should have thought it at least as much to my honour, since, by the effects, I find I cannot but esteem you as much above both of them in wit, as either of them was above you in place of the state."
There was a general opinion current, that Shadwell received assistance in his most successful pieces. A libel of the times, the reference to which I have mislaid, mentions with contempt the dulness of his "unassisted scenes."
Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy northern dedications fill.—P. [438].
Sir Formal Trifle is a florid conceited orator in "The Virtuoso," whose character is drawn and brought out with no inconsiderable portion of humour. Dryden intimates, that his coxcomical inflated style attends Shadwell himself upon the most serious occasions, and particularly in his dedications to the Duke and Duchess of Newcastle, to whom he has inscribed several of his plays. Hence Dryden, in the "Vindication of the Duke of Guise," calls him the Northern Dedicator. The truth is, that Shadwell's prose was inflated and embarrassed; and his adulation comes aukwardly from him, as appears from the opening of the dedication of that very play, "The Virtuoso," to the Duke of Newcastle.
"So long as your grace persists in obliging, I must go on in acknowledging; nor can I let any opportunity pass of telling the world how much I am favoured by you, or any occasion slip of assuring your grace, that all the actions of my life shall be dedicated to your service; who, by your noble patronage, your generosity and kindness, and your continual bounty, have made me wholly your creature: nor can I forbear to declare, that I am more obliged to your grace than to all mankind. And my misfortune is, I can make no other return, but a declaration of my grateful attachment."
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Jonson's hostile name.—P. [439].
Shadwell, as appears from many passages of his prologues and prefaces, and as we have had repeated occasion to notice, affected to consider Ben Jonson as the object of his emulation. There were indeed many points of resemblance between them, both as authors and men. In their habits, a life spent in taverns, and in their persons, huge corpulence, probably acquired by habits of sensual indulgence, much coarseness of manners, and an ungentlemanly vulgarity of dialect, seem to have distinguished both the original and the imitator. As a dramatist, although Shadwell falls short of the learned vigour and deep erudition of Ben Jonson, his dry hard comic painting entitles him to be considered as an inferior artist of the same school. Dryden more particularly resented Shadwell's reiterated and affected praises of Jonson, because he had himself censured that writer in the epilogue to the "Conquest of Granada," and in the critical defence of that poem.[449] Hence he considered Shadwell's ranking himself under Jonson's banners as a sort of personal defiance. But Dryden more particularly alludes to the following ebullition of admiration, which occurs in the epilogue to Shadwell's "Humorists:"
The mighty prince of poets, learned Ben,
Who alone dived into the minds of men;
Saw all their wanderings, all their follies knew,
And all their vain fantastic passions drew
In images so lively and so true,
That there each humorist himself might view.
Yet only lashed the errors of the times,
And ne'er exposed the persons, but the crimes;
And never cared for private frowns, when he
Did but chastise public iniquity:
He feared no pimp, no pick-pocket, or drab;
He feared no bravo, nor no ruffian's stab:
'Twas he alone true humours understood,
And with great wit and judgment made them good.
A humour is the bias of the mind,
By which with violence 'tis one way inclined;
It makes our actions lean on one side still,
And in all changes that way bends the will.
This————
He only knew and represented right.
Thus none, but mighty Jonson, e'er could write.
Expect not then, since that most flourishing age
Of Ben, to see true humour on the stage.
All that have since been writ, if they be scanned,
Are but faint copies from that master's hand.
Our poet now, amongst those petty things,
Alas! his too weak trifling humour brings;
As much beneath the worst in Jonson's plays,
As his great merit is above our praise.
For could he imitate that great author right,
He would with ease all poets else outwrite.
But to outgo all other men, would be,
O noble Ben! less than to follow thee.
Dryden, in the text, turns the idea of bias into ridicule; for its original application being to the leaden weight disposed in the centre of a bowl, which inclines its course in rolling, he alleges, that the only bias which can influence Shadwell is his predominant stupidity.
Leave writing plays, and chuse for thy command,
Some peaceful province in Acrostic land.
There thou may'st wings display, and altars raise,
And torture one poor word ten thousand ways.—P. [440].
Among other efforts of gentle dulness, may be noticed the singular fashion which prevailed during the earlier period of the 17th century, of writing in such changes of measure, that by the different length and arrangement of the lines, the poem was made to resemble an egg, an altar, a pair of wings, a cross, or some other fanciful figure. This laborious kind of trifling was much akin to the anagrams and acrostics. Those who are curious to read, or rather to see, a specimen of such whimsies, (for they are rather addressed to the eye than the understanding,) may find a dirge of Mr George Withers, arranged into the figure of a rhomboid, in Ellis's "Specimens of the Early English Poets," Vol. III. p. 100. They are mentioned with anagrams, acrostics, rebuses, and other exercises of false wit, in the "Spectator," No. 63.
END OF THE TENTH VOLUME.
Edinburgh,
Printed by James Ballantyne & Co.