FOOTNOTES:
[1] "I am so many ways obliged to you, and so little able to return your favours, that, like those who owe too much, I can only live by getting farther into your debt. You have not only been careful of my fortune, which was the effect of your nobleness, but you have been solicitous of my reputation, which is that of your kindness."
[2] Used for elaborate composition.
[3] Some of Sir Robert Howard's songs were set to music. One of them, beginning, "O Charon, gentle Charon," is quoted as a popular air in one of Shadwell's plays.
[4] Rete Mirabile. Dryden.
[5] Sir Robert Howard's collection contains a translation of the Fourth Book of the Æneid, under the title of "The Loves of Dido and Æneas."
[6] Sir Robert also translated the Achilleis of Statius, an author whom Dryden seldom mentions without censuring his turgid and bombastic style of poetry. The story of this neglected epic turns on the juvenile adventures of Achilles.
[7] The annotations on the Achilleis.
[8] Sir Robert Howard's poems contain a "Panegyric to the King," concerning which he says, in the preliminary address to the reader, "I should be a little dissatisfied with myself to appear public in his praise just when he was visibly restoring to power, did not the reading of the Panegyric vindicate the writing of it, and, besides my affirmation, assure the reader, it was written when the king deserved the praise as much as now, but was separated farther from the power; which was about three years since, when I was prisoner in Windsor Castle, being the best diversion I could then find for my own condition, to think how great his virtues were for whom I suffered, though in so small a measure compared to his own, that I rather blush at it, than believe it meritorious."
[9] The volume begins with the "Poem to the King," and ends with a "Panegyric to General Monk."
Hic situs est Rufus qui pulso vindice quondam,
Imperium asseruit non sibi sed patriæ.Dryden.
[11] The author speaks the language of astrology, in which geniture signifies nativity.
[12] The copy prefixed to the "Chorea Gigantum" reads, Until 'twas.
[13] First edition, The English are not.
[14] Bacon, Lord Verulam, a name beyond panegyric.
[15] William Gilbert, M.D. chief physician to Queen Elizabeth and King James I. He published a treatise, "De Magnete, magnetecisque corporibus, et de magno magnete Tellure Physiologia Nova. London, 1600, folio." This treatise on the magnet is termed by the great Bacon "a painful and experimental work." Gilbert also invented two instruments for the use of seamen in calculating the latitude, without the aid of the heavenly bodies. He died A.D. 1603.
[16] The Hon. Robert Boyle, who so laudably distinguished his name by his experimental researches, was a son of the great Earl of Corke. He was about this time actively engaged in the formation of the Royal Society, of which he may be considered as one of the principal founders. This necessarily placed his merits under Dryden's eye, who was himself an original member of that learned body. His great brother was Roger Lord Broghill, created upon the Restoration Earl of Orrery, to whom Dryden dedicated the "Rival Ladies." See Vol. II. p. 113.
[17] William Harvey, the famous discoverer of the circulation of the blood. His Exercitatio Anatomica de motu cordis et sanguinis, was printed at Frankfort, 1627. He adhered to his master Charles I. during the civil wars; and when his affairs became desperate, retired to privacy in London. His last treatise, entitled, Exercitatio de generatione Animalium, was published in 1651, at the request of Dr George Ent, a learned physician, mentioned by Dryden in the next line. This gentleman, in a dedication to the President and College of Physicians, gives a detailed account of the difficulty which he had in prevailing on the aged and retired philosopher to give his work to the press, which he only consented to do on Dr Ent's undertaking the task of editor. Harvey died in June 1667.
Ent himself was a physician of eminence, and received the honour of knighthood from Charles II. He defended Dr Harvey's theory of circulation against Parisanus, in a treatise, entitled, Apologia pro circulatione sanguinis contra Æmilianum Parisanum. He was an active member of the Royal Society, and died, according to Wood, 13th October, 1689.
[18] First edit. Chose by.
[19] This conceit, turning on the ancient and modern hypothesis, is founded on the following curious passage in Dr Charleton's dedication of the "Chorea Gigantum" to Charles II. "Your majesty's curiosity to survey the subject of this discourse, the so much admired antiquity of Stone-Henge, hath sometime been so great and urgent, as to find room in your royal breast, amidst your weightiest cares; and to carry you many miles out of your way towards safety, when any heart, but your fearless and invincible one, would have been wholly filled with apprehensions of danger. For as I have had the honour to hear from that oracle of truth and wisdom, your majesty's own mouth, you were pleased to visit that monument, and for many hours together entertain yourself with the delightful view thereof; when, after the defeat of your loyal army at Worcester, Almighty God, in infinite mercy to your three kingdoms, miraculously delivered you out of the bloody jaws of those monsters of sin and cruelty, who, taking counsel only from the heinousness of their crimes, sought impunity in the highest aggravation of them; desperately hoping to secure rebellion by regicide, and by destroying their sovereign, to continue their tyranny over their fellow-subjects."
[20] Preface to "The Wild Gallant," Vol. II. p. 17.
Dryden, who one would have thought had more wit,
The censure of every man did disdain;
Pleading some pitiful rhymes he had writ
In praise of the Countess of Castlemain.
Session of the Poets, 1670.
[22] This seems to be the passage sneered at in the "Session of the Poets."
[23] Our author alludes to the copy of verses addressed to him by Lee, on his drama, called the "State of Innocence," and which the reader will find in Vol. V. p. 103. Dryden expresses some apprehension, lest his friend and he should be considered as vouching for each other's genius, in the same manner that Bessus and the two swordsmen, in "King and no King," grant certificates of each others courage, after having been all soundly beaten and kicked by Bacurius.
"2 Swordsman. Captain, we must request your hand now to our honours.
Bessus. Yes, marry shall ye; and then let all the world come, we are valiant to ourselves, and there's an end." Act V.
[24] The person thus distinguished seems to be the gallant Sir Edward Spragge, noted for his gallantry in the two Dutch wars, and finally killed in the great battle of 11th August, 1672. In 1671, he was sent to the Mediterranean with a squadron, to chastise the Algerines. He found seven vessels belonging to these pirates, lying in the bay of Bugia, covered by the fire of a castle and forts, and defended by a boom, drawn across the entrance of the bay, made of yards, top-masts, and cables, buoyed up by casks. Nevertheless, Sir Edward bore into the bay, silenced the forts, and, having broken the boom with his pinnaces, sent in a fire-ship, which effectually destroyed the Algerine squadron; a blow which was long remembered by these piratical states.
[25] See Vol. XII. p. 264.
[26] Vol. XII. p. 341.
[27] Vol. X. p. 33.
[28] Roscommon, it must be remembered, was born in Ireland, where his property also was situated. But the Dillons were of English extraction.
[29] In this verse, which savours of the bathos, our author passes from Roscommon to Mulgrave; another "author nobly born," who about this time had engaged with Dryden and others in the version of Ovid's Epistles, published in 1680. The Epistle of Helen to Paris, alluded to in the lines which follow, was jointly translated by Mulgrave and Dryden, although the poet politely ascribes the whole merit to his noble co-adjutor. See Vol. XII. p. 26.
[30] Vol. IX. p. 402.
[31] Vol. IX. p. 344.
[32] Vol. X. p. 366. Otway furnished an epilogue on the same night.
[33] Vol. XIII. p. 108.
[34] "They tell me my old acquaintance, Mr Dryden, has left off the theatre, and wholly applies himself to the study of the controversies between the two churches. Pray heaven, this strange alteration in him portends nothing disastrous to the state; but I have all along observed, that poets do religion as little service by drawing their pens for it, as the divines do poetry, by pretending to versification." This letter is dated 21st October, 1689.
[35] Charles, 2d Earl of Middleton, a man of some literary accomplishment. He had been Envoy Extraordinary to the Emperor of Germany, and was now one of the secretaries of state for Scotland.
[36] Graf, or Count.
[37] Countess.
[38] Quere, Did Pope think of this passage in his famous account of Belinda's bodkin?
[39] Henry VIII.
[40] The map does not convey any such information. Ratisbon lies in latitude 48° 58´ N. Dryden alludes to the commencement of Etherege's epistle to Middleton, in which he mentions having gone three degrees northward, London being 41° 15´ N. Dryden transfers Ratisbon into a high latitude, merely to suit the rhyme, and produce the antithesis of 53 degrees latitude, to 52 years of age.
[41] The three ecclesiastical Electors WERE, the Electors of Treves, Cologne, and Mentz. At this time the Diet of the empire was sitting at Ratisbon.
[42] Etherege has been pleased to confirm our author's opinion of the German jollity, and his own inclination to softer pleasures, by the following passage of a letter to the Duke of Buckingham.
"I find that to this day, they (i.e. the Germans) make good the observation that Tacitus made of their ancestors; I mean, that their affairs (let them be never so serious and pressing) never put a stop to good eating and drinking, and that they debate their weightiest negociations over their cups.
"'Tis true, they carry this humour by much too far for one of my complexion; for which reason I decline appearing among them, but when my master's concerns make it necessary for me to come to their assemblies: They are, indeed, a free-hearted open sort of gentlemen that compose the Diet, without reserve, affectation, and artifice; but they are such unmerciful plyers of the bottle, so wholly given up to what our sots call good-fellowship, that 'tis as great a constraint upon my nature to sit out a night's entertainment with them, as it would be to hear half a score long-winded Presbyterian divines cant successively one after another.
"To unbosom myself frankly and freely to your grace, I always looked upon drunkenness to be an unpardonable crime in a young fellow, who, without any of these foreign helps, has fire enough in his veins to enable him to do justice to Cælia whenever she demands a tribute from him. In a middle-aged man, I consider the bottle only as subservient to the nobler pleasures of love; and he that would suffer himself to be so far infatuated by it, as to neglect the pursuit of a more agreeable game, I think deserves no quarter from the ladies: In old age, indeed, when it is convenient very often to forget and even steal from ourselves, I am of opinion, that a little drunkenness, discreetly used, may as well contribute to our health of body as tranquillity of soul.
"Thus I have given your grace a short system of my morals and belief in these affairs. But the gentlemen of this country go upon a quite different scheme of pleasure; the best furniture of their parlours, instead of innocent china, are tall overgrown rummers; and they take more care to enlarge their cellars, than their patrimonial estates. In short, drinking is the hereditary sin of this country; and that hero of a deputy here, that can demolish, at one sitting, the rest of his brother envoys, is mentioned with as much applause as the Duke of Lorain for his noble exploits against the Turks, and may claim a statue, erected at the public expence, in any town in Germany.
"Judge, then, my lord, whether a person of my sober principles, and one that only uses wine (as the wiser sort of Roman Catholics do images,) to raise up my imagination to something more exalted, and not to terminate my worship upon it, must not be reduced to very mortifying circumstances in this place; where I cannot pretend to enjoy conversation, without practising that vice that directly ruins it."
[43] This is the only mention that our author makes of the "Rehearsal" in poetry: In prose he twice notices that satirical farce with some contempt. The length of time which the Duke spent upon it, or at least which elapsed between the first concoction and the representation, is mentioned by Duke in his character of Villerius:
But with play-houses, wars, immortal wars,
He waged, and ten years rage produced a farce.
}
The last line alludes to the magnificent structure at Cliveden, which Buckingham planned, but never completed. Another satirist has the same idea:
}
[44] To the honourable Thomas Wharton, Esq. comptroller of his majesty's household.
[45] See the introductory remarks on that play, Vol. VIII.
[46] Welsted, "howe'er insulted by the spleen of Pope," was a poet of merit. His fate is an instance, among a thousand, of the disadvantage sustained by an inferior genius, who enters into collision with one of supereminent talents. It is the combat of a gun-boat with a frigate; and many an author has been run down in such an encounter, who, had he avoided it, might have still enjoyed a fair portion of literary reputation. The apologue of the iron and earthen pot contains a moral applicable to such circumstances.
[47] The moral of the "Wives' Excuse" is as bad as possible; but the language of the play is free from that broad licence which disgraces the dramatic taste of the age.
[48] Nokes was then famous for parts of low humour. Cibber thus describes him: "This celebrated comedian was of the middle size, his voice clear and audible, his natural countenance grave and sober; but the moment he spoke, the settled seriousness of his features was utterly discharged, and a dry, drolling, or laughing levity, took such full possession of him, that I can only refer the idea of him to your imagination. In some of his low characters, that became it, he had a shuffling shamble in his gait, with so contented an ignorance in his aspect, and an aukward absurdity in his gesture, that, had you not known him, you could not have believed, that naturally he could have had a grain of common sense." Our author insinuates, that the audience had been so accustomed to the presence of this facetious actor, that they could not tolerate a play where his low humour was excluded.
[49] Alluding to the character of Mrs Friendall in "The Wives' Excuse."
From spawn of Will's, these wits of future tense,
He now appeals to men of riper sense;
And hopes to find some shelter from the wrath
Of furious critics of implicit faith;
Whose judgment always ebb, but zeal flows high,
Who for these truths upon the church rely.
Will's is the mother-church: From thence their creed,
And as that censures, poets must succeed.
Here the great patriarch of Parnassus sits,
And grants his bulls to the subordinate wits.
From this hot-bed with foplings we're opprest,
That crowd the boxes, and the pit infest;
Who their great master's falling spittle lick,
And at the neighbouring playhouse judge on tick.
Thus have I seen from some decaying oak,
A numerous toad-stool brood his moisture suck,
And as the reverend log his verdure sheds,
The fungous offspring flourishes and spreads.
Verses prefixed to "Sir Noisy Parrot," 4to, 1693.
[51] This circumstance is noticed by one of Higden's poetical comforters:
Friend Harry, some squeamish pretenders to thinking,
Say, thy play is encumbered with eating and drinking;
That too oft, in conscience, thy table's brought out,
And unmerciful healths fly like hail-shot about.
Such a merry objection who ere could expect,
That does on the town or its pleasures reflect?
Is a treat and a bottle grown quite out of fashion,
Or have the spruce beaus found a new recreation?
At a tavern I'm certain they seldom find fault,
When flask after flask in due order is brought:
Why then should the fops be so monstrous uncivil,
As to damn at a play, what they like at the Devil?
Begging pardon of this apologist, who subscribes himself Tho. Palmer, there is some difference between the satisfaction of eating a good dinner at a tavern, and seeing one presented on the stage.
[52] A truncheon, with a fool's head and cap upon one end. It was carried by the ancient jester, and is often alluded to in old plays.
[53] Juvenal.
[54] Mr Malone quotes part of a letter from Dryden on the subject of "The Double Dealer," and his own tragi-comedy of "Love Triumphant." It is addressed to Mr Walsh, and runs thus:
"Congreve's 'Double Dealer' is much censured by the greater part of the town, and is defended only by the best judges, who, you know, are commonly the fewest. Yet it gains ground daily, and has already been acted eight times. The women think he has exposed ——; and the gentlemen are offended with him for the discovery of their follies, and the way of their intrigue under the notions of friendship to their ladies' husbands.
"I am afraid you discover not your own opinion concerning my irregular use of tragi-comedy, in my doppia favola. I will never defend that practice, for I know it distracts the hearers; but know withal, that it has hitherto pleased them for the sake of variety, and for the particular taste which they have to low comedy."
[55] "The first that was acted was Mr Congreve's, called 'The Double Dealer.' It has fared with that play, as it generally does with beauties officiously cried up; the mighty expectation which was raised of it made it sink, even beneath its own merit. The character of the Double Dealer is artfully writ; but the action being but single, and confined within the rules of true comedy, it could not please the generality of our audience, who relish nothing but variety, and think any thing dull and heavy which does not border upon farce. The critics were severe upon this play, which gave the author occasion to lash them in his epistle dedicatory, in so defying or hectoring a style, that it was counted rude even by his best friends; so that 'tis generally thought he has done his business, and lost himself; a thing he owes to Mr Dryden's treacherous friendship, who, being jealous of the applause he had got by his 'Old Bachelor,' deluded him into a foolish imitation of his own way of writing angry prefaces."—See Malone's History of the English Stage, prefaced to Shakespeare's Plays.
[56] Shadwell, who, at the Revolution, was promoted to Dryden's posts of poet-laureat, and royal historiographer, died in 1692: was succeeded in his office of laureat by Nahum Tate, and in that of historiographer by Thomas Rymer. Our author was at present on bad terms with Rymer; to whom, not to Tate, he applies the sarcastic title of Tom the Second. Yet his old co-adjutor, Nahum, is probably included in the warning, that they should not mistake the Earl of Dorset's charity for the recompense of their own merit. We have often remarked, that the Earl of Dorset, although, as lord-chamberlain, he was obliged to dispose of Dryden's offices to persons less politically obnoxious, bestowed at the same time such marks of generosity on the abdicated laureat, that Dryden, here, and elsewhere, honours him with the title of "his patron." For the quarrel between Rymer and Dryden, see the Introduction to the "Translations from Ovid's Metamorphoses," Vol. XII. p. 46. Rymer was an useful antiquary, as his edition of the Fœdera bears witness; but he was a miserable critic, and a worse poet. His tragedy of "Edgar" is probably alluded to in the Epistle as one of the productions of his reign. It was printed in 1678; but appeared under the new title of "The English Monarch," in 1691.
[57] It was augured by Southerne and by Higgons, that Congreve would succeed to the literary empire exercised by Dryden. The former has these lines addressed to the future monarch:
Dryden has long extended his command,
By right divine, quite through the Muses' land,
Absolute lord; and holding now from none
But great Apollo his undoubted crown,—
That empire settled, and grown old in power,—
Can wish for nothing but a successor;
Not to enlarge his limits, but maintain
Those provinces, which he alone could gain.
His eldest, Wycherley, in wise retreat,
Thought it not worth his quiet to be great;
Loose wandering Etherege, in wild pleasure tost,
And foreign interests, to his hopes long lost;
Poor Lee and Otway dead; Congreve appears
The darling and last comfort of his years.
May'st thou live long in thy great master's smiles,
And, growing under him, adorn these isles!
But when—when part of him, (but that be late!)
His body yielding, must submit to fate;
Leaving his deathless works, and thee, behind.
The natural successor of his mind,
Then may'st thou finish what he has begun;
Heir to his merit, be in fame his son!
In the same strain, Bevill Higgons:
What may'n't we then, great youth, of thee presage
Whose art and wit so much transcend thy age!
How wilt thou shine in thy meridian light,
Who, at thy rising, give so vast a light!
When Dryden, dying, shall the world deceive,
Whom we immortal as his works believe,
Thou shalt succeed, the glory of the stage,
Adorn and entertain the coming age.
[58] Congreve discharged the sacred duty thus feelingly imposed. See his Preface to Dryden's Plays, Vol. II. p. 7.
[59] These sarcasms are levelled at the players; one of whom, George Powel, took it upon him to retort in the following very singular strain of effrontery, which Mr Malone transfers from the preface of a tragedy; called "The Fatal Discovery, or Love in Ruins," published in 4to, 1698.
"Here I am afraid he makes but a coarse compliment, when this great wit, with his treacherous memory, forgets, that he had given away his laurels upon record twice before, viz. once to Mr Congreve, and another time to Mr Southerne. Pr'ythee, old Œdipus, expound this mystery! Dost thou set up thy transubstantiation miracle in the donation of thy idol bays, that thou hast them fresh, new, and whole, to give them three times over?
"For the most mortal stroke at us, he charges us with downright murdering of plays, which we call reviving. I will not derogate from the merit of those senior actors of both sexes, of the other house, that shine in their several perfections, in whose lavish praises he is so highly transported; but, at the same time, he makes himself but an arbitrary judge on our side, to condemn unheard, and that under no less a conviction than murder, when I cannot learn, for a fair judgment upon us, that his reverend crutches have ever brought him within our doors since the division of the companies [1695]. 'Tis true, I think, we have revived some pieces of Dryden, as his "Sebastian," "Maiden Queen," "Marriage A-la-Mode," "King Arthur," &c. But here let us be tried by a Christian jury, the audience, and not receive the bow-string from his Mahometan Grand Signiorship. 'Tis true, his more particular pique against us, as he has declared himself, is in relation to our reviving his "Almanzor." There, indeed, he has reason to be angry for our waking that sleepy dowdy, and exposing his nonsense, not ours; and if that dish did not please him, we have a Scotch proverb for our justification, viz. 'twas rotten roasted, because, &c. and the world must expect, 'twas very hard crutching up what Hart and Mohun before us could not prop. I confess, he is a little severe, when he will allow our best performance to bear no better fruit than a crab vintage. Indeed, if we young actors spoke but half as sourly as his old gall scribbles, we should be crab all over."
[60] The poet here endeavours to vindicate himself from the charge of having often, and designedly, ridiculed the clerical function.
[61] There is a report admitted into the "Baronetage," that this gentleman and his three brothers took upon them a vow to die unmarried; and it must be owned, that the praises of our author, on the score of celibacy, argue his cousin to have been a most obstinate and obdurate old bachelor. But Mr Malone produces the evidence of an old lady descended of the family, in disproof of this ungallant anecdote.—See Baronetage, Vol. II. p. 92. Malone's Life of Dryden, p. 324.
[62] "'Tis thought the king will endeavour to keep up a standing army, and make the stir in Scotland his pretence for it: My cousin Dryden, and the country party, will, I suppose, be against it; for when a spirit is raised, 'tis hard conjuring him down again."
[63] "In the description which I have made of a Parliament-man, I think I have not only drawn the features of my worthy kinsman, but have also given my own opinion of what an Englishman in Parliament ought to be; and deliver it as a memorial of my own principles to all posterity. I have consulted the judgment of my unbiassed friends, who have some of them the honour to be known to you; and they think there is nothing which can justly give offence in that part of the poem. I say not this, to cast a blind on your judgement, (which I could not do if I endeavoured it,) but to assure you, that nothing relating to the public shall stand without your permission; for it were to want common sense to desire your patronage, and resolve to disoblige you: And as I will not hazard my hopes of your protection, by refusing to obey you in any thing which I can perform with my conscience, or my honour, so I am very confident you will never impose any other terms on me."—Letter to the Honourable Charles Montague.
[64] In the family of Pigott, descended from John Dryden of Chesterton.
[65] Sir Robert Driden inherited the paternal estate of Canon-Ashby, while that of Chesterton descended to John, his second brother, to whom the epistle is addressed, through his mother, daughter of Sir Robert Bevile.
[66] William Guibbons, M.D.—Dryden mentions this gentleman in terms of grateful acknowledgment in the Postscript to Virgil:—"That I have recovered, in some measure, the health which I had lost by application to this work, is owing, next to God's mercy, to the skill and care of Dr Guibbons and Dr Hobbs, the two ornaments of their profession, which I can only pay by this acknowledgment." As Dr Guibbons was an enemy to the Dispensary, he is ridiculed by Garth in his poem so entitled, under the character of "Mirmillo the famed Opifer."
[67] Sir Richard Blackmore, poet and physician, whose offences towards our author have been enumerated in a note on the prologue to "The Pilgrim," where his character is discussed at length under the same name of Maurus. See Vol. VIII. p. 442, and also the Postscript to Virgil, where Dryden acknowledges his obligations to the Faculty, and adds, in allusion to Blackmore, that "the only one of them, who endeavoured to defame him, had it not in his power."
[68] In this line, as in the end of the preface to the "Fables," our author classes together "one Milbourne and one Blackmore." The former was a clergyman, and beneficed at Yarmouth. Dryden, in the preface just quoted, insinuates, that he lost his living for writing libels on his parishioners. These passing strokes of satire in the text are amply merited by the virulence of Milbourne's attack, not only on our author's poetry, but on his person, and principles political and religious. See a note on the preface to the "Fables," near the end.
[69] Sir Samuel Garth, the ingenious author of the "Dispensary." Although this celebrated wit and physician differed widely from Dryden in politics, being a violent Whig, they seem, nevertheless, to have lived in the most intimate terms. Dryden contributed to Garth's translation of the "Metamorphoses;" and Sir Samuel had the honour to superintend the funeral of our poet, and to pronounce a Latin oration upon that occasion. Garth's generosity, here celebrated, consisted in maintaining a Dispensary for issuing advice and medicines gratis to the poor. This was highly disapproved of by the more selfish of his brethren, and their disputes led to Sir Samuel's humorous poem.
[70] A very bloody war had been recently concluded by the peace of Ryswick, in 1697. But the country party in Parliament entertained violent suspicions, that King William, whose continental connections they dreaded, intended a speedy renewal of the contest with France. Hence they were jealous of every attempt to maintain any military force; so that, in 1699, William saw himself compelled, not only to disband the standing army, but to dismiss his faithful and favourite Dutch guards. The subsequent lines point obliquely at these measures, which were now matter of public discussion. Dryden's cousin joined in them with many of the Whigs, who were attached to what was called the country-party. As for the poet, his jacobitical principles assented to every thing which could embarrass King William. But, for the reasons which he has assigned in his letter to Lord Montague, our author leaves his opinion concerning the disbanding of the army to be inferred from his panegyric on the navy, and his declamation against the renewal of the war.
[71] Our poet had originally accompanied his praises of the British soldiers with some aspersions on the cowardice of the Dutch, their allies. These he omitted at his cousin's desire, who deemed them disrespectful to King William. In short, he complains he had corrected his verses so far, that he feared he had purged the spirit out of them; as Bushby used to whip a boy so long, till he made him a confirmed blockhead.
[72] Sir Robert Bevile, maternal grandfather to John Driden of Chesterton, seems to have been imprisoned for resisting some of Charles I.'s illegal attempts to raise supplies without the authority of parliament. Perhaps our author now viewed his opposition to the royal will as more excusable than he would have thought it in the reigns of Charles II. or of James II. It is thought, that the hard usage which Sir Robert Bevile met on this score, decided our poet's uncle, his son-in-law, in his violent attachment to Cromwell.
[73] The reader will perhaps doubt, whether Mr Dryden's account of his cousin Chesterton's accomplishments as a justice of peace, fox-hunter, and knight of the shire, even including his prudent abstinence from matrimony, were quite sufficient to justify this classification.
[74] The ancients did not understand perspective; accordingly their figures represent those on an Indian paper. It seems long before it was known in England; for so late as 1634, Sir John Harrington thought it necessary to give the following explanation, in the advertisement to his translation of Orlando Furioso.
"The use of the picture is evident;—that, having read over the book, they may read it as it were again in the very picture; and one thing is to be noted, which every one haply will not observe, namely, the perspective in every figure. For the personages of men, the shapes of horses, and such like, are made large at the bottom, and lesser upward, as if you were to behold all the same in a plain, that which is nearest seems greatest, and the farthest shews smallest, which is the chief art in picture."
[75] This portrait was copied from one in the possession of Mr Betterton, and afterwards in that of the Chandos family. Twelve engravings were executed from this painting, which, however, the ingenious Mr Stevens, and other commentators on Shakespeare, pronounced a forgery. The copy presented by Kneller to Dryden, is in the collection of Earl Fitzwilliam, at Wentworth-house; and may claim that veneration, from having been the object of our author's respect and enthusiasm, which has been denied to its original, as a genuine portrait of Shakespeare. It is not, however, an admitted point, that the Chandos picture is a forgery: the contrary has been keenly maintained; and Mr Malone's opinion has given weight to those who have espoused its defence.
[76] He travelled very young into Italy. Dryden.
[77] Mr Walpole says, that "where Sir Godfrey offered one picture to fame, he sacrificed twenty to lucre; and he met with customers of so little judgment, that they were fond of being painted by a man who would gladly have disowned his works the moment they were paid for." The same author gives us Sir Godfrey's apology for preferring the lucrative, though less honourable, line of portrait painting. "Painters of history," said he, "make the dead live, and do not begin to live themselves till they are dead. I paint the living, and they make me live."—Lord Orford's Lives of the Painters. See his Works, Vol. III. p. 359. Dryden seems to allude to this expression in the above lines.
[78] Tycho Brache, the Danish astronomer.
[79] Dryden's opinion concerning the harshness of Oldham's numbers, was not unanimously subscribed to by contemporary authors. In the "Historical Dictionary," 1694, Oldham is termed, "a pithy, sententious, elegant, and smooth writer:" and Winstanley says, that none can read his works without admiration; "so pithy his strains, so sententious his expression, so elegant his oratory, so swimming his language, so smooth his lines." Tom Brown goes the length to impute our author's qualification of his praise of Oldham to the malignant spirit of envy: "'Tis your own way, Mr Bayes, as you may remember in your verses upon Mr Oldham, where you tell the world that he was a very fine, ingenious gentleman, but still did not understand the cadence of the English tongue."—Reasons for Mr Bayes' changing his Religion, Part II. p. 33.
But this only proves, that Tom Brown and Mr Winstanley were deficient in poetical ear; for Oldham's satires, though full of vehemence and impressive expression, are, in diction, not much more harmonious than those of Hall or of Donne. The reader may take the following celebrated passage on the life of a nobleman's chaplain, as illustrating both the merits and defects of his poetry:
Some think themselves exalted to the sky,
If they light in some noble family;
Diet, a horse, and thirty pounds a year,
Besides the advantage of his Lordship's ear;
The credit of the business, and the state,
Are things that in a youngster's sense sound great.
Little the unexperienced wretch doth know
What slavery he oft must undergo;
Who, though in silken scarf and cassock dressed,
Wears but a gayer livery at best
When dinner calls, the implement must wait,
With holy words, to consecrate the meat;
But hold it for a favour seldom known,
If he be deigned the honour to sit down:
Soon as the tarts appear, Sir Crape withdraw;
These dainties are not for a spiritual maw.
Observe your distance, and be sure to stand
Hard by the cistern, with your cup in hand;
Hard by the cistern, with your cup in hand;
There for diversion you may pick your teeth,
Till the kind voider comes to your relief:
For mere board-wages such their freedom sell;
Slaves to an hour, and vassals to a bell;
And if the enjoyment of one day be stole,
They are but prisoners out upon parole;
Always the marks of slavery retain,
And e'en when loose, still drag about their chain.
And where's the mighty prospect, after all,
A chaplainship served up, and seven years thrall?
The menial thing perhaps, for a reward,
Is to some slender benefice preferred;
}
[80] Henry Killigrew, D.D., the young lady's father, was himself a poet. He wrote "The Conspiracy," a tragedy much praised by Ben Jonson and the amiable Lord Falkland, published in 1634. This edition being pirated and spurious, the author altered the play, and changed the title to "Pallantus and Eudora," published in 1652.—See Wood's Athenæ Oxon. Vol. II. p. 1036.
[81] This line certainly gave rise to that of Pope in Gay's epitaph:
In wit a man, simplicity a child.
[82] James II. painted by Mrs Killigrew.
[83] Mary of Este, as eminent for beauty as rank, also painted by the subject of the elegy.
[84] Mrs Katherine Philips, whom the affectation of her age called Orinda, was the daughter of Mr Fowler, a citizen of London. Aubrey, the most credulous of mankind, tells us, in MS. Memoirs of her life, that she read through the Bible before she was four years old, and would take sermons verbatim by the time she was ten. She married a decent respectable country gentleman, called Wogan; a name which, when it occurred in her extensive literary correspondence, she exchanged for the fantastic appellation of Antenor. She maintained a literary intercourse for many years with bishops, earls, and wits, the main object of which was the management and extrication of her husband's affairs. But whether because the correspondents of Orinda were slack in attending to her requests in her husband's favour, or whether because a learned lady is a bad manager of sublunary concerns, Antenor's circumstances became embarrassed, notwithstanding all Orinda's exertions, and the fair solicitor was obliged to retreat with him into Cardiganshire. Returning from this seclusion to London, in 1664, she was seized with the small-pox, which carried her off in the 33d year of her age.
Her poems and translations were collected into a folio after her death, which bears the title of "Poems by the most deservedly admired Mrs Katherine Philips, the matchless Orinda. London, 1667."—See Ballard's Memoirs of Learned Ladies, p. 287.
This lady is here mentioned with the more propriety, as Mrs Anne Killigrew dedicated the following lines to her memory:
Orinda (Albion's and our sexes grace)
Owed not her glory to a beauteous face,—
It was her radiant soul that shone within,
Which struck a lustre through her outward skin,
That did her lips and cheeks with roses dye,
Advanced her height, and sparkled in her eye:
Nor did her sex at all obstruct her fame,
But higher 'mong the stars it fixed her name;
What she did write not only all allowed,
But every laurel to her laurel bowed.
[85] James Bertie, Lord Norris of Rycote, was created Earl of Abingdon in 1682. There is in the Luttrell Collection an Elegy on his death.
[86] The gout.
[87] Donne's character as a love-poet is elsewhere very well given by Dryden. "He affects the metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his amorous verses, where nature only should reign; and perplexes the minds of the fair sex with the speculations of philosophy, where he should engage their hearts, and entertain them with the softness of love." Elizabeth Drury was the daughter of Sir Robert Drury, with whom Donne went to Paris. Donne celebrated her merit, and lamented her death in elegies, entitled, "The Anatomy of the World, wherein, by occasion of the untimely Death of Mrs Elizabeth Drury, the frailty and the decay of this whole World is represented." These elegiac verses are divided into two anniversaries, through which the editor attempted in vain to struggle in search of the acknowledgment quoted by Dryden.
[88] In allusion to the provision made in Egypt, during the seven years of plenty, for the succeeding seven years of famine.
[89] Lady Abingdon had six sons and three daughters.
[90] Æneas descending to the shades, finds his father Anchises engaged in the review of his posterity.—See Æneid, lib. vi.
[91] Lady Abingdon died in her thirty-third year; at which age Jesus Christ was crucified.
[92] She died in a ball-room in her own house.
[93] Whitsunday night.
[94] I have here inserted the Dedication which led to so singular a mistake, as the "Orpheus Britannicus" is a scarce book.—"To the Honourable Lady Howard. Madam, Were it in the power of music to abate those strong impressions of grief which have continued upon me ever since the loss of my dear lamented husband, there are few, I believe, who are furnished with larger or better supplies of comfort from this science, than he has left me in his own compositions, and in the satisfaction I find, that they are not more valued by me, who must own myself fond to a partiality of all that was his, than by those who are no less judges than patrons of his performances. I find, madam, I have already said enough to justify the presumption of this application to your ladyship, who have added both these characters to the many excellent qualities which make you the admiration of all that know you.
"Your ladyship's extraordinary skill in music, beyond most of either sex, and your great goodness to that dear person, whom you have sometimes been pleased to honour with the title of your master, makes it hard for me to judge whether he contributed more to the vast improvements you have made in that science, or your ladyship to the reputation he gained in the profession of it: For I have often heard him say, that, as several of his best compositions were originally designed for your ladyship's entertainment, so the pains he bestowed in fitting them for your ear, were abundantly rewarded by the satisfaction he has received from your approbation and admirable performance of them, which has best recommended both them and their author to all that have had the happiness of hearing them from your ladyship.
"Another great advantage, to which my husband has often imputed the success of his labours, and which may best plead for your ladyship's favourable acceptance of this collection, has been the great justness both of thought and numbers which he found in the poetry of our most refined writers, and among them, of that honourable gentleman, who has the dearest and most deserved relation to yourself, and whose excellent compositions were the subject of his last and best performances in music.
"Thus, madam, your ladyship has every way the justest titles to the patronage of this book; the publication of which, under the auspicious influence of your name, is the best (I had almost said the only) means I have left, of testifying to the world, my desire to pay the last honours to its dear author, your ladyship having generously prevented my intended performance of the duty I owe to his ashes, by erecting a fair monument over them, and gracing it with an inscription which may perpetuate both the marble and his memory.
"Your generosity, which was too large to be confined either to his life or person, has also extended itself to his posterity, on whom your ladyship has been pleased to entail your favours, which must, with all gratitude, be acknowledged as the most valuable part of their inheritance, both by them, and your ladyship's most obliged, and most humble servant,
Fr. Purcell."
[95] The following account of the manner in which Sir Palmes Fairbone fell, and of the revenge to which the author alludes, is taken from the Gazette of the time:
"Malaga, November 12.—Three days since arrived here a small vessel, which stopped at Tangier, from whence we have letters, which give an account, that on the 2d instant, Sir Palmes Fairbone, the governor, as he was riding without the town with a party of horse, to observe what the Moors were doing, was shot by one of them, and, being mortally wounded, fell from his horse: That the Moors had intrenched themselves near the town, whereupon the whole garrison, consisting of 4000 horse and foot, sallied out upon them, commanded by Colonel Sackville: That they marched out in the night; but were quickly discovered by the Moors' sentinels, who immediately gave the alarm: That in the morning there was a very sharp engagement, which lasted six hours; and then the Moors, who were above 20,000, fled, and were pursued by the English, who killed above 1500 of them, took four of their greatest guns, and filled up all the trenches, and then retired to the town with several prisoners, having obtained a most signal victory, wherein the Spanish horse behaved themselves as well as men could do. The day the said vessel came from Tangier, which was the 7th, they heard much shooting, which makes us believe there has been a second engagement.
"Malaga, November 12, (1680.)—By a vessel arrived from Tangier, we have advice, that on Wednesday last all the force of that garrison took the field, and gave battle to about 30,000 Moors. The Spanish horse and 800 seamen marched in the van, the English horse with the main body. The fight lasted near six hours, with the slaughter of between 1500 and 2000 Moors, and of 150 of the garrison: That the Moors fled; the English kept the field; took six pieces of cannon, and six colours. Every soldier that brought in a flag had thirty guineas given to him; and every one that took a Moor prisoner had him for his encouragement. There were about twenty taken; and 300 bodies of Moors were dragged together in one heap, and as many heads in another pile. But the great misfortune was, that the Saturday before, the governor, as he was walking under the walls, received a mortal wound, which the Spanish horse so bravely resented, that immediately, without command, they mounted and charged the Moors with that courage, that they killed many of them, with the loss of seven or eight of themselves. Before this action, the Moors were so near the walls of the town, that with hand-slings they pelted our soldiers with stones."—London Gazette, No. 1567.
"Whitehall, November 27.—Yesterday morning arrived here Lieutenant-colonel Talmash from Tangier, and gave his Majesty an account, that Colonel Sackville, who has now the chief command, (Sir Palmes Fairbone, the late governor, having been unfortunately wounded with a musket shot on the 24th past, of which he died three days after,) finding that the Moors began to approach very near to Pole-fort, and were preparing to mine it, called a council of war, and, pursuant to what was there resolved, marched out on the 27th with 1500 foot and 300 horse, and fell upon the Moors with so much bravery, that, notwithstanding the inequality of their number, and the stout resistance they made, they beat them out of the trenches, and from their several lines, and gave them a total defeat; pursuing them a mile into the country, with a great slaughter of them; filling up their trenches, and levelling their lines, and taking two pieces of cannon, five colours, and several prisoners; though with the loss of many officers and private soldiers killed and wounded on our side."—Ibidem, No. 1569.
[96] The diapason, with musicians, is a chord including all notes. Perhaps Dryden remembered Spenser's allegorical description of the human figure and faculties:
"The frame thereof seemed partly circular,
And part triangular; O, work divine!
These two, the first and last, propitious are;
The one imperfect, mortal feminine,
The other immortal, perfect, masculine;
And 'twixt them both a quadrate was the base,
Proportioned equally by seven and nine;
Nine was the circle set in heaven's place;
All which compacted made a goodly diapase."
Fairy Queen, Book II. canto ix. stanza 22.
[97] St Cecilia is said to have invented the organ, though it is not known when or how she came by this credit. Chaucer introduces her as performing upon that instrument:
"And while that the organes maden melodie,
To God alone thus in her heart sung she."
The descent of the angel we have already mentioned. She thus announces this celestial attendant to her husband:
I have an angel which that loveth me;
That with great love, wher so I wake or slepe,
Is ready aye my body for to kepe."
The Second Nonne's Tale.
[98] James, second Duke of Ormond, was eldest son of the gallant Earl of Ossory, and grandson to the great Duke of Ormond, to whose honours he succeeded in 1688. He was first married to Lady Anne Hyde, daughter of Lawrence Earl of Rochester; and, upon her death, to Lady Mary Somerset, second daughter of the Duke of Beaufort. The Duke of Ormond was favoured by King William, but attained still higher power and influence during the reign of Queen Anne, especially in her later years, when he entered into all the views of her Tory administration. Upon the accession of George I, he was impeached of high treason, and consulted his safety by flying abroad. He died in Spain in 1746.
The tales which follow, with the various translations marked in the preface, were first published in 1700 in one volume folio.
[99] See Vol. XVII. p. 1.
[100] See the passage in "Absalom and Achitophel," Vol. IX. p. 242. and the notes on that poem, pages 294-301.
[101] This character of the unfortunate nobleman was not exaggerated. When the impeachment against him was moved, Hutchinson, Jekyll, and many others, gave a splendid testimony to his private virtues.
[102] P. Valerius Poplicola, the third Roman consul; the same who caused the fasces, the emblems of consular dignity, to be lowered before the common people.
[103] In the bloody battle of Landen, fought on 29th July, 1693, the Duke of Ormond was in that brigade of English horse which King William led in person to support his right wing of cavalry. The Duke charged at the head of a squadron of Lumley's regiment, received several wounds, and had his horse shot under him. He was about to be cut to pieces, when he was rescued by a gentleman of the gardes-du-corps, and made prisoner. King William lost the day, after exhibiting prodigies of conduct and valour.
[104] This was, I suppose, our author's old foe, Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, the tardy progress of whose great buildings at Cleveden was often the subject of satire:
"Once more, says fame, for battle he prepares,
And threatens rhymers with a second farce;
But if as long for that as this we stay,
He'll finish Cleveden sooner than his play."
The Review.
[105] These translations are to be found in the 12th volume, being placed after the versions of Ovid's "Epistles."
[106] I cannot find any such passages in Spenser as are here alluded to.
[107] Edward Fairfax, natural son of Sir Thomas Fairfax of Denton in Yorkshire, translated Tasso's celebrated poem, stanza for stanza, with equal elegance and fidelity. His version, entitled "Godfrey of Bulloigne, or the Recovery of Jerusalem," was first published in 1600. Collins has paid the original author and translator the following singular compliment:
"How have I sate, while piped the pensive wind,
To hear thy harp by British Fairfax strung;
Prevailing poet, whose undoubting mind
Believed the magic wonders that he sung."
Ode on Highland Superstitions.
[108] It would seem, from this respectful expression, that our author's feud with Rymer (See Vol. XI. p. 60. Vol. XII. p. 46.) was now composed.
[109] Jeremy Collier, whose diatribe against the theatre galled Dryden severely.
[110] See this version, Vol. XII. p. 357.
[111] The celebrated author of the "Leviathan." Burnet says, he was esteemed at court as a mathematician, though he had little talent that way.
[112] In this instance Dryden has inverted the fact. Boccacio tells the story of Griselda in his "Decameron," which was written about 1160, and Petrarch did not translate it till 1173, the year of his death, when he executed a Latin version of it. Even then, he mentions it as a traditional tale, which he had often heard with pleasure. The original edition of the story is difficult to discover. Noguier, in his "Histoire de Tholouse," affirms, that this mirror of female patience actually existed about the year 1103, and Le Grand lays claim to her history as originally a French fabliau. It seems certain, at least, that it was not invented by Petrarch, although Chaucer quotes his authority, probably that he might introduce a panegyric on his departed friend:
"I wol you tell a tale, which that I
Lerned at Padowe of a worthy clerk,
As proved by his wordes, and his werk:
He now is dede, and nailed in his cheste,
I pray to God so geve his soule reste.
Fraunceis Petrark, the laureate poete,
Highte this clerke, whose rhetorik swete
Enlumined all Itaille of poetrie."
Clerke's Prologue.
[113] Tyrwhitt has laboured to show, that Boccacio's poem, called the "Philostrato," contains the original of Chaucer's "Troilus and Creseide." But Chaucer himself calls his original "Lollius" and the Book "Trophe;" and I think, with Mr Godwin, that we are not hastily to conclude that this was an invention, to disguise his pillaging Boccacio, when we consider the probability of the work, which served as their common original, being lost in the course of so many ages. See this question discussed in Godwin's "Life of Chaucer," Vol. I. p 263.
[114] Unquestionably these poems are original as to the mode of treating them; but, in both cases, Chaucer was contented to adopt the story of some more ancient tale-teller. The "Wife of Bath's Tale" is imitated from the "Florent" in Gower, and that probably from the work of an older minstrel. Or Chaucer may have copied the old tale called the "Marriage of Sir Gawain," which is probably the corrupted fragment of a metrical romance. The apologue of "The Cock and the Fox," is to be found in the "Fables" of Marie of France, who seems to have lived in the reign of Henry III. of England.
[115] The Tabard was the inn whence Chaucer's pilgrims set forth on their joyous party to Canterbury, and took its name from the sign, a herald's coat, or tabard.
It is much to the credit of British painting, that Mr Stothard, of London, has been able to execute a picture, representing this celebrated groupe on their journey to Canterbury, with the genius and spirit of a master, and all the rigid attention to costume that could be expected by the most severe antiquary.
[116] Dryden seems here to intimate some hankering after those Dalilahs of composition, as he elsewhere calls them, that consisted in turning and playing upon words.
[117] The famous Cowley, whose metaphysical conceits had already, it would seem, begun to tarnish the brilliancy of his reputation.
[118] Thomas Speght's edition of Chaucer was published in 1597 and 1602. The preface contains the passage which Dryden alludes to: "And for his (Chaucer's) verses, although, in divers places, they seem to us to stand of unequal measures, yet a skilful reader, who can scan them in their nature, shall find it otherwise. And if a verse, here and there, fal out a syllable shorter or longer than another, I rather aret it to the negligence and rape of Adam Scrivener, (that I may speake as Chaucer doth) than to any unconning or oversight in the author: For how fearful he was to have his works miswritten, or his verse mismeasured, may appeare in the end of his fift booke of "Troylus and Creseide," where he writeth thus:
"And for there is so great diversitie
In English, and in writing of our tongue,
So pray I God that none miswrite thee,
Ne thee mismetre for defaut of tongue."
By his hasty and inconsiderate contradiction of honest Speght's panegyric, Dryden has exposed himself to be censured for pronouncing rashly upon a subject with which he was but imperfectly acquainted. The learned Tyrwhitt has supported Speght's position with equal pains and success, and plainly proves, that the apparent inequalities of the rhyme of Chaucer, arise chiefly from the change in pronunciation since his time, particularly from a number of words being now pronounced as one syllable, which in those days were prolonged into two, or as two syllables which were anciently three. These researches, in the words of Ellis, "have proved what Dryden denied, viz. that Chaucer's versification, wherever his genuine text is preserved, was uniformly correct, although the harmony of his lines has, in many cases, been obliterated by the changes that have taken place in the mode of accenting our language."—Specimens of the Early English Poets, Vol. I. p. 209.
[119] Chaucer was doubtless employed and trusted by Edward and by his grandson, and probably favoured by Henry IV., the son of his original patron; but if Dryden meant, that he held, during these reigns, the precise office of poet-laureat, once enjoyed by himself, it is difficult to suppose that any such had existence.
[120] The rebellion of the Commons was that tumult which took place under the management of John of Northampton, commonly called John Cumbertown. Chaucer was forced to fly to Holland, in consequence of having some concern in that insurrection, and on his return he was arrested and committed to the Tower. Katherine Swynford, mistress, and at length wife, to John of Gaunt, was sister of Philippa Rouet, wife of the poet.
[121] "The Ploughman's Tale" is now generally accounted spurious. In speaking of it, Dryden inadvertently confounds it with the work of Robert Langland, a secular priest, well known to collectors by the title of "Pierce Plowman's Visions." Both poems contain a bitter satire against the clergy; but that which has been falsely ascribed to Chaucer, is expressly written in favour of Wickliffe's doctrine. Dryden probably was sufficiently ready to adopt any authority which seemed to countenance severity against the churchmen,—a subject upon which he always flies into declamation.
[122] This ceremony having been only partially performed when Samuel Johnson, the author of Julian, was thus ignominiously punished, it was found that the degradation was incomplete, and thus he saved his benefice.
[123] It is almost unnecessary to mention their names,—Henry the Second and Thomas a Becket.
[124] Dr James Drake wrote, in answer to Collier, a work called, "The Ancient and Modern Stage Surveyed, or Mr Collier's View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the Stage set in a true light." 8vo, 1699, p. 348-355.
[125] The famous Italian physiognomist.
[126] Gat-toothed, according to Chaucer; meaning nothing more than goat-toothed, which, applied to such a character, has an obvious meaning. The commentators, however, chose to read gap-toothed, as of more easy explanation.
[127] Alluding here, as elsewhere in the preface, to Jeremy Collier and Luke Milbourne, who had assailed not only his writings, but his moral character, with great severity.
[128] To whom "Don Sebastian" is dedicated. See Vol. VII. page 281. He died in 1696-7.
[129] This literal error was corrected by Tyrwhitt, from the better MSS. of Chaucer, being in fact, not a blunder of the poet, but of the press.
[130] This lady lived to the age of ninety-four. Her huge romances, "Artamenes, Clelia, and Cleopatra," were in my childhood still read in some old-fashioned Scottish families, though now absolutely forgotten, and in no chance of being revived. Mademoiselle de Scuderi died about eighteen months after this discourse was written. There is no reason to think she was seriously engaged in translating Chaucer, whose works certainly never existed in the old Provençal or Norman French, into which last they were more likely to have been translated.
[131] Pope, however, modernized this prologue, and, it is said, some of Chaucer's looser tales, though the latter were published under the name of Betterton. Malone, vol. iv. p. 631.
[132] The allusion, in Boccace, was probably to his own poem, the "Theseida," a work so scarce, as almost never to have been heard of, until it was described by Tyrwhitt, in his Essay concerning the Originals whence Chaucer drew his tales. It contains the whole story of Palamon and Arcite. But the tale itself was more ancient than the days of Boccace.
[133] There seems to have been something questionable in Milbourne's character. Dryden, a little lower down, hints, that he lost his living, for writing a libel upon his parishioners.
[134] "Prince Arthur," and "King Arthur," two works, facetiously entitled epic poems, published in 1695 and 1697. In the preface to the first, occurred the following severe attack upon Dryden, which is inserted by Mr Malone as illustrative of the passage in the text.
"Some of these poets, to excuse their guilt, allege for themselves, that the degeneracy of the age makes their lewd way of writing necessary. They pretend, the auditors will not be pleased, unless they are thus entertained from the stage; and to please, they say, is the chief business of the poet. But this is by no means a just apology. It is not true, as was said before, that the poet's chief business is to please: his chief business is to instruct, to make mankind wiser and better; and, in order to this, his care should be to please and entertain the audience, with all the wit and art he is master of. Aristotle and Horace, and all their critics and commentators, all men of wit and sense, agree, that this is the end of poetry. But they say, it is their profession to write for the stage; and that poets must starve, if they will not, in this way, humour the audience; the theatre will be as unfrequented as the churches, and the poet and the parson equally neglected. Let the poet, then, abandon his profession, and take up some honest, lawful, calling; where, joining industry to his great wit, he may soon get above the complaints of poverty, so common among these ingenious men, and lie under no necessity of prostituting his wit, to any such vile purposes as are here censured. This will be a course of life more profitable and honourable to himself, and more useful to others. And there are, among these writers, some, who think they might have risen to the highest dignities, in other professions, had they employed their wit in those ways. It is a mighty dishonour and reproach to any man that is capable of being useful to the world, in any liberal and virtuous profession, to lavish out his life and wit, in propagating vice and corruption of manners, and in battering, from the stage, the strongest entrenchments, and best works, of religion and virtue. Whoever makes this his choice, when the other was in his power, may he go off the stage unpitied, complaining of neglect and poverty, the just punishments of his irreligion and folly."
[135] This play is bad enough, yet the assertion seems a strong one. There can be little pleasure, however, in weighing filth against filth, so the point may be left undecided.
[136] There is an account of this desperate action, in the Memoirs of Captain Carleton. The Confederate Army were upon their march when the Prince of Condé suddenly attacked their rear, which he totally routed, and then led his forces between the second line of the Confederates, and their line of baggage, to compel them to a general action. But the plunder of the baggage occasioned so much delay, that the van of the Prince of Orange's army had time to rejoin the centre; and, though the French maintained the action with great vigour, they were, in the end, compelled to leave the Confederates in possession of the field of battle. This battle was fought 11th August, 1674.
[137] Lady Mary Somerset, second wife of the Duke of Ormond, to whom she was married in 1685. She was second daughter of Henry, first Duke of Beaufort.
[138] The first patroness of Chaucer was Blanche, first wife of John, Duke of Gaunt, whose death he has celebrated in the "Boke of the Duchesse." She was the second daughter of Henry, Duke of Lancaster, grandson of Edmund, surnamed Crouchback, brother of Edward I. But I do not know how the Duchess of Ormond could be said to be "born of her blood," since she was descended of John of Gaunt by his third, not his first wife. Dryden, however, might not know, or might disregard, these minutiæ of genealogy.
[139] John of Gaunt had by his mistress, Catharine Rouet, whom he afterwards married, three sons and a daughter, who were legitimated by act of Parliament. John de Beaufort, the eldest of these, was created Earl of Somerset, and from him the ducal family of Beaufort are lineally descended. The patent of the first Duke, the father of this Duchess of Ormond, bears to be, in consideration of his services, and of his most noble descent from King Edward III., by John de Beaufort, eldest son of John of Gaunt, by his third marriage.
[140] Our author remembered his master Virgil:
Et Pater ipse, manu magnâ, Portunus euntem Impulit
——Æneidos, Lib. V.
[141] Our author is guilty of the same extravagant idea in the "Astræa Redux:"
It is no longer motion cheats your view;
As you meet it, the land approacheth you.
For which he is deservedly censured by Dr Johnson.
[142] The Duchess of Ormond went to Ireland in autumn 1697, according to Mr Malone, and was followed by the Duke.
[143] Alluding to the wars of the Revolution in Ireland.
[144] She seems to have been just recovered from a fever.
[145] Titus, who is said to have wept at the destruction of the Temple, during the storm of Jerusalem.
[146] Dr Christopher Love Morley, a physician of eminence.
[147] It was not the Duchess's fortune ever to pay this debt to the house of Ormond.
[148] The poet here introduces a distinction, well known in heraldry. The banner was a square flag, which only barons of a great lineage and power had a right to display. The pennon was a forked streamer borne by a knight: Theseus carried both to the field, each bearing a separate device. Chaucer says,
"And by his banner borne is his pennon."
[149] This play of words, which is truly Ovidian, does not occur in Chaucer, nor is it in conformity with our author's general ideas of translating him. (See Introduction to the "Fables.") The Old Bard says simply:
The other where him list may ride and go,
But see his lady shall he never mo.
[150] This violent machine seems unnecessary. The change, previously described as having taken place in Arcite's appearance, might have vindicated his return to the court of Theseus. The apparition of Hermes is only intended as an allegory, to signify Arcite's employing stratagem.
[151] Juno.
[152] Here Dryden mistakes his author's meaning, though he employs his word. Chaucer says,
"Pity renneth sone in gentel herte:"
That is, in the heart of a man of gentle, or noble birth.
[153] The bars were the palisades of the lists. Upon one occasion, when a challenger, in a cause of treason, had died before the day of combat, a court of chivalry appointed his dead body to be brought into the lists, completely armed, and adjudged that the defendant should be held conqueror, if he could throw it over the bars. But the corpse and arms being weighty, the sun set before he could accomplish this, and he was condemned for treason as conquered in the trial by combat. See Sir David Lindsay on Heraldry, MS. Advocates' Library.
[154] This strange association of persons did not shock the times of Chaucer.
[155] Chaucer reads more appropriately, "under a bent."
[156] Rubeus and Puella.—Dryden.
[157] Dryden has here omitted a striking circumstance:
A wolf there stood before him at his feet,
With eyen red, and of a man he eat.
[158] Prussia.
[159] Boots, or armour for the legs.
[160] The accoutrements of the knights of yore were as various as the modern fashions of female dress; and as it was necessary, in the single combat, that each warrior should be equally armed, it was a matter of no small nicety, to ascertain exactly, what weapons, offensive and defensive, should be allowed to them. But in general tournaments, each knight seems to have used the arms which pleased him best; subject always to such general regulations as were laid down by the judges, for lessening the danger of these military games. There is a long enumeration of various kinds of armour, in the romance of "Clariodus and Meliadus."
[161] First edition, pots.
[162] Derrick's edition, The.
[163] This line, containing a political allusion, is Dryden's exclusively. In Chaucer's time, the "churl's rebellion" excited the dreadful remembrance of the insurrection of Jack Straw in England, and that in France called the Jacquerie, both recent events.
[164] The court of chivalry, which, in 1631, regulated the intended judicial combat between David Ramsay and Lord Rae, appointed, that until the word lesser les armes was given, the combatants should have meat and drink, iron-nails, hammer, file, scissars, bodkin, needle and thread, armourer, and tailor, with their weapons to aid them as need required. See State Trials, Vol. XI. p. 130.
[165] That is, at disadvantage.
[166] Derrick's Edit, the.
[167] This fine passage does not occur in Chaucer, although his commencement of the battle is in the highest degree animated. Perhaps Dryden remembered Sidney's "Arcadia."
"And now the often-changing fortune began also to change the hue of the battles. For at the first, though it were terrible, yet Terror was decked so bravely with rich furniture, gilt swords, shining armours, pleasant pensils, that the eye with delight had scarcely leisure to be afraid: but now all universally defiled with dust, blood, broken armour, mangled bodies took away the masque, and set forth Horror in his own horrible manner."—Arcadia, Book III.
[168] Derrick's Edit. The.
[169] Emetrius.
[170] Another political sarcasm of the Tory poet, unauthorized by his original.
[171] An "infernal fury," according to the best readings of Chaucer, though others, which Dryden probably followed, have "fire."
[172] Folio Edit. Not.
[173] This sort of expostulation is common to many barbarous nations, and is said to be retained by the native Irish.
[174] The French launde, means a wild, uncultivated meadow, or glade. The word lawn, which we have formed from it, has a more limited signification.
[175] Derrick's Edit. their.
[176] Partlet, or Perthelot, as the proper name of a hen, is a word of difficult and dubious etymology. Ruddiman, in his Glossary to Douglas's Virgil, gives several derivations; the most plausible is that which brings it from Partlet, an old word signifying a woman's ruff.
[177] Among the distiches ascribed to Cato, we do in fact find one to that purpose:—
Somnia ne cures.—Lib. ii. distich 32.
[178] Cicero, who tells both the following stories in his treatise, De Divinatione, lib. i. cap. 27. Chaucer has reversed their order, and added many picturesque circumstances.
[179] Hoped and unhoped, anciently meant only expected and unexpected. Puttenham, in his "Art of English Poesie," 1589, mentions the Tanner of Tamworth, who, in his broad dialect, said to King Edward, upon discovering his rank, and remembering the familiarities he had used with him while in disguise; "I hope I shall be hanged to-morrow," for "I fear me I shall be hanged." The use of the verb hope, was therefore limited to its present sense, even in Queen Elizabeth's time. But Dryden, in translating an old poet, used some latitude in employing ancient language.
[180] There may be room to suspect, that the line should run,
A court of coblers, and a mob of kings;
as better expressing the confusion of ideas incident to dreaming.
[181] Kenelm, son of Kenulph, king of Mercia, was murdered at the age of seven years by his sister Quendreda, and accounted a martyr.
[182] This vision Chaucer found, not in Homer, but in Dares Phrygius. Shakespeare alludes to it:
——Come, Hector, come, go back,
Thy wife hath dreamed.——
[183] In principio refers to the beginning of Saint John's Gospel.
[184] Taken from a fabulous conversation between the Emperor Adrian and the philosopher Secundus, reported by Vincent de Beauvais, Spec. Hist. Quid est Mulier? Hominis confusio; in saturabilis bestia, &c. The Cock's polite version is very ludicrous.
[185] Indulging, as usual, his political antipathies, Dryden fails not to make the fox a Puritan.
[186] According to the romantic history of Charlemaign, Gano, or Ganelon, betrayed the Christian army, at the battle of Roncesvalles, where Orlando and the Peers of France were slain. The pun upon Gallic, which is renewed in deriving the cock from Brennus and Belinus, a little farther down, is entirely Dryden's.
[187] Thomas Bradwardin, archbishop of Canterbury, a contemporary of Chaucer, composed a treatise on Predestination, and a work entitled, De Causu Dei, against Pelagius.
[188] Nigellus Wireker, who, in Richard the First's reign, composed a Book, called "Burnellus, seu Speculum Stultorum." The story alluded to, is of a cock, who, having been lamed by a priest's son, called Gundulfus, in revenge, omitted to crow upon a morning, when his enemy had directed that he should be called very early, in order to go to a distant church, where he was to take orders. By this stratagem, Gundulfus overslept himself, and was disappointed of his ordination.
[189] Native, in astrology, is the person whose scheme of nativity is calculated.
[190] Ganfride, or Geoffrey de Vinsauf, a Norman historian, and parcel poet, bewailed the death of Richard in plaintive hexameters, in which he particularly exclaims against Friday, the day on which that hero was shot by Bertram de Gurdun:
Oh Veneris lacrymosa dies, O sydus amarum
Illa dies tua nox fuit, et Venus illa venenum, &c.
[191] Dryden has given Jack Straw the national antipathies of the mob in his own time. Chaucer says more correctly, their rage was directed against the Flemings. In the next two lines, Dryden again alludes to the riots of his own time, whose gathering cry used to be "one and all."
[192] This excellent parody upon Virgil is introduced by Dryden, and marks his late labours:
——Vicisti! et victum tendere palmas
Ausonii videre.——
[193] In the original, the tale concludes by a reflection of the Fox. The cock had said,
——he that winketh when he should see
Al wilfully God let him never the.
Nay, quoth the Fox, but God give him mischance
That is so indiscreet of governance,
That jangleth when that he should hold his peace.
[194] Godwin's Life of Chaucer, Vol. I. p. 346.
[195] Derrick, wearied.
[196] Trumpeters, and other warlike musicians, long held some part of the character of heralds and of ancient minstrels. They were distinguished by collars and tabards, and often employed on messages, during which their persons were sacred.
[197] The joints of the armour were rivetted with nails after the warrior had put it on. Hence among the sounds of preparation for battle, Shakespeare enumerates that of
——The armourers accomplishing the knights,
With busy hammers closing rivets up.
[198] Personal attendants, as the name implies. They followed the knights in battle, and never quitted their side:
The Duke of York so dread,
The eager vaward led,
With the main Harry sped,
Among his henchmen.
Drayton's Ballad of Agincourt.
This office was long retained by the Highland chiefs, and usually conferred on a foster brother. Before a battle, the Frenchmen carried, as in the text, the arms of the knight ready for use.
[199] Derrick, pleasures.
[200] i.e. psaltery.
[201] A species of song or lyric composition, with a returning burden. It is of kin to the Rondeau, but of a different measure.
[202] The common list of the nine worthies comprehends—Hector, Pompey, and Alexander, Pagans; Joshua, David, and Judas Machabeus, Jews; and Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey of Boulogne, Christians: But it is sometimes varied.
[203]This is a mistake of Dryden, who was misled by the spelling of the old English. Chaucer talks of boughs, not of bows; and says simply,
And tho that barin bowes in their hand;
Of the precious lawrier so notable.
This refers to the description of the knights at their entrance, which Dryden has rightly rendered:
Some in their hands, besides the lance and shield,
The bows of woodbine, or of hawthorn, held;
Or branches for their mystic emblems took
Of palm, of laurel, or of cerrial oak.
The bow, though the youth trained to chivalry were taught to use it, made no part of a knight's proper weapons. But it is curious how Dryden, having fallen into an error, finds out a reason for his false reading, by alleging, that the bows were borne as an emblem of strength of arm, valour, and victory. [Since this note was written, I observe, that the ingenious Dr Aikin has anticipated my observation.]
[204] Derrick, glance.
[205] The disappearance of the Fairies, which Chaucer ascribes to the exercitation of the friars, a latter bard, in the same vein of irony, imputes to the Reformation:
By which we note the fairies,
Were of the old profession;
Their songs were Ave Marie's;
Their dances were procession.
But now, alas! they all are dead,
Or gone beyond the seas;
Or farther for religion fled,
Or else they take their ease.
See "The Fairies Farewell," a lively little song, by the witty Bishop Corbet.
[206] Our author, to whom, now so far advanced in life, the recollection of some of his plays could not be altogether pleasant, is willing to seek an excuse for their licence in the debauchery of Charles and of his court. The attack of Collier had been too just to admit of its being denied; and our author, like other people, was content to make excuses where defence was impossible.
[207] Or Ganore, or Vanore, or Guenever, the wife of Arthur in romance.
[208] Ovid, indeed, tells the story in the Metamor. lib. xi. But how will the fair reader excuse Chaucer for converting the talkative male domestic of Midas into that king's wife?
[209] The sound which the bittern produces by suction among the roots of water plants, is provincially called bumping.
Cantabit vacuus coram latrone viator.
Juvenal, Satire x.
[211] This passage is obviously introduced by the author, to apologize for the splendid establishment of the clergy of his own community. What follows, applies, as has been noticed, to the non-juring clergy, who lost their benefices for refusing the oath of allegiance to King William.
[212] He flourished in the reign of Henry VII.; and his work, entitled, "The Stately Tragedy of Guiscard and Sigismond," is printed in 1597, probably from an earlier edition.
[213] It was published by Wilmot, in 1592, under the title of "The Tragedy of Tancred and Gismund," and occurs in the 2d volume of Dodsley's old plays.
[214] This minute circumstance, which is mentioned by Boccacio, seems to argue, that the story had a real, at least a traditional foundation; for there is no other reason why it should have been introduced.
[215] The dispute between William and his Parliament about his favourite Dutch guards, was obviously in Dryden's recollection.
[216] Manni Della Illustrazione del Boccario, p. 355.
[217] There is a copy in the late Duke John of Roxburghe's library, under the title of "Nastagio and Traversari."
[218] Derrick, spoke. The reading of the folio, besides furnishing an accurate rhyme, is in itself far more picturesque. The spectre is described in the very attitude of assault.
[219] Although this interpretation is invidious, it might have been wished, that Collier, against whom the insinuation is directed, had been less coarse, and somewhat veiled the indecencies which he justly censures.
[220] Dryden willingly seizes the opportunity of being witty at the expence of the militia of England, which were then drawn out, and exercised once a month, instead of being formed as at present into permanent fencible regiments; differing from those of the line, only in the mode of raising them, and the extent of service.
END OF THE ELEVENTH VOLUME.
Edinburgh:
Printed by James Ballantyne & Co.
Transcriber's notes:
P.36. 'Hoddesden' changed to 'Hoddesdon'.
P.119. 'Eleanora' changed to 'Eleonora'.
P.120. 'Eleanora' changed to 'Eleonora'.
P.152. 'copartment' changed to 'compartment'.
P.232. In footnote 130 'reason to thing' changed to 'reason to think'.
P.260. 'musk ask' changed to 'must ask'.
P.279. 'profered' is 'proffer'd' in another volume, changed.
P.301. 'atchievements' changed to 'achievements'.
P.436. 'mein' changed to 'mien'.
P.453. 'criti- objections' changed to 'critical objections'.
P.475. 'disagreeble' changed to 'disagreeable', changed.
Various punctuation fixed.