JOHN DRYDEN.
(1631-1700.)
[XVIII.] SATIRE ON THE DUTCH.
Originally printed in broadside form, being written in the year 1662. It was bitterly resented by the Dutch.
As needy gallants, in the scriv'ner's hands,
Court the rich knaves that gripe their mortgag'd lands;
The first fat buck of all the season'd sent,
And keeper takes no fee in compliment;
The dotage of some Englishmen is such,
To fawn on those, who ruin them, the Dutch.
They shall have all, rather than make a war
With those, who of the same religion are.
The Straits, the Guinea-trade, the herrings too;
Nay, to keep friendship, they shall pickle you.
Some are resolv'd, not to find out the cheat,
But, cuckold-like, love them that do the feat.
What injuries soe'er upon us fall,
Yet still the same religion answers all.
Religion wheedl'd us to civil war,
Drew English blood, and Dutchmen's now wou'd spare.
Be gull'd no longer; for you'll find it true,
They have no more religion, faith! than you.
Int'rest's the God they worship in their state,
And we, I take it, have not much of that.
Well monarchies may own religion's name,
But states are atheists in their very frame.
They share a sin; and such proportions fall,
That, like a stink, 'tis nothing to them all.
Think on their rapine, falsehood, cruelty,
And that what once they were, they still wou'd be.
To one well-born th' affront is worse and more,
When he's abus'd and baffl'd by a boor.
With an ill grace the Dutch their mischiefs do;
They've both ill nature and ill manners too.
Well may they boast themselves an ancient nation;
For they were bred ere manners were in fashion:
And their new commonwealth has set them free
Only from honour and civility.
Venetians do not more uncouthly ride,
Than did their lubber state mankind bestride.
Their sway became 'em with as ill a mien,
As their own paunches swell above their chin.
Yet is their empire no true growth but humour,
And only two kings' touch can cure the tumour.
As Cato did in Africk fruits display;
Let us before our eyes their Indies lay:
All loyal English will like him conclude;
Let Cæsar live, and Carthage be subdu'd.
[XIX.] MACFLECKNOE.
This satire was written in reply to a savage poem by the dramatist, Thomas Shadwell, entitled "The Medal of John Dayes". Dryden and Shadwell had been friends, but the enmity begotten of political opposition had separated them. Flecknoe, who gives the name to this poem, and of whom Shadwell is treated as the son and heir, was a dull poet who had always laid himself open to ridicule. It is not known (says W.D. Christie in the Globe Dryden) whether he had ever given Dryden offence, but it is certain that his "Epigrams", published in 1670, contain some lines addressed to Dryden of a complimentary character.
All human things are subject to decay,
And, when fate summons, monarchs must obey;
This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young
Was call'd to empire, and had govern'd long;
In prose and verse, was own'd, 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, pond'ring, which of all his sons was fit
To reign, and wage immortal war with wit,
Cry'd, "'Tis resolv'd; 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:
Shadwell alone, of all my sons, is he,
Who stands confirm'd 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 fabrick fills the eye,
And seems design'd for thoughtless majesty:
Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain
And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.
Heywood and Shirley 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, 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-tim'd oars before the royal barge.
Swell'd with the pride of thy celestial charge;
And big with hymn, commander of an host,
The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost.
Methinks I see the new Arion fail,
The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.
At thy well-sharpened thumb, from shore to shore,
The trebles squeak with 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 wield'st thy papers in thy threshing hand.
St. Andre's feet ne'er kept more equal time,
Not ev'n the feet of thy own Psyche's rime:
Though they in number as in sense excel;
So just, so like tautology, they fell,
That, pale with envy, Singleton forswore
The lute and sword which he in triumph bore,
And vow'd 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 inclin'd)
An ancient fabric, rais'd t' 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, undisturb'd by watch, in silence sleep.
Near these a nursery erects its head
Where queens are form'd, and future heroes bred;
Where unfledg'd 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 just reception finds
Amidst this monument of vanish'd minds:
Poor clinches the suburbian Muse affords,
And Panton waging harmless war with words.
Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,
Ambitiously design'd his Shadwell's throne.
For ancient Dekker prophesy'd 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.
Now Empress Fame had publish'd the renown
Of Shadwell's coronation through the town.
Rous'd by report of fame, the nations meet,
From near Bunhill, and distant Watling-street.
No Persian carpets spread th' imperial way,
But scatter'd limbs of mangled Poets lay;
From dusty shops neglected authors come,
Martyrs of pies, and reliques of the bum.
Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,
But loads of Shadwell almost chok'd the way.
Bilk'd stationers for yeomen stood prepar'd,
And Herringman was captain of the guard.
The hoary prince in majesty appear'd,
High on a throne of his own labours rear'd.
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 play'd 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 plac'd a mighty mug of potent ale;
Love's kingdom to his right he did convey,
At once his sceptre, and his rule of sway;
Whose righteous lore the prince had practis'd young,
And from whose loins recorded Psyche sprung.
His temples, last, with poppies were o'erspread
That nodding seem'd 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 Tiber's brook,
Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.
Th' 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.
"Heav'ns! 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 paus'd, and all the people cry'd "Amen".
Then thus continu'd 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.
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,
And in their folly show the writer's wit.
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their authors' want of sense.
Let 'em 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 diff'ring but in name.
But let no alien Sedley interpose,
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.
And when false flowers of rhetorick 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.
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Jonson's hostile name.
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,
Promis'd a play, and dwindled to a farce?
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whole Eth'ridge dost transfuse to thine?
But so transfus'd, as oil and waters flow,
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
This is thy province, this thy wondrous way,
New humours to invent for each new play:
This is that boasted bias of thy mind,
By which, one way, to dulness 'tis inclin'd:
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 set'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 calls 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,
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 prepar'd,
And down they sent the yet declaiming bard.
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.
[XX.] EPISTLE TO THE WHIGS.
This excellent specimen of Dryden's prose satire was prefixed to his satiric poem "The Medal", published in March, 1682. It was inspired by the striking of a medal to commemorate the rejection by the London Grand Jury, on November 24, 1681, of a Bill of High Treason presented against Lord Shaftesbury. This event had been a great victory for the Whigs and a discomfiture for the Court.
For to whom can I dedicate this poem, with so much justice, as to you? 'Tis the representation of your own hero: 'Tis the picture drawn at length, which you admire and prize so much in little. None of your ornaments are wanting; neither the landscape of the tower, nor the rising sun; nor the Anno Domini of your new sovereign's coronation. This must needs be a grateful undertaking to your whole party; especially to those who have not been so happy as to purchase the original. I hear the graver has made a good market of it: all his Kings are bought up already; or the value of the remainder so enhanced, that many a poor Polander, who would be glad to worship the image, is not able to go to the cost of him; but must be content to see him here. I must confess, I am no great artist; but sign-post-painting will serve the turn to remember a friend by, especially when better is not to be had. Yet, for your comfort, the lineaments are true: and though he sat not five times to me, as he did to B. yet I have consulted history; as the Italian painters do, when they would draw a Nero or a Caligula; though they have not seen the man, they can help their imagination by a statue of him, and find out the colouring from Suetonius and Tacitus. Truth is, you might have spared one side of your medal: the head would be seen to more advantage, if it were placed on a spike of the tower; a little nearer to the sun; which would then break out to better purpose. You tell us, in your preface to the No-Protestant Plot, that you shall be forced hereafter to leave off your modesty. I suppose you mean that little, which is left you: for it was worn to rags when you put out this medal. Never was there practised such a piece of notorious impudence in the face of an established Government. I believe, when he is dead, you will wear him in thumb-rings, as the Turks did Scanderbeg; as if there were virtue in his bones to preserve you against monarchy. Yet all this while, you pretend not only zeal for the public good, but a due veneration for the person of the king. But all men, who can see an inch before them, may easily detect those gross fallacies. That it is necessary for men in your circumstances to pretend both, is granted you; for without them there could be no ground to raise a faction. But I would ask you one civil question: What right has any man among you, or any association of men (to come nearer to you) who, out of Parliament cannot be consider'd in a public capacity, to meet, as you daily do, in factious clubs, to vilify the Government in your discourses, and to libel it in all your writings? Who made you judges in Israel? Or how is it consistent with your zeal for the public welfare, to promote sedition? Does your definition of loyal, which is to serve the King according to the laws, allow you the licence of traducing the executive power, with which you own he is invested? You complain, that his Majesty has lost the love and confidence of his people; and, by your very urging it, you endeavour, what in you lies, to make him lose them. All good subjects abhor the thought of arbitrary power, whether it be in one or many; if you were the patriots you would seem, you would not at this rate incense the multitude to assume it; for no sober man can fear it, either from the King's disposition or his practice; or even, where you would odiously lay it, from his ministers. Give us leave to enjoy the Government, and the benefit of laws, under which we were born, and which we desire to transmit to our posterity. You are not the trustees of the public liberty; and if you have not right to petition in a crowd, much less have you to intermeddle in the management of affairs, or to arraign what you do not like; which in effect is everything that is done by the King and Council. Can you imagine, that any reasonable man will believe you respect the person of his Majesty, when 'tis apparent that your seditious pamphlets are stuffed with particular reflections on him? If you have the confidence to deny this, 'tis easy to be evinced from a thousand passages, which I only forbear to quote because I desire they should die and be forgotten. I have perused many of your papers; and to show you that I have, the third part of your No-Protestant Plot is much of it stolen from your dead author's pamphlet called the Growth of Popery; as manifestly as Milton's defence of the English people is from Buchanan, de jure regni apud Scotos; or your first covenant, and new association, from the holy league of the French Guisards. Anyone, who reads Davila, may trace your practices all along. There were the same pretences for reformation and loyalty, the same aspersions of the King, and the same grounds of a rebellion. I know not whether you will take the historian's word, who says, it was reported, that Poltrot a Huguenot murder'd Francis Duke of Guise, by the instigations of Theodore Beza; or that it was a Huguenot minister, otherwise called a Presbyterian (for our Church abhors so devilish a tenet) who first writ a treatise of the lawfulness of deposing and murdering Kings, of a different persuasion in religion. But I am able to prove from the doctrine of Calvin, and principles of Buchanan, that they set the people above the magistrate; which, if I mistake not, is your own fundamental; and which carries your loyalty no farther than your liking. When a vote of the House of Commons goes on your side, you are as ready to observe it, as if it were passed into a law: but when you are pinch'd with any former, and yet unrepealed, Act of Parliament, you declare that in some cases you will not be obliged by it. The passage is in the same third part of the No-Protestant Plot; and is too plain to be denied. The late copy of your intended association you neither wholly justify nor condemn: but as the Papists, when they are unoppos'd, fly out into all the pageantries of worship, but, in times of war, when they are hard pressed by arguments, lie close intrenched behind the Council of Trent; so, now, when your affairs are in a low condition, you dare not pretend that to be a legal combination; but whensover you are afloat, I doubt not but it will be maintained and justified to purpose. For indeed there is nothing to defend it but the sword: 'Tis the proper time to say anything, when men have all things in their power.
In the meantime, you would fain be nibbling at a parallel betwixt this association, and that in the time of Queen Elizabeth. But there is this small difference betwixt them, that the ends of the one are directly opposite to the other: one with the Queen's approbation and conjunction, as head of it; the other, without either the consent or knowledge of the King, against whose authority it is manifestly design'd. Therefore you do well to have recourse to your last evasion, that it was contriv'd by your enemies, and shuffled into the papers that were seized; which yet you see the nation is not so easy to believe, as your own jury. But the matter is not difficult, to find twelve men in Newgate, who would acquit a malefactor.
I have one only favour to desire of you at parting; that, when you think of answering this poem, you would employ the same pens against it, who have combated with so much success against Absalom and Achitophel: for then you may assure yourselves of a clear victory, without the least reply. Rail at me abundantly; and, not to break a custom, do it without wit. By this method you will gain a considerable point, which is, wholly to waive the answer of my argument. Never own the bottom of your principles, for fear they should be treason. Fall severely on the miscarriages of Government; for if scandal be not allowed, you are no free-born subjects. If GOD has not blessed you with the talent of rhyming, make use of my poor stock and welcome; let your verses run upon my feet: and for the utmost refuge of notorious blockheads, reduced to the last extremity of sense, turn my own lines upon me, and, in utter despair of your own satire, make me satirize myself. Some of you have been driven to this bay already; but above all the rest, commend me to the Non-conformist parson, who writ The Whip and Key. I am afraid it is not read so much as the piece deserves, because the bookseller is every week crying Help, at the end of his Gazette, to get it off. You see I am charitable enough to do him a kindness, that it may be published as well as printed; and that so much skill in Hebrew derivations may not lie for waste-paper in the shop. Yet I half suspect he went no farther for his learning, than the index of Hebrew names and etymologies, which is printed at the end of some English bibles. If Achitophel signify the brother of a fool, the author of that poem will pass with his readers for the next of kin. And, perhaps, 'tis the relation that makes the kindness. Whatever the verses are, buy them up, I beseech you, out of pity; for I hear the conventicle is shut up, and the brother of Achitophel out of service.
Now footmen, you know, have the generosity to make a purse, for a member of their society, who has had his livery pulled over his ears: and even Protestant flocks are brought up among you, out of veneration to the name. A dissenter in poetry from sense and English, will make as good a Protestant rhymer, as a dissenter from the Church of England a Protestant parson. Besides, if you encourage a young beginner, who knows but he may elevate his style a little, above the vulgar epithets of profane and saucy Jack, and atheistic scribbler, with which he treats me, when the fit of enthusiasm is strong upon him? By which well-manner'd and charitable expressions, I was certain of his sect, before I knew his name. What would you have more of a man? He has damned me in your cause from Genesis to the Revelations; and has half the texts of both the Testaments against me, if you will be so civil to yourselves as to take him for your interpreter, and not to take them for Irish witnesses. After all, perhaps, you will tell me, that you retained him only for the opening of your cause, and that your main lawyer is yet behind. Now, if it so happen he meet with no more reply than his predecessors, you may either conclude, that I trust to the goodness of my cause, or fear my adversary, or disdain him, or what you please; for the short on it is, it is indifferent to your humble servant, whatever your party says or thinks of him.