[521]. His best deed was to elicit from Dryden, in Heads of an Answer to Rymer (Works, xv. 390), the memorable observation that "if Aristotle had seen ours [i.e., "our plays">[ he might have changed his mind." One may add that, if Dryden had worked these “Heads” out, he might have solved the whole mystery of criticism as far as in all probability it ever can be solved, or at the very least as far as it could be solved with the knowledge of literature at his disposal.
[522]. History of the Royal Society, 4to, London, 1667, p. 111 sq. It may be found conveniently extracted at vol. iii. pp. 271, 272 of Sir Henry Craik’s English Prose Selections (London, 1894).
[523]. It is well known that Thomas Heywood, the dramatist, had planned, if he did not actually execute, a Lives of the Poets very much earlier, and some sanguine souls have hoped that it may yet turn up. But the famous passage about poets’ nicknames, as well as the whole cast of Heywood’s work, suggests that, though biography may have lost something, criticism has not lost much.
[524]. London 12mo.
[525]. 8vo, London, 1686.
[526]. 1691: but pirated earlier.
[527]. I do not know whether this was cause or consequence of his being a friend of Shadwell. But I am bound to note, though with much surprise, that my friend Mr Sidney Lee finds (D. N. B.) “no malice” in Langbaine.
[528]. This is the odder, and the more discreditable, because one of the few things to be counted to Langbaine for righteousness is a distinct admiration of Shakespeare.
[529]. Ed. 1757, vol. iii., pp. 394-501, containing the Poetry, the Ancient and Modern Learning, and the Thoughts upon Reviewing that Essay. Some have charitably found in Temple better knowledge of the Moderns, whom he scorned, than of the Ancients, whom he championed, on the strength of his references to “Runes” and “Gothic Dithyrambics.” I cannot be so amiable. It is all a mere parade of pretentious sciolism varnished by style.
[530]. Diss., § xvi. My copy is the London ed. of 1817.