ABSALOM
AND
ACHITOPHEL.
PART I.
——Si proprius stes
Te capiet magis——
ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL.
The following poem has been uniformly and universally admired, not only as one of Dryden's most excellent performances, but as indisputably the best and most nervous political satire that ever was written. It is said to have been undertaken at the command of Charles; and if so, no king was ever better obeyed. The general state of parties in England during the last years of the reign of Charles II. has been often noticed, particularly in the notes on "The Duke of Guise," Vol. VI. Shaftesbury, dismissed from the administration, had bent his whole genius for intrigue, to effect the exclusion of the Duke of York from the crown of England, even at the risque of a civil war. Monmouth had thrown himself into the arms of the same party, flattered by the prospect of occupying that place from which his uncle was to be excluded. Every thing seemed to flatter his ambition. The pretensions of the Duke's daughters must necessarily have been compromised by the exclusion of their father. At any rate, they were not likely to be supported by a powerful party, while Monmouth, by his own personal influence, and that of Shaftesbury, was at the head of all, whom zeal for religion, disappointed ambition, restlessness of temper, love of liberty, or desire of licentiousness, had united in opposition to the measures of the court. Every engine which judgement or wit could dictate, was employed by either party to place their cause in the most favourable light, and prejudice that of their adversaries. Among these, the poem which follows was the most powerful, and the most successful. The time of its appearance was chosen with as much art, as the poem displays genius. Shaftesbury had been committed to the Tower on a charge of high treason on the 2d July, and the poem was published a few days before a bill of indictment was presented against him. The sensation excited by such a poem, at such a time, was intense and universal.
It has been hitherto generally supposed, that the idea of applying to Charles and Monmouth the apt characters and story of Absalom and Achitophel, and indeed the general plan of drawing a poetical parallel from scriptural history to modern times, was exclusively our author's. This appears to be a mistake. So far back as 1679, some favourer of Lord Stafford and of the Catholic cause ventured to paraphrase the story of Naboth's vineyard, and to apply it to the condemnation of that unfortunate nobleman for the Catholic plot. In that piece, the scripture names and characters are given to the objects of the poet's satire, precisely on the plan adopted by Dryden in "Absalom and Achitophel,"[208] as the reader will perceive from the extracts in the note. Not only had the scheme of a similar poem been conceived, but the very passage of Scripture, adopted by Dryden as the foundation of his parable, had been already applied to Charles and his undutiful son. There appeared, in 1680, a small tract, called "Absalom's Conspiracy, or the Tragedy of Treason," which, as it seems to have furnished the general argument of Dryden's poem, and has been unnoticed by any former commentator, I have subjoined to these introductory remarks. (See p. 205.)
In a "Letter also to his grace the duke of Monmouth, this 15 July 1680, by a true lover of his person and the peace of the kingdom," the same adaptation is thus warmly urged.