The same year he praised the new king in a second poem on his restoration. In the Astrea was the line,
An horrid stillness first invades the ear,
And in that silence we a tempest fear—
for which he was persecuted with perpetual ridicule, perhaps with more than was deserved. Silence is, indeed, mere privation; and, so considered, cannot invade; but privation, likewise, certainly is darkness, and probably cold; yet poetry has never been refused the right of ascribing effects or agency to them as to positive powers. No man scruples to say that darkness hinders him from his work; or that cold has killed the plants. Death is also privation; yet who has made any difficulty of assigning to death a dart, and the power of striking?
In settling the order of his works there is some difficulty; for, even when they are important enough to be formally offered to a patron, he does not commonly date his dedication; the time of writing and publishing is not always the same; nor can the first editions be easily found, if even from them could be obtained the necessary information[99].
The time at which his first play was exhibited is not certainly known, because it was not printed till it was, some years afterwards, altered and revived; but since the plays are said to be printed in the order in which they were written, from the dates of some, those of others may be inferred; and thus it may be collected, that in 1663, in the thirty-second year of his life, he commenced a writer for the stage; compelled, undoubtedly, by necessity, for he appears never to have loved that exercise of his genius, or to have much pleased himself with his own dramas.
Of the stage, when he had once invaded it, he kept possession for many years; not, indeed, without the competition of rivals who sometimes prevailed, or the censure of criticks, which was often poignant, and often just; but with such a degree of reputation as made him, at least, secure of being heard, whatever might be the final determination of the publick.
His first piece was a comedy called the Wild Gallant[100]. He began with no happy auguries; for his performance was so much disapproved, that he was compelled to recall it, and change it from its imperfect state to the form in which it now appears, and which is yet sufficiently defective to vindicate the criticks.
I wish that there were no necessity of following the progress of his theatrical fame, or tracing the meanders of his mind through the whole series of his dramatick performances; it will be fit, however, to enumerate them, and to take especial notice of those that are distinguished by any peculiarity, intrinsick or concomitant; for the composition and fate of eight-and-twenty dramas, include too much of a poetical life to be omitted.
In 1664, he published the Rival Ladies, which he dedicated to the earl of Orrery, a man of high reputation both as a writer, and a statesman. In this play he made his essay of dramatick rhyme, which he defends in his dedication, with sufficient certainty of a favourable hearing; for Orrery was himself a writer of rhyming tragedies.
He then joined with sir Robert Howard in the Indian Queen, a tragedy in rhyme. The parts which either of them wrote are not distinguished.