"No grain of fenfe does in one line appear, Thy words big bulks of boift'rous bom"baft bear,

"With noise they move, and from players "mouths rebound,

"When their tongues dance to thy words empty found.

By thee infpir'd the rumbling verses roll, "As if that rhime and bombaft lent a foul: "And with that foul they feem taught duty

" too,

bow,

"As if it would thy worthless worth en"hance,

"To th' lowest rank of fops thy praife ad

vance;

"To whom, by instinct, all thy ftuff is <<< dear;

Their loud claps echo to the theatre. "From breaths of fools thy commendation

"fpreads,

"Fame fings thy praise with mouths of log

gerheads.

"With noise and laughing each thy fustian greets,

""Tis clapt by quires of empty-headed cits, "Who have their tribute fent, and homage given,

"As men in whispers fend loud noise to

"heaven.

"Thus I have daubed him with his own puddle: and now we are come from aboard his dancing, masking, rebounding, breathing fleet; and as if we had landed at Go

“ tham,

"tham, we meet nothing but fools and non"fenfe."

Such was the criticifm to which the genius of Dryden could be reduced, between rage and terrour; rage with little provocation, and terrour with little danger. To fee the highest minds thus levelled with the meaneft, may produce fome folace to the consciousness of weakness, and fome mortification to the pride of wisdom. But let it be remembered, that minds are not levelled in their powers but when they are firft levelled in their defires. Dryden and Settle had both placed their happiness in the claps of multitudes.

The Mock Aftrologer, a comedy. is dedicated to the illuftrious duke of Newcastle, whom he courts by adding to his praises thofe of his lady, not only as a lover but a partner of his ftudies. It is unpleafing to think how many names, once celebrated, are fince forgotten. Of Newcastle's works nothing is now known but his treatise on Horfemanship.

The preface feems very elaborately written, and contains many juft remarks on the Fathers of the English drama. Shakespeare's plots, he fays, are in the hundred novels of Cinthio; thofe of Beaumont and Fletcher in Spanish ftories; Jonfon only made them for himself. His criticisms upon tragedy, comedy, and farce, are judicious and profound. He endeavours to defend the immorality of fome of his comedies by the example of former writers; which is only to fay, that he was not the first nor perhaps the greatest offender. Against thofe that accufed him of plagiarism, he alleges a favourable expreffion of the King:

"He

"He only defired that they, who accufe me "of thefts, would fteal him plays like mine;" and then relates how much labour he spends in fitting for the English stage what he borrows from others.

Tyrannick Love, or the Virgin Martyr, was another tragedy in rhyme, confpicuous for many paffages of ftrength and elegance, and many of empty noife and ridiculous turbulence. The rants of Maximin have been always the sport of criticism; and were at length, if his own confeffion may be trusted, the shame of the writer.

Of this play he takes care to let the reader know, that it was contrived and written in feven weeks. Want of time was often his excufe, or perhaps fhortness of time was his private boast in the form of an apology.

It was written before The Conquest of Granada, but published after it. The defign is to recommend piety. "I confidered that plea"fure was not the only end of poesy, and "that even the inftructions of morality were

not fo wholly the bufinefs of a poet, as "that precepts and examples of piety were to "be omitted; for to leave that employment

འ་

altogether to the clergy, were to forget that

religion was first taught in verse, which the "laziness or dulnefs of fucceeding priesthood "turned afterwards into profe." Thus foolifhly could Dryden write, rather than not fhew his malice to the parfons.

The two parts of the Conquest of Granada are written with a feeming determination to glut the publick with dramatick wonders; to exhibit in its highest elevation a theatrical meteor

of

of incredible love and impoffible valour, and to leave no room for a wilder flight to the extravagance of pofterity. All the rays of romantic heat, whether amorous or warlike, glow in Almanzor by a kind of concentration. He is above all laws; he is exempt from all restraints; he ranges the world at will, and governs wherever he appears. He fights without enquiring the caufe, and loves in spite of the obligations of justice, of rejection by his miftress, and of prohibition from the dead. Yet the fcenes are, for the most part delightful; they exhibit a kind of illuftrious depravity, and majestick madness: fuch as, if it is fometimes defpifed, is often reverenced, and in which the ridiculous is mingled with the astonishing.

In the Epilogue to the fecond part of the Conqueft of Granada, Dryden indulges his favourite pleasure of difcrediting his predeceffors; and this Epilogue he has defended by a long poftfcript. He had promised a second dialogue, in which he should more fully treat of the virtues and faults of the English poets, who have written in the dramatick, epick, or lyrick way. This promife was never formally performed; but, with refpect to the dramatick writers, he has given us in his prefaces, and in this poftfcript, fomething equivalent; but his purpose being to exalt himself by the comparison, he fhews faults diftinctly, and only praises excellence in general terms.

A play thus written, in profeffed defiance of probability, naturally drew down upon itself the vultures of the theatre. One of the criticks that attacked it was Martin Clifford, to whom Sprat addressed the Life of Cowley,

with fuch veneration of his critical powers as might naturally excite great expectations of inftruction from his remarks. But let honest credulity beware of receiving characters from contemporary writers. Clifford's remarks, by the favour of Dr. Piercy, were at last obtained; and, that no man may ever want them more, I will extract enough to fatisfy all reafonable defire.

In the first Letter, his obfervation is only general: "You do live, fays he, in as much "ignorance and darkness as you did in the "womb your writings are like a Jack of all "trades fhop; they have variety, but nothing " of value; and if thou art not the dullest plant-animal that ever the earth produced, "all that I have converfed with are strangely "miftaken in thee"

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In the fecond, he tells him that Almanzor is not more copied from Achilles than from Ancient Piftol. "But I am, fays he, ftrangely mistaken if I have not feen this very Almanzor of your's in fome disguise about this town, and paffing under another name. Pr'ythee tell me true, was not this Huffcap once the Indian Emperor, and at another "time did he not call himself Maximin? "Was not Lyndaraxa once called Almeria, I

mean under Montezuma the Indian Empe46 ror. I proteft and vow they are either the fame, or fo alike that I cannot, for my heart, diftinguifh one from the other. You "are therefore a strange unconscionable thief; "thou art not content to steal from others, "but doft rob thy poor wretched felf too."

Now