^{page 56 note 1} It should be remembered that the relations between Dryden and Swift place the sincerity of this criticism under suspicion.

^{page 56 note 2} Lives of the Poets, ed. Arthur Waugh, London, 1896; ii, 207.

^{page 56 note 1} Edinburgh and London, 1902; n, 371–89.

^{page 56 note 2} Jahrbuch der deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft, vol. IV.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. Margaret Sherwood: Dryden's Dramatic Theory and Practice; Yale Studies in English, 1898; pp. 27–31.

^{page 56 note 2} Essays of John Dryden, Oxford, 1900.

^{page 56 note 1} Kölbing's Englische Studien, iv, 373.

^{page 56 note 1} Parenthetically it should be remarked that Bobertag fails to show in just what feature of Dryden's criticism the influence of the court is discoverable; thus his threefold division of influences remains incomplete. Two of the forces mentioned are purely literary, the other is social, and no attempt is made to shown what was the literary, or theoretic, form taken on by the latter, or social, moment.

In the same category with Bobertag's treatise should be placed Laura Johnson Wylie's chapter on Dryden in her volume, Studies in the Evolution of English Criticism (1894). Miss Wylie's analysis of Dryden's work is less schematic than Bobertag's, but far more searching and accurate.

^{page 56 note 2} Leipzig, 1897.

^{page 56 note 1} We owe to Hamelius a careful distinction between neoclassicism and English rationalism.

^{page 56 note 2} P. 63.

^{page 56 note 1} P. 63.

^{page 56 note 1} Suppose, for example, that he had been a young man at the beginning, instead of at the end, of the Puritan revolution: might not his career have resembled that of Milton?

^{page 56 note 1} i, 5. All references without titles are to Ker's edition of the essays.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 8.

^{page 56 note 2} Though the comedy of manners flourished at this period, it did not reach its height until later.

^{page 56 note 3} i, 6.

^{page 56 note 4} i, 8. The significance of this passage was pointed out by George Stuart Collins; cf. his dissertation, John Dryden, His Dramatic Theory and Praxis, Leipzig, 1892, p. 8.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 23.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 27.

^{page 56 note 3} i, 36.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 47.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 68.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 70.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 72.

^{page 56 note 3} i, 78.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 79.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 82.

^{page 56 note 1} 2, 16.

^{page 56 note 1} This expression 1 use rather loosely to designate English sensationalism. This kind of materialistic rationalism is represented by the tendency to hold art down to the common-sense standards of ordinary life.

^{page 56 note 2} Of course I do not mean to imply that Dryden had a deep, modern sense of historical development of the arts. Now and then, when it suited his occasions, he explained the difference between Greek and Roman art, between French and English, or between ancient and modern, by means of references to the social conditions, or peculiarities of taste, of the nations or periods in question. But any systematic application of the historical method of criticism was out of the question.

^{page 56 note 1} Works, ed. Scott and Saintsbury, ii, 288.

^{page 56 note 2} Perhaps it is unnecessary to say that I do not attempt to account satisfactorily for the nature of the criticism which Dryden produced during any particular period. The motives which work themselves out in the mind of any great man are naturally complex, and the influences to which Dryden was subject were particularly numerous and varied. I merely attempt to point out the relations of his criticism to certain other features of his life and works.

^{page 56 note 1} Like most critics, Dryden paid little attention to the problems of comedy. In addition to the difficulties presented by the subject his neglect was no doubt prompted by his natural dislike of comedy writing: more than once he lamented the fact that he was forced to this distasteful labor. At any rate it is certain that his comedy is related to his critical theory only so far as it exhibits his general state of mind or throws light on his relations with his public.

^{page 56 note 2} Saintsbury, Life of Dryden, English Men of Letters Series, p. 10; Christy, Memoir of Dryden, Globe edition of works, p. xx.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 10.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. Dryden's poem, To the Lady Castlemain.

^{page 56 note 2} Preface to The Wild Gallant, Scott-Saintsbury, vol. ii, 27.

^{page 56 note 3} Scott-Saintsbury, ii, 285.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 24.

^{page 56 note 2} Scott-Saintsbury, ii, 417.

^{page 56 note 1} Ibid., i, 96.

^{page 56 note 2} Ibid., iii, 376.

^{page 56 note 3} “Now, if they ask me whence it is that our conversation is so much refined? I must freely, and without flattery, ascribe it to the court; and, in it, particularly to the King, whose example gives a law to it. His own misfortunes, and the nation's, afforded an opportunity, which is rarely allowed to sovereign princes, I mean of traveling, and being conversant in the most polisht courts of Europe; and, thereby, of cultivating a spirit which was formed by nature to receive the impressions of a gallant and generous education. At his return, he found a nation lost as much in barbarism as in rebellion; and, as the excellency of bis nature forgave the one, so the excellency of his manners reformed the other. The desire of imitating so great a pattern first awakened the dull and heavy spirits of the English from their natural reservedness; loosened them from their stiff forms of conversation, and made them easy and pliant to each other in discourse. Thus, insensibly, our way of living became more free; and the fire of English wit, which was before stifled under a constrained, melancholy way of breeding, began first to display its force, by mixing the solidity of our nation with the air and gaity of our neighbors. This being granted to be true, it would be a wonder if the poets, whose work is imitation, should be the only persons in three kingdoms who should not receive the advantage of it; or, if they should not more easily imitate the wit and conversation of the present age than of the past.” i, 176.

In order to appreciate the full significance of this passage one should place in contrast to it the epilog written by Dryden just before his death for a presentation of Beaumont and Fletcher's Pilgrim for his benefit. Attempting to defend the stage against Jeremy Collier's attack Dryden wrote on this occasion:

^{page 56 note 1} i, 116. Of course the important point is, not that Dryden was connected with a court, but that he was connected with a court which was, in large measure, cut off from the national life. Compare his situation, for example, with that of Shakespeare or Racine. The case of the first of these, it is true, differs from that of Dryden in that his effort was partially directed toward entertaining the promiscuous crowd of Londoners who flocked to his theater. But there is abundant evidence to show that he took account of the aristocratic part of his audience, and his ardent royalism crops out in nearly everyone of his plays. In Queen Elizabeth's time, however, the best elements in the nation were rallying about the throne; consequently Shakespeare's devotion to the court and things courtly did not lead him outside the main interests of English national life. Tho the relations of Racine with the court of Louis XIV were very different from those of Shakespeare with the court of Elizabeth, still, thro them, Racine was, like his great English predecessor, kept in vital touch with the life and ideals of his nation. The continuing popularity of his plays proves that they really represent French thought and feeling.

Dryden's position differed from that of Shakespeare and Racine in that for him devotion to the court meant separation from the best traditions and life of his nation. During the time when he was writing his heroic plays the court of Charles II was rapidly alienating, not only the citizen class, but even many among those of noble blood who had at first hailed it with enthusiasm. Its ideals were so largely exotic that plays written to suit its taste could hardly represent the life of England. Hence when one says that the heroic play grew up as a result of the influence of the court of Charles II, his position is not invalidated by the remark that plays of a very different type have been produced under the influence of other courts.

^{page 56 note 1} The passage referred to occurs in the dedication of The Assignation (1673), addressed to Sir Charles Sedley, the most brilliant and dissolute among the wits of the court: “For this reason, I have often laughed at the ignorant and ridiculous descriptions which some pedants have given of the wits, as they are pleased to call them; which are a generation of men unknown to them, as the people of Tartary, or the Terra Australis, are to us. And therefore, as we draw giants and anthropophagi in those vacancies of our maps, where we have not traveled to discover better; so those wretches paint lewdness, atheism, folly, ill-reasoning, and all manner of extravagances amongst us, for want of understanding what we are … I am ridiculously enough, accused of being a contemner of universities; that is, in other words, an enemy of learning; without the foundation of which, I am sure, no man can pretend to be a poet. And if this be not enough, I am made a detractor of my predecessors, whom I confess to have been my masters in the art.” Scott-Saintsbury, iv, 373.

For the real characters of Sedley and his associates see Scott-Saintsbury, iv, 373; and Beljame, Le Public et les Hommes de Lettres, pp. 5, 6.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 14.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 15.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 113.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 120.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 138.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 139.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 147.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, iii, 376.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 148.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 149.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 150.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 159.

^{page 56 note 2} Epilog

To the Second Part of the Conquest of Granada (1672).

Following are the essential parts of this epilog:

^{page 56 note 1} i, 162.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 166.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 172.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 174.

^{page 56 note 3} i, 174.

^{page 56 note 1} “In the age wherein those poets lived, there was less of gallantry than in ours; neither did they keep the best company of theirs. Their fortune has been much like that of Epicurus, in the retirement of his gardens; to live almost unknown, and to be celebrated after their decease. I cannot find that any of them had been conversant in courts, except Ben Jonson; and his genius lay not so much that way, as to make an improvement by it. Greatness was not then so easy of access, nor conversation so free as it now is. I cannot, therefore, conceive it any insolence to affirm, that, by the knowledge and pattern of their wit who writ before us, and by the advantage of our own conversation, the discourse and raillery of our comedies excel what has been written by them. And this will be denied by none, but some few old fellows who value themselves on their acquaintance with the Black Friars; who, because they saw their plays, would pretend to the right to judge ours.” i, 175.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 177.

^{page 56 note 3} Die Kritik in der Englischen Literatur, p. 37.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 177.

^{page 56 note 2} The fact that the Defense of the Epilog was omitted from some copies of the second edition of The Conquest of Granada (1673) and from all later editions seems to indicate that Dryden soon became ashamed of it.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, v, 182.

^{page 56 note 1} In his dedication of Marriage a la Mode (1673) Dryden gave Rochester profuse thanks for favors procured at court. Cf. Scott-Saintsbury, iv, 255.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, v. 196.

^{page 56 note 2} As a proof of Dryden's opposition to the court Christie mentions that in a satire against Shaftesbury published very shortly before the appearance of Absalom and Achitophel “he is made to figure in Shaftesbury's train, as poet laureate to Shaftesbury, imagined to have been elected king of Poland.” The satire referred to is given in a note as “A modest Vindication of the Earl of Shaftesbury, in a Letter to a Friend, concerning his being elected King of Poland.” Poetical Works, xlvi.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, i, 195–6.

^{page 56 note 2} “Men of pleasant conversation (at least esteemed so), and endued with a trifling kind of fancy, perhaps helped out with some smattering of Latin, are ambitious to distinguish themselves from the herd of gentlemen, by their poetry ….

“And is not this a wretched affectation, not to be contented with what fortune has done for them, and sit down quietly with their estates, but they must call their wits in question, and needlessly expose their nakedness to public view? Not considering that they are not to expect the same approbation from sober men, which they found from their flatterers after the third bottle. If a little glittering in discourse has passed them on us for witty men, where was the necessity of undeceiving the world? Would a man who has an ill title to an estate, but yet is in possession of it; would he bring it of his own accord, to be tried at Westminster? We, who write, if we want the talent, yet have the excuse that we do it for a poor subsistence; but what can be urged in their defense, who, not having the vocation of poverty to scribble, out of mere wantonness take pains to make themselves ridiculous? Horace was certainly in the right when he said that no man is satisfied with his own condition. A poet is not pleased, because he is not rich; and the rich are discontented, because the poets will not admit them of their number.” i, 196–7.

^{page 56 note 3} “Some few of our nobility are learned, and therefore I will not conclude an absolute contradiction between the terms of nobleman and scholar; but as the world goes now, ‘tis very hard to predicate one upon the other; and ‘tis yet more difficult to prove, that a nobleman can be a friend to poetry. Were it not for two or three instances in Whitehall and in the town, the poets of this age would find so little encouragement of their labors, and so few understanders, that they might have leisure to turn pamphleteers, and augment the number of those abominable scribblers, who, in this time of license, abuse the press, almost every day, with nonsense, and railing against the government.” Scott-Saintsbury, vi, 8.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 152.

^{page 56 note 2} Scott-Saintsbury, vi, 9.

^{page 56 note 3} P. xi.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 180. In reading this passage one should remember that in 1671, in the preface to An Evening's Love, Dryden wrote: “I think there is no folly so great in any poet of our age, as the superfluity and waste of wit was in some of our predecessors.”

^{page 56 note 2} i, 190.

^{page 56 note 1} i, lviii.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, xv, 385.

^{page 56 note 2} Scott-Saintsbury, xv, 392.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. Saintsbury, Biography of Dryden, p. 101.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 207.

^{page 56 note 1} It must be remembered that at this time, just after the “Popish Plots,” the Protestant party was so strong that Dryden was risking nothing; and, on the other hand, in case of a Protestant triumph his anti-catholic play would have opened up to him a way into the new court.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 247.

^{page 56 note 2} i, 268.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. ante, p. 72.

^{page 56 note 2} Cf. ante, p. 83.

^{page 56 note 3} i, 190.

^{page 56 note 1} i, 270.

^{page 56 note 2} Cf. Preface to Ovid's Epistle, i, 233. Here, speaking of Ovid's descriptions of the passions, Dryden says he needs no other judges of them than the generality of his readers: “for, all passions being inborn with us, we are almost equally judges when we are concerned in the representation of them.” And a little later he criticizes Ovid for leaving “the imitation of nature, and the cooler dictates of his judgment, for the false applause of fancy.”

^{page 56 note 1} Perhaps the reader does not need to be again reminded that I do not pretend to have accounted completely for all the differences between the various periods of Dryden's critical development. The causes for the transition from the third to the fourth period seem to have been especially complex. I have my attention drawn to the fact that during the third period Dryden leaned pretty heavily on Rapin and that, although he was using his contemporary French critic in the support of romanticism, Rapin may have influenced him in the direction of rationalism. Rapin had after all more affinity to Rymer than to Dryden. It is not impossible that our author's very attacks on Rymer may have reacted in favor of Rymer's own doctrines.

^{page 56 note 1} Scott-Saintsbury, viii, 7.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 38.

^{page 56 note 2} ii, 174.

^{page 56 note 3} Scott-Saintsbury, xviii, 191.

^{page 56 note 1} Ibid., 123.

^{page 56 note 2} Ibid., 201.

^{page 56 note 3} Cf. Beljame, pp. 198 ff.

^{page 56 note 4} ii, 2.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 272.

^{page 56 note 2} Scott-Saintsbury, vii, 307.

^{page 56 note 3} Ibid., viii, 221.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. James Wright: Historia Histrionica (1699); An Apology for the life of the Colly Cibber by himself, ed. by Robert W. Lowe, London, 1889, i, 187; Beljame, Le Public et les Hommes de Lettres, 2nd ed., 1897, pp. 198–224, and 244–59.

^{page 56 note 1} It is to be regretted that studies of Dryden's translations do not furnish sufficient material to warrant a generalization as to his tendency as translator. It seems extremely probable that he allowed himself constantly increasing liberties with his originals. Francis H. Pughe, after an examination of a part of the material involved, comes to the following conclusion: “Wir sehen also, kurz gesagt, Dryden am Anfang seiner Uebersetzerthätigkeit von dem Vorsatz ausgehen, wörtliche Uebersetzung, ebenso wie Nachahmung zu vermeiden, um später einen zwischen Paraphrase und Nachahmung schwankenden Weg einzuschlagen.” John Dryden's Uebersetzungen aus Theokrit, Breslau, 1894, p. 5.

^{page 56 note 2} ii, 42.

^{page 56 note 1} “Tis not with an ultimate intention to pay reverence to the Manes of Shakespeare, Fletcher, and Ben Jonson that they commend their writings, but to throw dirt on the writers of this age …. Peace be to the venerable shades of Shakespeare and Ben Jonson! none of the living will presume to have any competition with them; as they were our predecessors, so they were our masters.” ii, 4–5.

^{page 56 note 2} “As little can I grant, that the French dramatic writers excel the English. Our authors as far surpass them in genius, as our soldiers excel theirs in courage. ‘Tis true, in conduct they surpass us either way; yet that proceeds not so much from their greater knowledge, as from the difference in tastes in the two nations. They content themselves with a thin design, without episodes, and managed by few persons. Our audience will not be pleased, but with variety of accidents, an underplot, and many actors. They follow the ancients too servilely in the mechanic rules, and we assume too much licence to ourselves, in keeping them only in view at too great a distance. But if our audience had their tastes, our poets could more easily comply with them, than the French writers could come up to the sublimity of our thoughts, or to the difficult variety of our designs.” ii, 7.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 138.

^{page 56 note 2} ii, 145.

^{page 56 note 3} ii, 152.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 178.

^{page 56 note 1} “Let the French and Italians value themselves on their regularity; strength and elevation are our standard. I said before, and I repeat it, that the affected purity of the French has unsinewed their heroic verse. The language of an epic poem is almost wholly figurative: yet they are so fearful of a metaphor, that no example of Virgil can encourage them to be bold with safety. Sure they might warm themselves by that sprightly blaze, without approaching it so close as to singe their wings; they may come as near it as their master.” ii, 229.

^{page 56 note 2} ii, 253.

^{page 56 note 1} ii, 262.

^{page 56 note 2} ii, 257.

^{page 56 note 3} ii, 264.

^{page 56 note 1} John Stuart Collins, in his extremely valuable work, Dryden's Dramatic Theory and Praxis (Leipzig, 1902), makes an elaborate comparison of Dryden's critical theory as set forth in the prefaces and his practise in the plays. The prefaces, especially the passages dealing with rime, the unities, the decorum of the stage, and the like, he examines in order, and in connection with each tries to make out whether the theory enunciated is developed in the accompanying play or in other plays of the same period. His general conclusion is as follows: “On the whole, I fail to discover any such intimate connection between theory and praxis in Dryden's dramatic authorship as might reasonably be expected. Nowhere does he say: ‘thus and thus shall be written’ and then follow up these exact lines.” After recognizing a distinct connection between Dryden's theory and practise during the heroic period, Mr. Collins proceeds. “A comparison of such statements of individual opinion as are to be found in Dryden's essays, prefaces, and dedications regarding points of dramatic technic, with his practise in dramatic composition, leads to the discovery of the lack of any exact organic connection in every particular between the two: an attempt to show either a complete reconciliation between theory and praxis or a complete divergence of each from the other leads to no precise results.”

The obvious comment on this is that the connection which was sought in certain details of dramatic theory and practise might have been found in the general spirit of the two. Dryden was far too careless a play-wright to work out every detail according to theory: but the essays and plays of any particular period were acted upon by the same general influences, were expressions of the same personality at a particular stage of its development, and one would expect to find in them substantial agreement as to mood and purpose.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. ante, p. 117, note.

^{page 56 note 1} Cf. p. 74, note 2.