generally known. Spence, in his remarks on Pope's Odyffey, produces what he thinks an unconquerable quotation from Dryden's preface to the Eneid, in favour of tranflating an epick poem into blank verse; but he forgets that when his author attempted the Iliad, fome years afterwards, he departed from his own decifion, and tranflated into rhyme.

When he has any objection to obviate, or any licence to defend, he is not very fcrupulous about what he afferts, nor very cautious, if the prefent purpose be served, not to entangle himfelf in his own fophiftries. But, when all arts are exhaufted, like other hunted animals, he fometimes ftands at bay; when he cannot difown the grofsnefs of one of his plays, he declares that he knows not any law that prescribes morality to a comick poct.

His remarks on ancient or modern writers are not always to be trufted. His parallel of the verfification of Ovid with that of Claudian has been very justly cenfured by Sewel*. His comparison of the first line of Virgil with the firft of Statius is not happier. Virgil, he fays, is foft and gentle, and would have thought Statius mad, if he had heard him thundering out

Quæ fuperimpofito moles geminata coloffo.

Statius perhaps heats himself, as he proceeds, to exaggeration fomewhat hyperbolical; but undoubtedly Virgil would have been too hafty, if he had condemned him to ftraw for one founding line.

Preface to Ovid's Metamorphofes. Dr. J.

Dryden

Dryden wanted an inftance, and the firft that occurred was impreft into the fervice.

What he wishes to fay, he fays at hazard; he cited Gorbuduc, which he had never feen; gives a falfe account of Chapman's verfification; and difcovers, in the preface to his Fables, that he tranflated the first book of the Iliad without knowing what was in the fecond. reacting

It will be difficult to prove that Dryden ever made any great advances in literature. As having diftinguished himself at Westminster under the tuition of Bufby, who advanced his fcholars to a height of knowledge very rarely attained in grammarfchools, he refided afterwards at Cambridge; it is not to be fuppofed, that his fkill in the ancient languages was deficient, compared with that of common students; but his fcholaftic acquifitions feem not proportionate to his opportunities and abilities. He could not, like Milton or Cowley, have made his name illuftrious merely by his learning. He mentions but few books, and thofe fuch as lie in the beaten track of regular ftudy; from which if ever he departs, he is in danger of losing himself in unknown regions.

In his Dialogue on the Drama, he pronounces with great confidence that the Latin tragedy of Medea is not Ovid's, becaufe it is not fufficiently interefting and pathetick. He might have determined the question upon furer evidence; for it is quoted by Quintilian as the work of Seneca; and the only line which remains in Ovid's play, for one line is left us, is not there to be found. There was there

gravity of

fore no need of the

CC 4

conjecture, or the

difcuffion

difcuffion of plot or fentiment, to find what was already known upon higher authority than fuch difcuffions can ever reach.

His literature, though not always free from oftentation, will be commonly found either obvious, and made his own by the art of dreffing it; or fuperficial, which, by what he gives, fhews what he wanted; or erroneous, haftily collected, and negli gently fcattered.

Yet it cannot be faid that his genius is ever unprovided of matter, or that his fancy languishes in penury of ideas. His works abound with knowledge, and fparkle with illuftrations. There is fcarcely any fcience or faculty that does not fupply him with occafional images and lucky fimilitudes; every page difcovers a mind very widely acquainted both with art and nature, and in full poffeffion of great ftores of intellectual wealth. Of him that knows much it is natural to fuppofe that he has read with diligence: yet I rather believe that the knowledge of Dryden was gleaned from accidental intelligence and various converfation, by a quick apprehenfion, a judicious felection, and a happy memory, a keen appetite of knowledge, and a powerful digeftion; by vigilance that permitted nothing to pafs without notice, and a habit of reflection. that suffered nothing useful to be loft. A mind like Dryden's, always curious, always active, to which every understanding was proud to be affociated, and of which every one folicited the regard, by an ambitious difplay of himself, had a more pleafant, perhaps a nearer way to knowledge than by the filent progrefs of folitary reading. I do not suppose that

ha

he despised books, or intentionally neglected them; but that he was carried out, by the impetuofity of his genius, to more vivid and speedy instructors; and that his ftudies were rather defultory and fortuitous than constant and systematical.

It must be confeffed that he scarcely ever appears to want book-learning but when he mentions books; and to him may be transferred the praise which he gives his mafter Charles;

His converfation, wit, and parts,

His knowledge in the noblest useful arts,
Were fuch, dead authors could not give,
But habitudes of thofe that live:

Who, lighting him, did greater lights receive;
He drain'd from all, and all they knew,
His apprehenfions quick, his judgement true;
That the most learn'd with fhame confefs,
His knowledge more, his reading only lefs.

Of all this, however, if the proof be demanded, I will not undertake to give it; the atoms of probability, of which my opinion has been formed, lie scattered over all his works; and by him who thinks the queftion worth his notice, his works muft be perufed with very clofe attention.

Criticism, either didactick or defensive, occupies almoft all his profe, except thofe pages which he has devoted to his patrons; but none of his prefaces were ever thought tedious. They have not the formality of a fettled ftyle, in which the first half of the fentence betrays the other. The caufes are never balanced, nor the periods modelled: every word feems to drop by chance, though it falls into its

proper

proper place. Nothing is cold or languid: the whole is airy, animated, and vigorous; what is little, is gay; what is what is great, is fplendid. He may be thought to mention himself too frequently; but, while he forces himself upon our efteem, we cannot refufe him to ftand high in his own. Every thing is excufed by the play of images, and the fprightlinefs of expreffion. Though all is cafy, nothing is feeble; though all feems carelefs, there is nothing barfh; and though, fince his earlier works more than a century has paffed, they have nothing yet uncouth or obsolete.

He who writes much will not eafily escape a manner, fuch a recurrence of particular modes as may be eafily noted. Dryden is always another and the fame; he does not exhibit a fecond time the fame elegances in the fame form, nor appears to have any art other than that of expreffing with clearness what he thinks with vigour. His ftyle could not easily be imita ed, either ferioufly or ludicrously; for, being always equable and always varied, it has no prominent or difcriminative characters. The beauty who is totally free from difproportion of parts and features cannot be ridiculed by an overcharged refemblance.

From his profe, however, Dryden derives only his accidental and fecondary praife; the veneration with which his name is pronounced by every cultivator of English literature, is paid to him as he refined the language, improved the fentiments, and tuned the numbers, of English Poetry.

After about half a century of forced thoughts, and rugged metre, fome advances towards nature

and