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"on any other. As I have endeavoured to ❝ adorn my poem with noble thoughts, fo "much more to express those thoughts with " elocution."

It is written in quatrains, or heroick ftanzas of four lines; a meafure which he had learned from the Gondibert of Davenant, and which he then thought the most majestick that the English language affords. Of this ftanza he mentions the encumbrances, encreased as they were by the exactness which the age required. It was, throughout his life, very much his cuftom to recommend his works, by reprefentation of the difficulties that he had encountered, without appearing to have fufficiently confidered, that where there is no difficulty there is no praise.

There feems to be in the conduct of Sir Robert Howard and Dryden towards each other, fomething that is not now easily to be explained. Dryden, in his dedication to the earl of Orrery, had defended dramatick rhyme; and Howard, in the preface to a collection of plays, had cenfured his opi

nion. Dryden vindicated himself in his Dialogue on Dramatick Poetry; Howard, in his Preface to the Duke of Lerma, animadverted on the Vindication; and Dryden, in a Preface to the Indian Emperor, replied to the Animadverfions with great afperity, and almost with contumely. The dedication to this play is dated the year in which the Annus Mirabilis was published. Here appears a ftrange inconfiftency; but Langbaine affords fome help, by relating that the answer to Howard was not published in the first edition of the play, but was added when it was afterwards reprinted; and as the Duke of Lerma did not appear till 1668, the fame year in which the Dialogue was published, there was time enough for enmity to grow up between authors, who, writing both for the theatre, were naturally rivals.

He was now so much diftinguished, that in 1668 he fucceeded Sir William Davenant as poet-laureat. The falary of the laureat had been raised in favour of Jonfon, by Charles the Firft, from an hundred marks to one hundred pounds a year, and a tierce

of wine; a revenue in those days not inadequate to the conveniencies of life.

The fame year he published his Effay on Dramatick Poetry, an elegant and inftructive dialogue; in which we are told by Prior, that the principal character is meant to represent the duke of Dorfet. This work seems to have given Addison a model for his Dialogues upon Medals.

Secret Love, or the Maiden Queen, is a tragi-comedy. In the preface he difcuffes a curious question, whether a poet can judge well of his own productions: and determines very justly, that, of the plan and difpofition, and all that can be reduced to principles of science, the author may depend upon his own opinion; but that, in those parts where fancy predominates, felf-love may eafily deceive. He might have observed, that what is good only because it pleases, cannot be pronounced good till it has been found to please.

Sir Martin Marall is a comedy, published without preface or dedication, and at first without

without the name of the author. Langbaine charges it, like most of the reft, with plagiarism; and observes that the song is translated from Voiture, allowing however that both the sense and measure are exactly obferved.

The Tempeft is an alteration of Shakspeare's play, made by Dryden in conjunction with Davenant," whom," fays he, "I found of "fo quick a fancy, that nothing was propofed to him in which he could not fuddenly produce a thought extremely "pleasant and furprifing; and those first thoughts of his, contrary to the Latin

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proverb, were not always the leaft happy; "and as his fancy was quick, fo likewise "were the products of it remote and new. "He borrowed not of any other, and his imaginations were fuch as could not easily "enter into any other man.'

"

The effect produced by the conjunction of these two powerful minds was, that to Shakspeare's monster Caliban is added a fifter-monster Sicorax; and a woman, who, in the original play, had never seen a man,

is in this brought acquainted with a man that had never feen a woman.

About this time, in 1673, Dryden seems to have had his quiet much disturbed by the fuccefs of the Empress of Morocco, a tragedy written in rhyme by Elkanah Settle; which was fo much applauded, as to make him think his fupremacy of reputation in some danger. Settle had not only been profperous on the stage, but, in the confidence of fuccefs, had published his play, with fculptures and a preface of defiance. Here was one offence added to another; and, for the laft blaft of inflammation, it was acted at Whitehall by the court-ladies.

Dryden could not now repress these emotions, which he called indignation, and others jealousy; but wrote upon the play and the dedication fuch criticism as malignant impatience could pour out in haste,

"He's

Of Settle he gives this character. "an animal of a moft deplored understanding, without converfation. His being is " in a twilight of sense, and some glimmer

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