Section VI.-His Prose Style Let us then leave this drama in the obscurity which it deserves, and seek elsewhere, in studied writings, for a happier employment of a fuller talent. Pamphlets and dissertations in verse, letters, satires, translations and imitations; here was the true domain of Dryden and of classical reason; this the field on which logical faculties and the art of writing find their best occupation.1 Before descending into it, and observing their work, it will be as well to study more closely the man who so wielded them. His was a singularly solid and judicious mind, an excellent reasoner, accustomed to mature his ideas, armed with good longmeditated proofs, strong in discussion, asserting principles, establishing his subdivisions, citing authorities, drawing inferences; so that, if we read his prefaces without reading his dramas, we might take him for one of the masters of the dramatic art. He naturally attains a prose style, definite and precise; his ideas are unfolded with breadth and clearness; his style is well moulded, exact and simple, free from the affectations and ornaments with which Pope's was burdened afterwards; his expression is, like that of Corneille, ample and full; the cause of it is simply to be found in the inner arguments which unfold and sustain it. We can see that he thinks, and that on his own behalf; that he combines and verifies his thoughts; that besides all this, he naturally has a just perception, and that with his method he has good sense. He has the tastes and the weaknesses which suit his cast of intellect. He holds in the highest estimation" the admirable Boileau, whose numbers are excellent, whose expressions are noble, whose thoughts are just, whose language is pure, whose satire is pointed, and whose sense is close. What he borrows from the ancients, he repays with usury of his own, in coin as good, and almost as universally valuable." He has the stiffness of the logician poets, too strict and argumentative, blaming Ariosto "who neither designed justly, nor observed any unity of action, or compass of time, or moderation in the vastness of his draught; his style is luxurious, without majesty or decency, and 1 Dryden says, in his "Essay on Satire," xiii. 30, the stage to which my genius never much inclined me.' 2" Essay on Satire," dedicated to the Earl of Dorset, xiii. 16. his adventures without the compass of nature and possibility." He understands delicacy no better than fancy. Speaking of Horace, he finds that "his wit is faint and his salt almost insipid. Juvenal is of a more vigorous and masculine wit; he gives me as much pleasure as I can bear." For the same reason he depreciates the French style: "Their language is not strung with sinews, like our English; it has the nimbleness of a greyhound, but not the bulk and body of a mastiff. ... They have set up purity for the standard of their language; and a masculine vigor is that of ours."5 Two or three such words depict a man; Dryden has just shown, unwittingly, the measure and quality of his mind. This mind, as we may imagine, is heavy, and especially so in flattery. Flattery is the chief art in a monarchical age. Dryden is hardly skilful in it, any more than his contemporaries. Across the Channel, at the same epoch, they praised just as much, but without cringing too low, because praise was decked out; now disguised or relieved by charm of style; now looking as if men took to it as to a fashion. Thus delicately tempered, people are able to digest it. But here, far from the fine aristocratic kitchen, it weighs like an undigested mass upon the stomach. I have related how Lord Clarendon, hearing that his daughter had just married the Duke of York in secret, begged the king to have her instantly beheaded;" how the Commons, composed for the most part of Presbyterians, declared themselves and the English people rebels, worthy of the punishment of death, and moreover cast themselves at the king's feet, with contrite air to beg him to pardon the House and the nation." Dryden is no more delicate than statesmen and legislators. His dedications are as a rule nauseous. He says to the Duchess of Monmouth: "To receive the blessings and prayers of mankind, you need only be seen together. We are ready to conclude, that you are a pair of angels sent below to make virtue amiable in your persons, or to sit to poets when they would pleasantly instruct the age, by drawing goodness in the most perfect and alluring shape of nature. No part of Europe can afford a parallel to your noble Lord in masculine beauty, and in goodliness of shape."8 Elsewhere he says to the Duke of Monmouth: Dedication of the "Eneis," xiv. 204. 7 Ibid. 8 Dedication of "The Indian Emperor, ii. 261. "You have all the advantages of mind and body, and an illustrious birth conspiring to render you an extraordinary person. The Achilles and the Rinaldo are present in you, even above their originals; you only want a Homer or a Tasso to make you equal to them. Youth, beauty, and courage (all which you possess in the height of their perfection) are the most desirable gifts of Heaven."" His Grace did not frown nor hold his nose, and his Grace was right.10 Another author, Mrs. Aphra Behn, burned a still more ill-savored incense under the nose of Nell Gwynne: people's nerves were strong in those days, and they breathed freely where others would be suffocated. The Earl of Dorset having written some little songs and satires, Dryden swears that in his way he equalled Shakespeare, and surpassed all the ancients. And these bare-faced panegyrics go on imperturbably for a score of pages, the author alternately passing in review the various virtues of his great man, always finding that the last is the finest;11 after which he receives by way of recompense a purse of gold. Dryden in taking the money, is not more a flunkey than others. The corporation of Hull, harangued one day by the Duke of Monmouth, made him a present of six broad pieces, which were presented to Monmouth by Marvell, the member for Hull.12 Modern scruples were not yet born. I can believe that Dryden, with all his prostrations, lacked spirit more than honor. A second talent, perhaps the first in carnival time, is the art of saying broad things, and the Restoration was a carnival, about as delicate as a bargee's ball. There are strange songs and rather shameless prologues in Dryden's plays. His "Marriage à la Mode" opens with these verses sung by a married woman: 347. "Why should a foolish marriage vow, Which long ago was made, Oblige us to each other now, When passion is decay'd? We loved, and we loved as long as we could, Dedication of " Tyrannic Love," iii. 10 He also says in the same epistle dedicatory: "All men will join me in the adoration which I pay you.' To the Earl of Rochester he writes in a letter (xviii. 90): "I find it is not for me to contend any way with your Lordship, who can write better on the meanest subject than I can on the best. You are above any incense I can give 12 See Andrew Marvell's Works, i. 210. But our marriage is dead when the pleasure is fled; The reader may read the rest for himself in Dryden's plays; it cannot be quoted. Besides, Dryden does not succeed well; his mind is on too solid a basis; his mood is too serious, even reserved, taciturn. As Sir Walter Scott justly said, "his indelicacy was like the forced impudence of a bashful man."14 He wished to wear the fine exterior of a Sedley or a Rochester, made himself petulant of set purpose, and squatted clumsily in the filth in which others simply sported. Nothing is more sickening than studied lewdness, and Dryden studies everything, even pleasantry and politeness. He wrote to Dennis, who had praised him: "They (the commendations) are no more mine when I receive them than the light of the moon can be allowed to be her own, who shines but by the reflection of her brother." 15 He wrote to his cousin, in a diverting narration, these details of a fat woman, with whom he had travelled: "Her weight made the horses travel very heavily; but, to give them a breathing time, she would often stop us, and tell us we were all flesh and no blood." 16 It seems that these were the sort of jokes which would then amuse a lady. His letters are made up of heavy official civilities, vigorously hewn compliments, mathematical salutes; his badinage is a dissertation, he props up his trifles with periods. I have found in his works some beautiful passages, but never agreeable ones; he cannot even argue with taste. The characters in his " Essay of Dramatic Poesy" think themselves still at college, learnedly quote Paterculus, and in Latin too, opposing the definition of the other side, and observing" that it was only à genere et fine, and so not altogether perfect." 17 In one of his prefaces he says in a professorial tone: "It is charged upon me that I make debauched persons my protagonists, or the chief persons of the drama; and that I make them happy in the conclusion of my play; against the law of comedy, which is to reward virtue, and punish vice."18 Elsewhere he declares: "It is not that I would explode the use of metaphors from passion, for Longinus thinks them necessary to 13" Marriage à la Mode," iv. 245. 14 Scott's Life of Dryden," i. 447., 15 Letter 2, "to Mr. John Dennis," xviii. 114. to Mrs. Steward,” xviii. 16 Letter 29, " 302. 17 Essay of Dramatic Poesy," xv. 18 Preface to "An Evening's Love," iii. 225. raise it." His great "Essay on Satire" swarms with useless or long protracted passages, with the inquiries and comparisons of a commentator. He cannot get rid of the scholar, the logician, the rhetorician, and show the plain downright man. But his true manliness was often apparent; in spite of several falls and many slips, he shows a mind constantly upright, bending rather from conventionality than from nature, possessing enthusiasm and afflatus, occupied with grave thoughts, and subjecting his conduct to his convictions. He was converted loyally and by conviction to the Roman Catholic creed, persevered in it after the fall of James II, lost his post of historiographer and poet-laureate, and though poor, burdened with a family, and infirm, refused to dedicate his “Vergil " to King William. He wrote to his sons: "Dissembling, though lawful in some cases, is not my talent: yet, for your sake, I will struggle with the plain openness of my nature. In the mean time, I flatter not myself with any manner of hopes, but do my duty, and suffer for God's sake. You know the profits (of Vergil') might have been more; but neither my conscience nor my honor would suffer me to take them; but I can never repent of my constancy, since I am thoroughly persuaded of the justice of the cause for which I suffer."19 One of his sons having been expelled from school, he wrote to the master, Dr. Busby, his own former teacher, with extreme gravity and nobleness, asking without humiliation, disagreeing without giving offence, in a sustained and proud style, which is calculated to please, seeking again his favor, if not as a debt to the father, at least as a gift to the son, and concluding, "I have done something, so far to conquer my own spirit as to ask it." He was a good father to his children, as well as liberal, and sometimes even generous, to the tenant of his little estate.20 He says: "More libels have been written against me than almost any man now living. I have seldom answered any scurrilous lampoon, and, being naturally vindictive, have suffered in silence, and possessed my soul in quiet."21 Insulted by Collier as a corrupter of morals, he endured this coarse reproof, and nobly confessed the faults of his youth: "I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he has faxed me justly; and 19 Letter 23, "to his sons at Rome," xviii. 133. 20 Scott's "Life of Dryden," i. 449. 21" Essay on Satire," xiii. 80. |