THE LIFE OF DRYDEN.

displayed in their contexture. Dryden's are more natural and free, and while they communicat their own sprightly motion to the fpirits of the reader, hurry him along with a gentle and pleasing violence, without giving him time either to animadvert on their faults, or to analyse their beauties. Pope excels in folemnity of found; Dryden in an eafy melody and boundless variety of rhyme. In this last refpect, I think I could prove that he is fuperior to all other English poets, Milton himself not excepted. Till Dryden appeared, none of our writers in rhyme of the last century approached in any measure to the harmony of Spenfer and Fairfax. Of Waller, it can only be faid, that he is not harsh. Of Denham and Cowley, if a few couplets were ftruck out of their works, we could not fay fo much. But, in Dryden's hands, the English rhyming couplet affumed a new form, and feems hardly to be fufceptible of any farther improvement."

His poetical character is given by Dr. Johnson, with a fagacity of discrimination, and a felicity of expreffion, which far tranfcend all praise.

"In a general furvey of Dryden's labours," fays that judicious and claffical critic, " he appears to have a mind very comprehensive by nature, and much enriched with acquired knowledge. His compofitions are the effects of a vigorous genius operating upon large materials.

"The power that predominated in his intellectual operations was rather strong reason than quick fenfibility. Upon all occafions that were presented, he ftudied rather than felt, and produced fentiments not such as nature enforces, but meditation supplies. With the ample and elemental paffions, as they fpring and operate in the mind, he feems not much acquainted, and feldom defcribes them but as they are complicated by the various relations of society, and confused in the tumults and agitations of life.

"He is therefore, with all his variety of excellencé, not often pathetic, and had fo little fenfibility of the power of effufions purely natural, that he did not esteem it in others. Simplicity gave him no pleasure, and, for the first part of his life, he looked on Otway with contempt; though at last," indeed very late, he confeffed that in his play there was Nature, which is the chief beauty.

"The favourite exercise of his mind was ratiocination. Next to argument, his delight was in wild and daring fallies of fentiment, in the irregular and eccentric violence of wit. He delighted to tread upon the brink of meaning, where light and darkness begin to mingle, to approach the precipice of abfurdity, and hover over the abyfs of unideal vacancy.

"He was no lover of labour. What he thought fufficient he did not stop to make better, and allowed himself to leave many parts unfinished, in confidence that the good lines would overbalance the bad. What he had once written, he dismissed from his thoughts, and, I believe, there is no example to be found of any correction or improvement made by him after publication. The hastiness of his productions might be the effect of neceffity; but his fubfequent neglect could hardly have any other cause than impatience of ftudy.

"Some improvements had been already made in English numbers, but the full force of our language was not yet felt: the verfe that was smooth, was commonly feeble. If Cowley had fometimes a finifhed line, he had it by chance. Dryden knew how to choose the flowing and the fonorous words; to vary the paufes, and adjust the accents; to diverfify the cadence, and yet preserve the fmoothnefs of his metre.

"Of Dryden's works it was faid by Pope, that " he could felect from them better specimens of every mode of poetry, than any other English writer could fupply." Perhaps no nation ever produced a writer that enriched his language with fuch variety of models, To him we owe the improvement, perhaps the completion of our metre, the refinement of our language, and much of the correctness of our fentiments. By him we were taught "fapere et fari," to think naturally, and exprefs forcibly. Though Davies has reafoned in rhime before him, it may be perhaps maintained that he was the firft who joined argument with poetry. He fhowed us the true bounds of a tanf lator's liberty. What was faid of Rome, adorned by Auguftus, may be applied by an eafy metaphor to English poetry, embellished by Dryden, "lateritiam invenit, marmoream reliquit." He found it brick, and he left it marble."

ORIGINAL POEM S.

UPON THE DEATH OF LORD HASTINGS.

War, our confumption, was their gainful trade :
We inward bled, whilst they prolong'd our pain;
He fought to end our fighting, and efïay'd

To ftaunch the blood by breathing of the vein.

Swift and refiftlefs through the land he past,

As wands of divination downward draw, [grow.
And point to beds where fovereign gold doth

XX.

When paft all offerings to Feretrian Jove,

He Mars depof'd, and arms to gowns made Successful councils did him foon approve [yield; As fit for close intrigues, as open field.

XXI.

To fuppliant Holland he vouchsaf'd a peace,
Our once bold rival of the British main,
Now tamel glad her unjust claim to ceafe,
And buy our friendship with her idol, gain.

XXII.

Fame of th' afferted fea through Europe blown,
Made France and Spain ambitious of his love;
Each knew that fide muft conquer he would own;
And for him fiercely, as for empire, strove.

XXIII,

No fooner was the Frenchman's caufe embrac'd,
Than the light Monfieur the grave Don out-
weigh'd;

His fortune tu.n'd the fcale where'er 'twas caft;
Though Indian mines were in the other laid.

XXIV.

When abfent, yet we conquer'd in his right:
For though fome meaner artist's kill were
shown

In mingling colours, or in placing light;
Yet ftill the fair defigument was his own.

XXV.

For from all tempers he could fervice draw;
The worth of each, with its alloy, he knew,

Like that bold Greek who did the East subdue, | And, as the confidant of nature, faw
And made to battles fuch heroic haste,

As if on wings of victory he flew

How the complexions did divide and brew.

By his command we boldly crofs'd the line,

And bravely fought where fouthern stars arise; We trac'd the far-fetch'd gold unto the mine, And that which brib'd our fathers made our prize.

A

A POEM ON THE HAPPY RESTORATION AND RETURN OF HIS SACRED MAJESTY