My Lord,
As I was lately reviewing my loose papers, amongst the rest I found this Essay, the writing of which, in this rude and indigested manner wherein your lordship now sees it, served as an amusement to me in the country, when the violence of the last plague[3] had driven me from the town. Seeing then our theatres shut up, I was engaged in these kind of thoughts with the same delight with which men think upon their absent mistresses. I confess I find many things in this Discourse which I do not now approve; my judgment being not a little altered[4] since the writing of it; but whether[5] for the better or the worse, I know not: neither indeed is it much material, in an essay, where all I have said is problematical. For the way of writing plays in verse, which I have seemed to favour, I have, since that time, laid the practice of it aside, till I have more leisure, because I find it troublesome and slow. But I am no way altered from my opinion of it, at least with any reasons which have opposed it. For your lordship may easily observe, that none are very violent against it, but those who either have not attempted it, or who have succeeded ill in their attempt. It is enough for me to have your lordship's example for my excuse in that little which I have done in it; and I am sure my adversaries can bring no such arguments against verse, as those with which the fourth act of Pompey will furnish me[6] in its defence. Yet, my lord, you must suffer me a little to complain of you, that you too soon withdraw from us a contentment, of which we expected the continuance, because you gave it us so early. It is a revolt, without occasion, from your party, where your merits had already raised you to the highest commands, and where you have not the excuse of other men, that you have been ill used, and therefore laid down arms[7]. I know no other quarrel you can have to verse, than that[8] which Spurina n had to his beauty, when he tore and mangled the features of his face, only[9] because they pleased too well the sight[10]. It was an honour which seemed to wait for you, to lead out a new colony of writers from the mother nation: and upon the first spreading of your ensigns, there had been many in a readiness to have followed so fortunate a leader; if not all, yet the better part of poets[11]: n
I am almost of opinion, that we should force you to accept of the command, as sometimes the Praetorian bands have compelled their captains to receive the empire. The court, which is the best and surest judge of writing, has generally allowed n of verse; and in the town it has found favourers of wit and quality. As for your own particular, my lord, you have yet youth and time enough to give part of them[13] to the divertisement of the public, before you enter into the serious and more unpleasant business of the world. That which the French poet said of the temple of Love, may be as well applied to the temple of the Muses. The words, as near as I can remember them, were these:
I leave the words to work their effect upon your lordship in their own language, because no other can so well express the nobleness of the thought; and wish you may be soon called to bear a part in the affairs of the nation, where I know the world expects you, and wonders why you have been so long forgotten; there being no person amongst our young nobility, on whom the eyes of all men are so much bent. But in the mean time, your lordship may imitate the course of Nature, who gives us the flower before the fruit: that I may speak to you in the language of the muses, which I have taken from an excellent poem to the king:
I confess I have no greater reason, in addressing this Essay to your lordship, than that it might awaken in you the desire of writing something, in whatever kind it be, which might be an honour to our age and country. And methinks it might have the same effect on you, which Homer tells us the fight of the Greeks and Trojans before the fleet, had on the spirit of Achilles; who, though he had resolved not to engage[17], yet found a martial warmth to steal upon him at the sight of blows, the sound of trumpets, and the cries of fighting men.
For my own part, if, in treating of this subject, I sometimes dissent from the opinion of better wits, I declare it is not so much to combat their opinions, as to defend my own, which were first made publick. n Sometimes, like a scholar in a fencing-school, I put forth myself, and shew my own ill play, on purpose to be better taught. Sometimes I stand desperately to my arms, like the foot when deserted by their horse; not in hope to overcome, but only to yield on more honourable terms. And yet, my lord, this war of opinions, you well know, has fallen out among the writers of all ages, and sometimes betwixt friends. Only it has been prosecuted by some, like pedants, with violence of words, and managed by others like gentlemen, with candour and civility. Even Tully had a controversy with his dear Atticus; and in one of his Dialogues, makes him sustain the part of an enemy in philosophy, who, in his letters, is his confident of state, and made privy to the most weighty affairs of the Roman senate. And the same respect which was paid by Tully to Atticus, we find returned to him afterwards by Caesar on a like occasion, who answering his book in praise of Cato, made it not so much his business to condemn Cato, as to praise Cicero. n
But that I may decline some part of the encounter with my adversaries, whom I am neither willing to combat, nor well able to resist; I will give your lordship the relation of a dispute betwixt some of our wits on the same subject[18], in which they did not only speak of plays in verse, but mingled, in the freedom of discourse, some things of the ancient, many of the modern, ways of writing; comparing those with these, and the wits of our nation with those of others: it is true[19], they differed in their opinions, as it is probable[20] they would: neither do I take upon me to reconcile, but to relate them; and that as Tacitus professes of himself, sine studio partium, aut irâ[21], without passion or interest; leaving your lordship to decide it in favour of which part you shall judge most reasonable, and withal, to pardon the many errors of
Your Lordship's
Most obedient humble servant,
- ↑ A = edition of 1668.B = edition of 1684 (here, in the main, reprinted).C = edition of 1693.
- ↑ C has, 'Charles Earl of Dorset and Middlesex, Lord Chamberlain of their Majesties Houshold, Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, &c.' Lord Buckhurst had become Earl of Dorset in 1677. It is hard to say why Dryden did not give him his proper title in the edition of 1684.
- ↑ The great plague of 1665 (Malone).
- ↑ a little altered, A.
- ↑ whither, A.
- ↑ as the fourth Act of Pompey will furnish me with, A.
- ↑ Armes, A.
- ↑ then that, A.
- ↑ onely, A.
- ↑ the lookers on, A.
- ↑ Writers, A.
- ↑ expes, A.
- ↑ of it, A.
- ↑ Si ce nest son vray, A.
- ↑ Ce'st un giste, A.
- ↑ designes, A.
- ↑ ingage, A.
- ↑ upon this subject, A.
- ↑ 'tis true, A.
- ↑ 'tis probable, A.
- ↑ Tac. Ann. I. I; sine ira aut studio, quorum causas procul habeo.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.
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