With such assurance as they meant to say, Who, when they might prevent, would wait the blow; We will o'ercome, but scorn the safest way. I had the Grecian poet's happiness, 35 40 45 50 TO MR. LEE, ON HIS ALEXANDER.* THE blast of common censure could I fear, This complimentary poem was prefixed to Nathaniel Lee's tragedy "The Rival Queens, or the Death of Alexander the Great," published in 1677. It has been printed by Broughton, Derrick, and other editors with several small inaccuracies, which are here corrected from the first publication Lee had a few years before addressed a complimentary poem to Dryden, which was prefixed to "The State of Innocence:" this is referred to in the opening lines of this poem. In 1679, Dryden and Lee jointly produced "Edipus," and in 1683 "The Duke of Guise." In Beaumont and Fletcher's "King and No King," Bessus and the two swordsmen certify to each other's courage, after having been all thrashed and kicked by Bacurius (act 4, scene 3). And yet my silence had not scaped their spite; Or dares the most makes all the rest his foes. 15 20 25 Who took the Dutchman and who cut the boom. + 30 35 40 Prizes would be for lags of slowest pace, With too much fire, who are themselves all phlegm : Were cripples made the judges of the race. The too much vigour of your youthful Muse. Despise those drones, who praise while they accuse 45 Is in your power; you need but stoop and take. Hard features every bungler can command; 50 Opprest, the reading of the first edition; in the second edition of 1694, exprest appears, but it is probably a misprint, for it is not consistent with the context. Scott has printed supprest. + Scott explains this as referring to an exploit of Sir Edward Spragge in 1671 on the Mediterranean against the Algerines: but that cannot be, as Dryden says, "took the Dutchman." Mr. Holt White, in his MS. notes, suggests that the reference may be to the attack on the Dutch in the harbour of Berghen in 1665; there one of the captains who, under Teddiman's orders, passed the boom, might have earned this glory; but there is no record of it. As this was written in 1677, it is perhaps more likely that the reference is to some exploit in Charles II.'s second Dutch war. TO THE EARL OF ROSCOMON, ON HIS EXCELLENT ESSAY ON TRANSLATED VERSE.* WHETHER the fruitful Nile or Tyrian shore Those rude at first; a kind of hobbling prose, Of Vandal, Goth, and monkish ignorance, In Charles his reign, and by Roscomon's pen. For all the needful rules are scattered here; So well is art disguised for nature to appear. 5 10 15 20 25 30 The Earl of Roscomon's "Essay on Translated Verse" was published in 1684, with this complimentary Address by Dryden prefixed. A second edition, corrected and enlarged, appeared in 1685. Roscomon returned Dryden's favour with a complimentary poem on his "Religio Laici," which Dryden prefixed to that publication. Roscomon, born in 1633, died in January 1685. He and Dryden had at one time joined in projecting a scheme of refining and fixing the English language. Pope, who elsewhere is not sparing of praise for Dryden, has in a well-known couplet justly blamed the coarseness of his verse by comparison with Roscomon: "Unhappy Dryden! in all Charles's days Translations of Horace, 2 Epist. i. 213. ↑ Andrew Marvel uses the expression "tinkling rhyme" in his lines to Milton on his " Paradise Lost:" "Well mightst thou scorn thy readers to allure 'Tis well for us his generous blood did flow, The more instructed we, the more we still are shamed. 45 That here his conquering ancestors were nurst, Else must the two contending nations fight 50 55 60 When these translate, and teach translators too, In the first edition this line was printed "That here his conquering ancestors was nurst." Dryden, in a letter to Jacob Tonson, complains of the was as a printer's error. The same letter gives information as to the success of Lord Roscomon's poem: "I am of your opinion," says Dryden; "you should reprint it, and that you may safely venture on a thousand more." 1" The Earl of Mulgrave.” He had joined Dryden in a translation of Ovid's Epistle of Helen to Paris, which had been published in 1680. §" Infused Titan," Prometheus, son of Iapetus, one of the Titans. It was an ancient fable that Prometheus made the first man and woman with clay, animating them with fire stolen from heaven. Dryden here copies an application of that fable from Juvenal: "Forsitan hæc spernant juvenes, quibus arte benigna On equal terms with ancient wit engage, Nor mighty Homer fear, nor sacred Virgil's page; TO MY FRIEND MR. NORTHLEIGH, AUTHOR OF THE PARALLEL, 75 ON HIS TRIUMPH OF THE BRITISH MONARCHY.* So Joseph, yet a youth, expounded well 5 ΙΟ TO MY INGENIOUS FRIEND, HENRY HIGDEN, ESQ.‡ ON HIS TRANSLATION OF THE TENTH SATIRE OF JUVENAL. THE Grecian wits, who Satire first began, at least, 5 John Northleigh, a student of law, who afterwards became a physician, published in 1685 the political work to which this complimentary poem of Dryden was prefixed. It was entitled The Triumph of our Monarchy over the Plots and Principles of our Rebels and Republicans, being Remarks on their most eminent Libels, by John Northleigh, LL.B. author of the Parallel. 8vo. 1685. Northleigh was twenty-eight when he published this work. He had published in 1682"The Parallel, or the new specious Association, an old rebellious Covenant, closing with a disparity between a true Patriot and a factious Associator." Dryden's allusions to his youth may have been excited by his earlier publication. This illustration is used by Dryden in "Annus Mirabilis," stanza 43. 1 Mr. Higden was a lawyer, a member of the Middle Temple His Translation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal was published in 1637, having been licensed June 2, 1686; so this poem of Dryden was probably written in 1686. Derrick and Scott, neither of whom had seen Mr. Higden's work, have wrongly conjectured a later date for the poem. Pasquins; jesters. Laughed was improperly changed by Derrick into lashed, which appears in all following editions. |